Chapter Text
There was a new professor at the Soltryce Academy. That’s what all the gossip said, anwyas. It would be something interesting to talk about in general, but it was especially applicable since Maleana was a transmutation student, and he was apparently, a transmutation teacher.
“Know anything else about him?” Maleana asked as she stretched out on the sunny courtyard stones.
“Nope. Guess you’ll have to report back to us, Maleana.” Garret shrugged.
“Lucky. Tell us he’s any good. Or if he’s weird like Professor Ianforth. Or if he’s hot.” Ariana sighed. “At least you have something interesting, I still have fucking Ianforth.”
Maleana laughed. “I’ll let you know, I guess. Though you’re gonna have to judge the hot part for yourself, I’m not doing that.”
“Boooo.” Ariana rolled her eyes. “Good luck, anwyas.”
So, that’s why two days later, Maleana came bright and early to her first class with the new Professor, prepped and ready to analyze his every movement and catalogue it for her friend’s consideration later. There were a few other students already waiting excitedly outside his door, probably also there to inflict their studently judgment. So far though, the door was shut.
“I wonder if he’s late?” One of the students, Julian or Julia or something muttered.
“No, we’re just early dipshit.” A different person, maybe… Till? responded, rolling his eyes. Julisomething shrugged.
“Teachers are supposed to be early.” Julisomething snapped back. Till just rolled his eyes.
At precisely ten minutes before class, the door swung open with a faint creak. “Ja, come in.” Called a zemnian voice from inside. Maleana hurried in with the other handful of students.
The inside of the classroom was warm, with several balls of floating lights dancing around it giving the entire space a bright, inviting hue. It was on the smaller end for a classroom, the desks shoved haphazardly together, leaving the front of the classroom open, filled with a desk to one side, a lectern, and a big blackboard.
Sitting at the desk was a man with long, bright red hair dressed in a big, sweeping coat. He was bent over the desk writing in a notebook, and next to the notebook in the little space that wasn’t covered with knickknacks sat a purring orange cat. Maleana grinned. He was already her favorite teacher, her being partial to cats.
“Welcomes students, we have ten, almost nine minutes till class begins, so… talk amongst yourselves.” He didn’t look up from his writing, but smiled all the same. It was a warm smile.
Maleana did not talk with the classmates already there, she didn’t really know or like any of them. Instead, she took a moment to catalogue all the items she could see on his desk. A seashell, a little cat statue, a pearl in a little glass container, several buttons, a stack of papers, a few pressed flowers, a chunk of rock, a little box, extra pencils, and a metallic something she couldn’t place. Interesting. Teachers with a lot of stuff on their desk generally proved to be better than the ones who kept their desks perfectly clean, but it wasn’t always an accurate measure.
More students began to file in, and New Professor nodded at each one in turn, but never looked up from his writing. He didn’t seem to mind the students chattering, as he wrote without interruption and smiled faintly as he did. At precisely 9:00, he snapped the book shut, closed the door with a mage hand, and walked up to the lectern right in front of the blackboard.
“Right. Hallo stu-“ he frowned, noticing he had very few students attention, as the rest were still talking and in no hurry to start class. He frowned, not in annoyance, but like he was considering something. Eventually he nodded, and flicked a hand. The windows slammed open with a bang, letting in the whistling wind howling outside. The entire class jumped in surprise, and Professor Widogast chuckled, then closed the windows with another bang. He now had every students attention, including Maleana, though he’d already had it before.
“Thaumaturgy to open all the windows. Works like a charm in every inn. But that’s besides the. Hallo class, I am Professor Widogast, and welcome to your second year Transmutation class.” He smiled warmly, eyes crinkling with humor.
“So. Today, let us start with a quiz. Answer anything you can, I’ll stop us at 9:30.”
The class groaned and yelled as Professor Widogast passed out the papers, and Maleana decided she might rescind her favoritism towards him, even if he had a cat. But at least she was good at transmutation, so it wouldn’t be hard.
The room went quiet as the quiz began. It was pretty simple, drawing easy glyphs and answering questions on basic transmutative theory and the like. There were a few harder questions, but those weren’t out of the ordinary, so it wasn’t until the last page that Maleana got interested. The last page was comprised of two questions. One on the ethics of magical study, and the other, one phrase. “Why did you do this quiz?”
Maleana stared. It was a stupid question. Why did they do this quiz? Because he’d asked them too. It was clearly a trick question, but what was the trick? Maleana sighed, and decided not to answer.
Exactly 30 minutes after the quiz started (to a t, this man must have the most sensational internal clock), Professor Widogast clapped his hands together. “Alright. Thank you for doing that for me, please pass the papers up here. Now, I assume you all saw the last question?”
Everyone nodded and murmured their assent, though Maleana guessed several of them hadn’t actually gotten there, or just didn’t bother. Professor Widogast smiled.
“What is the answer to that question?”
Everyone was quiet. Several glances were exchanged, faces scrunched into a confused frown. Eventually Maleana raised a tentative hand.
“Yes?” Professor Widogast pointed to her.
“Because… you told us to?” Maleana said like it was the most obvious thing. It was, really.
“Right. And why did you do it because I told you to? I gave you no reason, and we haven’t done enough yet in class for a quiz to be necessary.” He smiled like she’d given the correct answer, or maybe the stepping stone to the correct one.
“Because you’re the teacher?”
“Right. And you do what the teacher says. But why?”
No one answered. Professor Widogast didn’t seem to mind, instead he began pacing behind the lectern and gesticulating, his voice intense.
“Here is my first, and my most important lesson to you. Think critically. Always ask, “why am I told to do this?” People in power often give you orders, and sometimes they are good. Sometimes the people know what they are doing and are really trying to do the best for their people and their home. But sometimes they are not. Sometimes, they are just there for power. And so you must always ask, “is this really the best for me? For my home? Or am I falling into the trap of only ever doing what I am told and not thinking.
“I want you to question why I give you the assignments I do. To think. I gave you that quiz to see how much of your first year Transmutation you knew, it will not be graded, don’t worry. But you did not know that. You should know that. You should know why everything you are being taught is being taught to you, and you should think if that reason is a good one. Critical thinking, always critical thinking.”
Maleana was silent, and so was the class. This was not at at all what she’d expected, for any teacher let alone him. It was so… alien, and borderline treasonous if interpreted certain ways. Finally, one of the other students, Ivan maybe, raised a hand.
“Yes?” Professor Widogast asked, pointing at him.
“Why did you in ask the question about wizard ethics?” He asked tentatively. Professor Widogast practically glowed as he smiled.
“Very good, this is what I’m talking about! I included that question because very often becoming a powerful wizard goes hand and hand with hubris, with self centered ideas of power, and that can lead to grave consequences for the wizard in question and others. So you must always keep in mind the ethics of what you are doing, the morality, so you do not fall prey to that folly.” He said grimly.
“Have you seen that happen?” Maleana braved.
“Ja, many times. It never ends well.” And now the Professor looked truly sad, face suddenly looking ten years older and lifetimes more weary than it had moments ago. She wondered what he’d seen, to get that way. What wizard failures he’d witnessed.
“How long have you been a wizard?” One student asked, Maleana did not know who.
“A long time, since I was very young.”
“What’s your cat's name?” A different student asked.
“That’s Lina, she’s a very good cat.”
“Did you go here?” Julisomething or other asked.
Professor Widogast was about to say something when his face suddenly snapped around towards the door. Standing there silently, his approach unnoticed by anyone else, stood the Martinet Ludinus Da’leth himself. Maleana found herself repressing a gasp and trying not to sink back in her seat. An archmage, head of the Cerberus Assembly, the Martinet here. In their class. She felt the contents of her stomach had been polymorphed into butterflies.
Professor Widogast frowned, turning towards him stiffly shoulder high and face suddenly a smooth mask. “Hallo Martinet, what can I do for you?”
“Ah, professor. No need to stop on my account, I’m just here to… observe your first day of lessons.” He smiled. Bullshit. Maleana didn’t know a huge amount about the doings of Archmages, let alone the Maritnet, but they certainly didn’t observe rookie teachers first classes. There was something else going on here. She knew it. Maybe the other students knew it. Professor Widogast most definitely knew it.
“Well, I hope it proves enjoyable to you. We were just talking about the ethics of wizardry and how easy it is to fall into bad habits.” He looked The Martinet in the eye pointedly as he said this, but his face was now smiling lightly.
“Of course, it’s important to instill good values young.” He smiled back, making the same heavy eye contact.
“Yes, yes it is.” Professor Widogast turned back to the class. “Now, I’d like to start examining the theory behind the Transmuter’s stone. You all are nowhere near ready for your own yet, but it is a keystone, hah, of this school of wizardry and it’s important to understand it early.” He began scrawling on the blackboard as he talked.
The rest of the class passed… normally, but tensely. Professor Widogast was a good teacher, clearly very smart, but the Maritnet watched the whole time, and that combined with the odd start of the class was… disarming.
After class was dismissed (with no homework as an apology for the quiz), the Maritnet stayed in the classroom as the student filed out. Maleana wanted to stay behind and see what happened, it was obviously going to be juicy and she could already hear the gossip from her other classmates starting even as they were a mere foot out the door, but the look on Professor Widogast’s face was a little too intense to make finding some excuse to stay worth it.
So, Maleana gave Lina a scritch and exited the door, her minds spinning with what the fuck was up with Professor Widogast.
When she got to lunch Ariana and Garret pounced on her as soon as she sat down.
“What was he like?” Ariana asked, shoveling sliced carrots into her mouth as she did.
“Fucking weird. The Martinet showed up, he lectured about ethics and questioning everything, and he has a cat. Really, all I know is it’s going to be one hell of an interesting class.”
And she was right.