Jorun’s routine for the next week was pretty much the same as before.

He would work on tidying up the house in the morning after he woke up, and then he would something for lunch and go visit the old man. He hadn’t yet learned his name, but they had quickly taken to the game. Despite his protests, he had actually began carving out the more basic shapes of the different pieces. Jorun would help a little there, but mostly he would just focus on the crops.

Seeing the different plants sprout and grow into their distinct shapes had proven to be a highly enjoyable experience. He had taken to watering the different sprouts and was even thinking about growing his own garden at his house.

As he worked on the plants, he couldn’t help but feel connected with his mom. He had never thought of her doing this kind of thing. There were no plants where he had grown up, but this felt right in a way he couldn’t explain.

The image of her working in a garden flashed through his mind. Her hands were covered in dirt and there was a smile on her face.

She turned and smiled.

Jorun dropped to the ground, his head aching.

“You alright boy?” The old man was suddenly standing over him.

“I… I don’t know,” for a moment, Jorun had been seeing his mother from someone else perspective, “For a moment, I was remembering something…”

“Sit down you fool boy. Sit down.” He helped Jorun get into a more comfortable position, and then scuttled away. Jorun had never seen the old man hurry before, and he watched the man draw a bucket of water. He then hurried back and gave Jorun a drink.

The cool water refreshed Jorun and helped him catch his senses.

“Thanks,” he looked up at the old man, “What should I call you?”

“Narlin,” He looked down at the ground, “I haven’t had someone talk to me by name in a long time.”

“Thanks Narlin,” Jorun offered his cup back to the old hermit.

“Go ahead and stop working on the garden. Let’s just play a few games and then you can eat with me.”

Jorun didn’t see any reason to reject the offer.

So he got up and the two of them began to play away.

“Moving your knight, eh?” He cackled with delight.

Jorun resisted the urge to smile. He knew what Narlin was going to do next. Move his bishop to kill his knight. He watched as the man lifted the bishop and did exactly that. Jorun was tempted to follow that up with another good move on his part. This exposed his rook to one of Jorun’s bishops. He could take it easily enough, but then he would be too close to winning the game. It was better to leave the piece on the board and let Narlin win.

Jorun had lost every game until now, and he had found that Narlin loved to explain his victory at some considerable length.

Losing a battle could teach you more about your opponent than defeating them.

“I am not out of the game yet,” He boasted as he moved one of his pawns into a slightly better position.

Narlin cackled with delight and proceeded to destroy Jorun. Once the match was over, he cleaned up the board and looked Jorun square in the face.

“You didn’t see your bishop had a wide opening to take my rook a seven moves ago. Pay attention boy. If I didn’t know you better I might think you lost that game on purpose.”

Jorun blushed. Not because Narlin had spotted his deception, but because he had underestimated Narlin himself. He had been thinking that Narlin wouldn’t be able to spot that. In that moment he realized that a player could intentionally leave an opening to test their opponent.

This game seemed simple at a glance, but it had so many layers built into it.

“Alright, it’s getting late, and I want to eat. One more match and then we eat and you head home before it gets too dark.”

They played and this time he was more careful not to miss anything too obvious that might be an opening. He lost, but only because Narlin suddenly switched his tactics after Jorun took out a similarly suspicious piece.

“You aren’t playing you best, are you?” Jorun asked as they put the pieces away.

“Of course not. It wouldn’t be fair to play a complete rookie at my full ability. I would crush you and you would never want to play again.”

“Am I getting close to you?”

The old man’s eyes twinkled mischievously, “Not yet.”

“Looks like I will need to try harder next time. I can’t have you thinking that I am too easy to beat.”

The man laughed, “There aren’t many chess players who can beat me. I can only think of a few.”

The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

“Here in the village?”

Narlin laughed harder, “No boy, in the capital.”

Jorun felt shocked at the statement, “You have been to the capital? What’s it like?”

Narlin laughed harder, “Sometimes I forget how little of the world you have seen. It’s a crazy place, full of the most powerful sorcerers I have ever seen. If you don’t have a talent of some kind, they will crush you with ease.”

“You have seen magic?” Jorun didn’t have to feign surprise. Magic was almost completely unheard of in either of these villages. People would talk about it as if it were some form of evil that needed to be removed from the world.

“Plenty, there is a huge abundance of magic in bigger cities. In the capital it is even worse. I would almost say that it is necessary to have access to magic to thrive there, but it isn’t really that bad. You just have to understand that without magic you need to find an alternative to accomplish your goals.”

Here he tapped the chess board.

“Some day you need to tell me what you were before you came here.”

The laughter vanished from Narlin’s face, “Wouldn’t matter if I did. If you are amazed at the idea of magic, than you aren’t going to even know enough about the places of power to be able to survive there.”

“So you used to be somebody important than?”

He stopped and looked at the board, “I suppose I was. At the time, I just thought I hadn’t accomplished enough and that I would need to climb higher. Compared to almost anyone in this part of the world, I have done a lot. Enough questions kid. Let’s get you some food.”

He brought out two bowls of soup, “Eat up.”

Jorun did, and he practically died, “What is this?”

Narlin looked up, “What do you mean?”

“This is delicious!”

“It’s alright, I am not a great cook so I don’t know if I would describe it as delicious…” He looked down at the bowl of soup and looked at it confused.

“I don’t care what you say. This is the single best meal I have ever had.”

“Kid you need to get out of this place and go somewhere bigger.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, you are smart enough to play decently well and you haven’t even played that many games. You have some brains, even if you don’t have any magic worth mentioning.”

“Why do you think I have no magic?”

Jorun just laughed, “Kid, you are killing me here. Everyone bears the mark of their power in some form or another. The only ones that don’t are their children, but children never develop power that can rival a real practitioner.”

“So everyone who can use magic is obvious?” Jorun couldn’t believe his luck. This guy had just told him some incredibly important information.

“Yes. In order to become a practitioner, you must have accomplished something at some point to get the attention of one the divine.”

“The divine? Is that a way to describe gods or something?”

“Not really. There are gods, and the divine are similar, but each of them represents one of the attributes. Take fire for example. The divine of fire is Ifrit. If you want to wield fire magic you must have been chosen by him. Without his blessing you can’t ever cast magic.”

“How do I catch one of the divine’s attention?”

Narlin stroked his gnarly chin, “Think you are going to go earn the favor of one of the powerful and somehow become a great one than you have a lot to learn. It isn’t going to happen. You are too old. The divine never choose anyone after infancy.”

“Never?”

“Never.”

Jorun had a million questions, but there wasn’t any way to continue this conversation without admitting what had happened to him. If Narlin was right and the divine never gave power to anyone, did that really mean this was some form of curse? Of course, that would still admit his knowledge fo something dangerous if he asked about that.

“Well that’s a bummer. I was born a normal enough kid. Although I have wondered if my mom might have had some power.”

“What gives you that idea?”

“Oh just something I saw her do right before she died. I get the feeling that she was trying to protect me.”

“How did they all die?”

Jorun suspected he could admit it was a disease to the old man, but he also knew that someone else in the village talked to him. If they found out, there was no guarantee that they would be as reasonable as Narlin.

“A thing killed them.” It was almost true.

“Don’t want to talk about it?”

Jorun just shook his head.

“Fair enough kid. Now eat up and get out of here. I can’t keep talking to you all day.”

Jorun did as he asked and wandered home. Once he was around a bend in the path, he spoke to Latty.

“Is he right about the divine?”

“I don’t know. It doesn’t sound entirely right, but I think he is telling the truth about his past.” She slowly appeared next to him. For once she actually look like a normal girl, she moved her feet along the ground as if she were walking next to him.

“Why is that?”

“When he talks about chess he reminds me of someone the old man knew.”

Jorun made a mental note that this was probably a reference to the Sorcerer who was her father. Whatever had happened between the two of them had driven her to curse them both and create the waste itself. A place where only Jorun had been able to escape the curse.

He thought about the large golden gem that he carried with himself.

It was dangerous to think that he had escaped the curse. He had faced disease and curse, and he had walked away from them without any obvious indication of personal harm. That didn’t mean that they had disappeared.

“If there are divine, are there an opposite to that?”

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t know. I am just trying to figure out how I gained this power when I shouldn’t have.”

“So like an evil version of the divine?”

“Yeah.”

Latty shrugged, “I don’t think so. I am not really sure about the divine itself. Something about that really bugs me. I feel like he is close to the truth, but missing something important.”

“Can I learn to cast fire?”

“I doubt it.”

Jorun wanted to object, but he was quickly learning that there were many advantages to the power he held. It might have it’s draw backs, but it was probably the case with any powerful magician. Latty’s own father had apparently had the power to destroy a nation, and he was nothing more than a faint echo.

“Everyone dies in the end.” He muttered to himself.

Latty floated past, “I am still here.”

Jorun thought about the words in the book, about how she was little more than a shell of the person she had been. When he had seen the seventh circle for her, it had implied there was a connection to her original life. He just had no way to figure out what that was exactly.

“You don’t know of anything like a divine related to death, do you?”

Latty shivered, “I don’t think so. That sounds really horrible.”

Jorun couldn’t believe it. That was almost as impressive revelation as what Narlin had said to him.

She shivered.

He had observed her behavior for a long time now. She was the single person in his life he could say that he knew well, and she wasn’t even really alive. In the month he had known her, she hadn’t done anything even remotely close to something like shivering.

So there was an answer there. If the idea of a god of death couldn’t cause a ghost to shiver, nothing would. That meant that someone had chosen him.

The image of his mother using the cauldron as she coughed, slowly succumbing to the sickness, popped into his head.

“Mother what did you do?” He asked the cooling night sky.

There was no response.