A year and a month would pass, and with that time a new normal established. Mabel would do her best to fit in, but constant pushing and minor bullying from Nemi made it difficult, the poor child was just shy of 3, what did Nemi expect of her? Of course, Mabel tried. She learned quickly and grew up far faster than she should have.
Now, at almost 4, she was performing basic chores and keeping the lower parts of the house tidy, like the floors. At times it felt like she was doing as much as Reese was, and while he was only 8 it was a lot just for him so it was almost unimaginable for the little child.
Well, he was 8 in this world anyway. With the longer years, and what he suspected were longer days, he suspected he was closer to 9 by now. At least based on his old world's clocks and calendars.
Gezal had finally left the village at the end of summer. Fortus was extremely impressed with his sword progress, and his handling of the goblins a few months prior. Even if he did chew him out for it. The battle wasn't easy, and almost killed him, but it got him into an academy in the special district. Something call the Knights Order Ast-Astrix, it was supposedly the best military academy in the six kingdoms. Fortus himself had even attended it at one time.
Ah, yes, the goblin attack. Reese felt like he was barely apart of all that. Emilie and he had headed out to the forest's edge on the south of the village as they had done on occasion. It was there where they found a nearly unconscious Gezal who had been practicing his sword play on some trees, like he usually did. However, this time some lesser goblins made themselves known, by attacking him. A mistake on their part. It had to be one hell of a fight, from how Gezal told it, and those nasty balls of spite had been armed with shorts words. Reese and Emilie had tried to rescue Gezal, but they had quickly found themselves surrounded.
Thanks to his sword training Reese was able to use one of those short swords and charge the group surrounding them. He brought down two of them, making a distraction for Emilie to lug Gezal in the opposite direction. It was risky and stupid as hell, but it worked, and he was able to get his father involved. The majority of the village's forces were dispatched, and they found a nest. From what the soldiers and knights said, it was not an easy battle. There were hundreds of them. They had actually found Emilie and Gezal not far from it with dozens of dead goblins around them. Fortus chewed all three of them out, but underneath it all Reese couldn't help but think part was impressed with them. Even if he was terrified at the prospects of losing his son.
Reese still felt like he missed out on part of that adventure, but as he was now, there wouldn't have been much he could have done.
Calling Gezal a close friend would be a stretch, but he was still a friend, and had become a decent sparring partner. While Reese could never compete against his sword techniques, his own basic blade skills had improved quite a bit as he physically grew. He was even able to get a hit in once in a while, now. Of course, Gezal wasn’t particularly interested in his experiments or general book learnings, but Reese’s enchantments elicited some interest from him. Perhaps one day he would enchant a set of armor and a sword for him.
Sword training had of course changed as well. Since the argument between his parents, Reese had been allowed to “go at his own pace”, to use his father’s words. He still tried to make training every day, but on the rare day he missed, it wasn’t a big deal. Though, without Gezal around, there weren’t many near his age or skill level. With everyone utterly surpassing him even in basic blade skills, each session turned into a bruise-fest for him.
In fact, today was no different, and the pages he had to do after school just made his arm hurt even more. He was grateful for the warm sun of a mid Sootember day, as it helped melt away some of the pain. It was Vobeesdeg, the hump day in an 8 day week. It was a bit of a special day because one of his favorite merchants was supposed to be coming through the village.
Wandering though the open-air market, and it was fairly small compared to the ones in a big city. It made it trivial to find who you were looking for, since it was usually 2-4 traveling carts at most. But, to be fair for a village like Wollseeth it was still quite sizable. Not that Reese had ever been to another one to compare.
Without Emilie being around, It was the perfect opportunity to search for new magic items, like stones and gems, as well as ideas. Ethmond, the traveling junk salesman as other merchants liked to call him, always had interesting items for sale. Most was of course junk, but some of it, was particularly interesting.
The idea that a 5'6" Racoon Anthro would be collecting and selling trash and junk was an amusing one in itself. But he was quite nice, and seemed to enjoy his job, which made interacting with him all the better. In the conversations Reese had with him, he seemed to gather many of his “artifacts” with his own hands, that gave him unique insights into his stock. Particularly the artifacts he would occasionally sell.
The racoon always had some interesting trinkets and usually quite a few cheap mana stones. If Reese had to guess, nearly half his stash had come from Ethmond alone. Today though, he was breathed of anything particularly useful for his experiments.
“I’m sorry kid, I sold all my stones to a black smith down the road. I’ll be heading back this way with a small shipment in a month though. I’ll make sure I save some for you!”
It was the nature of the game, you can’t expect a traveling merchant to just keep things for you, at least not without a preexisting contract. However, some of his “junk” on display sparked his interest. Normally it was just old Auslang debris. Bits of metal with writing, pretty and polished. What he had today, wasn’t anything like that. Two things in particular caught his attention.
A broken red crystal with metal intrusions caught his eye. It looked, wrong, or more accurately unnatural. The metal inside was gold by the looks of it, like his enchantment circuits. The crystal seemed to have other imperfections too, like it was made from different crystals somehow fused together. Right in the center at the end of the gold filament was a very small, barely visible set of imperfections. They looked like multiple smaller mana crystals, connected together, but they had to be tiny. The rainbow pattern of Iridescence implying micro level structures. Very tiny indeed. It looked like his hypothesized integrated mana circuit idea but made real. The fact that it was so badly damaged would have made it useless if that was the case though, likely broken beyond use.
“Pretty isn’t it.” Ethmond noticed Reese’s attention on the item. “I’ve got a noble woman a few cities over who fancy’s herself a jeweler. I think she’d be able to make something really nice with it. But maybe you want it?”
There was no price. Either he was expecting some strong haggling or already had a buyer in mind. That nobel woman could have just been part of a story to sell it to him, though.
“I don’t know. It looks like a mana crystal. Might be useful in my experiments, but it’s badly damaged.”
Reese could see the gears in the merchant’s head twirling as he crafted a story that might have been half true or half false, “It very much is a mana crystal, part of a larger crystal. Sadly, that was all I could salvage. It came off some old rusted Auslang technology. It was too damaged to know for sure, but I suspect it was a walker.”
Walker. Reese had heard that term before in one of the history books he read. Something the Auslang used a millina ago. It certainly got his attention, but again. It was too damaged to really make use of it.
“5 Gold.” Ethmond thought he had a good read on the kid, but in truth, all he did was ensure Reese put the item down.
“Ha, you’re nuts man. I’m not even going to try and haggle that down. The thing is broken.”
“Ok, what about 2 gold?”
Reese considered it. In truth, 2 gold may not have been too unreasonable if the crystal had less fractur lines. It was clearly some kind of fire crystal, and large. But tons of imperfections. Really, 1 Gold would have been more reasonable, and probably 30 silvers more than he wanted to spend on it.
“Nah, still too much. Maybe I could do 20 silvers?”
Now it was Ethmond’s chance to laugh. “No way. No I just couldn’t do less than 1 gold… No, 1 gold and 30 silvers.”
Reese shook his head, his attention turning to something else, the other artifact of interest. It was flat and smooth glass. But it was odd. There were some imperfections that seemed to catch the light.
“Mind if I see this?” Reese picked up the glass with a nod from Ethmond. Along the side was a length of metal, that seemed like brass. The pane of glass was actually two, layered on top of each other with something running in the center of it all. It reminded Reese of an LCD matrix, but that couldn’t be possible. The item was clearly ruined, even worse than the fire crystal. But, this seemed much more useful.
“20 Silvers.” Ethmond proclaimed.
It wasn’t worth 5, just given the materials. But, he wanted it.
“I’ll give you 6 Silvers.”
“You’re a cheeky kid, after all the business we did. You know how much I’ll lose on that?”
“Given you found this, nothing. I’ll go up to 7.”
“Nothing. I spent weeks out in the desert digging these things up with my bare hands. Time, effort, water, food, none of that is free. I’ll go as low as 16 silver.”
“You don’t have bare hands, you’re a racoon.” The joke didn’t translate over well. “Look, material wise, this isn’t even worth 5 silver, and we both know no one is going to see value in it.” He pulled 9 silvers out of his wallet and put them on his cart. “I do want it, but it’s not worth any more than that to me.”
Ethmond considered the coins, the junk and any future business prospects with the kid. In truth, he could probably have afforded to let it go for the 6 silvers, but it would have hurt. Reese had no idea how much it effort it took to steal that in the first place.
“Fine, I’ll sell it at a lost to make more room and keep a good customer happy.” Ethmond pretended to pout, of course, no sane merchant would sell at a loss. If they could help it. Reese knew that and couldn’t help but smile at their haggling game.
Heading home, he would have the rest of the night to work on his new project. Figuring out what this actually was, and how it worked. The tiny imperfections would be a prefect specimen for his newly constructed compound micro scope. The optics weren’t cheap, but with this, they should show their value.
One cold dinner and many hours later, his notebook was packed with new findings. He couldn’t be sure, but the traces were probably gold, just very, very thin. He wished he had more chemistry knowledge, trying to reduplicate all that from scratch was beyond his current efforts. Regardless, what he did know was they conducted all the different mana types equally. Well, at least all the types he had stones for. Solistum and pure light were out of his current testing process.
The glass itself was also strange, it seemed to block most kind of mana, which was unusual for glass. So when he brought a charged mana crystal in, nothing much happened. But if he brought it to the edge separating the two plans a slight glow would be seen. Near as he could tell the traces were coated with some kind of mana reactive dust. Probably some crushed mana stone, but again, he couldn’t be sure. The microscope was just barely able to see a fuzzy substance on the traces, but it was way too small to resolve.
It gave him an idea to test though. He thought it might be possible to make something like a display, a flat panel display specifically, eventually. One of the necessary components of the device he had been sketching out over the past few years. First though, he would try making something much simpler. He already knew he could “turn on” mana stone fragments with a mana potential, could he make something smaller and simpler than a full display?
Hours more would pass, and it had to be close to midnight, but he had it. A very simple, 7 segmented display. What’s more, it worked!
The euphoria Reese felt overshadowed the sleeplessness threating to take him. He couldn’t wait to show Emilie. Before he fell asleep, he took a few moments to consider her. She really was brilliant. If he could convince her to help him in his experiments, he could probably leapfrog his own timeline. Maybe he could actually get her interested in his machinations, beyond just the spell casting. Having a fellow mechanic and tinker would be nice.
For reasons he couldn't understand, it almost seemed like she had been avoiding him today. Which was a shame, he really would have liked her to see that fused mana gem in the marketplace.
Morning came, and Reese almost missed both breakfast and the morning bell. His attention was caught up in his experiments. He had successfully tied together the inputs for the display using some of the simple logic gates he developed. He’d have to work on miniaturizing them later, but for now, there were 10 lines that lead into the display. Of course, that was just for testing, he’d probably convert it over to binary later.
School was a blur. Though, Reese did notice Samil wasn't present, and Venginn looked despondent. It was clear something was going on between those too, but best not to pry she didn't particularly like him anyway.
In terms of studies, Fense was lecturing on the continents again. Abscondi was much more rocky then he realized, with far more islands. His mind drifted between the ideas in his notebook and day dreams about the demon races that lived there. He was so caught up in his own internal conversation that he missed the conversation Fense was trying to have with him.
“And that’s why Reese will be doing pages after lectures are done. Right Reese?”
“Huh, yes… Wait, what?” The attempted conversation clearly caught him off guard. But the class found it amusing at least.
Thankfully Fense was gentile, only asking for 2 pages.
“Thoughts somewhere else today?”
“Hmm, yeah. I’ve been caught up in some ideas… I think I’m close to a big breakthrough.”
“Ah, so you this wasn’t about Emilie.”
That caused his though process to misfire. “What about Emilie?”
"You didn't know?" Fense shook his head. “Not my place. You might want to finish those pages and talk to her yourself.”
Outside the school, Emilie stood waiting for him. It wasn’t unusual for her to wait around, but often she’d be over by the hill or back at her parents’ shop.
“Emilie! Everything ok?”
With a jump she turned and looked at the source of the question. “Reese! Yeah, I’m just… lost in thought. Do you want to hang out for a bit, I need to get my mind off things.”
She seemed dejected by something, but he couldn’t figure out what. For now, maybe hanging around him would cheer her up?
Perhaps it was a bit selfish, but he would be grateful to have a sounding board for his current ideas.
“Ok, so I’ve got a new idea. See this glass?” He took the artifact he’d been studying at his desk.
“It looks like glass?”
“Right! But look carefully, see how there’s these subtle imperfections? I think these are gold traces and mana stone fragments.”
“It doesn’t look like gold. And I don’t see the any mana stones.”
“Well, the gold is really thin, thin enough to see through. And the stones are almost like dust. Come see.”
Using the microscope, he beckoned Emilie to look. Inside, the scope focused on one of the traces, on top of if it small fuzzy dust could be seen, just barely with a hue of color.
“Now, watch this.” He hovered a mana stone near the traces, and a very subtle glow could be seen.
Emilie didn’t really understand the importance, but it looked neat.
“Anyway. I get it may not seem like much, but I think I can make my own version of this.”
She thought about it, but couldn’t see any value in making glass glow. Though, it would look interesting, she supposed. “Ok. What would that do?”
“Well, it would be a screen. Like a page in a book, only it could change. Instead of only being one page it could be any number of them. If I can get it to switch pages fast enough, you might even be able to see things move!”
The statement left her even more lost. What was a ‘screen’? “Like watching pages flip?”
“No, like move. Imagine if a painting 'came to life’ and started moving inside the frame.”
The look of disbelief and skepticism was as subtle as a car crash waking you from your slumber. It was something he hadn’t seen from her in a long time and hurt just as much.
“I get it's hard to believe but, I’ve sort of got a working prototype.” He beckoned to the glass he had laid out. Very thin strands of gold were visible connected to small gem fragments that went under a thin piece of paper, that itself seemed to cover more gold strands. All of that was covered in a fine red powered with 7 notable lines. Emilie guessed the red powder was some kind of crushed mana stone.
“Watch when I tap this wire.”
Two of the stands glowed, creating a rough outline of the number 1 in the human alphabet.
Next, he tapped an adjacent wire, creating a 2. Then a 3 all the way to 9 and 0. It was a neat trick, but she didn't understand the usefulness of it.
“Maybe with more numbers it could be useful?” she queried.
“Exactly! I'm going to clean this up and make an 8 digit display next. Then I'm going to work on this.”
He handed her his notebook open to a page with some of symbols, and lines. A square with a rounded tip, some round arrows, circles. It was alien to her, but looked like drawing he had shown her before. “What is this?”
“A calculator kind of like an automatic abacus. If you charge these wires in the right order you'll put a number into it, then you select what operation you want and put in another number. When you’re done, you'll have an answer, on this display.”
She began to see some of the possible utility of the display and idea, but it was just hard to fathom mana stones and gold foil being able to count. Much less divide and multiply. “Is this like your bit adder you showed me a while back?”
“Yeah, exactly! Just bigger.” That reminded him, there was something else he needed to show her. “Oh let me also show you something else cool I figured out! It was purely accident when I was messing with the microscope last night.”
A plank sat on his desk at an angle, propped against the textbook, as he moved the textbook it would change it’s angle.
“Ok, so if I put this regular stone on this sheet at just the right angle it will stick, barely. If I change the angle even a bit, it will… there, start to slide down. This is the angle where static friction fails. It’s always the same, for the same materials. But if I set this just on edge of slipping… and I bring this mana stone very close.”
The rock began slowly and erratically sliding downward.
“The mana forces are changing the coefficient of friction! I only have these weak stones, but I’m betting more powerful ones would have a stronger and longer-range effect. Also, different mana stones seem to have different intensities. Sound mana is the biggest. Metal seems to have the opposite effect and makes it stick more!”
Emilie watched the small rock slowly jerk down the ramp, it was, kind of neat. Maybe. But like most of his ideas, what he was saying was detached from everyday life. Either too far ahead of what others would think about, or too far removed to really understand. So, she had to ask, “Ok. Why is that important?”
Of course, coming from a world of technology, it was important. Gears, motors, really anything that moved would be affected by this changing force. It meant much of what he knew wasn’t possible. Which as he thought about it, wouldn’t really matter to someone who have never seen or even conceived of such things. “Well… It means it’s hard to build anything that transfers force. Like, if I built some gears and had these crystal by them, it could cause them to jam up or slip.” Though good examples that he was despite to call upon, he would skip cars, trucks and trains for now.
“But why does that matter? Do you think the flour mills will have some issues if you make this calculator?” Given the different realities, it’s no wonder that even some one as intelligent as her was lost, any one would be. The fact was the effect was interesting, but it didn’t seem to lead anywhere, unless you already knew the end goal.
“Well, it explains why my mechanical clock idea might never work, and it had nothing to do with the calculator. Just something I found and realized last night while testing stuff.” He flipped to another page in his notebook.
If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.
“This is what I’m eventually going to build. I’ll probably need help putting it together, and definitely testing it. I know we’ve hung out a lot in the past few years, but we never really worked on something together. I think you’d understand where I’m coming from with a lot of this if we worked on it together. I mean, we could change the world!”
A pit began to form in her stomach. “Reese about hanging out. I’m not sure I’ll be able to for much longer.”
“Why not? Did something happen?" A bit of fear crept into him, this was what Fense was talking about. Maybe it was him, “Did I do something?”
Nothing had happened, though, she did want to tell him he was overbearing. This probably wasn’t the best time for that though. “No. My parents were contacted by someone from a college in Yoth, they’re interested in testing my skills.”
The words filled him with relief, but also concern. “You mean the Yoth magic school? I read about them.”
She nodded.
“Emilie, that’s… Incredible. That’s one of the best magic schools in all the kingdoms. I’m, envious.” It was then that it really began to hit him as the concern drew into dread. “That means you won’t be around anymore.”
“Yeah, but I mean, they might test me and see I’m not a good candidate. I’m only 8, they usually don’t take people till their teens.”
“You're basically 9, and they’d have to be blind or insane not to take you. When are they coming?”
“Probably this weekend, either on Sanedeg or Ostara. My parents didn’t give me an exact day. If I pass, and they accept me… I was told It would be quick, like a week or two since their next quarter us starting soon.”
Sanedeg came and went, no one showed up to the village. Emilie was unavailable for the whole day. Seemingly kept inside by her parents. Whether she was resting or studying Reese couldn’t tell. It was usual for Emilie’s parents to be so protective of her though.
With little to do, and no one to talk to, Reese found himself wandering around. Part of him felt like sparing, like if he was able to hit something he'd be able to knock the poison out his mind and system. Unfortunately, there was no one in the keep or at least no one in a position to cross swords. There were some training dummies, but they were mostly meant for real swords. Not the wooden ones he was allowed to use.
A thought occurred to him, maybe he could convince his father to let him use one of the steel training swords for a change. They were kept without an edge so they couldn't cut well, the key point being 'well'. A good swordsman could find a way to cut with one, and even a bad one could bludgeon you with it, if you weren't careful.
It was unusual but Reese found Fortus in his office, a space he rarely used outside yelling at people, preferring to be in the field or directly managing his knights.
Fortus stared at the two pieces of paper, as if he had a conclusion he couldn't accept. The one Reese recognized, was recovered from the goblin attack a few months ago. The other one, he wasn't sure about, it look familiar. A year ago, Reese caught his father looking at something similar after the bandit raid took Athenia's life.
A pang of remorse overcame him as he remembered the pain he put his father through during the goblin and the bandit attacks. Perhaps that was why he was reviewing the two pieces of paper. He saw a similar pattern of loss between both events. At least, that's what Reese thought.
"Dad, are you still thinking about Athenia?"
Looking up from the papers, he acknowledged his son, and sealed away some of his emotions. It was clear he didn't want his son to see the concern he suddenly had. "…Something like that."
"Is that why you were so mad about what Gezal, Emilie and I did."
Fortus' only response was to glare at his son.
"Sorry, I shouldn't have asked that."
Reese could tell there was more. Those two papers had some kind of meaning that seemed to scare Fortus. Like there was a link between them only he had become aware of.
"Are those two-paper related somehow?"
A flash of shock, followed by a rapid movement to secure both papers in his desk away from sight. There was something to that statement, his father wasn't sad about the notes. He was scared and angry.
"Why are you in the keep? Citizens shouldn't be here if they don't have official business, and that includes you."
"I was hoping to get a training sword. I wanted to practice a bit, though it might clear my head."
"You know where the swords are."
"I was hoping to practice with a steel one on a training dummy?"
Again, his father glared at him.
"I guess that's a no…"
The next day, Ostara, Reese watched and waited. His experiments saw little advancement as he couldn’t focus on them. For a brief time, he was almost relieved that no one was showing up to take his friend away. But he shook those thoughts out of his head. They weren’t right. Emilie was already a powerful sorceress, she belonged somewhere that could hone and expand her skills and that wasn’t this town. He was just sorry it wasn’t with him.
Eventually though, a late afternoon carriage arrived, and a dark elf draped in dark robes walked out. It was obvious that person was a mage.
An hour later and the sound of spell casting could be heard throughout the village. That was Emilie’s spell casting from the sounds of it. Eventually it was over, and the quiet was deafening as he tried to think, but just couldn't.
An unexpected knock at the door pulled Reese from his disaffected daydreaming. He could just barely hear what was being said downstairs, it was something concerning him?
“Reese, I need you to come down here.” His mother called up to him.
He was not expecting to see that same Dark Elf from earlier in his doorway.
The dark elf was clothed in dark garbs with gold inlay. The pattern made Reese think it was enchanted. He hadn’t seen a cloth enchantment before, but it didn't seem any more unreasonable than any other. Perhaps more difficult to bind.
“Ah, good afternoon. You must be Reese?”
“I am.”
“Very good. I’m Sibula, with the Yoth magic college. Your friend Emilie… pushed, for me to give you an interview.”
It was hard to contain his excitement. This was a change! A chance to actually go somewhere and learn, maybe find answers and ways around his gatelessness. He had to make a good impression here. Seemed like a good first place to start was the elf's enchanted clothing, maybe pointing out that he knew about it would help paint him in a better light?
“Great. Out of curiosity, your robes look enchanted. I haven’t seen enchanted cloth before. What does it do?” His bumbling attempt seemed to illicit a moment of disinterest from the dark elf, who still tried to humor him.
“Oh this? I’m not sure, our smith at the college tailored some pure light enchantment into it. Makes it sturdy to magic attacks. But, we’re not here to talk about mundane things like cloths.”
His query had the opposite effect from what he intended.
“Now, like I said Emilie was quite insistent I interview you.”
The fact that Emilie was thinking about him and wanted him to head to the college too made him happy. In truth, he wouldn’t know what to do if Emilie left him alone. It wasn’t just about building his computer, and yeah, their mental ages were different, but they were still friends. It was the nature of life that people come and go, but he always struggled with the going part.
“First, I understand you have an undersized gate?”
“Not exactly. It's more complicated than that.”
“I see, disorganized then?”
Reese's eyes dropped to the floor, “No. I’m technically gateless.”
“Technically?” The elf didn't seem amused by that statement, seemingly unsure if he was joking or not.
“Well, I don't have a gate, but I found other ways to cast spells and I’ve been working on enchantments. I pretty sure I can augment my limited casting abilities.”
The elf tried to stifle a laugh, he needed to be professional.
“Reese, I appreciate your desire, but the magic college of Yoth is the most prestigious in the six kingdoms. We can't just accept anyone. Maybe this was a bad idea.” He whispered that last part.
“What about a test, I can show you what I can do, and the devices I've made.”
Sibula took in a deep breath and forced a smile. "I suppose I am already here. Let's start with the interview process."
They moved to the kitchen table, where Sibula sat down with a small journal. "Now can you tell me about the first time you cast a spell?" He paused for a moment, "I suppose though if you're gateless that wouldn't have happened…" With his pen he began making some notes in his book only to be stopped by Reese.
"Actually, I can cast spells, the first time I was 6. I think it was a Water Bolt spell, but I know I also cast a Fire Bolt spell too."
"You said you were gateless? You can't cast spells without a gate."
It was time for his mother to intervene. "He is gateless, we had him tested when he was 4. But, he can also cast spells, silently too!"
The Elf scratched at his head and wrote some more notes in his journal. "I've hear rumors of gateless casting, but never seen proof of it. I mostly assume it's myth. Why did you test him when he was 4? Most people don't cast spells till they're much older."
Lilith put her hand on his head and patted his hair, "He was very well read for a 4 year old and was practicing spell casting for over a year. Simple spells but still, after his repeated inability, I thought it wise to test him early."
Again, Sibula wrote more notes. "Ok, so you can cast some simple spells, can you explain how?"
Reese spent the next few minutes explaining his process, how he studied Emilie's casting, how he read up on invoking, and all the work that went into making sense of it all.
For a moment, the interviewer seemed quite speechless. "I see… that's, impressive." It was hard to tell if that was a sarcastic or serious response. "Perhaps we can move on to the demonstration part of the exercise."
As they stood outside, Reese focused as hard as he could. This could be his one shot, maybe he could convince the Elf with some of his enchantments, but he had to assume this would be it.
First, a Fire Bolt spell. His cast was quick, he had been training, in half a second, a tiny puff of fire flew from his hand and winked out of existence about 12 feet away. If one was being generous, it was small compared to Emilie’s, or anyone else really.
Sibula was clearly unimpressed, and jotted some more things down in his journal.
Next was a water bolt. A small round of water, just about the size of tensis ball flew forward with some speed, before landing about 15 feet away. Reese wouldn’t say it, but that was probably the farthest and largest he had ever cast the spell.
The Dark Elf shook his head not bothering to write anything that time, “Reese I think that’s enough.”
“Just one more.” He practically begged.
This one was going to be hard. He had to chain three symbols together, a dark fire, a light water, and another dark fire in just the right position an order and timing. He barely did it but was rewarded with a tiny sliver of ice that flew forward and landed just out of sight.
While the advanced spell was, interesting, being generally hard to cast. It was still just pathetic. But, he wanted to be generous to the child. “I see you know some advanced spells, you’re even able to silently cast them.” He paused, at first he was going to suggest Reese try and incantation but that was probably not going to work if he was truly gateless. “I take it you can’t do an incantation.”
Again a handful of scratches at journal.
Of course, Reese shook his head no. “But, I’ve got other things. I’ve been working on some really neat enchantments and other magical projects. Just please let me show them to you. I think you’ll be impressed.”
His heart raced as he ran to his room. This was not going the way he wanted too, and as much as he didn’t want to admit it, the outcome already seemed to be decided.
The elf couldn't help but feel this was an utter waste of time. This child had no gate and the spells he did cast were absolutely pathetic. He wasn’t even casting them properly.
His enchantments did seem somewhat interesting, at least. Sibula only had a basic understanding of enchantments, it was generally seen as beneath a mage like him. But he had never heard about someone “turning them on and off”. It almost piqued his interest, though the boy's constant attempts to explain things, and his incoherent explanations into magic droned on.
Taking a moment from the child’s ramblings, he looked around the room. Something did catch his attention. A piece of broken glass, with brass or gold attached. It looked familiar.
“This is an interesting artifact. Where did you find it?”
Reese stopped his explanation of automatic differentiation and looked up, “Oh, yeah. I picked that up from a merchant. I've been trying to figure out how it works. I know there’s not much left of it, but I've made some progress.”
“Oh?” now that may have been with some consideration. “If you’ve made any interesting discoveries into magic technology, that could maybe earn some favor.”
As he setup his display prototype and explained it all, the dark elf's interest began to wane again. It was interesting in some regards. But his explanation was absolute nonsense.
“So explain to me again, how you think this artifact works?”
“The glass has gold traces-“
“That you can’t see.”
“You can see them, they’re just thin. You don’t need a lot of gold to carry the small amount of mana.”
“How would you even get it that thin?”
Reese had to admit, he didn’t know. There were probably a dozen methods to do it. Vapor deposition or sputtering would be able to. But that technology was at best centuries beyond anything he saw here. It was an interesting question though, how did they do it without advanced technology?
He made a note in his book as he gave a quick handwavy possibility. “I’m not completely sure. Maybe a strong acid dissolves the gold, and then it’s evaporated, leaving the gold behind?”
“A, strong acid? Dissolving gold.” It was clear Reese had lost him.
“It’s just an idea. There are other possibilities. Regardless of what you think, I do have a protype, and it works.” He tapped the fire mana stone against each wire, and sure enough, the display read out what one might expect.
To Sibula though, it was just a light show. Nothing like the intricate graphics and letters he knew that artifact would have been capable of. “I think that’s enough. Let’s go downstairs and discuss this with your parent.”
As they sat around the table, Reese, was not hopeful but refused to give in. There was always a chance.
“Reese, I don’t think you would be a good fit for the college. You don't have any serious magic potential, your gadgets while interesting don't offer much.” The elf thought for a few moments. It was very unlikely, but maybe he'd have some small bit of value. He did have an interest in those artifacts, and his insights while likely wrong were still, intriguing. “Would your parents even be able to afford the tuition? It's 10 gold a year, plus expense.”
10 gold. His family was well off, well enough anyway. But 10 gold, he guessed his mother and father brought in maybe 20-30 gold a year. At best, the tuition would be a third of that, and it didn’t include the expenses, whatever those would add up too. He looked at his mother who lowered her head and then his father who shook out a ‘no'.
“Is Emilie paying 10 gold a year?”
“Emilie’s skills are amazing. Very few can compete with them, including mine. We're offering her a full scholarship. We could not offer the same for… someone like you.”
That last part felt like a dagger to chest.
“If you could at least afford the 10 gold… it’s still unlikely, but I would bring it up to the archmage. With that said, if you’re interested in pursuing enchantments, maybe you should consider apprenticing under a blacksmith. It’s a fine profession.”
Several moments were spent in silence. Eventually Reese felt his father’s hand on his shoulder. It was, unusual for him to comfort his son, but it was not unwelcomed.
Sibula stood up and began to leave, “You can expect a formal letter in a few weeks with our decision. Have a good day.”
For Reese, that was it. The letter was a formality, he had failed in every measurable way to impress the college. He could have blamed it on anything, lack of time, sleeplessness, over eagerness, it didn’t matter. Only the outcome mattered, which seemed to be predetermined at this point.
Maybe Emilie should never have tried to help him. Maybe then he wouldn't know how much of a failure he was. But he shook his head at that thought, it was a very kind thing she did. It wasn't her fault he was useless.
Hours later, Sibula sat alone in the inn room he reserved, choosing to pass the time by completing the necessary paperwork for his journey. He could have waited till he was back at the college, but this seemed as good a time as any with little else to do in the small village. The forms he filled out were all the same, each drawn up by one of the many students back at the college. Either as a demerit, a chance to earn some favor, or just a requirement of the college administration, a partial payment for a scholarship.
A line for a provenance and country, another for town or city, and an applicant name followed by some demographics. The center had some meat, it was the portion where he evaluated each candidate, but it was the last few lines that mattered the most. The first was simple, “Admittance” He could write either “Deny” or “Allow”. A two lines after were “Justification”. The last was funding, which was a little harder, it could be any number of things from self-funded, to college scholarship, a kings grant, or anything that explained how they would pay. “Unknown” was technically allowed, but frowned upon. Having someone come up to college who couldn’t pay was a problem in waiting.
Wollseeth was the last in his journey this month, so he started with the other villages and other applicants, which were easy enough. Unlike the past summer, they were all denies. Mana potential too low. Gate too disorganized. Unintelligent and unread. Too old to start at the college without a good reason, and there was no good reason. Fourteen applicants in total, over three days. Fairly typical.
Next, he moved to the one he was looking for, Emilie:
“Exceptional mana potential, large well-organized gate. Practical examples of silent casting and advanced spells. Maybe being too close to another child villager could make leaving difficult. Very young.”
“Admittance: Allow”
“Justification: I’ve never seen anyone this young, with this much skill. We need to grab her before another college does.”
“Funding: Full College Scholarship, and minor expenses covered.”
And lastly, one he had almost considered not even writing, Reese's:
“Gateless, zero limited mana potential. Unable to cast Shows evidence of silent casting but only silent casting, some advanced casting evident. Even without a gate. Still, very low mana potential. Unusually strong knowledge of enchantments, some things I’ve never seen before. Claims to have insight into at least one Technopolis item and has failed continues to try and replicate, with questionable successes. I’m skeptical but may warrant future consideration.”
As he wrote, he had to pause many times. What should have been simple, was turning out to be anything but. He even found himself correcting his points over and over. He had to admit, a gateless mage was an interesting concept. But his spells were just too anemic. If anything was going to get him in, it would be enchanting, but that’s more the realm of blacksmithing. Even if the college did technically have research in the area.
“Admittance:”
This particular part was the most important. You allowed someone into the college or denied them. There was no other option really. It was almost unheard of to re-interview applicants, except in the most extreme cases. Each time he went to write deny, he had to stop. He tried writing Allow once, but couldn’t do that either. This should have been easy.
Maybe the justification would make it easier. He tapped at the page for several minutes, before writing something he didn’t want too but couldn’t figure out anything else to put.
“Justification: Applicant is a quandary. I can neither Deny or Allow at this time. Recommend future contact to reevaluate progress.”
The statement basically wrote itself. His leadership wasn’t going to like it. But he just couldn’t write anything else.
“Funding:”
Blank, since he wasn’t being admitted.
His eyes burned, as the hour grew late. It must have been close to 11, maybe even midnight. The carriage would leave in the early morning. If he didn’t want to stay in this backwater village he needed to be up by 5.
Momadeg, the first day of the week. As the year crept towards it’s end, the sunrises came later and later. In his room, Reese sat in a twilight darkness. Unable to move forward. What was he supposed to do now?
He was only 8, at least in body. But even at such a young age he felt like he had no options. He was intelligent, read more books than most adults ever would. Had knowledge that was literally centuries ahead of anything here. Yet, he still had no real way to use it. Without a gate, he couldn’t do the things he wanted. He would never be a full mage. Could never be a hero sword fighter or join the freelancers. He couldn’t even be a healer, or anything that used magic. Which seemed to be most things in the world. To make it worse, in a week or two, he’d be alone.
It wasn’t like he couldn’t have a life here. Blacksmithing was a valid profession after all, and some part of that did appeal to him. A peaceful life of underachievement banging away at metals, disappointing his parents and himself. What was wrong with him, it was a fine and normal choice, not everyone could be the hero. So why wasn’t he satisfied with that path?
“Reese, come eat before you head to school.” His mother tried to be supportive of him last night, even his father stood behind him. But they couldn’t fix it. In truth, he locked him self away like he had done all those years ago. That lifetime ago that he still couldn’t pull himself away from.
His body felt sluggish, like every movement was either mired in mud or weight down. He knew this feeling, the early stages of depression. This was a fight he couldn’t afford to lose again, forcing himself wasn’t easy. It was never easy. But he still had some hope here. He just needed to find a stick to prop himself up with. Shame there weren’t any owls handing out sticks here.
School was unusually hard for him. He couldn’t think or concentrate. Perhaps Fense knew something wasn’t right, as he gave Reese a wide berth for the day. There were no pages for forgetting his homework, no pages for missing a question directed at him. Just, an allowance to exist for the day.
After school was another matter. What was he suppose to do today? The bookstore was closed again, Charston didn’t say why, just that he needed time. Had Reese paid attention he would have noticed a younger robed man hanging around the shop with Charston, but his mind was too preoccupied the past few days.
“Reese! How did it go yesterday? I expected you to come hang out, but you never did.” Emilie’s smile beamed at him.
It was obvious how it went for her, even if Sibula hadn’t told him anyone would have guessed. What should he tell her? That he was an utter failure? That he was happy for her? That it didn’t matter, and he would come back stronger? All he wanted right now was to be alone.
“Not good. He said I wasn’t a good fit.” Reese looked down and considered the dirt, while waiting for Emile to say something, but she didn’t.
“I guess it doesn’t matter. I was never going to be a mage, I’m just, not as good as you.”
Emilie did not like that talk, “Reese, that’s nonsense. You know more about the theory of magic then I do!”
Did he know more about magic than she did? If you consider esoteric knowledge as knowing more, then perhaps. But if you only consider actual useful information, actionable information, then no, he did not. At least in his mind.
“I can’t cast spells like you can. I can’t feel mana like you can. For everything you claim I know I keep coming up short. I’m useless.”
“Why are you like this? You always knock yourself down and say horrible things about yourself. I’m the one who’s useless, I almost burned the village down and drown my brother, I almost killed Gezal when I was trying to heal him because I didn't follow the book's instructions to the letter. I made no progress on learning new spells till you came along. You always solve my problems for me. In fact, it’s one of the things that’s always bothered me. You’re so far ahead of me I can’t catch up, and you won’t let me try!”
A thrumming in his chest caught him off guard, as his brain demanded oxygen. The spinning in his head was overwhelming as he couldn’t process what being said to him. There was truth to what she said, he knew that. After all he was certainly well read, but he couldn’t acknowledge that to himself. Admitting success meant he could stop, and he couldn’t, he had to keep going. But if he didn’t acknowledge some meaningful amount of truth Emilie would be upset with him and herself, which lead to bad outcomes such as them no longer being friends. Which lead to further bad outcomes. Path after pathway, connection after connection warped though his head making it harder and harder to think.
His brain was a mess of disordered thoughts. It just wasn’t big enough to handle all the data he needed to process. This is why being alone with machines was easier, it was simpler. Computers, technology, science, he understood these things, they made sense to him and were predictable.
The silent storm of thoughts, bothered Emilie who didn’t know what to say herself. She needed him to acknowledge what she said, even if he didn’t agree. “Reese. Just say something.”
“Leave me alone!” He shouted. He didn’t mean to shout.
“Ok. I’ll leave you alone.” Emilie turned and quickly walked away. Reese wouldn’t be able to see her crying.
There was still a chance, he could have run after her, and told her he was sorry that he didn’t mean to yell. But in some way, this seemed better. Just sever the connection now, before it really started to hurt. That didn’t change the fact that it still hurt, but it did numb it just a bit.
What was wrong with him, why couldn’t he just be normal for a moment.
A week went by, neither Reese nor Emilie would talk to each other, and she had stop going to class there was no reason after all. Those around them could see the friction between the two nearly inseparable friends was strange. Of course, no one brought it up to either, it wasn’t their business. But it felt sad somehow.
When the day came for Emilie to leave, Reese sat in his room. Looking over his experiments and projects, unable to focus on them.
Why didn’t he at least say good bye to her? He was her friend, wasn’t she? Even if they had a fight, so what, friends fight. Why was this so hard for him.
A knock at his door interrupted his train wreck of thoughts. Of all the people he might have expected to see, Mabel was not one of them.
“Reese, are you ok?” For a four year old Mabel was quite aware of the world around her.
Forcing lukewarm smile he regarded his younger half sister, impressed she could read his emotions so easily. “I’m fine, just… lost in thought.”
“Are you sad your friend is leaving?”
“I don’t…” No, that’s not right, he did know. “Yes, very much so.”
“You had a fight, that’s what Lillith said. That’s why Emilie didn’t come over this week?”
“You’re very observant, you know that?”
“And your defaulting.”
“Defaulting?” He couldn’t help but laugh, “You mean deflecting. That’s a good word, where did you learn it?”
“Dad, I mean Fortus says it when sword fighting, and I’ve heard you say it a few times.”
It kind of hurt to hear Mabel correct herself in regard to their father. Lilith may not have been her mother, biologically. But Fortus was her father in all regards. A conversation for another time though.
“I don’t know what to do. She’s leaving today, probably in the next few minutes. She was my best friend here. I don’t know what I’m going to do without her around.”
“You should make up before she leaves. You’ll feel better.”
Wisdom from a child, but she wasn’t wrong. Inside of him, he couldn’t reconcile her leaving. "Maybe… you're right." He stood up and took a deep breath as he walked to the inn.
Emilie's family, was walking away. "Reese, you just missed her." Basilara seemed almost sad to say that.
Scrambling, Reese scanned the horizon looking for something. There, the carriage had already begun its long trek north, but if he was quick, he could catch up to it. Maybe.
“Emilie!” Calling out the carriage couldn’t hear him. He had to run faster.
This was hard, not just the words, but the run too. The carriage was only moving about 10 miles an hour, but that’s a six-minute mile for what had to be a mile so far. For a 8 year old, that’s a lot.
Looking down he focused on his steps, pushing himself to move just a bit faster.
He thought about what to say, “I'm sorry. I shouldn’t have said that stuff… “Seemed like a good start.
“Shit I'm winded.” He whispered to himself.
What else would he say. “ I don't want you to hate me.”
Then she would apologize too, they’d be friends just separated by distance. It was going to work; they’d still be friends. Pushing his legs as hard as he could, he could feel his muscles starting to tear.
Looking up though, he saw it. The carriage and Emilie, as it disappeared over the bridge. It was on its way to the Paved Road, and the north. The last time he would see her, he missed it.
He could only do one last thing, stop running. It was over, and he missed it.
The question remained for him, what now?