Chapter 6
I did not sleep well that night, my mind wouldn't stop replaying the conversation with Yu, until the part about digging a tunnel under Atlanta, at least. Then there were running and giggling and flashes of magic light in the hallway. It felt like I had barely closed my eyes when it was time to get up.
I stumbled into the dining hall and had a couple bites of my toast before the assembly bell went. I settled in my seat and was just getting comfortable when I was rudely awakened by a mob of students. Apparently Master Gendun had announced that the day-students could get coaching in the light spell if they were interested. I told them I'd forgotten some words and pointed them in Brook's and Rhe'en's direction before scooting off to homeroom.
I was also counting on an hour of shut-eye in first period but wouldn't you know it, Magic swept in and then I felt the goose bumps brought on by Yu's presence in my mind. He was much more careful this time and started with a small nudge, a sort of clearing of his throat, before saying, "Julie Olsen? Can you come down to the maze? Gendun and Ashlyn are here..." I got up and asked for a pass, which was immediately given - no doubt arranged by our principal.
Ashlyn was again seated on the ground where she had been the last time, and I joined her. I could sense a root reaching out from the Tree. "I have reached the boulder," she confirmed to the others, "and there, the hole is there." That got a smile and a nod from Gendun.
I followed her path down, easing more magic threads in the hole and started wedging it in to free more of the rock out.
After a while, I had another bullet-shaped rock in my hand, but it was even smaller than before, kind of .38 caliber sized.
"Good work, good work!" Master Gendun encouraged. I sat stunned, I had worked harder, but got even less done. Was it true? Was there really an imprint? Did it just vanish? I reached back in the hole and, what the...? I couldn't find my magic threads anymore!
I looked helplessly up and the Medmage stepped forward. Without saying anything she started chanting to create more magic strings. Strange - I had no problems sensing them, and, reaching out, I could move them if I wanted to. So the skill was still there, but why couldn't I find it in the hole? Ahhh...
"Thank you!" I smiled at the Doctor. It was obvious! I had simply used up all the magic in the hole, but there was plenty elsewhere. Actually, an even better source was nearby, sitting right next to me, as a matter of fact.
"Ashlyn, can you feed some magic into the hole?" She nodded, and I could instantly feel the awesome amount of power she controlled. The magic was pure, and delicious! My tiredness vanished as it flooded through me, filling me and beckoning to me. I knew it would obey my slightest whim, one thought and I could make miracles happen. What's one crappy hole when I could make a billion of them? I could carve a tunnel to Australia if I wanted to. The intoxicating power was telling me that this is what a god feels like! Yes! I AM a god! I wanted to tell everyone; I wanted to tell Yu. I looked up and he was staring at me with a frown on his face.
"Are you OK?" He appeared in my head. There was no mistaking the worry in his voice, and some fear too.
Fear? I blinked and closed my eyes. What's wrong with me? I'd never been like this before... not since my friend Maddie and I stole some hard lemonade from Kate's office and drank it all, then I spent the night throwing up.
I was high! High from the amazingly wonderful feast that was Ashlyn's magic! I pulled back, and took a few deep breaths before whispering hoarsely to Ashlyn, "Shut it down, it's too much. I can't handle it." Not without drowning in its tempting and addicting oblivion.
When I was sure I was myself again, I looked up and whispered at Yu, "Thank you, it was kinda close." The relief in his eyes told me everything I needed to know.
"OK, let's start again," I said to Ashlyn, "when I ask, just give me a tenth, no, a hundredth of what you just did. Your stuff is just too fucking good." I shivered just thinking about it, "I don't know how you can do it!"
This time, even though I was much more careful with the power, the hole went quickly, as chunks of rock rained around my feet. Two more 'squirts' of magic from Ashlyn later and I was through with the boulder.
"There's another rock just past this one, but if you move a foot to the left and up two, you'll get past it." I told her.
She tried, but apparently the root can only have so much 'bend' in it, no more than 2 to 3 inches for every foot of travel. Another headache, but not impossible. I thought about it, then asked Yu to walk out to the Garden to show me the spot where we needed to come out of the ground. By gently curving and adjusting my new tunnel for that point, Ashlyn and I wouldn't have to make any awkward repositioning of her root.
It was a couple of hours later, with a few breaks in between for so-called 'recharges,' and Ashlyn had a clear shot the rest of the way.
Gendun rushed us to the Garden to see the results, not that there was anything obvious, but he was almost dancing between the blooms, clearly elated over what appeared to be an answer to the major problem with the lei-lines. There was little doubt the power was getting through - I was getting buzzed just standing there and Yu was almost glowing with it.
He looked at me, frowning, "How are you feeling?"
"The magic was too good, it almost sucked me in..." I whispered to him.
"I'm glad it didn't." He gave me a solemn look, "I don't want to lose my goddess."
"No, I won't ever let it take over like that again. Not ever." I assured him. "How can you not let it affect you? How'd you be able to soak up everything Ashlyn can't handle?"
He thought about it, "Again, I have no words to describe it, but I know which part of me can safely absorb magic, and which cannot."
"Yes... you mentioned something like that before..." I thought about him using his silver threads to 'eat' magic. I looked down at my arm, and, yep, I have the same silver threads too! Just not quite in the same numbers. So...
"Are you alright, Julie?" Gendun stopped his waltz of the flowers to ask.
"She pushed herself quite hard." Yu supplied.
"Yes, you must be tired. I hope you see what you did was excellent - excellent work indeed." He smiled. "You know I appreciate your efforts. Why don't you and Ashlyn take the rest of the morning off and we'll reconvene here after lunch?"
Which really only meant we had an extra 30 minutes or so before lunch to get the dust off our skin and clothes. On the way to the showers I was still trying to figure out how to get the magic to go to the silver threads instead of the blue ones, then I realized something.
"How come you don't look a bit dirty?" I asked Ashlyn, "You were sitting next to me and I've got at least ten pounds of dirt and crap on me!"
"I just made sure they don't stick to me, is all."
"Whuh?" I said.
"The dust and dirt do not belong on me. So they can stay only with my permission, right?" She told me matter-of-factly.
"Sure... It's makes sense when you say it, kinda. Is it like telling the oak how not to get damaged?"
"No, no, it's not like that. Once the oak learns, it'll know to do it, but the dirt, I have to keep chasing it off!"
"Sooooo, I can tell the dirt to get off me too?"
"You should... I don't see why not - you've got enough power!"
"Well, that's good to know... But HOW? Can you do it for me?"
"No, it's your body! YOU have to tell them to get off!"
I turned to the crud on my arms, but no amount of "Get the hell off me!" made me any cleaner. "Maybe I got the hard-of-hearing dirt!"
"No," Ashlyn laughed, "You're just not saying it right, that's all."
"OK, let's see you say it!" I wiped one of my grimy hands on her. "There, now make it..." I stared as the smudge flaked off her arm. "Freaking weird! Do it again, slowly, as slowly as you can!" This time I could see her soft green aura push out, just a little, just enough to dislodge the pieces of dirt.
That seemed simple enough but, by the time the Lunch bell went, all I could manage was more sweat over my grime and to thoroughly impress Ashlyn with my extensive vocabulary of swear-words.
I hurriedly dunked my face and arms in water and we headed for the dining hall.
"Hey that's Rhe'en!" Ashlyn said.
"Yeah, and she's not happy." She was surrounded by her veggie friends from the first seating and I could sense, within her, a dark green flow pulsing madly behind the swirling grey of her glamor.
"STOP IT!" I yelled, "Leave her alone!" I elbowed my way through and pulled her out of the crowd. Ashlyn took her from me and started cooing to her in a soft voice.
"What the hell do you freaking idiots think you're doing?" They took one look at the screaming, filth-encrusted maniac with hair plastered all over her face and, wisely, scattered.
I turned back at Rhe'en, "What the hell happened!" She shrank into Ashlyn's hold, shivering. Her colors were almost wearing through the magic disguise.
"Stop, please stop! You're scaring her!" Ashlyn pleaded, then resumed her soft singing.
"Uhhh, I'm sorry, Rhe'en." I knelt down next to them, "It's OK, I'm not mad at you - I just wanted to get those guys away from you, alright?" I pasted an idiot's smile on my face, "See? The scary witch is gone now! OK?"
"Yeah, that's a good imitation of a nightshade you did!" Brook, who had walked up, commented.
"Who sounded like a Screaming Banshee!" Giggled Barka, then shied away when I pretended to throw something at him.
I turn back to Rhe'en, "So... what happened?"
"The day students, t-they kept asking me to help them with the s-spell... but there were too many of them!" She finally replied.
"OK, no more crap from them - from now on you're sitting with us!" I decided, turning to Brook, "Back me up on this..."
"Hey, no prob! We'll just let Master Gendun know we're working on the spells together!"
We took Rhe'en to our table, and I realized I was quite hungry. As I was eating, I could tell Ashlyn was sending a stream of dark green, almost black, threads into Rhe'en.
"Are you feeding Rhe'en?"
"Something like that," Ashlyn replied, "In nature we would absorb it from the plants around us but Rhe'en needs strength now and I can share some of mine with her."
"I can take over now, if you want a break." I said, shoving the last bit of food in my face.
"You... Ahh, right, you can copy it."
"Exactly." I gave my hand to Rhe'en and fed the same rich green strands to her. Rhe'en was visibly getting stronger and her swirling gray glamor settled much more firmly on her. "Rhe'en, how much energy do you need?"
"I'll be OK soon, you can stop if you want."
"No, I mean, like, how much can you use?" She gave a little shrug, "OK, just tell me when you've had enough." I turned to Ashlyn, "How 'bout giving me a 'squirt?' " And just like that, I was floating in the warm, sudsy caresses of her magic.
I converted that into the green stuff for Rhe'en, who was noticeably steadier by the minute. Her glamor settled on her so that it no longer bothered me to look at her face. In fact I was staring at her. She still looked the same girl, yet moment by moment, she was changing.
"Y-you're beautiful!" Barka blurted out. And we nodded our agreement around the table.
"Why, thank you...!" Rhe'en replied, with a brilliant smile. Complete with dimples, fer crying out loud! "You're not so bad yourself!" She started giggling, then frowned and stopped. She turned to me, "I think I've had enough, now!"
"Wow, sorry. I'm sorry!" I yanked my hand away, "I didn't mean to overdo it!" The harrowing experience of almost drowning in the magic was still way too fresh in my mind.
"Not your fault, Julie." Rhe'en patted my arm, "It's just that I've never had this much power before. It's not something I could normally get from nature." She closed her eyes, "It feels good, right; like what we SHOULD be, I am certain. Perhaps we lost something when the magic faded, or when the tree groves were cut down..."
"How long can you stay like this?"
"A day, maybe more." She gave us her eloquent shrug.
"So same time tomorrow? Or just find me when you need a recharge." I offered, and that got me a dazzling dimpled smile. I found myself liking this Rhe'en, a lot.
The class bell went. "We need to have our meeting with Master Gendun," Ashlyn reminded me.
"Will you be back in time for gym?" Sheila asked.
"Of course." Brook nodded, "she needs to be back by fifth period," she aimed a ghoulish smile at me, "for algebra."