THE WINTERCHILD | onc 2021

ii. challenge

The Academy was a destiny ascribed for me nearly as much as magyk was in my Allinos blood. In these times of war, it was every mage's duty to serve in whatever way we could: warriors on the front lines or teachers to train us in our arts, and nothing in between. Brief hiatuses were allowed when a family had newborns to watch over. But after our fifth birthdays, all children of magyk enrolled in the Academy.

The close-knit affection of a family was something I had only glimpsed at the market. Commoners had not our gifts and so were allowed to live lives beyond the confines of service. I am sure they had duties in their own way, too, but they were not bred for war as we were. There were a handful of families who concentrated as hunters, the partners in our endless battle. But magyk could only arise from magyk blood. We were rarer, and our numbers were dwindling.

No one could remember when the first vampire came, but before long, they were legion. Worse, their powers of conversion made multiplying their numbers a far simpler task. A mage had to be bred of magyk bloodlines, praying that the gods would bless the child with the gifts. Then we trained in the Academy for the entirety of our childhoods in the hopes we would slay enough of their number to keep them at bay. If a mage were lucky enough to survive to childbearing age, then they would start the cycle anew. Hunters could be plucked from the humblest of farmers or the noblest of men, but they, too, required years and years of training. But should a vampire find its army lacking, it needed only bite mortals to turn them into monstrous kin.

All of this I learned merely through Academy teachings, of course. I would meet no vampires until my graduation; they were not yet so powerful or foolish to attack our center of magyk power. Still, I ached for a test of real danger. It was the hubris of youth, perhaps, but I was certain that a vampire could be no match for my power. By my sixteenth year, I easily bested my classmates, and it would not be long before I ran through the gamut of the Academy's mentors, too. I was swifter at my spellwork, nimbler on my feet, and the concussive force of my winter blasts winded even my eldest brother, Kanos. Within my family, only Aunt Ferika could defeat me. But she was the one who'd survived the longest outside of the Academy's walls as well. She wielded her magyk with deadly intention, not for the mere playacting of Academy training.

But my first true test happened within Academy walls.

By then, Dalynea Avi Cerenos had mentored me for four years. As a wielder of springmagyk, she was well-suited as my teacher. While I learned the extents of my wintermagyk from other wintermages, they could not be my only teachers; like trained by like bred lazy magyk, unprepared for any surprise. Much like Aunt Ferika, she had fought and slain vampires for nearly twenty years. Then the Academy ruled to retire her from the front lines, preserving her life to share her power. Of all the Academy's mentors, she had fought the longest. The age of retirement was a delicate balance: a mage too soon retired meant years of unslain vampires. But wait too long, and the Academy risked losing a valuable asset. It was equally invaluable to train the next generation as it was to serve in active battle.

Dalynea spoke little of her battle years except as a useful anecdote. Many Academy teachers could not hide their bitterness at being retired too early or denied the glory of dying in war. To her credit, Dalynea seemed content in her second life as teacher rather than warrior. She celebrated my successes as if they were her own, and I found her critiques sharp but insightful. I could sense how my wintermagyk had grown stronger under her tutelage for a mere four years.

She spoke of her other students from time to time, but the first one to interest me was the Seryntor girl. The Seryntor family was one of the great magyk families, much like mine — they fought longer, and they survived at higher rates than most mages. But what interested me was how Dalynea spoke of her.