Meran's room

The room was medium in size but looked small because of the sheer amount of possessions that Meran had crammed haphazardly into it.

Thick dust carpeted the floor, broken only by the tracks of Meran’s feet going back and forth from the different items in the room. Cobwebs filled the corners of the room but were kept clear of Meran’s magical possessions.

The walls were lined with bookcases, stuffed full of thick leather-bound tomes containing ancient spells and enchantments. The edges of the pages were aging and yellowed but well cared for, the leaves of books well loved by someone who knows and loves books in general.

Here and there racks of thick, fat scrolls took up space, untidily arranged but carefully placed away from windows so that the sunlight may not fade their ink.

Above a small, messy bed that looked like it should have been replaced at least a decade before were shelves full of glass jars. Potion ingredients fill these jars, a bright array of different liquid and powders, leaves and herbs, and shrivelled nameless things.

Next to the bed was a large cauldron, full of a thick blue potion bubbling away quietly, a mixture that would coat an amulet to protect Meran from bad luck and evil spirits.

In the centre of the room sat Meran on a spindly old stool, gazing into his most prized possession; a large scrying glass.

It was by far the cleanest thing in the room, polished to perfect clarity. The table on which it rested was large and sturdy, in a way that was totally out of proportion with the rest of Meran’s furniture. His stool, his bed, and the little tables under the window were all rickety, ancient things, but he would not trust his precious scrying glass to anything so frail.

Around the base of the table runes were inscribed, runes of strength, balance and good fortune. They were clumsily etched into the grain by Meran himself, with little skill at woodwork but much knowledge of runes and the magic imbued in them.

The more fragile tables under the window held no such engravings, the trinkets they held being important but easy to replace. The surface of these tables was speckled with light patches of dust, and cluttered with amulets and wards. Here and there were some more powerful items, artefacts that would warn Meran of any evil likely to befall him in the near future. Placed to front, clearly the favourite of these, was an object shaped like a horn which would alert Meran if anyone spoke his name, and relate to him the conversation in which it appeared.

The rest of the room was crowded with piles of more common books, books full of magic that Meran hadn’t seen fit to get bound properly. These dotted the room in towering piles, precarious to say the least. A few weak charms lay over the towers to help prevent them from toppling over as the wizard hurried from place to place gathering whatever he needed at the time.

From the ceiling hung a fragile glass lamp that slowly filled with light as the sky outside grew dark.