Since I could think I was being prepared for today, for the trials.
My name is Alexandre Baltasar, and I have been trained since I could walk, studying the history books in our family library or running for miles until I fell over, not being able to continue. I am from an old family, imbued with magic potential, and in service of the royal crown of the Hearith Empire, which in turn is protecting us against outside forces, as our blood is a valuable and sought after resource outside of these walls. My grandfather settled here in the aftermath of the great war, in which outside invaders from across the great sea were looking to pillage our lands in search of royal blood.
As our carriage is bringing me and my sibling, Teodor, towards the temple grounds, which also houses the school we both are attending, I can't help but think about my achievements so far, or the lack thereof.
I have never left the city, as it is dangerous outside without magic to defend yourself, and I was deemed too valuable to go out to forage, as we don't need it to survive. Magical beast roam the forests to our east and south, and the shores to our west and north are populated by smaller settlements under another kingdom and pirates, living on small islands, robbing the civilian settlements near the great sea.
I grew up in the magical housing district near the templar guild, at the heart of our city, in a house built by our grandma after a great war which nearly took Hearith whole. Whenever im not training, I sit on top of our roof and look out on the streets, barely able to see the faces of the people below, and sometimes able to hear small parts of conversations, or getting a whiff of the 2 day old fish that Frederic is selling on the marketplace below.
Most evenings I fall asleep on the slight incline of our roof, slumped against the chimney, and held in place by the facade protruding half a meter over the edge of our roof. Sometimes within minutes due to the intense training, but most times I look out on the streets below for hours, not being able to sleep.
My father told me that a strong body and mind were supposed to help me, but he never said why that is or what the test actually consists of. I know that people die every year trying, even thou I never saw it happening, as those that don't make it simply never come back.
Out of the year before me only 12 out of 20 students made it, and when they came back to school after the summer break they were treated like kings and queens, and would immediately be tutored by one of the old masters. Sometimes graduates are able to disintegrate whole houses just by waving their hand, although it always comes at a great personal price. If you overexert yourself, you might never recover, and a small mistake in intention would take you whole if not stopped by outside forces.
The carriage hits a crossing stone on the way, rattling the interior, waking me out of my thoughts.
At some street corners I can spot shrines dedicated to those who sacrificed themselves for the city, mostly mages whose family line nearly or completely went extinct during those times. Of course I know their stories by heart by now, and have run past them so often that even though they are richly decorated with gold and non-magical gems, they have become mundane. Sometimes you see smaller civilian sects praying to them in hopes of fortune or a lessening of their burdens. Most people don't really believe that any mage would help them, especially not any dead ones. And they are right, as civilian life out here is hard, especially if you need to go outside of the walls to hunt or gather, and that is for sure not worth the time or effort of a magician.
Once, at a festival, one of the graduates lost her arm up to the elbow, trying to extinguish a firespell gone out of control. She wanted to show off to her crush, only to be distracted by another student, throwing earth at her. She choked on it, and the flames started to eat at her fingertips. The skin and flesh started to melt away, falling from her bones in a sickly gray color, only to be turned to dust as the fire continued eating away at her, dancing on her arm. They never touched the ground, only eating up the arm at an alarming rate, and one of the guards nearby hacked the arm of with a swift swing of his halberd, before grabbing at his belt and producing a circular metal stamp, very similar to those used to stamp cattle. It was made large enough to cover the open wound. The severed arm was gone in an instance, blazing away mid air, and the open cut started to stream out blood before the guard pressed the device against it, cauterizing it with immense heat. The girl blacked out instantly, and I never saw her again as she was transported away by an invisible force towards the nearest field medics tent. My father hurried me along and told me that things like this happen every year, and if the guard wouldn't have done what he did, the whole body would have been consumed by the spell, or she would have bled out within minutes. The spell would have burned everything it touched until it reached the core of the wielder, its essence, which would have not only resulted in her death but also the death of mostly everyone at the festival. I could never get her cries out of my head as she fell to the ground, clutching her severed arm, and the eerie silence that followed.
There are many tales surrounding the trials, or magicians in general, and through my studies or through my father I´ve encountered many.
It was a story of a great magician, who came out of trials with chaos energy, one of the most powerful iterations possible, only to be consumed by it, turning him into a writhing ball of flesh, unable to speak or breathe, but still alive. No one was able to end his suffering, and those that tried were consumed into it, never to be seen again. I don't know if it is true, but honestly, I don't want to find out.
Sometimes when I'm on the roof I can hear loud explosions, or agonizing screams piercing the temple walls, even though they are supposed to be deep underground. The temple itself is a great old building, only rivaled in size by the castle in which the royal crown resides. The one thing that differentiates our city from others is the templar guild, as my father used to tell me. I feel like I can recite the story in my sleep, having heard it so often that im not sure I could forget it if I tried.
After the great war, the templar guild was formed out of the surviving families, and many of them weren't able to wield magic themselves as most mages of their respective line gave their lives saving them. So knowing that without magic to defend themselves they wouldn't stand a chance when the next invasion came, they put all their knowledge together with the intend to form a new generation of images through means of forced marriage and harsh education, out of which the trials were born. Surrounding families who were bestowed came to the city, sometimes under threat of violence or even death from the surviving mages of Hearith Empire. The way they saw it, everyone was dead anyway the next time the enemy came knocking at the walls. Out of these efforts, the temple was built, supposedly with a huge underground complex, in order to protect anything remotely magic to the last man; and the temple on top was the first building erected in the city. Before that, Hearith was a normal city-village for a long time, albeit larger then the surrounding ones. Even the royal crown is said to be serving the templar guild, although that is never said out loud.
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Sometimes my grandma tells me stories of her life before she was forced behind those walls, as she likes to put it, of times where magicians weren't royal bloodlines but people empowered by their village, when magic could be given even to those not born with hereditary talent by means of rituals. In turn, those empowered would take care of the village, protecting it from animal attacks, and sometimes even working with those magical beasts in order to ensure a peaceful life for everyone.
Of course, in times of crisis, the human default is always to resort to crude measures in the name of efficiency; but it always ends up worse than it was to begin with. She is rather cynical towards Hearith due to the way the temple operates, but I was told to never repeat that to anyone outside of family.
No one is allowed to enter those sacred templar halls, except on graduation day, or, if you become a templar, to guide those seeking power. The templars themselves can't wield magic, as most families can't, but are chosen for their great intellect and determination. They would study the scriptures, and guide those seeking greater power.
Templars or civilians are not allowed to reproduce with royal blood, as it is seen as a waste of great potential; and those that ignore those restrictions are dispatched of quietly by their faithful brothers and sisters. At times you would see the parents of the deceased or failed students later in the year buying bread at the bakery down the street or at the armory, mostly selling old heirlooms or treasures to pay the fine imposed by the templar guild for failing the trials.
You have to be of royal blood and of age to enter the trials, which means that today is my turn. Everyone tells me how lucky I am, and those that are in my grade are excited to attend,or at least thats what they are saying. Sometimes, when I look in their eyes as they tell me of their plans after passing the trial, I can see the fear in them. Most try to compensate by studying religiously, but I was never that good in school. I was always bored by the dry lessons of the robed scholars, so I spent the days looking out the window towards the busy street, seeing normal people passing by, glaring with barely suppressed contempt or envy. Honestly, I dreaded today, and have been treading it for years, but my family has no doubt that I will pass, and be bestowed with great power as my parents were before me. We are an old family with an unbroken bloodline, back when we were living in a village in the huge forests to our east, and after coming here no one on my father's side ever failed the trials.
The way they saw it, I was guaranteed to pass.
Honestly, I'm not so sure. Other families with powerful magical heirlooms sometimes had their kids practicing magic, even before the trial, by having them wear them in order to unlock parts of their magic earlier. We were well of, but not that rich, as my family never fought on the frontlines of the small wars to bring the kingdom together after the invasion, but were scholars, imbued with power pertaining to infrastructure and logistics, like being able to further plant or animal growth, or as my grandma, able to build huge houses out of nothing in a days work. Historically, we were designated to build and maintain the walls and castles surrounding the capital against animals or raiders. There was always work, even in those years where we weren't under direct threat, as the city was ever growing, and with that the need for housing or agriculture never stopped.
Sometimes huge delegations of refugees arrived, uprooted by smaller wars of the surrounding kingdoms, as every couple decades whole family trees were eradicated, and with that their respective cities and castles. Due to our standing relative to those around us, we were always a beacon of hope and order, only rarely taking active part in battles. As far as I knew, Hearith never lost a war domestically, and therefore were rarely attacked head on by armies. Every couple of years there would be a poisoning or an assassination attempt, but they would rarely lose royal blood on those, and always make sure to get their due from the assumed perpetrators. Out of my studies I learned that in recent history Hearith eliminated two different royal lines, and fought seven wars, all of which ended in surrender or annihilation of the enemy, sometimes both.
The capital-village I grew up in was located in a valley between three mountains, each with a castle for the original ruling families, manned with powerful offensive images from each family. The strongholds were relatively small, as strongholds go, and were never meant to house civilians. Only those that could help defend our immediate borders, as raids on the surrounding villages under our protection are common. We are a small but powerful kingdom, surrounded by smaller villages, rivaling other kingdoms that only consist of a single family of royal blood. We have smaller settlements towards the forest to our east, older than the capital itself; but the shores to our west are occupied by another royal line, which specialized in water magic. We have a trade relation with them, as we rely on their fish, for which we trade herbs or plants imbued with magical properties. Sometimes we send out expeditions over the great sea, as the war with the opposing unified Kingdom never really stopped. To us, they are the Trewen Empire, although I am sure they name themselves differently.
I would give a lot to just returning to school for another year or two, especially since Teodor is two years younger and still has that time. I look up to see him looking at me, like smaller siblings do, with a mixture of dread and excitement.
"You know I`ll be fine, right?" I ask him.
"Yeah, I know" he says, quickly looking away.
"Im just worried, is all"
"What are you worried about? You know I`ll be the greatest mage Hearith has ever seen! Well, at least for the next 2 years, after that its your turn, so keep studying, otherwise I´ll be the one worried about you, and we dont want that" I say jokingly, patting his head.
"You know I hate it when you touch my hair, what is Isabella going to think when i come to school looking like a common vagrant?" he says, in an exasperated tone, trying to fix his hair and making it worse.
"That nothing has changed?" I reply, while a thin smile shows itself.
He huffs at me, and turns to look out the window.
"You know I wont forgive you if you dont come back home"
"I know. I wont let you down, I promise!" I don't know if that convinces him, as he just winces, and honestly, im not even convinced myself.
The carriage comes to a stop, and I get out, holding the door for him as he fumbles with his books stacked high, nearly covering his face. The last 2 weeks he has buried himself in studying, not wanting to show weakness. It is a great excuse to why he cant get enough sleep, as the bags under his eyes only grew these past few days. Honestly, I can't blame him, as I couldn't get any sleep last night either.
"Dont get all the girls while im gone" I tell him sternly, which in turn gets a smile out of him.
I look around, seeing the templar delegation of black-robed figures waiting a couple meters behind the entryway to the temple grounds, ready to take me with them. There are two for each student going into the trials, as much for comfort as to make sure no one bolts before taking the trial.
"Alright, see you soon!" I shout towards Teodor, who is already going into school grounds, not wanting to break infront of his friends. He turns around and tries to wave, which makes him drop half his books.
He quickly tries to recover as Isabella appears behind a corner, hurrying over to help him pick up his books, and he nearly headbutts her as he turns around to see whos running towards him. They both laughed awkwardly for a second, before going inside the building without saying another word.
"Young and in love, huh?" I nearly flinch but restrain myself as Atena comes up from behind me. At least I thought I did as she just smiles knowingly. I nod towards her, as she comes up and embraces me in a hug.
"Im scared too" she wispers in my ear before releasing me and taking a step back.
"Wasnt expecting us?" A second voice emerges from behind, this time further from the left, as Atenas brother Roderic comes up to greet me.
"I sure should have. Are you ready?"
"As ready as i´ll ever be" says Roderic, offering our patented handshake, which I grasp firmly as we pull each other into an embrace.
"Alright, no reason in waiting." I say, as I start walking towards the templars, taking a deep breath with Atena and Roderic following behind.