Because of that ability, they were able to survive many of the mistakes that violently ended other wizards’ aspirations for flight.
Another amazing success had been one of my ancestors, Demandred Illeniel, who had built an entire sailing ship that could fly. He had been a skilled enchanter and had invested almost five years of his life into designing and constructing the massive vessel. It had been modeled after a carrack and had supposedly been over a hundred feet in length with three masts for sails. Demandred had suffered a number of setbacks before finally getting his ship ‘sailing’ per se, largely because flying and sailing were very different endeavors, but he had eventually managed to adapt his design until it was workable. The end result made him famous for a number of years, until he finally set off on an expedition to explore the unknown wilds of the world. He had never returned.
I hadn’t been particularly enamored with any of their designs. Geoffrey Mordan’s style seemed likely to get me killed, and I had no intention of spending five years building a massive floating ship as Demandred had. There was also the fact that his ship was limited to the speed provided by the wind alone.
My idea had been to create something simple that would enable me to fly in the manner of a wizard who wasn’t using any outside devices. What I had created was essentially an aerodynamic shell that would protect me from wind and give me a much larger surface to push against with the wind. I could have done something similar with a temporary spell to create a shield around myself, but this allowed me to keep my attention firmly on controlling our flight and propelling us through the air. It also circumvented the biggest problem Geoffrey Mordan had complained of, which was that at a certain speed the wind buffeting him made it difficult to breathe.
“I hope you’re ready,” I said to my unconscious passenger, and then I began a spell that would allow me to control the wind around us. I could have done it more easily by speaking with the wind directly, but I didn’t intend to use my abilities as an archmage unless my own strength proved to be insufficient.
Quelling the fear that suddenly sent my heart surging into my throat, I used the wind to send my invisible craft rushing up and out over the wide world. My own fears had kept me from doing it before, but desperation had finally provided the impetus I needed.
Holy shit! What have I done!? screamed my inner voice. I might have shouted the words aloud, but my jaw was clenched so tightly I could do nothing to open it. The world beneath us was vivid and bright, as though it had been painted by a giant with a mad passion for color. Blue sky, white clouds, verdant fields, and everywhere the sun reflecting from surfaces that refused to be bound by simple colors. Adrenaline had sent my mind into overdrive, and the world was infused with a clarity that we often talk about but seldom experience.
The sensation of movement, of acceleration, was incredible, and I knew in that moment that I had discovered a new passion. The first minute passed, and my heart rate began to return to something a bit closer to normal as we raced along, driven by a wind that my mind pushed ever harder, giving us a speed unimaginable.
A viewer from the ground would have seen two men, one sitting and the other lying flat, moving rapidly across the sky, if they had noticed us at all. I gained altitude and speed rapidly, putting ever more force into the wind so as not to lose the feeling of acceleration. My face brightened, as I experienced a feeling of pure exhilaration such as I had never known.
The earth below us was moving by lazily, despite our prodigious speed, and I found myself fascinated by the vast distance between us and the ground. I should get closer and see how fast it appears to move then, I thought. Adjusting the wind, I applied a small downward pressure on the front of our ‘craft’ and discovered one of the reasons why so many wizards died trying to fly. Our speed at that point was impossible for me to calculate, but I’m sure it was many times faster than any bird I had ever seen flying, and when I applied my downward pressure at the front it caused my craft to dip suddenly.
The air that had been flowing smoothly over the top now hammered the oblique surface, and some of our forward motion was converted into a chaotic spin. Being only human, I tried to stop it, and my reactions made things worse. In less than a second, we went from flying smoothly at immense speed to dropping like a stone, spiraling and spinning out of control, and the violence of our uncontrolled flight rendered me incapable of knowing which way was ‘up’.
I had no way of knowing how much time was left before we struck the ground, but I was certain it would be sooner than I expected and probably with enough force to destroy any protections I might try to use. Even if I managed a shield that was strong enough to protect us, the violence of our stop would probably kill us anyway. I had learned that lesson first hand in treating the wounds of my knights who wore armor that was nigh invulnerable. The human body required gentle treatment.
Giving up my attempts to control our flight or stop the spin, I instead activated the second enchantment built into the stones that made up my nearly invisible craft. I had read the stories and concluded that there was a chance I might wind up in a situation such as this; though once we had started flying I hadn’t really believed it was possible. It had seemed so simple, and completely under my control. Thankfully my cautious nature had provided a possible means of survival.
The rapid spinning had thoroughly disoriented me, and I doubted I could have managed even a simple bit of magic at that point, but my enchantment only required the utterance of a single command word, ‘lyrtis’, which was Lycian for ‘feather’. The magic reduced our mass to a tenth of what it had previously been, and that meant the overall density of my twelve foot in diameter disc was now very low. We were still falling, but now air resistance was a much larger factor than gravity and inertia. The result was a rapid decline in our downward velocity and slowing of our spin. In no more than a few tens of seconds our spin stopped entirely, and our precipitous fall had become nothing more hazardous than the gentle decline of a leaf drifting in the wind.
As the stark terror receded from my mind, I became aware of a loud shrieking sound; though perhaps screaming would have been a better description. The turbulent brutality of our recent fall had awoken my passenger, who seemed none too happy about our current situation. His voice had already faded, largely owing to the fact that Roland’s lungs were empty, and he had thus far been unable to stop yelling long enough to draw a fresh lungful of air.
The younger son of the Lancasters looked to be in terrible condition. His face was marked with blood (probably from striking the walls of our craft while unconscious), and his eyes seemed on the verge of rolling up into his head. He is never going to forgive me for this, I told myself, but in reality I was more worried he might relay the tale of our near death to Penny.
“Calm down, everything is alright!” I shouted at him, in a voice that was guaranteed to do nothing more than increase his panic.
The words seemed to help. He stopped screaming long enough to take a long shuddering breath before yelling back at me, “What the fuck is going on?!”
“Don’t worry,” I told him, more calmly now, “We had a bad turn, but everything is better now.”
“How the hell did I get up here?” he shouted, “And what part of this is better? Are you mad?!” And then he threw up.