He thought back to living at Caer Iron and how training there worked a little differently. He supposed that because Caer Baronel was so far north, quite a bit away from the nearest caer and even farther from any city, it made sense for craft training to be done the way it was here.
Each of the craft halls went out of their way to train as many people as they could to at least apprentice or journeyman level. They could then assist the craft hall with normal day-to-day needs as they continued training. And once they became journeyman, they could either stay working for the craft hall, assuming there was need for another craftsman to work there, or they could continue training, or even move on to work somewhere else.
But everyone had to do something. Life wasn’t easy out here on the fringe of civilization, and everyone needed to pull their own weight. People had to contribute in some way to the running of the Caer, either in providing labor for the many tasks required to keep things running smoothly, or in crafting needed items. After all, the trade caravans that came every few months helped provide some goods and supplies, but everything else had to be made here or the Caer would have to do without.
It was about a quarter of an hour early for lunch, so Aeron headed to the Leather Craft Hall just next door to see what Willem was doing and to tell him all about his exciting morning. He made his way to the side of the craft hall and poked his head in the door that opened onto the back area.
He could see several workbenches where leatherworkers were working on various items. The sound of hammers striking tools, the sound of leather being worked and formed, filled the room. He could also smell the various cured leathers, and it made him smile. It smelled of craftsmanship and fine goods. And though neither of his parents had worked in leather when he was younger, it still reminded him of his old home.
He looked around the large workroom but didn’t see Willem anywhere. He might be in the front area working with one of the masters. Aeron didn’t want to bother him if that was the case. He decided instead to go see what Sharrah was doing and tell her about his good fortune. He headed off to the Caer’s barn, which housed the Animal Craft Hall.
He cut between the Wood Craft Hall and the Archive Craft Hall and was heading for the alley between the stable and the Smith Craft Hall, when he heard a voice from behind him.
“Well what have we here? Looks like a runt to me. What do you think Renny?”
Aeron froze.
“I do believe you’re right, Jessip. It does look like a runt.”
Aeron turned toward the voices. Jessip and his cronies were watching him and laughing. They sometimes liked to hang around outside the barracks and talk with the guards. He’d forgotten about that in his rush to go talk to Sharrah.
Jessip moved toward Aeron. “What’s that you have there, hmm? Is that a book?”
Aeron gripped the slim leather book tightly. He’d just gotten the primer! He looked down at the ground and tried to keep walking to the alley. Jessip’s friends started closing in on him, however, so he stopped, staring at them. They stopped and stared back.
“Give me the book, runt.” Jessip held out his hand toward Aeron, expecting him to walk meekly over and give it up.
Aeron clenched his jaws. Why was there always a Jessip? Why couldn’t idiots like Jessip just leave him alone so he could live his life in peace? Without really thinking, he said, “Why do you even want it, Jessip? You need to be able to read to use a book.”
Jessip dropped his hand to his side and his friends all laughed at Aeron’s jibe. He glared at Aeron and his face turned red. He looked really angry.
Aeron swallowed hard. What in the world was he thinking? He was going to get pummeled for sure now. He quickly glanced about looking for an escape route. Jessip guessed at what he was doing and ran to grab him. Aeron jumped back, turned, and dashed for the alley between the stable and the smithy.
Just ahead, he saw the water pipes on the side of the stable that supplied its large water tanks from the Water Hall. The pipes ran from the ground up to the roof. He raced to them, shoving his primer in the back of his pants as he ran. When he was close, he jumped, grabbed the closest pipe, and shimmied his way up and onto the roof.
He looked back over the roof edge. Down below, Jessip and his friends were staring up at him, surprised and unsure what to do.
“You little pipsqueak, how’d you get up there so quick?” Jessip shouted. He then eyed the pipes, which were maybe four inches in diameter. It looked like Jessip wasn’t sure they would support his weight.
Aeron glanced around the roof. He, too, was surprised that he’d made it up here, and he had no idea what to do next. He saw the roof of the smithy across from him, not that far away, black smoke rising from the cluster of smokestacks that served the forges. Behind him, on the other side of the stable, was the courtyard and nowhere to go. But beyond the Smith Craft Hall ahead of him was the Wood Craft Hall, which he just remembered had stairs to the roof!
The stairs were used to take lightglobes to the roof of the large craft hall for recharging. Aeron glanced over and saw the multitudes of globes in their racks on the far roof, sunlight glinting off of them. He’d gotten a very nice tan when his chores included helping cycle the globes from rack to rack. His medium skin tanned easier and held onto it longer than his friends, but the tan was mostly gone now.
Looking down, he saw Jessip moving toward the pipes, a determined look on his face. Apparently the older boy had decided to try the pipes after all. Aeron had to do something quickly. Bouncing on his heels, he looked around the roof again, but saw no new avenues of escape. The sparkling globes on the far roof caught his eyes again.
After letting out a deep breath, he backed up and ran as fast as he could toward the smithy. He jumped and sailed through the air, wind whipping his hair and clothes as he arced over the alleyway. His shoes slid a bit when he landed and he nearly fell on his butt, but he made it! He turned and glanced back down over the edge to see Jessip and the others staring up at him, mouths wide open. Seeing the distance to the ground again, he gulped, surprised and relieved to have made it, and ran off.
He easily made the jump to the Wood Craft Hall as well. He had leaped from the corner of the smithy away from his pursuers so that, if he was lucky, they might not have seen him make that second jump. He made his way to the stairs, weaving through the racks of gleaming glass, keeping low to avoid being seen.
Once he reached the ground, he quickly, and as stealthily as he could, made his way to the Glass and Leather Craft Hall building, then behind and beyond it and all around the Caer the long way back toward the Dinning Hall, peeking around the corner of each building before making a mad dash for the next. He’d talk to Sharrah and Willem at the Dining Hall and hopefully not run into Jessip. He wasn’t sure what he was going to do that night in the dorms to avoid the bully, however, but he would cross that bridge when he got to it.
Outside the Dining Hall, Aeron paused and took a careful look around. Luckily, neither Jessip nor his friends were anywhere to be seen. He quickly made his way in and scanned the dining room, which was starting to fill with people, and again, there was no sign of the bullies.
He was quite happy at having made it safely. The high-adrenaline running and jumping and sneaking around were catching up to him, though, so he took a quick side trip to the toilets to relieve himself, wash up, and splash some water on his face. Once that was done, he felt much better. He stepped back into the dining room and noted that it was already half full. His stomach rumbled as he headed to the serving line.
After getting his meal, another of his favorites, roast fowl with roasted vegetables, he made his way to the tables, trying to find a spot that was not easily seen from the serving line. He didn’t want Jessip to be able to find him. Of course, that also meant Aeron’s friends would have a hard time finding him as well, but he’d much rather not be seen by Jessip.
There! A spot at the far end of one of the tables behind several people was the perfect place. He worked his
way over, sat, and began eating, quite content and humming a tune to himself. He pulled out his primer and glanced over the first few pages, careful not to get any food or drink on the thin book.
Fostwhittle’s Primer for Beginning Sorcerers was the title with a subtitle of Elementary Magic is Elementary! Aeron grunted at the terrible pun and skipped past several pages until he got to the first actual page of the primer.
Chapter One — Magic for Fools!
Aeron couldn’t believe it. There was an actual print of a fool, a court jester. He shook his head, and after another forkful of roast fowl and one of potatoes, he continued reading.
The first parts of magic, its basics, will be presented in such a simple way that even a fool can understand it! Let’s get started, shall we?
Aeron sighed and grumbled, “Yes, let’s.”
“There you are!”
Aeron nearly fell off the bench. He had jumped and smacked his knee on the underside of the table and at the same time had tried to back off the bench, nearly falling to the ground in the process. Luckily, he hadn’t knocked over his drink or scattered any food. His primer was safe. He quickly made a grab for it and looked around to see who had spoken.
“Hey, there. A little jumpy are we?” Willem asked as he sat next to Aeron.
“Barbs and blades but you nearly ended my life right there and then,” Aeron gasped.
“Why?” Willem asked, laughing. “What’s going on?”
Aeron made a face and said, “Jessip. I had a run-in with him a bit ago on the way here. For a moment, I thought you were one of them.” He put the primer back down and swiveled his leg out to rub his knee. “Barked my knee a good one too. Thanks.”
Willem chuckled. “Sorry about that.” He removed his plates and glass from the tray and began to eat. “You sure did look like you were about to wet yourself. What happened anyway?”
“Yeah, yeah. Very funny.” Aeron swiveled back and continued to eat, taking forkfuls between snippets of his explanation. “I was on the way to see Sharrah. Master Doronal had let me out a little early for lunch and I had gone over to see you, but you weren’t at your workbench in back, so I decided to head over to the Animal Craft Hall.”
“Oh, I was at the smith’s, checking on an order,” Willem said.
Aeron nodded. “Ah, I see. Well, on the way to the Animal Craft Hall, I took a shortcut between the Wood Craft Hall and the Archive Craft Hall and Jessip and his idiot friends were there by the barracks.”
“Why do they imagine that talking up the guards makes people think any better of them?” Willem asked. “I’m pretty sure it doesn’t impress anyone.”
“I know! They’re so stupid. At any rate, they were there and Jessip made some crack about me and he noticed this.” Aeron pointed at his primer.
“Hey! Is that . . .”
“Yes! But hang on, hang on, I’ll get to that. So when Jessip saw me, he asked if that was a book I was looking at and told me to give it to him. Well, not really thinking, I said, ‘Why do you want it? You need to be able to read to use a book.’”
Willem burst out laughing. “Wow, I bet he didn’t like that too much!”
Aeron quirked his lips in a rueful half-smile and said, “No. No he didn’t. I knew he’d be chapped the minute I said it, but by then it was too late, so I ran for it. I was worried they were going to be able to catch me as I didn’t have much of a head start. Then I noticed the water pipes on the side of the stable, and I somehow got up them and onto the roof. From there I jumped over to the smithy, then to the Wood Craft Hall, where I ran down the access stairs and made my way back around the Caer the other direction, sneaking and dashing until I made it here.”
“You,” Willem began, a forkful of food midway to his mouth as he stared at Aeron, “jumped from the roof of the stable to the roof of the Smith Craft Hall?” He placed the fork down onto his plate. “You could’ve been killed!”
Aeron twisted his mouth and said, “It actually was a little scary, but it didn’t turn out to be that far of a jump. The buildings are a lot closer than you’d think. Anyway, that’s why I’m on edge. I’m trying to keep out of sight of Jessip and his stupid friends.”
Past Willem, Aeron could see Sharrah making her way over, and he smiled and waved at her.
Willem turned and saw her. Before she could even sit down, he said, “Sharrah, this idiot here nearly killed himself earlier and he seems to think it’s some kind of game.”
“What!” she said, quickly sitting opposite of them and looking at them both. “Explain!” she demanded, looking at Aeron sternly.
Aeron looked sheepish and recapped what had happened with Jessip. “Look, you don’t have to make such a big fuss about it. The buildings aren’t that far apart and the roofs overhang each building a bit, lessening the gap even more. I’d be surprised if the jump was more than five feet or so.”
“You need to be more careful Aeron,” Sharrah said. She removed her meal from her tray and began eating. “That was very dangerous. Depending on what part of the stable roof you jumped from, the roof of the Smith Craft Hall is anywhere from twenty to thirty feet high. If you had missed and hit the ground, you’d have been seriously hurt. Some silliness with Jessip isn’t worth losing your life or risking serious injury.”
“Exactly!” Willem agreed. He had started eating again as well and now pointed a fork at Aeron to emphasize his agreement, a green bean hanging on precariously.
“Have you talked to your father about Jessip?” Sharrah asked. “Maybe he has some ideas about what to do.”
“No. I mean, if he was here, I might have already. But he’s back at Caer Iron, and I didn’t want to bother him or waste my monthly letter allowance just to complain about that jerk.” Aeron shook his head and stared at his plate. “There wasn’t much hope of me getting into a craft at Caer Iron, there are so many people there. Yes, up here we’re forever and a day away from the rest of humanity, but there is opportunity here to get into a good craft and have a chance at making something of myself. My father arranged for me to be allowed to come here, giving me that chance. I don’t want to bother him about some stupid bully.” Aeron frowned. “Although, if Jessip is going to keep at me like this, maybe I should.”
“I would,” Sharrah said, sipping from her drink.
Aeron shrugged at his friends and took a bite of his food. After a moment, he said, “It was actually rather fun climbing up the wall and running around the rooftops. Being up there, above everyone else, the breeze whipping at you . . .” His eyes lost focus for a moment as he thought back. He then shook off the memory, looked at his two friends and said, “Anyway, this is the real news.” He pointed to the small leather book. “I got my primer today.”
“Oh! That’s fantastic!” Sharrah smiled at him.
“Congratulations!” Willem said. He had entirely forgotten about seeing the book earlier.
“That is such good news for you,” Sharrah said. “Master Doronal obviously feels you are ready to start working on magic. Finally!”
“Yes! I’m very excited,” Aeron replied, a large smile on his face. He lowered his voice. “I accidentally created a new spell, sort of.”
Willem looked shocked. “You what?” He and Sharrah glanced at each other, then looked back at Aeron.
“Master Doronal was surprised too. It was mostly his fault, though.” Aeron saw the look they gave him and continued before they could speak. “No, really! He said so himself.”
“I am not believing that for one minute,” Sharrah said, looking to Willem for support.
“Nor am I,” Willem agreed.
“It was part of the training,” Aeron explained. “We had been working together on a spell, well he was weaving the spell, slowly, so I could watch the steps. Anyway, we’d been doing that for a long time. He kept building the spell and breaking it down with me watching, over and over again. One time though, he built one step of the spell wrong, on purpose, and before moving on, he waited to see if I would catch it. We
ll, not really thinking about what I was doing, I fixed that step instead of asking Master Doronal why it was wrong.”
Sharrah inhaled sharply. “Aeron, that’s so dangerous!”
Aeron looked at her guiltily and said, “That’s not all. I had also noticed that if I adjusted the spell a little bit it could be made better.” He looked at them both. “So I did.”
Sharrah and Willem both began berating him for taking too many chances, for not thinking, for recklessly endangering both himself and Master Doronal and on and on. People around them stopped talking and glanced over at them.
“Quiet!” Aeron hissed fiercely. “I’m trying not to be noticed! Remember Jessip?” His friends stopped harping at him, though they still had fierce looks of disapproval on their faces. Aeron glanced around, but the nearby diners were returning to their own conversations and meals, and there was still no sign of Jessip.
“Listen,” he said, looking first to one and then the other. “The second it happened I knew what I had done, or had almost done. I was . . . devastated. I realized that I could have killed myself, or even worse, I could have killed us both. Luckily, I had not. But I just knew I was going to be turfed. I was as shocked and disappointed in myself as you are now, maybe even more so.”
Aeron paused and looked at his primer. “Magic is my chance to show my father that his effort to get me here was not wasted. It’s my chance to make him proud. And with that one stupid moment of not paying attention, I could have lost it all.”
Sharrah and Willem continued to gaze at Aeron, though their looks had softened. He was obviously distraught over what he had done.
Aeron let out a breath and said, “Master Doronal told me not to worry, though. He said that the spells used in early training were used precisely because they were almost impossible to botch up in a way that makes them deadly. He also said he had done it on purpose to see if I would notice the spell was being built wrong. He was surprised that I had been able to fix it so easily and was very surprised that I had improved it. He told me no one had been able to come up with a better version, ever.”
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