Divinations One was horrible. Molly had been so lost, and she could not find any reason to care. The tarot decks were interesting, but since she had already missed a couple days, the class was already through learning the beginning of the standard cards and their meanings. They each got an individually worn deck in the classroom to work with that had faded emerald backs. Each card looked like it had been eaten by moths on the sides.
Symbols One wasn’t so bad. All she had missed was some history of the first set of symbols they were studying. Apparently, Lockdrest would tackle a wide variety of symbols from different areas of the world throughout the years.
It was like normal school, just more stressful. Molly couldn’t have been happier to see Ova waiting for her outside of Symbols One class.
“How were your classes?” Ova asked. She was not carrying any books with her even though Molly was. Molly had thought it would be better to catch up on what she could tonight, especially if she could not sleep again.
“Overwhelming,” Molly answered, clutching the heavy textbooks to her chest. She didn’t understand why she saw no one with bookbags around here.
Ova nodded and smiled apologetically. “I take it that you’re not from a magickal community or family, then?”
Molly’s heart stopped. Was it that obvious? “Why do you say that?”
“I mean, obviously, it’s different for everyone, but it’s the beginning of school. The beginning of first-year classes only go over basics. So…”
“So, this is all supposed to be easy, or I’m already supposed to know it….” Molly’s shoulders slumped.
“But it’s okay.” Ova smiled brighter this time. “If you’re new to the community, what made you come to magickal school then?”
Molly didn’t know what to say. She couldn’t tell Ova that she was an empty vessel. She wanted to keep that to herself until she understood what it meant. “Just… I wanted to check it out.”
Ova nodded uncertainly, as if she didn’t trust Molly. Because of course she didn’t. Molly’s answer had been suspicious. Why would she have shown up a few days late if she had just wanted to check the school out? Also, if she had never done magick before, that more than likely meant her parents were reluctant, which they were. So why would they have chosen to let her come?
“I’m sorry, I…” Molly grabbed onto the wooden banister of the stairs that led up to the main floor and stopped. “I just…”
Ova held up her hand. “You’re okay. Trust me.”
Molly noticed that two coin-sized red bumps had risen on Ova’s arm. Ova saw Molly looking at them and tucked her arm away. “I just want to be your friend and help guide you. Do you want to take those to your room, or do you want to bring them to the courtyard with us?”
Molly’s heart pitter-pattered in her chest. She was happy that someone wanted to help her, but it still made her nervous that someone knew she needed that kind of assistance. She focused on the two books in her hands, one with a periwinkle binding and a lavender cover and the other a sticky red, and decided to take them to the courtyard. She didn’t want to waste time taking them to her room when this was her time to bond. She also wanted to use them if something awkward happened, to say she needed to put them away or use them to hide behind.
“I’ll take them with us. I would love to see the courtyard.”
Ova pulled the purple book from Molly’s arm with a s-l-o-w sticking lug as it rubbed across the red one. “Then I will take half your load as a friend would,” Ova said. She started back up the stairs and Molly followed her. “What hall are you in?”
Biting her lip, Molly remembered how Kren had said that the name of her hall meant destroy for something new. Would that make Ova think badly of her? It wasn’t like she could escape that, though. She was stuck in that hall and in the room they gave her. She was sure she couldn’t change it. If they were going to be friends, Ova would find out sometime. “Kenaz. Room 206. Yours?”
“Uraz. 150,” Ova stated. “Which… I don’t know why. It isn’t like I resent power. I love the power of the gods and goddesses.”
“Yeah. I don’t understand mine either.” Molly was relieved that she wasn’t the only one worried about the room the school had allocated her.
Ova laughed. “There’s a deeper meaning for sure. Freya wouldn’t have it otherwise. My parents said it takes a couple of years for the meaning to come clear. It’s like divinations. It’s a look into ourselves that we refuse to glance at until we are brave enough. This school was built on Freya’s chaos magick, meaning her essence. So, in a way, the school has an all-knowing soul of its own. You were placed there for a reason.”
Ova guided Molly past the cafeteria, where a few students sat and chatted during their break. There was a giant fountain in the middle of the open floor that Molly hadn’t noticed that morning or the day before because there had been so much going on. Water fell down in countless streams from its top to various piers of smoothed grey rock until it emptied into a large open sky-blue, cloud-grey basin.
Molly followed Ova past the fountain to a door near the largest three-set restrooms she had seen in the school to a silver-handled glass door that led to the outside. Ova opened it and let Molly through.
At once, fresh air filled her lungs and Molly could hear birds chirping over the students chatting. There were students sprawled out over the beautifully rich, freshly cut green lawn. The shining sun warmed her skin, welcoming her outside. The distant horizon eventually collided with a mountainous drop and the broad expanse let her imagination run, dreaming of adventures and wonders in many worlds. It felt as though they were on their own planet, their own island, high up near the heavenly sky.
“Spectacular, isn’t it? Freya truly blessed us.” Ova headed to the sidewalk that ran the length of the front of the school. It was the same path Molly had taken yesterday when she arrived going from the airport to the entrance, but now Ova was taking her to the grounds on the opposite side of the school than the airport.
As they walked, Molly could see a forest reaching out behind where the grass plains stopped, where students from all years sat laughing. As she and Ova turned the bend, they came to what may have been a circular courtyard, except there were no buildings surrounding it. It was just a giant circle of tanned brick with stone benches cemented to the ground all around its curves, with a giant statue of a man watching over it.
Molly stopped to stare at it. The statue had to be four times the size of any human. Black as a moonless night, the warrior-like man stood, with one foot raised on a platform of onyx stone, extending a long thin horn into the sky. The man was depicted in armor, with a beard that fell to a cloak that draped over his broad shoulders, and stone fur sprouting out near his wrists and soft-detailed boots. The thing that entranced her the most was his very own horns that curved around from the top of his helmet to the back of his head.
“Heimdallr,” Ova said. “Born of nine sea monsters. A gift from Opendrest.” Maybe because Molly had stopped, Ova decided to stop to sit down there in the grass. She stretched out her legs, her blue romper blanketing around her thin frame.
“A gift from Opendrest?” Like how the pool in the basement was a gift from Closedrest.
“Yes. Opendrest is another one of the three main magickal schools over on this side of the country. Each with their own island. Each school gifted the other schools with a gift,” Ova said.
Molly sat too and set her book down. Some of the students nearby seemed to be waiting for something. A few were sitting on the stone benches staring at the statue or the middle of the brick circle, wringing their hands together nervously and pulling at their fingers. They were sitting in twos or threes, whispering and talking.
“I’m excited to hear what your favorite class is after you’ve taken them all later,” Ova said with a yawn, which prompted Molly to yawn too. “Are there any you’re most excited about?”
“Spirit Magick One,” Molly answered without thinking. She continued to watch as a few teachers came into the courtyard. One wearing a red shirt had a black container and was holding it out to the waiting students. Molly watched as each student pulled something out of the container; something long and white that left dust on their hands. Was it chalk?
“Oh, really? That’s a hard subject. Why that one?”
Molly didn’t want to explain too much about herself by answering that question, so she deflected it by feigning looking around. “Who is the principal of this place?” she asked.
“Principal? Oh!” Ova gave a quick laugh and then covered her nose before putting her hand down into the grass and plucking a single blade. “You most likely won’t meet or see the heads of the school. They are elsewhere, probably living in their mansions or all together. I hear they are pretty eccentric.”
Interesting.
The teacher had finished handing out what looked like chalk and tucked the small black box under her right armpit as she headed to the statue. Looking annoyed, the teacher dropped the black bag she had on her shoulder to her forearm and pulled out a small horn. The horn didn’t exactly match the one on the statue. It was shorter and not as beautifully made. She faced the statue, placed the chalk box on the ground, and blew a light note.
The students around the courtyard stepped back as a rumbling started deep in the earth, and the bricks began flipping and changing. They were transforming into a black mirrored pavement that might have been onyx.
Once it was done, the teacher picked up the chalk box and walked away with a huff.
“What just happened?” Molly asked, still mesmerized, as the students walked onto the glassy black slate and started writing on the ground.
They were writing symbols. Some were writing runes.
“Oh. Depending on the note played, the statue can change the terrain of the courtyard to nine different landscapes. Mrs. Heard is the only one who knows and can play all of them. I haven’t seen it myself, but she has told me that. That wasn’t her though. That was the Projection and Memory teacher, Mrs. Refra.”
Molly turned to Ova watching the red-shirted teacher as she disappeared into the school with an annoyed sigh. “Most teachers don’t like doing it,” Ova added. “But Lockdrest’s main focus is symbols and runes, so the students need time to practice, and some like the sport.”
“Sport?”
Something suddenly drew her attention back to the courtyard. One of the symbols, made by a girl with braids, had risen from the ground and had tilted itself right-side up. The symbol had a few twists and turns making it look like numerous number 8s flung together haphazardly. Molly heard Ova tsk.
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The boy the girl was facing, who had long hair and determined eyes, stood up next as his symbol began to rise. His was perfectly connected Os, maybe even 8s, forming its own circle.
The symbols flew toward each other and connected with a small flash before the girl’s disintegrated and the boy’s twisted itself into a perfect full circle and then shone a light up to the sky as bright as the sun for one second before disappearing.
Molly didn’t know what to think. She didn’t even know what the symbols meant.
“She should have taken her time,” Ova said, shaking her head. “It’s called chalk-rising. If you pair up, you need to decide what symbols to use against each other. You can test to see if you are faster or which ones are stronger. Some symbols are naturally supposed to be stronger but may fail if not implemented correctly or if the incorrect amount of incentive is given into the chalk when transferred to the ground. Hers was supposed to be stronger. If you team up, you can also practice mixing symbols with others to create something new. This is the place to practice the power of runes and symbols. It has safeguards to let the earth ground them and not hurt anyone. It also streamlines the magick. Some things you can do here you can’t do anywhere else. A lot goes into it. It’s a hard sport.”
“Sounds boring,” Molly said, falling back a little to relax. She imagined Rexa and Val would have thought that too. “It’s like studying.”
Ova’s mouth dropped open an inch. “I would not say boring. This school is all about the academics of runes and symbols. They form the very foundation of many things. Like the halls… It only makes sense that their sport would be…” Ova stopped herself.
Molly hadn’t meant to offend her, so she tried to change tack. “What’s your favorite subject?”
Ova sat up straighter, scratching at a small red welt on her arm right below the golden band that hugged it. “Runes. I also like symbols, but I’ve been doing runes my whole life.”
“Your whole life?”
“Yes.” Ova leaned over, pulled her pink phone out of her right romper pocket, then leaned the other way and pulled out a small navy velvet bag. “With my family’s profession, it’s important.”
“What is your family’s profession?” Molly asked.
“My family runs and cares for the temple of Freya.”
Sliding open her screen with her finger, Ova hit a few buttons and then showed Molly an app. The logo had a bag much like the one lying on the ground next to Ova. But on the app, the bag was spilling out wooden sticks with runes on them.
“This app shows what each rune means. There are even rune games on it. There is another one for symbols too. It might help you. Koz made them both, so you would have to go and ask him for them.”
Koz had made them?
“How many pixels of your soul does it cost?” Molly asked.
Ova blanched, which made the blood drain from Molly’s cheeks.
“Pixels of your soul? What?” Ova asked.
“Um… in… well… where—my old friends. The apps… they cost pixels of your soul to use.”
Ova’s shoulders dropped. “You’re kidding.”
Molly shook her head as Ova put her phone away.
“It costs no pixels of your soul. How does that even work? Why and how would the gods allow that?”
Molly thought she could explain. “Before you use one of them, it asks if you want to give a pixel of your soul. You hit yes, and you feel something small get sucked out of you, and then you can use the magick of the app.” Molly was talking fast. “It’s only a little bit. That’s all.”
“And where do those apps come from?”
“I… I don’t know.”
“You’ve done this?”
Molly wanted to shake her head no, but she could not move her head at all. She only watched Ova’s hazel eyes widen.
“Oh, Freya, Metis, and Dagda, you need guidance. Who do you follow?”
“What?”
“What pantheon or gods do you work with? All are accepted here.”
Molly didn’t follow or work with any.
Ova covered her mouth for a moment and then took a big breath. “I work with Freya because she is our family goddess, which is why I was sent to this school of first foundations and runes. We have worshiped Freya for a long time. These runes, they help consult her. I mainly use these runes that I keep with me at all times like all my family does to consult Freya.”
Ova took the bag and emptied the contents onto the grass, her hands shaking. What came out of the bag were small wooden blocks with runes on them that were shaped just like the symbols for the halls.
“I also follow Metis for guidance, cunning, and wisdom. I have a tarot to consult her. Then I follow Dagda because she has power over life and death and is associated with Druidry, which I—well, that doesn’t matter. The last two were my choices. My gods. Not my family’s. You can worship anyone. Anyone. And then find a way for their protection or guidance. Please—please don’t tell me that you follow no one.….”
A shadow passed over them both just as Molly was about to pull some random god or goddess out of her head. She was willing to go along with whatever god or goddess she chose for the rest of her life as long as it got Ova to settle down.
But the shadow over them spoke first.
“Leave her alone about it,” the person said with so much disdain and authority that Molly felt obligated to give them her full attention. They had their arms crossed against their chest, their straight brown hair flowing in the wind over their shoulders. Their shrewd brown eyes stared at them both. “Not everyone needs to follow someone, a pantheon, god, or goddess.”
Ova started scooping up her runes and then clenched the bag in a fist as she stood to face this person. “Not everyone needs to, no, but it’s in their best interest.”
“For what reason?”
Molly went to stand up too but took a step away from the two of them because their new visitor looked ready to take a step forward and stand pointed nose to pointed nose with Ova.
“Protection. Guidance. When anyone has a question on what to do.”
The person gave one sharp laugh. “Sounds like knowledge would fit that need.”
Ova shook her head. “Who are you?”
“I’m Lily Pathon. Please use they/them when referring to me in your minds or elsewhere. Thank you,” they said with a tilt of their head, eyeing Ova up and down. “I had come over to apologize for my friend Namu earlier, who had run into her—” they looked to Molly, “But then I heard you terrorizing her.”
“I was not terrorizing her! I was helping!”
Molly took in too much air when she suddenly realized that Lily’s last name was the same as the airline’s. She started coughing.
“How is it helping overwhelming someone when it comes to religion and acting like it’s the most important thing there is?” Lily asked, leaving their mouth slightly open to showcase that they were biting their tongue with one side of the back of their teeth.
“It is the most important thing!”
Lily tsked. “Let me guess. Your family owns a temple?” Lily shook their head. “For some, it may bring comfort. For some, it doesn’t.” They shrugged. “For me, money is my comfort. I like to have it so I can use it to help people. Other things can help people, not just religion.”
When Ova opened her mouth to interrupt, Lily put their finger up. “And I don’t care about anyone’s opinions or what anyone says. I know what is best for ME, and I am offering variety for everyone else.”
Ova closed her mouth then opened it again. “So you follow no one?”
Tilting their head to the other side, Lily answered, “I didn’t say that. My family follows the goddess Aine of Knockaine, as do I. A goddess who has brought hope to many women. I also follow Cernunnos.”
“For wealth…” Ova hissed, clenching her runes tighter.
Lily turned and gave her a wink. “For wealth,” they confirmed, then walked away.
Ova’s eyes followed Lily as Lily went to the courtyard to watch the students work chalk rising into their break. Once Ova saw that Lily would not turn their attention back to the two of them, she looked down at the grass, and a tear fell from her eye.
Shoving her bag of runes back into her pants, Ova started walking away. “I’ve… I’ve got to… go to the nurse. Or Mrs. Heard. Someone. I’ll talk to you later, Molly.”
Ova left Molly in the grass with her two books on the ground, not knowing what to do or what had happened.
What had happened?
It seemed like Ova had been questioned about her religious beliefs—or had she? Honestly, it just seemed like Lily had been the one who was pushing their beliefs.
Whatever it was, at least now Molly knew it was a topic to stay away from, or at least to be cautious about around Ova. Molly would have to try to understand Ova’s position a little more when it came to it. Obviously, religion was very important to her, and Molly wanted to know why if it runs that deep. She was also curious about what Ova’s parents did.
Molly pulled out her phone and saw she still had about half an hour until her next class. She could return to her room, but the thought of the smell and possibly encountering the spirit sprites bothered her.
She looked at the impression that Ova had left on the ground and the spot where her bag of runes had been. She could try to find Koz right now, as Kren had wanted her to do. If she did that now, instead of later, it would be done, and then she could use whatever app Ova had to start practicing and catch up on her classes tonight. Maybe then she would not feel so overwhelmed and behind.
But where would Koz be? If he made apps, would he be in the computer labs?
It was as good a place to check as any.
She picked up her books and headed back inside the way she had come.
***
She should have taken the sidewalk around the school back to the front entrance so she could enjoy the outside more, and maybe it would have cut back some of her time. When she finally reached the labs on the other side of the school by the stairwell, almost ten minutes had passed.
There was a sign on the outside hanging from the glass enclosure that said the lab was open at all times, so she went in without knocking.
The room was dark, quiet, and the air buzzed with electricity, although no computer made a sound as each flat dark screen stared at her, and each soft upholstered chair offered her a seat.
A faint glow came from a corner on the far side of the room, many rows of computers away, with the sound of typing click-clacking from that direction. She cautiously went over, afraid to touch anything.
There were Koz and Rem. They were so engrossed in their computers that they didn’t notice her at all. It looked like they were playing a game on their screens with weaponry and monsters from a far-off world.
She didn’t want to interrupt them and was turning to leave when she bumped into a chair, making it squeak.
Koz paused the screen and swiveled in his chair to face her. He looked at her confused. “You again? May I help you?”
The girl stopped what she was doing too. “Come on! I want to play!”
“Hold on, Rem. Is it about your phone?” Koz smiled at Molly.
When Molly nodded, he held out his hand.
“Phone,” he demanded.
She dug it out of her shorts and handed it over.
“Who directed you here?” he asked, opening up the screen. He slid it along the side of his own computer screen without touching it and then drew some kind of symbol on it that allowed him to bypass her setup.
“Kren, the a mini-troll. And Ova, my friend.”
“I know Ova,” he said.
“In the game I play that Koz developed, my troll has four-inch-wide back teeth! I need to know how big a mini-troll’s teeth are compared to that! Do you know?”
“Oh…ok,” Molly stuttered. “Next time I see Kren… I’ll try to ask him.”
Koz nodded. He was deep into her phone now, his feet tucked under his chair, leaning back. “That would be great. Then Rem here can correlate, and I can make sure my data is correct.” He slammed his feet down. “Now, I see that you have some apps here.”
Molly froze.
“Oh, don’t worry, I didn’t touch them. But I suggest you delete them. It’s stupid to sell pixels of your soul for these apps when you don’t even know who makes them.” He eyed her for a second before looking back at her phone. He used one leg to kick out the chair next to him. “Have a seat.”
Reluctantly, she did.
“Um… how long have you guys been going here?” Molly asked, wanting to fill the silence and wash away the judgments. It was something she hadn’t asked them when they had showed her around. She knew they were at least a year older, so it wasn’t important to ask, except maybe it would remind Koz that she was new so he wouldn’t form a harsh opinion of the apps she used. She had no idea until recently that they were bad to use.
Rem spoke up as Koz swiveled some more, biting on his bottom lip. He pushed a few more things on her phone.
“My adoptive parents let me go to magick school because I wanted to,” Rem said.
“Oh. You’re adopted?”
“Yes. Because my parents loved me.”
It was a statement that didn’t allow for any slack.
“This is my second year,” Koz said, lazily raising his hand without looking at her and then putting it back down to type more things into her phone. “We started together.”
It took Molly a second to realize that he was returning her phone. “I gave you some good studying apps on there from my own database. Obviously, I didn’t allow you access to my database, but with how clueless you seem about techno magick, I’m guessing you won’t be able to backtrack to access it on your own. So, I don’t need to erase my imprint. Next time you come to me, though, it will be faster and easier to add apps from it.”
“I wouldn’t…”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah.…” Was she? Why was he making her second-guess herself?
“Now, about those apps. They’re stupid because, one,” he held up a finger, “Why not just make your own apps and sell your soul to yourself if you’re going to do that? Once you learn technology, it’s not that hard. The apps are just taking and re-using spirit magick.”
He held up a second finger, “Two, you don’t know how much of your soul they are really taking. No one knows how to measure a pixel in souls. And how can you measure it yourself? There are no regulations about it yet because it’s so new, so it’s very dangerous.”
“But… I know lots of people who….”
“I’m sure you do. Whoever made the apps can’t take too much of a soul because it would be too noticeable, and they would get tracked and taken down. Do you know anything about spirit magick?”
Molly shook her head. “I haven’t taken—”
“Then you don’t understand how it works at all! It takes some of you and transfers it. Depending on the app and who’s behind it, who knows how much it is taking. It can take too much of your essence too fast. Your essence, you can grow back slowly, but once too much is taken it is impossible. It’s complicated and disgusting, frankly, how people are taking advantage of the young and dumb when it comes to these things.”
“But… I…”
“Yeah. Yeah. I’ve heard it all before. But you use them all the time. But these certain ones,” he whined. “Just use apps made by someone you trust. I know you don’t know me, and I know it’s insane for me to ask you to trust me. But I promise you, I don’t want any ounce of your soul.”