“Again”

The envelope lay there, stubborn and unmoving. The apprentice rolled up his sleeves and reached out, tracing the dark ink lines and feeling the fire play upon his fingers once more.

The master sighed and grabbed at the misshapen ball of paper as it flung itself off the desk. He reached out for another strip of stamps but hesitated. Instead he reached for his quill and beckoned the young student to watch.

“Maybe this’ll help” With fine strokes of the quill he quickly defined the borders of Llyria. He spoke while sketching another below. “Don’t get too hung up on the stamps themselves. They’re guidelines, points for you to sight along to Send. If you know the destination well enough you can cast a decent Sending from a stamp as simple as this.” He gestured to the simple twofold-stamp, one showing merely the outline of the country, the other a rough approximation of the city of Combe. “However, details always help. In time if you take up the art you’ll begin to find your own style. You’ll find some Senders won’t like it. Some prefer very realistic portrayals of the landscape. Others see better from a more pictorial representation. Anyway, pinpointing the location”

After detailing the first two he went on to draw a full fourfold-stamp, explaining the process as he worked. When he was done he passed it over to the apprentice.

“Now, again”

* * *

Several months later a young man hurried out of the stationers, the twofold mark of both Sender and Stampmaker proudly visible on the lapel of his jacket.

Arriving home, he quickly laid his new purchases out. True, they had cost most of the pay from his first commission but a good quality ink and a true Gryphon feather could do wonders in defining a Sending.

The Kingdom of Llyria was almost reflexive now to sketch. Aben, less so. The city dated back to before the days of Sending and the city planning guidelines of the Cartographer’s Guild. As such it was a nightmare of uneven house placements that made it such an awkward place to Send to. Which is where local knowledge of the Sender could help so much.

Finishing the layout of the city in his second stamp he finalised the threefold stamp by detailing the neighbourhood of the Aben Central Post. From here the Dawn Post would, hopefully, collect the letter from the empty building in the morning and distribute it by hand to the addressee.

Putting down the quill and sealing the stamp to the envelope he reached out to it. Feeling the now familiar beginnings of Power twirling around his fingers he let the sparks dance their patterns along the ink, searing its image to the envelope below. Then, with a final flourish, he Sent the letter.