The Fallen - Chapter 7

Royan rose with the dawn and took a few minutes to relieve himself, wash up, and start some water for tea.  They’d eat trail rations once they mounted up.  Walking over to Rachelle’s bedroll to wake her, he was startled to see her iris colored eyes open to watch him approach.

Seeing the surprise on his face, she laughed, “I’m not normally a late riser.  Don’t look so shocked that I’m awake already.”  Shrugging out of her bedroll, she excused herself to answer nature’s call. 

When she returned to the camp, she gratefully accepted a cup of tea, which she hastily gulped down.  Her stomach warmed, she began packing up the few of her belongings she had pulled out the night before and then began packing up what she was beginning to think of as common gear – rations, cook pot…  When she had closed up the last of the saddlebags, she turned to see that Royan had saddled both Ghost and Bella and was waiting to strap on the saddlebags.

Grinning in delight, she handed the bags over to Royan and went to extinguish the fire, silencing the flames with her mind, willing the embers to a cold state.  Pleased with her efforts she turned to mount Bella only to find Royan standing and watching her.

He admitted, “That was handily done, but your lessons will teach you to do such as that not only more efficiently but also more quietly.  I didn’t know you already knew some magecraft – it will put you at an advantage over most new apprentices.”

“Mistress Evangeline taught me a few things – wait a minute…  Quietly?” she asked.

“All magic makes noise that can be heard by other mages.  As you become more practiced at your Craft, you will be able to do magic with only a whisper of sound.”  He added, “At least I think you will be able to.  You feel very strong in the Gift to me.”

Rachelle looked at him quizzically, “Do you have the Gift?”

“Do you feel magic from me?”

“I don’t know what magic feels like…”

Royan grinned, “Come on Rachelle – you have magic in you.  You must know what it feels like!  Let’s mount up and get out of here.  While we ride, you think about what the magic feels like and then tell me if you can sense it in general anywhere around you and specifically if any of the magic comes from me.”

Always game for a challenge, Rachelle grinned in return and nodded.  “Sounds like a good game to pass the day.”

Both mounted up and Rachelle, as yesterday, urged Bella to follow Ghost back to the traders’ road.  She held the reins loosely, trusting Bella to follow their food source.  Slowly Rachelle sunk into herself separating herself from the here and now and concentrating on the timeless world inside her.

Centering herself, she reached out to the world around her.  She was amazed – there was magic everywhere around her.  How was she to make sense of what magic belonged to what?

As her eyes snapped open, they connected with Royan’s.  He had fallen back to ride beside her and mirth lit his face from within.

Playfully she punched at his arm, “Are you laughing at me?”

“Perhaps.  If only you could have seen the shocked look on your face!”

“But what was all that?  It seemed as if there was magic everywhere…”

He nodded at her assessment and explained, “There is magic everywhere.  Everything around us has its own share of magic.  Some is quick and fast and obvious – like the magic of what we consider living things – people, animals, and, to an extent, the trees and plants.”

Puzzled, Rachelle asked, “Why do you say to an extent?”

Unsure how to explain what he meant, Royan started slowly, “Well…  How to explain?  Plant life is very different from animal life.  It’s almost as if time moves more slowly for plants.  Perhaps because they are truly rooted?  They are content to sit and draw the nourishment they need from the air and from their roots.  They don’t have the need to make things happen.  Nor do they have the ability to significantly change the lot they draw.”

Rachelle quirked an eyebrow at him.  Clearly, she was unimpressed with the explanation so far!

Struggling, Royan continued, “Let’s say you are a farmer and your fields die off – for whatever reason.  Could be blight on the land, could be poor weather ruined your fields, could even be poor stewardship of your land.  Regardless of the reason, your fields are no longer able to provide you with sustenance.  This doesn’t mean that your life will end.  We humans say we put down roots, but we always have the ability to uproot ourselves should our life not work out the way we expected.  We have the ability to move on.”

Rachelle nodded and Royan continued, “A plant doesn’t have that ability.  They have some minimal ability to adapt to change – a larger tree overshadows a smaller, and sometimes the smaller tree will grow crooked – grow towards the light it needs to survive.  Or the patch of earth that a shrub is rooted in goes bad – the drive to survive can lead it to force more roots out seeking better, healthier earth from which to draw sustenance.  And if there is healthier earth near by, it may survive.  But there is a limit at how fast a shrub or a tree can grow – there is always the chance that the slight changes it tries to effect will not be sufficient to allow it to survive.”

Rachelle nodded again and agreed, “Well, yes.  That does make sense.  But what about the rocks and the earth beneath Bella’s feet?  I sensed magic everywhere…  And why have I never felt these things before?  I’ve grounded and centered and meditated for years.  I’ve done simple tricks – like lighting the fire – for as long as I can remember.”

Royan explained, “First – calling fire is so much more than a simple trick.  What comes so easily to you most apprentices struggle to achieve for months.  You have a very strong Gift that I think was lying dormant – something recently triggered it for you.  And yes, magic is there in the rocks and earth beneath Bella’s feet.  Everything around us is alive to some degree or another.  Nothing that you will find around you is anything more than a synthesis of the organic material around you.  Animal life holds the most magic and it is also the most unpredictable, the most changeable.  The magic that can be drawn from plant life is steadier than that in animal life, but is more difficult to grasp.  Partly because it is not as abundant, but I believe mostly it is because it is alien to us.  We know ourselves and by extension the animals that share our time.  Plants are not something that we truly think of as alive.  We know they grow, but when you pull a turnip from the ground, do you think ‘I have just taken the life from this plant.’??  No.  Because a plant, as far as we know, is not self-aware they way we are.  And mineral ‘life’ is even more foreign to us.  It is the steadiest form of magic, but the hardest to draw from because it is truly alien.”

Rachelle asked, “What of the air?  The spirit?  The water?”

Royan was pleased with how quickly her mind worked and explained, “The air, the water, even fire is akin to the magic in the earth.  But there are two different schools of magic when it comes to the elements.  And I will caution you that I am likely doing a piss-poor job of explaining…  When you are apprenticed, you will receive a much better explanation of this than I can give…  But to make my point – there is the deep slow magic of the elements that can be drawn by any Mage.  Then there is the magic of the elementals – the spirits that actually inhabit the stone, the flame, the wind, and the wave.  Elemental magic is fast, fierce, and extremely dangerous.  Only the most adept Mages dare have traffic with elementals.  They are not overtly malicious, but they are nothing like humans.  They are theoretically immortal and tend to do things for reasons very different from our own.”

Rachelle nodded again, taking in all the information that Royan was throwing at her.  “What about spirit – you didn’t answer about spirit.”

Royan hesitated, “Well…The Church forbids spirit magic.  They believe it constitutes trafficking in the darker Arts.”

Confused, Rachelle asked, “But doesn’t the Church tell us to Commune?  To pray?  To seek guidance from the Holy Angels?”

“Yes, but in their minds, that is not magic – that is Fayth.”

Rachelle squinted at him and muttered, “To my mind they seem awfully similar.”

Grinning, Royan agreed, “To my mind as well, but it would behoove you not to make that observation in polite company.  Actually, it would probably be best not make that observation to anyone.  You never know when someone might take offence and report you to the Church.”

Rachelle looked at Royan speculatively and absent-mindedly nodded her assent.  Royan sighed and hoped she took his warning to heart.  It was clear that she was processing all the information he had given her so he rode ahead a few paces and left her to her thoughts.