you need to worry about. “Now I will most likely have to undo the garbage you’ve learned before. I bet all somebody taught you to do was light a campfire or something.”
I couldn’t light a cigarette, even if I wanted a smoke. Lighting a fire right now didn’t exactly seem like a genius thing to do anyway.
“Just go ahead and teach me.”
“Let’s start with water, then. All around you is matter to be manipulated. Either you move it, freeze it, or vaporize it. You can play with it like clay. Are you following me so far?”
“Yep.”
“Manipulating matter requires two things: tapping into the inner source, and the words to do the push for us to make the connection.”
I didn’t interrupt her. It was nice to learn something my grandma was so eager to hold back about. This was something I needed to learn.
“The memorization is the easy part. Finding your way to unleash your power is another thing entirely.” She went through a series of phrases for the manipulation. And it wasn’t something simple like move water around. Each way you could alter water had a three-word phrase. And Tamara was perfectly able to info dump them all.
Instead of mumbling like a damn fool, I chewed on each phrase and swallowed it into my head.
Pretend like she’s Bill , I told myself.
Every morning Bill went though his work list, his order list, and a bunch of other bullshit he remembered at the moment but would forget by the time he grabbed his morning coffee.
For a goblin who loved money more than his relatives, he sure didn’t work hard toward learning more of it.
“What are you doing?” she asked out of the blue.
I opened my eyes to see her staring me down.
“This is what I do to remember stuff.”
“So how do you freeze water then?”
I read the phrase in my head.
“Vaporize water.”
I read the next one underneath that.
Three-word phrases weren’t so bad compared to the one spell Grandma had me learn. Now that took some time.
“Let’s go through the rest of the elements then. After that, I’ll give you a demonstration.”
Something my grandma said came to mind. “Wait a moment. What about the consequences? Doesn’t the fundamental exchange have rules? Energy is never used up. It’s merely transformed. If there is a consequence to changing matter, what is it?”
A slow smile formed on Tamara’s face. “You’re a smart girl. What happens to an object if you slowly grab bits and pieces of it?” She took a step toward the house. “What if you took this hand and removed a sliver of the cells on a finger? Not much. There are massive amounts of power there. But the sad thing is that, as spellcasters pulling from ourselves, we have little say in where we pull from. You could be pulling from your fingertip. You could be pulling from your stomach. The worse spots are your internal organs.” She laughed as dread rose through me. “Or even worse you can pull from your heart. How about a bleeder from there? The ones who truly lack self-control pull from up here,” she tapped her head. “And then it’s all over.”
Grandma had been unconscious for five days due to one spell to save my life. What the hell was I getting myself into this time?
“You ready for a demonstration then?”
The word no came to mind, but I nodded instead.
Tamara mumbled under her breath, the words weren’t discernible to me. First, there was nothing but the sounds of the rain and the feel of the drips on my coat. The chill in the air flowed from my forehead down to my toes. She was strangely calm, serene. I never had such a feeling. The only person I’d ever seen with such a calm spirit was Grandma.
Then I saw the drops of rain that fell go back up again almost as if gravity had flipped. The very sight made my jaw drop as I watched even more rain that normally would fall to the ground being sent up towards the sky. The best way to describe it would be as if time went backwards.
“Amazing,” I whispered. “How
I couldn’t light a cigarette, even if I wanted a smoke. Lighting a fire right now didn’t exactly seem like a genius thing to do anyway.
“Just go ahead and teach me.”
“Let’s start with water, then. All around you is matter to be manipulated. Either you move it, freeze it, or vaporize it. You can play with it like clay. Are you following me so far?”
“Yep.”
“Manipulating matter requires two things: tapping into the inner source, and the words to do the push for us to make the connection.”
I didn’t interrupt her. It was nice to learn something my grandma was so eager to hold back about. This was something I needed to learn.
“The memorization is the easy part. Finding your way to unleash your power is another thing entirely.” She went through a series of phrases for the manipulation. And it wasn’t something simple like move water around. Each way you could alter water had a three-word phrase. And Tamara was perfectly able to info dump them all.
Instead of mumbling like a damn fool, I chewed on each phrase and swallowed it into my head.
Pretend like she’s Bill , I told myself.
Every morning Bill went though his work list, his order list, and a bunch of other bullshit he remembered at the moment but would forget by the time he grabbed his morning coffee.
For a goblin who loved money more than his relatives, he sure didn’t work hard toward learning more of it.
“What are you doing?” she asked out of the blue.
I opened my eyes to see her staring me down.
“This is what I do to remember stuff.”
“So how do you freeze water then?”
I read the phrase in my head.
“Vaporize water.”
I read the next one underneath that.
Three-word phrases weren’t so bad compared to the one spell Grandma had me learn. Now that took some time.
“Let’s go through the rest of the elements then. After that, I’ll give you a demonstration.”
Something my grandma said came to mind. “Wait a moment. What about the consequences? Doesn’t the fundamental exchange have rules? Energy is never used up. It’s merely transformed. If there is a consequence to changing matter, what is it?”
A slow smile formed on Tamara’s face. “You’re a smart girl. What happens to an object if you slowly grab bits and pieces of it?” She took a step toward the house. “What if you took this hand and removed a sliver of the cells on a finger? Not much. There are massive amounts of power there. But the sad thing is that, as spellcasters pulling from ourselves, we have little say in where we pull from. You could be pulling from your fingertip. You could be pulling from your stomach. The worse spots are your internal organs.” She laughed as dread rose through me. “Or even worse you can pull from your heart. How about a bleeder from there? The ones who truly lack self-control pull from up here,” she tapped her head. “And then it’s all over.”
Grandma had been unconscious for five days due to one spell to save my life. What the hell was I getting myself into this time?
“You ready for a demonstration then?”
The word no came to mind, but I nodded instead.
Tamara mumbled under her breath, the words weren’t discernible to me. First, there was nothing but the sounds of the rain and the feel of the drips on my coat. The chill in the air flowed from my forehead down to my toes. She was strangely calm, serene. I never had such a feeling. The only person I’d ever seen with such a calm spirit was Grandma.
Then I saw the drops of rain that fell go back up again almost as if gravity had flipped. The very sight made my jaw drop as I watched even more rain that normally would fall to the ground being sent up towards the sky. The best way to describe it would be as if time went backwards.
“Amazing,” I whispered. “How
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