Seed 19
June 25th, 2032.
I chewed on my lips as I leafed through a book known as the ‘The Gifts of the Occult, the Sources of the Craft’.
The information was quite something…
The Gifts of the Occult are many and myriad dear witchlings, the source of our power. It is what binds and defines us, our understanding of the world given shape through the path of the arcane, of the craft, of magic and sorcery. The Gifts are the Elements in their purest form, their greatest expression in a higher, greater reality. All know the Basic Four, the tetrad of air, water, earth and fire. But that is the least of what they are, as Gifts of the Others, both Titan and not.
Here I will speak of the six Sources most well known to us, and how they each shape the occult, and blend together like all the colors of the infinite realms.
First is the promethean spark, the Red. It is the divine fire stolen from the gods, the trickster which burns the weave of reality, creation and destruction. The Gifts it offers are energetic, forceful and temperamental. Then there is the primordial chaos, the Blue. It is the depths of the ancient oceans, the chthonic mother of the liquids who shape the weave, it is death, suffusing life. The Gifts the Blue offers are dynamic and ever-shifting, fluid and receptive.
Next is the primeval order, the Green. The sacred mound which arose from the abyss, the lords of the dense living and nonliving matter which makes up the weave, solidity and nature. The great Gifts offered by it are material and physical, resilient and sustaining. Then there exists the primal expanse, the Violet. The firmament which arose from the depths of the void, the father who breathes for the weave, mind and wisdom. The strange Gifts given by the Violet are mental and active, capricious and swift.
The last two Gifts are opposite but interconnected forces, presenting themselves within and without. The archean congruity, the White and the antediluvian disparity, the Black. The Great Sources. Once upon a time they existed as dynamic interplays arising within the ontological void, the field of possibilities which birthed all of creation. The light, and the darkness confronting it. The White is the natural law driven towards complexity and activity, while the Black is the natural law driven towards simplicity and passivity. The White’s Gifts are kinetic and physical, active and creative. The Black’s Gifts are of the mental and cognitive, passive and destructive. The gardener and the winnower. They exist within all other sources, yin and yang energies, positive and negative, warmth and cold. The dynamic and natural dynamic flow of reality.
I sighed, rubbing my eyes as I read through a book layered in metaphor, and teleological bullshit. Yesterday had been useful in developing a better understanding of both void and light. The elements and their connection to the sources was fascinating as well. Fire and lightning were part of the Red, water and ice and steam and other liquids were part of the Blue. Earth, metal, plants were part of the Green, all gasses were part of the Violet.
And it wasn't mutually exclusive, there was overlap because reality is complicated. It was just like how the traditional picture of classifying matter into solid, liquid and gas was a lie. A simplification of a far more complicated existence, in the domain of soft matter. Liquids, colloids, polymers, foams and gels and granular materials. Liquid crystals, flesh, and biological membranes.
The Blue and Green were connected as the dense matter of the world, and as the substance of life itself, with the Red as the spark of life, with the Violet as the breath of it.
I carefully tossed handfuls of marbles I had filled with the energy of the portals which were rich in that white-gold energy. Fortunately, I had a good idea of what I was looking at because of Ultima and this book.
I was perceiving the nature of the magical energy, it was elemental light, dancing swirls of white trapped within the marbled glass. I thought back to what I had seen of other people’s auras.
Hakim’s aura had a rich olive and sepia color, flaring with the touch of the Green and the Red. Althea had a soft cyan aura swirling with black, flaring like a star and cracking the world at the seams, exposing spirits in her gentle grasp. Her blood ran with blue and green and true black, shaping the patterns of the world.
I looked into the light, and recalled a lesson from Ultima on magic, on the craft.
‘The Craft is the ancient science and art of manipulating and altering metaphysical energy, weaving the threads of reality through interaction with them. Materials, shapes, movements, and more can all alter the thread. Many spells were learned from studying otherkind, how they shape magic. You can do the same… so go out and experiment kid!’
I nodded to my illusory Ultima and reached out to the energy inside of the marble. In my eyes, I saw the white-golden threads interlacing with one another in many ways, warps and wefts, stitches and hooks and laces and braids and spread tows of light.
Oh. Oh my.
The pattern was beyond complex, a woven tapestry so glorious it made my eyes water. I noticed an interesting shape within the knots of magic. An unknot within an unknot, linked together by four radiating threads heading outwards, reminding me of a star…
I smiled as I set down a piece of paper and carefully abstracted the pattern into something two-dimensional. The knot became a circle inside a circle, with four lines at an angle radiating outwards and stabbing through the outer circle.
I tapped the glyph, and in an instant, the graphite powder flaked away as the glyph formed an orb of white gold. The ball of light fell into my hand, a gentle warmth bubbling up in my soul.
“Oh, this… this has answered so many questions and raised others.”
Before I had to guess blindly at what magic could do, I couldn't see it outside of when I cast glyphs. The energy surging through me let me process it, gave my brain and senses a target to latch on.
I had seen animals cast magic before, snails flicking their stalks in fine patterns to conjure slime, bees dancing together to cast complex spell arrays. Reyna shifting her wing feathers to lash out with complex wind blasts.
I couldn't see it. But that had changed with the glyphs guiding me. I couldn't feel my own energy, but with the magic of the glyphs running through me like an electric current… it had built into my ability to sense magic.
I wonder if this was how the first witches learned how to shape the energies inside themselves. The question then would be… how did they turn that into reshaping their own bodies to cast magic without glyphs? Why have glyphs become forgotten?
I clapped my hands instead and shouted. “Ultima! I figured out the light glyph!”
“Kaba!” She shouted back from her room with a booming echo.
I rolled my eyes. “Yes! I know the word for light, mooom!” I mocked my mentor with a sincere grin at her choke.
And ignored how it didn't feel like a mere tease.
“Don’t expect much work today little raven, today is Drowsing Day! Lethargy is the name of the game, as dream spirits drift downwards after feeding off the dreams of ionospheric beasts!”
“I thought it was Dowsing Day?” I yawned, rubbing my eyes.
“It's both, the spirits can be used for divination practices, since they pick up information from the dreams of rigids!”
“So good memories, their own magical senses, and spellcasting get dripped onto us by dream fluff!”
“Works best for minerals and forms of energy, the former for their bodies and the latter for their metabolism!”
“We should stop screaming!” I shouted one last time.
Ultima giggled and I shook my head.
I'll see how long I can keep this experiment going.
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I smiled as I drew out glyphs in the dirt. Actively playing with all I had learned about glyphs over the last few weeks. I also took a look at a kings-eyes tree, a type of legume native to the Calafia Isles. They were gnarly knotted acacia trees with crowns of cyan leaves around their dark branches, which grow thousands of little round speckled beans.
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The legumes were great for potions, brews and salves that you want to have a long shelf life or effect. Which was a combination of both magic and natural gum properties, so they can be used as thickening agents, gelling agents, emulsifying agents, and stabilizers.
Thickening and gelling is self-evident, make it thick or into a gel, emulsifying is the process to allow two unmixable liquids like oil and water to mix. Stabilizer is another obvious one.
The beans glowed green in my sight, with loops of magic twisting around them like an invisible shell, preserving and grounding themselves.
I could copy that with a single glyph… or could I create the right combination to do the work for me?
“Watcha working on?”
I screamed like a banshee when someone popped up out of nowhere, landing flat on my fat ass with a yelp. “Hijo de puta! Casi me diste un paro!” I screamed some more at the person responsible.
The giggle was familiar, and I flushed. I looked up at a bashful Althea who was twirling a lock of her honey-blonde hair. Then I saw her outfit.
I squeaked like a stress ball being squished.
She was… wearing a russet camisole under a sky orange low cut blouse with loose flowery sleeves. Paired with a pale blue slit skirt and dark brown shorts. I could see her slightly pudgy midriff, upper chest, and thighs had freckles all the way down.
I felt a flutter in my chest, like a thousand locusts swarming in my ribcage, and my face was searing hot. I… was always mesmerized by how gorgeous Althea was, she could make a potato sack look good.
Althea chuffed a rumbling laugh as she offered a hand. With a pout I let myself get pulled up onto my feet. Her cloak was draped over her left shoulder, and I had a hard time figuring out where I should look.
“So you've been experimenting with glyphs again?” Althea spoke with a curious lilt.
“I've been reading up on rune threads as a system,” I clarified with a casual shrug of my shoulders. “As a numeral system they've existed in their current form for around three centuries. But Ultima has lent me books that suggest runes were once a more complex pictogram language, with only the rectangle l and its enclosed binary numeral system surviving in the present.” I rocked back and forth with a grin as I explained. “Runes go back at least five thousand years, predating Cyfrinic, with the words for zero and one, sero and odu being root words on the same level as glyph words.”
“So what's your theory?” Althea had a lopsided smile, her pale gold eyes off and warm.
I lifted a finger. “Hypothesis my dear. My guess is that glyphs and runes are two parts of a greater whole. Glyphs are the ideographic half of this witch language, with runes being pictographic symbols used to change its form. Just like how they are used today as triggers to activate and deactivate spells.”
“Have you tried to prove it?” Althea asked, delight dancing in her eyes.
I grinned and gestured to four kaba glyphs. “I’ve experimented heavily with the runes, which on their own I’ve noted can be used to connect and disconnect magical energy.” I pointed to the first circle with a bare thread. “But it doesn't do it automatically without the math within it to control them. They’re like little computer chips, with this shape specifically meaning switch, or perhaps on/off. I can put it in on, off, and blinking mode with the right sequence of runes.”
“Huh… that's definitely a clue, but runes are mostly just triggers to activate and deactivate magic, so it's going to take a while to master more complex aspects of runes if they exist.” Althea rubbed her chin, gears turning in her head. “I guess I could see if there's any spirit that remembers older versions of runes.”
I fiddled with my necklace, gently rubbing my thumb along the smooth facets of black diamond. “Yeah… it does make it a tad troublesome that so many records have been lost.”
Althea’s smile became frail. “You still have that necklace?”
I nodded. “It won't go away, unfortunately. It's a living object, and apparently my discorporation of the dark spirit feeding on it means it refuses to leave.” I let her see the strange symbols and writings all along the silver-gold chain. “I'm fairly certain it's a kasbah, an object expanded into a realm, and not merely an expansion spell. Last time I tried to use the void to get more info knocked me out.”
I've been unwilling to experiment with it ever since.
I yawned, my jaw snapping against my will. Althea looked concerned and I waved it away with a flap of my hand. I slept… at least five hours yesterday, more than adequate even on a day where the whole world felt… lethargic and slow and—
I fell forward into Althea, who caught me with a quiet rumble of a laugh, almost a growl.
“Tired?” She asked and I answered with a yawn. “I kind of had a feeling, it's one reason I came here.”
“One?”
“The spirits like to tell me things, now that I'm more willing to listen.”
“Oh.” I am so fucking tired.
My eyelids slid shut, and I fell into slumber.
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To say that Althea was enraptured by her friend was doing her a disservice.
She had seen countless people pass her by over her years. She had met all kinds of people growing up, beautiful, cunning, intelligent. Boys and girls and non-binary teens, respectable adults with power in their hands and influence beyond her own.
But they were nothing compared to Celia’s own passion and obsession. They were people of fire, passion and rage, creators and destroyers. People of water, community and cooperation, the burbling stream and the roaring river. But Celia was even more spellbinding, she was like a great wave washing over the elements. She didn’t care what others thought was possible. Humans couldn’t do magic, and yet she did it anyway. The heir to the kingdom telling her to obey… she refused with no hesitation. Studying wild, lawless magic was just another goal for Celia. She wanted to learn and unravel the mysteries of the world, a chaotic void with a soul of silver.
That was a person she wanted to follow, a person she wanted to know as a friend, as part of her world. Celia wasn’t flawless, no one was and she didn’t expect her to be. But it still brought a smile to Althea’s face, watching as the air flowed and the spirits flowed with it. Celia was curled around the couch, spirits flowing around her spiritual gravity, to that heart of tarnished silver gray.
There was life here and there, flying through two domains and making demands of each other. She could hear them so clearly now, the song from the Outer Sphere, the ideal spirits at work being and feeding off what gave them birth. Becoming stronger so they wouldn’t be eaten by another spirit, in a cycle of life that would lead to the birth of creatures like the Meretsegger, or the Blood Jewel. Greed given time could become the spirit of an entire economy, elevating a nation to new heights or miring it in social and spiritual corruption.
They flurried around Celia’s sleeping form, information-spirits buzzed about like flies made of jumbled words and static. Curiosity, rage, and anxiety rolled over one another in waves but were pushed back by the elemental spirits hovering around her friend.
Air spirits orbited around Celia as faint dusty swirls of wind, water spirits swam in wet currents along her friend’s back. Earth inched around her thighs and hips, latching onto the dirt and soil on her clothing. Fire rippled around her chest and stomach, in belching spurts of red and orange.
The silver spirits, the strange warps in existence were the most curious, wrapping around Celia’s head like a crown. They were void spirits, and Althea was enraptured by Celia because of it.
“Why are you here?” Althea had to ask, while Ultima was busy cleaning up her potions room.
She is what we need.
Althea felt her spirit quail at the chilling hollow tones of the void spirit, taking a form like a raven made of silver starlight.
“Need for what?”
She has the strength, the will, and the means to change this world.
Althea understood that Celia was clever, stubborn and eager to expand her abilities. It’s why Hakim and her became good friends and were making plans on uniting their capabilities. Celia had a charisma all her own despite her awkwardness, an earnest nature she was drawn to.
“What has happened, for you to need a human girl my age?” Althea asked in a low mutter, checking over Celia as she mumbled nonsense about freckles made of stars.
Not just her, we need you as well.
“Why?” The void spirit rose up at her question, silver light dripping down in waves.
This world fumbles in ignorance. They do not understand. We needed you, all of you. In the now and in the future. We were stars once, but that time has passed.
Althea hid a scowl but doubted she had succeeded. Void spirits… knew things.
We are dying. This world is dying, a long, slow death. The realm of man is but a taste of what is to come, a corpse flailing in death and agony. We are being culled, day by day, sacrificed to hold a stasis never meant to exist. All the while, the echo of a dead age, an avatar of vengeance continues to walk the world, its hunger insatiable. We must heal this broken place.
Althea felt her blood run cold with ice, as horror ran through her mind. The world was dying… Why and how, and what could they even do? There was nothing that one unshifted werewolf could do on her… own.
Oh.
She wasn’t on her own was she? Celia had given her that, in her own way. She had opened her heart, her home and accepted Althea. Hakim was another friend, sweet and more than willing to fight, and they both shared that same loneliness and alienation.
We are weak. The heart has grown quiet. But we have hope.
Althea brushed back Celia’s dark bangs, unable to resist her growing smile as the void circled around her closest friend.
“I will do what I can, but I’m definitely owed something.” She shook her head with a giggle.
The void offered only a chiming laugh, as she watched Celia relax and curl into a comfortable position.
“You really are very charming Celia, I hope you take responsibility.”