As the morning bled into noon, Father, Isa, and my brother left on a hunting trip in the woods. Varis had gotten much better with Father’s rifle, unlike myself; I could hardly lift the thing. However, when matched with Isa he was nowhere near as skilled as her.

  The offer to go was extended to me, but I declined. That nightmare with the timberwolves was still too fresh. Even now, just thinking about it made my heartbeat escate and my palms sweat.

  Instead, I chose to stay at camp with my mother, who was more than happy to sit me down and teach me the ways of magic in this world. We sat along a log at the relit campfire as she began.

  “How much has Madam Soza told you about magic so far?” Mother asked me as she brought out her grimoire and ruby wand.

  I tapped my chin. “Uh, not too much, really,” I said before a memory popped into my head and I grinned. “Oh wait! She did tell us about its creation.”

  Mother smiled. “Recite it for me, then.”

  I gulped. “Uh…”

  Admittedly, I was a bit hazy on the story, as it was about a year ago when she told us.

  “Something about the gods Margon and Merlin. Merlin, the god of knowledge, became bored with Sylondra, Mother of Creation’s, uh… spawn, and wanted to make them more retable by gifting mortal men a piece of his power.”

  She nodded. “You’re on the right track; how did he do that?”

  My mind bnked. “I, uh, think I fell asleep that time in css. It was one of Isa’s early csses.” I blushed.

  Mother reached out to rub my shoulder. “It’s okay.” She cleared her throat and reached out with one hand towards the flickering fmes of the campfire. Suddenly, they brightened and rose, the dancing fire taking on the forms and shapes of beings.

  An old, hunched-over mage with pointed ears appeared within the fmes. In his hand, he held a mighty staff, which he then raised above his head.

  “The Keeper of Tomes and the Creator of the Arcane. Merlin, one of the Seven Saints, helped purge the world of the Dark Lord. He is the concept of curiosity, skepticism, wisdom, and the spread of all knowledge. He is a mind forever searching for the truth.” My eyes widened as I watched the image of the god raise his staff high into the air, the embers floating above coalescing into what looked like a falling meteorite.

  “Many, many years ago—around sixty millennia—during the Dark Lord’s rise to power, Merlin took pity on the mortal races as they struggled against the evil god’s influence. And so, from the heavens, Merlin cast down his essence upon Enora, piercing the heart and unleashing the wells within the Urd Trees.”

  Blinking, I held a hand up to stop Mother. “Urd Trees?”

  I vaguely recalled seeing, in an old book of Mother’s, beautiful trees bigger than anything I’d ever seen before reaching high up into the clouds.

  Mother nodded. “The limbs of Enora. They’re massive life-giving trees; four grown ones in total exist, one on each of the major continents, and a handful of smaller saplings are spread about. The Urd Trees are said to be the first living beings to exist on all of Enora. They’re rife with magic, which long ago was sealed away until Merlin released it.”

  She turned to the fire, and within it, another burning visage appeared. A muscur akumari woman, a demon-like humanoid. Her fmes were crimson, and the horns on her head twisted like those of rams. In her hand, she wielded a massive bcksmith’s hammer.

  “Yet not all was well after magic was set free on Enora. His pn backfired, for we mortals had no idea how to use it. The Dark Lord had already possessed powerful magics, and with the wells of the Urd Trees released, Merlin accidentally made him even more powerful.”

  It sounds like the god of knowledge didn’t think his pn through, I thought.

  Mother continued her story: “In order to assist the mortals of Enora, the Lady of the Forge, Margon, Goddess of Crafts and Magic, provided the resistance with the knowledge of magrite and the tools to mine and create weapons of great power from it.”

  The fire then twisted and turned as both the visages of Merlin and Margon faded. Soon there appeared a fiery eyeball.

  Oh whoa, Sauron?

  “But then the traitorous Gaul stepped in.”

  “Who?” I blinked. “Isa told us a lot about the gods, but she never mentioned this guy.” I pointed at the fming eye.

  “That is because many in the world would wish to forget him.” Mother sighed. “Yet his role in the story is important. Gaul, like Merlin, was a god of knowledge, yet he was also the concept of order and w. Unlike Merlin, he wished for all knowledge to be contained and controlled. He did not trust mortals with such power, and he sympathized with the Dark Lord. He saw the Lord as a means of uniting all of Enora and bringing peace, and thus, he defected and informed the Dark Lord of the Enorans’ acquisition of magic and weapons that could oppose him.”

  “And then what happened?”

  “The Camity.”

  The Camity? Isa hasn’t taught us this, but it sounds familiar.

  “Also known as the Intrusive War. It was fought amongst the gods: a civil war. As much as we hate to admit it, the Dark Lord was a god, one of the few ‘living’ gods, and many hated his involvement with Enora. When Margon and Merlin interfered with mortal affairs, this sparked outrage, as it went against the Divine Right.”

  I cradled my head in my hands, shaking my head. “Okay, I have so many questions.”

  Mother giggled. “I apologize if this is a lot of information, but it’s good to know.” She poked me.

  “What do you mean by living god?” I asked her. “Aren’t all gods alive, in some way?”

  “Yes, but a living god refers to one who lives and walks among mortals.”

  I nodded slowly. “Okay, that makes sense. And what’s the Divine Right?”

  She stroked her chin. “This is getting more into clerical studies, which is admittedly out of my field. Though I do have a basic understanding.” She held her hands out wide. “Think of it as a list of commandments the gods created for themselves. I believe there’s like ten or so rules, but I could be wrong.”

  This world has the Ten Commandments as well? I smirked.

  “The gods have always acted from a distance, watching mortals and only occasionally guiding us via avatars, chosen clerics, and padins during times of strife. Yet never had a god officially set foot on Enora, until the rise of the Dark Lord. As mentioned already, Merlin and Margon took pity on the mortals and were the second and third ones to oppose the Divine Right. The others were outraged by Margon and Merlin’s disregard for the w. One of those was Gaul, who went against Merlin and Margon, and it was here that the battle lines were drawn. Left and right gods began to take sides, and eventually the Divine Right was sullied, and war broke out in heaven.”

  I blinked. “Who won?” I asked as images of gods and angels duking it out pyed in my mind. I couldn’t imagine what destruction would’ve been wrought if that kind of war extended to the surface of the pnet.

  Mother smiled. “Thankfully, the Seven… Sylondra, Faren, Margon, Kraten, Okren, Baren, and Merlin…” She counted them off on her fingers. “Many gods and demigods were sin in the Intrusive War, yet in the end, those Seven stood tall among the rubble. The Dark Lord survived the war as well but was weakened. This halted his conquest of Enora for many thousands of years until, finally, the Twilight War.”

  Goddamn. This is a lot cooler than learning about World War II, that’s for damn sure. I ran a hand over the back of my neck.

  “So, what does all of that have to do with magic, though?” I asked.

  Mother smirked. “A lot, actually. Despite how tragic these wars were, it was during this time that Enorans learned how to use and control magic, and how it’s tied to all living things and our souls. We learned how to mine and process magrite to create light, machines, and everything we take for granted nowadays. It’s because of this event that we’re here now.” She pointed to the ground.

  I nodded and felt a little restless on the log. I was itching to try and cast some spells, but I knew better than to rush my mother. War breeds innovation, I guess. Destructive innovation.

  “Magic, Luna, is in all of us. It’s in everything. In the grass around and beneath us, in the trees, and even in the fire before us. Everything possesses it. Our souls are magic; you are magic.” She smiled. “And I don’t mean just in a cute way.” She pinched my cheek, and I squeaked. “But you are cute!”

  I giggled, squirming away from her as I swatted her hand off of me. “Sounds very philosophical when you put it like that.”

  My mother’s eyes widened. “In a sense, yes, but it’s true. Everything carries a soul, and within that soul is what magisters refer to as the well. Within that well, the byproduct of the soul is collected, and this is what we call ether. We don’t know exactly what ether is, yet what we do know is that mages like myself…” She trailed off into silence.

  Then she raised her hand in the air, palm facing up. The fire in the pit roared upwards in a torrent, and I gasped as intense heat radiated from it.

  She continued as she controlled the fmes. “…allows us to control the physics of the world to a degree,” she said, and the fme lifted off of the pit. She twirled it through the air with a flick of her wrist, and I watched, awestruck, as the string of fmes danced over my head. “The patterns that bind everything to w can be altered and changed with ether.”

  Eventually she dropped the fire back down into the pit and smothered it until it was as small as it was before.

  “Whoa!” I cried.

  Mother smirked and took a deep breath. “Some say it’s also what helps fuel and heal us. Ether can do so much, yet we know so little.”

  I swear to God, if it’s midi-chlorians, I’m going to cry.

  Giggling, I said, “That’s amazing, Mother!”

  “Isn’t it?” Mother patted my head before leaning in and kissing me on the forehead. “Every creature carries a well, as I already mentioned, yet the depth of their wells varies. That’s where the spiritest comes into py. The spiritest is how the magisters determine how deep one’s well is. This is done by… exposing oneself to vast quantities of concentrated ether.”

  I blinked. I hope this crap isn’t radioactive. I can’t imagine just walking into a concealed chamber and being bsted by radiation.

  “…Is it dangerous to do that?”

  Mother thought and said, “Well… not usually.”

  “Usually?”

  She blushed. “I’ll admit the test isn’t perfect. Those with wells that aren’t deep usually fall unconscious because the test is so overwhelming. No one has ever died, though, if that’s what you’re concerned about.”

  I sighed. “Well, that’s good to hear.” I smiled. “So, you took this test, right? What did you rank?”

  Mother smirked, straightened up, and thrust her chest out as she puffed herself up, looking silly. “Don’t go boasting about this to everyone, but Momma is an Ethereal Archon!”

  An ethereal what now?

  “That sounds metal,” I said.

  She blinked. “Excuse me?”

  I giggled. “Uh, it’s a thing Varis and I say when we think something sounds cool!” I beamed.

  Mother thought about it for a second, then ughed. “You’re such a goof.” She tousled my hair.

  “So, like, how strong is an archon?”

  Mother hummed. “Well, it’s said that my well runs deep as an ocean, and magic comes easy to me, as you can see.” She hummed more as she began to toy with the fire again. “I am capable of performing great feats, and you saw some of that the night before.”

  I gulped as the memories came back.

  She blushed, her eyebrows curled up with guilt. “O-Oh, I’m sorry, sweetie.” She ran her hand through my hair again. “That was wrong of me to bring that up so soon.”

  I shrugged. “It’s okay; what happened, happened.” She rexed. “You looked super cool!”

  Mother cocked her head and leaned back before her ego kicked in. She brought a hand to her chin. “Ohh? Did I, now?”

  Pying along, I nodded. “Yeah! You looked so pretty when you flew in the air all fire-like!”

  My mother smirked, crossed her arms, and straightened her back in a heroic, sidelong pose. If Father were here, he’d probably faint from how gorgeous she looked.

  “Thank you, dear, and you may get to do all that too in the future.” She smiled wide as she booped my nose. “Now, pay attention.” She leaned in. “So, because we don’t have a way to test how deep your well is as of right now, we’re going to start small. I’m going to see if I can teach you some mote-level spells.”

  “Mote?” I asked.

  “Yes. Some schors call these cantrips, but the majority refer to each spell by its given name. They’re simple spells; all etheric initiates can cast at least a couple of them with ease, and those proficient enough can skip the chant altogether.”

  “By chant, you mean what you say usually before a spell?”

  “Yep, a chant is what allows you to connect with your well and gain access to the ether. Most mages, even an archon like myself, still need to chant for higher-tier spells,” she expined. “Yet as you grow stronger and learn more, you’ll soon reach a point where chantless casting for lower-tier spells becomes natural. Very, very rarely, fully chantless casters make their appearance, and those who do are usually Celestial Magus-tier mages.”

  I sputtered, “Celestial what?”

  Mother ughed. “Cool name, huh? It’s the tier above me and second to st.” She smirked. “If you think Celestial Magus sounds cool, the st one is called Apotheonic Aegis.”

  “Doesn’t that mean you’re just a god?” I asked her, and Mother snickered.

  “Yep! Only one has ever existed in all of Enora, and that was the Dark Lord. A madman who drove himself into literal godhood. Despite his infamy, many schors respect what he’s done in terms of magical studies. He could literally reshape the fundamentals of reality and condemn entire armies to death with a single word. His grasp on the pattern of reality was quite extensive.”

  My eyes widened. “Sounds truly frightening,” I said as my mother nodded. I bit my lip in thought. She mentioned a pattern again. “Mother,” I prompted. “What do you mean by pattern?”

  She blinked, blushed faintly and smiled. “I’m sorry. It’s very complicated to expin.”

  “I think I can try understanding,” I said with a grin.

  Mother took a deep breath. “Remember how I said everything possesses a soul?” I nodded. “All souls and wells possess the same pattern. It was the Dark Lord himself who discovered that everything follows this pattern.”

  “The ws of physics?” I asked, and my mother smiled widely.

  “Yes, you’re on the right track, but the pattern and physics are not entirely the same. Before you ask,” she said, holding a finger up, “even I do not know what the pattern truly is. Nobody knows. What we do know is that it’s connected to our souls, wells, and incantations.”

  “Incantations?” I said. “How so?”

  “Well, I told you, silly. Incantations are what let us connect to our wells and ether. Some theorize it’s the pattern in which the incantation is spoken that allows us to channel our magic… but some argue that those who do not need to chant contradict this theory.”

  “Do you believe it?” I asked her.

  She thought for a moment. “The idea is nice and simple, but I don’t know. The only one who seemed to know how the pattern worked was him, the Dark Lord.”

  “And because of that, he became a god and could kill entire armies with a wave of his hand?” I said, and Mother nodded grimly. “He must’ve been terrifying to fight…” I muttered.

  “He was, and that’s why, when he was weakened, the Global Alliance formed and waged total war against him. If it wasn’t for that brief window of weakness, we would probably still be under his boot and the eternal twilight.”

  I stroked my chin. “Not to get further off topic, but why is he called the Dark Lord?”

  Honestly, for real… everything else has these cool badass names, yet this vilin I always hear about has such a generic one.

  Mother chuckled. “He does have a name… or did have one. Once again, we’re getting into clerical studies here, but gods harness power through beliefs and memories. The more followers a god has, the stronger they become. Or any man, for that matter.”

  My head perked up. “Wait, any man? Does that mean if I get enough people to worship you, you can become a god?” I asked with a mischievous grin.

  Mother ughed, covering her mouth, and nodded. “Hypothetically, yes, love. Though I don’t think I want to be a goddess, as nice as that may sound, it would take many, many followers. I’m talking millions of people, Luna. The collective faith of so many souls would allow their ether to converge and ascend one person to glory. Or darkness.” She sighed. “Hence, we never refer to the Dark Lord by his real name. It is best left forgotten. A god can never truly die; you cannot kill a concept. But you can forget it.”

  I nodded as I made a mental note of this. “That’s crazy.” With a deep breath, I joked, “Maybe I can become a goddess someday!”

  My mother giggled. “You goof.” She hummed and rubbed my head. “Well, before my little goddess can ascend, let’s get back to our studies. As said, we’ll be starting with motes of magic. Now, pay attention.”

  Mother scooted closer, her soft and warm body pressing against me. She wrapped one arm around my shoulder and pulled me in so that my head was pressed into her chest as she id her grimoire on our ps. She opened the book to reveal beautifully handwritten… gibberish.

  “I can’t read it,” I said, looking at the scripture. It almost looked like gorgeous calligraphy, if calligraphy could be incomprehensible garbage.

  “Watch this,” Mother delicately whispered into my ear, and I shuddered as she waved her hand over the book. Soon, the scripture began to shift. The ink on the page squirmed and wriggled as the letters reshaped themselves into legible text, and I gasped.

  “Lucien’s Cipher. One of my favorite spells. Your father hates it, though.” She giggled. “It helps keep a lot of my favorite books illegible to him.” She winked.

  I think she’s referring to the smut I found st year. That’d expin why I couldn’t find or read those books again.

  “But this isn’t what I’m going to teach you. We’re going to start with something simple.” She flipped through pages, finally nding on one near the beginning with depictions of clouds and air flows. On it, written elegantly, was the word “Gust.”

  “I’m gonna break wind?” I joked, and my mother snorted and bopped me lightly on the head.

  “No!” she excimed as I ughed. “Your brother is rubbing off on you too much, little dy.” She snickered. “But, in a sense, yes, you’ll be pushing the wind. I’m going to show you how to make a gust of wind.”

  I nodded, rubbing the spot she bopped. I should’ve guessed she wasn’t going to show me how to throw fireballs right away.

  Mother pointed to the firepit. “Your task is going to be putting out that fme.” She straightened her back and unwrapped her arm from around me. “Like this.” She held her right hand to her mouth, her index finger and thumb forming a circle while her other three fingers pointed straight up, like in the OK sign.

  Taking a deep breath, she then blew air through the window. It started gentle, yet on the other side, a torrent shot forth in a heavy gust! Dust and ash bsted back as the fme was instantly snuffed out.

  I gasped and cpped as my mother looked back at me with a big smile. “Now, I know that looks easy, but only because this was one of the first motes I ever learned. It’s been so long that I don’t need to say the incantation, but I’m going to say it this time to demonstrate it.”

  Mother held her hand out to the small pile of tinder and firewood. I squeaked with joy as she levitated chopped logs and tinder over to the blown-out firepit. One by one, the logs magically stacked themselves, and once the tinder was set, she snapped her fingers, and the fire ignited.

  She then nodded at me and rose her right hand to her mouth to cast the spell again. Except this time, she began with the incantation, “Breathe the breath of Okren, tempest’s sovereign might, whispering through leaves and roaring through heights. By his grace, let the winds respond to my call—Gust!”

  She blew into her hand, and once more, a surge of roaring wind put out the fmes and scattered the half-burned logs! I gasped loudly and said, “Holy crap—”

  Mother silenced me with a raised finger, then wagged it. “Language, dear.”

  “Wow!” I stood up from my spot and asked, “Can I try? Can I?”

  She giggled. “Of course. Sit back down; I’ll get the fire set up again.” I nodded and sat down, vibrating with childlike joy.

  Once more, Mother magically lifted logs and tinder and set everything up before me. As I squirmed, she handed me her grimoire and pointed to the lovely text written on its pages.

  “Now, reciting the incantation isn’t enough, love,” she said. “You’ll want to concentrate. Focus. Like in meditation, clear your mind and look inward. Focus on what you want to happen and begin reciting the incantation, and you’ll feel it. The ether bubbling out of you—it’ll feel weird, but it’ll feel nice. But don’t let the pleasure distract you. Just keep focusing.”

  I nodded. Does magic pleasure you when you use it? I shook my head. Shut up, degen, and get back in your cage!

  Nodding again, I cpped my little hands on my cheeks, pretending to hype myself up but just smacking away the impurities.

  “Okay!” I grabbed the book as my mother reignited the fire.

  I gnced down at the well-drawn hand diagram. If Mother drew these, call me impressed.

  Then I began to copy the image. I raised my hand to my mouth and closed my eyes. I had experience meditating in my old life, so clearing my mind shouldn’t be too hard. Inhaling deeply, I held it for a second before releasing it. I repeated this until the thoughts in my mind quieted down.

  Around me, I could hear nature, the crackling fire, and the gentle breathing of my mother. I was present. Gradually, I began to think about what I wanted to do—blow a gust of wind at this fire and extinguish it.

  I kept repeating this in my mind as my eyes slowly opened. Then I began to recite the incantation. “Breathe the breath of Okren,” I said, my voice low and monotone as butterflies built in my stomach. “Tempest’s sovereign might,” I continued as the butterflies radiated out throughout my core and up my torso. Goosebumps were forming on my skin, and my head began to buzz gently.

  My brow twitched as I hesitated; the sensations were, in fact, pleasurable!

  “Don’t get distracted; you’re doing this perfectly,” Mother hissed.

  I swallowed and continued, “Whispering through leaves and roaring through heights.” The sensation moved within my chest. could feel it wrapping around my heart. A bizarre yet welcome tingle began as whatever was traveling up my body neared my throat. I stuttered once more but kept going. “By his grace, let the winds respond to my call—”

  This sensation ran up my spine and into my skull. My brain erupted with a magical euphoria, and my perception expanded as my voice echoed out, “GUST!”

  Blowing through the window of my index finger and thumb, a cannon-like bst of air disintegrated the campfire pit and, further out, Mother and Father’s tent! An eruption of splitting air made my mother shut her pointy ears and watch with a mix of shock and horror as the tent and fire logs went into the tree line.

  Meanwhile, I was twitching and gasping from the tingles in my body, looking at my hands and then shakily at my mother. “I—I d-did it!” I stammered out.

  Mother, who had still been holding her long ears shut on the sides of her head, released them and looked at me with pinpricks for eyes. She gulped and nodded. “Y-You sure did, sweetie!” She looked back at the mess; the tent now hung from a nearby sycora tree. “I think you more than did it…”

  I don't have any qualms about your decisions, but it’s taken so many attempts...