When my vision re-focused, I found myself, not in my room, but in a huge room with people flying all around it. The room was big enough to fit Mount Olympus in it. The walls were multi-colored, covered in books. The walls were covered from floor to ceiling in books, millions and millions of books!!! I guessed that there were many types of books, but I probably wouldn’t get the chance to read them all. I looked down at the floor; it was covered in intricate designs, some showing the history and predictions of wizardry.
My clothes suddenly caught my eye. I wasn’t wearing the t-shirt and jeans that I had been when I left home; I was wearing a lavender robe with but a single white star on my chest. I was slightly concerned with this sudden change of clothes but I didn’t fight, the robe was comfortable and I liked the way it looked on me. I turned to look for Mandrake and found him twenty feet away waving me over. I perked up and ran over to him, eyes still wide and wondering. He chuckled, and wrapped his arm around my shoulders and we started to walk.
“Like our common room and our library?” he asked with a smile and a chuckle. I guess he knew that I was full of questions. “Inquisitiveness is a good thing. As warlocks, wizards and sorcerers, our jobs are to ask questions and find out the best and most efficient way of doing things. Once we have done that, well, then things get fun. Then we get to find a way to convert that method into a method that those without magic can use. Another thing that we do is we protect the world from those who want to destroy it.”
“So, how did you know that I had magic?” I asked, “Do you just know who has magic and when their abilities are going to manifest or how did you know about me?”
“I told you,” he started, “I am a seer, I see what is important and I really only see it a few days before it happens. What happened with you, well that is an interesting story. A few days ago, I had a vision that you were going to manifest and soon. So I cast a spell on you that would alert me to when you manifested. Once you manifested, I got out of bed and prepared to leave. I cast the transportation spell, unfortunately, because of the deep magic; I was stuck in limbo for a few minutes because your mother was in the room. If she had never entered, you would have been taken here sooner.”
“So there is a spell of some sort that prevents magic from being wrought around non-magic users?” I asked trying to understand what he was talking about. The way he was explaining things made it sound like the non-magic people couldn’t have magic practiced around.
We walked up to a door and Mandrake waved his hand. The door glided open to reveal a dark room. We walked in and then he began to talk. “Yes, the ancient magicians realized that using magic around the normal people could cause more trouble than it could solve. Over the years, people have tried to find ways to get around that ancient law.” He explained softly, “Some have found ways and some have gone mad because of the fight to circumnavigate the deep magic. The ancient ones were the only who knew what spells to use in order to temporarily negate the effects of the deep magic. Now, the world stays in peace and harmony because of the deep magic.”
I looked around, the room had become bright and I could see the details of the room. There were wooden dummies in various positions around the room. The walls and ceiling were made of tiles and the floor was a soft white marble. There were other people in here each one going through different motions. Each motion had a different effect on the dummy in front of them some of the younger ones would have their instructors animate the dummy so that they could practice working magic while they were dodging blows from the attacker.
“That stuff... with the animated dummy...” I started wondering if I was going to end up doing that eventually.
“Yes you will do that eventually.” he said, “That simulation is designed to teach the trainees how to handle a battle situation between a wizard and a knight. Magic is a concentration art. If you can stay focused you will likely be able to come out on top. There still is a chance that you won’t come out on top, just because there also is a physical side to it. When you were in your room experimenting, did you feel any sort of tiring as you did each spell?”
“I felt a slight tiring when I was trying to levitate.” I replied. I knew that there would be a catch to magic; I just couldn’t comprehend what it could be.
“Magic is the art of taking something that you can do and doing it without doing it. It takes just as much energy to do a spell as it does to the real thing without magic.” Mandrake explained, “The more practice you have with magic, the more energy you will have available to use when casting a spell. Levitation is one of the hardest spells to do. As you may already know, the act of levitating is the act of literally picking yourself up and making yourself float. It takes a tremendous amount of concentration and skill to successfully levitate. When you levitated, you were in deep focus, which leads me to believe that you are some sort of an athlete.”
“Yes, I was. I was a student in the marching band at my school. I was the best, I never got tired and I was always focused.” I said it was true I had a physically challenging job in the marching band and I never tired of it and I also never stopped focusing.
“The magic in your blood is my only explanation for your lack of tiring when you would march.” he started, “When you are working towards a specific thing the magic in you activates your mind and allows you to become more in tune with your task and therefore more capable of doing it.”
“Question?” I asked softly.
“Ask away,” he said.
“I have noticed that different people have different colored robes and different designs on their robes. Why is that?” I asked sincerely wanting to know what was going on with the multi-colored robes.
“Well, every color has a different meaning, generally the lighter the color the lower in skill and training you are. Normally people start at white. The stars and moons on the robes symbolize the number of missions that you have either been assigned or that you have completed. It is very rare for someone to start with a mission assigned to them. You are a special case.”
“So then, why do I have a star on my chest?” I asked.
“Because you have a mission to complete. We don’t know the time frame on the mission, so you will have to work quickly. Your mission is to recover a stolen artifact that is going to be used illegally, potentially to end the world.” Mandrake said in a soft voice, “We don’t know where the artifact is and we don’t know who has it. Ordinarily, we wouldn’t assign the mission to someone who is untrained, but when I cast the spell to assign someone the mission, no one’s robes showed any change. That night, I had a dream that you were going to manifest soon, and that you were the one that was supposed to complete the mission.”
“So, I am supposed to recover an artifact that I know nothing about?” I asked, “Do we at least know the artifact’s name? I know that normally artifacts have names.”
“Yes, artifacts do normally have names, and this one is no exception.” he started, “This one’s name is ‘Keyra: Lost Gem of Sieriantis’. You can use whatever methods that you deem necessary to recover the artifact.”
“So, I get to track a lost gem, recover it and survive all of this with no training.” I asked starting to be a little freaked out.
“Yes, but we will provide you with a bag of supplies. These bags though are not ordinary bags. These bags have the capability to store unlimited supplies and money. You can also take whatever books that you think you might need along with you. Some of them make decent reads.” He said as he pulled a small bag out of the sleeve of his robe.
I took the bag skeptically. It wasn’t bigger than a string bag and I doubted that it could really hold much in it, but you know, with magic a lot would be possible. I just wondered why these sorts of things weren’t present where I had grown up.
“So, in magic, are there any spells that we say out loud?” I asked. I thought that maybe I should know if I was going to have to speak any spells out loud.
“Yes, there are some,” he answered, “and to help you along with your quest we will provide you with a spell-book and a pronunciation guide, all of which will be talking about the language of magic.”
