Runic Apprentice, page 3
part #1 of The Rune Mystic Series
Caley smiled, “My story?”
He nodded, “How did you find out what you are, and how do you feel about it, if it’s not impertinent to ask.”
She laughed, “No, it’s a fair question, considering what I just asked you, even if you didn’t answer. Actually, my father and I expected me to be a mage. My mother was.”
“She was? I’m sorry for your loss.”
Caley waved that away, “I hardly remember her, she died on a mission for the king when I was only two. Mages and their spouses are allowed to live in the tower, be they mages or not. My father wasn’t, so when he was paid the death stipend, he left the tower and used it to start a farm not more than a few leagues from here.
“It was almost a month ago now that my magic appeared, though my father feared it, in truth I longed for it. But, it wasn’t until one of our horses were foaling and ran into trouble, that my magic deigned to show itself. I even managed to control it enough to heal the horse, although my hands were badly burned. I have a lot to learn just as you do, my father wouldn’t tell me how magic works, or at least what things he’d picked up about it from living in the guild.”
He smiled, even if it was a bit forced, sometimes the effort counted.
“I’m happy for you.”
She asked bluntly, “Are you afraid of magic, your own magic?”
He chuckled, “A little wary, it almost killed me after all, but I imagine that will go away when I learn how to channel it correctly? No, my mood isn’t about the magic, or where we’re going even, it’s about what the magic is taking me away from. I’m trying to keep an open mind about this new life.”
She nodded in understanding.
He asked, “Your father didn’t want this?”
She shook her head, “He doesn’t hate magic or anything, and he wishes the best for me. He just fears I will end up dead on some mission, like my mother. Reton, we do have our fair share of enemies.”
That was true enough, there was the Dreston Kingdom to the east, and the Vemor Empire to the south. The north and west of Reton were both bordered by the great ocean, and although they had no enemies out there, just trading partners, it wouldn’t be out of the question for that to change.
“Do you know anything about the towers, or the common building? All I know is the rumors, the mages work for the king, and magic is terrifying.”
She giggled, “Do I look terrifying?”
Adorable came to mind, but there was no way he was going to say that.
He laughed, “I just meant, I know you don’t have answers about the magic, but I thought your father might’ve told stories about the tower. Do the guilds get along? Why are they separated? I could use a friend and ally in this new life, but will I ever see you again once we get where we’re going?”
She looked startled for a second, then laughed.
“You’re a rather blunt person, aren’t you?”
He shrugged sheepishly, “Blacksmith. We tend to hammer things into submission. On the good side, I’m a hard worker.”
She wagged a finger at him, “Rune Mage.”
He sighed, “How about both? I expect my trade will give me an advantage, especially as a rune mage, even if I only ever work metal for myself in the future.”
She smirked, “Fine, you win. I’m not really sure what the underlying reasons are, but it’s true we’ll be in separate towers for all but joint classes and learning. And perhaps missions. Our towers have separate living spaces and even kitchens for meals. Even in the main building, our libraries are segregated, and our towers have places to relax. However, I don’t think there’s a prohibition for getting together with someone outside your tower for a trip into the city, or some other thing.
“Still, the way it’s set up, we’re more likely to grow closer to people in our own tower.”
He just nodded.
She added, “There’s also somewhat of a competition between towers, but it’s a friendly one from what I understand, unless that’s changed in the last fourteen years.”
“Competition?”
She smirked, “Yup, you may face me one day in a contest of arms. Intimidated?”
He laughed, “Yes?”
She shook her head, “You shouldn’t be, you do know two of those runes on your sword are life mage spells, don’t you?”
Now that she mentioned it, the speed and strength runes would be considered life magic, as it enhanced the wielder, assuming they had rune magic. The sword wouldn’t work for anyone else, since runes were spells, not enchantments. The other two would probably be earth magic, as they would keep the sword razor sharp, and from breaking.
“Why do we compete?”
Neal’s voice interrupted before she could answer, “Practice. Our enemies have mages too, and it gives all of us a good idea what it will be like to face someone of the other six magical disciplines and to come up with countering tactics specific to the threat. The arena is spelled to ensure no deaths occur, it’s safe enough. Of course, without danger, there are other incentives outside of bragging rights. The best ten mages out of the challenges earn the honor of protecting the royal family for a month, until the next challenge which happens every month.
“Beyond that, it’s used to gauge the effectiveness of a mage for particular missions, when the king has a request the master mages of our towers need to know who is best to fill that role. Of course, you won’t be going on any missions until after you’ve completed your apprenticeship and earned the title of mage. Not incidentally, how well you handle yourself in the arena is one of the measures of that advancement, as is how many spells you can successfully cast and your general knowledge of mage craft.”
Neal handed the sword and dagger to Caley, “Let’s go, we can continue this discussion on the road. I can’t and won’t be teaching you magic, that will wait for the tower, but I can fill you in on other things. There are also politics you should be aware of, mages are feared, and we have the king’s ear.”
They mounted up and headed south out of the village. He couldn’t help but look back wistfully at all that he was leaving behind, until the village disappeared behind some trees at the first twist in the road. It was going to be a long trip, three days until they got to the village of Sleekfalls where they could replenish their food supplies, then another four days on the road to Highspire.
Chapter Four
Neal said, “Mages are powerful, working for the king keeps us safe from our own people, relatively. Using your magic on a commoner is proscribed, and only acceptable to save a life or defend yourself. Using it for any other reason without permission, such as for healing or some kind of assistance, is a capital crime.”
He nodded, he’d known people feared mages, despite the fact incidents between mages and commoners were extremely rare. Now he knew why they were so rare, if a mage abused their power on a commoner, they’d be for the chopping block, or perhaps hanged.
“Are friendships discouraged between towers?”
Neal replied, “Not by law, but by custom and of course the physical separation of the towers. The competition and being separated just leads to that naturally. From what I understand mages almost died out by intermixing in the past. Two life mages will always have a life mage as a child, and such is true of the other disciplines. A non-mage and mage will have a mage child three out of four times, and it is encouraged to find a human spouse if someone can’t find a match within their sphere of discipline.
“Two mages from differing disciplines leads to problems in their children. Opposing disciplines cancel out completely, so all children born of a fire and water, life and death, or earth and air couple would be non-magical. Other mixes aren’t as bad, but even there half the children will be without any magic, and any mages born will be weak in whatever magic they happen to inherit. Almost as if the second discipline was still present even if inaccessible, and it will dampen their primary discipline as a mage. There are no mages with more than one discipline.”
He paused for a moment as that sunk in, and Olin wasn’t all that shocked by it, even if a little surprised by the blunt information.
It also didn’t bode well for a friendship with his travelling companions, which meant his life would be starting from scratch for a third time, when he arrived at the mage towers.
Neal continued, “As you know, forbidding a teenager from forming an intimate relationship will never work. Love buds where it will, and all that. Keeping the towers separate, ensuring the closer friendships will be formed within their own discipline allows us to just let nature take its course, so to speak. Add to that the fierce competition of the challenges, and it’s very difficult to maintain more than a casual friendship with anyone of another tower. More often than not.”
He asked, “How many rune mages are there?”
Not that he was worried about a relationship past friendship, he couldn’t even think of that right now, as the first love of his life was slowly being left behind him. Still, there was a certain curiosity.
Neal grimaced, as if to deliver bad news, at least in context to what was just spoken about.
“Including you? Eight, but only four in the tower. Cassandra is your master mage of the discipline, and relatively young at thirty-five. She’s the youngest tower master in our long history. There are two others who have almost completed their apprenticeship. Sam and Lia are around your age, but they’ve been in the tower close to a year. There are a handful of others of course, but they’re full mages and you won’t really see them much at all, if ever. They’re often on missions.”
He swallowed, that was a small dating pool indeed.
“The other towers?”
Neal said, “The numbers are always changing due to missions, and new people coming in. But there’s around forty life, thirty-two death, and over a hundred of each of the elemental disciplines.”
“Apprenticeship only lasts a year?”
He nodded, “For all of us. That year is a focus on maximizing your channeling potential without harming your body, which takes a lot of focus and discipline. The second focus is your spell knowledge, to become a full mage you need to know a variety of spells, and to be at least competent in the arena.”
“How does that work, with… over five hundred mages in the seven towers.”
Four hundred plus in the elemental disciplines, and about another hundred between life, death, and rune.
He smirked, “It’s a free for all, generally speaking. Sometimes people will ally, but that always ends in betrayal, even among fast friends. Only the top ten get to guard the king’s family along with the royal guard. It’s a highly sought post, because it’s relatively safe, and lends some influence, then there’s always bragging rights.”
“So, a group of ten would sweep it.”
He nodded, “Most likely, but in the end they’d turn on each other, to rank the top ten. And it never works out that way, or that neatly. Groups that try that almost invariably end up losing more than half of them to spontaneous alliances in the heat of battle.”
“The arena must be huge to accommodate so many at once. It’s really safe?”
Neal shrugged, “It is fairly large, and filled with obstacles and walls, like buildings in a town or trees in a forest. Accidents happen, but very rarely. The magic can’t stop an instantly mortal wound, but none of us would take a head or stab for the heart in a contest of arms. Any other wounds are put into stasis, and it knocks the person out of the competition as it heals them. The masters use magic to keep track of it all, and who ends up in the ten best.”
“There are apprentices, mages, and master mages? Any other ranks?” Caley asked.
Neal replied, “No, that’s it. When an apprentice reaches the point that they’ve mastered channeling, and they can keep learning spells on their own without supervision, they’re declared a mage. When they feel they’re ready, they take the master mage test which is given by the other masters. Only a master mage can teach apprentices and earn a permanent post in the tower, which means no more dangerous missions for the king. It’s also why I’m not allowed to start your training, mages aren’t permitted to teach apprentices, though we can share insights with another mage.
“Tower master is just the master mage in charge of all the mages of their discipline, but the politics get a bit murky just the same if the other masters disagree with them. Olin won’t have that problem, there’s only one master rune mage in existence right now. At least, in Reton.”
His mind spun with all the new information, though he suspected Cassandra would go over all this ground again when he arrived. He also hoped he got along with Lia and Sam, or his new life would be a very lonely one.
Caley asked, “What about mystics?”
Neal looked at her in amusement, “There hasn’t been a mystic in any discipline in hundreds of years, perhaps over a thousand. It is a fourth rank, above master, but it’s a moot point.”
He asked, “What’s a mystic?”
Neal shrugged, but Caley said, “Magic spells are demanding of perfection. A badly drawn rune could kill you, just as a misspoken or badly gestured spell could kill someone of the other disciplines. As a result, it’s against the law for a mage to experiment with magic in an attempt to make a new spell, or even modify one of the known ones, we’re limited to what’s in the libraries.
“A mystic is a mage who can feel their way through creating a spell, they’ll simply know when it’s right, and what it will do before they even cast it. They’re the ones that created the libraries in the past. They’re called mystics because even they couldn’t explain how they did it, the knowledge seemed to just come to them, when they wished to make a spell to perform what they wanted it to, it just… happened. Or at least, that’s what I was told.”
He smirked, “Sounds mystical.”
It also sounded familiar, even if he hadn’t known what he was doing at the time. He’d felt much the same when he’d come up with his maker’s mark, which just happened to be made up of five runes. It’d spoke to him in his heart, he’d just known what those runes represented, even if he’d had no idea it was magic, or even had known that they were runes. To him they were just symbols that to him represented those four concepts, all unified by the starburst symbol.
He also decided not to share that little insight. He wasn’t naïve, and he was already pretty sure that would make him a target. He was already set apart from non-mages, the commoners, the last thing he wanted to do was become something that mages feared, for political or ambitious reasons.
It also wasn’t something he’d feel comfortable with exploring, at least not yet. Why reinvent the wheel, if there were books of runes at the tower it made sense to learn all of those first, and certainly not before he could channel without killing himself or had verified it didn’t already exist in current knowledge. Standing out wasn’t always a good thing. Even given all that, he’d have to weigh if the cost was worth it to create a new rune and expose himself. No, he’d achieve mage before he even considered doing that, and only if something new would truly be a good thing, and not just set him apart.
He just hoped the runes he’d already made up were already known. Neal hadn’t jumped to that conclusion, and he could see Neal might not even believe him if he suggested that as a possibility, but surely Cassandra would recognize new runes. If they were new, she’d know as soon as she laid eyes on his sword. They were all pretty simple rune spells, or so he thought, so the chances were good he could hide the truth, at least for a while.
Of course, there was a chance he wasn’t a mystic at all, and it was just dumb luck that he’d stumbled across the runes. Yeah, he didn’t believe that either, but he wanted to.
She giggled, “Be nice. Anyway, that’s true enough, and why they were called mystics.”
Neal shrugged, “Some believe those are just tales, and that we’ve simply lost magical knowledge that would explain how to create new spells. I lean that way myself, feeling their way through a spell? Ridiculous. Regardless, it doesn’t matter, no one is going to risk death at worst, or at best having their magic sealed, by breaking the law.”
He changed the subject to something a little less close to home, “I know Vemor and Dreston are enemies of Reton, but as a journeyman blacksmith in a small village we get very little but rumors. Especially being so far to the North, far from the eastern and southern borders. How bad is it, are we at risk of war?”
Neal replied, “War is always a threat, but things are pretty stable right now, and have been since the brief skirmishes with Vemor five years ago on the southern border. They test us every decade or so in their quest to expand their empire to their north. Our air mage brothers and sisters make excellent spies, so we’d have advanced warning anytime they or Dreston make a move.”
Neal spoke about a few other things, but the conversation mostly trailed off around noontime, and while he found their company more than adequate, it was a depressing thought to build friendships with them both over the next week only to lose that going forward. He decided to just build a professional relationship with them both, no matter how pleasant and open Caley seemed to be, any kind of close friendship seemed doomed.
It was a nice sunny day, and the breeze was gentle as it rustled the leaves of the surrounding trees. Olin did know how to ride, but he hadn’t taken into account the fact he’d never done so for very long. It wasn’t long, before lunch even, when he realized his muscles would be sore as hell for the next week. The muscles used for horseback riding weren’t used in the smithy.
He missed the heat of the forge, the work, and the pounding of the hammer. The surety of it. He missed the village of Bayside, Cain and Evelyn, and most of all he missed his Celane. Starting a new life wouldn’t be easy, and this whole week he’d be in a kind of mental holding pattern. At least when he arrived, he could dive into magic. He was no stranger to discipline, and it would get his mind off what he’d given up.
But for the seven days of the ride, he’d think of little else but what he’d lost.
