“Hmmm,” Shad said. “That was interesting. Why don’t you try shifting into a wolf?”
Shad did it from his sitting position, a slow transition that was fascinating to watch. Ember enjoyed seeing the shift from one form to another, and once Shad the wolf sprawled on the floor, tongue lolling, she tried it as well. She focused on her face.
Nothing happened.
She tried to make fur grow.
Nothing happened.
It wasn’t until the frustration built and she yelled at herself that the shift happened, all at once, just like it had at the field when she was attacked—and oh, did it hurt. Ember lay on the floor, panting and whining with the pain for a long moment before she could gather her paws beneath her and shake herself.
Shad mindspoke. “When you shift back to human, make your tunic white again. Change now.”
Ember was stunned. Shad had never made her shift back and forth so quickly before. She gathered her energy and shifted, her white tunic appearing out of her fur. Shad changed at the same time and sat back down, waiting for her to finish. When Ember was fully clothed, he started to ask her questions.
“What do you feel when you shift?” he asked
“Pain,” she said, wiping the sweat from her brow and trying to readjust herself so the spot where her tail had been a moment before didn’t hurt any longer.
“I know that,” he said. “Emotionally. What do you feel when you shift?”
Ember had to stop to think about it. When she’d been attacked, she’d been afraid. Training with Shad, she felt frustrated. In the caves when Ian had kidnapped her, it had been desperate fear. She expressed all this, and Shad nodded his head sagely.
“Emotion is your trigger,” he said, as if that made all the sense in the world.
“Huh?” was Ember’s literate response.
“You change when you feel strong emotion. How about today, when you turned the seedling into a bush? What did you feel?”
Ember described the frustration of not being able to breach the wall of magic around the plant, and how that feeling had grown until she touched the leaf.
“Ahhhh,” he said. “Emotion is the trigger, touch is the catalyst. Do you understand what I’m saying, Ember?”
She shook her head.
“When you feel strong emotion, it activates your magic, lets you access it somehow. When you touch things, it releases the magic you’ve built. Emotion and touch. You’d think you were a water mage and physical mage, with the catalysts you’ve got. Water magi use emotion to access their magic. Physical magi use touch, just like your da did. You are going to have to work on controlling your emotions and using touch before the emotion gets too strong. That’s why things happen so fast. It’s like you’ve built up this dam of water and then you take the wall down all at once. You need to be more like a faucet. Can you do that?”
“I don’t know, Uncle,” Ember said, surprised at his evaluation and realizing he was right. She felt the truth of it deep in her soul. “I can try.”
“Good,” he said, patting her on the shoulder, then pulling both of them to their feet at once. “Lessons are over for now. How would you like to go see DeMunth? It’s lunch time. I’ll bet they’d let you feed him, if you want. We can feed you too. You’ve used a lot of energy and you need to eat.”
Ember hadn’t heard anything better all day.
The healing hall was farther away than Ember thought. She’d imagined it being more in the heart of the building, where the action was, but they had to travel through two portals to get there, different from the ones they’d come through originally. The portals were evidently scattered throughout the caves.
The healing halls were quiet. Whispered voices only existed there, and the smell of some kind of soupy lunch wafted from the area. Shad led Ember into a room that held many people, but to the left lay one that drew her like a magnet—a body still unmoving and barely breathing. Ember felt the draw, nearly shaking at being so near to DeMunth and the fear of losing him. The bonds between them were strong. She didn’t know why, but she wasn’t going to question it. Her uncle stepped to the side to visit with a nurse, who glanced at Ember with a smile.
Ember turned and headed toward DeMunth when Shad stopped her and handed her a bowl of soup. “Eat now,” he demanded. Ember’s belly growled. She didn’t even use a spoon—she drank the soup straight from the bowl, her stomach barely starting to calm when she was done, but it was enough to take the edge off her hunger. Shad then handed her another bowl with a silver spoon and nodded toward DeMunth. “Now’s your chance to take care of him, pup. I’m going to leave you for a bit. Call my name in your head when you’re ready to go, all right?”
Ember nodded and didn’t even wait for him to go. She took the bowl and spoon and walked across the room to DeMunth’s side. She barely registered when Shad left. Still shaking and trying not to spill the soup, she sat on the chair at the side of DeMunth’s bed. Unsure what to do, she began to feed him. She spilled a little of the broth on his chest and sopped it up quickly with the blanket. She had to do something to get her mind off of his condition and decided talking to him as if he were awake was her only option.
“Hi, DeMunth. It’s me, Ember. You’re supposed to be my guard, you know, and believe me, I could have used some guarding today. You should have seen what I did.” She told him everything that had happened, all the while dribbling soup into his partially open mouth. When he seemed to respond, she put the spoon in his mouth.
He bit down and Ember felt a moment of panic when he wouldn’t let go. She was afraid he would break his teeth. She pulled and prodded gently and finally he released it, but when Ember pulled the spoon from his mouth, the bowl end was missing. It seemed impossible, but DeMunth had just bitten through metal, and not just any metal, but precious silver. She was terrified that he would choke to death on it. But how in the world were his teeth that strong? She was afraid to stick her fingers in his mouth—if he could bite the end from a spoon, he could bite her finger off—but she didn’t want him choking, either. She pulled his jaw down with a rolled piece of blanket and called one of the magelights to shine in his open mouth—but what she found was not at all what she expected.
The silver of the spoon had melted and pooled in his mouth like mercury, but instead of blocking his airway or falling to the back of his throat, it was attaching itself in threads to the base of his tongue. It built up silver nerves, blood vessels, and muscle fibers—even a few silver taste buds popped up on the top of his tongue. Ember froze, staring into his mouth for a long moment, her heart racing with the shock and strangeness of it. She was horrified and fascinated at the same time. How could this happen? What was causing it? Then excitement took over and, feeling only slightly guilty, she put the end of the handle into his mouth to see what would happen.
As the silver handle touched DeMunth’s tongue, it melted like chocolate, continuing to pool around the silver bud, then adding more to the mass his tongue should be. She gasped as the light of his armor flared up, then something connected in her head. The problem with DeMunth’s armor had something to do with his tongue—or lack of one. It sounded ridiculous, but somehow she knew it to be true. Maybe she could help him after all.
Ember set the soup aside and went to the healer’s station to grab more spoons, taking them right off the lunch trays, not even caring that the healers would have to find more. She found a couple of forks tucked in a drawer, and with her hands full of silverware, she went back to DeMunth’s side and put the utensils in his mouth one piece at a time, watching as his tongue grew, now formed from silver.
She watched in fascination as the Armor that had begun as a breastplate and grown to cover his shoulders and thighs, burst to life with a bright yellow light and pooled over his body like honey. His tongue was not the only thing growing. Ember’s heart raced. She had been right. The armor rolled downward until it covered his feet, then upward until his head was encased in crystalline armor.
Then the it
began to change, firming up, creating angles on his chest and down his arms. His headpiece gained a visor and a sharp angle from forehead to the back of his neck. He gained gloves and greaves, knee guards and boots. It was lovely armor, made more lovely because it encased DeMunth’s body.
And then it faded into his skin, just like Ember’s bracelets had when Ezeker gave them to her. When the color faded completely away, he breathed deeply and his eyelids fluttered. Ember tried to give him another spoon, but he pursed his lips and turned his head, rejecting it. Evidently he had what he needed. Ember set the spoons on the side table and clasped her hands, trying to calm the shaking now that the deed was done. She picked up the cold bowl of broth and dribbled just a little into his mouth. He smacked his lips, then raised his head for more.
Ember’s heart thrilled. He stretched, yawning, his mouth open wide and his silver tongue bright and shiny for all to see. It moved just like a real tongue, fascinating Ember. A silver tongue that moved like a human one. This had to be the work of the Guardians. What other reason could there be?
DeMunth sighed, then settled into the deep, healing kind of sleep, and he was going to be oblivious for a while still. Full of relief and excitement, she stood, the stool scraping the floor behind her, then she impulsively leaned over and kissed him in the middle of his forehead and stroked his hair back. She just couldn’t seem to help herself. The connection between them was something she’d never known before.
All of a sudden, she wondered how old he was. She’d never asked him. He didn’t look old—older than her, yes, but only by five or six years, ten at the most. Very young to be sitting on the council, but there was a wisdom about him that was rare even in people much older than he. She determined to find out when he awoke. She was positive that he would awaken. There was no doubt.
Knowing there was nothing more she could do at the moment, Ember decided to address another of her other problems. She turned as one of the healers came through the door near DeMunth’s bed. “Excuse me, could you tell me where to find the library?”
The woman barely glanced at her as she went to tend another patient. “Certainly. It’s at the center of the school. Go toward the dining hall, but instead of turning left, turn right, follow the hall to the end, and enter the double doors. Talk to Master Earl. He’ll help you find whatever you need.”
“Thank you,” Ember said, but the woman seemed to have already forgotten her as she cared for her patients. Instead of feeling bothered by it, Ember turned on her heel and exited the healing hall, and following the directions, found the library in a matter of minutes. The double doors were solid wood, and though heavy, they swung easily as she entered. Uncle Shad had helped her understand herself a bit, but if she could find a training manual or a journal from an ancient white mage, she might be able to figure out how to do this magic thing.
Hopeful and anxious, she walked across the gigantic room to a large stone desk where a spectacle-wearing man sat, a magelight hovering over his shoulder as he read an ancient scroll.
Ember cleared her throat. “Excuse me.”
The man looked up, one eyebrow quirked in an unspoken question.
“Are you Master Earl?” she asked.
He nodded.
“And you are the head librarian?” she asked again. It was hard not to fidget under his gaze.
He nodded once again.
Ember was starting to wonder if his tongue was missing, like DeMunth’s. “I was told you were the person to talk to—I’m looking for some information on white magi.”
Now both eyebrows went up. The man leaned back in his chair and really looked at her. “You are the new white mage.” he said in a much deeper voice that she would have thought could come from his small frame.
“Yes, sir. Is anything here that belonged to a white mage? A journal, perhaps?” For some reason, this man scared her a bit. How could someone so slight give off such a feeling of power as to make her squirm?
“Don’t you think we would have something like that ready for you, if we knew of it? It’s possible there is something within these hallowed shelves, but this library is so old and unorganized, if it’s there, I have no knowledge of it.” He leaned forward and peered into her eyes. “You could search through these halls a thousand years and not find what you’re looking for.”
“If they are so hallowed, why are they unorganized?” she asked before she could think.
He stiffened. “Not all of the Head Librarians have treated these shelves as respectfully as they should. I, on the other hand, find value in the words of our ancestors.”
She’d obviously angered him, though she hadn’t meant to. Taking on a humble posture and tone, she asked, “Well, would you mind if I try?”
The man pursed his lips and cocked his head, looking her up and down, assessing her in his own way. “Why don’t you talk to Tyese and see if she can help you? If anyone can, she’d be the one.” He gestured with his head to the girl sitting behind him. She was hunched over a desk, scribbling in her little book. At that moment, a scroll flew over Ember’s head and directly into Master Earl’s hand. He grunted, then unrolled it and went back to his studies, completely ignoring Ember. She could see why they stuck him in the library. He seemed more content with his books and scrolls than people.
She walked past him, her footsteps echoing off the stone walls, though Tyese didn’t seem to notice her. Ember stood and watched the girl’s handiwork for a moment, now that she could see down the long lengths of shelves to what was happening. Books and scrolls flew from one shelf to another, several soaring over the bookcases at one time. How the girl managed to juggle so many at once, Ember didn’t know, though she wanted to. She felt a kinship this silent, redheaded child.
Ember spoke, softly, so as not to startle the girl, though she still jumped the sound. “How do you do that?”
Tyese stilled, but she didn’t answer.
Ember remembered what Ren and Lily had said about her that morning. Instead of getting frustrated, she took a chair from the wall and pulled it up to Tyese’s desk. She watched her go back to her drawings and list writing for a long moment before she spoke again, this time waiting for the girl to pause before she interrupted her.
“You know, it’s kind of hard being the new one here and having a gift that nobody understands,” Ember said in a near whisper, looking down. “I’ve got this gift, see. I’m the first white mage in three thousand years, which is amazing. I mean, it’s wonderful that I can help heal the world, but I’ve got a problem. It’s been so long since there was a white mage, nobody knows how to teach me. I’m not sure what to do.” Ember stopped talking and hoped Tyese would respond to her plea.
It worked.
“What do you need from me?” Tyese said in a sweet, but still guarded, voice.
“I wondered if you could find a journal or something that belonged to a white mage. Anything that might give me some understanding or control of my powers. Do you think you can help?”
Tyese looked up from beneath her curtain of red hair and met Ember’s eye. “I can try.” She was quiet for a moment, then said, “I know how that feels, you know. Not fitting in. Being different. It’s hard.” She sighed.
“Yes, it is.” Ember joined her with a sigh of her own.
“I’ve learned that most of the time, you just have to figure it out as you go. I know it’s frustrating, but trial and error is the best way to see what you can do. At least, that’s the way it was for me, though I think being a white mage and messing up would cause a lot more damage than a few dropped books.” She glanced at Ember again, a smile playing about her lips. She had a charming smile. She should let it out more.
Ember remembered her adventures in class that morning and knew Tyese was right. She needed to practice, but she was going to have to be sure it was in the shielded rooms so nobody got hurt again. She couldn’t stand it if her power ended up hurting anyone else. Or worse—killing them.
“I’ll help you. I can’t promise any
thing, but I’ll see what I can find,” Tyese said, looking shyly down at her book. Ember glanced at her hand, smeared with graphite and ink in the nails and the side of her palm. Such a big job for such a little girl, but Ember was thankful, nonetheless.
“Thank you, Tyese,” Ember said. “Is there anything I can do for you in return?”
Tyese bit the inside of her cheek and glanced hesitantly up at Ember. “Do you think you could come visit me again?”
Ember smiled at her and took a chance. She reached out and gave the girl a gentle one-armed hug. “I’d be happy to.”
Tyese gave her a full smile at that, and Ember was dazzled. If only this girl could see herself the way others saw her. Ember decided to help her. She needed to know what a gift she was, not only to the school, but to the people within it.
With nothing more to be done or said, Ember gave Tyese one more hug and said her good-byes, then left without a word to Master Earl.
She stopped at the dining hall on her way to her room. She had spent more time with DeMunth and Tyese than she’d realized. Dinner had come and gone, but there was still food to be had. She took a plate and packed it with as much as she could. When she got to the end of the line, she asked one of the kitchen workers if she could take the plate back to her room.
“So long as you bring the dishes back in the morning, that should be fine,” the woman said with a wink, handing her a silver fork. Ember looked at the fork as she walked down the hall, remembering the metal pooling in DeMunth’s mouth to create a new tongue. Oh, was he going to be surprised when he woke up. And with that thought, she walked through the curtains to her room and sat down to eat her dinner before going to bed. She’d never been so exhausted in her life.
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