Bartomeus Journal 1 - Ars-Archange/ars-pbp GitHub Wiki

The Chronicles of Bartomeus du Bois ex Bonisagus, Collected by Hildegard of Châteaurenard

Marginal note written vertically along the left hand margin of the page. The variation in color of the ink indicates it was likely added after the page was written:

A history unrecorded is a history unremembered.

_In a smaller, cramped hand is written in yet a third ink alongside the first marginal note: _

"Not to an intellego specialist!"

Archivist's Note: The full text of the document is written by someone in a hurry and occasionally distracted, some words crossed out, some lines lightly illuminated with small flourishes and doodles:

As suggested by the esteemed magus, Gerbert of Bonisagus, my parens, I commit to the page a brief history of my birth, childhood and of my years to this point as an apprentice in the Order of Hermes. What I record here I know to be true and am an eyewitness of much that is recorded here, though not all. My ask of you, dear reader, is that you delay rendering judgment upon me until the record of my days has been concluded, for how would one judge justly an incomplete life?

I was born in the year 1170 at the end of winter on the 21st day of December, on Alban Arthan, the druidic holy day. This shortest day and longest night was marked in that year by the Great Conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn. My mother, Marie, recalls that my father boasted to his sodales of Cantus Arborum how auspicious the occasion was on the birth of his son, whom he was named Bertram Delbosc. (I have indeed validated through my studies that a Great Conjunction did, in fact, occur on that solstice date in the year of my birth.)

My mother, Marie Delbosc, worked in the kitchens and her relationship with my father was never formally acknowledged though few doubted the rumors after the events that followed my birth. By my mother's telling, I disappeared directly from my cradling basket in the kitchens while she was kneading the day's bread, sometime shortly before dawn.

Perhaps to his paternal regret, Aubert ex Merinita, my father, came to the infant's rescue. According to eyewitness accounts, among them my mother and others of the covenant, Aubert was outraged at the theft of the boy child, vowing to "make that damned brownie pay!" My mother was not part of the party that set forth with Aubert into the regio but some six months later, Aubert emerged from the regio and returned to Cantus Arborum with an infant: yours truly.

Marginal Note: They say it was the same child, but how do they actually know? All mewling desperate babies look the same!

Some years later as I began my apprenticeship, I learned more of the truth of those first months of my existence. Aubert ex Merinita had made an arrangement with a clurichaun, Pierre de Foye, from a nearby faerie regio. Pierre agreed to come and work in Aubert's lab for the span of a dozens seasons in exchange for a promise of a steady supply of fresh cream and honey for a comparable number of seasons. Sadly, Aubert had all but forgotten his dalliance with Marie, my mother, and was attempting to renege on his arrangement with Pierre, blaming weak wax, arrogant bees, and dried up teats for his inability to make good on his agreement. Pierre was having none of that and when a child was born of Aubert's dalliances with Marie, the clknew exactly what price he would exact from Aubert: nothing like bringing back a mage's get to elevate Pierre's reputation in the WInter Court!

Thankfully, Aubert retrieved the baby boy before the child had been bartered away to the Sidhe court and before any of the Fae powers recognized the latent Gift the infant possessed. But that sojourn into Faerie did not leave the child unmarked. His mother often remarked in his earliest years how he would wander through the herb garden talking and playing with his invisible friends and animals. Later the boy was acknowledged to be in possession of a kind of second sight or faerie sight of some kind.

Marginal Note: If they only knew all the things I could see as a child…

I have few memories of those earliest years, but prominent among many of them are the kitchens of Cantus Arborum and the safety I felt in that fragrant, warm place. Many of those memories are gastronomic in association as I was spoiled and pampered by all of the kitchen help including the cook who treated me like her own grandchild despite having no relation to me as far as I have been told. One might even say my first role at Cantus Arborum was as the official "Covenant Taster," given that I was often the person who tasted the first of the sweet rolls or sampled the potato leek soup for salt. I use the term taste generously because often it was a whole fresh cardamon roll dotted with raisins or an entire bowl of soup. Even as fleeting as those memories are, I think of those years as peaceful, playful, and delicious.

Sometime in my sixth year, several of the magi of the covenant began to pay me a great deal of attention, especially Aubert ex Merinita. I would be stopped for brief conversations or turn around to see one of the magi watching me as I played. About this same time, I began to feel a growing divide between me and the other children. I became the butt of their jokes and the target of their teasing. In those times, I often found comfort in the kitchens, hiding my tears in my mother's aprons or in a bowl of honeyed cream and fresh berries.

By summer of that year, the arrangements of my apprenticeship were underway. Claiming me openly as his son, Aubert ex Merinita had struck another deal: an apprenticeship under the tutelage of Mordecus Grint, an Ex Miscellanea magus of some means but questionable methods. Aubert had no qualms handing over the Gifted boy (me!) for a rook of imaginem vis and thus my apprenticeship began.

I will say very little of those first years under the direction of Mordecus Grint. They were lonely, lean years under the grinding hand of Grint. Despite the difficulty and darkness of those seasons, Grint insisted on a breadth of study in the Arts and Theory that continues to prove to be a reliable and firm foundation to my ongoing studies and research.

Marginal Note: Mordecus Grint is now presumed dead. Rumor is that he was summarily executed by a pair of Flambeau zealots for his "foul Diedne heresies" but no records exist among the quesitori about any of House Flambeau pursuing Grint in Wizard's March or other sanctioned or unsanctioned action. Grint has not been seen in nearly two decades.

Light poured into the darkness and fog of those early apprentice years when the esteemed Gerbert ex Bonisagus (from the Portus Termini covenant) exercised his Founder's right and took young Bertram Delbosc as his apprentice much to the disappointment and ire of Mordecus Grint who had "spent priceless seasons, priceless seasons I say!" training the promising boy. But Gerbert was not to be denied, and the two returned to Gerbert's labs at a nearby covenant in the Tribunal.

The past decade has been a pure delight under the masterful tutelage of such an accomplished magus as Gerbert. Beyond correcting any errors in thinking and filling holes "in the most basic of foundational principles!" Gerbert established a robust curriculum of study that guided this young apprentice in navigating his way to an expansive, yet focused understanding of the Hermetic Arts, what glories and wonders to behold! The debt I owe Master Gerbert is incalculable and, in all likelihood, would offend this august and esteemed magus should I attempt such a mundane accounting. Let me simply say, that I am deeply grateful for Master Gerbert's generous and precise training.

[Marginal note has been roughed out with sandpaper, only the closest examination might reveal a very, very faint outline of the words "horse manure" written in Latin.]

Archivist's Note:

At the successful conclusion of his gauntlet, the young Betram Delbosc took the name Bartomeus ex Bonisagus as his official name within the Order. He did not immediately depart away from Gerbert's covenant but continued his studies there for nearly a decade, holed up in the covenant library or in an itinerant's lab he was allowed to use from time to time. Only now as a new century dawns has Bartomeus returned to the covenant of his birth: Cantus Arborum.