Every world in this realm is crisscrossed by ley lines; filaments of earth energy that connect places of worship, monuments, and historical sites. You have passed through innumerable ley lines in your life: think of any desolate place you have been where the hair on the back of your neck stood up for no reason you could fathom...

Meet Myer, an absentminded young mage who works for the Ministry in Frostford. Now meet Myer's helping hand: Stepwise, the daemon he creates so that he can find the things he misplaces. Myer is about to discover that giving humanity the ability to search for anything, at any time, can lead to catastrophe.

Part 1 of 2.

Written by: Jonathan Cohen

Narrated by: Trevor Schechter

A Faustian Nonsense production.

To read the full transcript of this episode, go to https://thelavendertavern.captivate.fm/episode/myers-helping-hand-part-1

Transcript

Every world in this realm is crisscrossed by ley lines; filaments of earth energy that connect places of worship, monuments, and historical sites. You have passed through innumerable ley lines in your life: think of any desolate place you have been where the hair on the back of your neck stood up for no reason you could fathom.

The more ley lines that intersect in an area, the more magically powerful that area is. Some unfortunate towns only have a single ley line passing through – barely enough to allow a local mystic to dowse for water. Other towns are gifted with an abundance of ley lines.

And of course, once the men and women of this world understood ley lines and how they could work to their advantage, they built towns and villages at the great crossroads of these lines. A mage might wander an unspoiled land, with enchanted spectacles on his nose, until he found a spot that burned with a grid of reddish-gold ley lines arcing across each other. Then he would send back word to those who had sponsored his expedition: here shall be a great city.

There was one place where there were hundreds, perhaps thousands of ley lines that gathered and writhed like snakes. It was destiny that this should be the greatest city ever built. Those of temperaments sensitive to magic had already settled it as a village, but with the ley lines to power their efforts, it grew into a city of spires and minarets, columns and porticos. Frostford: The largest city in the known world.

One cannot simply dip a wand or a staff into a ley line and extract the magic needed for a spell or incantation; it takes training and skill to handle the ley lines. It takes a Minister.

And so, it came to pass, in a section of Frostford that was neither too poor nor too wealthy, that a young junior minister named Myer was late for his work.

Myer was no more than twenty, with a shock of black wavy hair that never quite stayed where it should. He had hazel eyes and the babyish curious face of a child, and at this moment he stood among a pile of his clothes, looking for his staff.

He could summon the staff, of course; this was a trifling cantrip for any minister. But Myer had nearly expended his allotment of magic for the thirty-days, and he did not want the Ministry to sanction him.

Thomas would know where the staff was. But Thomas was not here, Myer thought.

The staff was ebony. Why had he chosen ebony? With his black robes and furniture of dark wood, and black walls, the staff was nearly impossible to find. The only spot of light in his chambers was –

And here he turned to his cat, Bedlam. Bedlam was officially a familiar, as far as the Ministry knew, but the luminous white cat with light green eyes, pink nose and ears spent his time sleeping or looking on with disdain. As Myer now saw, the cat had his paws wrapped around the ebony staff.

“Give that to me!” Myer said, leaping for the cat. In a flash, Bedlam...