by Jade Alters
Blue Pain
Emery,
The Broken Academy, B-Wing
Once I meet my roommates and get a certain intrusive Astral out of my head, the rest of orientation week flies by faster than I could keep track of. Helena and I eat lunch together. We drape across our beds, trading stories. We sink into the soft dirt of the courtyard while she shows me all the new spells she’d learned to guide the growth of flowers. Her magic is as gorgeous as ever. Violets twirl up while roses burst into life from the blanket of shimmering green over the gardens. Fey Deller fades in and out of our gatherings like a shadow. Her aloof observations make me feel more haunted than having Hoster invade my dreams. There’s not enough time in a day to cram in everything we’ve missed in the years we’ve been apart.
I tell Helena about my final project at the Clearlake Academy. A prismatic world in which you could interact with your own reflection. That was a doozy to put together and to say I walked the line between sanity and what lies beyond is an understatement. All in all, though, Helena has so much more to tell me.
She tells me about the struggle with her parents to accept the idea of her transitioning. It’s why she originally left Clearlake a few years back. Helena returned to Six Rivers National Forest, the ancestral home of her line. I can’t imagine the fights. The Bartoses are, after all, one of the Core Lines of Witches and Warlocks. One of the first names that appear in the Native American records of “mystical people”. If there’s any person I know who understands the weight of tradition like me, it’s Helena. But Helena knew she had to start with her parents. She needed advocates with a strong pull to talk to the other Core Lines, so she wouldn’t be exiled from the community. The story gets a little hazy on her lips, the more hate she’s forced to recall. I can’t blame her for not wanting to talk about it. Best I can tell, she managed to win over at least most of the Core Lines, being that it’s Helena that sits up late to talk with me, not Harry.
Before I know it, our free time has run out again. The first day of classes tolls a sort of ending for me. The end of carefree reunions and late-night chats. The end of my childhood innocence. Still, I consider myself lucky that I even got one last glimpse of it at all, in Helena. I’m an adult now - a student at the Academy - and an undercover agent in a war most don’t even know is brewing. I’m a soldier in an invisible war. I’ll be damned before I pull Helena into it. I’ll have to plan my moves carefully and keep her out of them.
That’s easier said than done, when we wake up together, leave the room at the same time and head off in the same direction for the first class of the term.
“What class are you going to?” I ask as we glide down the long, lantern-lit morning. It’s an early class, so the sun has only just shone up over the crest of the tallest mountains around the floating Academy.
“Cooperative Casting,” Helena tells me. “Looks like a ton of our Clearlake credits transferred here.” My face and my gut perform inverse maneuvers; my cheeks lift while my stomach sinks.
“No way!” I chime before any worry has a chance to escape me.
“You too?” Helena grins, and we set off together for the class hall on the fringe between B and D-Wing. The two of us join in a rushing current of bodies, en route for the same general destination. We squeeze in between shoulders and flex up on our tiptoes to make sure we haven’t missed the room until we reach it, on the right. I forge through the parade, a hand hooked through Helena’s arm to tug her along with me.
The two of us burst through the door into a nearly-full classroom with a teacher I happen to know. Fey Hartgen and Mother used to be friends…in some capacity, when she was a professor here. I suppose it makes some level of sense that my mother and a Fey would find some common ground, well over the heads of the pathetic humans beneath them. But then, my experience with the Fey has been limited. I try to clear my head of history as Helena and I walk in, to take everything in as it is now. We walk down the left middle of the classroom and take two adjacent desks somewhat near the front. We hardly have time to share a word before Fey Hartgen commences the class with the tap of her enchanted quill on the wide parchment board. Across it, she inscribes Cooperative Casting. Fey Hartgen’s voice sings from her throat like one incredibly long harp cord as she turns to face us.
“Welcome to Cooperative Casting,” a crystalline white smirk peeks out from between her emerald lips. I notice, at a glance, that her skin is a much deeper green than Fey Deller’s. I give a brief wonder if Fey are subject to discrimination on such tedious differences, like humans, but I doubt it. Fey Deller can’t even grasp distinctions between gender. “The name is more than just catchy alliteration. Who cares to explain the title? Anyone, with experience?” Fey Hartgen’s eyes surf the heads of her students again, her look shifting ever-so-slightly for each one. She sweeps the whole room before they shoot right back to me. “Ms. Dalshak, perhaps?” I straighten up, surprised by her boldness. I figured the Council would want my attendance hushed, to avoid controversy.
“Perhaps...” I mutter to myself while I get my thoughts in order. The rest of the class mutters along with me. Again with the, it’s true! She said Dalshak, right? It’s the youngest daughter. Margery, or something like that. I clear my throat to silence the rest before I start. “Cooperative Casting refers to…combining the supportive nature of one race with the offensive or defensive nature of another.”
“Excellent theory,” Fey Hartgen commends. I can hear the but in her voice long before she says it. “But that’s not all we’ll learn in this classroom. Delivery is just as important. These two things in equal measure are essential to any mystical process. You must understand what you’re doing, as well as have the finesse to do it well.”
“Look around you, all of you. Go on,” Fey Hartgen orders after a pensive moment. The class complies. I face Helena first, rolling my eyes while I shrug at the odd exercise. Helena stifles a chuckle. Then the two of us turn outwards, to the rest of the class. It’s a mixed bunch. Oddly mixed, for such a high-level course. At a single turn of my head, I see other Magicians and Witches, but also a peppering of Demons and Fey. “This is one of few classes in the Academy in which nearly every race is included. In this particular group, we have Witches, Magicians, Fey, Demons and Astrals. Your goal for the course is to learn how you can use your own abilities in tandem with each of these other races. That is cooperative casting. Working together to make two effective abilities, two effective people extraordinary.” Fey Hartgen gives us a second to drink the information, and our peers, in. I smell a group project coming on already, and I’ve just browsed the shelves of my partners.
“Let’s start today with a nice gentle nudge in the right direction. Think of it as an icebreaker with pizazz,” Fey Hartgen smiles. I almost burst into laughter at the word pizazz in her sweet, Fey tone. “First you will pick a partner for yourself. Choose wisely, based on how compatible your abilities are. You will put together one small-scale cooperative cast. Nothing that should be done outdoors. If there is damage to the room, the bill will be forwarded to you,” Fey Hartgen warns. “Then I will choose a second partner for you, to craft a second cooperative cast. Compare your judgment to mine. Compare your compatibility with your first partner to that with your second. These are skills essential to planning reconnaissance operations outside the Academy… You may choose your partner.” Fey Hartgen dismisses us to begin with a wide wave of her arm.
Helena and I turn inwards to each other immediately. No one else even has a chance to ask either of us to be partners. It’s not just because of our pre-established trust, either. It’s been some time since I’ve seen her magic at work, besides the flowers in the courtyard. I want to see what she can do. I want to see what we can do. The two of us scoot our desks close together.
“Any ideas?” Helena asks me first.
“You’ve always been great at growing things… How do you feel about destroying them?” I suggest. I see Helena’s nose wrinkle up before she can help it.
�
�It’s not my favorite thing to do.”
“But you can do it?” I extract from what she gave me. Helena gives me a subtle nod. “Is there enough heat in the air here for you to start a fire?” I draw this from the way Helena explained Witch and Warlock fire-starting in the past. It’s all about ambient heat in the environment. If there’s enough, she can manipulate that energy, enhance it to smoldering levels.
“Maybe over by the window. Where the sun is coming in,” Helena tells me.
“Perfect. I could use the light anyway. I’ve got an idea,” I smile. Helena and I spend the rest of the five minutes Fey Hartgen gives us working out the logistics. I can bend the light around Helena’s spell to trick away any trace of it.
“What about the smell?” she asks.
“A little more complicated… I can’t hide it, but I can send it somewhere else,” I realize. A temporal portal will do just nicely. When time is up, Helena and I stroll over near the window to demonstrate our cooperative cast. We bring with us only a single sheet of paper. I stop Helena from getting too close to the window, so as not to make what we’re doing obvious to those familiar with a Magician’s tricks. All I need is for the sunbeam coming in to touch my shoe, to manipulate its particles and waves.
“What is your cooperative cast?” Fey Hartgen asks, which catches me off-guard, as the first to demonstrate.
“An invisible flame,” Helena tells her.
“Very good. Let’s see - or not see - it,” Fey Hartgen challenges. I hold up the paper for the rest of the class and Fey Hartgen to see.
I watch in amazement as Helena’s eyes intensify on the paper. With a gaze of such focus, almost like rage, that I’ve never seen in her, she begins to literally burn a hole in the blank document with her eyes. As the first corner of the page lights orange with heat, I designate my own focus to the sunlight behind us. My discreetly flickering fingers behind my back call its particles around the flaming page in a concealing trick. By my will, every last trace of the flame actually burning the page is completely hidden. Even the smoke coming from it is sucked into my invisible portal and released safely outside the Academy, in the sky. To our ogling classmates, it appears as though the page is being eaten up by the orange line climbing its edges. In about six seconds, the whole page is gone, without a trace. The last little nub of it singes my thumb as it disappears. I flick my fingers out to show it’s gone, without so much as a wince. There is no ash. No smoke. No smell. The class bursts into applause.
“A well-executed and applicable cooperative cast,” Fey Hartgen commends, “How effective this would be in a covert operation, so long as you are near a source of light, and it’s hot enough in the room. Take solace in your accomplishments but never forget your limits.” Helena and I nod to her in understanding. I hide my gritted teeth behind a smile. If it wasn’t hot enough, or there wasn’t enough light, we would have done something else, I want to tell her, but I go back to my seat again.
In the demonstrations that follow, we see another Magician lift a Demon’s corrupting touch into a tossable orb, almost like a grenade. We see a Warlock harmlessly ignite an Astral’s spiritual body, creating a floating torch that can harm but not be harmed. We see a Fey and a Witch conjure thorny whips to bruise and cut. Before we know it, the security we bought ourselves by going first is all but expended.
“Alright. We saw many decent - some excellent - cooperative casting here. Now it’s time for me to choose your second partner. You may find yourself needing to get more creative to develop an effective cooperative cast here,” Fey Hartgen warns us, just before she starts to call names in pairs from her class roster clipboard. I give a farewell glance to Helena when she calls out:
“Emery Dalshak.” I’m rocked with surprise by the name that follows. “Hoster Rowsen. You two will work together to create a cooperative cast.” I stand as I’m bid, but I didn’t see Hoster when I came in earlier. After two full turnarounds, I’m positive the young man of my dreams is nowhere to be found. Then, from the back of the room, a slender classmate with a short brown fohawk lifts a hand to wave to me. I walk over only because Fey Hartgen has already moved down the list to the next students. She pays no mind to my bewilderment.
“Nice to meet you, officially,” the brown-haired boy says with an offered hand. I can hardly believe my ears. It’s Hoster’s voice alright. Light, airy and scrambling like it might make a break for it and run away any second. I take his hand and give it an oddly sweaty shake.
“You’ll forgive my confusion,” I open with a smile, “I was…expecting someone else.”
“Let me guess, blonde hair, brown eyes?” Hoster asks. There’s a certain sadness in his voice when he does.
“Yeah,” I tell him, all while dissecting the characteristics of the very different body before me. His eyes are an almost clear shade of blue. His hair is cropped short. His face is even a little different, more masculine and bony. “Why… I mean, if it’s alright for me to ask. Why is your Astral body different from your…physical one?”
“I wish I understood it enough to give you a clear answer, but…best anyone’s told me, our spiritual selves change from what they go through just like our physical ones,” his eyes sink down to his desk, where they dart around in search of something else to say.
“Alright, well…it’ll take some getting used to, but at least we got partners we know a little already,” I smirk at him. Even in the two days I’ve known him, Hoster has shown some abilities that could prove useful to me in my mission. It couldn’t hurt to have someone who can phase in and out of our Realm in my magical pocket.
“A little?” Hoster asks, suddenly lighter. “You practically gave me your whole life story last night, on your stony little therapist’s couch!”
“I wasn’t that bad!” I stomp back at him, though I also chuckle. How does he do that? Inducing laughter and anger in equal measures seems to be a talent both Astral and physical Hoster share.
“Alright, everyone, wrap up your cooperative cast and be ready to perform!” Fey Hartgen announces. A chill surges down Hoster’s spine and mine at once. Have we really been talking that long already? Damn him and his runaway tongue!
“Shit. Now what? Can you just make me disappear or something?” Hoster tries.
“That’s just using my abilities. We need to- wait,” I stop myself. A few of my fingers curl over my lips in thought. An idea sparks in the desperate blackness of my brain. I showed Hoster the world of illusions last night. What if we could reverse the process to show me the Blue Plane? And not just me. “Can you Astral Project while you’re awake?”
“Not exactly…not on command. I mean it happens sometimes when I’m surprised by something,” Hoster explains.
“But it happens when you’re asleep?”
“Every single time,” he tells me.
“Perfect. I’m going to create an illusory portal. A kind of…window-”
“To where?” Hoster breaks in.
“Well, if I can tap into the connection between your body and your Astral form, maybe I can set the frequency to the Blue Plane. We could open a window for everyone to see into the Blue Plane,” I tell him.
“But how are you going to get me out of my body?” Hoster asks.
“That’s time! Everyone prepare to demonstrate your cooperative cast!” Fey Hartgen announces. As the pairs of our classmates gather around the center of the room, I answer Hoster’s question by way of a wink. He gulps a tense mouthful of nerves. Helena and her partner, a Fey, go first. Helena uses a growth spell to grow organic armor and even a blade for her partner from her own plantlike sinews. Fey Hartgen calls us up right after.
“What is your cooperative cast?” she asks.
“A window to the Blue Plane,” I take the lead. I nod to Hoster in preparation as Fey Hartgen gives us the go-ahead. The whole class looks on with a gasp as I snap my fingers, and Hoster’s legs buckle. I grab his shoulders to guide his fall into my chest and arms. He’s out cold. I lay his body gently on the fl
oor, then stand back up to conjure my portal.
I close my eyes to focus on the energy moving around the room. I feel a certain connection, almost like the Tethers of the Academy, between Hoster’s body and…something else. I don’t know what else it could be than his Astral body, but I can’t pinpoint it. Still, with the eyes of the class and instructor on me, I hone in on that connection and swirl my hands in a circle around one another. A tiny blip of light flares into existence, then swirls open to a full-on window. The screams of the class are instant and deafening. The world on the other side… I don’t know what it is, but I don’t think it’s the Blue Plane. I leap away from it as soon as I see what’s inside.
“Remain calm!” Fey Hartgen screams over the commotion of students knocking desks away to flee. On the other side of my illusory window is a dark space, fringed by a dark blue glow. Bodies grow from the blackness like climbing weeds, twisted knotty vines of wailing flesh. Their screeches are processed not by the ear, but by the soul. Mine quakes at every shrill note.
“What the hell…is that?” I scream to Fey Hartgen. I’m not sure which is more horrifying, her lack of an answer, or that she looks as terrified as I do. The vines of flesh grow towards the portal. They’re coming to our Realm. I try to swirl my hands back around, counterclockwise, to slam the portal shut, but it remains.
“Magicians! Help her close the portal!” Fey Hartgen cries out. A few of them with a less than healthy fear of death manage to turn and mimic my motion, but the portal remains. The body-vines climb. “Astrals, can you break the connection between the portal and wherever that is?” Fey Hartgen calls out.
“I don’t think so!” one of the mortified Astral girls in the class yells. “It…might be part of the Blue Plane, but…” That doesn’t matter - Fey Hartgen’s reminded me of another connection that can be broken. I focus all of the light on my back into a mental shockwave that I send through the air with a thunderous clap over my head.
