Today's prompt, "Dream", gave me some trouble. I decided to cheat a little, by writing about an AU that originated in a dream that @creatorofuniverses had, none other than the Doppelganger AU. This AU is characterized by there being two very different versions of Colfax, one a wizard and one a thief. They get along about as well as you'd expect a strong personality like Colfax to get along with himself.
~~~
Coco blinked rapidly, wavered on his feet. “Was that a dizzy spell, wizard? Really?!” he griped, putting his hands over his eyes as he tried to regain his sense of equilibrium. He knew the wizard had a number of tricks up his sleeves, but it was odd to have magic, real magic, actually turned on him. Sure, he’d been pushing the guy’s buttons since arriving in this strange world, but he didn’t know what he’d expected when Colfax finally snapped and aimed a spell his way.
Colfax’s words echoed in his head in that eerie mimic of Coco’s own voice, words the wizard had invented himself for his spellcasting. A faint fog around him dissipated as the spell finished its course. Wisps sank into the well worn stones of the floor.
Stones that, Coco realized, were a lot wider than he remembered. In fact, there was suddenly a lot more space around him than he remembered there being in the wizard’s tower room. The nearest shelf, before only a foot or two away, was several paces from him. He tilted his head back, taking in the suddenly castle-like height of a simple bookshelf.
Whirling, he found other vaguely familiar furniture standing so much bigger than he remembered. He hadn’t been in this renaissance faire world all that long, but he had spent plenty of time all over the castle. He knew what the place looked like. The workbench, the charts on the wall, the window, they weren’t supposed to loom so high overhead. He was like a toy discarded on the floor.
Coco’s heart jumped to his throat. This wasn’t right. It couldn’t be right. The world had warped beyond recognition in the most frightening way. He turned his head this way and that, taking in details he never thought he’d see. As recognition crept up on him, he began to think he might have underestimated this crazy world.
“No way …”
“Don’t act so surprised,” a voice, familiar but not, rumbled overhead like a mild storm. “You were repeatedly warned that you’d face consequences if you kept trying to steal from me.”
Coco turned to the source of that voice, tilting his head back to meet the eyes of a man who stood as a giant over him. The face was normally a mirror of his own, a bizarre double that had grown up in fantasy land instead of the world Coco knew. He was the reason Coco needed to go by a nickname around here‒all to keep anyone from confusing him for the socially-inept wizard that spent so much time playing around with magic.
It was hard not to tease a guy like that, a version of himself that had never bothered to learn how to read people. Had never learned how to hold a basic conversation. He had never needed to blend in, to steal and lie just to keep his family fed. Really, Coco nicking a few golden coins here, some odd little magical implements there, were just practice. Teasing. A fun way to pass the time while stuck with an insufferable mirror of himself.
Now, though, he had a couple regrets. He held up his hands as if calming an agitated horse. “Come now, Colfax. Fella. Isn’t this a little drastic?”
Colfax narrowed his eyes. It was a chilling expression, full of all the intensity Coco might expect out of a Colfax, especially one who never bothered learning to tone it down. His heart fluttered in spite of himself.
The tower that was Colfax-the-wizard shifted, took a step forward. Coco’s gaze dropped to the footstep that covered all too much ground towards him. Seeing a giant coming his way cut right through his thoughts, sent an instinct for survival jolting through him more powerfully than any police chase.
He pivoted on one foot, already aiming himself for the door. It stood impossibly tall, too many paces away, but there was more than enough space beneath it to escape if Coco could just make it that far.
After that … no ideas leapt to mind just yet, but for now the important part was to get away from himself.
Behind him, the giant wizard started muttering something else in those made up words of his. Coco’s heart did a flip and the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. Something was coming, and he had no intent of waiting around for it. On some kind of instinct, he juked to the side and did a quick somersault, changing his trajectory for springing back to his feet. To his side, he saw something bright and quick dive into the floor where he’d been an instant before.
Wizard-Colfax wasn’t discouraged. He took a few more steps. Coco felt them, each and every one, through the floor. They rumbled beneath his frantic steps, so casual compared to him running for his life.
“C-Colfax! Can’t we talk about this?!” Coco called, still making his bid for the door. It was his only chance if the wizard had moved on to slinging spells around.
“Tried talking,” Colfax replied, his voice cold. “You refused to listen.”
He wasn’t precisely wrong. Coco swore and shook his head as he ran. He wasn’t about to convince the guy of anything now. He had happily bothered him, tried to find ways to get under his skin. And it had finally worked.
More spell words echoed overhead. Coco’s chest tightened and he prepared to make another dive out of the way. Just as he did, though, a thick fog washed over the floor, overtaking him with more speed than any vapor should be able to. He stumbled. The room around him was lost to his sight and he grabbed the cowl that hung loose around his neck, frantic hands holding it over his face just in case the gas was dangerous.
A scoff rang out overhead. “Don’t be so dramatic. I’m not poisoning you.” Colfax’s voice no longer came from behind him. It came from somewhere to the side. Coco glanced uselessly in that direction before turning the other way to get some distance.
Not three paces later, he tripped on something that appeared as if from nowhere in the fog. With a yelp, Coco toppled forward, hands shooting out to catch himself. Rather than stone, however, they met a pliant surface, something almost leathery. It radiated heat, and while the fog retreated as fast as it had rolled in, he came to the horrifying realization of what it was.
A hand. A hand so similar and so different from his own. Coco stared in shock at a lifeline longer than his torso, felt a heavy pulse beneath his own hands.
The vertigo of falling onto a giant hand was soon replaced by real vertigo as that hand shot into the air. Coco tried to flinch back into motion, only for the fingers and thumb of that hand to spring closed on him as if released from a trap. He was pinned all too securely in a fist as the floor dropped away.
Colfax-the-wizard stood from his kneel, dark eyes fixed dispassionately on Coco. Coco could only twist enough to catch that look in the corner of his eyes, and his body shuddered as the helplessness really sank in under his skin. “You got me,” he said, his voice a lot weaker than he hoped for. “I know when I’m beat. I’ll take the bounce, if you just put me right I’ll leave you to it‒”
“And let you go terrorize the rest of the castle?” Colfax cut him off. He turned and the dizzying speed of his pivot cut off any protests. “No, you need some time to yourself.”
He approached his workbench, scattered with all kinds of magic implements, crystals and tools and herbs and the like. Coco imagined being pinned like a bug on a board and squirmed while his stomach did flips. “What are you plannin’, mind if I ask?”
“I don’t mind,” Colfax dismissed, stopping before the workbench. For a long couple seconds, he scanned his various supplies before grabbing a jar from the back of the bench. A few fragments of leaves remained at the bottom, and when he maneuvered the large cork out of the top a faint but bitter smell almost immediately filtered out.
Coco thrashed, but couldn’t do a thing about Colfax holding that open jar underneath where he was suspended in his grip. Before dropping him in, though, Colfax nodded at him. “This will keep you out of trouble. Be grateful it isn’t the dungeons.”
“Grateful?!” Coco sputtered. “C’mon, Colfax, don’t‒” his voice gave way for a yelp as the grip around him released and he felt, for a small instant, the terror of freefall. Even knowing the jar was there to catch him, he couldn’t help but twist in fear, reaching to catch something, anything. And then he landed in a heap on a glass floor, the real floor looming so far below him.
When he looked up, Colfax was already fixing the large cork in place. More of those spell words got past the cork and some kind of magic seeped into the jar, and then no sound reached him at all.
July is here already, and with it the GT July Prompt Challenge! Day one is "Enchanted", and I had a hard time deciding what to do with this one. I landed on the tiniest court wizard Adrian has ever had in his employ, Colfax! From there, the story really came together.
Takes place sometime after the Trust AU "A Little Bit of Magic", cowritten with @creatorofuniverses!
~~~
“Wizard! You’ve been summoned to the council room.”
Colfax didn’t turn right away. He had his focus on the blackboard, where he had a complex spell circle taking form and several scribbled notes around it. His criss-crossed rope bridges swayed a bit from the back and forth pacing he’d been doing, and he probably had smudges of chalk on his face from absently tapping his chin.
He was close to figuring it out. He’d been studying these runes and their possible applications for a few days now. If he could get things tuned properly, he’d have a brand new spell.
“Wizard!” The gruff voice was louder this time. This time, he turned to face the door of his lab just to be safe.
Most of the people who lived in the royal castle knew not to enter the court wizard’s lab without invitation. For one thing, they ran the risk of getting caught in some spellwork while he experimented. For another, there wasn’t a lot of room for the standard human-sized person to move around in the lab.
At around six inches tall, Colfax required some extra walkways and bridges to access the different sections of the lab. The chalkboards alone sported a grid of walkways and ladders so he could make use of their full spans. Bridges and stairs extended between the large middle table and the shelves and counters along the wall, spaced out well but definitely creating a web for the bigger folk to navigate.
That was fine. They didn’t need to be able to get around the lab as much as he did.
The man in the doorway was some council representative or something. Colfax would probably remember his name and title if he tried, but the man had broken his concentration and refused to use his name. So he’d meet that energy in kind.
“Yes?” Colfax asked, already making his way to one of the bridges that’d take him to the central lab table. “What am I summoned for?”
The man huffed. “You are summoned by the Prince and his council. What does it matter what for?”
Colfax paused on the bridge to fix the man with a scathing look. As if he was just some performer that could be called upon at any time and not someone with his own job to do in the castle. The man frowned back, but eventually relented. “An artifact has been discovered by one of the royal research teams. They want to know if it’s enchanted.”
Colfax continued down his bridge. At least that sounded like an interesting interruption. “Acceptable. You can expect me in the council chambers shortly.”
He stepped onto the broad lab table, covered in a maze of potion implements, open books, and more walkways for Colfax’s use. Most of the things he’d realistically need for a task like this would be tucked away in the bag he carried at his side, but it wouldn’t hurt to grab a few extra items.
Not that he had a chance to go get any of them.
A shadow fell over the table, and Colfax could only whirl around before a gloved hand descended on him, long fingers wrapping inexorably around him and forcing him against a palm. He grimaced as the man hoisted him off the table far too quickly and then turned to exit the lab with him in tow.
“This is an urgent matter,” the man explained as he walked, carrying Colfax in front of his chest in an uncomfortably-tight grasp. “I will bring you to the council chambers.”
Colfax narrowed his eyes and squirmed a bit, at least enough to free one of his arms and settle it on the man’s knuckles. “You do not have the right to carry me like this,” he warned, keeping his voice remarkably calm considering the seething annoyance that built in him with every step the man took. “I have my own ways of navigating this castle. Put me down.”
He was used to this. All too used to people disregarding his ability to do things on his own. It hadn’t happened in a while, since getting himself really established as the court wizard. The prince had made it clear that people were to respect Colfax’s autonomy. If it meant waiting a little more time for him to respond to a summons, so be it.
This council representative, or attendant, or whatever the hell his actual title was, hadn’t gotten that memo. “This will be much faster. This could be an urgent discovery.”
“Could be?” Colfax echoed. “So you’re manhandling me and you’re not even sure it’s worth it.”
The man had the gall to roll his eyes. At least, by the directions he took through the halls, he was telling the truth about where he was bringing him. Colfax settled in to wait for them to arrive at the council chambers.
He’d been to the room where the royals held council with their various lords and representatives and such many times. He’d had to give and hear dull reports once or twice as part of his office as Court Wizard. It wasn’t as ostentatious as it could be, at least. The tall ceilings and large round table gave a certain official feeling to the place. The high backed chairs all seating very important people added to that.
The conversation in the room faltered as Colfax’s would-be escort stepped forward and deposited unceremoniously in the middle of the table, near a sealed wooden box. He stumbled, barely managing to catch himself as all eyes fell to him.
Adrian, seated in the seat with the highest back and with more papers and folders in front of him than anyone else, looked appalled on top of the shock everyone else wore. “What‒”
“I’m told I was summoned, Your Highness,” Colfax interrupted, not offering a bow. After a moment fishing in his bag, he retrieved his wizard’s staff. “To verify any enchantments on an artifact. It could even be urgent. Hence why I was brought straight here.” He knocked the end of his staff on the wooden box and got a resounding thunk in return.
Adrian’s cheeks turned a bit pink and he took a slow breath before turning his attention to the man who’d brought Colfax to the council room. “My apologies, Wizard Colfax. This summons was not meant to be handled in this way.”
Colfax glanced over his shoulder and was pleased to find the man who’d brought him looking rather sheepish. “Understood, O Prince,” Colfax replied, ignoring the few offended looks he got from the other dignitaries at the table. “I forgive you.”
That got a wry chuckle out of Adrian, if not anybody else at the council. “Very magnanimous of you, O Wizard. As this council has interrupted your work, we could cede the floor to you as long as you should need. If you like.”
Adrian was giving Colfax a chance to make this room full of lords listen to him for as long as he’d like. By the looks on the faces arrayed all around him, they knew it too, and couldn’t go against the prince’s words. Colfax was so, so tempted to take his sweet time testing the artifact there and then for possible enchantments rather than the basic checks they probably expected when they sent for him.
Luckily, he didn’t actually want to spend more time in a stuffy meeting than he absolutely had to. He shook his head. “No need. I feel residual magic coming out of this box, so there are enchantments on the artifact. If you need a full assessment and report, you know where to send it.”
Adrian smiled again. “Much appreciated, Wizard Colfax. You have dismissed yourself.”
Colfax nodded and turned, waving a hand at the others in a flippant goodbye. “Councilors.”
The great thing about being a wizard was that he didn’t need help to make a grand exit no matter how small he was. Already he was preparing a spell to get to the door without anyone laying a hand on him. “I will see myself back to my lab.”
The prompt today is "Cosmic" and I decided to get a little bit loose with that prompt because I certainly didn't have any ideas for anything cosmic scale. We return to the smallest and most stubborn wizard, Colfax. Many thanks to @creatorofuniverses for her blessing on the Sawyer cameo!
~~~
Magic had limits, but they were as yet undiscovered. There was only so much magic to go around in the world, according to common assumption. No one had a guess for how much there actually was. In theory, the limits were so far beyond comprehension that one could do anything with magic, given the right spellwork and the right amount of power behind it. From the cosmic to the mundane, wizards had managed incredible things throughout history.
Magic had rules, and these were much better documented and easier to discover. Even a self-taught wizard could learn most of the rules early on in their studies. Keep spell circles clean. Concentrate, without wavering, on big spells. Be wary of energy expenditure. Know that magic is its own beast and you are but a conduit for its effects.
Colfax had learned a number of those rules in his journey to magical mastery. He learned new ones, too, most days.
Like today, he was learning that he couldn’t pull the cork from a human-scaled bottle with any of the spells he had expected. He stood before the round, dusty-glass container that had been left behind in the court wizard’s lab. It had probably been stoppered at least a decade prior and forgotten in the corner of the shelf when the last wizard left. Colfax, in an effort to inventory everything left behind and everything he’d managed to bring to the lab so far, had intended to pull the cork and try to clean out some of the dust.
Any magical nudges at the cork only moved the bottle, too. His first attempt had nearly toppled it over on top of him, and even though it was empty it probably would have done some damage before rolling off the lab table to shatter on the floor. That wouldn’t do on his first day as court wizard.
He’d tried adjusting his spell to move things, taking different angles and nudging the magic a little differently. The cork was stuck fast, its friction holding tight to the glass neck of the bottle.
He knew without trying that if he tipped the bottle over and tried to pull the cork with only his hands and main strength, he’d have no better luck. The curse of being pixie-sized without any of their extra abilities.
It was frankly silly to spend more than a few minutes trying to best a dusty old bottle. And yet, now that it had presented a challenge, Colfax determined that he would manage this. He wasn’t about to be cowed by a stupid piece of glass and cork.
Simply moving the cork was getting him nowhere, so Colfax decided to change his approach. He tapped his staff absently on the lab table beneath him as he stared at the murky glass before him. The air in there had to have been trapped for years.
The air in there. With a faint smirk, Colfax welcomed the idea that popped into his head.
He planted his feet and shifted his grip on his staff. His hand fell over one of the runes carved into it, and he focused on the intent of that rune and the spells he attached to it. After a few moments gathering some magic into that rune, Colfax took his hand off the staff and planted it against the glass.
The air inside the bottle expanded immediately. The pressure suddenly soared, putting more strain on that cork from within the bottle than had ever been enacted on it. Colfax knew the spell would work; already he could swear he saw the cork shift.
And then it fired off the top of the bottle like a shot from a cannon, and the accompanying pop! echoed loudly in the room. Colfax flinched back as the cork bounced off the ceiling and then sailed back towards the lab table, smacking the surface only inches from him before veering off towards the wall and dropping, having lost its momentum at last. As it clattered to the floor somewhere out of sight, Colfax let out a sigh of triumph and relief both.
“Usually people pop the bottles with champagne in them, bud.”
The unexpected voice from the doorway caused Colfax to whirl around, looking far more startled than he’d have liked. Sawyer stood there watching with a characteristic grin on his face, though Colfax had no idea how long he’d been standing there; though the dustdevil was human-sized, he could be remarkably sneaky. “Sawyer. What are you doing here?”
“Came to see your new space, Colfax. Did you make any new spells yet?”
Colfax sighed. “I haven’t even fully set things up yet.”
Sawyer grinned again and took the few steps to the lab table, reaching out a hand to scoop Colfax off his feet before he could say otherwise. “In that case, let’s take a break and explore the castle! You can give me a tour or whatever.”
Colfax scrambled to sit upright in Sawyer’s hand, though he didn’t see the point in telling him off for the swift grab. That never worked. Instead, he shot the dustdevil a mild glare. “You don’t need a tour. But fine. We’ll take a break, if it’ll keep you from disrupting my work later.”
Today for GT July the prompt is "Royalty", and I could think of none other than the prince himself, Adrian Kennet. Of course, the prince is incomplete without the wizard. This story takes place sometime after the conclusion to A Little Bit of Magic, a Trust AU written with the wonderful @creatorofuniverses!
~~~
Colfax shouldn’t be surprised, but the lab in the castle was much fancier than the lab he kept back home. At home, he had a small awning over a single workbench cluttered with herbs and trinkets and other various pieces he’d collected for his magical studies. It had moderate protection from the elements and from the constant botherations of the crows, and it kept him outside just in case a spell went wrong while he was still developing it (he’d only burned the wall inside the house once, but once was enough).
The lab reserved for the Court Wizard, however, was ridiculously posh by comparison. Counters lined two of the walls, shelves filled a third one, and the others bore slate and narrow ledges for chalk. A large circular table took up the middle of the room loaded with bottles and beakers and heating implements and one midsized cauldron bigger than Colfax’s room back home.
He was a wizard, but admittedly a very compact one. He definitely didn’t need all this space.
He stood on the large center table, eyeing the various potion implements that had been left behind. His predecessor hadn’t left much in the lab on their exit. The shelves had a few clay jars shoved to one corner, likely empty under the layers of dust covering them. Colfax had inherited a cavernous room with frosted windows, more shelving than he’d ever need, and a handful of containers that could easily fit him inside of them.
“What do you think?”
The voice from the doorway between the two slate-board walls was polite and gentle, but Colfax jolted all the same. He turned to face it, somewhat sheepish but trying to convey all the confidence befitting a Wizard of the royal court.
He found Adrian standing there, dressed in more casual attire than his usual; the Prince must have found himself a rare day without meetings or briefings or anything that would require some level of regalia. Though a petite human, Adrian still towered over Colfax’s small frame even from up on the table. Standing a little over six inches tall, the wizard was outmatched by even the smallest of humans.
Adrian approached the table, and Colfax drew himself up anyway. He’d never bowed to the prince, and he didn’t think he’d start. He wasn’t very formal with his greetings, either. “Adrian. It will take some work, I think, but this workspace will do. That aside - you know it can be dangerous to walk into a magic lab without an announcement or invitation, don’t you?”
Adrian grinned as he came to a stop before the table; he always tried not to loom too much, and Colfax appreciated it even if he’d never admit it out loud. The prince stood back a step, which made quite a difference. “I had a feeling you wouldn’t have gotten started on anything too troublesome just yet,” he admitted, rolling with Colfax’s teasing. “I’ve sent for some of the most basic supplies that you can use here, but you’ll have to provide a list later for more specifics. I’ve also arranged for a builder to come and make some adjustments for you so you can get to whatever you need in the room.”
Colfax glanced around again. He would indeed benefit from having some easier methods of traversing the room. If it was truly meant to be for him, it was a bit too spacious for the time being. But there would be walkways for him, ways to easily get to any of the surfaces or storage he might want to reach.
Adrian was a good friend. Prince or not, he’d always considered Colfax’s size, but not in a way that felt demeaning or embarrassing. It was simply a fact about the small wizard that could be accommodated.
“You spoil me,” Colfax said flatly, hiding his thoughts with snark. “I suppose you’ll want all that done quickly so you can put me to work for whatever it is a prince needs a wizard to do.”
Adrian grinned. “It’s true, you’ll be earning your keep, wizard. No shirking responsibilities here, no sir. I’ve even got my first request for you already. It’s lunchtime; what say we find Charlie and rescue him from the head historian for a break?”
Charlie never wanted to be crowned king; at least, not like this. He insists he’s technically king regent, only ruling until his father is found. If they can’t find his father… well, that crown is going to feel a great deal heavier.
Even more Doppelganger AU stuff!
So, because the original premise didn't have Gt, of course we had to add it in. XD Wizardfax made a shrinking spell a while ago, just in case he needed it (and used it on Charlie first, saving his life but also making the very tiny king very opposed to using the spell overmuch). And, since Charlie left the two Colfaxes along, of course wizardfax turned to it in recourse.
Thiefax is decidedly not about this turn of events.
