Chapter 12: Magic Theory
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Aurelius directed the Team to the side of the common room near his quarters. Two long tables were set up with chairs enough for all. As they took their seats, Aurelius stood with his hands clasped behind his back, his head bowed as though contemplating where to begin.
“I’m certain everybody knows by now that in Faery, we essentially have seven different kinds of magic. We separate these magics into Courts, which again separate into Houses.” His gaze was primarily focused on Reggie and Ryssa.
The twins slowly nodded.
“Good. Now, in each of the magical divisions, there are also levels of proficiency that guide rankings within each House, which in turn earns you a title. Let’s take elemental Fire magic, for example.
“When you begin to demonstrate strength in a particular brand of magic, you are fostered into a House that can teach you the best control and use of that magic. With the element of Fire, you would begin your training as a Fire Initiate. As you gain focus and control, you move up through the ranks of that element, gaining higher titles to let everyone know how powerful you are. In the Fire Hierarchy, you would first move to Fire Practitioner, and then to Fire Branded, Servant of Heat, Master or Mistress of Flame, Lord or Lady of the Blaze and on up to High Lord or High Lady of the Conflagration.
“Pyro, Jr.,” he suddenly asked, “what rank do you hold in all of this?”
Pyro looked around the room as though in a panic, and then lowered his head, mumbling something into his chest.
“What was that?” Aurelius cupped a hand to his ear. “I don’t believe we heard you.”
“Fire Initiate.” Pyro defiantly raised his chin, daring anyone to say something.
“Fire Initiate?” Aurelius gave a look of exaggerated surprise. “Seventeen years of age and only a Fire Initiate? Hmm. That’s odd. And your father, Pyro, Sr.—what rank does he hold?”
“Lord of the Blaze.”
“Lord of the Blaze. And for how long has he held that title?”
Pyro seemed confused. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know? Let me tell you. It’s been over one hundred and fifty years. Your father took the title of Fire Initiate at age three. It took him until he was thirteen to become a Fire Practitioner. He was sixty-three before he became Fire Branded, one hundred forty-two before he achieved the rank of Master of the Flame, and four hundred and three before he became Lord of the Blaze.”
Jet seemed stunned. “Don’t most of the Faery reach the sixth level ranking before their first century?”
“Most do.” Aurelius agreed. “But some do not.”
He was quiet for a moment. “Glinda. What is a wand used for?”
“To amplify the levels of an individual’s personal inherent magical talent.” The girl blinked in surprise.
“Gervais. What if a person is unable to use their primary magic, for whatever reason, and is forced to use his secondary magic?”
“I’m not sure I understand the question, Lord Aurelius—”
“Counselor will do for now. I will try to clarify. What rank can someone expect to achieve within the use of a secondary power?”
“Fourth, usually. Fifth in some rare cases.”
“And without the use of a wand as an amplifier?”
“Second, then,” Gervais frowned. “Third on occasion, if the person worked at it really hard.”
“Meek must be working at it really hard then,” Aurelius speculated. “Because if I’m not mistaken, Lady Luza indicated he might be nearing advancement. Are you not already Healing Practitioner, Meek?”
The boy nodded.
“Hmm—and you are only seventeen. Quite the achievement, don’t you think?”
Meek shrugged, not having anything to say, as usual.
“Jade.” Aurelius turned. “What is a True Name?”
Jade appeared puzzled. “Isn’t that a name of power?” Aurelius nodded for her to continue, but she shook her head. “I don’t really know anything else about it.”
“Doesn’t it have something to do with the elder Faery?” Loo asked. “The ones who have been around since the time of Dana?”
“Yes and no.” Aurelius paced back and forth. Without warning, he raised his hand to the bookshelves and sent books floating to rest on the table in front of each child. Every book was different. The students looked at him with confusion.
“Maybe this will help.” He whipped out his wand and gave it a sharp wave across the tables. “Open your books to page one hundred and twenty-seven.”
The children didn’t have to do anything. A quick, but strong wind whispered across the tables, and every book flipped its pages open to page one hundred twenty-seven. Reggie read the title on his page. A Dissertation on the Treaty of the Sons of Mil. He glanced at Jet’s page, deciphering the upside down words. Magical Maladies and the Herbal Use of Myrtle.
Ryssa’s book flopped back and forth on the table like a fish out of water. “I don’t think mine goes up to page one hundred twenty-seven, Uncle.” She eyed the moving book.
Aurelius gave a quick flick of his wand, and the wind died down. The book came to a rest on the table.
He gave an awkward smile. “Maybe not quite as impressive as I hoped for. Now, can anybody tell me what I just did?”
“It was a pretty cool trick.” Reggie moved his hand back and forth across the pages of the book in front of him, trying to see if he could find any wires or other means that Aurelius might have used to manipulate it.
“Trick?” Aurelius rolled his eyes. “Can anybody tell me what kind of magic was used to perform this trick?”
“Celestial magic for the levitation,” Jet offered. “Anything besides flying that deals with gravity is Celestial, isn’t it?”
“To a point. And the wind?”
“Air magic,” Reggie said confidently.
“Very good, Reggie,” Aurelius said.
Reggie gave him one of his how-stupid-do-you-have-to-be-not-to-figure-out-the-obivous-answer kinds of looks.
“But what is wrong with what I just did?”
The members of Team Phoenix stared blankly at him.
“I performed Air elemental magic,” he prompted.
The children still looked confused.
“Children, children.” He shook his head sadly. “I know that when Court is in session, or at the various other functions you have attended, the naming of titles must seem to be quite a bore to you. Pompous-and-long-winded-old-folk is what I am sure goes through your minds. However, those titles are not given only to make someone sound important. They are to let everyone know the kind of magic individuals possesses, and how powerful the person is. You must learn to pay better attention. It could mean life or death to you someday.
“Jet, I have been your teacher ever since you came to the House of Starborn. What ranks do I possess?”
Jet gave an amused smile, cleared his throat and intoned as perfectly as any announcer, “Aurelius Trenton Icewand Starborn: High Lord of the Great Expanse; Lord of Mountains; Water Branded—Hey, wait. You don’t hold a rank in Air magic.” Astonished realization showed on his face. “And you surpass the fifth level for a secondary magic. How is that?”
“Ah, that is the question, isn’t it?”
Reggie looked at Storm and Whisper. “But if wands are supposed to amplify magic you already possess, how can it raise you to do what—first level—second—Air magic?”
Storm thought about it. “Third.”
“Third,” Whisper echoed. “A first level would have been able to raise the wind. A second level possibly might have been able to get the wind to open to a page on one book—but the same page on thirteen books?” She shook her head. “Third level at least.”
Reggie chewed his lip thoughtfully. “Okay, third. How can it amplify magic to a third level that you don’t possess?”
“Aha!” Aurelius’ voice was loud enough to make them all jump. “Now there is the real question.”
&nb
sp; Aurelius’s eyes swept over the room, drawing the students into his gaze. “Children, I am going to ask you to do what will seem like the impossible, for I am about to do the unthinkable—I am going to ask you to put aside all you have learned about concentrations of magic in the elements and levels and hierarchies. Reggie and Ryssa, Moira and Jet, and possibly Hammie, may have an easier time of this since they haven’t had it ingrained into their teaching since the time they could begin to think. In exchange, I am going to teach you to open up to the True Magic—the Magic of the Sidhe.”
“The Ancient Ones?” Loo said dreamily. “Cool.”
“Who is she?” Ryssa asked.
“Not she,” Aurelius replied patiently, “although the pronunciation is the same—Sidhe. S-i-d-h-e. The Sidhe is what we were called long before the mortal world came along and named us Faery. It is the magic of the True Name—soul magic. It goes far beyond the elements, yet incorporates them as a part of the whole.”
“If it’s so powerful,” Reggie leaned back in his chair, “why did they stop teaching it?”
“Because in the early years for one of the Sidhe, the magic is wild—unpredictable. A true Sidhe could just as easily call forth the dark magic as they could any other. With the banning of dark magic in the time of Dana, they were attempting to restore the balance of magic. That much wild magic, if connected with the dark, could have undermined what they were trying to accomplish.”
“But won’t the same thing happen again?” Gervais growled. “I mean, if we start using the True Magic of the Sidhe—doesn’t it eliminate the safety net that prevents us from lashing out with wild, dark magics?”
Aurelius seemed almost amused. “The majority of you have been trained since before you could walk to control the elemental magic within you. There is little chance you’ll be able to let go of that training enough to do any major devastation—and you have been trained to stay away from the dark side of those forces.”
“What about Reggie and Ryssa?” Jade frowned. “They haven’t had the same kind of training. They could be a true wild card, so to speak.”
“We will all be here to help and to guide them. With the trained magic available to us in this room—my own notwithstanding,” he pointed out, “there shouldn’t be a problem. Besides, when they were fostered into the mortal world, there were specific directions given for their training. They don’t realize it yet, but their control will be better than you think, because of it.”
Reggie and Ryssa looked at each other without expression. The twin-bond didn’t have to be in place for either of them to know what the other was thinking. Mary and Debra had gotten into a bit of an argument over the training that had not been provided for the children. Neither of the twins wanted to say anything for fear of Mary’s threat coming true—that they wouldn’t be allowed to return to the only mother they had ever known.
Reggie was conflicted. Hadn’t Debra raised them to understand that a lie by omission was still a lie? In Faery, they considered oaths, promises, and lies to be very serious. But if Aurelius didn’t specifically ask, then Reggie was neither lying nor omitting anything—right? He had no one to question about the moral lines of the dilemma, so he let it go—at least for the moment.
His attention returned to Aurelius who was saying, “Besides, I won’t take any of you into the realm of the In-Between to get your True Names for you to be able to pull forth any real power until I’m certain that you have the control needed to handle it.”
Hammie swallowed hard. “The In-Between?”
“What’s the In-Between?” Ryssa asked.
“The In-Between is the veil between the lands of Faery and the Zombie Zone,” Jet supplied.
“Do you mean that foggy stuff we came through to get here?” Reggie frowned. “It said things to me when I went through it.”
Aurelius drew in a breath. “You heard voices in the mist?”
Reggie nodded.
“What did they say?”
“I don’t know.” Reggie thought about it. “They said, ‘He’s back’—or something like that. Then I bumped into Ryssa, and she was really scared, like they were talking to her, too. She begged me to make them stop. The next thing I knew, Darkwind was flying toward us in that fireball, and the voices called to us some more, showing us the way to where you were waiting.”
“Did the voices call you by any name?” Aurelius pressed, but held up a hand and quickly added, “If they did, I don’t want you to speak the actual name. When you are True Named, you must never give that Name to another person. By knowing someone’s True Name, you gain control over him or her. I am only asking whether or not they did Name you.”
“No, but what did they mean when they said, ‘He’s back’?”
“They were possibly referring to your return to Faery.” Aurelius looked puzzled. “The In-Between is an entity of its own—for all it may seem otherwise. It doesn’t measure things the way we do in Faery, or even in the mortal world, for that matter. It touches your True Self—your soul or your spirit. That is how it Names you True. It is not Naming your physical body, but rather, the essence of who you truly are.”
“Oh.” Before Reggie could ask anything else, Aurelius turned to Ryssa.
“Did you hear the voices too, like Reggie said?”
Ryssa nodded, but she didn’t look happy.
“Did they Name you?” he asked.
She didn’t say anything for a long moment, her look dark and mutinous. Finally, she nodded again.
“They said other things to you as well,” Aurelius prodded.
Tears well up in Ryssa’s eyes, but she set her jaw with an anger that made her whole body go rigid.
“I’m sorry.” His eyes held regret. “The True Seeing of the In-Between can be harsh even for those who have been prepared, let alone those who have not.”
“Are you saying that what those things were saying to me is true?” Ryssa’s eyes begged him to say no.
Aurelius looked pained, but nodded.
“No!” She slapped the palm of her hand down on the table, making everyone in the room jump. “You’re wrong—they’re wrong.”
“What did they say to you?” Moira asked with genuine concern.
They had to be wrong, Ryssa ignored her. I’ll prove them wrong.
Ryssa replayed the disturbing event she had experienced in the fog. Voices, hundreds of them, had filled the mist around her, calling to her, just like they had Reggie. ‘She’s back’, they had said, ‘She brings darkness to the Sidhe. The Heart of Darkness returns to life. With the darkness, all that has been done in the name of light will be undone. She holds the power to destroy them all. We answer the call of darkness in your heart and we name you, Danu.’
Then Reggie had bumped into her, breaking the hold the voices seemed to have on her. Strange how I had forgotten it until now. Someone spoke her name, causing her to jump.
“Ryssa—child?” Aurelius was kneeling beside her. “Ryssa, can you hear me?” He placed his hands over the top of hers. “Heavens, child, you are ice cold.”
Ryssa pulled back from the warmth of his touch. She vacantly stared at him for a moment, letting her mind focus on his face, using it as an anchor to pull herself out of the quagmire of thoughts into which she had wandered.
“I’m okay, Uncle.” She shook her head to clear it. “I was just remembering—it was as though I had forgotten it all until now.”
“Remembering is good.” Aurelius nodded. “Preparation is usually required before a True Naming, or else important things can be lost—including your focus when you need it the most. Why don’t you come into my chambers, and we’ll discuss what has happened.”
“No,” her response was sharp, but she softened her tone. “No, Uncle. It’s okay. I’m fine, really.”
She gave him a smile that she didn’t feel, but she wasn’t ready to talk. She didn’t think she’d ever be ready to talk about it.
“Can we just get back to where we were at? There’s so much we h
ave to do in such a short period to get us ready.” Her thoughts warred within. The voices are wrong. I’ll prove them wrong.
“Yes, of course.” Aurelius watched her closely. “If you are sure—”
“Really. I’m fine.” This time the smile she flashed was genuine.
“Very well.” Aurelius dipped his head toward her, a signal of his letting the issue go—for now.
“As I was saying,” he stood and faced the rest of the team, “True Names are your internal link to the earth. They can help you to call forth the power directly and with a great deal of control—which is good, because it allows you to call forth a great deal of power.”
“But if your True Name is the link to the power,” part of Reggie’s mind was still distracted with concern for his twin, “wouldn’t you have to have your True Name first, before working with the power?”
“No,” Aurelius said. “In actuality, you already possess your True Name. It is a part of who you are. The In-Between only gives you access to what you already possess. They look into your soul and name you True—they are not creating something from nothing.”
Ryssa scowled, but tried to hide it. What had she heard from the voices of the In-Between? Reggie wondered.
“It is within the stillness of your mind that you find and connect to the magic of the Earth. When you are able to quiet the on-going chatter that usually spins cycles of thoughts through your conscious mind, you reach a level of awareness that takes you beyond your physical senses to connect directly to your spirit, which is already connected to the Earth.”
“Sort of like opening a birthday present,” Ryssa said.
“I’m not sure that I understand—”
“You know—you have all of the pretty packaging—the wrapping paper, the ribbons and bows. There might even be a card attached. All of it keeps your thoughts distracted and wondering what’s underneath. Or maybe you know what’s in it, ’cuz you sneaked a peak ahead of time.” She gave a guilty blush. “But you won’t have access to the prize that’s waiting for you until you get rid of everything that’s covering it up on the surface.”
“Yes,” Aurelius beamed. “It is a very good analogy. But this is like a gift you get at birth. It’s always there. Maybe it’s put away until you are of an age to understand that it is something—anything—even if not quite realizing it is a gift. As an infant, easily amused and distracted, you might play with the gift for some time, wrappings and all, without understanding there is anything more to it. Then one day, you become coordinated enough to remove the wrappings and find the real prize beneath. That prize is your connection to the Earth and its magic
“The prize is like a game board with many pieces. You start to play with the game, maybe making up a few rules or just moving the pieces around the board. For some people, that is enough. Then someone comes along and shows you it is an actual game with set rules and a purpose—to reach the end goal. That would be like your wand. Now you realize there is actually thought and organization behind it—a purpose—and that with help—meaning your wand—you might even be able to puzzle through most of it. Then one day, someone else comes along and hands you a rulebook outlining how the game is really played and shows you how to move all of the pieces to the winning square. That rulebook is your True Name.”
“Cool.” Reggie bobbed his head.
“But if you’re only connecting to the Earth,” Gervais shifted in his seat, “doesn’t it mean you’re only connecting to the elemental earth energies?”
“Yeah,” Pyro, Jr. tilted his head, “what about the other elements—like fire?”
“No—the Earth is the playing board in this case, the basis for magic. The pieces you move around the board are the individual elemental magics. Each one can be moved into the winning spot on the board as long as you understand the rules on how to move them. And like any game, each time you play, you can choose to be a different piece—to use a different magic.”
“Okay, oh most wise wand,” Reggie joked. “You have shown us the board—are you now going to show us part of the game so we can start moving the pieces around a bit?”
The others looked at their Counselor with hope.
“Not now.” Aurelius smiled. “For now, we do lunch.”
He pointed to a table that had been set up while their attention had been focused on him. It was spread with an array of fruits, bread, meats, cheeses and a variety of drinks. At the far end were little cookies and other baked snacks, the pleasing aroma drifting their way.
A loud rumble erupted and everyone looked to the source. It was Hammie, his stomach echoing agreement with Aurelius’ statement that it was time to eat. They all laughed, including Hammie.
“Besides,” Aurelius added as they started to get up, “I am not the wand. I have only pointed out the pretty box that the gift is encased within. After lunch, we’ll work on your coordination for opening that gift and take a look at the game under the wrappings. If we get that far before bedtime, then tomorrow we’ll introduce you to the actual wands that will be showing you the game.”
“But I’m only a Fire Initiate,” Pyro hung his head, embarrassed. “I’m not allowed to have a wand until I become a Practitioner. I’ll never get that good fast enough.”
“Pyro,” Aurelius said firmly, “along with forgetting some of the other things you have been taught about magic, you must also forget, or at the very least ignore, what others have made you feel about yourself. The rules are being changed, here and now. You are entering a new game where those rules no longer apply. I have every confidence that you will play this game much better than the last one.”
Pyro stared at Aurelius as though judging the sincerity of his words. Determination glittered in his eyes. “Then let’s eat, ’cuz I’m ready to play. We have a game to win.”
Aurelius smiled, the rest of Team Phoenix giving corresponding comments of a united front. They were going to play this game—and they were going to win.