there nevertheless, whispering strange logics of their own.
All of this Jaldis had taught him, forcing him to memorize, to meditate, to strengthen his skills while building the colossal foundation of magic itself. And all the while magic was opening before him like a gigantic rose, drawing him in to deeper and ever deeper magics hidden within its heart.
He learned the runes, the twenty-six signs capable of drawing down constellations of power, clusters of coincidence, to themselves, and how these runes could be combined into sigils and seals, to affect possibility and chance. He learned the art of talisman making, how to imbue an inanimate object with a field of altered probability or to cause it to have an effect upon the mind or body or perceptions of those it touched; learned which metals, which minerals, which materials would hold power, and which would shed it like a duck’s feather shedding water.
He learned Limitations and which spells were dangerous to work because of strange and unexpected effects—there were spells which would turn a man’s entire body into a field of blazing good fortune, so that luck would inevitably fall his way, but which were never used because the side effect was that the man would go mad; other spells of protection that, at certain seasons of the year which could never be accurately predicted, would call upon their wielder every grim and demon for miles around, attacking and attacking in a biting cloud; or spells that transformed ugliness into astonishing physical beauty, but which brought with them unspeakable dreams.
He learned also Illusion, the wizard’s stock-in-trade: how to make a man or woman believe that a cup was made of gold and gems, instead of cheap wood, and how to make them continue in that belief for hours or days; how to make them believe that the cup was filled with wine when it contained only water, and to make them not only taste the wine but get drunk on it, though it took a very clever wizard to engineer a convincing hangover the following morning; how to make a guard fall asleep, or believe that someone entering the room was a dog or a kitten, or someone else he knew and who had legitimate business there; the spells of Who-Me? and Look-Over-There that Rhion had used in dealing with the Felsplex mob.
It had all been like playing in a field of flowers.
He had learned, too, that simply knowing a spell, or having learned it once, was not enough. There were many who called themselves wizards who thought that it was, but usually these did not survive. Shavus had taught him, by the rough-and-ready expedient of chasing him around the room, beating him with a stick, that certain spells must become second nature, so that they may be cast accurately in an emergency, or when the mind is clouded with panic or sleep or—sometimes—poison or drugs.
And he had learned the Magic of Ill.
Jaldis had been unwilling for many years to teach him the spells to cause pain to another human being, spells to pierce certain portions of the brain like slivers of glass, spells to inflame the joints and the bowels with agony, spells which could, if wielded by a mighty enough mage, suffocate a man or rip his organs within him. “They are the obverse of healing spells,” he had said, “the dark side of our ability to shift the small workings of the body, and they must be used only in the gravest, the direst emergencies. There have been wizards who have allowed themselves to be beaten to death, rather than work such spells upon their killers.”
“Why?” Rhion had asked, remembering the wold woman sitting on her blanket, with a smear of dog turd on her cheek. He’d been in his early twenties then, and still in the stick phase of his education, nursing a dozen bruises under his robe. “I mean, if it’s a choice of your life or theirs…”
“It isn’t simply your life,” Jaldis had said quietly. That had been at Shavus’ house. The big old warrior-mage and the two apprentices
All of this Jaldis had taught him, forcing him to memorize, to meditate, to strengthen his skills while building the colossal foundation of magic itself. And all the while magic was opening before him like a gigantic rose, drawing him in to deeper and ever deeper magics hidden within its heart.
He learned the runes, the twenty-six signs capable of drawing down constellations of power, clusters of coincidence, to themselves, and how these runes could be combined into sigils and seals, to affect possibility and chance. He learned the art of talisman making, how to imbue an inanimate object with a field of altered probability or to cause it to have an effect upon the mind or body or perceptions of those it touched; learned which metals, which minerals, which materials would hold power, and which would shed it like a duck’s feather shedding water.
He learned Limitations and which spells were dangerous to work because of strange and unexpected effects—there were spells which would turn a man’s entire body into a field of blazing good fortune, so that luck would inevitably fall his way, but which were never used because the side effect was that the man would go mad; other spells of protection that, at certain seasons of the year which could never be accurately predicted, would call upon their wielder every grim and demon for miles around, attacking and attacking in a biting cloud; or spells that transformed ugliness into astonishing physical beauty, but which brought with them unspeakable dreams.
He learned also Illusion, the wizard’s stock-in-trade: how to make a man or woman believe that a cup was made of gold and gems, instead of cheap wood, and how to make them continue in that belief for hours or days; how to make them believe that the cup was filled with wine when it contained only water, and to make them not only taste the wine but get drunk on it, though it took a very clever wizard to engineer a convincing hangover the following morning; how to make a guard fall asleep, or believe that someone entering the room was a dog or a kitten, or someone else he knew and who had legitimate business there; the spells of Who-Me? and Look-Over-There that Rhion had used in dealing with the Felsplex mob.
It had all been like playing in a field of flowers.
He had learned, too, that simply knowing a spell, or having learned it once, was not enough. There were many who called themselves wizards who thought that it was, but usually these did not survive. Shavus had taught him, by the rough-and-ready expedient of chasing him around the room, beating him with a stick, that certain spells must become second nature, so that they may be cast accurately in an emergency, or when the mind is clouded with panic or sleep or—sometimes—poison or drugs.
And he had learned the Magic of Ill.
Jaldis had been unwilling for many years to teach him the spells to cause pain to another human being, spells to pierce certain portions of the brain like slivers of glass, spells to inflame the joints and the bowels with agony, spells which could, if wielded by a mighty enough mage, suffocate a man or rip his organs within him. “They are the obverse of healing spells,” he had said, “the dark side of our ability to shift the small workings of the body, and they must be used only in the gravest, the direst emergencies. There have been wizards who have allowed themselves to be beaten to death, rather than work such spells upon their killers.”
“Why?” Rhion had asked, remembering the wold woman sitting on her blanket, with a smear of dog turd on her cheek. He’d been in his early twenties then, and still in the stick phase of his education, nursing a dozen bruises under his robe. “I mean, if it’s a choice of your life or theirs…”
“It isn’t simply your life,” Jaldis had said quietly. That had been at Shavus’ house. The big old warrior-mage and the two apprentices
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