Memoirs of a Lich, Book I: War

“Immortality has always fascinated me. Not the beautiful, virile and indestructible youth of the gods. No, simply the halt of aging, avoiding the decay of the mind and body. The power to pursue anything that might catch my fancy without the constant worry that my days in this world are numbered. I am okay with being killed by a foe that is stronger and smarter than I, but death because of some quirk of fate, or simply the march of days, I have always felt unacceptable. It’s probably the reason I took up the study of necromancy.”
- Thomas DuLane Whitebone, apprentice

In the beginning there was sky and earth, known as the gods Zenith and Terra. Together they begat children. First, the lesser gods, then those who walked like gods, also known as the First Races. There were five, Human, Elf, Dwarf, Orc and Goblin.
It is said that, once, long ago, the continent of Aestrial was ruled by the Orcs, but that the other races came and took the land from them. The Elves came from the west and took the forests and jungles west of the Thestrian Wall. Since those mountains are mostly impassible, The Elves must have simply slaughtered most of the Orcs that once called the west home. The Dwarves came and took the mountains and caves, but that was not much of a problem until the humans
The humans came and took all the plains and foothills. All the land that was fit to farm or raise livestock on. The Orcs fought but, while Orcs are stronger and had the humans outnumbered, the human leaders were smarter, and in the end planning won out over strength.
The Orcs were left with the desert, a thin streach of barren land between the mountains and the plains. To survive they had to raid their neighbors for food and water, thus insuring there would never be peace between orc and human.
The goblins had always been there, and would always be. They are as ubiquitous as rats, and as hard to get rid of.
Not nearly so long ago, long after the humans forgot that the land was ever not theirs, long after the First War was nothing more than a story to frighten children, there arose a human Emperor. He was a charismatic man, and a genius at battle planning and governing. He conquered all of the human lands before his thirtieth birthday, and choked on a cow bone before his fortieth. He left no heirs, and his Empire disintegrated into a bunch of warring city-states and provinces.
Some five hundred years after the death of the First Emperor (which he was not, but it is what he has come to be known as), the countries had fallen into a somewhat stable state, with natural barriers helping to divide one from another. The second, less grand, mountain range bisects the arable land on Aestrial, and are known for the clouds that often form at their peaks, bringing rain to the lands west. The Mistpeak mountains are old and smooth, and have become nothing more than a long strech of foothills in places, but still serve well enough to divide countries. Most times.
The Kingdom of Kaelin occupied most of the coast between the Mistpeak Mountains and the desert. It started as a narrow strip only a few hundred miles east of the orcish lands and grew until it occupied a few thousand miles of the eastern Mistpeak Mountains. The Empire then took over the land, claiming mountain, hill, forest and swamp in a huge swath from the mountains east to the sea. The two countries were both hungry for land, people and goods. They both had expansionist philosophies, and they neighbored each other.
The war had been raging for quite some time by the time I was born. My home was in a small village near the geographic center of Kaelin. Contrary to some legends, I was not born in midwinter, but rather in the first month of spring. The river that ran by my village did not turn to blood the day of my birth, nor did the birds fall from the sky, or the leaves from the trees. I was not named for a bird that perched upon my mother’s window sill as she gave birth, nor for any sort of ill omen. I was named for my hair, which was a startling jet black, even from the moment of my birth. My name is Raven.
My father was a famous bowmaker and fletcher, my uncle an equally famous blacksmith. They drew custom from far and wide, nobles and generals alike traveling from the big cities to commission work from the two men. The tax collector came only once every few years, and I suspected that, without my father and uncle, he may not have came at all. At times I suspected that the town would not have existed without the two men.
I was eight and occupied crafting a flute during one such visit. The nobleman was speaking to my father in our common room, where he did most such business. He was negotiating the commission of a longbow.
He had a lady with him, a woman with dark hair and startling green eyes. Had I been older and more appreciative of such things, I would have considered her quite attractive. She wore a dark green dress that would have appeared plain other than the fact that it flowed like water when she moved, proving it to be spun from silk or possibly even something more exotic.
The lady had grown bored of her lord’s talk of wood and feathers, and her eyes had begun to wander. Finally they landed upon me and my half-carved flute. Suddenly there was a spark in those emerald depths and she came over to me, crouching so her eyes were on my level.
“Hello young sir, what is your name?”
I looked up in surprise, having not noticed her approach, and replied in a shy and uncertain voice “Uh… Raven Fletcher, ma’am. But I’m no sir, not here nor anywhere.” Then, belatedly remembering my manners, I put up the knife and the wood, standing as though for inspection.
“Raven, eh? Named for your hair?”
“Yes, ma’am”
She smiled, “A very nice name. What were you working on?”
“A flute, ma’am.”
“Oh, how nice. Were you planning on it being a magical flute?”
“Well, um, I kinda would like to make a flute some day that I could play and make all the birds follow me. But, I don’t think I’m good enough. And I need to learn to play the flute first.” I blushed and looked at my shoes.
“I don’t know, you might be surprised. Would you mind playing a game with me?”
“What kinda game?” I looked up at her, wariness and curiosity warring in my mind.
“Well, it’s simple, really.” She reached into her belt pouch and produced a small silver ring with a single small diamond set into it. “I want you to hold this ring, and imagine it glowing.”
“Um… okay.” I gingerly took the ring from her hand, holding it as if it were worth more than my life, thinking that it probably was. I looked at the ring, amazed at the simple beauty of it, and how the diamond in the center seemed to reflect all the colors of the things around it. But no matter how hard I looked, it did not glow. “It’s not glowing.” I said sadly.
“You can’t just expect it to glow. You have to want it to glow. You have to see it glow, see the colors come out and shine brighter than the sun. Wanting and expecting isn’t enough, you have to believe.”
“Um… ok.” I looked into the ring, putting all my desire into it, seeing it in my mind’s eye shining. Somehow I could make out my own reflection in that diamond, and I focused on the colors I saw there. I imagined them growing, bursting out of the ring and shining, lighting up the entire room. At first the black of my hair tried to dominate, but I thought that black wasn’t a real color, and pushed it into the background. Then the pink of my skin and the red flush of my cheeks grew brighter and deeper, and the blue of my eyes seemed to glow. The rest of my features were gone, as was everything else in the room, leaving only the blue and red whirling in a void of black. Those two colors, a red that just became deeper and smoother, until it was the color of fresh blood, and a blue as deep and dark as the sea, grew until they were all that were left. Their glow grew, shining out of the diamond to cast everything into shadows that danced upon the walls as the colors swirled around each other, giving everything in the room an otherworldly feel. It felt amazing, a shivering ecstasy that I would later compare to orgasm, a thrilling excitement that seemed to go on and on.
I realized that my father and the duke had stopped talking. The sun itself seemed to have disappeared out of the window in respect to the display of light within our small house. The lady that had given me the ring had a look of unadulterated delight on her face, made somewhat menacing from the way the shadows played on her skin. The duke looked thoughtful and somewhat petulant, but I learned later that petulance was simply the default look for a noble. My father‘s face was a battleground, anger and amazement waging a fierce battle for his features. I know not what my face looked like, but all I felt was delight and amazement.
The moment ended suddenly. My mother burst in from another room and started demanding to know what was going on. The lady snatched the ring from my hand, dousing the light and turning to my father, congratulating him and explaining how wonderful it all was. Anger finally won the day on my father’s face and he started screaming at the lady. The only ones who were quiet were myself and the duke, and perhaps because of that our eyes met from across the room. He must have seen something in my eyes that he liked, because he smiled before turning on his heel and leaving.
It took some time for the lady to realize that she was now alone with a mother and father who were quite upset with her. Almost immediately upon realizing that, she took to heel herself, hurrying after her lord. That night neither my father nor my mother wished to discuss the matter, and we had an unusually quiet dinner.

The next morning a messenger came, one of the duke’s guardsmen, with a parchment and a sack of coin. My father read it out loud.

Mr. Fletcher,

Since our discussion was cut short yesterday I have decided to include a price that I believe you will find more than fair for the merchandise that we had discussed, plus a bonus by way of apology for upsetting you and your wife. I would also like to open up a new discussion herein.
It has come to my companion’s attention that your son has quite a lot of potential when it comes to fields of magical study and practice. You are, I am sure, aware that our fair country is currently at war. Young men and women who are capable of manipulating arcane energies are quite rare and valuable.
I and my liege lord would be quite happy to have your son attend a school that specializes in teaching young men and women how to best take advantage of the talents he has displayed. Your son would be educated not only in magic but also in science, history, ciphering, command and court behavior, as well as the more practical skills that would avail him on the battle field. When he graduated, some years from now, he would be given an officer’s rank and would serve for the glory of the kingdom until the end of the war. After the war he would have the option to stay on as an officer in the military or retire and do as he sees fit with the education he has been given.
If you choose to accept this offer, both you and your son would be given a generous stipend while he attended school and a considerable bonus upon his graduation, not to mention doing your king and country a great service.
Should your son fail to graduate, a situation my companion deems very unlikely due to his apparent talent, you would be allowed to keep all of the stipend that had been paid up to that point and incur no debt to the school or your king.
This is a very generous offer, and if you wish to discuss it further or have any questions, you know where I might be found. I will be staying until I have your answer.

Lord Robert DuGaul
Duke of Blue Lake
Lieutenant General of the 5th Reserve Legion of
His Majesty’s Royal Army


My father checked the contents of the bag and let out a low whistle. “He sent enough all right. I would do three bows of the kind he wants for this price. I wonder how much is ‘by way of apology’.” He looked up at my mother. “I think we need to consider this, my love.”
My mother harrumphed. “Send him away to some school like some orphan? Never to see his family again? That’s what you want for our son? I won’t have it! He’s to stay here and learn a trade, just as your father had you and your brother do. Just as every child in this village will do. I will not sell my son!” The last came out as a shout so loud I felt certain that our duke himself heard it. My mother stomped out of the room, my father following close behind pleading for her to listen. They argued for some time, then refused to speak to each other for some time. I remember going out to the river so that maybe the sounds of nature would drown out the silence in my house. My thoughts were not on the school, or on learning magic. My thoughts were on my parents. I had never seen them fight like this, and I did not like it. I thought it was my fault. Even with these dark thoughts circling my mind, I would occasionally flash back to when I was holding the ring. That feeling of power and joy. Then, my thoughts would return to what that display had caused, and I was back to where I started. When I came back it was early evening and the sun was approaching the horizon.
My mother and my father were sitting around the small table that was in the dining room, quiet and appearing as though they were waiting for someone or something. When I opened the door and saw their eyes on me, I knew I had been what they were waiting for.
“Come, son, sit. We need to talk.” My father said.
I went over and took my seat.
My father opened his mouth to say something, but I interrupted him. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I made you hate each other. I promise I’ll never do magic again, as long as you promise you don’t hate each other anymore. Please?”
My father and my mother had almost the exact same look on their faces after I spoke: total astonishment. Then, they both started laughing. They laughed so hard they started crying, and I didn’t know what was going on, and must have had a horrible look on my face because my mother tried to stop laughing and explain.
“Oh, honey, it’s not your fault. I was just upset because I had thought that lady had hurt you. Then I was mad at your father because I thought he didn’t think things through. But now…” my father interrupted, which was very unusual for him.
“Now, son, we want to know what you want. That’s what’s important to us. You will always be welcome in my house, as long as I have one. But I’m not going to hold you back from a life that might be far better than you could ever have growing up in a small village. Now, we’ve given this a lot of thought. If you go, we will write you and when you learn how you can write us, and every once in a while we’ll come to visit. At least once a year. And you can quit whenever you want and just come home, and nobody will be mad or disappointed with you. Or we can forget this whole thing, forget all about the magic and tell the duke to go on his merry way. And you know what? Even if that’s what we do, your magic has already made quite a bit of coin, what with him overpaying for the bow and giving us that ‘apology’ money. But it is up to you. No matter what you decide, know that we love you and you will always be welcome here.”
I looked at my father and my mother sitting beside him, both of them expectant and loving, and almost said right then that I could not leave them, but then I remembered how it felt. I remembered the power, the ecstasy, the sheer thrill of magic pouring through me. I wanted that. I wanted more, but I didn’t want it at the cost of destroying my family. “I want you and mom not to be mad at each other.”
“Oh, honey. We’re not mad at each other anymore. And we promise that, no matter what you say, we’re not going to be mad at each other or at you. We just want to make sure you get to learn magic if you want.” My mother often addressed me as “honey” when she was trying to calm me down.
I looked at them both, and tried to figure out what I wanted. Of course, like any eight year old, I did so out loud. “I don’t want to never see you again. And I want to learn magic, as long as it doesn’t make you mad. I’ll still get to see you sometimes?” My father nodded. “Then I want to go.” I felt very grown up having made that decision.
My mother hugged me and cried, and I panicked for a second, thinking I had hurt her feelings, but she calmed me down, reassuring me that she was happy for me. My father left to tell the duke our decision and my mother started packing my things, tears still streaming down her cheeks. I “helped”, which meant that packing probably took twice as long as it should have. Not that it mattered, we were still done well before my father and two of the duke’s men at arms came to escort me to his carriage.
The men at arms carried all my things, and it felt strange walking through the town on a trip and having the grown-ups carry all my stuff. The only things I carried were a small wooden sword tucked into my belt and my half-finished flute in my hand.
We got to the carriage and the men at arms started putting my things in with the duke’s luggage. My two small bags filled with clothes and the few toys I owned did not seem to change the stack much, even though they stuck out amongst all the fine leather bags and wooden chests. My mother hugged me and gave me a kiss and cried some more, and when she was done, my father gave me a hug and said “Take care of yourself, son. Above all, remember who you are. Be true to yourself.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out his whittling knife, the one I had been using to carve the flute. It was in its sheath, but not strapped to his belt. He handed it to me, hilt first, like he taught me. I took it with wide eyes. “Take this, son, and be careful not to cut yourself. Keep it as a reminder of where you came from.” He gave me another hug and turned away before I could see his face.
I turned and saw the duke and his lady standing behind me, waiting by the carriage. The lady came over and knelt. “Shall we go, then, young sir?”
I looked up into her eyes and nodded, not saying a word, not trusting myself to speak. She offered her hand, and I realized that both of mine were full. I hooked the knife to my belt as my father had shown me and took her hand. As she led me to the carriage, I looked back and saw my parents’ faces filled with pride and sorrow. I wondered if I had done the right thing. Then I was in the carriage, and before I knew it we were moving and I couldn’t see my parents anymore. One of the guards saw me staring back at my village and met my eyes.
“Don’t worry boy, we’ll take good care of ya, and you’ll see them again before you know it. Name’s Roland, what’s yours?”
“R-raven, sir.”
“Ah, I’ve never been a sir. Nor your lordship nor any other title. Just Roland.” He smiled, and I felt a lot better. I liked Roland.

It would be some weeks of travel before we would reach the school, and during that time I got to know the people we were traveling with. The guards took to me quite readily, and they enjoyed telling me stories of their adventures and showing me new games and small bits of swordplay. Roland, the eldest of the guard and second in command, especially loved to teach me swordplay. He even gave me what he called a “Long Knife” that approximated the heft and balance of a long sword for someone my size.
One day, not a week into the journey, the duke’s lady called me into the carriage (I had been running alongside). “I believe, since this journey will take some time, that I should begin your training in the Art. Come, sit, and I will teach you.” I did so.
“First, I will tell you what those colors you made the ring show mean. There are eight colors of magic, each one representing a whole school of study, each one capable of an entire spectrum of effects. Each color of magic has an opposing color, a type of magic that is fundamentally opposed and whose energies react badly when they are combine. What that ring showed me is that you are quite talented with Red and Blue magics, representing Evocation and Enchantment. This also means that you will be… less than talented with the opposing schools, Conjuration and Transmutation, represented by the colors Green and Orange. Since Conjuration is my specialty, I don’t know all that much Evocation, and Enchantment spells are a bit… advanced to practice with; we will start with one of the schools I have not yet mentioned. Illusion, whose color is Gold. Do you understand so far?”
I nodded, having understood almost every other word.
“Good. Now, I am going to cast a simple illusion. I want you to watch closely, and you will see the golden lines of power come from my fingers to form the image.” She waved her hands in the air and sure enough, I could see shining yellow strands of energy emerge from her hands and form into a full color image of a butterfly. She let it stay for a few seconds then dismissed it with a wave of her hand. “Now, you try. Focus on forming the streams of power just as I did, and imagine the butterfly exactly as you saw it.”
I did so, and was amazed to see the yellow-gold lines emerging from my own fingers. I tried to picture the butterfly, but didn’t remember it very well, and ended up with a fuzzy blob of color perched on my hand. But it felt good to use magic, and I felt a rush similar to, but far less intense than what I had felt with the ring.
She laughed, once, and said “Oh, quite good, my boy. I didn’t expect you to even be able to summon the power the first time. Don’t feel bad that it doesn’t look much like a butterfly. Illusion is as much of an art as painting or sculpting. Some can perform the magic beautifully and it still looks like some shapeless blob. Let’s try something simpler. How about a cube? You’ve seen the dice the men play with,” she paused, waiting for me to nod at her unasked question “well, try just that basic shape. Six square sides, perfectly straight edges.”
I did so, summoning the image in my mind first, then calling the magic. I held my hand still as I formed the lines into the right pattern with my mind, feeling the slight tremor of joy as the power left my fingers and formed a perfectly geometric black cube floating inches above my hands.
She looked at the cube, and surprise, then concern, then a quick covering smile flashed across her face. “Let’s try… something else real quick. Hold on one second.” She looked out the window and ordered the driver to stop. She got out and picked five flowers that hadn’t yet bloomed. She jumped back in the coach and knocked on the back panel, and we started moving again. “What I’m about to show you is a very basic vitomancy spell. Vitomancy is the magic of life and of light, White magic. One of the most basic spells is a spell to make a picked flower bud bloom. I will show you.” She held out one of the stems with a bud on it, and from her hand flowed strong white lines of power, shining almost like silver. They flowed up the stem and collected in the bud, which glowed brighter and brighter until it exploded into a beautiful ***flower name*** blossom. She smiled and gave me one of the stems.
I concentrated, picturing the pattern she wove, and tried to summon the silvery white lines of power. Nothing came. I continued to concentrate, putting all my will into it, but still nothing. I couldn’t feel the white magic, couldn’t find it anywhere. I frowned and gave her back the stem. “I can’t do it.”
She smiled and patted me on the head, saying “That’s ok, it’ll come in time.” She sat back on her side of the carriage and looked lost in thought; a very unpleasant frown crept on to her face. After a while, I left and ran beside the guards, and when I got tired rode with them. I slept near Ronald for the next few nights.

When we were making camp two nights after my first magic lesson, the duke’s lady called me over. I came over and bowed as I had seen the men at arms do, “Yes, ma’am?”
“Oh, no need to bow, young sir. Your station in the world will soon be as high as mine. Now, I’ve come up with some tests I would like you to take, to see where you are in each of the different types of magic. Since we know you are quite adept in Evocation but you have yet to use it, we’ll start there. Now, as I said, I’m primarily a Conjuror, so I will not be able to produce much of an effect, but you should be able to do something quite spectacular. I will show you the pattern, and I want you to make the same pattern. And, this is very important, aim it at the camp fire.”
“But there is no fire there. Just a stack of wood.”
“Exactly. Now, pay attention and do exactly as I do.” She waved her hands in the air and summoned red lines of power so weak they were almost pink. She formed the complete pattern and seemed to almost physically shove it at the fire pit. A small spark appeared in the air at the end of the pattern of magic and went out long before it floated to the grass below.
I looked at her dubiously and then focused, easily remembering the pattern she had used. Bold, powerful lines of crimson and ruby flowed from my fingers, and I felt the same ecstasy I had felt with the ring. This was the right kind of magic. I felt my body pulse with the magic, felt the power flowing through me, raw and elemental. I was so taken with the feel of it, I barely remembered to form the power into the right pattern and aim it at the fire pit. A tower of fire burst into being in the fire pit, reaching almost to the tree tops. It burned brightly and fiercely, illuminating our entire camp site almost as well as daylight.
I stood there, basking in the warmth and power of that fire, until I heard the lady’s voice in my ear “Release the power, Raven. Let it go.” It was only then that I realized that I was still holding the pattern, and let it go. The fire immediately died down to a normal camp fire, and I was aware again of the world around me. Most of the men at arms were cursing, though Roland was trying not to laugh. The duke had looked up from his book to see the column of fire, and had gone back to reading as soon as it died down. I smiled at the lady, then collapsed onto the ground.
I woke up what must have been only a few seconds later, because men at arms were still cursing, and saw the lady kneeling over me with a look of concern on her face. “Are you ok?”
“I feel very tired.” I said. Had I known the word exhausted, I would have used it.
“Ha, yeah, well, you did a neat trick there. You didn’t use the exact same weave I did. Personally, I’m amazed you could use that weave at all. Here, just lie down, you’ll be fine in a few hours. I think we’re done with lessons for today.”

The next day, however, she called me into the carriage almost immediately after we set out.
“Our lesson for today will hopefully be much less violent than last night’s. Today we’ll do some Divination, if we can, then work on Enchantment a little.”
“What do you mean, if we can?”
“Well, either you’re an all-around talented magician or you have some very powerful specific talents. If you’re all-around talented, that means that you’ll eventually be able to perform some Conjuration and Transmutation. If you just have some very powerful specific talents then we can train you to become VERY good at those things, but you will probably never move beyond the most basic spells in the opposed schools, if you are ever able to do anything with them. Like you saw, I had issues with evocation, but if I ever become a master, I‘ll be able to do all but the most powerful evocations.”
“Ok… but what does that have to do with Divination?”
“Well, Illusion and Divination are opposed. We know you can cast illusion spells, though you don’t seem to be as powerful with them as Evocation. If you can cast the more simple divinations as well, then we’ll know you’re balanced in respect to those schools. We can then use your progress in those schools to measure your progress overall.”
“Is being balanced good?”
“Sometimes yes, and sometimes no. Someone who is totally balanced will be able to learn all the spells of both schools with sufficient study. They can craft new spells of either school, though it takes them quite some time. Someone who has a proclivity for one school over the other (like you have a talent with Evocation over Conjuration) will be able to cast spells of his favored school while using less energy. His spells will be more likely to succeed, and he will find it easier to invent new ones. Some people with extremely high levels of talent will find that school of magic affecting everything they do. The magic simply overflows and makes things happen around them. Those people are very rare, and I don’t think you have that level of talent, though you might.”
“Are you like that?”
“No, I’m fairly well talented with Conjuration and somewhat talented with Vitomancy, but balanced in most other respects. Anyway, we should get on with the lesson. There are a number of basic divinations that I could show you, but I’ve decided to start with something that I think will be harmless no matter what happens. Divination deals with two basic concepts: perception and time. Today you will be learning only a small aspect of the first. You’re going to learn how to sharpen your sight so you can see well at a distance. I’m going to form the weave and leave it in place so you can study it until you think you’re ready to try. Okay?”
“Okay.”
She wove a simple pattern in shining purple power that seemed to form a disk, then looked through it, nodding in approval. I studied it closely, memorizing every twist and turn. Finally, I believed I had it and started to weave my own. The purple power felt just like the yellow, a small rush but nothing great. I wove the magic, directing the lines of power with my will, forming them into something as close to an exact copy as I could get.
The disk was formed, hovering between my thumb and pointer finger and moving with my hand. It seemed to be made of nothing at all, but it’s edges distorted the light, and clearly showed it’s outline. I presented my weave to the lady and waited for her approval before looking through it.
She smiled and nodded. I smiled and looked through the disk. It seemed that the floor jumped up to meet me. I was startled and jumped back. “It’s ok. It only changes how you see things, not where things are or how close you are to them.” She paused in thought. “Try looking out the window. Watching things that are farther away is less disorienting.”
I looked out the window, holding the disk up so that I could see through it. I saw a bird, and suddenly it wasn’t just a dot far away but instead so close I felt as though I could reach out and touch it’s feathers. I moved the disk and suddenly I was observing an insect eat a leaf, only much larger than I had ever seen. I finally figured out that as I focused on something I was brought in closer, and if I unfocused I was pulled back. I played with this for a while, looking at leaves and insects, birds and mountains. After what seemed like a very short time the lady said “Okay, let the weave go now. We don’t want to wear you out on just this one spell.”
I dropped the weave reluctantly and sat back, waiting for the next lesson.
“There are five circles of magery. They are a measure of power and experience that is independent of a person’s talent in a specific school. The best way to measure what circle a magus belongs to is to find a pair of schools that the magus is balanced in and see how powerful of a spell they can manage in those schools. You will have to go through the tests when we get to the school, but I would guess that you are at least second circle, which is quite unusual for someone untrained. You are a very rare find, Raven.”
“Thank you. Can we do more magic now?”
She laughed, and after a few seconds said “Yes, we’ll do more magic now Raven.”
She taught me a basic enchantment that would keep my long knife sharp and clean, and a few other divinations that day. Over the next few weeks we had many lessons together, mostly working with illusion and divination, though she would teach me an occasional enchantment as a reward if I did well at my lessons. Using that bright blue power was as enthralling as channeling the red energy. Roland let me enchant his sword with the same one that was on mine, and I also enchanted my father’s knife with it. I began to think of enchanting as “fun” and of divination and illusion as “normal”. The lady refused to teach me another Evocation spell, saying that I needed an expert to teach me such dangerous magic.
She also tested me on how well I dealt with Conjuration and Transmutation magics. She could create a full meal with a wave of her hand, and showed me how the proper spell could change a flower into a frog. I could barely summon a wisp of green or orange magic, and couldn’t get it to form any sort of weave, much less cast a spell with it. She said that it was a good sign I could call forth that magic at all. It meant that with some training I’d be able to cast those spells, though with considerable difficulty. She seemed very concerned that I couldn’t summon even a hint of white magic, but refused to tell me why and said that it was nothing to worry about.
I continued to practice swordplay with Roland and he expanded my training a bit too, teaching me the bow with a makeshift one he had crafted himself and taking me with him when he went hunting. He taught me how to move quietly and how to track various animals. The lady clearly thought the lessons were unnecessary but simply counted it as play and didn’t complain as long as it didn’t interfere with my learning The Art, as she sometimes called magic.

It was the last night before we reached the school, and Roland and I had just finished practicing our swordplay. He plopped himself down on a log and grabbed his wineskin and took a large swig. Still breathing heavy, he looked at me and said “Boy, you gave an old man a run for his money.”
I was breathing somewhat hard and smiling, but after I put my sword up and sat down, I was quiet and looked at my feet.
“What’s wrong, Raven?” Roland inquired, giving me an odd look.
“It’s our last night to practice together. After we reach the school I’ll be learning and you’ll be gone.”
“Oh, I’m sure we’ll stay at the school a night or two, just to make sure all’s well.”
“Yeah, but then you’ll leave, and I’ll be all alone and I won’t know anybody.”
Roland frowned at that, but kept quiet. The rest of the night passed quietly, and far too quickly.