Hailey sat gasping in the back of the cave. She knew she should get up, should run out of there and not stop but she could only stare in fascination. The scale was curved and beautiful. About the size of her open palm, it was a lavender that shimmered silver in the light. If this wasn’t a good enough offering for the lady in the well, than Hailey didn’t know what was.
Berinon came rushing to the mouth of the cave. “Come on, he said to her, shaking her out of her fear. We have to go.”
And so they hurried out of the cave, making quicker progress down the hill and to the well. Hailey paused when they got close to it. “What am I supposed to do now?”
Barinon squeezed her shoulder. After facing the dragon, though the well didn’t even frighten her. Maybe it should have but she kept glancing up at the sky fearing that she would find the dragon staring down at her, knowing what she had done.
“Go to the well and call her name, ‘Sequana.’ She will come to you.
The well looked like any other that Hailey had seen. A curved wall of smoothed stones created a small circle around the opening in the earth. Two metal archways covered the well, and a small roof of pointed metal must have protected it from leaves. That was the only reason Hailey could think of for a well to have a roof.
Barinon gestured her forward and Hailey peered over the mouth of the well. She could see nothing but blackness down below. She said, “Sequana.”
A gurgling sound came from the bottom of the well and Hailey jumped back. Barinon stood close by, smiling at her like a proud parent. Hailey took a deep breath. The woman who rose out of the well was not what she had expected. She was completely made of water, or at least she looked to be, and she was naked. About where her thighs should have started, she became more of a snake than anything. She seemed to be attached to the well and yet, she could rise all this way. She grinned at Barinon and winked at him as she twirled above her well.
“Seqana, it is good to see you. You are lovely as ever.”
The water woman or whatever she was smiled at him. “You leave me a lone for so long, Barinon. How can you call me your friend if you will not even come to visit.”
She sighed and actually pouted at him. “It is only you and the other woman who ever comes and visits me now. She turned to Hailey and grinned a wicked little smile. “Did you bring me a new friend, Barinon? Someone to keep me company.”
Barinon cleared his throat, looking slightly uncomfortable. “Ah no. This is Hailey. If she passes your test, she will be training to be a new mage.”
The woman crossed her watery arms, making her breasts seem all the more obvious. Hailey looked away and tried not to blush. “Are you ready then, little one?”
Hailey glanced at Barinon. Ready for what? He nodded to her and she tried to sound confidant as she told the water woman, “Yes, I am ready.” She swallowed. Some of her previous fear returned to her. What was this woman going to do to her? Would it hurt?
Barinon had said that it was important. He had clearly explained all of the things it could do for her, but he had not told her what exactly the spell did.
Sequana looked at her seriously. “Once you begin this, there is no going back. This is your last chance.”
Hailey didn’t shrink away. “I’m ready,” she said again.
She held out the dragon scale and Sequana took it, turning it over in her hand. Hailey was surprised she could hold anything, even the scale, made of water as she was.
“You must answer three questions for me. Answer them honestly or I cannot help you.”
Hailey nodded and tried not to feel as tired as she was.
“How do you come by magic? Which parent was a mage before you?” Sequana cocked her head to one side and waited.
“My parents are dead. I was brought to the castle when I was a young girl.”
Sequana held a finger to her chin. “What are the spells that you can do now?”
Hailey cleared her throat. “There is only the one. I can turn invisible.”
“What is your greatest fear?”
Hailey felt a stab of sorrow, but she answered as honestly as she could manage. “I fear that my friends, the people who I care about will die because I cannot do anything to save them.”
“Ah, but there is a fear worse than that one, is there not?”
Hailey didn’t want to say it, didn’t want to confront what she kept buried. “That no matter what I do, no one will care. I will be alone because I have no family.” Tears streamed down Hailey’s face. It was cruel to force her to confront that. She looked down and blinked the tears away.
Sequana cocked her head to one side. “You did not mean to lie to me, and so I will let it pass.” She held a palm over Hailey’s forehead but did not touch her. “There is an ancient magic in you, something very powerful that has not yet reached the surface. “You have much to learn. The most important of which are the things about yourself.”
----------------------------------------
Then she placed her palm flat on Hailey’s head, fingers tight against the top of her head and Hailey closed her eyes. Magic poured through Hailey. She had never felt that much before. Her body thrummed with it. Sequana’s fingers tightened on her head. Her hand was cold on Hailey’s head.
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The woman at the well began to speak. “I see you, you are a baby, small and sleeping. A dark figure is carrying you away. A woman is crying, asking to change her mind.”
“Change who’s mind about what?” Hailey asked.
“Hush,” Sequana said. “I will tell you the visions as I see them. I cannot tell you more.”
“You are a small child. A woman is at an orphanage. ‘No,’ she says. ‘I need more than just the one. Give me two others.’” Hailey reeled at this one. Was she ever in an orphanage? The queen had told her that her parents had died in a fire but that she was the only one to survive. Her thoughts were cut off as Sequana moved on to the next one.
“You sneak through the castle. You are still small and your friends are trying to steal something.” Hailey smiled. She remembered that one at least.
“You are in the castle, hiding under the bed. The spell shifts and grows, feeding off of your untamed power.” She gasped. That was her fault. The spell, what had happened to everyone was because of her power?
Sequana continued, not waiting for Hailey to gather her thoughts. “You stay in the castle. You wrap a cloth around a man’s head, which is bleeding. You don’t know if he’s still alive but you don’t want him to die.” She remembered that too. It was one of the worst days of her life. He had lived. He was still breathing like the rest, and she had changed his bandage, though it didn’t need changing as often as she would have thought.
“You stayed in the castle, you watched the people sleep and you rescued a cat for a young woman who had a cart full of fish.” That was recent. Hailey wondered if Sequana would continue or if she would let go of her head now. She was beginning to feel dizzy. Sequana seemed to be sorting through her memories, but now something shifted. Sequana took a deep breath.
“You will kill your mother.”
“No!” Hailey said. She had always wondered who her mother was, had always wanted a family. She didn’t care what this water sprite said, she would not kill her mother.
Sequana waited.
“I see a Storm raging around you, trying to deceive you.”
What did that even mean? How could a storm try to deceive her?
“You hunt. You are far from home and you are huddled in the ruins of a freezing castle. You must kill your prey.”
Sequana stopped telling for a moment, then she said. “You must take on the responsibilities of a mage. You must do everything in your power protect your people from what is to come. I do not give this gift lightly, only to those who are willing to serve.
“Hailey Rowan, do you bind yourself to this well, to its magic and to the people of Taivalon?”
“Yes,” said Hailey. She had already been warned, had already decided that this is what she would do. She felt resolve Harden within her. She would learn. She could do this.
“Then I, Sequana of the Concordance River bind you to this well, to this magic. You will protect those around you to the end of your days.”
Sequana’s grip on Hailey’s head tightened and magic poured into her. She felt that she would burst before it was done. She could not contain it. She gasped and opened her eyes. She could see Sequana pulsing with light. Hailey didn’t dare move.
Finally Sequana let go. Magic thrummed through Hailey, a power she did not know that a single person could hold. She gasped and almost fell as the water woman’s hand moved away from her. She cocked her head at Hailey as if Hailey was not what she had expected.
“Thank you, Sequana.” Hailey said. She was uncertain if she was truly grateful yet. Her mind was reeling with what had just happened, but she knew that Sequana had shared with her some important things, some of which Hailey should already have known. She clutched at the words that Sequana had given her, trying to remember them all.
Sequana smiled and was gone.
Barinon took her arm. “We need to go. Already we have been in this forest for too long.”
Hailey didn’t want to hurry. She wanted to make sure she remembered everything Sequana had said, but Barinon rushed her to a spot near the well, about ten strides away from it.
“You must bind yourself to this place. I am going to teach you one of the most useful spells in a mage’s repertoire. These can only be cast in certain places. Eventually you will be able to find a lay line and create your own glyph but for now, where we are standing will do. Watch.”
He took a step back from her and moved one arm, almost like he was conducting music. In front of him, a symbol formed, purple and glowing and following the stroke of his arm. She had never seen anything like it. It was a square, made of loops and crossed down the center. Then it dissolved into the air.
“What did you do?”
“Half of a spell. It has dissipated, the magic returning to its source. Try it with me. Go nice and slow.”
Hailey moved her arm but nothing happened. Barinon didn’t seem to care as long as she was moving her arm correctly.
“Good, now reach for the magic like you do when you’re turning invisible.”
There was a flood of it for her to draw on now. She pulled on the magic, trying to push it out of her arm. As her arm moved, the magic flickered. Parts of the glyph were visible but not the whole thing.
“It takes practice,” Barinon said. “Constantly feed a trickle of magic into it rather than trying to push magic into the glyph in bursts.”
On her next try, she managed. The glyph shone in front of her and Hailey grinned. She had done something. She still didn’t know what, but it looked good.
“Watch the loop on the bottom left, he told her. It’s important not to skip any part of it. This time, when you create it, you will say “Ostium.”
She repeated the word several times until he was certain that she got it right. Then she recreated the glyph, careful to keep the trickle of magic going in to it. When the symbol glowed in front of her, she said, “ostium.”
The glyph held for a moment in the air and then it turned and sunk into the ground. It glowed for a moment and then went out. Somehow, Hailey could still sense it even though the ground looked as it always had.
“Good. That is your portal glyph. The next part is more tricky and I want to get back to the manor. He waved his arms in a circular movement and a shimmering doorway appeared. She could see into the backyard of the manor, ringed in clouds. It was a beautiful, white image. Hailey couldn’t help herself. She tried to walk around the doorway, but no matter how she looked at it, the doorway was the same. The angle stayed the same, no matter how she looked at it.
Barinon cleared his throat. “I need you to step through. I can’t keep it open for long after I step through it myself.
Hailey looked at him like he was crazy.
“You’ll get used to it. Step through.”
Hailey held her breath and stepped through. She could hear the clacking of swords in the distance and the mooing of cattle. She looked around. She was outside the manor. When she looked back, Barinon was stepping through. From this side, she caught a glimpse of the forest and the well. Then, the portal closed behind him.