Fly or Fall

Chapter Thirteen

Anna and Andy walked into the same dusty cluttered room they'd walked into two days ago, except it wasn't dusty or cluttered anymore. True to his word, Zoriah had the room cleaned. The wood had been polished and it shined in the afternoon light. The floors had been swept and the bookshelves re-stacked.

"Please," Zoriah spoke, "take your seats." He gestured for the two armchairs in front of the oakwood table.

Anna took her seat gingerly. "So how does this work?" she asked. "Do we just wave a wand, say some strange words then hocus pocus there's a small pink chicken in my tea?"

Zoriah didn't laugh. He just stared at her with the blankest face and said, "We won't be using wands." And she frowned. She was really looking forward to waving a wand. She did not spend all those summers back in elementary practicing her swish and flick when she was still obsessed with Harry Potter, only to end up in a magical world that didn't even use wands. How unfair.

"So how exactly do spells work?" Andy asked from beside her.

"Before we get to that," he took his own seat across from them, on the more impressive armchair. "We have to go over a couple of things." Both Anna and Andy nodded.

"Witches and Mages are not born with the ability to perform magic, we're born with the potential for it. Magic is a skill like any other, it has to be learnt. And with time and practice one can become a master." He pulled open a desk drawer and pulled out a leather bound book with a three crescent moon crest branded on the front cover. "There are three types of Mages and witches," he went on. "Practitioners, wielders and reformers. Practitioners are those with the ability to channel the ambient magic around them into their bodies and use it for clairvoyant or healing purposes. Wielders, unlike practitioners have no control over magic itself but have an aptitude to use magical artefacts; tools and weapons. Magical objects are dangerous things, they can be unpredictable and sometimes volatile. Wielder go through vigorous training before they're allowed anyway near an artefact. Then we have reformers. Reformers manipulate the ambient magic around them to form spells. Spells have the capability to bend, contort and control the physical and the metaphysical."

"What are we?" Andy asked. "Practitioners? Wielders? Or reformers?"

"All the above."

Anna furrowed her brow. "Is that possible?"

"Before I met the two of you I would have said no." He smiled, amused. "The two of you—the Foxton amulet," he amended, "is an astonishing thing. The power it holds is like nothing I've have ever known. Most magical objects are made with some ambient magic stored in them but are useless unless in the hands of a Wielder. They channel the magic within the mage or witch in order to function. The person who holds a magical object must have at least some magical aptitude. Which neither of you possess. The amulet should have been useless in your hands. However," he paused. "It's astonishing.

"Magical artefacts are usually made with one specific purpose in mind. Like a ring that grants the wearer the ability to tell when someone is lying. But the magic the amulet has imbued in you gives you the powers a reformer, the ability to affect the physical and metaphysical. Truly and utterly astonishing." He cleared his throat as if remembering himself. "Something like this would ordinarily entail further study but," he reached for the book, flicked past several pages before landing on a page with the heading: Magic and The Laws Against it.

Anna read the heading upside down and furrowed her brows. "There are laws against magic?"

"Yes," Zoriah said. "But not all magic. Only the spells the council has deemed too dangerous for the use of the public. Sixty-seven years ago, the Gavin ruling was passed, it categorized types of magics into three levels: level three magic, basic magic, level two magic, advanced magic and level one magic, forbidden magic.