The Paragon

Chapter Eight

"What's first?" I asked, bright and early the next morning as Phoenix and I arrived at what he called a basic training room. I had no other experience with wizard training to compare it to, but apparently a basic room involved a few tables and chairs pushed up against the wall, some metal cabinets, and a bookshelf with only a few books on it. Other than that, the room was large and empty. My eyes flashed around, taking all of this in. "Levitating furniture? Force fields? Summoning demons?"

Phoenix gave me a withering look. Impressive; I'd already gotten on his nerves and it was only nine in the morning. "Wizards do not summon demons," he said.

"Only boring ones," I replied. I reached up to pull my hair into a ponytail, securing it with an elastic band I'd had wrapped around my wrist.

I definitely saw Phoenix roll his eyes before he opened one of the metal cabinets along the wall, poking around inside. "Drag one of those tables out to the middle," he told me.

"Ah, so it is furniture," I commented, grabbing the table closest and pulling it out. It was heavier than it looked, and made a loud scraping sound along the floor.

Phoenix shut the cabinet door; it closed with a loud slam. "Not quite," he said. Once the table was properly in the room's center, he placed a plain white wax candle on it. We both looked at it, then at each other. "Light the candle," Phoenix instructed.

"Excuse me?" I asked, put off. "Do you require mood lighting to teach me, or something?"

"I am teaching you," he said, and nodded at the candle again. "Light the candle."

Hesitantly, I looked back at the stupid thing on the table. "Do you have matches, or...?" I asked sarcastically, shielding my unsureness with humor.

"Imogen," Phoenix said, his tone warning. "You want to start training your magic, then we will. And the first step is to—"

"Light the candle, yeah, got it," I interrupted, and faced the table properly. I stared, hard, at the little white candle. Compared to some of the things I'd done with my supposed powers already, this should be easy. Just making a tiny candle flame burst to life.

Except it wasn't easy apparently. This wasn't like when I'd taught myself to jump over obstacles, or learned to throw knives. I had no idea what muscle to move or spot to concentrate on. In fact, I was accomplishing nothing so far. I felt a twitch growing in my right eyebrow, and my teeth were gritted against my will as I tried to concentrate on the thought of willing a flame into existence.

"Why is nothing happening?" I asked Phoenix. He was still just standing by the table, watching with apparent interest, but not offering any guidance. What kind of teacher was he supposed to be?

He shrugged, looking as though he knew exactly the answer to my question. "You tell me," he suggested.

"Well, if I knew that," I said, my annoyance rising, "don't you think I'd have already fixed it?"

Phoenix merely looked at me expectantly, and when I only raised my eyebrows back at him, he sighed. In accordance with a gesture from him, a chair seemingly pulled itself away from the wall, crossing the room and coming to a stop beside Phoenix. He sat, crossed his legs, and folded his hands; still watching me, but apparently more comfortable now.

"Hey, if you could do that, why the hell did you make me drag this out by myself?" I demanded, giving the table leg a kick and placing my hands on my hips.

Phoenix shrugged. "I don't like to show off," he claimed, though the tiny smile on his face indicated the exact opposite was true. If I'd had any thoughts about possibly respecting this guy, I took them all back in that moment; I, in fact, still hated him.