Exchange Magic

Note: Please enjoy this sneak peek at the past. A past that really only got fleshed out this morning. And will probably be decidedly more interesting in the second draft.

Sonja looked up from the table where she had been working as Colm came in. His sandy hair was ruffled by the wind, and his expression dark.

“Any luck?” she asked. He sat down heavily on a chair and scowled. “What do you think? That foolish priest thinks we're making the whole thing up. He says that any reports of blood magic being practiced are just superstitious nonsense, that there's no source of power besides the Divine.”

“Why we make it up?” Sonja asked. Her accent seemed to get thicker and she forgot more words when she was under greater duress. Colm shook his head. “It's just his way of saying we're idiot kids who should sit down and do what we're told.”

“If my magister tells me to sit, I sit. But she told me to seek, so I seek.” Sonja said.

Colm nodded. “Likewise. But Priest Aaron thinks that just because he's older than us—by three years, Aaron—and because he's a full priest already, he's smarter than us. So no, he's not going to help.”

Sonja was reading a large tome, bound in leather and wood, and gathering various items based on the list she read. She and Colm were sitting in a moderately low-population corner of the workshop that she shared with four other apprentices. Colm watched her weave between them, collecting a coil of copper wire here, a charged crystal there, a yew wand, and a...contraption. He had no idea what it was or did. Finally she returned to the workbench and started assembling all of these pieces based on the book.

“How do you find anything in here?” He asked. The workshop was crowded and busy, but never noisy, per se. Sonja's Magister believed in efficiency and hard work, and wasn't overly fond of high spirited fun on the job. She did seem to have a soft spot for Colm, thankfully, perhaps because he was quiet, hard working in his own art, and was one of the few people outside of the workshop who called her 'magister.'

“How long have you known Marion?” Sonja asked.

“Since we were children, really. We both grew up in the shepherd's valley near Strand. The harbor wasn't there yet, so it was really just us locals at the time. We didn't have a wizard here, although the druids would send traders to us a few times a year.”

Sonja's face revealed what she thought about druids.

“Don't be like that, Sonja. Druids are quite powerful in their own right.”

“They talk to trees and expect them to answer,” Sonja said, wrapping the copper wire carefully around the crystal.

“Maybe they do answer, and you and I just don't know how to listen.” Colm said. Sonja shook her head. She was too busy to argue.

“Anyway, Marion's mother was a druid, or half-druid, or something. Grew up in an enclave, anyway, and wanted to get out. She married a shepherd, least magical person she could find. Although she always said it was like magic, the way he knew each sheep and could tell the dogs what to do, almost without saying a thing. I liked her mom, she was warm and loved to bake.” Colm smiled.

“Marion says she's learning her mother's recipes, which is hard because her mom only wrote down the parts she thought she'd forget. So her recipe for bread just says, 'let sit on the north wall, only in the afternoon' and nothing about, you know, which ingredients should be in the bread.”

Sonja looked up, head to one side. “Recipe as an aid to memory, instead of a teaching tool. Marion's mother was a master, not a magister.”

“I suppose you're right.”

Sonja nodded again, her dark hair falling over her eyes. In some ways Sonja looked like Marion, especially when they were studying. They both got that intense expression, entire face soft and passive except for their quickly moving eyes. Or perhaps Colm was just missing Marion and was glad to have Sonja there as a friend.

“What about you, Sonja? Is there someone special back home?”

“Ha! No. Not really for me. They think that my desire to study magic is scary, too much power for one person. My family fishes. All the families in my village fish. Nobody reads, nobody casts spells, nobody studies. My father saw I wanted something different, learned pearl diving so I could afford to travel, find a different life.”

“Your father harvests pearls?” Colm said. Sonja nodded and reached into a small pouch on her belt, and pulled out a black pearl, larger than any Colm had ever seen.

“Gave me this when I left. Largest black pearl he's ever found. Told me it's only to buy my passage home, if I need passage home. Otherwise it's a reminder of him and my family. I will go home, but I won't trade this pearl to do so.”

“Sonja, that's beautiful.” Colm said. Sonja nodded.

She fastened the copper wire to the...contraption...and let the crystal hang freely below it. She then sketched out some runes around the edges of the...contraption...and sat back with satisfaction as the crystal began to glow softly.

“Glad this works. Takes weeks to charge these crystals, and wasting a charge always feels terrible,” Sonja said. The crystal started to move gently in circles, then in a long oval, then the oval collapsed slowly into a line, swinging back and forth along a single axis. On one end of the axis the glow in the crystal changed from the deep purple that Colm thought of as “arcane color” to a light, sky blue.

“Okay, Dove, we have your direction!” Sonja said.

“I asked you not to call me that!” Colm objected.

“Why not? It's your name, but in normal words.”

“I know but it sounds so...soft.” Colm replied.

“You're a healer. You're supposed to be soft.” Sonja said.