11th Day of Late Winter 768 n.c
I woke up regretfully from a wonderful dream of Shard. It made me miss her touch, her presence, so much that I could still feel the echoes of my memories throughout my entire being. It was still fairly dark in my room but I could see that the sky outside was beginning to lighten. I fumbled for the lighting rune next to my bed and eventually I found the right one with the light crystals beginning to glow with their strange magical light. I made use of the inhouse and remained amazed that there was nothing in the bowl after doing my business. I put the cork into the bath and let a little bit of water into it, just enough to rub myself down and freshen up. I then considered the clothes that I would wear, deciding upon a dress once more. I dressed and tied up my hair. I hadn't heard a bell yet and decided that the best way I could thank Malkarov would be to prepare breakfast for us. He did tell me that it would be one of my tasks after all. I closed my bedroom door quietly and slowly walked up the stairs to the kitchen floor. I opened cupboards, checking to see what was in each. Taking note of where everything was, I made a decision on what to make. I pulled out some smoked sausages and a hunk of salted pork along with a few eggs and a loaf of bread. I found a large fry pan and a metal rack that could be inserted into the fireplace. It didn't look like it had been used recently. The fire was still burning the same as it had been the previous night, it hadn't died down at all.
"Magic," I said to myself with a smile, then snorted at my surprise. Why would I be so surprised about magic, when that was the whole purpose for my presence?
I inserted the metal rack over the fire and put down the frypan on top of it to heat up. A small slice of butter went into the frypan along with the dried sausages. While they cooked, I sliced up some of the salted pork to go into the frypan and put some butter onto some slices of bread. The salted pork went into the frypan to cook and I rolled around the sausages to ensure that they would cook evenly. Once the pork had finished cooking on one side, I turned it and added the buttered bread into the pan. It was almost all ready and I realised with a start that perhaps I shouldn't have started it without knowing what time Malkarov would rise. I could move it away from the fire to just keep warm, but it wouldn't be quite as nice to taste and would dry out a bit. Just as I made the decision to move it and wait for Malkarov, two bells chimed out. Oh good, that meant that he was awake! I pushed the salted pork and sausages to one side, flipping up the fried bread on top of it all and cracked the eggs into the frypan. I fetched plates from the cupboard we put the bowls away into last night and some cutlery to set the table. My timing couldn't have been more perfect, for Malkarov appeared on the landing just as I was laying the last egg onto the fried bread on my plate.
I stiffened a little and smiled at Malkarov hopefully.
"Fried breakfast?" he asked incredulously, before smiling widely and announcing, "If I had known this would be the benefit, I would have taken you on as an apprentice on your TENTH name day!"
I let out a giggle at his exaggeration and rushed to put the pan and spatula into the little bath tub in the bench. I pushed the rune for hot water and rinsed them both off quickly.
Malkarov joined me, holding two mugs. Before I could push the rune again to turn off the hot water, he put the mugs underneath the pipe and filled both of them up. From a small clay jar he poured a measure of herbs into the mugs one at a time and brought them both over to the table.
"It's an infusion of herbs that I like to have in the morning, to wake me up. Have a try as it is, then add some honey and give it a try," Malkarov told me.
We both sat down and I took a sip of the tea, it had a nice bright and floral flavour. At Malkarov's insistence I added some honey from a small ceramic jar on the table. Taking another sip, I marvelled at the changed flavour. The honey sweetened the tea and managed to bring out a whole host of other flavours that I hadn't even known were there. I let out a little moan and Malkarov laughed at me. Embarrassed, I put a hand over my mouth and refused to meet his eyes.
"I'm sorry Sharien," he said, "I shouldn't laugh when someone compliments me so honestly. Especially after that someone cooks such a wonderful meal."
I looked up at him hesitantly, but his attention was only on the meal in front of him. He put a forkful of food into his mouth and started chewing.
"Mmmmmm," he moaned and our eyes met. Mine widened in shock to match his and we both started laughing so very loudly and for such a long time that I was glad that I had some honeyed tea in front of me to sooth my throat.
We finished our breakfast and cleaned up. Malkarov indicated for me to follow him and we both walked down to the ground floor.
"Most of our practical lessons will be up on the fourth floor," he said, "but for theory, I much prefer to be comfortably seated."
We took seats opposite each other and he asked, "Do you know what magic is?"
I remembered how Shard described it when I told her about my apprenticeship and answered hesitantly, "The arcane is an important force that runs through everything."
His brows furrowed in confusion, "The force theory is not so widely supported, but does have it's proponents. Have you been reading The Force Theory of Magical Origins?"
I shook my head as I replied, "No."
He Hmmmm'd in reply, but continued on, "We aren't sure exactly what magic is or where it comes from. There have been many theories; the force theory among them, but none of them have sufficient evidence or ability to test them to determine which, if any, are true. There are many different ways for us to tap into magic and turn it to our own ends. We use ritual, runes, and combinations of components to cast spells. Other races use different methods, that seem to only work well for them. For instance; the bolt spell, which will be the first offensive combat spell I will teach you, requires both a magical phrase and the use of your staff to cast. Some spells require other material components to cast. For instance, the light spell requires both a magical phrase and a piece of a firefly. The material component will be consumed by the magic and be burned to ash. The other races use other methods. For instance, while we use a magical phrase the Elves use spell-song. They sing their magic into being. I can cast some basic spells through song, but it's very taxing on me. For elves to cast magic through magical phrases, it is similarly difficult. Dwarvish magic is performed through chanting and rune-carving mostly, but their material components are all earth based; metals, rocks and soil."
Malkarov paused for a few moments and I took the opportunity to ask a question, "Which other races have their own forms of magic? Are there any others?"
He nodded before replying, "I understand that Dark Elves have their own distinct magic compared to the rest of the elves, as do orcs. Even goblins and other such creatures, as rudimentary as their magic often is, use different methods. While we use material components, which can sometimes involve bones, I understand that goblins use bones exclusively. Instead of using a staff, they will use a long thigh bone and their material components will often be smaller finger bones and the like. Instead of magical phrases, I believe that they shake a bone necklace in a particular way, or bang two bones together. Some methods of magic blend together, Orcs for instance can use bones a lot more than we do but also use chanting similar to dwarves."
I nodded, taking in this curious aspect of magic. I wondered why different races were limited to certain components, it made me want to ask Shard which sent a pang of sadness through me. Although I was following Malkarov's explanations and descriptions quite well, when Shard told me something I just knew it to be true.
He continued, "Once you manage to cast your first spell we will discover your seeming. Your seeming is how your magic is projected upon the world. Your seeming is almost always linked to the elements, meaning that your spells will appear as fire, wind, earth or water. Your bolt spell may appear as a firebolt, a bolt of hardened wind, a bolt of stone or a bolt of water. Each have their own benefits and limitations. A bolt of fire will set fire to flammable things when it hits, a bolt of wind will push back a person hit by it, a bolt of stone will actually flow through stone to reform on the other side and a bolt of water will put out fires. Now, it may seem that the bolt of water seems the weakest of the four, but the damage that a bolt of water will do to a fire elemental is surprisingly significant."
I wondered what my seeming would be, I would honestly be happy with anything.
"The interaction between spells of different seemings are interesting and no one seeming appears overall to be any more powerful than any other. Some spells do not appear to be affected by the casters seeming and some schools aren't affected at all. That leads us on to the final thing to discover about your magic: we will be able to discern your affinity. This is the trickiest part of learning magic. There are seven different schools of magic: Protection, summoning, divination, enchanting, elementalism, illusion and ritualism. Protection, Summoning, Elementalism and Illusion are all schools involved with casting spells. Enchanting is the art of creating magical items, imbuing items with magic. Divination is the art of telling the future or discovering things and ritualism is the use of specific rituals that often affect life or death." Malkarov explained and honestly the magic of necromancers was something that was often told in stories to scare children. The idea of raising a loved one from the dead to return as a mindless killer was a horrid thought, "The most well known rituals are those that deal with the art of necromancy, reanimating dead things, but there are many other rituals beside those ones. Every wizard has an affinity towards one particular school. Spells of this school are always more powerful than the rest of the schools. The downside is, that just as spells of that school are more powerful, spells of the opposite school are weaker. The overall power level of the wizard seems to determine how powerful the affinity is. The strength of a wizard seems to be predetermined, but some things can influence it. There are certain rituals and artifacts that can increase a wizard's power, but not without sacrifice. Strong wizards will have a stronger affinity than weaker wizards. The strongest wizard I ever saw was Werriska the Red. His affinity was elementalism, he could cast a fireball spell that could melt stone. The opposite of elementalism is enchantment and he could not enchant even a dagger. Even the simplest enchantments were beyond him. My affinity is the opposite to Werriska's, I'm fabulous at enchantments. I can cast some elemental spells, however I can't cast anything more powerful than an explosion of wind; that's my seeming. Even then my explosion of wind isn't very strong."
So Malkarov's affinity was enchantments, which explained all the useful items around his tower and his seeming was wind. I didn't recall seeing him cast any spells, but it would be interesting to see how a wind seeming manifests. It made me more excited to cast my first spell and discover what my seeming would be.
Malkarov continued, "We will start today, after lunch, with elemental spells. The first of which, by tradition I think, will be the light spell. Once you manage to successfully cast it yourself, we will discover your seeming. It may take us a while to discover your affinity, you will have to test out every school and if your overall power isn't great then the difference your affinity makes may be negligible. If that's the case, there won't be any problems. However, if you happen to be very strong in magic and have an affinity towards elementalism, I won't be able to teach you much of my own affinity; enchantment. If this is the case, I'll be able to teach you the basics of most schools but we may have to consider finding another master for you."
I frowned at this final worry, I hadn't even had a chance to get used to Malkarov and his home yet and there was a chance I might have to go somewhere completely different to another wizard?
He chuckled at me, "Don't worry. The chances of you being another Werriska the Red are very slim. The biggest problem with magic, is that after you have successfully managed to cast your first spell you will begin to have an understanding of the feeling of using magic. The more magic that you cast, the more you will feel the connection to it. You may be tempted, at some point to attempt to force the magic. That is, try to cast a spell without one of it's components. This is possible, eventually; but to do it without preparation can be disastrous. It can cause you physical pain and can occasionally kill the wizard. You are sending the elements through your body instead of through the words, actions or materials. When the magic discovers that there are no material components to consume, it will consume you instead."
My eyes widened in shock! Oh dear, I never even considered that using magic could be that dangerous!
"Yes," he said, seeing my reaction, "I can't emphasise this enough. It's very rare that a magical accident like this will happen to someone new to magic, it happens more often when accomplished wizards find themselves in desperate situations and short of components or when trying to practice removing component requirements from spells and taking short-cuts. When we go to visit the Guild in Castlemere, I'll take you to see the magical accidents recovery ward. They have a room, with beds for wizards who have magical accidents. There are usually one or two overconfident wizards recovering there at any one time."
Malkarov stopped there, "Why don't we take a break for a few moments? Go and use your in-house if you need to and fetch me a hot drink, and one for yourself if you like; you did see which jar the herbs were in?"
I stood and nodded to his question, before heading up to my bedroom to use the in-house. There were no leaves or mosses like we had at home to wipe ourselves with, and I wondered whether I should have to just go without when I realised that next to the in-house was a small ceramic jar with a sponge in it. The jar and sponge smelled of vinegar and I assumed that it was placed there for just this reason. I wiped and was about to just throw it down the hole (which wasn't there) just like I would a leaf when I remembered that anything that went there just disappeared and there only seemed to be one sponge. I let out a sigh of relief that I'd picked up on that before I had to ask Malkarov for another sponge, or go sorting through the pit (wherever it was) to retrieve it. Once finished I went upstairs to make both of us a mug of infused herbs and brought them back down to the ground floor.
Malkarov took a sip of his and let out a pleased sigh, "You, my dear girl, are very quickly making yourself indispensable! Missus Rose will be bringing us lunch and dinner today, so we shall continue with your theory until she arrives. Then we shall practice until dinner time. Now to see how much you paid attention!"
As we sipped our hot drinks, Malkarov asked me questions on the magical theory he had already outlined. He asked me to name all the schools of magic, which with the exception of the school of illusion, I managed. I must have remembered enough, for part-way through he congratulated me for my memory, stating that "a memory like yours will do you very well indeed." For each question, whether I got it right or not, he expanded upon his lesson and by the time we had finished it felt difficult to keep all of the information straight in my head.
Eventually a single chime rang out through the tower and I rose quickly to get the door.
AUTHORS NOTE:
This chapter contained a LOT of background and world building descriptions, the next will contain a lot less (and will be out sooner rather than later).
A HUGE thank-you to all of my readers!
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