In answer, Archie pointed at me. “She was my motivation.”
“Me?” I said, bewildered.
He nodded. “Mum sat with me last night. Don’t think she expected me to last much longer. And she told me that she was training you to take up the fight once more. I wanted to help you!”
“Thanks, Archie,” I said, giving him an appreciative smile. Then I turned to face Astrea. “But we have a problem.”
“Such as?”
“I have no wand. Without one I can’t do magic.”
Archie said, “She clearly has a practical mind, Mum.”
It was disconcerting having Archie call her that, when she looked not that much older than he was.
She glanced down at my pocket. “What about the Elemental?”
“What about it?”
“Take it out.”
I pulled my glove out and started to put it on.
But she stopped me. “There’s no need for that, Vega.”
“But Alice Adronis told me—”
“I’m sure she did, but she was also in great distress when you met, and I doubt that she was thinking clearly. So just trust me. For I have given this much thought and believe I am correct. Just take it out with your bare hand.”
Yet despite her words, I noted that she was keeping her wand at the ready.
I cautiously slipped my hand into my pocket. My fingers inched closer to where the shrunken Elemental lay. My breathing got heavier and my heart started to beat faster. Alice had worn the glove. She had told me...
I felt my fingers an inch from the wood of the Elemental. I looked first at Delph. He was staring dead at my pocket. I glanced at Astrea. She was looking not at the pocket of my cloak but directly at me.
“Believe, Vega,” she said quietly.
“Believe in what?” I asked, bewildered.
“In yourself.”
I caught my breath, swallowed a huge lump in my throat and decided that taking this slow was only making it worse; it was better to just get it over with. I thrust my hand forward and my fingers closed around the Elemental.
I had closed my eyes at the moment of collision of flesh and wood. Now I opened them because nothing had happened. I drew the stick out and looked at it clutched in my hand. It looked tiny and impotent. I glanced at Astrea.
She was staring at the thing as if it was a frozen serpent.
“What?” I said.
“I haven’t seen the Elemental for over eight hundred sessions,” she said, her voice both awed and sad. “I saw Alice hurl that at so many of our enemies.” She glanced up at me. “Would you, please?”
I instinctively understood her. I willed the Elemental to its full, golden size. I held it up as though I was about to hurl it.
Astrea took a step back, her eyes filling with tears as she stared at the Elemental. Then when she glanced at me, she did a double take.
“What is it?” I said, glancing down at myself.
“Nothing,” she whispered. “ ’Tis nothing. You just reminded me of... never mind. You can shrink it now.”
I did so and said, “Now what?”
“Tell it to lengthen to nine inches precisely.”
I was surprised by this but conjured the thought and watched in satisfaction as the wood grew to what seemed the proper size.
Astrea drew closer and examined my hand in relation to the Elemental. “Good, good. Yes, that will certainly do.”
“Do for what?”
She stepped back. “Now that will be your wand.”
My face screwed up. “My wand? You just said that a wand had to be passed from a family member. And that it had to have something of that person inside it.”
“And those conditions have been met here,” she replied.
“How?” I exclaimed. “I got this from Alice Adronis on a battlefield hundreds of sessions before I was even born. She...”
“She what?” interjected Astrea. “She couldn’t be related to you? She couldn’t have put something in the Elemental of herself?” She paused. “Wrong on both counts.”
“That’s impossible!” I shot back.
“Look at it. Look at it closely.”
I stared at the Elemental. There was nothing to see. But then, then there was something. I bent my face nearer. It was a dark red line, like a thread weaving through the wood.
Astrea said, “It’s a strand of her hair, Vega. Alice’s beautiful auburn hair.”
I looked up to see her watching me. “It can’t be.”
“A simple test will suffice.” She pointed at the wall of books. “The incantation is ‘Rejoinda, book.’ Roll the r and make a slow, deliberate back sweep with your wand toward you. And let your mind focus only on the book. Like this.”
She pointed her wand at the first bookcase, uttered the phrase “Rejoinda, book” and drew her wand slowly toward herself.
A book shot off the shelf and zoomed right into her hand.
She set it down and turned to me. “Now you do it.”
I looked down at the Elemental. “I can’t.”
“Yes, you can. Place your thumb over the top of the wood and your index finger below. Let about six inches of the wand extend out from your hand. And not too tight a grip. It won’t slip.”
“Why not?”
“Because it has become a part of you now.”
I stared down at the thing, expecting to feel horrified. But I actually felt warm... and safe.
I glanced at Delph. He was staring at me. “You can do it, Vega Jane. You know you can. You’ve done things. THINGS! You can bloody well fetch a book.”
I turned back to look at Astrea.
“Just believe, Vega. As you did when you plucked the Elemental from your pocket without need of that glove.”
Well, she had me there. I had done that.
I took a deep breath, readied myself, looking at my hand, the books, the wand. Wand! Maybe I could do this.
I focused on one book in particular. I let my mind see only it. I said in a firm voice, “Rejoinda, book.”
I got the word right, rolling the r just as Astrea had, but in my excitement I snapped my hand and, with it, the wand toward me.
The entire bookcase flew from the wall and shot right at us, books cascading from it. I screamed and dove to the floor together with Delph and Archie.
“Embattlemento,” cried out Astrea.
I looked up in time to see the bookcase halt in midair as though it had hit something solid. Then it shot backward, settling neatly against the wall. All the fallen books picked themselves up and zipped back onto their original places on the shelves.
I slowly rose along with Delph and Archie. I gazed shamefacedly at first the bookcase and then Astrea, and then gazed ruefully down at the Elemental still clutched in my hand.
When I glanced up, Delph was staring at me with such astonishment that it was quite unsettling.
“I guess I’m not very good at magic,” I said miserably.
“On the contrary,” said Astrea, “you have surpassed my expectations. I believe that you can be a first-rate sorceress.”
This made me feel euphoric. And that feeling lasted until what she said next.
Astrea held up five fingers. “These are the numbers of layers to the Quag, Vega. Each layer, or circle, as we refer to them, is a world unto itself, separate from its neighbor. Each holds unique and deadly challenges. Each changes all the time, growing and evolving, feeding off the magic that created and inspired it.” She paused and then added, “And please understand one thing quite clearly. Despite your magical prowess, each circle could well be your graveyard.”
And with this final chilling pronouncement, she turned and left us.
Viginti tres: The Education of Me