The daughter of Lord Gregor of Issen, his sole heir. Amelie was used to making demands and getting her way. In her father’s keep, she would have very rarely heard the word no. But the world was not her father’s keep, and she needed to become used to the idea that when she arrived at the Sanctuary, she would be no one’s superior. She’d be among the lowest-ranking members of the order, and she’d need to accept that if she was to learn what they had to teach.
“Knowledge and will,” repeated Amelie. “I know that. Lady Greenfoot, my father’s adviser, has been instructing me. She told you that when you arrived to collect me, didn’t she?”
“Has she been instructing you?” asked Lady Towaal archly. “Then cast a bit of fire over there beside our log pile.”
“Cast a bit of . . .” stammered Amelie. “Well, I cannot actually—”
“You cannot use your will to manipulate the energy and transfer the heat, or you do not have the knowledge of how to do it?” interjected Lady Towaal. “If you have neither the knowledge nor the will, then I daresay Lady Greenfoot has not even begun your instruction.”
Amelie frowned.
“Training a mage takes decades of intensive study,” said Lady Towaal, “not months of sporadic discussions. From now on, you are no longer a highborn. When we reach the village of Farview, you will not walk in as the lady of this land, you will walk in as a simple traveler. When we reach Fabrizo, you will be a girl in my retinue, not a visiting dignitary. And when we reach the City and you are enrolled in the Sanctuary, you will be nothing more than an initiate. This sounds harsh, I realize, and you may think it unfair. I say this to help you, Amelie. If you are to succeed as a mage, if you are to become more than your birth would have earned you in Issen, then you must learn humility. If I teach you one thing, then I hope it is that. Be humble, listen, and learn.”
Amelie pursed her full lips and glanced at her companion, who sat silently beside them. Meredith, the girl’s handmaiden, another token of her previous life that Lady Towaal wished they had dispensed with before the journey had begun, but Lord Gregor had insisted.
Amelie asked, “You still think it was a bad idea for us to go to Farview?”
Lady Towaal nodded. “As a highborn, even more so as a mage, you have the power to change the world. You can do great good, or great evil, but what you cannot do is everything. No matter how powerful you become, no matter what heights you reach, you cannot do it all. There is too much sorrow in the world for you to save everyone. Too much hatred and pain for it all to be healed by one person. If you try, if you stop to assist every stray, to intercede in every conflict, to save every life, you will find yourself running in circles. Focus, girl, is what makes us effective. It is good that you want to help these people. You feel an obligation to them as the daughter of their liege, which is a noble sentiment. I do not mean to argue that feeling or take away your kind heart, but I ask that you direct it. Focus on where you can accomplish the most. Do not fight for two people when you can fight for a dozen.”
“You are suggesting we turn back,” guessed Amelie.
Lady Towaal shook her head. “We’ve already made it halfway. We will continue, but the next time, think if what you hope to accomplish must be done by you, or if there is another. Who’s to say that if we had not accepted the task from the innkeeper that a true hunter would not have arrived the next morning? Who’s to say that our presence in this village is necessary at all?”
“And who’s to say that it wouldn’t have been two more weeks before a hunter came to the way station, and that by then, dozens of innocent people would have died?”
Lady Towaal shrugged. “No one said being a mage was easy.”
Raising her hand, the mage drew heat from the fire, letting it build in her palm until red and orange flames danced there. She shielded her skin, directing the energy back into the silent, flickering ball of flame. “What mages do, Amelie, is take energy from one source and put it somewhere else. It is the core of who we are. That simple concept is what we understand with knowledge and manipulate with will.”
Amelie leaned forward, staring at the small ball of flame.
“As you watch, I am taking heat from this fire,” explained Lady Towaal. “I’ve studied the sciences of thermodynamics and entropy for years to understand what it is I do. I’ve practiced extending my will to accomplish such tasks for decades.” She let the fire die out. “Greenfoot may have taught you some, but you are just beginning to learn. Consider if I used another source to build the heat I just manipulated. What if we had not yet lit the fire, and to perform the task, I drew the heat from myself? I could pull it from my hand and my arm and perhaps get enough heat to ignite the wood. Not a bad thing, starting our campfire. Except, pulling the heat from my body would make me quite cold, and it’s likely I’d suffer frostbite in my extremities. Lighting our campfire with transferred heat would be a small but noble act. I would pay for it severely.”
“You’ve made your point,” grumbled Amelie.
Lady Towaal leaned closer, feeling the heat of the fire on her face. “Have I?”
The girl shrugged. “What do you want me to say?”
“Nothing,” replied Lady Towaal. “I want you to listen.”
And then she began to explain how she’d drawn the heat from the fire, how she’d directed it, and what she’d done to protect herself. The discussion of exerting one’s will was always more exciting than the scientific principles one needed to understand to do it successfully. In time, they’d get to those. In time, the girl would learn. But until then, all that was needed was for her to open her eyes and humble herself. She had to know how much she did not know. If she understood that, and gained the proper attitude to approach it, Amelie could become one of the most powerful mages in generations.
Beneath the trees in the forest on the outskirts of Farview, the shadows stretched like long, hungry fingers. The air was cool enough without the sun that Lady Towaal pulled her cloak tight and thought longingly of the roaring fire they’d left back at the tavern. Two days to walk up to the yokel-filled mountain village, one night to hunt the demon, and two more days back to the way station where they could resume their journey.
A waste of time, she’d decided, the moment they spotted the place. There were dozens of healthy men, strong from work in the forest or on the farms. They may have had no training or experience with weaponry, but an ax was an ax. Whether a man spent years learning the use of the thing in battle or years chopping through logs, it was the same principle. These men could have faced the demon had they the courage. A few of them might have perished, that was true. Demons, once they’d begun serious feeding, were shockingly quick, but the men would have prevailed.
She said as much to her companion.
The blademaster, Saala Ishaam, smirked at her.
“You’ve grown cold, Lady Towaal,” he remarked. “A few men dying? It does not seem much, in terms of battles and continent-spanning wars, but in a village such as this, it would be a catastrophe felt for generations. Families would lose their income as their healthiest, strongest members were gone. In a place like this, there is little they could turn to for alternatives, so they’d become impoverished. Perhaps the town council would make some allowance, but no one here has so much extra they could support dozens of hungry mouths. Maybe they could leave, move to where they could find a trade, but where? What trade? The closest settlement of any size is that way station, and they have no need of more hands to turn the spits or pour the ale. If a few more men fell to this demon, the entire village would be affected for years. A few men is nothing to the Sanctuary, but it’s everything to a village like this.”