Zorko’s Arcane Appraisals
The Scales of Misbalance
“Welcome,” Zorko whispered, as if afraid the room itself might tip, “to a chamber built for balance, but founded in hope. A hall of judgment that forgot what it was waiting for.”
He stood at the far edge of the Grand Rotunda of Admission, a wide, circular hall filled with echo and ambition. The ceiling arched into an unnecessary dome, embroidered with constellations of magical accreditation symbols. There were no chairs, just an oversized pedestal at the center, a half-finished banner that read “You Might Be the One,” and far too many unused clipboards.
Zorko stepped forward. His boots echoed louder than expected. The orb hovered behind him, silent but observing. The pedestal wobbled gently under its own weight, as though protesting its assigned destiny.
He raised the phoenix feather and traced a spiral in the dust.
“Today,” he murmured, “we weigh not applications, but possibility. A soul too light for rejection. A truth too heavy to falsify.”
From behind a curtain, clearly meant for dramatic reveals, emerged Magus Diggory of the Wood, moving with puppetlike precision. He carried a pair of golden scales like one might carry a sacred text that occasionally sneezes.
“This is the Appraisal Vestibule?” he asked.
Zorko turned. “This is the Rotunda of Reckoning.”
Diggory blinked, then nodded. “Ah. Yes. Excellent. I had it re-tiled.” He approached the pedestal, adjusted it minutely with one foot. “It still tilts a bit.”
Zorko eyed the pedestal. “Symbolic.”
Diggory did not disagree.
He held up the scales. “They used to lean,” he said. “Always left. Never still.” He paused. “But today they’re even. I think I’ve made progress.”
Zorko’s eyes widened. “Then the test begins not with measure, but with change.”
Diggory tilted his head. “I thought it began with the pledge recital.”
Zorko gestured. “You arrive not to pass. You arrive to reveal the shape of your balance.”
Diggory carefully placed the scales on the pedestal. They didn’t move.
“I’ve been trying,” he said, almost to himself. “Trying to earn even.”
The orb flickered.
Neither of them noticed.
Zorko raised the feather like a scepter.
“We begin,” he whispered. “Let judgment speak first in stillness.”
He circled the pedestal again, hands folded behind his back like an archivist deciding whether the relic was worthy of shame or worship.
“These are no common scales,” he said. “Not trade weights, not merchant’s measures. No. This is judgment, coiled in gold.”
Diggory squinted. “I thought they were candy prizes.”
Zorko raised one glowing blue eye. “Then you’ve brought something dangerous, unknowingly.” He straightened. “They resemble the long-lost Scales of Equinoxis. Forged by fate. Forged of fate. One pan gleams with promise, the other with debt.”
Diggory tilted his head. “They hum when near soup.”
Zorko turned to the orb. “That is confirmation enough.”
He turned back to Diggory. “These scales don’t weigh mass. They weigh the moment between decisions. The echo of futures unforked.”
Diggory nodded. “That tracks with what the Nightmare Imp said.”
Zorko froze. “I’m sorry. What?”
Diggory held up a scroll. “It was in the thank-you pamphlet. Nice layout.”
“You received paperwork?”
“Holiday event. It was this or a sour pumpkin that whispered regrets.”
Zorko stared. “And you chose judgment?”
Diggory looked at the scales fondly. “They felt appropriate.”
The feather drooped slightly in Zorko’s hand.
Still, the pedestal held steady. The scales didn’t move. Zorko leaned in.
“And yet,” he said, “they remain still. Not in peace. In tension.”
Diggory peered over. “I thought that meant I was doing better.”
Zorko whispered, “Or it means you are perfectly divided.”
Diggory beamed. “Thank you.”
Zorko stepped back.
“We are not here to measure morality. We are here to appraise purpose.” He drew a breath. “And if these are what I think, your presence has consequences.”
The orb dimmed.
Diggory didn’t notice. He was pulling out a crumpled application form.
“I also have references,” he offered.
Zorko stepped in closer, eyes on the still scales.
“They don’t tremble,” he murmured. “Not because you are calm, but because they’re listening.”
Diggory looked around. “To what?”
“To you,” Zorko said. “Your weight, your intention, your lineage of borrowed magic. You’ve placed yourself before prophecy and haven’t tipped it.”
Diggory straightened.
“I’ve been conducting trials,” he said. “Every solstice. And snack breaks. The scales never balanced until recently. I assumed that meant improvement.”
Zorko stepped back. “No. It means convergence.”
Diggory retrieved a sealed scroll. “Should this be filed with the orb? It’s a conditional enrollment contract. Based on scale neutrality.”
Zorko ignored the scroll. He raised both arms toward the orb.
“Today, the Golden Scales sit even,” he proclaimed. “Not in indifference. In recognition. They see you. Not as unfinished. But as—”
“They just tilted,” Diggory interrupted.
Zorko spun. The right pan had dipped. The left rose. He inhaled sharply.
“You moved?”
“I breathed,” Diggory said, unsure if he was apologizing.
Zorko dropped to one knee. “It is happening.”
“What is?”
“The Weighing.”
Diggory blinked. “That wasn’t this?”
Zorko gestured with the feather. “This is the preparation. The soul’s last unjudged exhale.”
Diggory took a breath. “Then I submit.”
“You what?”
“I’ll step back into the wood. Or the Lich. Or whatever task awaits.”
Zorko looked horrified. “No. You don’t surrender to the scales. You reveal something to them.”
Diggory opened his cloak. From inside he retrieved a toffee, an acorn charm, and a parchment labeled “Emergency Redemption Arc, Draft 2.”
Zorko stared. “That’s your offering?”
“I’m being transparent.”
The orb gave a soft hum. The scales shifted, back toward center.
Zorko gasped. “It responds to confession.”
Diggory nodded. “I may have stolen it.”
“The scale?”
“The moment. From the Nightmare Imp’s porch.”
The orb flickered again.
Zorko turned to it. “Document this. A self-weighing soul. A stolen destiny. A puppet choosing truth.”
He looked at Diggory. “You may be ready.”
Diggory lowered his head. “Then I await assignment.”
A faint hiss escaped the orb. A breeze circled the rotunda.
A thin column of fog rose beside the pedestal. Zorko didn’t flinch. Diggory stood very still.
From the mist, Uvlius of the Belfry emerged with the kind of inevitability usually reserved for tides and taxes. He held a leather-bound notebook.
“They’re party scales,” he said flatly. “Nightmare Imp Trick Series 4-B. Weighted left. Used in competitive candy distribution. Popular with chaos cults and youth ministries.”
Zorko turned. “You feel the tension too.”
“No. I read product tags.”
He tapped the base of the scales with his notebook. A small stamp: [NI-4B]
Diggory leaned in. “That wasn’t on the Lich’s set.”
“No. His are custom. Weighted left on purpose.”
Diggory froze.
“He prefers loyalty that feels like moral improvement. Shows it to subordinates. Lets them think they’re earning trust. Makes them easier to manage.”
Diggory said nothing.
The scales didn’t move.
Zorko opened his mouth.
Uvlius raised a finger. “No metaphors.”
Zorko closed his mouth.
Uvlius turned to Diggory. Watched him. Then:
“Yours are even.”
Diggory blinked.
Uvlius nodded. “That’s not nothing.”
He turned to leave, then paused. “I don’t know what the Lich Emperor wanted you to become.”
He looked back. “But he didn’t give you these.”
The orb flickered. Sharp and quiet.
And Uvlius was gone.
Diggory stayed by the pedestal, eyes on the scales.
“They’re not tilted,” he said softly.
“No,” Zorko replied. “They never were.”
Diggory didn’t smile. Not exactly. But something loosened.
Zorko looked at him. “Trying to earn even,” he said quietly. “What a thing to be taught.”
“You were told to earn balance,” he said. “But you were already whole.”
“Then I was never failing.”
Zorko smiled. Small, sincere, without flourish.
“Final appraisal,” he said. “The lie was heavy. But he let it go.”
The orb flickered.
The rotunda stilled.
And the episode ended, not in revelation, but in quiet, earned equilibrium.
Entered by: 0x6424…79B4
Zorko’s Arcane Appraisals
The Book That Listened
“Welcome," Zorko said, his voice reverent, "to a silence that has waited long enough to be heard."
He moved quietly through the chamber, robes trailing like thought. There was no audience today. Only presence. Only preparation.
The pedestal was already cleared, clean, centered, lit from beneath by a soft red glow. The orb sat above it, faintly pulsing. Not reacting. Just waiting.
Zorko brushed a hand along the stone ledge, then adjusted the position of his phoenix feather beside it. The feather shimmered faintly, then stilled.
"No interference," he murmured. "No echo drift. Good."
He stood back and looked toward the far curtain.
"Today’s guest brings no curse. No charm. No trick."
He paused.
"He brings a question. One that was never given room to speak. Until now."
The orb pulsed once, dimly. Zorko didn’t look at it. He just nodded, as if the room had caught up to him.
He placed his hands at his sides, palms open. The gesture was not show. It was invitation.
"Battle Mage Hothor of the Hills," he said quietly, "you may enter."
From behind the curtain came the soft rhythm of boots on stone. No rustle. No fanfare.
Hothor stepped through, tall and still and silent. His robes were grey like old stone, sleeved and worn at the edges. His presence was not heavy, but anchored, like a fact no one remembered to question.
In his hands: a wide, flat book with no clasp. Its cover looked grown, not made. Root-bound. Shale-backed. Silent.
Zorko gave a short nod. Not quite a bow. Not quite not.
Hothor crossed the room and placed the Book of Names gently on the pedestal.
Zorko did not speak again.
Not yet.
Because some moments ask not to be spoken through.
They ask to begin.
Zorko leaned over the Book with theatrical caution, peering at the surface like it might blink. "This could be a mood-reactive cookbook," he said suddenly. "Or perhaps a cursed guestbook for royal hauntings. Or" — he straightened dramatically, eyes wide — "a pet that only responds to interpretive dance."
"I must say," he murmured, "this doesn’t look like a book. It looks like a flattened root vegetable wearing ceremonial bindings."
Hothor said nothing.
Zorko crouched beside the pedestal, eyes narrowing. "It may also be a disguised pet. One that feeds on secrets. Or starch."
"It’s not," Hothor said.
Zorko stood again, brushing his robes. "Of course. I knew that."
He circled the pedestal. "You brought... a Book of Names."
"I did," Hothor said.
"Is it cursed?" "No." "Dangerous?" "Not exactly."
Zorko’s feather twitched with mild disappointment. "Then it is, undoubtedly, dangerous in the emotional sense."
Hothor gave a slight nod. "That’s closer."
Zorko turned to face him, for once curious without flourish. "And what do you want from it?"
"I have a brother," Hothor said. "A twin. We were separated at birth. I never met him. I don’t know his face, his voice. I don’t know his name."
Zorko’s tone softened. "But you brought the Book."
“If I could say it,” Hothor murmured, “maybe the Book would answer.”
"And if you don’t?"
“Then at least I’ll know silence is all I was given.”
A long pause.
Zorko stepped aside, sweeping one hand outward in gentle invitation.
"Very well," he said. "Let us ask a stone what it remembers."
Hothor stepped forward, quiet as fog, and looked down at the Book.
He opened his mouth.
No sound came.
The Book remained closed.
Zorko didn’t move. Didn’t speak.
But the air felt like it had started listening.
Zorko stood beside the pedestal, hands folded, gaze steady. He didn’t reach for the Book. He just watched it.
"It doesn’t feel sealed," he said, squinting. "It feels like a cabbage pretending to be a library. It waits for a recipe, not a reader."
Hothor remained still, arms behind his back, expression unreadable.
Zorko turned to him. "May I?"
Hothor gave a single nod. "If you don’t try to name him."
Zorko took a slow breath. "Of course not. I don’t know him. I never met him."
He moved one hand gently in the air above the Book, as if trying to warm it without touch.
"But maybe..." Zorko began, voice barely more than a breath, "maybe he was someone who never stopped listening for footsteps. Someone who imagined a door opening. Someone who waited without knowing why."
The Book didn’t move. But the surface of it grew stiller, as if holding still to hear better.
Zorko’s voice dropped further.
"A boy who learned silence before language. Who knew exile before affection. Who never got a name, but still built one... quietly, over time."
A flicker ran along the Book’s spine. Brief. Almost not there.
Zorko stopped. "Did you see...?"
"I saw it," Hothor said.
He stepped forward. His brow was set. His voice was low.
"That’s not supposed to happen."
Zorko looked at him. "You said it opens when a name is spoken."
"Yes."
"But I didn’t say one."
Hothor didn’t answer. His mouth was tight.
Zorko took a step back. "I was just... guessing."
"No," Hothor said slowly. "You were listening."
Another silence fell, but this one had shape. It wasn’t emptiness. It was weight.
Zorko looked at the Book, then at Hothor.
And for once, he didn’t speak.
"I didn’t mean to touch anything real," Zorko said. "I was just... imagining."
A new voice answered, calm and immediate.
"That’s why it flickered."
Uvlius stood at the edge of the chamber, hands behind his back, robes slightly damp at the hem. No one had heard him enter. He rarely arrived with sound.
Zorko turned slowly. "I didn’t say a name."
Uvlius nodded. "But you saw him. Or something close enough."
He stepped toward the Book, eyes on its cover. His gaze didn’t linger, just one brief moment of appraisal.
"It listens for recognition," he said. "Not titles. Not lineage. You can’t trick it. You can’t force it. You have to feel it."
Hothor stared at him. "I’m his brother."
"You are," Uvlius agreed. "But that doesn’t mean you knew him."
Zorko opened his mouth, then closed it again.
Uvlius continued. "The Book doesn’t wait for the person with the right claim. It waits for the voice that truly sees."
He turned to Hothor, not unkind.
"You were meant to carry the silence. That doesn’t mean you were meant to break it."
The chamber held its breath.
"I don’t understand," Hothor said.
"You do," Uvlius replied. "You just don’t like it."
He stepped back from the pedestal.
"The name will come. But not from effort. From truth."
Zorko looked at him. "How will we know?"
"The Book will open," Uvlius said.
And then, as always, he left.
No further explanation. No farewell. Just the faint echo of boots on stone, and then nothing at all.
Zorko and Hothor stood beside the Book, its cover still closed, but no longer inert.
It was listening.
They stood together, side by side.
Zorko didn’t look at Hothor. He looked at the Book, still closed. But something had changed. It no longer felt like a sealed vault. It felt... ready.
"I don’t know his name," Zorko said softly. "But I can try to describe him."
Hothor gave a faint nod.
Zorko stepped forward, hands loose at his sides, voice gentle now.
"I think he was someone who didn’t get the story he was promised. Someone who kept expecting a knock on the door that never came. Who shaped himself from questions no one else knew to ask."
The Book didn’t react.
Until it did.
The spine loosened with a quiet motion, like old breath. The cover eased open. One page turned itself, slow and quiet, as if the Book were drawing breath.
A single name etched itself into the stone. Not glowing. Just there.
Zorko leaned in, squinted, and read it aloud.
The sound was simple. Strange. Musical.
Hothor blinked. Just once. Then a small, honest smile appeared. One that looked unused.
"I never thought I’d get to know him," he said, voice quiet. "Maybe this is enough."
Zorko grinned. "Sometimes the answer isn’t relief or pain. Sometimes it’s just... lighter."
The orb flickered.
The room tilted.
Zorko placed one hand on the side of the pedestal, grounding himself.
“Final appraisal: One thousand gold in borrowed silence, none in resale for a book that refuses to be owned, and one priceless truth — even what we cannot name can still be felt.”
The Book stayed open.
The name stayed visible.
And for the first time in a long while, so did Hothor.
Entered by: 0x6424…79B4
