Fantastic Schools, Volume 3

by Emily Martha Sorensen

  A faint thunk. Yes! The arrow was standing out proud from the bullseye in the centre of the target. Right!

  She sent three more arrows down range and all hit the bullseye! She kept the last arrow for future reference and then wandered down to view her handiwork. All four arrows were crowded in the bullseye, but she found that each of them had hardly penetrated the cloth-covered straw at all. As she stood in front of the targets somewhat surprised, one fell out even as she studied them. Ah, she thought. So, I can make arrows shoot right where I want, but because the range was so long there was no force behind the impacts. Interesting. A lot of food for thought there.

  She headed back to the equipment shed where she deposited the bow and then had another thought. She felt the arrows and realised that the spell was still embedded in the wood. She had better not put them back with the ordinary arrows! She went in search of the instructor and found him sweeping out the area where the wrestling and boxing took place. He nodded to her and then cocked his head when he saw she still had the arrows in her hand.

  “Yes?” he asked.

  She grinned sheepishly. “I was trying an idea out and impressed a spell into these arrows so I thought I better give them to you so you can keep them apart from the others.”

  He looked at the arrows, looked at her. “What did you do?”

  It wasn’t as if this was the first time she had experimented on school equipment. She had probably spent more money on replacing equipment her spell experiments had broken than she had on good food in the town. Not that school food was bad. It was just, well, limited.

  She held the arrows up.

  “I put a spell of targeting into the shafts. If the archer has any magic, focuses on the spot she wants to target, and then triggers the spell as she releases the arrow, the arrow will hit the target.”

  He looked startled.

  “Just like that?”

  She shrugged. “Pretty much. It was something mentioned in some of the accounts, you know. Kern Martane and his magical arrows that never miss.”

  He nodded. It was one of the few stories that had survived the Great War and it was included in any number of the common ballads that had spread around the lands of Ithria. Over the centuries it had morphed and changed a great deal. The version you would hear way up here would be rather different from the version common in, say, the Republic of Witon. Even the names and events were changed in some versions, but the basic story remained.

  He stared at her steadily.

  She stuttered a little.

  “S-so, I, um, impressed this spell I worked out into these five arrows and fired four of them at the centre target of the three hundred pace targets.”

  “You don’t have the strength to shoot that far,” he offered.

  She shook her head.

  “Well, yeah, magic, you know. All four hit the bullseye in the centre of the target. They didn’t penetrate far; in fact, one fell out as I reached them to have a look, but the spell meant they went where I aimed. All four.”

  He held out his hand and looked at the five arrows she handed him. “Right. I won’t go and test them just now but I will put them under lock and key. They are very dangerous objects to have laying around.”

  “I know. That’s why I brought them to you,” she offered with a small smile. At least he hadn’t yelled at her this time.

  “I shudder to think what you will come up with next!” he said, a bit melodramatically. She could tell he was putting it on a bit from the crinkling around his eyes.

  “I could tell you,” she offered, trying to look innocent.

  He threw up his hands.

  “No! I don’t want to know! Go have dinner, you horrible girl.”

  He pointed at the main building, but he was smiling as well. She smiled as she nodded and headed inside. She rather thought the next thing she’d scare him with would be the sword she was going to get the blacksmith to make, that would have properly embedded spells. She was almost certain her idea would work.

  Fronday brought Advanced Spell Notation, an interesting subject. Spell notation was the method of writing out a spell on a clay tablet, waxed board, or even, horrors, parchment while you fiddled with the various aspects and values of the spell. Most people found it easier to grasp a new spell by studying it in written form first before trying to conceptualize it. And those that were developing new spells always wrote them out as they went. It was too easy for most people to miss something if they tried to develop a complex spell just in their head. Instead of turning water into wine, you could just as easily turn it to acid.

  The original Spell Notation system went right back to a couple of small scrolls that had somehow survived the Great War and the purge by the Revilers in the century following. The school had copies, and so did several Royal libraries in the area, specifically the four kingdoms that supported the School. These consisted of Marland, Metonia, Pickantia, and West Dumfordia, and with their support, over the centuries the Academagicians at the school had slowly expanded the notation to cover new things they had developed. This was helped by the odd scrap of notation that turned up now and then and the occasional reference in an old tale that something could be inferred from. There was nothing intrinsically magical about the notations, but it was useful, if limited.

  Taroniah had already come up with a dozen variations of standard notation forms for various tweaks to spells she had developed, and she had also devised a dozen new notation forms to cover spell aspects she had already created and she now needed to define a couple more. So far, no one had asked about her strange spell notations, but then she didn’t wave them around in front of everybody.

  After lunch was the mundane History and Geography class where the Known World was studied and the supposed history analyzed. That night, she thought about how there were no sorcerers anymore and why that was so, but didn’t come up with any fresh insights before she fell into a restless sleep.

  And then it was Bedinday.

  Chapter Three: Words of Power

  Taroniah left her friends to enjoy the town of Alcitran, and headed up the street to where the temple of Emilar stood opposite the temple of Teshar. Both temples were small and were attended by only a few priests or priestesses most of the time. Emilar was one of the old gods that had fought in the Great War where many of the gods and most of the sorcerers had died. In the century that had followed, the Revilers had destroyed the remaining temples and shrines wherever they had found them, conflating the gods with the magic they were determined to stamp out.

  As a great many of the gods appeared to have died in the Great War, most lacked any worshippers these days. Once the Revilers had lost their drive to destroy almost all signs of magic in the world, the worship of the old gods had begun to pop up again here and there. At first, it had just been small wayside shrines, untended, which the occasional passerby might choose to say a prayer at. With the reign of the Revilers over, along with a gradual rediscovery of magic, the centuries that followed saw a gradual increase in the worship of some of the old gods, mostly the ones purported to have survived the Great War.

  These days, the religions were once more gaining in power and influence as their carefully husbanded wealth compounded slowly over the centuries. There was still prejudice and some realms didn’t allow the worship of some gods while others were bound to the worship of different gods. Emilar and Teshar were two of the more common gods worshipped and their temples were found in most towns and cities.

  The small temple of Emilar consisted of a raised platform that was three steps above ground level. In the centre of the platform was a rectangular building, although the rear two corners were actually rounded in form. At the front, the roof extended forward from the building resting on three plain stone columns. There was a simple doorway that led into the front part of the temple. There was the traditional alcove for offerings to the right and on the left were the hand and feet basins where supplicants could wash.

  In the front centre against the
wall that ran across the width of the building stood a statue of the goddess. This was reputed to be the likeness of the real goddess taken from before the Great War and carefully reproduced ever since. To the right of the statue was a small wooden door that led into the further part of the temple building where the priestesses lived. Taroniah dropped a silver coin in the curved stone basin for offerings, then moved across and quickly washed her hands and feet before moving forward and kneeling before the statue of the goddess.

  She had always felt an affinity for Emilar, and as she knelt in front of the goddess she felt it stronger than ever before. She reached out and touched the carved foot of the goddess and prayed.

  “Oh, Goddess Emilar. I ask you to grant me wisdom in the use of the great powers I have been given. I ask for your guidance that I may not succumb to the vanity of pride, to the slippery slope of hate, and that I restrict the use of my powers to when they are truly needed and not just arbitrarily to satisfy my personal greed and whims.”

  As she paused to consider her words it felt as if the stone had warmed to her touch. “Let me not succumb to the temptation to treat others as lesser beings than I am, as many of the great sorcerers appeared to have done in the time before the Great War. Grant me the ability to see when I must use my powers fully or when mercy and restraint are the better courses of action. Hear me, goddess Emilar as I supplicate myself before you.”

  She was about to continue when she heard a gasp to her right. Opening her eyes, she saw that the statue of the goddess was glowing in a pale mauve light. She glanced to her right where the sound had come from and saw a priestess standing there with hands to her face, apparently shocked.

  “I meant no offense,” Taroniah said defensively.

  The priestess jerked slightly as if she had just come awake and stared blankly at Taroniah for a moment. Taroniah could see out of the corner of her eye that the mauve glow had dissipated and the statue was back to its normal appearance.

  “How did you do that?” the priestess demanded, moving towards her.

  “I merely prayed to the goddess. I did not even see the glow until you disturbed me,” Taroniah replied.

  The priestess halted a pace from her and looked her up and down. Whatever she saw caused her to change her manner from one of concerned annoyance to a softer, puzzled expression.

  “I have never seen the statue of the goddess glow before. I have heard a couple of rumors that a statue had glowed here or there, but nothing ever certain; and only ever in front of one person, never with a witness.” She looked again at the statue and appeared to mumble something that Taroniah couldn’t make out. Whatever it was, the statue remained inert.

  “In the time before the Great War, the statues of the Goddess would glow frequently whenever a true worshipper prayed to Her. That's a sign that the Goddess was indeed listening. Now I have seen something I never expected to see... who are you, that the Goddess would listen to your prayers when she ignores even her own priestesses?”

  Taroniah studied the priestess for a moment but the annoyance appeared to have disappeared from the woman’s face and had been replaced by a look of inquiry. “I am Taroniah of Marland. I am in my final year at Lightbearer Academy.”

  The priestess muttered something which Taroniah decided was a simple spell of some type and not one that was inimical so she ignored it. A look of surprise appeared on the priestess’s face. She took a step back.

  “You are powerful for one so young.”

  Taroniah nodded.

  “Yes. Which was why I sought guidance from the goddess.” She decided it was time to get back to Harkon, so she bowed to the priestess. “I have other tasks perform this afternoon so I will be leaving now.”

  The priestess considered her for a moment, then nodded slightly.

  Taroniah turned on her heel and left the temple. She headed for the smithy, where she sought the permission of big Harkon the blacksmith to watch him work as she had an idea.

  “An idea, young lady?” He laughed. He had made her a sword a couple of years ago which she had been unable to turn into a magical sword, but she had an idea.

  “Yes, big man. I won’t trouble you today if you let me watch for a while and also think on a price for a new sword, one I will help you forge.”

  Harkon looked at her for a moment but then nodded and went back to his work. She watched for a while and thought her idea had some chance of succeeding. After some time, her stomach started complaining so she headed to the inn where the food was good. Jenna and Jek were just leaving, ready to head back to the school. They were surprised she was just heading in to get something to eat as it was getting fairly late in the day.

  “Don’t take too long, Taroniah.” Jenna said. “You need to get back to school before the night monsters come out.”

  “Ha. They’re just old wives’ tales.” She grinned and headed into the inn. The food was as good as usual, not fancy but different from the school fare so it made a nice change. The innkeeper looked worried as she left, admonishing her to hurry back to school.

  She waved and headed up the road out of town towards the Academy. As she traipsed up the road, she thought over the strange business in the temple. Why was she so powerful? Why had no one else been able to duplicate the targeted arrows of Kern Mentone? And while her sword idea was not fully viable, she was almost certain she was on the right track. If so, they would produce the first magical sword to be made in two thousand years.

  But it didn’t seem that hard to her.

  Was it perhaps that all the powerful sorcerers had been killed in the Great War and it had taken this long for a new generation of powerful sorcerers to arise? Well, one powerful sorcerer. She grinned. It was very strange. None of her teachers were anywhere near as powerful as she was. She wasn’t entirely sure about the Lord of Magic, though she rather suspected he wasn’t much more powerful than any of the other academics at the school.

  She thought of the court magician at home and realised that he probably wasn’t as powerful as most of the lecturers here. She hadn’t considered that aspect before. The lack of knowledge was perhaps a large part as well. It would be hard to be a powerful sorcerer if you had no idea of how to go about it.

  Which brought her back to Kern Mentone, and the arrows that never missed. Yes, it had taken her some months of thought, planning, and writing out innumerable versions of the spell before she was happy with the version she had finally used. But, in all the centuries since the Great War, was there no one else that had been able to think up the same spell?

  Apparently not.

  It was completely dark as she neared the Academy gate. She was sure something was moving parallel to her in the scrub off the trail to her right. Tales of night monsters ran around inside her head and she was starting to feel a little nervous. Then she slapped herself, mentally. She conceptualized another spell she had been working on for months and which she had only tested slightly but was sure would work. She thought, All right, night monster, come on out and we’ll see who the monster is!

  Having the spell ready made her feel much better, and she picked her way along the road far more relaxed despite the darkness. The movement to her right seemed to speed up and angle in towards the road as if it was trying to get ahead of her. I’m ready for you, she thought. She actually saw the bushes beside her move as something passed through them and onto the road, She heard a hissing sound.

  There was some sort of beast standing in the road. It had a strange glow, and she realised with a start that it was some sort of magical beast!

  Well, doh! she thought. Everyone said the night monsters were magical. She put one foot forward and raised her arm for spellcasting with power.

  “Piss off or die!” she commanded. Not that the thing would understand her words, except, well, it was magical.

  It hunkered down like a cat preparing to pounce while the magical glow intensified. She had never seen a magical glow on a living thing other than a fellow human before, only on objects i
n class that had been magically impregnated. Hmmm.

  Right, it was going to pounce.

  “Piss off!” she yelled and threw the spell.

  She had only half-tested it in a small way, but although untested she was sure her spell would work. What she hadn’t expected was how it would work.

  Her small experiment had resulted in a small pile of leaves bursting into flame like someone had doused them in oil and then dropped a lighted taper on them. There had been a sort of soft puff; a hot air halo had formed around the leaves; and then, the leaves burst into flame and started burning like, well, leaves. All very unexciting, and not really like the firestorm spells spoken of in stories. Still, she at least knew she could set things alight. It was something that wasn’t in the list of spells available to be learnt at the Academy, let alone amongst the small sub-set of spells that were actually taught.

  Her previous small test meant she was totally unprepared for the rather different effect of the spell when thrown, hard, with her very strong magical ability. The beast literally burst into flame, incredibly hot flame, that lasted maybe three or four seconds before the beast was reduced to ashes and the flames subsided and went out. Parts of the woods and bushes behind where the beast had stood were also smouldering, although they soon went out as they hadn’t really caught fire because she had concentrated the spell on the beast.

  Taroniah sank down on the ground, sitting cross-legged, and contemplated instant incineration. Shit! She had modified the spell to affect only the beast but she had put too much into it not expecting it to work so well. She felt quite drained, and doubted she could throw it again for a good while, or any other major spells for that matter!

  Right, up and at them, uppity Royal female bastard, she thought. She stood up and immediately saw stars before her head cleared. She wobbled around the charred patch of ground where there were just a few ashes to show where the beast had stood and headed unsteadily up the road.