The Dramatis Personæ is the roster of conjurers and sentient magical creatures staying in the many rooms, grottos, and byways of Lita’s castle. Here is an entry in the guest book for the Clockpunk Wizard Wing.
Bright [brīt] proper noun, c.1000; ME >OE beorht, breht > Gothic bairht, Old Saxon beraht, Old Norse bjartr; < berkto- Welsh berth “splendid”; L flagrāre “to blaze”; Albanian bardhë “white”; Sanskrit bhrājate “shines”; also Brighton
- Profession: Assistant for Wizard Kadmeion
- Race: Narfleet (a half-blood with a human mother and elf father), male
- Appearance: blue eyes, blond hair, medium build
- Full Name: Wolverhampton Brighton M’Choakenchilde
- Formal Title: Twice-Seventh Son Mage
- Honorifics: Honorable Mage, Sir Bright
- Education: Master Magician in the Clockwork Arts, summa cum laude, Agatha University of Magical Arts and Sciences
- Milieu: Bright is a denizen of the Clockpunk Wizard world.
Bright is the seventh son of Elf Mage Higginbotham Norfiwyn M’Choakenchilde (a Seventh Son Mage) and Sorceress Wode Rilmandra. Bright’s father is a Prince of the Elf Court, and his mother has the court title of Princess. Bright’s grandfather, Wolverhampton, is also an Elf Mage Prince of the Court. Bright grew up on the floating island of Dolphin Barns, named after its extensive rookeries of nesting land porpoises.
Because of his human mother and twice-seventh son lineage, his parents hoped that Norfiwyn’s seventh son would be a rare elf wizard (wizardry is a human magic). When Rilmandra became pregnant with Bright, Norfiwyn hired Wizard Pursuance to be his son’s magical caretaker.
Pursuance was unable to control his greed. He enchanted the helpless babe in his crib and siphoned Bright’s magic for his own use. This magical parasite damaged Bright’s wizardry potential, and most of his native elf magic, beyond repair. Growing up was a trial. Bright’s weak magical ability made him the target of his older brothers’ teasing. The school bullies were especially trying.
To escape the taunts and magical humiliation, young Bright went to the forests and orchards and excelled at tree climbing. Never once did the lad fall. Rilmandra, hopeful that her son would someday be a mage, attributed his aerial safety to the remnants of his wizardry.
When Bright moved to Agatha to attend the university, he apprenticed as a rig monkey in the zeppelin yard. He intended to sign up for the Airship Guild after graduation. Professor Morton introduced Bright to the soon-to-graduate Kadmeion, and the young wizard recognized Bright’s great magical potential. Kadmeion took on the damaged narfleet as a wizard’s assistant despite the naysayers who insisted it was a fool’s decision. Kadmeion had known the now deceased Wizard Pursuance. This familiarity with Bright’s magical attacker allowed Kadmeion to correct most of Bright’s damage. However, for Bright to work all but the simplest spells, the narfleet must share a profound magical binding with an accommodating wizard.
Bright’s love of trees blossomed into Arboriculture, which was his undergraduate minor at Agatha. His passion was cultivating oak trees.
He converted the bay window of his dormitory room into a quercetum, filled it with saplings, and lavished his scant enchantments on them. His roommates swore that when Bright talked to his pet trees, they answered the narfleet in sighing whispers.
Lita Burke 