Caster's Spell (A Mage Tale Book 1) Page 15

  Deciding that they were all going to pummel him for letting them fall, Wesley chose to stand up and apologize as quickly as possible. Before he could get a word out, however, the herd of students laughed and cheered.

  "I toldja buddy," said Cameron, the only student left in the air, as he lowered to Wesley. "It’s the Midwinter Festival. All of the rules change."

  Indeed for the rest of the night he was treated like everyone else. If anything, he was among the more popular students of the night. He spoke with more Wiccan than he ever had, laughed with more Sorcerers than he had the time to meet, and enjoyed the occasion more than any of the other students.

  Alas the end of the night came and at eleven o’clock the students were shown to their dorm rooms. Wesley fell into his bed, fully clothed in a tuxedo, with a feeling that he hadn’t felt in a long time. He was satisfied with the evening’s events, even with the slow start, but one thing lingered in his mind:

  A dark kiss.

  Break

  "Are you packed to go?" asked Cameron. "I don’t see any of your bags."

  "I’m staying," said Wesley. Winter break, which was initiated by the Midwinter Festival the night before, had begun and most of the students on campus returned home for the whole of the month, but Wesley decided that in order to succeed, he couldn’t afford to go a full month without rigorous study.

  "What do you mean, you’re ‘staying’?" asked the Sorcerer. "Don’t you want to see your family?"

  "Already did," Wesley replied. "Master Sinclair opens up magicomms for students that stay on campus during the break. Something about liability. I spoke to them and my dad thinks it’s a good idea. Since my parents don’t know enough magic, I’d be better off with access to the library."

  "You talked to them once. We can’t open magicomms on our own without magicomm orbs. Are you sure that’s enough for you?"

  "It’ll have to be," said Wesley, hoping that he made the right choice. "I have to pass and not just to get to the next grade. So I can’t take it easy."

  "I get’cha man," said the Sorcerer. "I just hope you’ll be okay alone. Reviberous is a big place and there won’t be a lot of people here."

  "Yeah, I know. But that gives me loads of free time to work on my conjures and besides, Master Rosen is staying too."

  "Okay," Cameron said, hoisting one of his heavy bags over his shoulder. "Just promise me you won’t get into any trouble."

  "Trouble?" repeated Wesley as he followed the Sorcerer to the front door. "What makes you say that?"

  Cameron looked him in the eye with a half smile. "Most things are forbidden for a reason, Wes, remember that."

  "I’ll see you in four weeks," laughed Wesley from the doorway.

  "Yeah." Cameron turned and started down the hall. "Either in the dorm or from a jail cell, right?"

  The rest of the students were gone by noon and the emptiness of the school was only enhanced by the echoes of his footsteps. During the break, students were barred from much of the school, but even still, there was more space than Wesley knew what to do with. So after hours of exhausting himself with conjures, he decided to pay his favorite teacher a visit.

  "Hello, Wesley," Master Rosen called before the boy could turn into his office.

  "How did you know?" asked the boy upon arrival.

  "There are very few students in the western dormitory and only two are in my class." The Master pulled down his glasses for a moment. "Plus, you’re not the only source-sayer in the school, you know."

  "You’re—you’re a…" He tried to contain his astonishment. "How long have you known?"

  "Since the first day you entered my class," Rosen replied.

  Wesley took a step back. "I—I’ma…"

  "Relax. I’m not a noble either; sometimes it just happens, this ability. You have nothing to be afraid of."

  "You can’t tell anyone," Wesley warned. "If they find out that a Warlock—"

  "I won’t tell anybody… else." The Wizard looked down.

  "What? You told someone?"

  "I had to tell Sinclair. One of his protection spells picked up an unregistered source-sayer, but we agreed not to disclose it to any other parties."

  "Protection? From who?"

  "There are several students of noble blood that attend Reviberous. Certain precautions had to be put in place."

  "Ya know, that’s not really an answer."

  "Hm," Master Rosen grinned and reached for a book at the corner of his desk.

  "Why couldn’t I sense you?" Wesley asked. "After Cynthia, I learned how to feel others like us. There are about five underclassmen, all nobles. But you feel no different from the other masters."

  "Yes, very good," Rosen smiled and opened the book. "Brilliant observation, I must say. Unfortunately, the answer isn’t all that deserving. It’s simple really: a couple of decades back, I learned how to alter my source signature. I control the shape and texture and even weight. If I wanted, I could be mistaken for as low as a C-class mage. It’s a trick only source-sayers can do. At this point, hiding that particular trait has become second nature. I don’t even think about it anymore."

  "Can you teach me?" Wesley sat down.

  "Perhaps, in time," the master licked his finger to turn a page, "but as of now, you are far too underdeveloped. I’d have to make you a stronger source-sayer before then."

  "Well let’s do that," said an enthused Wesley.

  "First," the Wizard looked at the boy, "I want to know why you’re angry with me."

  "What?" Wesley said before letting out an uncomfortably fake laugh.

  "There’s no sense in trying to hide anything anymore. It’s all written in your source. You’ve felt this way for some time now. Tell me, why?"

  "Caster," Wesley’s voice dropped.

  "Mm?" the master raised a brow.

  "You never told me he was a renegade, or that he’s dead, or that it was Sinclair who killed him."

  "So you’ve figured it out. I should have known," Rosen sighed. "Telling you would have been illegal."

  "You let me want to be like a criminal."

  "Don’t try that one with me," the master refrained from laughing. "We both know that you still want to be better than him. But I understand the sentiment. You feel betrayed. Don’t worry, Wes, you’re not alone. He was like a son to me. And I know you met his cousin. Though they aren’t even a year apart in age, she looked up to him like a brother."

  Wesley looked down at his hands and then back up to his master. "Why would Sinclair be the one to kill him?"

  "You already know the answer to that, don’t you?"

  "Benjamin attacked the school?"

  "I didn’t tell you that, so technically no laws have been broken. But I won’t discuss him any further."

  "But—"

  "Read this." Master Rosen closed the book and pushed it across his desk.

  "What is it?" asked the boy as he took it.

  "Something you were never supposed to see."

  Wesley looked down at the cover and read the title aloud, "Intermediate Spell-casting for Warlocks." He looked back up. "No way. So I’m not the first?"

  "You’re the first to enter a formal school, but not the first to practice. That is a century old book. Originally, there were Beginners and Advanced volumes, but that’s the only one left in the entire world. And now it’s yours."

  "Why was this kept from me?"

  "Believe it or not, it isn’t just the children that are against you. I had to pull rank to get it and even then it took months. I’ve looked through it and it would seem that so far, we’ve been teaching you all wrong," the Wizard laughed. "Take a look inside."

  Wesley opened the book to a random page. There was an image of two hands in a deliberately odd position. "What is this?"

  "Hand-signs," answered his master. "I can’t believe I didn’t assume it would be something like this. Sorcerers must take certain positions to initiate their more complex spells. Why wouldn’t a Warlock, whose power is locked
entirely within his hands, have to use hand-signs to control his source?"

  The boy flipped through the pages. "There’s so many."

  "Apparently each sign represents a number. There are twelve distinct digits that I’ve been able to find: one through ten, one hundred, and one thousand. It would seem that spells are just certain numbers, the more complex the spell, the higher the number."

  Wesley turned to the twenty-seventh page: the beginning of the chapter Fire, labeled, review. Ignis was the first spell that he saw and its number was eleven.

  "So it’s ten then one," he said trying to understand the text.

  "What?"

  Wesley put two fists together, making the first sign. He separated them and slammed his palms together, interlocking his fingers. Then he raised his hands.

  "Ignis."

  Small flames jetted from his open palms.

  "Know that that spell was only so easy because you’re already experienced with it. You are still very much required to control your source, as you’ve been forced to learn earlier in the school year. This will just make it a bit less impossible," the man lectured. "Oh and I almost forgot, how are your conjures coming?"

  "I’m only on chapter five, but I almost have the haybusa." Wesley scratched his brow.

  "Good, good. Have you gotten it to explode yet?"

  “Oh, it explodes just fine," Wesley assured, "only not when I want it to. Last time I conjured one, I blew myself into a tree. Trust me, that was not fun."

  Rosen let out an airy chuckle, "Trial and error, that’s how we learn."

  "If I keep learning like this, we might not have a school next year," the boy joked.

  "I’d like to apologize to you, Wesley," the master finally said. "I never wanted to lie to you. But this will be the last time that I’ll ask you to not go any further into Caster. The next time I hear of any such dealings, I’ll be forced to report you."

  The boy was shaken by the idea, but was beginning to grasp the severity of his actions. Benjamin Caster was killed. The fact that he was put to death, rather than arrested, must have meant that the Sorcerer aimed to do something terrible. As he raced through possible conclusions, for some reason, Wesley’s mind returned to the first question he had for Master Rosen. What was the cost for creating a blood diamond?

  The Wiccan Way

  "Anything?" Wesley asked while putting his purple emblem back on, after a midday study session.

  "Nope," said Cameron to his roommate as he picked up a book-bag. "No one’s seen her. Sorry man, it’s been a week with no notice. I don’t think Winter’s coming back."

  Wesley sighed, "Yeah, probably not."

  "Speaking of…" Cameron opened the door. "She said that she ‘helped’, right? Do you know what that means?"

  Wesley walked out into the hall to see Axel. "It means that you weren’t attacked by a single Wiccan like we thought," said the Earth Sorcerer. "Since she said ‘them’, there musta been at least two other perps. And if I had to guess, I’d say that one of the others is an Earth Sorcerer."

  The three walked towards the stairs and as they took their first steps down, Cameron asked, "So what do you want to do about it?"

  "Nothing."

  "What?" asked Axel, almost violently.

  "I don’t wanna go into it, and I don’t want you guys staging some kind of investigation," admitted Wesley.

  "Why the he—"

  "Okay," said Cameron, gripping Axel’s shoulder. "If that’s what you want, we’ll back off."

  "Whaddever," said a less than enthused Earth Sorcerer.

  "Let’s talk about something else," suggested Cameron. "How do you like Wiccanry?"

  "Hate it," Wesley said quickly. "There’s no winning those guys over. Plus, Ashlyn is in my class."

  "She givin’ you problems?" asked Axel.

  "Nothing yet. I’m just trying to stay out of her way." They exited the western dormitory and headed to the Lockhart building, where just before they entered through the large double-doors, Wesley saw someone that he thought he knew. "Hey, Trina, what’s up?"

  The girl frowned and she brushed by them without saying a word.

  "Well, it’s official," said Wesley. "The girls are back to normal."

  "Told you man, everything’s different during the Midwinter Festival. You really can’t trust anything that happens there," Cameron said as they turned a corner.

  "Speaking of trust, you talk to Ranuka yet?" the muscular boy said.

  "No." Wesley’s eyes sunk. "I haven’t seen her."

  "No, no, no, that’s not what I meant at all," Cameron rushed out with a wave of his hands. "Sri’s a different case. She told us that she’d be on vacation for an extra eight days."

  "Yeah… you’re probably right."

  "Don’t worry, I’m pretty sure she won’t totally ignore us when she gets back," Axel added, before Cameron gave him a shove.

  "Well, my class is down in the north courtyard today," Wesley said with a heavy tone and stopped at the stairs that led out to the courtyard. He was usually excited at the chance of getting out of the classroom, but this was a different case, Wiccanry. "I’ll see you guys later."

  "Alright then," said Cameron as the Warlock set off. But before Wesley got too far he heard Cameron’s voice again, which almost made him laugh. "What are you, stupid?"

  Less than five minutes later, Wesley was in an orderly crowd of Wiccan all paying close attention to the spell casting master.

  "Once again, we find ourselves at a moment of opportunity, that is to display our hold on magic," said the noticeably short man. "I want you all to take part in a series of five friendly duels. You will be permitted only to use three incantations during each of these matches and they will be over when one student has an opportunity to harm the other. Any questions?"

  Wesley had really grown to hate the magic philosophy of the Wiccan community. Everything about them, circled around one singular thought and motive: dominance. The way they commanded their power, the way they treated the people around them, and in this case, the way they taught classes, was completely committed to this central theme.

  This class was definitely not for a Warlock.

  The master clearly disapproved of his presence and the students were just as discouraging. They all wanted him gone and it would seem by any means necessary. So far, the master had created a grading opportunity for Wesley, every single day. They weren’t chances for him to succeed, and he knew it. That is, because every time he passed—and he did so, hanging on by a thread—the Wiccan master seemed to be disappointed.

  And to top off this depressing situation, he didn’t know if Sri’s apology was genuine! Or was it perhaps, like Cameron said, just another symptom of the Midwinter Festival?

  "Master Wagner," said one of the students, staring directly at Wesley. "How do we choose our opponents?"

  The master raised his scepter, which was equally as miniature as he, and every other student’s shirt shone like a bulb. "If you’re glowing, look at the person immediately to your left. That will be your first adversary, and from there, I’ll leave the selection up to you."

  Wesley wanted to shout, this was a bad situation for him. If they had the choice, he knew that all of the students would simply take turns pummeling him. But, like it or not, he had to follow every ridiculous and oppressive rule this man set forth. With a sigh, he looked down at his shirt, and then to his left.

  Oh no!

  "And if you are to lose one of these friendly duels, you will be demoted by a full letter grade. So don’t take it easy on," Master Wagner glanced at the outcast, raising a bushy gray eyebrow, "your peers. And be sure to choose your next four opponents wisely."

  While Wesley was a bit angered by Wagner’s obvious allusion, he was too frightened to really react. He could feel her power swelling and her anger far surpassing it. It was his first opponent, a pretty girl with curly blond hair, Ashlyn.

  "Now, separate," said the old man to the class. The students paired up.
"Face-off." They stood about five meters apart and raised their scepters to each other, Wesley raising his empty hand. "Duel!"

  Some of the Wiccan immediately leapt into action. Others were slower to start, sizing up their opponents. Wesley did his best to remember Master Conley’s teachings.

  The most important component to battle is strategy, he thought, starting with a line of attack you take into battle that is most likely to result in victory. She has to make the first move.

  "Ashlyn," Wesley called. "No matter what happens, let’s promise not to take it outside of class."

  She scoffed at the suggestion and jabbed with her scepter.

  "Puls!" she shouted and an invisible sphere that, like curved glass, slightly distorted light, shot from the tip of her magical tool.

  Seventy-two.

  "Terra wall!" Wesley said, throwing his arms forward. A rectangle of earth jumped up between them and crumbled when struck by Ashlyn’s spell.

  So that’s one aggressive spell for her and one defensive for me, considered the boy. Good thing mine was more powerful.

  "Don’t underestimate me!" the Witch warned. Then she vanished, to which Wesley was originally taken aback. Then he felt her source behind him. Seventy-two, another chunk of earth stabbed up beneath his feet and tossed him into the air. Wesley narrowly avoided her second puls which obliterated the wall. That’s two down, thought the boy, and so far, my spells are more effective.

  "That’s it!" declared the girl. "You’re dead."

  Ashlyn reached into her pocket and retrieved what, from his distance, appeared to be two stones. She threw them to ground midway between them.

  This is her final incantation. I have two more, giving me the advantage. If I can top this one, I win. I can do this!

  "Panic! Mayhem! Rise and be my will!" Ashlyn shouted and immediately the stones explosively grew into ten foot humanoid figures.

  Panic, Mayhem? Wesley didn’t explicitly recognize them, but he knew from his book that they were very complex Form conjures. They were golems called Champions, each the embodiment of a particular human trait. Champions were prone to having certain skill-sets and abilities that made them very dangerous if not intimately understood.