Records: the Ricardian Presence in York

### **The Speed of Rumor**

Proving that the only thing faster than the speed of light is the speed of rumor, word of the Edwardian War Ride into the western Holy Roman Empire had made it back to London. In the Royal Court of Queen Joan, Prince Rick made a cogent, measured argument against war rides in general as "unchristian," but pointed out that this was retaliatory against states that had taken lives at Calais – and diminished the Honor of England in the process.

The inaccurate, incomplete and non-contextual quote, however, was printed (on English-made presses) and circulated in a truncated form around Paris. One of those pamphlets made it back to King Edward. At the time, the king was in the field, finishing the annexations around Luxembourg and heading toward Champagne. Edward sent word via *Scrolls of Correspondence* that Richard was to be "banished to York."

There was a realization of exactly what was said, but there were optics to the perception. King Edward ordered Prince Richard to York, though that *may* have been under advisement given what both the ROM and the Jesuits had discovered.

### **Prince Rick's York Arrival**

The rumor was faster than the carriage. As Prince Rick held his own court in York, the question came up again. This time, the prince tailored it, knowing exactly who the source was.

Sure enough, the slightly-revised quote was carried by a courtier out of court, making it onto another pamphlet (the "York" version) that found even wider circulation through Europe.

In this case, Rick was laying the groundwork for scaling back his *Magus* war wizard reputation. He could play up the *King of Blood and Thunder* reputation of his father and use that as a deterrent rather than over-engineering every defense.

That quote would have a lasting circulation – and impact – but was largely buried by the findings of the York investigation (and *everything* was buried under the abortive biblical plagues of the Cairo incident).

## **The Silver Spheres**

There were reports of bubbles from the City of York and well into the surrounding countryside. These silvery spheres of various size were like mirrors, but interacted with *nothing*. They went in random directions, including up, so appeared not be affected by gravity. They sunk into the ground or passed through matter, including people, as if it's not there.

They're not lethal, but there was a falling sensation if one's their head passed through the bubble. From the reports, Prince Rick was a bit critical that someone might stick their head in one, but the initial reports came from people who didn't realize the mostly-silent bubble came from behind. Undoubtedly, though, there were others who ran up to stick their head right inside...

The Royal Order of Merlin was dispatched to investigate, though there were already a few wizards in York that sent out detailed descriptions.

### **The Mercury Sprites**

The bubbles were absolutely mirrored surfaces, though beyond the spherical convex distortion of the reflection, there was nothing else visible to the human eyes. Well before Prince Rick's arrival, the local wizards confirmed these thing were *heavy arcane magic*.

By the time the SNS-capable Jesuits arrived, they detected zero divine magic: *neither inherently good nor evil*. That it wasn't good, wasn't good. That it wasn't bad was very good.

After York, both "Silver Spheres" and "Mercury Sprites" would find their way into records around the world. Some thought it really was manifestations of fairies or sprites, though what few patterns they found didn't seem to demonstrate the kind of free will one would expect with creatures of fey mythology. Eventually, the larger ones were classed as *spheres* while the smaller, faster one were dubbed the *sprites*.

In and of itself, they were absolutely benign, but there was some element of the gravity and partial patterns that couldn't quite be parsed out. This left the Order feeling that the phenomena was more of a side effect of something else rather than something done for its own sake. *That* was ominous.

Regardless of what portent it held, since it couldn't be explained or otherwise stopped, it was dubbed the *"The Ineffable Fairies of York"* (with ROM specialists stepping up the study and monitor the phenomena).