01 - The Price of Talent (30 page)

“I’m sorry, it just really hurt…” I said. “Maybe it would help if you could tell me what I should be doing. All I felt was your body heat.”

“You need to concentrate on my mind,” he responded. “You need to see how the energy flows through it, read it, and tell me what it says. That’s the best I can tell you as, I must admit, mental magic is not my specialty. But it doesn’t have to be for me to test your abilities. We just want to see if you have the aptitude.”

“I think this is going to be a long afternoon then…” I said. “Because I got nothing on that last attempt.”

“Well, not everyone gets it on their first try,” he said. “Those that do, often get a few shocks before the figure it out.”

“Those that don’t?” I asked with some trepidation.

“Well, they have long afternoons I’m afraid,” he said.

              And we were right. It was a long afternoon. I have no natural talent for mental magic, reading minds, or whatever you want to call it. I could sense the energy, knew it was there, could even tap it a little, but I could not use it to read his mind. I got shocked a lot. It started as merely painful. By the end of a half hour it was almost debilitating. On the last one I think I passed out for a short time. I tried not to yell. I tried not to blaspheme. I was only partially successful on that point.

“Well, I think we can conclude from this that telepathy is not where your talents lie,” said Claudius.

“Fuck…” I said through chattering teeth, twitchy eyes and spasming limbs. “You’re not kidding…”

“We will stop testing you for now,” he said. “I think you need some time to recover, and probably a little lunch. I will have lunch and a warm bath drawn for you in a private room so that you can regain your composure. We will talk again tomorrow.”

              And with that he undid my arm straps and left the room. I could not have run out and tried to escape then, even if I wanted to. I was still twitching quite a bit from the last round of shocks. After a few minutes I got control of my limbs. This was good because a guard came in to see me.

“Come with me,” he said. “I’ll show you to your private room.”

              Not having the energy to do much else, I staggered out of the chair and followed him. The route we took seemed familiar, but I was in no condition to recognize it. I was mostly concentrating on making my legs and arms work properly. It was only after I entered the room that I recognized it. It was the room I had taken a bath in a few days ago, where Meredith had brought me the monk’s robes I was wearing now.

              Just like last time, I found that there was a tub full of warm water for me to bathe in behind a screen towards the back of the room. I headed back there, stripped down, and got into the bath. The warm water felt good on my strained and twitchy muscles. When I heard the door open I didn’t even turn my head.

“So, not so good with mental telepathy I hear,” said a voice I recognized right away.

“Hello Meredith,” I said. “I’m afraid Claudius decided to fry me with that wand of his.”

“So I hear,” she said. “You will be happy to know that I bring both food and a change of clothes.”

“Right about now, the effort to get out of this bath and enjoy either of those things is too much for me,” I said.

“That’s ok,” she said. “I wouldn’t want you to feel all embarrassed being naked around me anyway. If I remember, last time I was here you were trying to hide yourself behind the soap bubbles.”

“Last time I had not been shocked repeatedly by lightning,” I replied. “Right now my modesty plays second fiddle to my exhaustion.”

“Are you still twitching from the shocks?” She asked.

“More or less,” I replied. “At first I was so twitchy I couldn’t stand. But now, aside from a few tremors, I seem to be ok.”

“Well, that’s a good sign,” she said.

“And yet, somehow I don’t feel all that lucky,” I replied.

“You should feel lucky,” she said. “Getting shocked like that can have serious neurological effects. Those spasms could have been permanent.”

“Wait what!?” I exclaimed. “Claudius said I wouldn’t suffer any lasting harm.”

“I’m just teasing! Claudius is very good at testing people. Though, I don’t think he realized you would be quite so inept with telepathy,” she replied. “You’re such a natural with elemental magic.”

“We can’t all be perfect…” I said.

“Yeah, it also explains why Claudius was able to knock you out so quickly when you were apprehended,” she said. “Your inability to shield your mind from even a basic knock out spell wasn’t just ignorance apparently.”

“You mean what Claudius used to disable me was not advanced magic?” I asked. “And how do you know about all this?”

“I guess you have no reason to know since you’ve been locked away in that cell, but you’re kind of the talk of the castle,” she said. “It’s rare for the Inquisitors to fail as spectacularly as they did trying to apprehend you. Even rarer that someone who killed so many of them is kept alive. And that you have been kept in a cold room in solitary confinement for so long too… well, it all marks you as exceptional. That makes people talk.”

“Not so exceptional that I was able to do even the most simple of telepathic readings,” I said.

“We all have limitations, Tyr,” she said. “I’m best at healing people and good at mental magic. But, I can barely summon enough external power to test people like I did you. My skills are more… subtle I guess. Mental magic doesn’t take much energy, but it does take a deft hand. You are… I guess… not that subtle.”

“Apparently not,” I said ruefully. “But most of my evasion of the Inquisitors was pure chance. I don’t know what happened at my parents’ farm. I got captured at your dad’s place. I only escaped because my friends in the woods thought the cart I was locked in had tax money in it.”

“And you didn’t light those inquisitors on fire?” She asked with a skeptical look on her face.

“Well, yeah, I did do that,” I said. “But it was a reactionary thing. My friends were in danger, I was freaking out and… well… I just sort of reacted.”

“So, without any training, you were able to summon enough power to immolate inquisitors,” she said. “And you can make your magic sword appear at will. Tyr, these are not normal abilities. Most people we bring here are barely able to light a candle wick with their magic. And that, only after intense training. What you did, instinctively, has not been seen since the war with the mages 500 years ago. Only the highest level priests are capable of doing anything like it, and only after years of training. And summoning a magic sword? That’s right out of fairy tales.”

“I… I had no idea,” I said.

“Well, now you do,” she said. “This is why you are the subject of a lot of the gossip among the initiates. Why your story is the worst kept secret around here. It is also why Claudius has been training you personally, instead of letting you join the general population. Depending on who you ask, you are either an extremely valuable asset, or an extreme danger.”

“Had they come to me without threatening my family, I would not have been a danger,” I said.

“If you saw a child playing with a loaded crossbow, what would you do?” She asked.

“Take it away from him I guess,” I said. “But I was hardly a child with a crossbow. I was a farmer living happily with his family. The worst that had happened was a few barrels bursting near me when I got headaches. I’m not sure how good a comparison that is.”

“Tyr, you killed a bunch of people,” she said. “And while that may not have been what you set out to do, it does mean that you are dangerous. I know you mean well, but it isn’t me you need to convince. Moreover, the fact that things were exploding around you shows how dangerous your untrained powers were even before you were being pursued. No one had gotten hurt because you lived on a farm away from crowds of people. Imagine if you got a headache in a crowded city? What would have exploded around you then?”

“So you sympathize with these people?” I asked, getting annoyed. “They kidnapped both of us, virtually killed my parents, and did god knows what to your father.”

“I know,” she said. “But can you at least turn off your indignation long enough to see why?”

              And truth be told I could. I hated to admit it, but her city analogy struck a chord with me. A barrel in the barn is one thing, but surrounded by people… It didn’t really bear thinking about. Still, just because I understood their motivations did not mean I approved of their methods. While I was thinking this, Meredith had tiptoed closer to me.

“I understand your frustrations,” she whispered into my ear. “I share them. But remember, we are being watched here. I have some measure of freedom because after almost a year of training, they trust me. There are guards at the door even now. Save your rebellion for when we have a chance at escaping. For now, continue to go along with things.”

“That’s the plan so far,” I whispered back. “And if or when we have a chance at escaping, do you really want to come? You seem to have made a life for yourself here.”

“They have my father locked up somewhere,” she said. “Or at least, I hope they do. I don’t think they would have let him free, and the only other alternative is to have… Done away with him. I have tried to find out what I can, but I have no access to the prisoners’ records. So until we can find out what was done with him and find a way to escape, we both have to play along.”

              Then she backed away from me, put down my clean clothes, collected my dirty ones and started heading for the door.

“Your food is on the other side of the blind,” she said. And then with a smile: “Enjoy your bath Tyr. Remember to use the soap though, the water is far too clear for you to be clean yet.”

              And with that she turned and left. It was then I realized that, while whispering to me, she likely had quite a view of me sprawled out in the tub. Worse, she was right, the water was clear of obscuring soap bubbles. Despite being alone, I found myself blushing quite furiously.

Chapter 18.

              After my bath, dinner and a change of clothes, I had been led back to my cell in the basement to have a long night’s rest. The next day arrived and I found myself quite sore. Turns out having all of your muscles spasming periodically from electric shocks strains them quite a bit. For the first time in a while I felt like I had worked a full day in the field, or had an hour or two of intense sword training. After stretching out my sore muscles, I waited for someone to collect me. Fortunately, I didn’t have to wait too long. A guard showed up with food and then left, leaving the roof open. Once I was done, Claudius appeared and took me to our training room. He continued training me in channeling various forms of energy and teaching me how to use external sources of power so I wouldn’t be quite as exhausted after casting a spell. Still, it was tiring work. At the end of the day I was led back to my cell. This pattern continued on for quite a few days.

              Fortunately for me, I progressed quickly enough with my lessons that Claudius did not feel he had to break out his electric wand. After our lessons, I was frequently left alone in my cell. I used this time to summon my sword and practice my swordsmanship. After a few days of this, the guards gave up confiscating the sword from me. I did them the favor of not having it in hand when they came to visit me. It was a small thing, but it was nice to see someone here trusting me.

              Meredith also dropped by periodically to see how I was doing. Often it was under the guise of checking that my health was fine and that I was not using too much of my vital energies in spell casting. I have no doubt this was permitted, or even encouraged, by Claudius as a way to keep me happy and docile while I was in captivity. You would be surprised how a little kindnesses like that will make people forget the larger injustices orchestrated against them. I always had to keep in the back of my mind why I was here in the first place. That sobering thought always kept things in perspective for me. The vision of my deceased parents, and the thought of my friends in the woods, whose fates were not known to me, were constant foils to the sweetness of learning how to use my powers.

              As the days passed I became quite adept at channeling energy. No longer did I have to concentrate hard to summon fire, lightning took a little more effort, but not too much more. Ice was still a challenge though. Using telekinesis to collect water from my environment, or even coalesce it from the air around me, then drawing the heat out of it to make it freeze into a shape, and then using that shape as a projectile, was quite a challenge. You would think an icicle would fly better than it does, but it keeps trying to spin in midair. I found snowballs worked better, but it wasn’t as satisfying as hitting a target with a spear of ice. It took me a surprisingly long time to figure out that if you added rotation to the icicle, it was more likely to fly straight and point first. I had been thinking about it like shooting an arrow of ice, but the reality is quite different. Ice is quite brittle, so something as thin and aerodynamic as an arrow with feathers to guide it is not the best shape for an icy projectile. If you want it to do anything other than shatter on impact, you needed something with a more robust shape. You needed there to be a strong impact.

              Telekinesis, on the other hand, I was nearly as good with as fire. After a few days of training, I could not only move objects the size of cutlery, but much larger objects. The chairs in the training room were my favorite to move. The first time I tried it, I accidentally smashed the chair. Claudius commented that if I was going to keep destroying his chairs he was going to have to break out the shock wand again. I can’t blame him too much, that was the second chair of his I had destroyed. After that, I took more care to learn control. It’s surprisingly difficult to do. Once you open a channel through your mind for power to flow, managing the amount you are channeling takes a lot of self-discipline. The training with ice helped a lot as it required a great deal of telekinetic finesse. Also, I found that different energies wanted to flow through me more than others. Electricity, if the conditions were right, would just blast through me. This was dangerous because, since I was using myself as a conduit, it could burn me out, like a lightning bolt hitting a tree. Heat though, that required some energy to get to transfer from one area or object to another. Momentum, in the form of telekinesis was somewhere between the two. It did not blast through once a magical conduit was opened like electricity tried to, nor did it seep like heat tended to, instead it pushed against your resistance like someone trying to push an inanimate object out of the way. It made sense, given the nature of each, but surprised me to learn nonetheless.

After a while, I started to try and experiment with using magic to augment my sword work. My sword loved this, as it meant he got to participate more. He was however, reluctant to show it.

Why do you love icicles more than me?

What?

              I was in mid sword stroke at the time and almost lost my footing when the sword asked me that question.

Icicles. You spend so much time thinking about how to throw them, and then they just smash to pieces when they hit anything. I, on the other hand, would not break apart on impact, and yet you never send me flying. So, the only conclusion I can reach from this is that you love icicles more than me.

Don’t be ridiculous. I follow the lessons that Claudius sets out for me. I’m trying to win him over so that maybe, someday, he will let us out of this dungeon.

Lies! We spend all this time practicing and yet you never let me fly. It’s only ever icicles, fire and the occasional chair, and you only do that stuff with Claudius. I want to fly, to smash objects from a distance. It looks like fun.

So you want to fly? Is that what this is about? Because swords are hand to hand weapons…

Who doesn’t want to fly? It would be awesome! Flying point first through the innards of our enemies! I would make a fantastic projectile!

Do you remember the part where this is a cold room and I barely have enough energy to summon you here?

You haven’t needed to summon me in weeks. You just leave me in the corner, as usual, and the guards just ignore me.

If I tried to levitate you and use you as a projectile, would you stop complaining and let me finish my sword practice?

For now. But why not make it a part of the practice? I bet I would love flying!

Promise?

Ok, but only if you get me to fly!

              Not knowing what else to do, and not wanting the sword to get too chatty while I was practicing, I put it down on the floor and sat down in front of it to try levitating it. I figured if it got its way, I could finish up my sword practice without any more distractions. It’s not good to swing a sword around while distracted. Mistakes can mean suddenly having less fingers and toes than you were born with. I didn’t want to test Meredith’s healing skills by handing her a few fingers and asking if she could reattach them for me. Even if she could, something told me I would never live it down.

              So while sitting in front of the sword, I concentrated and got it to levitate off the ground. While it was a lot more aerodynamic than the chair, it was not balanced with flight in mind. I was debating whether adding spin would help it fly better when…

This is floating not flying! Send me flying!

If you hit a wall and blunt your edge I have no way to sharpen you.

Hello, I’m a magic sword, nice to meet you. What part of my being magic do you not understand?

Your point being?

Nice pun, jackass. You have had me for well over a year and never had to sharpen me before. I don’t get blunt. I’m a magic sword.

You sure about that? I haven’t exactly bashed you into all that many things.

Just the wooden dummy in the woods, and the roof here a few times when you were clumsy. And look, no chips or nicks on the blade. That’s a STONE ceiling.

Ok, I get your point.

              So, with no further thought, I sent it flying. It clanged into the other wall and hit the ground. It didn’t exactly fly straight, it swapped ends in midflight. I tried it a few more times with similar results. I even tried to add spin to keep it going straight, but a blade is not an icicle and it kept trying to swap ends midflight.

This is fun and all, but I don’t think you have this right.

No kidding. Do you have any suggestions?

Do you think a saw blade is more aerodynamic than an icicle?

Probably less, a long serrated edged blade likely would flop around midflight just like you are.

What about a spinning saw blade, like they use on mills?

That might work better, you seem to swap ends in flight anyway.

              So I tried it again. This time, I levitated the sword into the air and then made it spin like a saw blade. Then I sent it flying. It worked a lot better, though keeping the blade side out, instead of hitting the wall with the flat was a bit of a challenge. Still the rotation helped and the hilt biased balance meant that it was more likely to hit with the blade than the handle.

That’s more like it! We can work with this.

Now will you let me finish my practice?

Ok, fine. But we try this again tomorrow.

              Then I stood up… And almost fell over. Not only were my legs like jelly, I was light headed and had a bad case of vertigo. I realized then that, in my excitement, I had overextended myself. I quickly sat down again before I really did fall over. It’s odd to have the spins when you can’t even see the walls. I managed to keep my lunch down, but only just. I think at that point I passed out, because I lost quite a large period of time.

…

“Tyr, wake up. Come on, get up. You need to eat something…”

              From far away I heard that voice… Meredith’s voice. Or so it sounded. I opened one eye and confirmed it was, in fact, Meredith. It was also extremely bright wherever I was. So I decided to shut the eye again as quickly as possible. I felt hung over, but without the benefit of having had fun the night before.

“Hello Meredith…” I managed.

“Oh, thank goodness you’re awake!” She said. “Just what were you doing that almost killed you?”

“Wait… Uh… What?” I believe I managed in response.

“First you need to eat something,” she said. “But that doesn’t mean I forgive you for being so colossally stupid.”

              I had no idea what she was talking about. More to the point, I had no idea where I was. I vaguely remembered trying to make my sword fly and then needing a nap… I don’t remember my cell ever having been quite this bright before, even with the roof opened and the stairs coming out of it.

“Where… Where am I?” I asked.

“You are in a recovery room,” said Meredith in a surly tone with fire in her eyes.

“Why am I here?” I asked.

“That was what I asked you,” she said. “No matter, you need to eat. Your symptoms indicate that you were either violently ill, violently drunk, or you were using your own life force to cast spells in a cold room.”

“Well, I guess that explains this headache and light sensitivity…” I said.

“You WERE using magic in your cell!” She said accusingly. “Tyr, that’s very dangerous, you are lucky you didn’t die!”

“Just how long have I been asleep?” I asked.

“Two days,” she replied.

              I was surprised to hear it. Though everything was slowly coming back to me. The sword practice, the attempt to make the sword fly… The attempt to make it fly multiple times while in my cold cell… Damn! I really had been stupid. As I realized this, I also realized I was quite hungry.

“Did you mention you had some food?” I asked.

“You are impossible!” She said. “But you need to eat. And don’t think I’m done scolding you yet. You’re the only person I know here from home, and I’ll be damned if you go and off yourself by being stupid. Try it again and I’ll bring you back just so I can shock you to death with Claudius’s wand!”