Soulburned : The School of Souls

Chapter Two : Burnt Parchment

Lyra dropped her quill onto the desk and pressed her palms into her eyes.

This noise is driving me crazy! She thought.

Alarm bells rang throughout the city and soldiers shouted to one another across the Iris's lower courtyard. Their scrambling movements outside the Exam Hall caught Lyra's eye and drew her attention away from her work and out a nearby window.

These damn drills are becoming absurd!

"Eyes on your scroll, Miss Mornstag." Master Hur said.

"Sorry, Master Hur, I was just-"

Master Hur held up a hand. They were alone in the large room.

"If you do manage to pass Lyra... " he sighed, "You'd do well to remember that focus is a virtue required of a Wizard."

Lyra bristled. His words echoed those she'd heard

"Now," Master Hur continued, "Finish your test, I'd like to go home."

Lyra deflated. He'd written her off again. It wasn't her fault that she kept failing. Things kept happening. During her first exam, there had been a flood. During her second, a fire. During her third...well, during her third she'd just been hungry, but still!

She sighed and turned her attention back to the scroll.

She'd studied too hard to fail again. Declan had pushed her too hard for that to even be possible. She didn't even want to think about how many tomes and scrolls she'd read in the last year... her fingers were calloused just from turning pages.

What are the six primary Schools of Magic, and which Soulmancy is each most closely related?

Lyra furrowed her brow.

The Logos schools, the province of Wizards, were Illusion and Conjuration. Simply put, Imagination. Either projected onto the world through Illusion or made solid through Conjuration. These she knew off-hand -- this is the entrance exam for the Wizard's Wing, after all. She thought.

The Eros schools took a bit more thought. She'd seen the Mages change shape and alter the physical properties of objects, so that'd be... Transmutation. She wrote it in. Lyra also knew that Mages often enhanced and protected their bodies with magic, which was also transmutation...but what about those Shields? She thought.

Lyra nibbled on the end of her quill. The power wasn't so much elemental as it was... nullifying. Declan had described the shields as removing the forces interacting with objects that struck them, not stopping the objects outright.

Abjuration.

She wrote it next to "Transmutation" on her scroll.

The last was Soulmancy was Thymos. Lyra had never met, or even seen a Sorceror, but their destructive and manipulative powers were legendary.

Divination and Evocation. She wrote.

Next question.

What is an Artificer, and which advanced School of Magic do they gain access to?

A distant roar rattled the glass of the nearby window.

What was that!?

"Master Hur, do you think we should-"

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"Focus, Miss Mornstag. I will not tell you again."

Lyra took a deep breath.

Focus...right, you've got this. She bit her tongue, and reread the question.

An Artificer, she wrote, Is someone who can pull power from both the Eros and Logos of their Soul. They bear both the Mage and Wizard marks and gain access to the Soulmancy School of Imbument.

She took another calming breath. I'm going to pass this time. I have too.

Her brother's lessons had been difficult... but necessary. Just thinking about the disappointment on Declan's face if she had to tell him she failed... again, broke her heart. On the other hand, thinking about the look of stunned disappointment on her father's face when she told him that she passed? She could almost taste that moment, and it was delicious.

There was no age requirement for entering the Iris as a Wizard student, but there was an intelligence requirement. If one's mind wasn't strong and plastic before accepting the Wizard's Mark, it would drive them mad. The Logos cost of any spell would grow exponentially, weakening one's faculties until they rotted away entirely. To combat this, The Iris had long ago adopted rigorous testing to ensure that prospective pupils were up to the task.

Declan, who had earned a Wizard Mark several years prior, ensured Lyra that she would meet the mental requirements to take the Mark, that she'd met them for years now, even when she was a child. It was her general lack of focus and persistent procrastination that caused this delay.

The hourglass on Hur's desk caught Lyra's attention. Her pulse quickened when she saw how much sand had already fallen. She turned her attention back to her test.

Only a few left, keep it together. She coached herself.

Which two advanced Schools of Magic would a Sorceror gain access to, if their Thymos was compounded with either Logos or Eros, respectfully?

Lyra shivered.

Enchantment, she wrote, The ability to bend others to their will.... and Necromancy, power over life and death.

It was largely taught in The Void Scriptures that sorcerors were dangerous because any deep connection to a Thymos could act as a potential bond to an Accursed... however, even without the threat of a bond, The potential power trajectory of Sorcery was frightening. Sorcerors were rare, and Compounded Soulmancers were even more so... but even so, just one Enchanter or Necromancer was enough to topple nations.

Do not suffer sorcerers. She quoted in her head. Burn their Souls from this world, lest they be used to Burn the world.

Another roar echoed through the city.

Lyra tensed, pressing her quill hard against the aged parchment. Ink pooled around the nib, leaving a wet blemish on the otherwise neat handwriting.

Declan's on the wall tonight... Lyra thought.

"Is this a drill, Master Hur?" She asked.

"If it is not, the Soulmancers stationed on watch tonight will handle it. Your task is here."

Lyra stared out the window off and on for the next few minutes, continually pulled away from her exam by the sounds of shouting and running warriors. Scenario after scenario played through her mind. Of Declan hurt. Of Declan killed. Of Declan personally repelling the invaders and being lauded as a hero... Of the battle breaking through to the sixth and final wall of Sclera, all the way to the base of The Iris Tower. Of her and Master Hur then having to run, or even, participate in the Iris's defense.

Not that I'd be much use. She thought. I'm not any sort of Soulmancer, and I can't fight... maybe I would-

"Time's up Lyra." Master Hur said, interrupting Lyra's contemplation, "Bring me your scroll."

"But I'm still not-"

"Miss Mornstag, we're already bending the rules to let you take the exam a third time so soon. I will not bend them further, regardless of who your father is. Bring me your scroll."

Lyra complied. You've done it again, she berated herself, you've failed... Dad was right.

With a bored expression on his face, Master Yinstrad Hur unrolled Lyra's exam and laid it across his desk. He removed a piece of black charcoal chalk from one of the many drawers of his desk and pressed it against the center of Lyra's scroll. With a flick of his wrist, he formed a near-perfect circle, then started filling that circle with small, intricate runes. One for speed, one for calculation, one for... comprehension.

Lyra's best guess was that it was an algorithm for grading, but she couldn't tell exactly, there were a good many runes here that she'd never seen before. The first few times Lyra had taken the exam, she'd been in this same hall, but with many others, all of whom were taking the test. When the time had been called, they'd stacked the scrolls on Hur's desk, then been asked to leave.

Still, grading seemed like an awfully...mundane use of Logos to Lyra, but Master Hur seemed to know what he was doing.

The runes were spell instructions, together forming into a glyph, a guide for Hur's Logos to follow. Wizardy was certainly possible without the runes, and common, but the cost extracted from the Wizard was greater if they had to manually control the flow of Logos. Building glyphs, while slower, allowed a Wizard to cast more spells before needing to recover.

The Wizard Mark on Hur's forehead began to glow faintly, almost imperceptibly, as he poured Logos into the glyph. The glyph began to glow, then smoke as something in the charcoal was allowed to react with something in the paper. Within a moment the entire scroll was set ablaze, in another, it was gone. Only a few dark ashes lingered on Hur's desk.

Lyra slumped, defeated. She wasn't sure of the function of Hur's glyph... but fire was never a good sign.

"Why," Master Hur said, a shocked smile splayed across his face "Lady Mornstag... you've passed!"

Another roar shook the Iris.