by D. R. Rosier
I considered that earth mages would find it easy to keep it looking new and unblemished. The shape of the building was rectangular, perhaps forty feet wide and three times that in length, perhaps a little longer.
We walked into the front door into a large center room. There was a desk toward the back of the room with an opening in the wall behind it where I could see stairs. There was an open doorway to the left and the right that led to hallways. There was a man behind the desk in his middle years, perhaps forty, his hair was showing the beginning of graying and he had an impatient look on his face as we took a quick look around the room.
The man said in a bored voice, “Who are you, and why are you here?”
So much for expecting us, or perhaps the games have already started.
I introduced us all, “I’m Marcus, and I was sent here by the mayor in Cliff’s Edge to be trained. This is my wife Sienna, and this is Ari who is also here for training and other matters. Who are you?”
I had spoken politely but he didn’t return the favor, “I’m Jonathan, the administrator of this facility. I’m responsible for assigning rooms, schedules, and a variety of other jobs. I had been expecting you and Ari, but not your wife.”
He looked annoyed and peered at us like we were distasteful, “New trainees are usually discouraged from bringing someone along until they reach a certain level of competence.”
He frowned, “But seeing that you are not an eighteen year old who is away from home the first time, and she is actually your wife, I’ll see what I can do. For now though, you are assigned to a smaller one person room. I don’t have anything else available.”
He smirked at me as if waiting for me to react badly. This was clearly an attempt to put me in my place for the trouble I’d caused and the fact they hadn’t managed to kill me. I wanted to know badly who had put him up to it. That is, if I wasn’t reading into it too much, it seems to me most kings get paranoid about treason, hadn’t he questioned his mages?
His face fell when I simply nodded.
He turned to Ari and said, “Welcome, we have a one person room for you as well, I take it that won’t be a problem?”
She spoke so coldly I had to suppress a smile, “No, who am I to object if you decide to stick an Elven representative and the man that exposed treasonous mages and risked his life to save the second largest city in your kingdom inside a tiny room.”
I almost felt sorry for him as he froze there. He seemed to recover after a while and stood.
“I will look into the matter, but I only have so much space to work with.”
He led us over by the door and pointed at another building.
His voice had changed to instructive, “Breakfast is served over in that building at dawn. Lunchtime is at noon and dinner right before sunset.”
He pointed at a small building and said, “The baths are located in that building, they are reserved for us immediately after breakfast. You are not barred from using them at other times, but you will need to share with the common soldiers. They are segregated by sex.”
He waved negligently to the hallway on the left, “There are two morning classes for elemental affinities. One for beginners and one advanced. I understand Ari will be excused from these.”
He pointed to the right, “There are also two rooms for spell training in the afternoon, one is the library where the lectures will happen, the room across it is warded to prevent accidents and will be the only place where the spells will be practiced. Is that clear?”
I told him, “I understand, but Ari has been training me in the Elven way of elemental affinity magic. She will be continuing on with my training in that area. Who do I need to speak with to make that happen?”
He grumbled and then said, “That is supposed to be impossible. You must take it up with our affinities instructor in your first class. It will be up to him, I’m sure he will test your competence and he must sign off on any such thing.”
I asked, “Do you know how long it usually takes for the training.”
He sighed and looked at me, seeming to measure me, “It is different from person to person. Affinity training usually only takes a month or two to become competent enough to practice on your own. Spell craft can take from six months to a couple of years. Mostly due to the need to learn a specific language. Any other questions?”
He made it clear he really didn’t want to hear any. When we remained silent he turned and started walking back toward his desk.
He almost growled, “Follow me, you can take the day to get settled in and look around, but please do not disturb the afternoon spell training.”
He led us around the desk and up the stairs. There was a long hallway that ran the length of the building. He took us down the hallway to the left and showed us two rooms across from each other.
He said, “Do not enter anyone’s rooms but your own without permission, they are warded against intrusion and it will not go well with you. Good luck.”
I don’t think he really meant that last bit; we stood there until he started down the stairs. Sienna and I went into our room. There wasn’t much there, but it was larger than I had expected for a single occupant. It was only about eight feet wide, but it ran twelve feet deep to a window. There was a fairly large bed, a wardrobe and chest.
I sighed, could have been worse. We took the time to invite Ari in, and she did the same for us. We all headed to the bath to get the road dirt and smell of horses off of us. There were soldiers in there, but they just ignored me. I smiled when Sienna and Ari came out. They were both in dresses and looked really good. I gave Ari a questioning look as her face was bared.
She winked as no one was around at the moment, “On the road hiding my face and hair from the gawking of commoners is one thing, but I can’t do that here among our… peers?”
Well great, now I’d have to suppress the urge to kill people all day when they stared.
We went back to the room and discussed the situation but came up with nothing better than a wait and see attitude.
I said, “Going to try that travel thing, if it works you can do your training easier.”
She looked dubious as I stood up. I didn’t think of any preconceived notions from Earth, such as teleportation or folding space. I just fed a large stream of magic to my air elemental and thought of the grassy hill where we had broken camp this morning and the desire to be there now. In other words I’d let my elemental figure out how to do it. I didn’t think it was much of a risk, it would either work, or I’d run low on magic and abandon the idea.
I thought it was a failure when my magic kept streaming out and gave myself a cutoff at halfway. But I didn’t get that far down, in fact when I got close to a quarter empty something happened and I cut off the feed of magic. I was surrounded by an elemental wind, the same kind that my elemental used to tear apart other magic.
This time though it surrounded and enveloped me and the room kind of… faded away.
I found myself surrounded by nothing, except I was being buffeted by air. It was… alien. There was a light, but it was diffuse and looked exactly the same everywhere. I looked around and started to make out eddies of air and some large twisters in the distance. There also seemed to be few sprites around. The wind was pushing hard against my back as well, but I couldn’t tell how fast I was going because there were no fixed points of reference, it was all air.
There was one problem, it was elemental air and I couldn’t breathe.
At one minute it was just uncomfortable. At two minutes my lungs were twitching. At three minutes I was getting desperate and feeling dizzy. The irony that I was suffocating in the dimension of elemental air was not lost on me. Finally at four minutes I saw the hilltop from this morning slowly fade into being. I collapsed to my knees and desperately gulped at the sweet air around me.
My head cleared after a few minutes and I sat back and considered. I estimated the hill was twenty miles away from the city and it had taken me four minutes to get here. Not im
mediate, but that meant I was moving around three hundred miles an hour.
For Ari’s morning workouts, and leaving the city for mental health, it would take about thirty seconds to go two miles. Still, holding my breath had been… unpleasant. I also thought that the magic price was probably more for transitioning the planes. I imagined pushing me any distance in my elemental’s dimension wouldn’t cost much magic wise.
I changed my thoughts a little, adding the idea to take enough normal air for me to breath for the trip. I didn’t bother with the stream method, just grabbed an eighth of my magic and quickly sent it with the thought of my room and the elemental wind spun and surrounded me. This second trip was much better, I could breathe just fine.
I was able to study my surroundings better; it really was a bit disorientating. No gravity, no up or down, no land, water, or fire. Just elemental wind currents as far as the eye could see. The sprites and wind formations were the only thing that broke up the monotony of it.
Before I knew it, I appeared in my room between two angry and concerned women.
They both hugged me fiercely, which was much better than the scolding and hitting.
I asked, “What’s wrong? It worked fairly well; I worked out the bugs for the second trip.”
Ari growled, which was… disturbingly sexy.
She said a little on edge, “I couldn’t scry you for just over four minutes after you simply disappeared, it scared us. Then I saw you collapse on the hill and knew something was wrong. Then you did it again!”
I suppressed my smile due to my enhanced will to live.
“The elemental took me to its own plane of existence to move me quickly. That first time I didn’t specify an air supply so I was a little light headed when I arrived. It cost about an eighth of my magic, wouldn’t that be worth it to escape the city twice a day?”
She shuddered, “That made the feeling worse; I knew you risked it for me. Still, using a quarter of my magic first thing every morning might be too high a cost.”
I kissed her, and Sienna who looked worried too.
“An eighth, I’ll be going with you so we each only need cast the spell one way.”
She blushed, “Of course you will,” she spoke softly as if in amazement.
Women were so confusing sometimes.
I spent the next few minutes describing the spell. She tried it, just going to her room, and took me along with her just to test that part of it. We walked back across the hall to Sienna.
She muttered, “I wonder why no one has done it before.”
I shrugged, “Humans don’t use elementals. I doubt I’d know where to begin to do it for myself. The concept is far from understanding exactly how it works. Even if I understood it, I don’t think I could find the destination on my own. It would be impossible to figure out where in the vastness of nothing but air corresponded to my target spot in our world.
“Elves from what you’ve told me don’t like to leave home, so quick distance travel just probably never occurred to you without a need for it. I also have many years of reading science fiction and fact on my world and I am sure that made a difference.”
She nodded thoughtfully.
There was a knock on the door. I went and opened it. There was a tall man around thirty in blue robes, and a short woman with short spiky dark hair in a white robe.
The woman said looking unsure, “I’m Erin, royal healer… This is Reed, royal mage and guard of his majesty. Is the princess in here? I know she came in with you and there was no answer at her door…”
Princess?
I heard Ari sigh very softly, then say evenly, “I am here, and though my uncle is the head of my tribe I am not a princess, please call me Ari.”
Reed said in an oily voice, “Of course Ari, there has been a mix up somewhere. The king would like to invite you to dinner to discuss your stay and any mutual goals as it pertains to the treaty. He also has more… suitable rooms in the castle for a lady of your importance.”
Ari looked at me, her face was marble with strangers here, but I could see in her eyes she was nervous about separating, but she had no choice, it was why she was here after all.
She replied, “I’d be pleased to share dinner with the king but I must turn down the kind offer of rooms in the castle. Part of the reason I am here after all is to attend this academy and get to know the future rulers of Cirenthia, I can hardly do that if I closet myself away when not in a training session.”
I felt a little relief at that. It was all normal sounding and expected. I had been a little surprised at her almost anonymous reception earlier. Still, I couldn’t help but feel like divide and conquer was in play here, and I certainly didn’t like the way Reed’s eyes were feasting over her body.
Ari whispered, “I will see you later, after dinner, be watchful.”
I wanted to kiss her, but I knew she wouldn’t thank me for that. Not in front of strangers, showing them that connection would be showing weakness in her eyes.
Ari walked out and deliberately put Erin between herself and Reed. Ari started talking to her as they moved away but I couldn’t hear about what. I shut the door and Sienna and I sat together on the bed.
Sienna asked, “Think she will be okay?”
I nodded, “I think so, but I can keep an eye on her to be sure. How about you? I was expecting other wives to be around but I haven’t seen anyone else.”
She shrugged, “I’ll go into the city tomorrow while you’re in training, buy some things to warm up the room. Don’t worry, I’ll figure things out. The important thing is us, and our time here is just temporary.”
She grinned, “You could always teach me to wield a sword. I’ll certainly have the time to practice.”
I pondered that for a moment. I didn’t want her that close to an enemy, but better she knew how just in case.
I held her hand, “We can start on that. I want to teach you a lighter sword technique though, because you’ll never be able to overpower a man with hard strokes and blocks in the style I fight. Your best bet will be a lighter sword, speed, dodging and parrying. When you go shopping tomorrow pick up a saber or the like, and if you can find one, a wooden one to start practicing with.”
She kissed me, “Are you sure you don’t mind?”
I frowned, “I will always mind if you put yourself in danger, but I know I can’t change who you are or lock you in a box to keep you safe. So all I can do is compromise, we will keep each other safe. I only want you to do it if you want to though; I hope you don’t feel like you have to?”
She shook her head, “No… I do want to. You have a way of making me believe in myself, I feel like I can do anything.”
She moved and straddled me, resting her forearms on my shoulder she started to massage my hair and the back of my neck. She kissed me passionately and moaned into my mouth. She rubbed her generous breasts against my chest and rubbed her body against mine. I could feel myself respond as she rocked her ass forward, brushing against me.
She broke the kiss and ordered breathlessly, “I’ll have to insist you perform your husbandly duties.”
I sighed in mock regret, “If I must wife,” the corners of my mouth betrayed me.
She chuckled throatily as she stripped my shirt up and over my head before she reclaimed my mouth hungrily. Her hands felt good as they roamed my chest and then she pushed me onto my back breaking our kiss. She reached down and fished my now hard cock out of my breeches. She smiled in satisfaction, her eyes rolling up in pleasure, as she pulled up the bottom of her dress around her waist and started running her labia along my hardened length.
It was a wonderful afternoon that passed in pleasure as she required my husbandly duties until dinnertime…
Chapter 20
When we got to dinner, we joined the mage students; there I go thinking in school terms again, at a large table with no soldiers. There were currently four students, or trainees, there, along with three older adults who I assumed were instructors of some kind.
I wondered if there were others or if not, how seven other people had filled up all the larger rooms. Perhaps the instructors had huge suites on the other side.
There three instructors were Maggie, Stella, and Carl.
Maggie was the head instructor and gave the stamp of approval on training and if someone had earned their robes. She was in her late thirties and looked to take a no nonsense approach to other people.
Stella was the youngest, still in her twenties, and taught spell craft. She had a ready smile and seemed happy to meet me; even more importantly she treated Sienna like a real person, not a commoner beneath her notice.
Carl was also in his thirties, and he was in charge of training affinities. He was very arrogant and I disliked him almost immediately.
Carl had said, “So I hear you trained with the Elf woman on the way here? That you actually figured out how to do it their way?”
He snorted in contempt, “Elven magic is inferior, what is the point of it if you can’t actually control the elements directly? I will test your competence tomorrow to see where we are yes?”
It was annoying as he continued a diatribe to explain how the Elves were basically backward and stupid. The only good thing was I wouldn’t be stuck in his class for long.
The four trainees were Thomas, Sally, Steven, and Penny. They were all just eighteen or nineteen, barely adults.
Thomas was the tall handsome and very spoiled type. He didn’t talk much, at least not at the dinner, but I learned a lot about him from his arrogant expressions and dismissive posture.
Sally was absolutely gorgeous. She had stunning bright red hair and emerald green eyes. She flirted with me on and off throughout the meal. Still, I had the feeling of being hunted, she was a flirt and her speech was light, but she was not a nice person. I had the idea she liked to chew men up, shape them how she wanted and then spit them out. I was polite but distant.
Steven seemed to be the nicest of them, though he was mostly silent. He seemed shy and mostly just studied the people around him.