When Jeb woke, he was beside a cold fireplace. Looking around, he saw that the room had no obvious exits and was empty save for the fireplace and a piece of paper. Despite lacking any obvious source, there was still sufficient light for him to see what the note said.
There are lentils distributed amongst the ashes in the fireplace. Separate them
That seemed like an easy enough task, and Jeb quickly called up a Glyph to move the ash. Thankfully, the Druids had used wood ash for the assignment. During his Doctoral work, Jeb found himself beside enough burning logs that he had become almost too familiar with the exact shape of a Glyph to move them. Within seconds, the ash sat in a pile beside the fireplace and lentils rested in the fireplace.
The moment he dismissed the Magic, a door appeared beside the fireplace and the Archdruid looked in.
“Interesting,” he said, stroking his beard.
“What is?” Jeb asked, but the Archdruid had already turned away. Jeb stood to follow, but the door was already closed. Looking around, he saw a different doorway on the opposite wall. It led into another room, and Jeb walked into it.
As soon as he had crossed the threshold of the room, the door slammed shut behind him. Jeb watched as the seams of the door merged into the stone around them. The door did not simply fit well, it was Magically connected to the wall around it. Jeb tested the seam with his Magical senses and found that, rather than being sealed away, the door had instead been a temporary hole in the wall.
Satisfied that he would likely need to solve another puzzle before a new door arrived, Jeb looked in the room, where he once again saw nothing but a fireplace and the note. The note was identical to the first, and the contents of the fireplace appeared the same. Confused, Jeb gathered his Magic to once again create a Glyph to move the ashes. As soon as he tried to bend the Magic to a Glyph, however, the room siphoned it away.
“Ah,” Jeb said out loud. “I was able to solve the puzzle with Glyphs, so now I need to demonstrate that I can do so without any.” A part of him wondered at the fact that the Druids would have a room built to restrict Glyphs, but he pushed that question aside for later. After all, even if he wanted to learn the answer now, there was no one he could see to ask.
Shrugging, Jeb called his Magic once again. This time, rather than trying to shape the Magic into a Glyph, Jeb instead started to write an Enchantment on the air in front of him. Glowing runes traced out as Jeb manifested his will onto reality. When he had finished, the script of light flashed once and disappeared. As it did, the lentils flew out of the fireplace and arranged themselves into a pleasant spiraling pattern.
Once again, a door beside the fireplace opened and the Archdruid looked in. Once again, the Archdruid nodded once and turned around, letting the door close behind him. Jeb turned and was unsurprised to find that another door had opened behind him. Walking through it, he was once again faced with a fireplace and a note telling him to separate lentils from ashes.
As Jeb expected, he was unable to push his Magic into either a Glyph or the Runes for an Enchantment. Finding himself increasingly grateful for his work connecting the different Schools of Magic, Jeb reached into the fireplace and plucked a small piece of ash between his fingers. He rubbed them carefully, calling on his Magic to enhance the Essences within the ash. After a few minutes of concentration, Jeb had a small portion of Ash in his hands.
“Like calls to like,” he mumbled, forcing the world to accept the Alchemical truth, if only for a moment. He tossed the Ash onto the floor and watched as the rest of the ash snaked out of the fireplace towards the perfected Essence. As the last motes settled, Jeb pulled the Magic out of the pile, returning it to nothing more than mundane ash. The number of times he had accidentally caused an explosion during his Doctoral work had taught Jeb the value of removing Essence from finished projects.
Repeating the same routine, he found himself in another room. Quickly feeling his Magic fade when attempting to craft a Glyph, Enchantment, or work with any Essence, he sighed. Effecting explicit physical changes with Bardic Songs was always more difficult, especially since Jeb did not have his lute with him. Nonetheless, Jeb began to sing.
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As notes flowed from his throat, he started weaving Magics into the music. With an effort of will, he wove in the threads of an unplayed lute. Slowly but surely, though, he crafted a Song which would separate the two into separate piles. As sweat began to bead on his brow, he gave up on making them any more distinct than simply two lumps in the fireplace.
He cut the Song off suddenly and started to breathe deeply. Weaving an entire Song with a single instrument was never going to be easy. The Bard’s claim that any Bardic Mage should be able to craft Songs without any audible sound had never come true for Jeb, and he made a note to himself to spend more time working to do so. Even working without the lute was difficult enough.
In the fifth room, the only Magic he was able to perform was a Ritual. Single person Rituals were incredibly strenuous, but Jeb managed. He took some time before moving into the sixth room, sitting down and panting until he caught his breath.
After half a dozen rooms, he was surprised to see that the space was different. It was an open air space, and instead of a fireplace, there was a large basket filled with, unsurprisingly, lentils and ash. Jeb noticed the first lights of dawn peaking over the horizon as he read the note attached to the basket.
You have until the end of sunset to sort the basket.
Jeb called on his Magic but was unable to force it into any of the Schools he had been taught. Just from a brief glance at the basket, Jeb knew that he had nowhere near enough time to sort through the entire pile without Magic. He called to his bees and felt as they started to fly towards him. Before they were able to reach him, though, they were blocked by a wall of some sort. Through their Bond, Jeb tried to feel what was blocking them. As far as they were able to communicate, though, the air in front of them was just suddenly impassable.
Sighing, Jeb got to work. Even if he knew that it was a hopeless task, he would give it his all. He carefully felt around in the ash for a single lentil and pulled it out. Being Eighth Tier did come with some advantages, and he did not need to take a break once during the entire day. Still, as the sun passed noon and began to sink lower into the sky, Jeb felt his hope draining.
A part of him wondered what failure in the Trial would mean. The Archdruid had spoken of Trials plural, and Jeb hoped that meant he would have multiple chances to prove himself. A nagging voice in his head reminded him that he had, in fact, gone through multiple rooms. Even if all six spaces were a single Trial, it was also equally possible that his participation in the future Trials was dependent on passing this first one.
As the sun touched the horizon, Jeb scanned the area once again, hoping beyond hope that he would find some clue he had missed. There was nothing there that he had not seen during his day of work, however. When darkness fell, the basket in front of Jeb disappeared.
He found himself standing on the bare stone where they had summoned the Archdruid.
“Jeb,” the Archdruid said, tone as cold as winter’s last frost, “you have failed the first Trial. The lentils and ash remain mixed, reflecting the fact that your own dreams and desires remain murky and unseparated.”
Jeb nodded, accepting the statement. He knew that he had any number of hopes, though how having them in complete alignment would have made the work doable, he had no idea.
“Do you have nothing to say in your defense?” the Archdruid asked, tone no warmer.
“No?” Jeb ventured hesitantly, “I cannot say that you are incorrect. I don’t know exactly what I want out of life, or even out of my time here.” He had meant to stop there, but found that his mouth had continued moving, “I do not see how being less conflicted would have made the task any more doable, though.”
“If you were able to see the answer, you would have passed the Trial.” There was something in the Archdruid’s tone that made Jeb unreasonably angry. He wasn’t sure what it was, but something inside of him screamed to put the old man in his place. The rest of him, recognizing the sheer power that the Archdruid commanded, prevented him from making such a poor choice.
The Archdruid must have sensed what was going on in Jeb’s mind, because he smiled. “You have earned the right to withdraw from the Proving. Be forewarned that each future Trial will become more difficult and dangerous. Do you wish to continue forward?”
Jeb nodded, firming his resolve.
“Then follow the trail to where it leads,” the Archdruid said. A breeze blew past Jeb and the Archdruid seemed to fade into the wind. Behind him, a well lit trail shone in the dark forest. Jeb began to walk, hoping that he would pass this next Trial.
On high alert, Jeb kept scanning the forest for any signs of danger or traps. When he broke through the tree line to find a sandy beach, he was surprised. Apparently the walk had not been a Trial in itself, simply a way to take him to the next Trial.
The Druid who had spoken for the sea was standing in the surf.
“Come into the water,” he demanded. “Your next Trial awaits.”