[that strikes viktor, that assessment, even in terms outside of magic and necromancy. maybe he's been thinking too much about power and those who wield it, what it does to people, the typical, tired line of thinking.

he finishes his drink with a little 'bah' at downing the last of the now warmed beer. yuck, but the task is done.] Interesting you should put it that way. I've met a couple of people who came from a world without magic and the magic they have been developing draws on natural talents they did not regard highly. One man good at reading people able to occasionally read thoughts, for example.

[poetry seems to slip into ortus' words now and again, giving viktor an idea of the kind of poem this man might right. something epic rather than the flowery love poems he usually imagined when thinking of poetry. maybe more like the operas heimendinger was fond of, the rare times viktor saw one himself.

the way he speaks of this matthias though, it really does make the man seem like a the stuff of myths rather than stories.] Perhaps you can explain it better- when I spoke to Palamedes of cavaliers the understanding I got was it would be belittling to call them mere bodyguards. Would you say they are more like... hm, knights? Soldiers?