Restless

by Scott Prussing

  At the start of their nearly two hour trip, she had peppered Dominic with questions about why they needed to travel so far from Middletown today to practice, but the wizard had kept his reasons to himself. Realizing she wouldn’t get anything from him, she had dropped the subject. Dominic had spent most of the ride quietly lost in thought, his eyelids half-closed. Leesa hadn’t really minded, but now that they were here her curiosity was growing again.

  She pulled into an empty spot near the back of the lot. She had barely stopped the car when she saw Rave striding toward them. The sight of him made her smile, as usual. He would have been here a few hours already, she knew, having headed here directly after leaving the apartment last night. She quickly climbed out of the car and hurried into his outstretched arms.

  “Good morning,” she said, lifting her chin so she could look up into his face.

  Rave kissed her forehead. “It is now.”

  Dominic came around the car and nodded to Rave. Without saying anything, he turned and headed toward a dirt path that led into the trees. Holding hands, Leesa and Rave fell into step behind him.

  They walked almost half a mile into the woods, following the trail most of the way, then picking their way through the trees and brush for the last hundred yards.

  With every step, Leesa’s curiosity mounted, wondering what Dominic had in store for her today. When they had first begun practicing her magic he had been extra careful, taking her to all sorts of places far from home because he didn’t know if his enemies would be able to detect her magic. He knew now, though, that the black waziri were unable to sense the use of any of her powers, even active magic. So why the need to come all the way back here now? She guessed she would find out soon enough.

  Finally, Dominic stopped in an area where the larger trees grew farther apart than elsewhere. It couldn’t properly be called a clearing—there was too much underbrush for that—but it was more open than any spot they had passed through since leaving the trail. Leesa glanced around. She couldn’t see more than thirty or forty yards in any direction—she should be able to practice her magic here unseen and uninterrupted.

  “Warm up with some easy spells,” Dominic told her. He leaned his back against the trunk of a thick tree and let his eyelids fall half closed once more.

  Leesa decided that if Dominic wasn’t going to watch, she might as well entertain Rave.

  “Illuminati verdus,” she said, picturing a blue orb of light on her hand. The glowing sphere that immediately appeared floating above her palm was not as bright as the golden ones she usually produced, but it was more fitting for Rave.

  Rave smiled at the blue color, and Leesa continued on with her favorite illumination trick, making the light jump from hand to hand.

  Rave’s smile widened. He held his own hands out wide and made blue flames flicker from his right hand and then his left. His display was even more impressive than Leesa’s, because he used five individual tongues of flame, rather than a mere sphere of light.

  Leesa grinned. “Pretty good, mister—but can you do this?”

  Using her telekinesis, she broke an inch thick dead branch off a nearby tree and lowered it slowly until it was floating at eye level in front of them.

  Rave bent his legs and sprang upward, alighting on a branch at least twenty feet off the ground. He snapped a thick branch as if it was a twig, then leaped easily back to earth and held his branch out parallel to Leesa’s.

  She laughed, loving it when Rave was playful like this. She tried to think of what to do next. She considered levitating herself higher than Rave had jumped, but floating slowly upward would not have the same dramatic effect as Rave’s quick leap.

  Before she could come up with a suitable follow-up, Dominic spoke.

  “I think you two have had enough fun for now,” he said. “Magic is not a toy.”

  The wizard’s smile showed he was more amused than upset. He pushed himself away from the tree and crossed over to Leesa.

  Reaching into his back pocket, he pulled out his magical wallet. He opened it and stuck his hand inside, his arm disappearing up to his elbow. When he withdrew his hand, he was holding a small, shiny knife. Before Leesa even had a chance to wonder what the blade was for, Dominic held out his other arm and sliced a three-inch long cut into the top of his forearm. A thin line of blood immediately appeared.

  “Heal me,” he said, nodding toward the slowly bleeding wound.

  It took Leesa a moment to recover from the shock of seeing Dominic cut himself. She forced herself to concentrate, trying to remember her recent lesson in healing. Rave looked on with interest.

  She placed her palm half an inch above the cut, picturing an image of Dominic’s forearm as it had looked before the wound appeared. She felt the familiar warmth emanate from her palm, but when she pulled her hand away she was disappointed to see a narrow red scab on Dominic’s skin. At least the bleeding had stopped, and the cut was no longer open.

  Dominic examined his arm. “What do you suppose happened?” he asked, ever the teacher.

  “I’m not sure,” Leesa replied.

  “Think about it,” Dominic prodded.

  Leesa thought hard. She wasn’t certain, but she had an idea.

  “I don’t think I fully got the image of the cut out of my mind,” she offered. “I was a still little bit shocked you did that yourself.”

  “You must try to never let yourself be shocked,” Dominic told her. “Where magic is involved, you never know what may happen. You cannot let surprise sidetrack you. With what lies ahead for us, being shocked could cost you your life.”

  Leesa nodded somberly. What the wizard said was true. Who knew what the Necromancer or his black waziri lieutenants might have planned? She had to be ready for anything. She promised herself she would be.

  “I know,” she said. “I’ll try not to let it happen again.”

  Dominic ran his knife blade along the scab on his forearm. The wound immediately resumed bleeding. He held his arm out to Leesa. The cut looked even deeper this time.

  “Try again,” he instructed.

  Leesa repeated the process, this time concentrating as hard as she could on picturing Dominic’s arm looking totally unblemished. When she pulled her hand away, only the faintest red line remained, like the leftover scar of a long ago wound. Leesa allowed herself a small smile. It still wasn’t perfect, but it was pretty darn good.

  Dominic nodded in approval. “Much better.”

  “When did you learn that?” Rave asked. He glanced down at Dominic’s arm and then back to Leesa. “I’ve never seen you do anything like it.”

  “Just the other day,” Leesa replied. “Cali was my unintended guinea pig, when she scraped her arm watching me practice my spells with Dominic.”

  Rave grinned, picturing Cali being magically healed. “I bet she loved that. She loves anything magic, but having it used on her must have been a special thrill.”

  “Yeah, she was kind of stoked,” Leesa said. “At least she was after my first try, which hurt her just a bit.”

  “No pain, no gain,” Rave said, still smiling. “Isn’t that something you humans say?”

  Leesa smiled back. “That we do. I think Cali much preferred the gain part, though.”

  “You are going to try something else new now,” Dominic said. “It is part of the reason I brought you here.”

  Leesa looked at the wizard expectantly. She was finally going to learn why they had driven all the way to New York.

  “You have done many different types of magic in these past months,” Dominic continued. “Enough so that I believe you are ready for this. I want you to turn your mind inward, to try to visualize the magical vibrations inside you. I need you to be able to see them. Begin with everywhere/nowhere and then focus your thoughts internally, recalling all the magic you know, but focusing on none of it.”

  Leesa pursed her lips in thought, trying to digest everything Dominic had just said. The concept was somewhat confusing—she had never
thought of her magic as being something she could actually see. Also, Dominic’s instructions sounded contradictory—to think about all the magic she knew, but not to concentrate on any of it. She had felt the same way back at the beginning of her training, though, when he had first described everywhere/nowhere to her. Now she could enter the relaxed but focused state with just a single thought. She hoped this would be similar.

  “I’m ready,” she said after a moment. “At least, I hope am.”

  “You can do this,” Dominic said encouragingly. “I have confidence in you.”

  Leesa closed her eyes and tried to turn her vision inward. She began recalling every single bit of magic she had ever used: telekinesis, dream magic, the plant growth spell, illumination, levitation, heat and cold resistance, energy beams, healing. She mentally flipped through them as if she was thumbing through the pages of a book, not stopping at any page. When she reached the end of her list, she returned to the beginning and did it all over again.

  Slowly, something began to change. An image came to her, vague and fuzzy at first, but growing steadily clearer. She saw an oblong sphere of pale yellow light, taller than it was wide. The outside edges were barely visible, but the glow grew brighter the deeper into it she looked. In the center, she saw a shining yellow ball about the size of a grapefruit. Somehow, she knew she was seeing the core of her power, a place she had yet to reach, but which was there waiting for her. The thought gave her great comfort.

  The entire oblong glow seemed to shimmer and pulsate, almost like a heartbeat, but not quite so regular. This was the special vibration of her magic, she knew. She felt her mind merging with the light, touching it, growing familiar with it.

  Finally, she opened her eyes. How long they had been closed she had no idea.

  “I did it!” she said excitedly. “I saw it.”

  “Tell me what you saw,” Dominic said.

  She described everything she had seen, everything she had thought, everything she had felt. With each sentence, the smile on Dominic’s face widened.

  “Perfect,” he said. “You did exactly what I wanted you to do.”

  She glanced at Rave, who was also smiling at her proudly.

  “I’m sorry it was yellow and not blue,” she said to him.

  Rave laughed. “Finding blue light inside you would be too much to hope for,” he joked.

  “Now for the true test,” Dominic said. He reached out and took both of Leesa’s hands in his. “I want you to try to use the same insight on me—try to visualize my magic.”

  Fresh from her success in picturing her own magic, Leesa was undaunted by this new task. She closed her eyes and tried to imagine that her mind’s eye was traveling down through her fingers and into Dominic’s strong hands.

  As before, the image came to her slowly, but it grew more distinct with every passing moment. The glow inside Dominic was lighter in color than hers, almost white rather than yellow. It pulsated far more vibrantly than hers, too. The longer she looked, the brighter it grew, until it surpassed the glow of her magic like a floodlight surpasses a simple light bulb. Such was the extent of his power, she knew. In the center of the shimmering light, she saw a core that burned almost white hot, although she felt little heat from it. It was almost too bright to look at.

  She opened her eyes and found Dominic staring intently into her face.

  “It worked!” she said. “I saw it all, just like mine—only a hundred times brighter and more alive.”

  “I know,” Dominic replied. “I could feel the presence of your magic inside me. You did exceedingly well—so well that my hopes for what I am about to attempt have grown several fold.”

  He looked at Rave. “I’m pretty sure we are alone, but will you make certain no one is anywhere nearby where they might stumble upon us? Or even spy us from a distance?”

  “Of course,” Rave replied.

  He turned and raced silently off into the trees. Even watching him go, Leesa was amazed at how quickly he disappeared from her sight. Few creatures moved as stealthily as a volkaane in hunting mode. She peered hard into the shadows, but could detect no movement at all. She had no idea which way Rave had turned to begin his search.

  Waiting for Rave’s return, Leesa’s curiosity about what Dominic had planned returned with a vengeance. First the two hour drive out here to practice, and now having Rave scout the woods to insure they were totally alone—Dominic clearly needed secrecy and privacy. She didn’t think it was going to involve him using active magic, because neither distance nor the thickest forest would prevent his renegade brethren from detecting its use.

  She did not have much time to ponder it, though, for Rave was back in just two or three minutes. Despite the brevity of his absence, Leesa knew he would have made a complete circle of their location.

  “We’re alone,” Rave told Dominic. “I made a pretty wide circuit. There’s no one within two hundred yards in any direction.”

  “Good,” Dominic replied, confident that if Rave said there was nobody around, then they were indeed alone. He held out his hands to Leesa. “Take my hands again.”

  Leesa did as she was bid, laying her fingers onto Dominic’s open palms. This time, she kept her eyes open, looking into the wizard’s grey eyes and waiting.

  She expected some kind of instruction from him, but he said nothing. Instead, he closed his fingers loosely around hers and met her gaze with a penetrating stare of his own.

  Leesa felt a faint tingle begin to crawl up her forearms, almost like a very mild electric current was passing from Dominic’s hands into hers. The feeling was not unpleasant at all. It moved slowly up her arms into her shoulders and then down through her torso. In less than a minute, she felt like her whole body was vibrating softly.

  If possible, Dominic’s stare seemed to become even more focused. The lower part of Leesa’s right leg began to grow warm. Suddenly, she felt a flash of intense heat just above her ankle, but it was gone before it could bring any pain. Dominic let go of her hands.

  “It is done,” he said.

  “What’s done?” Leesa asked. “What did you do?”

  Dominic held up a finger, silencing her.

  “Just a moment,” he said. He closed his eyes.

  Leesa recognized the look of intense concentration that etched itself into Dominic’s features. It lasted maybe ten seconds, and then the wizard opened his eyes. He smiled.

  “My part worked,” he said. “Now to see about your part.”

  “My part of what?” Leesa asked, still mystified about what had just happened.

  “Walk,” he told her.

  “Walk? Why? Where?”

  “Anywhere. Just walk.”

  An idea began to dawn on Leesa—she wondered if it could possibly be true. She walked five or six steps away from Dominic and Rave. Her leg felt strange, but strange in a very good way. She realized she was not limping at all. Walking without a limp was a completely new sensation for her—no wonder it felt strange.

  She turned around. Dominic and Rave were both smiling at her.

  She moved back toward them, looking down at her leg as she walked to make certain this was real.

  “My leg,” she said when she stopped in front of Dominic. “You fixed it.”

  “Yes, I did.”

  Leesa could not believe it. After eighteen years, her leg was cured. She skipped around in a small circle, just because she could. Twigs and dead leaves crackled under her weight as she trampled through the underbrush, delighted with her newfound mobility.

  Suddenly, she stopped and spun around to face Dominic.

  “Wait a minute,” she said worriedly. “Isn’t healing active magic? Won’t the black waziri be able to find you now? Will you have to go away again? Healing my leg is not worth you having to leave—not when there’s still so much for me to learn.”

  “Do not worry,” Dominic assured her. “I need not go anywhere.”

  “I don’t understand. Why not?”

  “Healing is
indeed active magic—you are correct in your surmise. However, I channeled my magic through yours, mixing the two. As I hoped, the altered vibrations of our combined magic cannot be detected by my brethren. That’s what I was checking a few moments ago.”

  Leesa thought about that for a moment. She hadn’t known such a thing was possible. Obviously, it was. She still had questions, though.

  “If this was safe for you to do, why did we have to come so far to try it?”

  Dominic grinned. “In case I was mistaken, of course. If this failed to work as I hoped, I did not want to lead the black waziri to Middletown.”

  Leesa guessed that made sense. She was glad Dominic had been right, though—she would have hated for him to go away for a month or more again.

  “I have one more question,” she said. “It’s not a complaint, I promise—but if you could heal my leg so easily, how come you waited so long to do it?”

  Dominic rested his hand on Leesa’s shoulder. “I had to wait until you were in touch enough with your magic to be able to visualize it the way you did earlier, and then to be able to visualize mine. Without those steps, I could not have wrapped my magic inside yours the way I did.” He gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze. “Otherwise, I would have healed your leg the day we met, I promise.”

  Leesa remembered how guilty Dominic had felt over the possibility that he might have been the cause of her deformity, by imparting his magic to her before she was born. She wondered if he had been carrying that burden inside him the whole time since he had found her. She certainly had never worried about it. Until now, a limp was all she had ever known.

  “Okay, I guess you’re off the hook,” she said lightly, to let him know the matter had never bothered her.