“Now, I’m not going to use all my strength, as there’s a chance it could break the shield.” His arm swept up, palm facing outwards, and a ball of pure force began to coalesce against his open hand. The deep tingling sensation in Gaspi’s belly told him powerful magic was being conjured. The furrow in Voltan’s brow deepened suddenly as he thrust out his palm, sending the ball of power hurtling across the room. It hit the force shield dead centre, and it glowed a vivid red as it absorbed the force. At the moment of impact Gaspi felt rather than heard a kind of detonation, a deep but muffled resonance like a large bell being struck underground.
“The harder the strike, the deeper the colour,” Voltan said. His eyes moved round the class, observing the eager faces of pupils itching to have a go for themselves. “Gavin,” Voltan said, “do you want to try it?”
“Yes sir,” Gavin said, rising from his desk and walking over to the professor.
“Okay, let’s see if you can summon the force strike first,” Voltan said. “Just summon your power as you would normally, but instead of forming it into a ball of light, summon it as raw energy in your palm.”
Gav held his hand palm upwards, staring at it in fierce concentration, his brows knotted above squinting eyes. Slowly, a ball of magic took shape in his hand, opaque and alive with energy. The tingling behind Gaspi’s navel was less this time, but still noticeable.
“That’s good, Gavin. Now keep the strike there, and think about firing it at the shield.” Gav looked up to set his sights on the target, but his ball disintegrated into thin air. “That’ll happen if you lose concentration,” Voltan said. Gav looked embarrassed. “Summon it again,” Voltan said, “but this time concentrate on both things at once; maintaining the ball’s integrity, while focussing on the target.” Gav squared his shoulders, and lined himself up with the force shield. A force strike gathered in his hand again as Gav lifted his hand, palm towards the target. His brows knotted even more tightly than before, and the ball flickered as he looked at the shield, but he managed to keep it together, almost glaring at the force shield while the ball of power swirled against his hand.
“Good,” Voltan said. “When you’re ready, send it at your target. Just imagine it flying from your hand and hitting the target, and release your power.” Gav stood rigidly for a few moments, then suddenly flung out his arm, and the force strike left his palm, sailing across the room much more slowly than Voltan’s strike. It hit the target, which turned a straw yellow colour as it absorbed the force. The detonation was so subtle Gaspi almost couldn’t feel it. Gav looked at Voltan uncertainly.
“Excellent,” the teacher said. “It’s not easy, is it?”
“No, it’s not,” Gav answered, looking drained.
“Take a seat Gavin,” Voltan said as he walked back to the front of the room. “There are a lot of things you have to think about when doing this,” he continued. “First of all, there is summoning the ball. Then you have to maintain it while you focus on your target, and then you have to impart both direction and speed to the force strike. Gavin’s strike would have had more of an impact if it had been faster, but he got the direction right. If you can summon a powerful strike and send it with speed and accuracy, you can get a devastating result. But if you get any of it wrong, it will be ineffective.”
He looked around the class slowly. “Who else wants to try?” Several hands shot up but fell again when Everand stood up and walked to the back of the class.
“Okay, Everand, in your own time,” Voltan said. Everand stood with his legs apart, planted firmly on the ground, and raised his arm as Voltan had done. A ball of energy formed in his hand much more quickly than it had for Gav, and without waiting he pushed out his palm, sending the ball of power he’d created spinning quickly across the room into the forceshield. The shield absorbed the strike as before, but this time it glowed an orange colour. Everand’s strike was clearly more powerful than Gav’s, and as he strode back to his seat, arrogance etched all over his face, Gaspi felt annoyance at Everand balling in his stomach.
Several other students had a go at the force strike with varying degrees of success. Some delivered a successful strike, though no-one achieved as deep a colour as Everand until it was Ferast’s turn. Pushing his lank hair out of his eyes, he squinted at the target. There was something about the way he carried himself that made Gaspi uncomfortable. The small boy was fidgety and awkward, his movements jerky and somehow spider-like. Ferast brought his hand up, a ball of power filling it almost immediately, and with an almost casual flick of his bony fingers it sped across the room. It moved faster than anyone’s strike except Voltan’s, and the shield glowed burnt-orange as it absorbed the strike, a deeper colour than the one Everand had produced. Gaspi glanced at Everand, catching a look of surprise on his face, which was quickly suppressed. Ferast wore a smirk as he slunk back to his desk.
“Very good,” Voltan said. “That was a good, swift strike. Now, let’s give our new pupils a chance. Emea - how about you?”
Emea had uncertainty written all over her, as she pushed back her chair and walked to the back of the classroom. She held her slender palm upwards, that neat little line Gaspi liked so much appearing in her forehead as she concentrated. Gaspi crossed his fingers, desperately hoping that for her own sake Emea would be able to conjure the force strike. At first nothing happened, but then Gaspi saw something swirling in her palm, a walnut-sized ball of force that flickered on the edge of existence. The small ball of power didn’t disappear when Emea raised her eyes to the shield, nor when she held her hand out in front of her, palm facing the target. She stretched out her arm, trying to push the ball forwards, but after disconnecting from her palm it span slowly forward for a couple of seconds before dissipating into the air. One of the girls started to snigger, and Emea went bright red.
“Who’s laughing?” Voltan asked calmly, but with an edge to his voice that instantly shut the culprit up. He turned back to Emea. “Well done, Emea,” he said. “You’re much newer at this than most of this lot. Miss Emelda tells me you have a deft touch, and power will come with time. You can sit down now.” Emea bustled back to her seat, relieved to be out from under the class’s scrutiny.
It was Lydia’s turn next, and with quiet confidence she summoned a force strike and hit the shield with it, which glowed a light orange colour in response.
“Gaspi, your turn!” Voltan said, once Lydia had taken her seat. With a mixture of excitement and trepidation, Gaspi walked to the back of the classroom. This would be the first time he would use magic to actually do something since his block had been removed. Unlike the meditation classes, there was no time to enter an altered state, and he had to engage directly with his power without any preparation. Digging deep he sought out the inner flow of magic, finding its currents after just a few moments of inward searching. The magic felt eager, strong, hungry.
Gaspi raised his palm upwards, drawing magic into his hand as a sphere of raw force. The magic came at his call, forming into a swirling ball of power. The sense of gathering force was intoxicating, and Gaspi was filled with a determination to do better than Ferast and Everand. He continued to summon his power, the force strike swelling in his hand beyond the size of anyone else’s. A slight wave of giddiness washed over Gaspi, and, realising he had become caught up in the moment, he stopped the flow of magic to the strike. Or at least he tried to, but it didn’t want to stop. It was like throwing a rock in a river – the water just flowed around and over the block and carried on its way. Suddenly nervous, Gaspi doubled his efforts to stop the flow, the ball of force now double the size that even Voltan had produced.
Gaspi started to panic, terrified of letting the magic get out of his control. He tried to strangle it like a snake, cutting it off from the source, but it just squeezed through his fingers. The ball of force grew larger and larger until it was a swollen sphere of power held against his open palm. Dizziness came rushing through him in greater waves, and Gaspi felt his knees weaken, his legs in danger of buckling.
“Gaspi, stop drawing on your power!” Voltan said sharply, stepping nearer the young Mage, but not too near. Gaspi looked at Voltan helplessly, desperate to regain control, and then he remembered the spell song Hephistole taught him. Urgently, he recalled the tune, humming it as quickly as he could. Some of his classmates gave him a puzzled look, and a few began to push their chairs backwards away from him as his still-growing ball of force churned potently against his hand.
“Gaspi, stop!” Voltan said again, louder and more urgently. Fighting through dizziness and pushing away panic, Gaspi sang the spell song again, directing his rampant magic to flow into the notes of the song, unlocking the power Hephistole had lent it. When the last note of the short tune passed from his lips the uncontrollable flow of power was suddenly ended. Gaspi stumbled backwards into the wall, and if it wasn’t for Voltan leaping forward and catching him he would have slid down to the floor. Voltan half-carried him to his seat.
“Are you okay?” he asked. Gaspi had not lost consciousness. He may have been on the brink of it, but he had cut off the magic in time, and was just left with a pervasive weakness. His limbs felt like they were made of lead.
“I…I think so,” he said, in a quavering voice.
Voltan peered intently into his eyes for a moment and nodded. “You replaced your block,” he said. It was not a question. Gaspi nodded. “Quite impressive really,” Voltan muttered, “managing to spell-sing under that pressure.” He stood up snappily.
“Well, young Mage, I think we need to think about other ways of restricting your magic. A partial block may be an option. After class we will talk to Hephistole about it.” He turned back to the class. “Okay, that’s enough excitement for today,” he said. “I don’t want you practicing the force strike unsupervised. No martial magic is to be used outside of class. Is that understood?”
The pupils groaned grudgingly. “Does that mean we have no homework, sir?” Matthius asked.
“Thank you for reminding me, Matthius,” Voltan said, as several pupils groaned, glowering resentfully at the small lad. “For next class I want you to have all read the first three chapters of Soltere’s
Theories of Magical Combat.
There will be a test.” The class grumbled unhappily as Voltan waved them out the door. Gav smacked Matthius round the back of the head.
“Why d’ya have to go and ask?” he asked as they left the room.
Soon Gaspi was the only student remaining. Voltan glanced at him. “Go and have some lunch, Gaspi. You need to get some energy back. Come back here afterwards, and we’ll work on your block with Hephistole.” Gaspi said he would and left the room, where Emmy and Lydia were waiting for him. As they walked into the refectory, laughter burst out from Everand’s group, and from the looks he was getting Gaspi was pretty sure what they were laughing about.
“Never mind him!” Emea said firmly, placing a hand on Gaspi’s arm. “Go and sit down, Gaspi. We’ll bring some food over.” Gaspi hated being seen to be weak, but he had no strength left at all, and sat down wearily at an empty table. He could hear the mockery from across the room.
“The Nature Mage can’t even summon a force strike!” Ferast’s nasal voice evoked a flush of anger in Gaspi. Why couldn’t they just leave him alone? What galled him most was that there was nothing he could do about it with his block in place. Until he learned control of his magic, they would never shut up. He was still fuming when Emmy and Lydia brought his food over. It was a vegetable soup accompanied by two thick slices of cheese and a small loaf. Grateful for the distraction he tucked in, and slowly the girls’ company calmed him down. They wanted to know what had happened in class, which he explained as well as he could.
“I’m going to get control of this,” he said determinedly. “Voltan said something about a partial block. Maybe that will help,” he added hopefully.
“I’m sure it will,” Lydia said, with her usual calm certainty. Conversation moved to the coming evening. Roland and the gypsies would be moving on soon now that Lydia had settled into the college, and they’d invited the three students to feast with them at the circle.
“So…is Taurnil coming tonight?” Lydia asked. Gaspi blinked and looked up at her. Usually she was measured and sure in everything she did, but all of a sudden she had sounded…vulnerable. Emea was taking a great interest in her soup, moving it round and round in the bowl.
“Yeah, he said he’d come over after practice with Jonn,” Gaspi responded. “We’ll all go down together.”
“Oh…good,” Lydia said, and Gaspi could have sworn he saw a faint red tinge beneath her tanned skin. He resisted smiling to himself. He was sure that Taurnil liked Lydia, but until now hadn’t known what the mysterious girl thought about his friend. He might be wrong, but it looked like the feeling might be mutual. He certainly hoped so, for Taurn’s sake.
After lunch they returned to Miss Emelda’s classroom, where Emea’s mentor was waiting for them, along with Hephistole and Voltan.
Hephistole stood up as they entered. “Ah good - here you are. With your permission, Voltan and I will be borrowing Gaspi for just a short time, but will return him to you shortly for the rest of this afternoon’s class.”
“Of course, Chancellor, as you wish,” Emelda said, playing along with his exaggerated courtesy.
He inclined his head in Emelda’s direction, and sketched a bow in the direction of the girls. “Ladies,” he said as he left the room, followed by Voltan and Gaspi. As it happened they didn’t have far to go, as the main classroom was free.
“So,” Hephistole said once they were seated. “You had to replace your block during class this morning, I hear?” They sat in a kind of triangle, and Gaspi felt strangely equal, like he was being treated as a peer.
“Yeah...I could summon my magic and make the force strike, but when I tried to stop drawing on the power I couldn’t cut it off. It just kept flowing, and the strike was getting bigger all the time. I had to use the spell song to stop it.”