Wizard's Blood [Part One]

by Bob Blink

  “You mean something that holds the electrical spark?” Ronoran asked.

  Jolan nodded.

  “I’ll bet old Mage Buris could help. I think he has a bunch of sparker bottles. I’ll take you over there at the end of the week if you get out of class in time. Come by my room.”

  * * * *

  The next day of class was spent having everyone show what they could do to a group of mage instructors. Jolan was pretty sure most of the staff were really higher level students rather than professors, based on their apparent ages and the sheer number of them involved in the exercises. They broke the class into groups of four and proceeded to practice. It seemed a bit pointless to keep doing the same things over and over, but it was pointed out that repeated use of the power was one way one advanced in level. Jolan had to admit by the end of a couple of days of this he found he no longer had to think about calling one of the skills he possessed. It had become instinctual.

  They also spent time trying out additional skills that mages of even their low level should be able to perform. Jolan didn’t understand how it was supposed to work, but by having the instructor demonstrate the skill, the mage sensitive part of the brain was supposed to be triggered and they should be able to “learn” the skill. The College must know what they were talking about, because everyone else in Jolan’s group picked up additional capabilities during the three days of these exercises. Jolan, of course, was unable to develop any new skills, something that had him more than a little frustrated.

  He also became more sensitized to a problem the College faced. The whole theme of the College was peaceful application of the power. Unfortunately for the school, the set of mage skills were not aligned along those lines. A perfect example was fire. It seemed that the ability to make fire was one of the most natural skills to develop spontaneously, and there was nobody in the class who couldn’t do so. Fire could easily be a weapon. It could especially be a weapon when the skill progressed to the ability to toss fireballs of various degrees of intensity. There was no way for a mage not to have this ability. So the school had to emphasize the concept of restraint. It was a code more than a restriction on what they learned.

  From other bits and pieces, he realized it was even trickier. The skills were hierarchical, and one skill usually required the ability of other skills. The relationships were not always logical. That could mean, for example, to develop a particular skill in healing, which was considered a noble goal, a mage had to be proficient in another skill which to all intents and purposes seemed to have no other function than destruction. Even more frustrating for the College purists, someone who could use the power to heal, with just a little imagination could use the exact same talent to kill. In other words, Jolan was going to be exposed to most every possible basic skill and talent if he remained in training. The College simply had no recourse but to fall back upon its Code of Ethics which it was trying to instill in the new recruits rather than a restriction of some of the basic skills.

  There was more to the process and restrictions he was to learn later. There had existed a number of “spells” which were highly specialized and designed to perform functions that clearly crossed the line. Here was an area the College had been diligent in hiding or destroying all reference or knowledge of. They had teams of mages whose job it was to comb through all new discoveries from books and scrolls recovered from the libraries of destroyed cities and eliminate and store away this kind of informtion rather than release it into the general community. There were apparently vast numbers of such books waiting to be reviewed.

  The start of the second week brought the first round of eliminations. On the first day of class, fifteen names were called out, and the rejected stood up and marched out, some with tears rolling down their faces. The next morning several more were taken away. The group had shrunk considerably.

  Jolan faced a bit of resentment from the remaining members, something he was certain was felt in spades among those who had been taken away. He had failed many of the tests the previous week. He still could not perform many of the basic functions that every remaining member of the class could do with ease. Yet he was still here while many were gone. Worse, the survivors had come to realize that while they were at risk, for some reason he was immune. Even if he continued to under-perform, his inclusion in the class was secure. It didn’t make him any friends, and rapidly he was snubbed by the remaining members of the class who felt betrayed by his protected status.

  By the end of the second week, the class was down to thirty-three individuals. Apparently expecting most or all of these to survive, they had an abbreviated day, and were allowed to leave for the two-day after the morning lecture. The lecture was the first organized introduction to magic that Jolan had attended.

  Ability with magic appeared to be a lot more than one simply having the capability to access the power field. The whole concept of what constituted ability was broken down into a number of facets, each of which had a determining factor on a mage’s ultimate effectiveness. The lecturer noted the most basic, promising those who remained in the college would become extremely familiar with each facet, and would learn more subtle factors once they achieved a much higher level. After all, it was expected that full training would take a decade.

  Everyone was familiar with the concept of the level each mage was given, which was a measure of that individual’s ability to tap the power field and draw the energy needed to perform a specific function. The ranking went from one to ten, although no one had held a ranking above seven in recorded memory. Records and rumors implied that mages of eight and nine were not uncommon before the Mage Wars, and there supposedly had even been a few tens. Everyone in the class was now at least a level two. Full time students rapidly advanced to level three, and fours were common after the first year or two. The transition above four was longer, and most of the mage staff were either fours or fives, with the Chancellor being one of the two sixes at the College. There were no sevens at the College any longer.

  To be an effective mage required far more than simple strength with the power. Of course training was emphasized as a key factor. Well, Jolan thought, that’s what the College is all about so it made sense they’d make that a highly rated part of the process. Other factors were not as obvious and he hadn’t considered some of them. Memory was key. Those without a decent memory would not go far. Even though learning and executing spells did not directly require recalling the memorized sequences, a real correlation had been established between those with good memories for other details and those who could effectively execute complex spells. Later, when Jolan advanced to a four and was able to comprehend the mage’s language, he understood this assertion far better. Some of the “spells” were akin to carrying hundreds of hieroglyphics around in your mind, all in a particular order, without knowing what a single one of them meant.

  Strength of will was also important. How tenacious was the mind behind the spell? Could an individual force his mind to grab on and hold an idea, and carry the intent through to completion? For simple spells, this was easy. As the complexity grew, the task became considerably more complex and challenging.

  Ability to deal with complex ideas and reasoning ability also made sense when he thought about it. Sometimes tailoring or adjusting a spell was required. Those who could simply memorize were at a real disadvantage. Their lecturer made a separate listing for mental agility, but Jolan was inclined to think this was much the same thing, at least until he was shown reason to feel otherwise.

  Knowledge of how the world actually works was listed as being a crucial component, especially for the mage that wanted or needed to tackle unique problems. Understanding the physical operation of the world allowed the mage to approach a problem from a more effective direction, and often accomplish tasks that a mage without this knowledge could not.

  The two final categories included experience with the spells and magic, and external modifiers. Jolan wondered what this latter category might be until the lecturer
pointed to him and his staff as an example. Staffs, rings, necklaces, and the like could often significantly alter or increase the abilities of those who possessed them. Many of these objects could no longer be made, the skills lost along with so much other knowledge. As a result, any of these objects were of immense value and those fortunate enough to possess them guarded them carefully.

  One thing that was emphasized was the manner in which spells were executed. It was the brain, not the hands that were responsible for the creation and direction of the spell. So while some mages, beginners especially, felt the need to use their hands to “direct” the spells, this was only a crutch for their own purposes, and the hands had nothing to do with what ultimately happened. Since the majority of the spells formed at the object being acted upon, nothing was actually directed from the mage creating the spell. A very special class of spells, such as energy beams or pulse balls, actually formed a couple of feet in front of the mage, and were directed toward the target in question. These types of spells in particular were the type that beginning mages often felt the need to use the hands to “direct” the energy.

  They were also given a brief overview of how the school approached their training in magecraft. The first weeks were spent in practicing the spells they already knew in order to build up their spell-strength. They were also exposed to instructor mages who performed spells they should be able to learn, which allowed most to pick up additional skills. This type of training extended through the full period of beginner training, and extended into the full time training until the student mages advanced to the point they could learn from written spells.

  Exactly how this was supposed to work was not at all clear to Jolan, but it was an established fact that the mage-centric part of the brain was sensitive to exposure to spells, if done in the correct manner. It was almost as if there was a slot inside the brain waiting to be filled with the proper information. If one wasn’t advanced enough, or didn’t have the required lower level spells, the slot didn’t seem to exist. When all the conditions were met, and the apprentice mages were exposed to one of these spells, somehow the kernel of necessary information was locked into the brain.

  Part of the process was based on the fact that the use of magic could be detected by other mages and at a subconscious level interpreted, if the spelling mage were to perform without any attempts at shielding his actions. The higher the level of the mage, the greater his ability to detect even the smallest use of the power, and interpret any unprotected spells.

  Also, as a mage grew in strength, it became harder for another mage to prevent his use of spells and prevent his access to the power fields. Under normal conditions, a mage would automatically shield his actions, both to protect his spells and to mask their intent prior to execution. During the training, therefore, it required special action on the part of the “instructor” to remove this shielding. Jolan didn’t understand it, but he had seen it work for many of the trainee mages during the past week.

  Once a mage advanced to a higher level, nominally level four, the ability to read the mage language seemed to appear. Up until this time a transcribed spell appeared as no more than a long string of unintelligible symbols, and reviewing them accomplished nothing in terms of a mage learning the skill. Once one gained the necessary ability, written spells could be reviewed and the spell knowledge absorbed, thus adding the spell to a mage’s skills. A few, very few these days, mages could actually pick apart the transcribed version of the spell, and point out what specific symbols were meant to accomplish, or even suggest changes to the symbolic content, thus producing a variation in the spell. It was written in the old texts, that the ability to work with the written spells was once commonplace. In Jolan’s mind, this meant that all the mages were exercising spells by rote, learning what a spell did, but not really understanding the basis, nor having any ability to create new spells.

  A first step in dealing with the written level spells involved reviewing spells one already knew. This process seemed to help a new reader become comfortable with the process, and also helped “lock-in” a fully correct version of the spell. After a few weeks of this type of “review”, student-mages were started on the process of learning new spells by reviewing prepared scrolls. Scroll libraries were available around the campus, segregated by mage level and the specific point in their training. Until one was given free study privileges, they were supposed to follow a preplanned program of adding skills.

  Jolan couldn’t help a snide thought to the effect that this approach also served to censor what learning mages were exposed to. He couldn’t help but wonder how much information was held somewhere in forbidden libraries that the students weren’t allowed access to, or for that matter how much material had actually been destroyed. It wasn’t being kept secret that certain material was off limits, because it had been made clear early on that some topics were not to be supported or encouraged. Even Ronoran, who was involved to some degree in the review of newly discovered materials, talked about censoring items before they were released to the school populace.

  A final learning method was mentioned briefly, but they were told it was only used in special cases due to the complexity and effort involved in preparing the materials. It also required one to be sufficiently advanced, or to be under the control of a team of specially trained mages, when the information was transferred. One advantage to this last method was its ability to pass on not only spell information, but other skills as well, and it could be used to pass skills or knowledge to individuals who were not magic capable. It involved the use of something called the pairing crystal. They were told it was not the same as the dangerous process known as “pairing” which they would learn more about at a later time.

  In the questions section at the end of the lecture, a number of misconceptions were dispelled by the instructors. It was not possible to create something out of thin air. Thus, no matter what level a mage rose to, he would never be able to perform a spell and deliver up a block of gold, for example. Transmutation was also an issue of interest, but it was simply not possible to transform a block of iron or lead say, into a block of gold. Jolan was not surprised by this, since gold had a considerably different atomic number and atomic weight than either of the materials selected for conversion. A conversion from lead would require both protons and neutrons to be stripped away from the nucleus to create a gold nucleus, not to mention a few extraneous electrons. But he couldn’t help but wonder about converting something much closer on the chart of the nuclides. What if one started with something with the same atomic mass, but off by one in atomic number? Modify or ditch a bit of charge, seemingly not a major obstacle given all the electric charge running around loose, and maybe one could actually do what was being asked. It was something to stuff away in the back of his mind until he was a bit more advanced.

  Creating an absolute copy of something fell into the same category, and in spades for things that were living. One could sometimes mask the appearance of something with a bit of glamour, making it look like a copy of something or somebody else, but actual duplication involved pretty much the same process of creating matter out of energy, and was an unknown skill.

  Of course, many wanted to know about the wizards of Ale’ald. The class was told about the types of mages that Angon produced, and those that specialized in fields such as medicine and healing, nature, materials, plus more of a generalist who often branched into the experimentalist rating. The wizards of Ale’ald were more frequently generalists, but with a specialty in spells that could be used for war and destruction. While many of the Ale’ald knew all the same spells, they had a vast knowledge of spells that had been forbidden by the rulers and church of Angon. Jolan knew that he was being argumentative again, even if he didn’t verbally raise the issue, but it certainly seemed to him that the mages of Angon were at a distinct disadvantage should a real war break out. He was going to have to ask someone, politely of course, how the wizards of Ale’ald were controlled if they had access to magic
that no one else seemed capable of offsetting.

  “Hey, two weeks under your belt. You should be completely at home by now.”

  Ronoran beamed at Jolan as they walked together down one of the hundreds of hallways on campus. Jolan was so lost he knew the only hope he’d have of getting back home to the dorms without his friend’s guidance would be to venture out into the snow and cold, and walk around the outside of the campus where he could at least get his bearings. Since he still hadn’t been able to pick up the trick of pushing off the weather, that would be an undesirable alternative with his short sleeve shirt and thin pants.

  “Old man Buris wondered what happened to us last week when we didn’t show up,” Ronoran explained. “I told him you were in a newbie class, and it had run late. He was more than a bit surprised that someone in the incoming class would have any knowledge or interest in his sparker bottles.”

  “You told him who I was I hope,” responded Jolan. “It would be good if he understood I have a bit of background and am not just some kid with a wild hair.”

  “Oh, he’s real curious about you. He’d heard that someone supposedly from Earth was here. He didn’t really believe it, but he’s gonna have a lot of questions about how things are where you come from.”

  Jolan sighed. It seemed everyone wanted to know about Earth. He’d told the stories so many times they were starting to seem like stories rather than his former life.

  “Here we are,” Ronoran said and turned through a pair of double doors leaving Jolan to follow along behind.

  Buris’ lair was a very large room, in fact it had to be several rooms that had been stripped free of interior walls or some special area from the beginning, perhaps one of the auditoriums. As they continued walking toward the back of the lab, they passed shelf after shelf of stacked equipment, much of which Jolan couldn’t even guess the function of, but occasionally he did recognize an item as a variation of something from home. A reasonably complete machine shop also was hidden away in a back corner. There was also a section with multiple rows of chemical compounds of various colors and shapes, in glass bottles so the contents could be observed. By the time they reached the back, Jolan had established in his mind that this was a laboratory of the physical sciences, not restricted to a single discipline.