Nature Mage (39 page)

The large boy stalked out to the back of the room with exaggerated confidence. He immediately summoned a large strike, waiting only long enough to make sure he couldn’t make it any larger, and then thrust it dramatically across the room. Gaspi watched the powerful strike surge across the room, wondering in that infinitesimal moment why Everand had to be so pompous about everything he did. It landed with by far the deepest detonation so far, and the force shield glowed a deep red colour that lasted for several seconds, as the force was slowly absorbed and safely dissipated.

“Very strong, Everand,” Voltan said matter-of-factly. “Ferast!” he called immediately, not giving the large boy a chance to posture. Ferast slid into position, pushing his greasy hair back out of his eyes and hooking it behind his ears. He squinted at the shield and then flipped his hand over, so that his palm was facing upwards. Gaspi was accustomed to the tingling sensation he felt deep in his belly when someone was performing magic nearby, but he couldn’t help noticing that the sensation was the most pronounced when Ferast was summoning his strike, even more so than when Everand had taken his turn. The ball forming in Ferast’s palm grew until it was as large as the one Everand had summoned, and then carried on a little further, stopping at an impressive size. Ferast bent his elbow, brought his hand up behind his head, and flicked out his arm with whip-like speed, releasing the strike at the last possible moment. It flew across the room much more rapidly than Everand’s had, and when it hit the shield there was no doubt in Gaspi’s mind that the detonation was the loudest and the colour the deepest of the whole class. There was an extended moment of silence after the shield had returned to its normal, colourless, state. Ferast was not universally popular and only kept his position by being Everand’s sidekick. Beating the boy whose coattails he clung to didn’t seem the smartest idea in the world to Gaspi, and the silence in the room as Ferast slunk back to his seat seemed to bear that out.

“Gaspi, your turn,” Voltan said, distracting Gaspi from his thoughts. Gaspi pushed himself out of his chair, and went to the back of the room. He’d never actually cast a force strike at one of these miniature shields before. The only time he’d attempted it was just after his block had been taken off, and he’d had to spell-sing his block back in place when the spell-casting had got out of control. He’d cast one against the large shield in the Test of Precision, of course, and he didn’t feel the slightest bit nervous, but he just didn’t know how the shield was going to respond to his strike.

Gaspi started to summon his power, gently calling it to form in his hand. It coalesced into a swirling ball of force about the size of his palm, mesmerising to look at as it turned and span, driven by its own shifting energy. He fed it slowly, watching it shift and grow in his hand. Soon it swelled to twice the size of his palm, and then larger. He could feel the reservoirs of strength within him, far too much for this simple bit of conjuring, and marvelled at the total control he now felt over his power. It was only eight or nine months ago that summoning a force strike had been a nearly catastrophic undertaking for him, but now it was as easy as breathing. He fed more power into the strike, enlarging it until it was clearly bigger than those summoned by Everand and Ferast. He glanced at Voltan, who gave him a nod, and stopped feeding the strike. He lifted his palm, took careful aim, and, imitating Emmy, sent it flying across the room with a simple flick of his wrist. The strike span away from him, bearing swiftly down on the force shield. Gaspi was waiting for a loud detonation, but in the moment of impact a deep crack sounded, making everyone in the room jump. The force shield had split right down the middle, and black smoke curled out of the jagged edge of the split metal.

“Sorry, Gaspi,” Voltan said. “I thought the shield could take it. That’s my fault.”

Gaspi felt slightly disturbed by the cracking sound, which, like the detonating sound, seemed to resonate from inside him as much as from outside. He felt a bit shaken, and as he took his seat he could tell the rest of his classmates felt the same. On the other hand, he’d broken a force shield with what was only a small portion of his power, and the whole class had seen it. Voltan ended the lesson after that, and as the pupils filed out Gaspi could hear the muted buzzing of excited conversation that would inevitably be about what he’d just done. Following them out with Emmy and Lydia, he couldn’t help thinking that, in the long run, it wasn’t a bad thing.

Gaspi’s impressive display against the force shield was the final nail in the coffin of the class’s taunting that Gaspi was just a hedge wizard. That had died down after he’d called down the windstorm on Everand in martial magic, and tailed off even more now that Gaspi was performing strongly in almost every class. The result of breaking the force shield was the class’s final acceptance that Gaspi was what he claimed to be - a Nature Mage. Even Everand seemed to have backed down. He was grudging about it, and maintained a rude attitude towards Gaspi, but he no longer taunted him publicly.

The change in attitude towards him made Gaspi’s life a bit easier, and he found himself increasingly excited by the exploration of magic. An idea he’d had after Taurnil fought in the tournament motivated him to work particularly hard at enchantment. He’d read about magical weapons in one of the historical texts set by Voltan, and hadn’t been able to shake the idea since. If he could enchant a stone or a piece of chalk, why not a weapon? He stayed behind to speak to Professor Worrick about it one day after class.

“Yes, Gaspi, how can I help you?” the professor asked. Professor Worrick had been impressed by Gaspi’s increasing skill as an enchanter, and had been particularly pleased the previous week when Gaspi had enchanted his robes to be impervious to getting wet, and somehow managed to add an enchantment that made them warmer or cooler to the wearer, depending on the temperature of the room. He hadn’t yet worked out how Gaspi had done it, as the clothes didn’t change thickness or weave, but somehow warmed or cooled the wearer without changing state. Gaspi didn’t really know how he’d done it either, and couldn’t seem to repeat the trick once he knew how difficult it was. This didn’t frustrate Professor Worrick, who loved a good conundrum, and whose passion for magic was as much academic as practical.

“What magical marvel have you unearthed today, young Mage?” he asked amiably. Gaspi liked Professor Worrick. He was straightforward and honest, and always enthusiastic about his pupils’ achievements, even down to the most mundane of spells. Gaspi also liked his curious mind, which reminded him very much of Hephistole; although where the Chancellor had a kind of fierce, burning energy, Professor Worrick’s curiosity expressed itself as a constant sense of quiet delight and surprise.

Gaspi went straight to the point. “I was hoping, sir, that you could teach me to enchant weapons.”

“Weapons, eh?” Professor Worrick reflected. “There’s no reason why not, Gaspi, but can I ask why?” The professor sounded curious, rather than concerned.

“It’s for my friend, Taurnil,” Gaspi answered. “He’s a city guard, and I thought it would make a great gift for his Nameday.”

“No doubt it would,” Professor Worrick answered thoughtfully. “Did you know that Hephistole has some magically enhanced weapons in his study? They‘re artefacts from another age, powerfully made.”

“No, I didn’t,” Gaspi answered, excited now. “Well - I want to make another one.”

“I admire your determination, Gaspi,” Professor Worrick said. “It’s not an easy thing to do, however. The reason we only have a few is because of the difficulty involved in the enchantment. There are no rules stopping you doing it, but just remember that the kind of enchantments you’re likely to put on them would be exhausting. A normal magician would be unable to do much spell work for several days afterwards, and there‘s no guarantee the weapons would pick up anything of power.” He peered at Gaspi with a sparkle of interest. “But you’re hardly a normal magician, now, are you Gaspi?”

“I guess not, sir,” Gaspi answered, pleased by the recognition. “Even if it was exhausting I’d like to give it a try - maybe at the end of the week, when there are no classes for a couple of days.”

“Good idea,” Professor Worrick answered. “So - what do you know of enchantment that will help you turn a normal weapon into a magical one?”

Gaspi thought for a second. “Well, you always say that different materials take different types of enchantments, and that some materials are better than others full stop - like the stone used to make the wall.”

“Yes, so that means you’ll have to choose your materials well,” Professor Worrick responded. “The problem you have is that if you want a truly powerful weapon you’ll first of all have to have it made of the right materials, which means you’ll have to pay for both the materials and for a weaponsmith’s services. I don’t know how your resources are, Gaspi, but I’d guess that they won’t stretch that far.”

“No, they won’t,” Gaspi answered, furrowing his brow in thought. “What if I just enchanted a normal weapon?” Gaspi asked. “How powerful might it be?”

“Well, almost anything will take a degree of enchantment,” Professor Worrick answered. “The general rule is that the purer the substance, the stronger the enchantment, but this doesn’t always hold true. Also, metals tend to hold an enchantment better than wood.”

“Taurnil fights with a staff!” Gaspi said, frustrated..

“Well, you can only try your best, Gaspi, and see what happens,” Professor Worrick said. “For now, that may be all you can do. What enchantment do you think will effectively enchant a staff?”

“Staffs break a lot, so maybe I should make it stronger, less breakable, or make it hit harder?” Gaspi said.

“Interesting,” Professor Worrick said. “Remember that energy cannot be created. It all comes from somewhere,, and goes somewhere. I know Voltan has been teaching you how to use an air strike. When you summon an air strike, you still have to use raw magical force to trap the air into a narrow space and then to push that out, but you use a lot less raw energy than when performing a spell that is entirely crafted by magic such as a force strike. The air strike uses the energy captured in the air to create the substance of the attack. The magical element is just in the shaping and moving of that energy - energy you did not have to create. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” Gaspi said. “Is that why Emmy always feels more tired using a force strike than almost anything else?”

Professor Worrick started to speak, and then stopped himself. He looked at Gaspi intently for a minute, and then seemed to make a decision.

“I’m going to tell you something that you are not to share with your fellow students, except when you are in great need, Gaspi. That’s my condition for answering your question.” He peered at Gaspi, waiting for an answer.

“Okay, sir,” Gaspi answered, unhappy with being asked to keep anything from Emmy; but he supposed that if something happened where she really needed to know, then he could tell her.

“We don’t tell this to students in their first year, Gaspi, in case the knowledge is abused. But seeing as you are particularly gifted, you may actually need to know this before we’d normally expect.” Professor Worrick paused for a moment to collect his thoughts. “You’re right that the reason a force strike tires you is because you are drawing your energy from yourself. This can be very dangerous, and if the magician draws too much they can either burn themselves out for good, and never be able to use magic again, or they could even die, which might be better!” Gaspi swallowed anxiously, remembering how close he had come to this on two separate occasions. 

“There are some spells where the energy is drawn from the environment, but others -  like most blocks, or other types of strikes - draw energy from the caster. What you are not aware of yet is that you can chose to draw energy from any other source. For instance, you could focus your spell to take the energy for your strike from the person you are attacking.” Professor Worrick paused, letting Gaspi absorb this. “Can you see why this is so open to abuse?”

“Yes, sir,” Gaspi said. It wasn’t hard to imagine what someone like Ferast might do with this knowledge.

“It’s not easy, but once you get the hang of it you can direct a spell, or even an enchantment, to draw from any source of power. So let’s say you wanted your friend’s staff to hit with a force that doubles the force of the actual swing of the weapon. If you simply enchant the staff to do this, the enchantment will draw the energy from the obvious source - the fighter. Your enchantment would drain your friend with every swing, which would defeat the purpose of the enchantment, and maybe place your friend in danger. See?”

Gaspi nodded impatiently. Sometimes he wished teachers would just tell him the answers without all the rambling. “So, where can the energy come from?”

“Well, that’s the question, isn’t it?” Professor Worrick said, scratching his head. “The good thing about enchantments is that they can be as sophisticated as you like, as long as you have the deftness of touch required for the spell. You could enchant the staff to draw energy from everything except the bearer, but that would indiscriminately take energy from friend and foe. That wouldn’t be a good thing if your friend was fighting alongside others on the same side.”  Gaspi nodded, waiting for information he could use.

“I think the best place to draw the energy from is the ground,” the professor continued. “It means that if your friend is fighting on soil, he will be taking energy that is normally used by plants and growing things, or if he was fighting on rock, he’d be weakening the structural integrity of the rock. But there’s so much energy stored in the ground that, if the draw was spread nice and wide, he shouldn’t do any real damage; unless he was fighting on one spot for a long time. I think that’s probably the best solution, don’t you?”

Gaspi didn’t like the idea of draining the ground of life, but if Professor Worrick said it wouldn’t have any real effect, then that would have to be good enough for him. “That works for me, sir,” Gaspi responded. “But how do I make sure the enchantment draws from the ground? Is there some kind of special spell?” he asked.