Aldric had only just made it back inside the classroom building when a second alarm tripped. Someone had just opened Miraea’s case.

Aldric set off at a dead sprint for his office, cursing his current inebriated state as he stumbled on the way there. He burst into the classroom, blew through his office door, and grabbed the perpetrator by the arm before they could do anything further. He growled out a question to the thief, one of his daggers already at the ready, before his brain caught up to the situation.

It was a girl, a student even. Specifically, one from his class that morning. The girl’s hand was outstretched and reaching for Miraea’s staff, the case for which was somehow open. Despite her obvious guilt and terror, Aldric had forgotten her almost immediately, instead focusing on the heavy wooden lid on the floor. How the hell did it get opened?

Aldric was at least relieved he’d caught her before she touched it. If he’d been just moments too late, she would have activated the various other defensive runes he had placed on the staff. He didn’t feel like sweeping this girl’s ashes out of his office.

He looked around the room, expecting to see someone else, but found only the girl. “Who opened this? Where did they go? Answer me!”

“I-I’m so sorry,” the girl whimpered, her eyes wide and wet. “I-I-I’m the one w-who opened it... I-It was an a-accident... I-I-I’m s-sorry....” She continued her sniveling, but Aldric wasn’t buying it. There was no way she could open a multilayered rune script that he himself had created.

That being said, when he looked at the case again, he saw that the key structure was indeed completed, albeit a bit sloppily. The rune array had apparently decided it was close enough and unlocked itself. Aldric was more than a little embarrassed at such a stupid oversight, but it was still a one in a million chance that she would have guessed it correctly. Was it talent, or blind luck?

Resolving to rework the enchantment later, he hastily picked up the lid and refastened it to the box, double checking to make sure the rune array was still in place and locked completely. He noted this girl was wearing the blue trimmed robes of a sorcerer, so it was technically possible she could have done it. But for a novice to identify and fill in such a complex rune structure, without even carving? If she was lying, she was a wonderful actress. The look of panicked terror on her face was awfully convincing.

Aldric suddenly realized that he still had a vice-like grip on the girl’s arm. A crying and scared girl was alone, at night, in a professor’s office, when said professor was obviously holding her against her will. He also still had a dagger in his hands.

Yeah, not a good look.