Introduction
This is a sample from chapter two of my upcoming novella, Misplaced Fools. We are introduced to the Highly Inadvisable Magical Practices Building, and we meet the wizard-lawyer Xammin.
It should be noted that Xammin is not a condemnation of all laywers. Some of the best people I know are or were lawyers. I have nothing against lawyers. However, I despise ammoral lawyers who use the law as a weapon. I think that is made very clear, but try to keep that in mind.
If you woul like to read a sample of chapter one, you can do so here.
Misplaced Fools Preview
The Inadvisable Magical Practices Building was a giant ebony block of a building. A gleaming ebony chunk stood solid and unbroken. It was as though the wizards had pulled a complete structure from the ground.
Magical experiments had once been common. What happened? Parts of the university rained down upon the surrounding city. Demons hunted people in the night and subjected them to math quizzes. People woke up as pot plants, venomous reptiles, or even city planners. Something had to be done. And so, they built the Inadvisable Magical Practises Building to contain such vast dangerous magic. So, they built a building which absorbed incoming and outgoing magic.
Their research required vast piles of gold. They wisely thought it best to avoid the sort of complaints that had the unfortunate tendency to reduce their funding. The Inadvisable Magical Practices Building served them well in that regard. They were smart enough to realize it was harder to gather money from people if they were newts or dead.
Experiments mattered to the ancient wizards. In more recent times, they had concluded experiments were futile and they should instead prove their assertions on a blackboard. Experiments were messy. Why go through the trouble of experiments? A good math proof was vastly superior! Math rarely exploded and seldom required piles of pesky paperwork.
Why spend enormous sums of money on magical experiments? No, the money was better spent on funding the wizards’s debate clubs. That was far less dangerous and less difficult. Besides, what was so great about magic? It got them no closer to unraveling the mysteries of the universe. No wonder the building was mostly empty!
Esmer stormed into the front offices of the building. A familiar mountain of muscle sat completing paperwork. The massive wizard was Xammin, one of the Chancellor’s talented and ruthless young lawyers. Esmer decided she had better tread carefully around him.
Xammin was the sort of thick brick house of a man who pumped weights in his sleep. Esmer watched him sit at a desk in a well-tailored blue suit bulging with hundreds of pounds of pressure. She expected him to fall to the floor and start effortlessly bench-pressing the desk for a warm-up. Esmer suspected that he woke up, ate six raw ostrich eggs, bench-pressed a whale, and then ate nails for breakfast.
Those with limited imagination thought that it was impossible to develop biceps and brains. They thought him stupid. Xammin proved that was a dangerous fallacy. His eyes had the penetrating intensity of a religious zealot. Unlike the zealot, he didn’t need a rack to take your secrets from you. He could flex his muscles, sigh, and stare at you with diamond eyes. Most men confessed their deepest and darkest secrets.
His mastery of the law was as powerful as his body. Xammin had graduated top of his class in ninth dimensional magical law. He had beaten dozens of the city’s best legal minds into submission with his powerful mastery of the law. He had a tongue so skillful it could outsmart even the most cunning weasel.
Xammin did not acknowledge her as she approached his desk. He wrote at a frantic pace, his hands moving in a blur. His pen’s neat calligraphy appeared printed rather than hand-written. She peered at the paperwork and noticed he was busy signing off on legal waivers.
“The University of Esoterica denies liability for any loss, including, but not limited to: loss of limb, life, income, sanity, continued physical tangibility, and presence in this dimension. The university denies liability for any other form of loss or damage, real or imagined,” Esmer said. She put the paper down and pinched her brow before continuing.
“The university cannot be accountable for any actions, whether said actions violate this contract or law. Reading this contract is forfeiture of legal rights in the past, present, future, and all parallel dimensions and universes.”
Esmer raised her eyebrows and frowned as she pointed to the dubious legalese. “That seems excessive, even for your people. I don’t think any sane court of law will uphold a word of it!”
“Esmer, you know the answer to that,” Xammin said. He shook his head with disappointment. “I know better than to draft a waiver that cannot hold up in court. That is as foolish as prosecuting a case I know I cannot win.” He scoffed. He shook his head as though she had proposed that he walk up into the sky.
“But what of rights? Don’t they matter?”
“What is the connection between rights and law? How do rights safeguard the university?”
Esmer felt her blood run cold. She would not continue this line of questioning. She respected those lawyers interested in protecting rights, but Xammin was no such lawyer. Xammin was a lawyer who gave the others a bad name. He sought to shield his client at all costs. Xammin had no interest in justice. He saw it as a spiked shield to protect his client from the consequences of his actions. To Xammin, the law was a weapon to bludgeon and gore his opponents into submission.
“You wish to engage in inadvisable temporal practices?” He crossed his arms and his biceps strained against his suit.
“Easelstein wants to time travel,” said Esmer. She did not know what Albie’s intentions were. However, wasn’t it obvious? He had likely run right ahead of him to sell his crazy idea before she pointed out how insane it was.
“I heard about that wild time travel scheme of his. Do you think we will not cover our asses for time travel?!” He shook his head in disbelief. “I’ve never attempted time travel and never will. But I can imagine the trouble now. Imagine if someone comes back from the past and says we wiped out humanity! It is a massive liability to handle! What is the precedent? Which forms do you fill out? It would be a mess!”
“Morality is more than liability forms.”
“I am a lawyer. What do I care about morality?” He asked. He shrugged nonchalantly and shoved the forms at her.
Esmer knew why people called lawyers sharks. She knew enough lawyers to know it was an unfair generalization. However, then there were people like Xammin. They were grinning predators with rows of razor-sharp teeth who waited for blood in the water so they could devour their prey. That the shark bided its time, wore an expensive suit, and showed a polite smile made it no less deadly.
“Easelstein told me what you folks are doing. Interested in discussing or joining them? Well, you had better sign!” Xammin said. He pushed the stack of papers into her hands. She flicked through it, noting it was at least four thousand pages of tightly written legalese.
“How am I to read this massive tome?” she objected. She figured it she would require take five days to read the waiver, assuming the lawyers had written it sensibly. It would take her multiple weeks to understand the complex and unclear legal language in the waiver.
“Signatures are nine-tenths of the law. The details are irrelevant. Sign. Don’t like it? Cry to the Dean. I work for the Chancellor. Sign, or return to your office with a null result….” He leaned back in his chair with a smug grin. Esmer shook her head as she signed the massive booklet of waivers. “Are you happy?”
“That our asses our ironclad? Sure, sister!” He grinned. Esmer smirked as she headed through the next set of doors.
I hope you enjoyed this excerpt of my upcoming book! Look out for the published book wherever Phos Press sells its books! More soon!