Maddox

Maddox was a typhoon dragon arcanist and Marshall of the Southern Seas. He was one of the first arcanists to contract the Arcane plague and died battling the Frith Guild. Due to the marshall's status, the ex-pirate Everett Zelfree spread rumors that he was solely responsible for the killing.

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> The door to the captain’s quarters opened, and a gust of icy air rushed inside. I tightened my coat, but I didn’t move from the chair. The door closed, and the echo of heavy boots filled the room. A mountain of a man walked around behind the desk, his shoulders teeming with so much muscle, he had lost his neck.
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> He wore all the decoration befitting the Marshall of the Southern Seas—a bright blue coat, white shirt and trousers, black gloves, and more than a dozen medals. Marshalls also wore silver torcs—a type of neck ornament that looked like a reverse necklace. The metal went behind the neck and hung down in front, resting over the collarbones.
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> The weirdest part was his cap. It was a tricorn, common on the seas, but he wore it with a bandana that covered his forehead. Arcanists never covered their mark. Well, some did, but the majority didn’t. The mark was a sign of one’s magical status. I supposed the marshall was so famous, everyone *knew* he was an arcanist.
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> When I looked closer, the bandana had a star and dragon stitched into the blue fabric. That was his mark, but why had he shown it on the clothing rather than displaying it openly?
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> “I’m sorry to keep you waiting,” the marshall said, a rumble to his voice as he smiled. “I had to finish some matters before I could start new ones.” His clean-shaven face seemed larger than most and definitely more square. His dark brown hair poked out from the bandana, but not much.
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> Maddox withdrew two glass vials from a drawer. He slid them across the desk, and they twirled twice before stopping right at the edge. The crimson contents almost seemed black in the dim lighting.
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> “Blood?” I asked.
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> Maddox tapped a thick finger on his desk. “Have you ever seen arcanists with glowing white marks? The ones who have achieved a true form of their eldrin?”
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> “Once or twice.”
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> “Their eldrin are more powerful than normal, but the method of acquiring such a transformation is still baffling. Now there’s a way to force it. That’s what the blood is. A means to have your eldrin transcend into its perfect form.” Maddox held up both hands as he said it, his fingers spread.
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> Calisto chuckled, but didn’t offer commentary.
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> “I’m skeptical,” I said as I picked up the vial and turned it over in my hand. “How do I know it works?”
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> Maddox removed his tricorn hat and then yanked off his blue bandana. His hair, slick with sweat, was stuck to one side and puffed on the other—but his arcanist mark demanded all my attention.
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> It glowed red. The star. The typhoon dragon.
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> A part of me had feared the vials of blood were the arcane plague, but I thought this was too far in the past for that to be the case. Now I knew they were. The Marshall of the Southern Seas had been infected, and the plague had gone on so long—he had consumed enough magic—that he now had a dread form dragon as an eldrin.
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> - Plague Arcanist
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