“Do you know how this works?” I ask Galea in my head.

The golden dragon lands on the orb and taps a claw against the glass, though I don’t think that she really touches it. “It is a simple device,” she informs me.

“Is that a yes?”

“Run your finger across the surface,” she says.

When I do so, the cloudy light inside the orb splits open. Similar to the transparent, black signs that I have been seeing since waking up, rows of words appear inside the glass. Experimenting a bit, I discovery that I can flip through the rows like the pages of a book. There are hundreds of pages of the lists available, and I spend more than ten minutes with the orb before I find a way to filter the lists for anything practical to me.

Conflux Combinations: Page 1 of 1

* Gold, Dragon, Fire: Conqueror Conflux

* Gold, Earth, Magic: Enchanter Conflux

* Gold, Earth, Spear: Juggernaut Conflux

* Gold, Fire, Forge: Inventor Conflux

* Gold, Fire, Magic: Magus Conflux

* Gold, Illusion, Magic: Enchanter Conflux

* Gold, Iron, Forge: Inventor Conflux

* Gold, Lightning, Magic: Magus Conflux

* Gold, Silver, Emerald: Queen Conflux

* Gold, Silver, Ruby: Queen Conflux

* Gold, Silver, Sapphire: Queen Conflux

* Gold, Sword, Wing: Myrmidon Conflux

“There aren’t many combinations that include gold,” I say.

“Ms. Willian did say that it was an uncommon essentia,” Galea reminds me.

"Then what was my brother thinking when he sent it to me?” I go back and look through the full lists for several minutes. Most of the confluxes I have never heard of before; the fact that there is a Queen Conflux at all is bizarre. I wonder if all queens make certain to get it. “Do you know what these different confluxes do?”

“I only know what you know, or what you can perceive Mistress Charlene.”

“So no.” I sigh, turning away from the index to carefully approach one of the open cupboards. As I approach, I get my first good look at the essentia shining out from inside, standing on eight different elevated shelves inside the cupboard, they stand unmarked, twenty to a row. Before I can ask, signs appear in the air above the essentia, relating them to me. A multitude of extravagance shines at me: Water Essentia, Serpent Essentia, Lightning Essentia, Void Essentia, Lion Essentia, Acid Essentia, Frost Essentia, Luck Essentia, Genius Essentia, Puppet Essentia. Scanning through all of the words popping into the air in front of me brings back to mind the headache that I had almost forgotten in my excitement. Willing it to be so, I dismiss the signs as I read them, slowly working my way though the deluge of information in front of me. I stop my scanning when I find one essentia that stands out to me.

Gingerly, I pluck a pyramid from the shelf that shines in the perfect light of the morning sun. The essentia glows a warmth that spreads though my fingers as I cradle it in my hand, and as I hold it, I being to feel the pain in my head recede.

Magic Essentia(Rare): The condensed magical essence of Magic.

“My brother, Corinth, this is one of the essentia he has.” Holding up the Magic Essentia, I can feel a resonance inside of it. “How is the Magic Essentia only rare quality. Aren’t all of the essentia magic?” Not wanting to get carried away with myself, I set it back down and pick up one labeled “Frost Essentia.” The pyramid of wintery white nips at my fingers with the promise of frost. I find each of the small magical pyramids carries a similar effect, the most interesting one being the spicy taste of cinnamon that comes to me when I heft the Acid Essentia.

“Does anything strike your fancy, Mistress Charlene?” Galea asks from my shoulder.

I replace the Blasphemy Essentia that I am holding in the cupboard and turn to start looking through some of the other cupboards. I pause, picking up the Magic Essentia again and sighing in relief as my headache recedes the barest amount. “They are all interesting,” I say. “It will take an eternity to look through all of them.”

“Perhaps it would be best to select a searching methodology,” Galea suggests.

“Can you do that?”

“Of course.”

I stare at the congregation of essentia on the cupboards around me. “What is the rarest kind of essentia?”

“The highest classification of rarity in essentia is legendary,” she tells me.

“Show me those.”

Hundreds of signs spring to life in front of me. In an instant the number of signs are cut back to display only a few between the shelves of several cupboards. I walk to the nearest, picking up a pyramid of soft green and white, the colors slowly flowing one another.

Aurora Essentia(Legendary): The condensed magical essence of luminescence suspended in time.

“It’s beautiful,” I say, spinning the essentia between my fingers. It brings to me the taste of mint and a feeling of childlike wonderment. “How rare is legendary?”

“The index might know,” Galea suggests.

Carrying the Aurora Essentia and Magic Essentia in my left hand, I return to the index and try to peruse it for an answer. I find an entry within the index. “Common essentia make up ninety percent of all essentia. Rare essentia are one in ten. Very rare essentia are one in a thousand. Legendary essentia are one in a million.”

I’m not very good with numbers, I’ve never had a reason to be, but even I’ve been taught just how big of a number a million is. I look back down at the green and white pyramid of condensed magic in my hand before my sight drifts back to the shelves, at least six other signs shining at me for attention. “Just who is this woman,” I whisper to myself.

“Very well connected,” Galea answers unbidden.

With more care than I have ever given anything in my entire life, I walk back to the cupboard and replace the Aurora Essentia. I don’t know if it is even possible to break an essentia, but given how impossibly rare the item must be, it can probably be used to buy a castle and have enough for a town to spare, I’m not going to take any chances. Dread tries to needle me, seeing how there are more signs from the other cupboard still to look at.

Taking a long, slow breath I make a circuit of the room, taking my time to examine each of the legendary essentia left on the shelves. The Emotion Essentia makes me almost throw it away as soon as I pick it up, a swirl of emotion invades me that knocks me to my knees with ecstasy, rage, and sorrow all at once. It takes several calming breathes to recover from.

“Are you alright, Mistress?” Galea asks me as I leverage myself back to my feet.

“Let’s just get this over with.” I feel impatience creeping up on me and take a moment to try and drive it away. Rushing things won’t help me.

The next legendary essentia I find I don’t dare even pick up. The Black Essentia, the only one that I’ve found that is named for a color, is almost impossible to see in the cupboard, and I realize that the shadow of the cupboard’s wall moves strangely as I walk around the cupboard, always keeping the Black Essentia in the shade. A floating sign labels another as the “Phoenix Essentia.” It looks like a sunburst and is warm to the touch. As I hold it, I feel it pulse like a heartbeat between my fingers.

When I find the next legendary essentia, I know it is the one that I need as soon as I lift it. It is heavy in my fingers, and as I hold the pyramid of golden fire the same sensation I felt come over me watching Arabella Willian first strut out upon the stage in front of the assembled young adventurers penetrates my soul. There is a deep greed that pervades me, the same desire, the same deep longing that I felt seeing Bali reel us up the side of the cliff. The essentia in my hand whispers to me about power, but more than that, it speaks kind acknowledgement to my soul that it understands that hunger I feel when I see those extraordinary people. It is the Dragon Essentia, and I must have it for my own.

“This is the one,” I tell Galea, looking down at the golden fire of promise in my hand. “This is the one that I am taking.”

“The Dragon Essentia,” Galea says with a nod. “That is a powerful one. At least I assume so. How could it not be.”

“There are more legendary essentia left?” I ask Galea. I clench my hand tight around the Dragon Essentia, afraid that it might disappear if I let it go for even a moment.

“Two more.”

“It would be smart to take one of those as my other essentia I suppose.” Looking down at my hands I realize that I have been holding the Magic Essentia for a long while now. Loosening my grip on it a bit, I compare it to the Dragon Essentia in my other hand. Magic shines with the pure radiant light of the morning sun, where the dragon’s fire is wrathful and hungry. “My brother uses the Magic Essentia,” I tell Galea again. “He managed to reach the fifth rank in less than ten years. If it is good enough for him then it should be good enough for me.” The pulse of tender light that radiates out of the Magic Essentia continues to drive the pain out of my head. I breathe in the feeling, it is good, it is right. “I have my selections,” I tell the ice clones standing at the door.

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The construct nods to me. It moves to the center of the room and lifts the index from the pedestal that it sits upon, playing its fingers over the surface of the orb and raising the light. It gestures with its chin, indicating me to walk after it as it walks into the larger chamber beyond the foyer containing the sparkling essentia. I dutifully follow after the clone, Magic Essentia clasped in my left hand and Dragon Essentia in my right.

The soft, pink light illuminates a room of gray stone, perfectly square, ceiling reaching for twenty feet overhead. A puzzle of rune work is painted onto the stone floor with luminesce purple, a complex array of magical architecture that a country bumpkin like myself can’t begin to even guess at. I don’t need to guess however, I have seen the same rune circle drawn twice before, when each of my family members had their essentia integrated into their souls and when I did the same. A chair of plain wood sits in the center of the formation, the room bare of any ornamentation other than it and a covered mirror at the back of the room. The ice clone tuts at me when I look to the mirror, and I put thoughts of it aside.

I am left to sit in the chair at the center of the array. The warm light of the two essentia that I hold contrast the orb of pink light the clone tosses into the air to hover ten feet above us. The clone moves about the magical array, checking the lines, and fixing minor imperfections that it finds.

“This is where I have second thoughts,” I say to myself.

“Do you?” Galea responds.

“No.” I stare at the essentia in my hands. I feel anticipation building inside of me, a palpable relief of stress that I didn’t realize I had been carrying until now. I’ve been waiting for a year for this moment, and a few days ago I still wondered if the moment would ever come. “I don’t even have a smidge of doubt.”

“That is great to hear,” Arabella Willian says, entering the stone room from the foyer and studying the arcane symbology on the ground in much the same way that her ice clone had. “What have you selected?”

I hold up the essentia for her to see. “Dragon and Magic.”

Arabella arches her eyebrows at me before tapping her chin in thought. “I like it,” she says at last. “It sounds ambitious to me. Ambition is good. Ambition is what we need.” The woman steps lightly through the scrawling of runes on the floor, careful not to nudge them with her aquiline metallic boots. “I suppose that I should be beginning your education in the affairs of a magician at some point. What better time to start than right now. Tell me, Charlene, what do you know of the magical ranks?”

“I know that they start at zero and go up in number,” I respond.

“The is correct,” Arabella says. “A bit simplistic, though that is to be expected. Most adventurers do not bother to learn all that much about the etymology of their own profession. The ranks are a funny thing. Until the international band of adventurers known as the Adventurer’s Association bothered to stretch the many borders and cultures of the world, each place had their own system of classification.

“The ranking system was determined by simple rote of each culture at least having basic numbering in common. The thresholds between the ranks are explicit and important. The first rank, which we now call rank one, was commonly referred to as The Calling by many different peoples the world around. By attaching three essentia to your soul, the material world is connected to the spiritual inside of you, and your soul begins its slow transition into the world of the physical. Rank two, The Seeding, is when that transition is completed. In some corners of the world, there is no distinction made between the first and second ranks. Noble families who have the wealth to do so, prepare their young from the time of early adolescence to become magicians, and when the essentia are first related to them, many can skip the first rank completely, going straight to manifesting their soul in the real world.”

“You can skip ranks!” I say, shocked.

“Yes. The resources employed to do so are vast, but it is possible. The fastest way to make it through the ranks, at least the lower ones, is to use the powers bestowed onto you by the essentia that you integrate, the faster and more completely that you make them a part of your true being, the faster you will climb. All first rankers will hit the second rank eventually, even if they do nothing at all, which is why many other cultures consider them a part of the same rank. Theoretically, it is possible to pass through any rank with deep and powerful meditation on the nature of the soul, but the savants capable of doing that are few and far between. Easier to simply explore the world and slay monsters with gouts of fire or what have you.”

“Its easier to kill monsters than to meditate?” I ask.

“Believe it or not, it is,” she tells me. “The third rank is called The Body. It is called that because that is the point at which your body and soul become one. When a magician crosses the threshold into the third rank, they receive their Regalia, individual markers of their station.” Arabella gestures to her streams of silky, violet hair that billow around her as if she were underwater. “That is also the point at which a magician's body reaches its perfected form. Some experience further changes to the body as they continue to advance past the third rank, but usually those changes are invisible; increased strength, speed, attention, these are all to be expected, but it is unusual for magicians to puff up like muscle marshmallows as their strength continues to grow.

“The fourth rank is referred to as The Mind, the rank at which I am currently. It is attained by integrating the mind, soul, and body into a singular entity. Magicians develop enhanced perception, memory, faster thought, deeper insight, and analytical powers that surpass the mortal realm. The potency of soul presence reaches a major benchmark at this rank as well, becoming a truly devastating weapon.”

“My brother, Halford, the soul presence he attained at the second rank allowed him to cut down trees with a thought,” I say. “I don’t see how that could be even more terrifying.”

“Oh, my dear Charlene, over the course of the next few years I am going to demonstrate to you that you have been suffering from an extreme lack of imagination your whole life. That is not an indictment upon you. Merely an observation about the environment you were raised in.”

“It feels like a judgment,” I say. “You’re basically calling me ignorant.”

“We are all born ignorant,” Arabella dismisses. “Now, are you ready for the integration ritual? You are about to emerge a new woman.”

“Wait, you didn’t tell me about the fifth rank,” I say.

“Ah, the fifth rank.” I watch enthusiasm leave her. “It is called the threshold of Mortality. If I knew what was needed to attain it, I would already have done so. One thing you are likely to learn on your journey through magic is that the higher you go, the less your betters are willing to tell you about how to become stronger. Like the powerful the world over, they tend not to like others encroaching on their power.”

Arabella claps and takes a burgundy pouch from her waist. First taking a pinch between her fingers, she tosses sparkling green dust onto the ground around her. The purple paint on the ground springs to life, projecting an illusionary copy of the script into the air at knee height.

“It is time to begin,” she says. “I told you how I felt about wasting time earlier.”

“I understand,” I say, curling my legs up onto the chair with me and holding the two essentia to my chest. “I am ready.” I squeeze my eyes tight and try to focus on my breathing. When this was done to my mother and brother, the ritual finished in a flash, but when my father underwent it, he was left dazed and moaning in pain for hours.

“I will not lie and tell you that you have the option of turning back at this point. You have crossed that threshold already.” I hear a humming in the room, and peek my eye open. Standing on the edges of the magical array are six clones of Arabella, humming together in harmony. “Remember, you need to breathe.”

“Just let me know before you--”

The snapping of Arabella’s fingers cuts off my words, and my world turns into a void of sunlight. Something collapses inside of my chest, a pain I hadn’t expected, and the blinding light around me dims. Painful yellow melts away like syrup from my vision, specks of black poking through the opaque sheet of color, expanding until the yellow light becomes nothing more than faint spots millions of miles away, floating along the line of a horizon that I cannot see. One of the beads of light grows, no, I realize that it is accelerating out of the infinite distance towards me. It’s light grows and blues as it makes an approach, and when I can reach out to touch it, I find a crystalline sphere of ever changing shapes revolving thousands of times a second in front of me.

I float, naked in a void of black amid the light of distant stars as the blue crystal approaches, growing in size as it nears so that it dwarfs me like a mountain does a fly when it comes to a rest no more than an arm's length away from me. There is no air in the space I inhabit, no time to count the changing shape of the crystal by. A light peels out of my chest, a shifting orb of pure, strong gold and that halos in front of me. Two more lights join it, a burning, golden fire and a pebble that contains the might of a sun. They form a triangle before me, their radiances mixing and melding into a solitary radiance of gold and red. As the lights shrink together, the mountain of crystal before me shakes, resonating with the approach of the light.

I shudder, a feeling of change running over and through my skin. The lights touch and cracks appear, riveting the crystal as it continues to revolve. The crystal whines as it shatters, its disparate ever-changing parts folding over each other again and again as it comes to form a single shape that sets and stays still. The crystal shrinks as the triangle of light expands to encapsulate it. A hum reverberates through the empty air around me, and the blue of the crystal shifts, becoming that singular light of gold and fire at the center of the three spheres. Movement ceases for the barest moment. The four interconnected shapes turn to face me, and I feel as if I gaze into a mirror. Then, without further fanfare, the shapes race away into the stars at a speed incalculable.

I fall back into myself and feel the chair I sit in vibrate with energy. The light from a brilliant flash of white still fades in the room around me, and Arabella crouches in front of me. She is saying something at me, but a ringing buzz in my ears prevents me from making out the words. I try to concentrate on the woman, but my blood races and my eyes have difficulty focusing.

“Breathe, Charlene,” Arabella tells me in a calming voice. “Breathe.”

I take in a shuddering breath and feel alien lungs in my chest expand with the first breath they have ever been forced to take. The light that continues to shine from my skin fades as my breathing smooths out. I am left half-slumped in the chair, sweat sticking to my skin, and the pounding of my heart slowly fading into the realm of stability.

“Can you hear me?” Arabella asks.

“I can,” I answer in a voice foreign to me. “What.” The words sound strange to my ears. The girlish crack is gone from my voice, it has grown deeper, the serious voice of a woman. I stare at my hands, finding perfect and smooth skin stretching over delicate fingers that do not know the calluses that have been there for as long as I can remember; no hint remains of my previously chipped and rounded nails.

In front of me, Arabella motions to one of her clones, and together a pair begin to wheel over the covered mirror. My back straightens in the chair as it approaches, an unknown terror rooting me clearly in the moment. Before I can say a word in protest, Arabella rips the silk away from the mirror and I see myself.

I don’t recognize the girl in the mirror. No, not a girl, a woman stares back at me from the other side of the glass. I am rising to my feet before I notice, clumsily taking a step forward on new legs to touch the glass in front of me. Some distant part of my mind recognizes that I have grown, I must be almost six feet now, but my eyes cannot leave the face of the woman in the mirror.

Her skin is perfect, a deep tan the color of caramel that lacks pores or the freckles that I had once inherited from my mother. Full and flush lips frame a mouth agape, filled with perfectly straight and intact teeth. A cascading wave of hair the orange-pink of sunset light coils around her shoulders and spill over her chest. Two alien eyes stare back at me; the left a black orb, the only color in which is the blood red of an angry iris. The right is normal except for the slitted pupil the color of the shallow ocean. I run fingers over the woman in the mirror’s face; the regrettable nose has become small and feminine, the points of her ears subtle now, perfectly frame her face. Tears begin to spill from her eyes even as the most beautiful smile I have ever witnessed blesses her red lips.

“I’m---I’m pretty,” I finally manage.

Arabella appears in the mirror behind the woman I stare at. She runs her hands past me to pull back the hair, showing off a delicate neck that I had missed. “No, Charlene. You are gorgeous.”