The day dawned too early for both, and the early summer sun was well up by the time they met downstairs. The inn didn’t provide breakfast, and they were short on time, so bags and horse were quickly collected, and they made straight for the docks.
“Not a bad job for your first time. How long did it take you to figure that out?” asked Lloyd, eyeing Yaric’s bundle of armor tied off below his bag.
“Not too long,” replied Yaric, stretching the truth a lot, while trying to act nonchalant. Lloyd just smirked.
The docks were already busy when they arrived, with cargo being unloaded or loaded everywhere, and carts coming and going to transport the cargo around the docks. They were no problems with getting Jelly on board, so Lloyd led Yaric up the gangplank and straight to their small cabins, both on the top deck with views of the opposite riverbank. Well, right now they were views of the boat works on the opposite bank, but they would have great views once they were on their way.
Yaric finished dropping his bags and went across to Lloyd’s room, but his door was locked, and Lloyd wasn’t answering. Locking his own door, Yaric decided to go for a walk around the boat and get a feel for where things were. He’d never been on a boat before, and wasn’t sure what to expect. Perhaps he should have known, as the first large room he walked in turned out to be a dining room, complete with Lloyd muttering in a chair by himself. Yaric was unsure what he should be doing, so he went over.
“They said they aren’t serving breakfast today, because the boat isn’t even leaving until 10. The first meal will be lunch at 12,” he grumbled, before Yaric had made it even halfway to the table. Lloyd spoke as if he were talking about a pickpocket, so Yaric just sat uncomfortably while Lloyd continued muttering his curses at the boat, the crew, the captain, the captain’s mother, and for some reason, that same particular Council member Lloyd had been railing about while on the road, who Lloyd seemed sure was ultimately responsible for the kitchen not being open yet.
It was already 9:40, so they only had to wait for 20 minutes for the boat to push off and slowly start making its way down the river. Neither said much, watching the river boat slowly gather speed, with all the much smaller boats scattering around them. Even once they got going, both just watched the passing countryside, and the much higher foot traffic on the road between Taiyuan and Hasver Lake, as Yaric settled straight back into his brooding.
The silence was uninterrupted until one of the crew came out of the kitchen, carrying a tea pot and cups, with a small plate of biscuits. Yaric ignored everyone as everything was placed on the table, though Lloyd nodded gratefully to the crew member as he claimed the entire plate. With only half an hour to go until lunch, Lloyd was already in a much better mood, and he poured them both a cup while he ate the biscuits.
Yaric only stirred a little when lunch arrived, as he was hungry too, and soon after they had eaten, he mumbled to excuse himself before going back to wandering around the boat. As large as the boat had seemed, it took Yaric barely 30 minutes to explore every inch that was accessible to him, the only part that held any interest for him being a game deck.
The game deck was an entirely different area from the game room, where there was gambling and board games available. The game deck was a larger, open space, with various ball sports played with a net or along the deck. What really interested Yaric though was the small wooden shield put up, forming a short corridor up against a wall, because when Yaric looked inside, he found a thick wooden wall with a target at the end. A short archery range. A crew member was nearby to assist, and unlocked the bow and a quiver of arrows, giving Yaric a quick lesson on notching and firing.
Yaric sucked. He was really bad, hitting the deck in front of the target in the beginning, before placing arrows all over the wall, never getting close to the target. He got more and more frustrated with himself, actually starting to get worse again, before the attendant jumped back in and explained that this was normal for anyone's first time. He himself and not done any better or worse when first learning.
Yaric spent almost an hour trying out the bow, eventually putting the occasional arrow onto the edges of the target. He only gave up when his arm became too tired to keep drawing the bow, and promised to be back the next day. The rest of the day was spent in his cabin, staring at the ceiling while deep in thought, before joining Lloyd, who appeared to have not left his seat, for a much longer dinner. Lloyd had also arranged for a special tea for him to try at the end. It wasn’t very good, but Yaric pretended to like it and drank it with a smile. Their cabins came with a three-course meal, so both ate very well before going back to their rooms to sleep. For once, Yaric dropped off into a deep sleep almost immediately.
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Breakfast in the morning was quiet but good, although Lloyd had arranged more of his special tea for Yaric. After breakfast, Lloyd insisted that Yaric go back to his cabin and lie down for a while, sending him back straight after breakfast. Yaric was very surprised to find himself waking back up at noon, having fallen asleep again, when he was so used to waking before sunrise and working all day before sleeping after dark. After lunch, Yaric spent his time trying to get better at archery. Dinner too was followed by Lloyd’s now infamous tea, and again Yaric dropped off to sleep in his cabin, almost as he lay down.
The third day was an exact repeat of the second, tea after breakfast, nap, lunch, archery, dinner, tea. Sleep. The only difference was Lloyd’s extra good mood after Yaric woke up from his morning nap. He was smiling when Yaric came in, but didn’t say much except to ask how Yaric was feeling.
It was on the fourth day when Lloyd finally tried to make conversation, smiling widely as Yaric made his appearance for breakfast. “You’re looking much, much better! Hardly any bags under your eyes now. You seem much more rested now.”
“Well I’d hope so, I’ve slept more in three days than I normally do in a week,” he grumbled.
“Yes, well, you weren’t sleeping much in those weeks, were you? That was the whole problem.”
They paused to get some food, and both were quiet for a moment as they started eating. Lloyd finally interrupted the silence, “We left the lake while you were asleep, so we should be arriving at Lekton tomorrow, probably midafternoon. You ready to start your training?”
Yaric looked a little uncertain for a moment, before replying, “I don’t think I could be more ready than I am.”
“Good, good. Don’t push yourself too hard with your archery today, you don’t want to be sore tomorrow.” Seeing Yaric’s expression, he smiled slightly, “Hehe, you think I don’t know what you’ve been doing every day?”
Yaric just grumbled to himself for a moment before asking, “Why has the rowing stopped? I saw oars out along the whole boat yesterday, but none today.”
“They will come out on occasion; they have been the whole way. But yesterday we were still on the lake, there was no current to push us along so the rowers down in the lower decks had to row the whole day. We’re back on a river that exited the lake, so now the current does most the work again.”
“So they don’t use magic? I thought they used magic to make the boats move.”
“Oh, they do. Just not one of these boats. No, the boats with Mages pushing them along are larger and only carry very valuable cargo and high-class passengers. They have to, to cover the cost of Mages spending so much time just pushing them along. Mages with an affinity for magnetism can make a lot of money that way. Of course, they still only use the Mages to go upstream, it’s too expensive and unnecessary when travelling downriver.”
“Then how does this boat make the trip back?”
“With the rowers. They will have to row the entire time. It’s why the return trip takes a few days longer, even though the rowers can push the boat upstream at almost the same speed as the current carries us down. The boat will drop anchor a few times on the return trip.”
“Glad I'm not a rower.”
“And you never will be. You’ll be a wizard! Or a mage, up to you.”
Yaric looked at him questioningly. “Never mind, that’s for later. You just drink your tea and go back to your cabin. This is the last time I’ll send you to go rest.”
Yaric grudgingly drank his tea and went back to his cabin. And again, he was out like a light until lunch time.
This time Lloyd waved him over as he entered the dining room, motioning to a chair opposite him.
“Sit, sit, I have some things to explain to you before we arrive tomorrow, and I want you have time to think about them and ask questions before we get to Lekton. Otherwise you might embarrass yourself when you get to your classes. What I have to tell you should also make your life easier.”
“You’re going to teach me about the Academy?”
“No, magic.”
“You’re teaching me magic?!” Yaric sat up excitedly, leaning forward over the table.
“No.” Yaric slumped straight back down.
“What do you think you’re going to the academy for? No, you need to understand what magic is, where it comes from, how it’s used. Do you even know the difference between a Mage and a Wizard?” Seeing Yaric’s blank look Lloyd continued, “I thought not. It’s always painfully apparent how little non-arcanists understand about the magical world. Or in your case, uneducated arcanists.”
“I need you to bear with me for a while and hold all of your questions until the end. There is a lot for me to tell you and it can be hard to even know where to start. I’ll probably end up answering most of your questions before I finish.”
“Now, you might know some of what I’m about to tell you already, that doesn’t matter. Just humor me. And some of what you think you know will probably be wrong. So lets start at the very beginning.”
“You and I are both arcanists. Do you know what that means?”
“We can do magic?”
“Yes, but why? Why can an arcanist use magic?”
“Because we have magic power.”
“See, there! That’s what I mean when I say non-arcanists don’t have any real understanding about magic. No, we have no magic power at all, no one does.”
Yaric was frowning in confusion, clearly not understanding.
“You see, what makes an arcanist an arcanist, is that we have an ability to tap into the arcana of the universe. We don’t have our own power, but we can channel and use arcana whenever we want.”
“But then how are some people more powerful, and why…” Yaric trailed off as Lloyd raised his hand.
“No questions until the end. Now, I want you to look at this table we are sitting at. What is it made up of?”
“Wood.”
“And deeper than that? What is the smallest possible thing it can be broken down into, what makes it real?”
Yaric thought for a few seconds, and eventually just shrugged.
“Energy! Everything is, at its heart, just energy. Water, air, the fork in my hand, all of it is made up of energy. I can see you look skeptical, and that’s ok. You don’t need to understand what I’m saying right now, I’d be shocked if you could. You just need to know what I’m telling you. Now, tell me, what do you think arcana is?”
After a brief moment Yaric replied hesitatingly, “Energy?”
“Exactly! Arcana itself is also energy, magical energy! What you need to know is that there are many High Wizards, Arch Wizards too, who dedicate their lives to particular fields, working to understand everything there is to know in their field of interest. Amongst those fields are wizards who study the universe, the stars, planets - everything that makes up the skies above us. A lot of them tend to have gravity affinities, as they help tremendously with their studies. And you know what they found when they measured the gravity of the universe and looked at what’s actually there?”
This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.
Lloyd paused dramatically before answering his own question. “Nothing! I mean, they didn’t find what they were looking for. There are far, far less things in our universe than what there should be. Not even 10%. But, nothing is really missing. It’s all there, just in a dimension that most can’t access. We all live our lives in four dimensions, but all of the missing matter is in the fifth. Only, it’s in its raw form – energy. Magical energy - arcana.”
“But I already learned about this, things are three dimensional. We aren’t four dimensional?”
“Oh really?” Lloyd pointed at a pitcher of water on the table. “Tell me exactly where that is in your three dimensions then.”
Yaric smiled as he leaned over, “Ok, it’s height is at the surface if the table, and it’s this far from my side of the table and that from the left side.”
The pitcher lifted off the table, drifted to the side, and stopped, remaining hovering in the air. Remarkably, no one else in the room noticed a thing. “No, it’s not.”
“It was, you moved it!”
“Yes, it was! Which is the dimension you are missing. Time. Nothing is anywhere without when it is there. Now arcana is sitting in an entirely different dimension, one we can’t even comprehend. But we don’t need to, we can still access it from within our four dimensions. Which is exactly what makes us arcanists.”
“Exactly how we can connect to arcana in the fifth dimension is something that’s been debated fiercely, with most theories revolving around the soul. Of course, I know which one is correct, but you need to develop your own opinion, so I won’t tell you. And it’s not necessary right now anyway.”
“I’ve given you an extremely basic overview on arcana, but you also need to understand what magic is. How we use spells. What spells are.”
“When we channel arcana, we can use that arcana to directly change the reality around us. That is functionally what a spell does. Every spell can be divided into two types. The ‘pure’ type of magic is called ‘shaping’. This is when an arcanist creates water, turns an opponent’s blade into paper or levitates something like this pitcher. Shaping is changing the reality around you directly. But it has its draw backs.”
“First, it is usually far more complicated to directly shape something into the result you are looking for. Both in the understanding of reality required, and the complexity of the spell. While mages definitely can, and often do, use spells to shape reality, it is far more the domain of wizards. If you don’t have the understanding and skill required, shaping is not an option.”
“Second, shaping reality usually requires far more arcana to directly change reality to your wishes than the other type of spell. And it’s not just that forcing something to change directly needs more arcana, but also that the distance you do it over increases the energy required exponentially. When we channel arcana we are drawing it from the fifth dimension, and partially anchoring it in the fourth dimension, but it still has an anchor in the fifth dimension as well. Trying to shape reality into something different when that reality is far from you - with you being the anchor in the fourth dimension - lets much of the arcana escape back into the fifth dimension. The further the target is from you, the greater the loss, and the more arcana you need to be able to draw to compensate.”
“You will learn about those specifics on campus, you just need to understand the basics when instructors refer to something being ‘shaped’.”
“The second type of spell is called ‘augmentation’. Augmenting is used to change something much simpler, and use that change to create the effect you wanted somewhere else. It can still really be seen as shaping, but on a far more basic level, and most importantly, creates an effect in one place to generate the effect you want somewhere else. It doesn’t so much create something as improve something already existing. You will likely start off learning how to augment yourself, strengthening muscles, tendons, bones and the like to hit harder, run faster, jump higher. You can even learn augmentation that will temporarily allow your skin to resist arrows, or your eyes to see in the dark.”
“Even something like a lightning spell can be done through augmentation. Instead of shaping the lightning itself into existence, with a huge amount of arcana, you can use far less arcana and create the difference in charges needed, from yourself and part way to your target, for the lightning to be generated naturally. Don’t be fooled by the different names, all forms of augmenting actually involve shaping as well, it’s more about the method of how you go about changing things.”
“If you even have the power, do you directly set your opponent on fire, while he is standing 20 meters away you? Or do you use a fire spell to create a fire ball inches from your hand, that is then propelled away from you and in his direction? The first would be considered shaping, the second augmentation.”
“This is a lot to take in, go, do whatever it is you planned to do today, think about what I’ve told you, and we can continue over dinner. Just take the time to think over everything as well. I don’t want you to have forgotten everything when we sit down again later.”
Lloyd considered the matter closed, as he immediately went back to his lunch, even ordering another plate 10 minutes later. Yaric just picked at his for food for a while, staring off into the distance again, and when he finally finished his lunch, he wandered off, walking around the boat.
In the end he decided to completely ignore Lloyd, and went back to his archery for the express purpose of trying to get his mind off things. So much had happened lately, and he’d realized that what he really liked about archery was how it made him forget about everything else for a few hours.
It was only much later, when the sky darkened too much for him to continue, that Yaric finally made his way back to the dining room. Lloyd was there as usual, sitting at the table that he had made his own. He had already finished his first course, now busy making his way through his second when Yaric arrived.
Yaric mumbled a quick hello and sat down to start his own meal. Once Lloyd had his third course in front of him, he sat back slightly with his ale in hand, looking Yaric up and down.
“You ready to continue with the basic education on what you need to know before Lekton?” Yaric didn’t stop eating, but paused long enough to give Lloyd a nod, so Lloyd continued. “Right, so there isn’t much left that would be considered important to know in advance, they will teach you most of what you need to know. But you do need some basics on magic society, and I would prefer if you had some knowledge of what you’ll be doing for your first few years as well.”
“First, you need to understand the testing that you will undergo when you go through admissions. It’s very basic,” he added hurriedly at Yaric’s expression. “Not all that different from what I had you do with the compass in Clery. They will be testing to measure your power, and will see if they can get an indication of your affinities and any talents you might have. Don’t be concerned if they can’t, you will be going back a few times over your training to be retested for the last two.”
“I’m sure you’re wondering what those things are, so I’ll try to explain it to you in a way that’s simpler to understand. The first test will be to test your power. Whatever your power is, it will be a fixed value throughout your life, but don’t mistake it as a static measurement. It’s much more like measuring potential. What it is measuring is how much arcana you can channel, essentially how much magic you can put into a spell.”
“Try to understand it like this. When you were playing high ball with your friends, some of your friends were able to hit the ball harder than others. Of those, there were some who spent time doing hard physical work, and some that were just born naturally stronger than average. That last group is similar to the meaning behind your power measurement.”
“Someone with higher power will be able to channel more arcana at the start than someone else, and if both work similarly to develop their strength, the one with higher power will always be able to draw more arcana than the other. That person will grow faster and reach a higher peak, as his potential is higher. If you don’t actually realize your potential though, your power value won’t mean all that much.”
“That is why an arcanist who’s studied for 10 years will be much weaker than an arcanist with the same power, but who’s studied for 20 years. Even if you have a value of 19, and went up against a High Wizard with a power of 10, you would be like a moth in a hurricane. I mention this because you’ll be in classes with other arcanists who are also just starting out, and stupid kids sometimes try creating hierarchies based on power values. That’s stupid, power is just potential. How quickly and how far you can go in channeling arcana.”
“The values range between 0 to 20, with most falling between 12 and 14. So the majority of your classmates will have values of 12 point something, or thirteen point something. Values over 16 are very rare, and over 18 is considered exceptional.”
“More important than your power is your affinities. Magic controls all aspects of reality, but having an affinity in any particular aspect makes it easier for you to use spells of that aspect, as well having more power for the same amount of arcana. You will not have some innate understanding of spells of that type, you will still need to study it like everyone else, ideally even harder than others if you really want to really take of advantage of it. What your affinities will mean in essence is that when drawing arcana, you can filter the arcana to be of a type matching with your affinity, kind of like a flavor of arcana. Fire arcana powering a fire spell makes the spell much more powerful for the same amount of arcana.”
“There are a few reasons why this is important. Most obviously, those are the kinds of spells you will be most powerful with. Second though, it can also impact your study choices, possibly pushing you in a slightly different direction to what you had intended, so you can make better use of your advantages. And lastly, it can have a large affect on career choices, such as the mages powering river boats as we discussed earlier.”
“Mages that work with farmers need to have affinities aligned with wood, life, earth or water. They often have more than one of those. Someone making magical weapons such as swords or spears, usually have at least either fire, metal or magma affinities, if not all, and would require an affinity in lightning for example, if the magical properties of the weapon they wanted to make included lightning. Working in communications or logistics often involves space or light affinities - there is a very wide range of career opportunities available that are influenced by your affinities.”
“Some affinities are considered base, such as fire or earth, whereas magma is a secondary affinity as it is effectively both fire and earth combined. The advantages of that is that if you have five affinities, including magma, you effectively have six. The disadvantages are that your fire and earth combination is more limited than what they would have been when separate. Magma for example won’t be as effective at empowering a fireball as pure fire arcana would be, or even air arcana. Some people will also have fire, earth AND magma, making them exceptionally potent for their level in any related work.”
“Most people have three to five affinities, and it’s fairly common to have less. More than five is very unusual.”
Yaric had finished his first course a few minutes earlier, but didn’t seem to notice as he kept his attention on Lloyd.
“And last but most important of all, they will try to get a measure of your talents. This is almost impossible at the beginning, but don’t worry too much as you will be sent back regularly. The tests will attempt to determine what you are naturally most skilled at. And it can be anything, the possibilities are even greater than with affinities.”
“Can you learn new spells quicker than most, or cast them faster? Are you above average with a blade or axe? Do you easily gain in depth understanding of particular subjects, or maybe you have a lot of talent in organizing or commanding groups? Much of this will only become apparent over time, and some of these things will need you to have developed some basic skills first, before anyone will be able to recognize your talents.”
“To me, talent is, by far, the most important of all three, as the first two will always be limited by your talents. But with enough talent, neither power nor affinities will be much of a limit to you at all.”
“To go back to the high ball example from earlier, power is your natural strength and speed. Some will naturally be stronger, which can be overcome by someone with less natural strength but who worked harder to increase what they had. If the stronger people also worked as hard though, they will grow stronger much faster, and reach much higher peaks before they hit their limits.”
“For affinities, that is something like your abilities in each position. Every striker will be different, maybe one has particular skill in being able to hit the ball while another might miss more often, but is particularly skilled in hitting the ball exactly where he wants it to go. Your affinities bend you towards being particularly good at specific aspects of the game.”
“Your talents are different though, as that is more like a player being able to always be at the right place at the right time, or being able to spot what the opposing team is trying to do. Regardless of strength or abilities in your position, are you good at coming up with your team’s strategy? Do people naturally follow when you lead? Can you anticipate who will receive the ball next? Can you play at your best under any kind of pressure?”
“As you learn and train over the next few years, you will get a clearer and clearer picture of where you lie, and you will hopefully start to get an idea of what you would like to do in the future. For now just focus on your studies and training. The first three years are mostly physical and combat training anyway, with some math and science lessons.”
Yaric looked at Lloyd aghast. “I’m not learning magic yet?!”
“Not in the beginning, no. You need to be both stronger and more mature. You will be trained in certain channeling exercises early on though, so work hard on them! They can have a big impact on what you can learn when you start your first magic classes.”
Yaric was a bit stunned, staring into the chicken stew that had arrived while they were talking.
“Don’t worry, I think you will enjoy the combat training. The physical training, ah, well… some things in life just have to be accepted. It will get slightly easier with time though.”
“I don’t care about the physical training, I wanted to learn magic. That was the whole point of coming here.”
“And you will - once you’re ready. Work hard on the channeling exercises and you might be ready early. Once the training starts, you will definitely start to care about the physical training, so don’t worry about the magic for now.”
“I ran the flour mill by myself. I carried every bag of grain and loaded everything myself. I packed every bag of flour and carried it back by myself!”
“Ah, but did you race to move every single sack from one side to the other as fast as you could, without any breaks, or did you rather carry the bags and pack them throughout the day while pacing yourself?”
Yaric looked a little pale. “Don’t worry, they won’t push you beyond your limits, just close to them. And as you get stronger and fitter you will start to get used to it. I’m not trying to scare you; I just want you to take it as seriously as you should. Now eat your food, this is the last time you will have a meal like this for a while.”
The two of them ate in silence, with Yaric back to his brooding. This time when they finished however, Lloyd dragged Yaric into the game room, where he had Yaric playing card games against other passengers, making bets on Yaric’s behalf, before pulling him over to some of the board games. Yaric had to learn almost every one of them from scratch, but he ended up having fun as he occasionally won a bet, or made a good play.
The boat's crew also wouldn’t let Lloyd buy Yaric any of their beers, and he was left speechless when Yaric not only said that it was ok, but then added that he had actually never had any before in his entire life.
It was Lloyd’s turn to sit in a chair and stare off into space, shaken by the cruelty of the world.
When they finally decided they had had enough, both went off to their cabins to get some sleep after enjoying their last night on the boat. The next day they would be arriving in Lekton. One of them was both excited and nervous, eager to see what the campus would be like, a whole new future ahead of him. The other was mostly just resigned to his fate, his future filled with morons and idiots. Morons and idiots everywhere.