Now Mags, who had, up until this moment, loathed his geography and mapmaking class with a sincere and undying passion, suddenly was just as passionately grateful to them. Because now that he had been in those classes, he knew where Cole Pieters’ mine was, so he knew what the nearest town was. And he knew that he had come from somewhere in the vicinity of that town, because he didn’t remember a long journey. He did remember the shouting and screaming, he remembered cowering in a corner, then he remembered being put in a cart and given sweets to suck. It could not have been a very long journey. It had ended in a bare stone room, from which, after several boring days, Cole Pieters fetched him.

“We’re lookin’ for th’ reports from around about a town called Blueflower Hill an’ a place called Cole Pieters’ mine, from about . . . twelve, fourteen years ago, sir.” He tried to make his tone and his expression as respectful as possible. This man would respond to respect.

The Archivist nodded. “Very good. That narrows the search down considerably. There are three Guard Posts in that area. Come with me.”

He led them between two of the rows of shelves, and stopped when they were so deeply in that Mags could not really see either end of the room. The man took ribbons out of his pocket, and sorted out a handful of white ones with little blue beads threaded on the ends. Each of the boxes had a ring attached to it; he tied these ribbons off on the rings of several of them.

“I’ve marked each of the boxes you will want to look through with these,” the man said. “You will probably see other boxes marked in this way; if you look through those, be careful not to disturb or remove any markers in the reports. As you finish a box, please remove the ribbon and either leave it at my desk at the rear, or attach it to a new box you wish to look through.” He tapped the end of the box. “The name of the Guard Post and the year are here. The boxes are organized geographically. Put everything back as you found it. You are—?”

“Heraldic-Trainee Mags and Bardic Trainee Lena,” Lena answered for both of them. “We’re looking for information for Mags, sir.”

Mags waited for the Archivist to ask what that was, but he seemed utterly incurious.

“Very good. These will be your colors until you are finished with this particular research. When you have returned all the ribbons, if you wish to pursue another line of research, let me know what it is you are looking for, and I will assign you another set of ribbons.” He smiled thinly. “If it is nothing like as specific as this one, I shall ask you to confine your searches to one small area at a time.”