It is deadly quiet. The trees are perfectly still. The cliff walls, hiding behind the fallen underbrush, resist even the smallest echo. The sky is still. Time is still.

The air is thin now, too fickle to make me feel hot or cold. A cabin nestles against the cliffside brush. Kenneth looks at the cabin, and then looks at me. His face is calm, dignified.

We approach the cabin door, twigs cracking under our shoes. Above the firm oak door is a small stained-glass window. Its colored tiles are muted by the sunlight, reduced to a formless web of shapes.

Kenneth steps in front of me and opens the door, which gives way silently. I step inside. The air smells faintly of oil and wood shavings. To my left is a tan coat hanger, on which hangs a robe and a pair of thin-soled slippers. Underneath my feet is a grey wolf pelt.

The door clicks closed behind me. I hear a deep sigh.

"Finally, we're alone! Ha ha." Kenneth laughs awkwardly.

I feel his hand on my shoulder. I turn to face him.

"Iris, surely you know, at this point, why it is that I brought you here?" Kenneth is crouching, facing me eye-to-eye.

The question hangs in the air.

"Come on, spit it out."

"You want me... to become your apprentice," I answer softly.

"Right you are!" He lifts his hand off my shoulder and onto his knee. "You see: this is why I knew you were the one. With any other child your age, my hinting would be way over their head... or they'd think it's some stupid game." Kenneth's lips widen into a grin. "Of course... learning to use one's life force to manipulate matter is far from a game. Take your shoes off and follow me. I will show you what it means to be a mage."

My heart beats faster as I tear off my shoes. I follow Kenneth through the coatroom corridor and into a stately living room. To the left, richly upholstered chairs face a brick fireplace, lightly coated with ash. A plush, white fur rug covers the open floor. At a table with chairs to the right sits an unfolded map, a protractor, a compass, a stack of papers and a flint pen with a honing stone. On the opposite wall is a bookcase with a collection of books, more stacks of folded papers, drawers, and small crates. The top two shelves are nearly empty. A chandelier hangs from the ceiling...

I look to my left and notice Kenneth leaving through a door, not bothering to wait for me. I run to catch up.

The next room looks not unlike a kitchen. There are furnaces, pots, buckets, cabinets... but on the upper shelves are more unusual things: a surplus of thick books, jars of powder, sealed pouches, and many sizes of empty glass flasks...

We reach a metal door with neither a knob nor a handle. Kenneth places his palm upon its center. A moment passes, and then I hear a click. The door swings open on its own.

We enter a third room, which looks partly like a library, partly like an emporium, and partly like an armory. Kenneth's fingers stretch out, brushing the metal blades, bows, and twisted staffs which hang against one side of a bookshelf. He then licks a finger and slides it along a series of books, pausing to pull out a green-bound tome with gilded script, titled "Focus and M.A.N.A.: Volume II."

"This is where, you could say, all the magic happens." Kenneth lays the book upon a podium and opens the cover. He flips through the pages one by one until, finding something, he pokes his finger through the thick of the tome and spreads the pages flat.

Kenneth reads for a few minutes, then closes his eyes. His face relaxes. His breathing deepens.

A current of warmth makes me stiffen instinctively. An inescapable feeling convinces me that something big is about to happen. I feel a distinct presence begin to grow. I reach for it, but it falls out of my grasp like the falling step on a Jacob's Ladder. My eyes focus on Kenneth. He is at the center of this strange presence.

Kenneth's eyes open and focus upon me. His eyes now glow silver. He raises his hands with a smirk. I feel a faint rumble.

A sliver of violet light appears in front of Kenneth. It spreads around him as it widens, its center becoming whiter and paler. Light begins to bend around its edges, its immediate surroundings deprived of color. It is half a meter tall now. Stars appear in its grey center and spread outward. The purple at its edges grows thinner as a grey haze spreads out from the source. The strange form is now over a meter wide in every direction.

I knew this man was more than just a stage magician.

Kenneth's breath itself echoes from the walls as he inhales to speak. "I am a mage of void." His voice booms with energy. "I study the flames which rage beneath the bedrock, whose billows formed the rifts of the Farlands. I practice the magic of forgotten memories and forbidden worlds. This hole you see is a rift into the deep void, the stuff which flows between other worlds." He plunges his hand into the starry grey cloud. His crazed silver eyes flicker and then glow even brighter. "I coexist with the element of destruction, the substance in which even the soul dissolves. What could tear my flesh from bone has instead made me stronger. What could steal all my knowledge has instead made me wiser. What could destroy my being has instead defined my very existence. Void fire is as much a part of me as the blood which flows through my veins!"

He pulls his hand out. The rift collapses with a sharp crack. Kenneth's eyes, still fixed upon me, lose their silver glow. "However, the void is not for weak minds. If given the chance, it will burn every part of you. Given enough time, it will break into your mind, destroying what you know and believe, and you will then feel the distinct pain of nothingness. However, if you befriend the void, you will gain access to its ever-burning flame, you will gain its deep connection with knowledge and the mind, and you can use its energy as if it were your own. If you become my apprentice, I will teach you everything I know about magic and the void. Do you accept?"

"I accept." I respond immediately, both blessing and loathing my decision. The danger feels so real... but so does the power. The intrigue of magic, the glorious stories of mages I've read in books, the hope of harnessing such energy as my own... all are too much to resist.

"Wonderful... although I must admit that I am not surprised at all. You always try to hide your excitement about magic, but I know your feelings are greater than they appear. You becoming my apprentice was inevitable."

"And yet you had to drag this process on, just to make sure." I smile.

"For a while, yes, but let us not forget that you also had cold feet, worrying what your life would be like without your parents and your friends. I was beginning to doubt you could handle the change, but then my doubts were proven wrong." Kenneth closes the book and puts it away.

There he goes about my parents and my friends again. Why does he have to keep reminding me of them? It just makes it harder for me to not miss them, when I really should be focusing on magic right now...

How long am I going to be away from home?

"Jeez, I got carried away," Kenneth admits. "I guess I'm just so enamored with void magic that I had to share it with you, you being my new apprentice and all. I guess I should give you a tour, then."

Kenneth explains the various aspects of the magic room, its many books, its weapons, and strange crafting devices. When we leave, the metal door closes behind us. Kenneth continues the tour through the kitchen which is part alchemy lab, and across the living room, toward the wall of bookshelves. We turn left, and enter a room which is rather empty for its size, having only a twin bed with a nightstand and a dresser across from it. The mattress is bare, with neatly folded bed sheets stacked on top of it. Light streams in calmly from a small window next to the bed. The air smells fresh.

"This is where you will sleep," Kenneth says. "It's a work-in-progress, since I've moved into this house quite recently."

The reality of my new home sinks in. I imagine laying under the covers of the bed at night, casting magic light spells to make shadow puppets.

"Now I'll show you my room."

Kenneth leads me across the living room and into a study, complete with a tilted desk and a haphazardly filled bookshelf. Beyond this room is a half-closed door. Through it I can see a sofa next to curtained windows. Kenneth opens the door, revealing a grand draped bed with a nightstand on one side and a chest in front. To its left are a pair of dressers and a fur rug.

"I just thought I'd let you see it so as to satisfy your curiosity. As a general rule, however, you are not allowed inside, and you shall not disturb me. If the matter is urgent, you must knock, but you must not, under any circumstances, enter. The same rule applies to the study we are standing in. Do I make myself clear?"

I nod.