Moss Gate

by Alex Linwood

  Classes dragged on that day. Portia blamed it on her empty stomach. She vowed to never have such a light breakfast again, not if she could help it. It was a shorter day, and most of her classmates planned to go to the Library of Mages to get some work done before supper.

  She arrived to find Mia and Ella already there working at one of the long tables. Mia was industriously copying from a book while Ella conversed with some students at a nearby table, drawing irritated looks of other library patrons. Ella made it a point to make friends wherever she went. The hardest challenge she would ever face, Portia decided, would be to sit still and not talk for longer than thirty minutes. She valued her roommate greatly, but at times the noise was too much even for Portia. Mia seemed to be doing exceptionally well ignoring the conversation and focusing on her own task.

  “Good afternoon, housemates,” Portia greeted her friends. “Do you know about the Spring Festival? I would like to go—”

  This drew Ella’s immediate attention. “Spring Festival? Is that already going on? We must go. Today. Tell me it’s going on today, Portia, tell me.”

  Portia’s eyebrow’s knit together. “I’m not sure. I think so.” She realized she hadn’t confirmed the dates and wasn’t sure how to do so.

  “It is,” Mia said, without looking up from her paper.

  Ella clapped her hands together excitedly, drawing even more irritated looks from other patrons. She noticed the looks and stopped clapping, her face reddening. “We must go today,” she whispered to Portia and Mia, nearly as loud as her normal talking voice.

  Mia put down her pen with a sigh. She knew as well as Portia that once Ella had a notion in her head, it was nearly impossible to dissuade her. They were going to the festival that day.

  Just then, Richard and Liam entered the front doors and weaved their way through the tables towards the group of girls.

  “Greetings, ladies,” Liam said, a broad grin on his face. His hair was black today with white tips, pushed into a Mohawk rising several inches in the air. Portia wondered if he ever got tired of fussing with his hair. He rarely wore the same style for longer than a week. Today he looked much different from how he did even yesterday. When did he have time to make these changes?

  His twin brother, Richard, merely nodded his greetings. He was as opposite to his brother as could be imagined. While they were both tall, Richard was retiring and Liam an extrovert. Richard consistently had the same shaggy brown hairstyle and conservative clothes, and Liam often looked like a rooster or peacock showing off his prized plumage. Despite their differences, they were rarely apart.

  “Liam and Richard, we’re going to the Spring Festival today!” Ella told them, brooking no argument.

  “Wonderful! Excellent! Much more exciting than this boring homework,” Liam said, on board with the idea immediately.

  Richard, however, was not so enthused. “We just got here. And our reports are due in a few days…”

  Mia nodded agreement, tucking a strand of her red hair behind her ear. She too was a conscientious student and would have stayed the rest of the day working in the library.

  “Nonsense,” Ella said, rising and pulling on Mia’s arm to draw her to her feet. “We have plenty of time for silly reports. Let’s go.”

  Liam clapped Richard on the shoulder and then turned him to face the door again. He didn’t bother responding to Richard’s protest. Richard looked down in resignation and dutifully marched towards the exit, followed by the rest of the group. Portia felt a bit sorry for him, but not sorry enough to argue for the group not to go. It was homework for her anyway, and she’d much rather go with her friends than alone.

  The festival itself was located off campus, near the central marketplace that was close to the seawall. It was close enough to walk. Other students had the same idea, so they joined a stream of fellow students leaving campus and heading towards the market streets.

  Portia could smell the food several blocks away. Lunch had not fully banished her hunger left over from such a scanty breakfast, and she was glad of the coins in her purse. When they reached the market, she saw festival booths tucked in amongst the normal stalls and scattered in the normally empty grassy area by the seawall. The crowds were thick. It seemed like half the countryside had come into the city to either sell something or seek entertainment at the gathering. Cloaks of various colors gave away that travelers had come from far and wide.

  “I have to eat something,” Portia said to Mia and Ella.

  Mia snorted under her breath. Portia knew Mia was well used to her appetite, only outdone by Ella on the girls’ side of the pyromancy house.

  “I know just the thing,” Ella said, pulling Portia towards a vendor that had a long line in front of it. The smell of grease and sugar wafted from the stall. Portia did not argue.

  The fried dough balls were perfect—hot, chewy, and not too sweet. Portia could not stop herself from eating too fast and burned her tongue, but it was well worth it. They served nothing like this on campus.

  The twins joined them, bringing the three girls glasses of mead and holding their own cups. They wandered through the festival together, seeing what other treats vendors had brought. Most of the food smelled delicious, but there were a few things that made Portia recoil. A sign over one booth said, ‘Duck Eyes, five for a copper’.

  “They aren’t really serving duck eyes, are they?” she asked. It must be a euphemism for an unusual dish.

  Mia nodded. “Yes, it really is duck eyes. It’s not a savory dish—I know because my father insisted we try all new things in my training.” She glanced at Portia’s expression, amused. “Unfortunately, that was one of them.”

  For the first time in her life, Portia was glad she had been an orphan and not a noble. At least no one had forced her to eat anything she did not want to.

  Beyond the central core of food vendors there was a ring of games, both of luck and of skill. Normally quiet, Richard excelled at one game that involved throwing balls at glass bottles, winning so many times that he refused the prizes the glum vendor offered. The vendor was so grateful he gave Richard extra balls and allowed him to continue his streak until he was too tired for further play.

  Liam laughed and clapped Richard on the shoulders when he was done and then stepped up to the counter. He bested Richard by five throws, also refusing additional prizes from the vendor after the first. Other students from the Academy lined up to try their luck, seeing the twins’ success and thinking it was an easy game. Portia heard cries of disappointment after they walked away when those students found out after the first throw that it was not so simple. She thought the vendor stood to make a great deal of money and probably should have paid Richard and Liam for bringing people to his stall.

  Even Ella and Mia won prizes tossing rings on bottles. Portia tried as well but failed miserably, the rings falling between the bottles or to the side. Anywhere but where she intended them to go. She was too cheap to spend more than a copper trying and so resigned herself to walking along as the only one in her group without a prize tucked in her belt.

  Liam noticed her lack of a prize. Coming up next to her, he put his arm around her. “What? You can’t hang out with us without some sort of prize. It’s a house rule!”

  “No, it’s fine,” Portia protested, but Liam was already gone. Portia bit her lip. She wanted to stop him but knew it was probably futile. He could be as stubborn as Ella. Giving up the idea, she followed the rest of the group.

  A few moments later, Liam reappeared at her side holding out a small locket. She gave a small smile. He held up one finger at her lukewarm response then spun the locket. An image of a bird in flight appeared as the locket spun. Portia gasped in delight.

  “I did good, right?” he asked, a wicked smile on his face.

  “You did,” Portia said, mesmerized by the beautiful piece of art. It was not something she expected as a fair prize.

  “It’s yours.” He grabbed her hand, putting the locket into it.

&
nbsp; “I can’t,” Portia said, but Liam only shrugged and ran up to join his brother. It was ironic that she was so bad at games when supposedly she was the unique Jack of Magic and was told she was destined to save the kingdom. She couldn’t even win a prize at a festival game. But at least she had friends.

  They continued on, going further into the festival. It was so large that it took over a good section of the city.

  “What’s that?” Portia asked the group, noticing for the first time an open square beyond the games where colored fog and flashes of light were drifting upwards from the ground.

  Ella glanced over then clapped her hands excitedly. “Oh, magic demonstrations! We have to go.” She hooked her arms in Mia’s and Portia’s, dragging them towards the open square with Richard and Liam following closely behind.

  “Magic demonstrations? Don’t we see everything at school?” Portia asked, confused.

  “No, no. This is different. These are people with magic so rare we would only read about it in the books in school. We would never be so lucky as to see all the different types of magic in person,” Ella said, excitement shining in her eyes. “The Academy has access to some of this magic, but it can’t afford to keep these people on full-time. They make far more money traveling the country and showing off than they would in some stuffy school.”

  Portia looked sharply at Ella at the word ‘stuffy’. She knew Ella was just as grateful to be at the Academy as she was.

  Ella saw Portia’s scowl and squeezed her arm. “You know what I mean. School is great and all, and I love it, but wait until you see these folks. Then you’ll understand.”

  Mia nodded solemnly at Portia from the other side of Ella. She would know more than any of them. Portia felt a bit of excitement as they approached the square.

  There were individual performers scattered in the large square, each surrounded by a group watching. Portia and her friends had to peer between people’s shoulders to see what was going on. One large group of observers was gathering on the far side, so they hurried over there to see what the fuss was about.

  An elderly man was digging rocks from the hard-packed earth. He had two fist-size rocks at his feet and was using a small shovel to dig out a third. He arranged the rocks in a row in front of him and then looked up and around at his observers. He did this slowly, dramatically. He knew how to work his audience and wanted their full attention. The surrounding people quieted expectantly as the old man waited for their full attention.

  Slowly, he walked to the end rock and held his palm over it. At first nothing seemed to happen, then the rock glowed, at first subtly then a more intense red. The glow morphed into a yellow and white color, the rock itself melting into a puddle on the hard-packed earth. Steam rose from it. Even from ten feet away Portia could feel the heat emanating from it. The old man had turned the rock into lava.

  He repeated the task with the other two rocks, maintaining the super-heated state of the first one. Finally, he had three small puddles of liquid rock. Raising his hands, the puddles lifted off the ground and were suspended in the air at his chest height. Slowly, they started to rotate until it looked like he was juggling lava. The crowd whistled and cheered, clapping in appreciation. The old man beamed in their adulation. He then winked at the crowd and held up his right hand to get their attention. Making a twisting motion with his right hand, he changed the trajectory of the lava, causing it to all join briefly in the shape of a horse then break apart again, once again in three chunks. He did this repeatedly, every time in the shape of a different animal, much to the crowd’s approval.

  Portia had never seen such power exhibited in pyromancy—for that was surely what it was.

  “Do you think anyone at the school could create that much heat in their pyromancy?” she asked Ella quietly, not wanting to draw the attention of others or their ire for disturbing the show.

  “Not many, I’d say,” Ella said, chewing her lip. “Though, where I’m really puzzled is how he can move them with so much control through the air. I’d give much to be able to do that. I feel like I’m throwing globes of mud with my magic, but he has such minute control over the shapes and effects of his magic.”

  Portia nodded. She had not thought of that. When she was doing her light mote magic, she only had control over the general direction where they went and roughly how many there were based more on her strength than anything else. She could not control the path of the single mote, much less masses of them simultaneously. This man possessed a great deal of mental strength and discipline.

  Liam, standing on the other side of Ella, looked over at Portia and whispered, “Someday I’ll be that good, just you see.”

  Richard shook his head at Liam’s bravado. Mia simply stared, entranced, at the show. Portia knew that of all the pyromancers, Mia was the closest to having that intensity of strength. But Mia was a quiet one, not prone to bragging.

  The group peeled off from that display, curious to see what else was there. The next was a young woman who had cryomancy as her power. She too had great control, sending out streaks of ice and simultaneously having the streaks themselves shrink down into complex structures, swirls and curlicues, and intricate carvings the most skilled woodworker would be jealous of—all while continuously projecting new ice.

  Portia edged closer, trying to see the details on the ice carvings. She regretted it when another section of ice twirled around her waist unexpectedly as the young woman quickly formed small rivers of carved ice that touched the ground in sections and then soared up and whirled around her and the other observers. The young woman worked so quickly that an individual spectator could barely react before the ice formed itself around them and moved on. Her control of the growing ice never wavered, and not a single observer was touched as it streaked by, its speed creating cold puffs of air.

  Soon, the woman’s display area was a tangle of ice and people. The woman laughed, clearly enjoying herself and the surprised and shocked looks on the people observing her. The young woman abruptly halted her work and then raised her hands and snapped her fingers. All the ice instantly collapsed and broke apart into tiny fragments the size of snowflakes, falling to the ground and freeing the observers who had been trapped within swirls. The crowd cheered and clapped.

  Portia stepped back to join the rest of her group. As much as she appreciated the skill of the magic user, it made her uncomfortable to be within the display itself. It brought back bad memories of having ice used against her by the bullies in the Academy that past winter. And she appreciated that something could always go wrong. It would be wise to not make herself vulnerable to such an instance.

  A few displays over, Portia noticed something she had never seen before. Or rather people she had never seen before. They were slender and willowy, much thinner than the average human and perhaps just a little shorter. At first, she had thought they were children, but looking closer she realized they were adult males and females, some with gray hair and wrinkles. They had pointed ears and heart-shaped faces.

  Portia nudged Ella and motioned to the group. “Who are they?”

  Ella looked over and her face lit up with excitement. “Elves! How exciting! I remember elves at a festival once when I was just a child but haven’t seen them since. What a treat. Their magic is so different.”

  Elves? Portia wanted to ask what was so different, but Ella had already taken off in the direction of the elves. Portia looked over at Mia and shrugged her shoulders and they followed Ella. Richard and Liam talked excitedly behind her. She was not the only one who had not seen elves before.

  When they joined the ring of observers, they found that a lone elf was standing in the center of the circle. Her clothes were beautiful and delicate in shades of green and brown. The Elven woman had large orange eyes that stared from one observer to the next. She started singing a beautiful tune, her vocal range sometimes going so high Portia wasn’t sure if she could hear it at all. Behind her, several elves played on percussion instruments, beating out
a complex rhythm Portia recognized from her music class. Surprised, she began to understand, perhaps belatedly, the reason for such an esoteric topic being required at the Academy.

  Around the Elven woman the grass visibly grew, slowly at first and then with speed. Further from the elf, the growth turned into small trees that sprouted quickly, the tender shoots and bright green leaves spreading and darkening as the trees rose into the air. The circle around the woman widened, making room for the display. Gasps of delight wafted up from the crowd.

  Portia noticed that when the elf’s singing increased in tempo, so too did the speed of the growth. Her magic was coming from the music—or perhaps from her singing. It was so unique.

  Portia felt a strong desire to learn how to do this magic. It was so beautiful. She vowed to do better in her music classes.

  Mia was next to her, tapping her foot to the beat of the song. Mia had always excelled in music classes; at least that was what she told Portia since they had not shared one of those classes yet.

  Portia leaned in and whispered in her ear, “Do you know how this is done?”

  Mia shook her head and continued watching the display. Richard and Liam’s mouths hung open slightly as they watched. Portia guessed they didn’t know how it was done either. She vowed to ask the elf as soon as the display was over.

  Just as the trees in the outer ring display had reached full maturity, five elves burst into the center of the circle, startling the singing elf. Her song faltered, and the display stopped changing. The elf eyed the newcomers and then bowed gracefully and retreated away from the center of the circle. The woodland display created with her magic remained.

  The largest of the elves, dressed entirely in black cloth that matched the blackness of his hair and his flashing dark eyes, stepped forward and held up his hand. “We come sharing important news.” He looked around, making sure he had everyone’s attention. “The Splintering is once again upon the world. Beware. Preparations must be made.”