1 - Invitation

“This one?!” Bjørn asked perplexed while drying the insides of a large beer glass behind the bar, “You want this one to be the next Guildcrafter? You’re joking right?”

Astrid smiled, turning her gaze up to the stout man. He had short onyx colored hair with a well-kept beard, and dark brown eyes. As per usual he wore an ironed formal black shirt with a khaki bow-tie, pants, and suspenders. Astrid waited a moment, “Yes, I’m sure of it, just look at him.” The pair gazed at the screen on the bench where they were watching. Four small black cubes made each corner of the screen where in each corner, two streams of blue-white light burst forth in a channel that connected to one of the cubes in the other corner. This created a membrane of light with a white backing, allowing Bjørn to see the man Astrid was watching. She returned to staring back at the screen and the pair saw a panicked young man sprinting from something just out of view.

Bjørn huffed, “Seems like a coward to me. What makes you so sure he would be a good Guildcrafter anyway?”

Astrid stroked some of her straight blonde hair out of her face, “You always were one for only taking people at face-value, you haven’t seen what he’s been through. He’s had to endure so much, for so long, and he kept fighting. This is someone who has bravery and patience. In other words, the perfect candidate to be a Guildcrafter.”

“Stalker.” Bjørn chuckled, “You’ve always been one to over-plan and calculate. Are you doing even more since –”

Astrid slammed her fist on the bench, her glasses becoming crooked from the fury she unleashed, “Shut it!” She took a deep breath, calmed down, and corrected her glasses, “What happened back then wasn’t my fault, none of us could have seen that coming.” She met his eyes, then turned towards the fireplace that bathed the room in an orange hue behind the darkly stained wooden chairs and tables that were neatly arranged around the large room. Artworks with gilded golden frames lined the walls, and the only thing the pair of them could hear were the crackling flames, each other, and the silence that mingled in-between.

Bjørn set the glass aside, “Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.”

Astrid sighed as she turned back to him, “Yeah, I know.”

He leaned on his arms after finishing with the glass to get a better look at the paused video on the man running, “Let’s move on, what else makes you so sure that this one will be a good candidate?”

Astrid perked up at that, a new sparkle in her eyes as she corrected her glasses, “Well a Guildcrafter has to be humble – able to admit when they’re wrong. They must be willing to lead, a good team player, and able to stand up for what they believe in. They need to be creative, and have a critically thinking mind, seeing both sides before coming to a conclusion. Above all though, they must be willing to listen, and be positive and hopeful. If they can’t be positive or hopeful, then there is no chance that they can become a Guildcrafter. This one has all these traits, and his hope has stood many tests. He’s been downtrodden and disrespected, but still gets up again, still moves forward. There was a time this one almost gave up, but a friend got him back on track.”

Bjørn poured himself and Astrid a drink, “Sounds like the perfect guy for the job then, so why isn’t he here already? Especially if you’ve watched him and reviewed his history for so long?”

Astrid pushed down on the cube immediately to her right and the other three cubes were summoned as if by strong magnetism to the one cube, immediately closing the screen, “Frustratingly, the door on his end won’t open for him yet, and no matter what I try, I can’t establish a connection.” She turned to the door, “You hear me, you stupid piece of junk! Why won’t you just let him in already?!”

Bjørn took a long swig of his beer before setting it down, “The door doesn’t talk you know. It might be an advanced piece of tech that allows people to travel long distances instantly, but it can’t talk.”

Astrid picked up her glass and stared at the door through the translucent red wine, “I know, but there’s just got to be something, something that will get this connection to work.”

“Did you try turning it off and on again?” Bjørn smirking, and laughing quietly at his own joke.

“Ha ha, very funny.” She said back sarcastically, not even looking at him, her focus intensely on the door trying to solve the problem, “But in all seriousness, why isn’t the connection working? It works fine for me and for you, otherwise we wouldn’t be here. Other candidates have come through. Other Guildcrafters haven’t had any issues either, so what makes this one so special, that I can’t get a connection through to summon him?”

“Well, has he met all the criteria for the connection to even be established?”

She swung back around to him, “What do you mean? This isn’t my first Guildcrafter I’ve worked with, but I haven’t heard about any ‘criteria’ before.”

“Wait… You weren’t taught this?”

“No.”

“You know they have to open and read the message, then hold it while opening a door for the connection to be established right? It even says that on the message.” Astrid started to turn red, and Bjørn knew how much Astrid hated being embarrassed, so he quickly moved on, “If the candidate hasn’t even opened the message, there’s no way for the connection to be established, so the doors won’t connect, and the candidate can’t be summoned.”

Astrid started to ponder and mutter to herself and pressed the cubes to make the large screen on the bench again. She swiped and scoured through the data, and started at the first message delivery. But when this new candidate opened the letter, he threw it away callously. When she tried again, the same thing happened. Bjørn observed, stretched, and massaged a sore spot on his shoulder. He could feel the ‘I told you so’ moment coming, but held it in.

“I can hear you, you know.” The first words Astrid murmured after all the muttering and frantic searching through the data, “You’re about to say, ‘I told you so’, aren’t you?”

“Yup. Told ya so.” Bjørn smiled rotating his head from side to side to get a crack out of his neck, “You aren’t stealing that moment from me.”

Astrid studied the screen again, and with a few waves of her hands, had split the large single screen into a series of smaller ones with a little notepad open and what appeared to be a pen made from light in her hand. She started to spin it around her thumb, “Why is he just throwing them away though? It’s the opportunity of a lifetime. Being a Guildcrafter is one of the rarest opportunities one can get!”

“Maybe it’s too unbelievable for him? Remember, we can’t talk about what Guildcrafters even are outside of a few areas. So, to him, this could just look like a scam.”

She continued to twirl the pen around her thumb, “So, how do I get him to believe?”

Bjørn sighed, “Well, we can’t force them, they just have to follow the instructions. It’s just how becoming a Guildcrafter works.”

“Maybe, I try this instead…” She began to write.

“What are you doing?”

“A different strategy.”

Bjørn started to read the notes she was taking. Except he could see there weren’t just notes, she was writing a personal letter to the candidate. He knew he had to stop this, “Wait, you aren’t seriously going to send that to him, are you? That’s against our rules. You know that.” Bjørn’s tone changed to something very firm and serious, “Astrid, if you send that, you would lose your title as the Head Steward for all your Guildcrafters, and then they will all go back to dreary lives. Is that what you want?”

“The Seniors don’t need to know.”

Bjørn’s voice became more assertive, like a malevolent presence was beginning to emanate from him, “This has to stop. Now. I’m serious Astrid. You know we’re extremely strict on this.”

She stopped writing, and the pen evaporated. She sighed, “Yeah, you’re right.” She closed the document, and all the smaller screens disappeared before she assembled the four cubes back together, “Fine, I’ll be boring.” She threw back the wine in one go and began to ascend a beautifully carved staircase.

“Where are you going?” Bjørn asked, “There’s –”

Astrid interrupted, “I’m going to bed. I need time to think.”

“Fine. Sleep well.”

Astrid waited until later that night. She knew that Bjørn would be around, but even he had to go to sleep eventually, and since they were both here, she had to be careful. While in her room, she opened the letter again and finished writing before pressing a button on the screen. A pair of gloves appeared on her hands similar to the translucent light of the screen appeared. She wore them, and took the written document out of the screen, adjusted the magnification and placed it on a piece of paper. The light vanished, and the document was etched with the light. She quickly folded it, stuffed it in an envelope, and put it in her pocket.

She was proud of her work, certain that this would work, it had to. She could see a lot of potential in this candidate, and she wasn’t going to stop until she could recruit him to be a Guildcrafter. As the night drew on, she heard Bjørn’s footsteps and a door close. She waited patiently until she felt it was safe. The door to her own room, carved with intricate designs and a gold handle never looked more menacing. She could still feel the weight of Bjørn’s words from the conversation at the bar. However, she knew that if he never saw the letter, and it was delivered, then he won’t be any the wiser. The letters always dissolve when a candidate enters through the doorway anyway. Astrid calmed herself, knowing the danger she was putting herself in if she was discovered.  Gently, slowly, she twisted the door handle and carefully opened the door, ensuring not even the sound of the latch working could be heard. She was even more careful as she closed it behind her. A long narrow white and red paisley patterned carpet stretched in both directions with a few small floating blue glowing lanterns lighting the way as she commenced her stealthy journey to the door downstairs. It was the only one in the building that could establish a connection. As she approached the first lantern, two little white eyes blinked to life alongside two small pointy ears, and immediately jumped on her shoulder, purring, and rubbing up against her like a cat. Astrid petted it gently, “Husj Flikk.” She whispered, “We can’t let the grumpy man catch us.”

The blue ball of light nodded, understanding and ceasing to purr simultaneously. Astrid held out her hands like a cup and motioned with her head for Flikk to jump down. It did so willingly, as if it was proud to be of service. As the two traveled down the unlit corridor together, they couldn’t see far in front of them. This was Astrid trying to be as stealthy as possible, and Flikk was well aware of this, sensing her feelings of urgency, fear, and suspense. Flikk turned to look up at her for a moment, confused as to what was going on, but she mouthed for the creature to be quiet.

It felt like an eternity to just get to the stairs, and these stairs were known for creaking, but she had a plan. Now that they were away from Bjørn’s room, and with the fireplace still dimly keeping the main room downstairs illuminated in a light orange glow, she studied the area. No-one was in sight. She could only just hear a faint breathing and whistling from the wind outside. She knew she couldn’t use the railing, and if the stairs creaked even once, Bjørn would be awake and catch her immediately. She hated that he was such a light sleeper, impossible to go to the bathroom at night without waking him up.

With the awareness that she wasn’t skilled enough to use hard light to hold herself up, she had to take each step down the staircase as warily as possible. Every stair felt treacherous, impossible to predict if even one small step could cause a creak to wake Bjørn up. But after a few minutes and some very tactful, cautious footsteps, the pair of them managed to reach the bottom without disturbing Bjørn.

“Whew, we made it.” She thought, relieved. The glowing Flikk leapt up and down in delight at her success, “Now we just have to get to the door. Should all be smooth sailing from here.” From upstairs, she heard a loud yawn… Bjørn’s yawn, “No! No, not now! Go back to bed!” Flikk quickly bounced up the stairs, sensing Astrid’s feelings and what she needed, “Thanks Flikk. I’ll give you lots of treats later for that.” With delicate paces, Astrid quickly made her way over to the main entrance of the bar. Each step carefully placed and taking a second to go from heel to ball of the foot to ensure as much silence as possible. No turning back now. Her heart raced, but this had to work, or Bjørn would never let her send this letter of invitation. She gripped the letter, knowing it had to get through to him. Each slight move made her heart race a little more, and she heard a small commotion from upstairs, likely Bjørn talking to Flikk as it distracted him.

She pulled the envelope out of her pocket and took one deep breath as she reached the main door. The key was already there. As she turned it, she heard the lock release, and could feel how alert Bjørn became. He was approaching. Astrid opened the door to see the man he was hoping for and thrust the letter through, a foreign sunlight streaming into the bar. She took a moment as she looked at the man and whispered, his back facing her, “I know you can’t hear me, but please. You have to answer this time. We need someone like you here. We can’t let them get you too. Please just do what the letter says. You don’t know what’s at stake here.”

She took a long exhale and closed the door behind her, forgetting in that one moment that she was trying to be stealthy, only realizing when it was too late.

In the next instant, a tall, pitch-black smoke-like substance appeared in front of her with piercing, glowing red eyes before materializing into the familiar stocky figure of Bjørn, “What are you doing here so late? Could you not sleep either?”

“Yeah…” She paused with a quick glance at the door behind her, “Yeah, something like that.”

He shook his head, hands on his hips, “You sent it, didn’t you - The thing I warned you about? Just be honest.”

She turned her gaze to the ground, then back to him, “Yes, this was too important. He has to be the next one.”

He frowned and stared at her, “I should report this you know.”

She took in a huge breath, feeling like she needed to have a backup plan, but Bjørn continued, “In this instance I’m not, even though you are a Head Steward. I am here to watch over you, give you the best advice, not enforce what the Seniors do, but no-one can know about this. Do you understand?”

“Of course. Plus, at worst, he just won’t answer anyway.”

He raised an eyebrow, “What if he does?”

“Then we will just have to cross that bridge when we come to it.” She said with cheer and optimism, hiding every other feeling that screamed through her body.

Bjørn turned and began walking back to his room, “You better be right about this.” He paused and turned to her as he began to ascend the staircase, “Well, I’m going back to bed. I suggest you do the same, we’ve got a big day tomorrow if your new Guildcrafter comes walking through that door.” He turned and resumed with a slow, heavy gait back to his room.

Astrid leaned against the door, waiting for him to be gone. Her heart couldn’t stop pounding and she sank to a seated position on the floor. Flikk saw her from the top of the staircase, raced down, and immediately pounced to her and rested on her shoulder. She took one final look at the glimmering embers in the fireplace, “Young man, you better come through that door.”