I went about my official duties, especially if I happened to be on the west coast, I collected documents and anecdotes that might help me piece together the puzzle of who the Bane really was.
“The more I learned about the Zephyrus clan, the more my attention came to focus on its founder, a man by the name of Palaemon Zephyrus, who lived until age ninety-one.”
Mages seldom lived to sixty-five, and almost never past seventy—it was something that for all the wonders of their powers, they could not change. Hesperia the Magnificent, who reached eighty, was not only the longest-living of all the heirs of the House of Elberon by a large margin, but also the third-longest-lived mage in the entire recorded history of the Domain. Titus’s grandfather, who had died at sixty-two, was considered to have been in full old age.
For a mage to live to his nineties was unheard of, a life span almost 50 percent greater than the expectancy of even the most privileged and well cared for.
“Did he live to ninety-one by natural means?” asked Fairfax.
“That question was very much on my mind. I also wanted to know whether that was his true age—or whether he had lied when he claimed to be a young man when he arrived on the west coast. But my biggest question was: ‘What evidence can I find that he actually died?’
“Since there was no strong central government at the time, documentation for life events was spotty. The Bane had actually donated his family’s papers and letters to the historical archive at the grand library. Bit by bit—since I didn’t want to appear to be too curious—I combed through those papers.
“A less suspicious researcher would have come away with the impression of a family that was completely above reproach—there were innumerable thank-you notes from mages they had helped over the years. And yet members of the family met with a slew of misfortunes, especially in the earlier years, as attested by the almost equally innumerable condolence notes.
“A flood of such letters came when Palaemon Zephyrus was in his seventies, condolences on the loss of his son and daughter, his only two children. There were also a number of get-well-soon wishes for himself. I was able to locate a copy of a seigneury circular from that time. A seigneury circular was a paper published by a landholder for his tenants to inform them of the goings-on in the area, and sometimes in other parts of the realm and maybe even abroad. It was a common practice of the era, since the ordinary mage didn’t have any other access to news. It was also used to announce significant events on the estate itself.
“According to that particular edition of the Zephyrus seigneury circular, Palaemon Zephyrus and his children had the grave misfortune of running into a giant serpent.”
Titus cocked a brow. “Do giant serpents truly still live on Atlantis?”
He had seen a replica of a giant serpent skeleton in the Hesperia the Magnificent Museum of Natural History. He did not doubt that they had slithered the earth at some point, but it was the general belief that giant serpents had long ago become extinct.
“Here on Atlantis we tend to give a little more credence to the reports of their existence. There are very few eyewitness accounts, because it is said that giant serpents are fiercely territorial and will kill without any other provocation. But sometimes hikers come across bone piles characteristic of those left behind by giant serpents—usually as territory markers—and they immediately turn back. The truly public-minded might file a report with the Department of Interior Resources. Most don’t, because such reports could lead to unwelcome questions. ‘What were you doing in that area?’ ‘Why did you stray from the boundary of the nature reserve?’ ‘Where else did you go besides the place where you claim to have seen the bone pile?’
“In any case, we believe in the existence of giant serpents enough that when my sister disappeared, everyone sincerely thought it was what had happened to her. She had been on an approved nature reserve with her classmates, but the place was said to have been infested with giant serpents at one point, and that was where all our minds went.
“So Palaemon Zephyrus’s account was not questioned. He was a man respected and beloved, not to mention he’d lost half an arm in the incident himself. The clan mourned and life went on. Almost exactly ten years later, there came another flood of