Chapter 7 Part 1

MAGIC

“Now pay attention,” Gage instructed his pupil. “This is the Shro-Dinger equation of magic,” he said scribbling the information on a piece of paper. “As we have discussed, all magic is governed by one of two focuses. A spell is either controlled by thought, or by time.”

“Thought controlled spells are those requiring concentration,” Dylan reviewed.

“And time controlled spells are those with duration.” Gage had spent almost two months with Dylan in the tutelage of basic magic theory.

“The Shro-Dinger equation expresses the state of the magic field. And after you separate the terms, you see that you are left with two separate expressions. The one on the left is the time dependent part, and the one on the right is the thought dependent part.”

Dylan studied the equation Gage had derived. They had spent weeks in Gage’s study deriving various equations and discussing laws of magic. “Why did we separate those?”

“When the time comes for you to create your own spells, the control that you place on the spell will dictate which of these terms you use to balance your spell’s power equation.”

Dylan nodded. “Do you ever use both parts of the equation?”

“Occasionally, if it cannot be avoided,” Gage answered. “But those would be very complex spells and the calculations would be extremely involved. A miscalculation could be disastrous.”

Gage rolled the paper and placed it in a tube. The tube contained many rolled papers. They were Dylan’s notes and studies. “Now tonight I want you to take that equation, and differentiate it, first with respect to time, and then with respect to thought. You should wind up with two fairly simple expressions that we will talk about tomorrow.”

“Yes, master,” Dylan replied. The few weeks following his promotion to apprenticeship had included some dramatic changes to Dylan’s life. He no longer had to labor as when he was an initiate. He found that the initiates interpreted even his smallest suggestions as commands. He also noted, with a private bit of pride that two weeks later, an initiate of Master Tesron who planned to study magic had accepted a green tunic. Dylan felt proud that he had undoubtedly contributed to the breaking of that silly tradition.

His studies were very intense, though, and Dylan found that often he would study right through mealtimes without knowing it. Gage was wasting no time in introducing some of the more complex theories of magic to him. And though Dylan had comfortably fallen into a workable routine at the Academy, he was quite ready for a change of pace when one afternoon Gage instructed Dylan to pack his things for the trip.

Gage directed him to make two packings. The first was things to be left behind stored in Gage’s apartment. The second were the things to be taken on the road. Beyond that, Gage provided no more instruction.

That night Dylan went through his belongings. His private room--that of an apprentice--was barely larger than the ones he had lived in as an initiate, except that he had it all to himself. He spent the better part of the evening sorting and packing, and then lay down for the night.

The next day, Dylan and Gage boarded a wagon and Dylan drove the team of mules out of the city on the northern road. It was a part of Allentown that Dylan had never visited. To his surprise, it appeared to have very few of the tents and temporary lodgings that were so common to the other roads.

Gage and Dylan made small talk for the first few hours of the trip. Then as they watered their mules and sat under a large tree that provided a pleasant amount of shade, Gage decided to review a few of Dylan’s lessons. “So let us review what we have discussed,” Gage began. “Name the parts of a spell.”

Dylan paused for a moment organizing his thoughts. “The first part of a spell is the Preamble. It’s the Preamble that generates the energy to operate the spell.”

“What if the Preamble is wrong?” Gage asked.

“If the Preamble generates too little energy, the spell will either fail harmlessly or misfire,” Dylan answered. “If the Preamble generates too much energy, the spell will backlash and the spell caster risks severe energy burn.”

“Backlashes are often fatal,” Gage added, “whereas misfires can be totally unpredictable. Please continue.”

“The second part of a spell is the Direction.” Dylan scratched his chin. There were a few hairs beginning to sprout there and he had taken to shaving. His skin was not yet accustomed to it, though and so it caused rashes on occasion. “The Direction dictates the area of affect that the magic of the spell is to be worked upon. The greater the distance, the higher the direction value in the equation.”

“What about a short distance, but large area of effect?” Gage asked.

“Also a higher value,” Dylan answered. “The Direction is proportional to a constant times the product of the range and area.”

“Excellent,” Gage agreed. “Please continue.”

“The Function’s next,” Dylan stated. “The Function of the spell is the set of instructions dictating how the magic is to work. It controls the magic to achieve a desired goal. It’s also the most difficult part of the spell field equation to calculate.” Dylan gave his master a questioning glance. Gage had not taught Dylan any thing about the Function calculations.

“That is sufficient,” Gage told him. “We will learn more about the Function of a spell later. First we must learn how to control the energy and balance the equation.”

Dylan nodded. “The Conclusion of a spell is the next part. It defines the parameters, which limits the spell. The Conclusion determines when the spell has achieved its function and purpose. It represents the duration and limitation of the magic.”

“I like the way you worded that,” Gage laughed, “and the last part?”

“The Closure of the spell is the opposite of the Preamble. It directs the spent energy and balances the equation.”

“Yes, well it is a little more complex than that,” Gage said, “but we have not really talked about the Closure much, so I would not expect you to know the rest.”

Gage took the reigns from his apprentice. “I will drive for a while. I want you to get the manuscript entitled ‘The Principle of Source and Sink’. Read the section on spell Closures. When you are done, come back up here and we will talk about it.”

Their progress on the first day of their travel was somewhat less than impressive. While Dylan continued his studies by reading the assigned text, Gage drove their wagon steadily on the northern road at a leisurely pace. Only the occasional passing of a wagon headed for Allentown disturbed the otherwise quiet afternoon. And when sunset approached, Gage and Dylan set up a camp in a clearing several hundred feet from the road. The site was well worn and had the distinguishing marks of numerous campfires.
That evening as Gage and Dylan dined on the stew that Gage had prepared under the protection of his magical wards, they discussed Dylan’s reading assignment.

“Magic,” Gage explained, “behaves according to something called the circuit theory. It is a theory that describes how magic moves as well as some other things in nature such as lightning.” He spooned another helping of stew. “Magic flows freely from its source to a sink. Think of the source as a boundless sea of water, and the sink as a bottomless pit. The Preamble of a spell opens a channel from the sea to the pit and allows the water to flow. The power of the Preamble can be thought of as the width and depth of the channel. As long as the water moves, it can be harnessed to turn millstones, irrigate land, move barges, and many other uses. But unless you block the channel when you are done, as the Closure of a spell does, then the water will continue to flow unstopped.”

“But if the sea is endless and the pit is bottomless,” Dylan asked, “why worry about closing the channel?”

“Because if the channel is not closed, over time it will erode the walls, widen, and grow. Eventually it will grow so large that it will be uncontrollable. In the meantime, you will have hundreds of thousands of channels moving ridiculous amounts of water every moment. Leaving spells active all over the place would cause some serious trouble. Especially since two spells operating within the same area of effect will interfere with each other.”

Gage finished his stew and placed the bowl and spoon in a bucket. “That is where the real danger of omitting the Closure of a spell lies. By leaving a spell unclosed, you invite disaster the next time you cast a spell.”

Dylan stared at the coals a few moments as he spooned his own stew. “Is it possible to predict the reaction between two spells?”

Gage held a straight face, but he was inwardly thrilled with the question. Such a concept generally would not occur to most journeymen much less an apprentice and certainly not a beginning apprentice. It spoke volumes about Dylan’s insight and latent talent.
“Yes as a matter of fact, it is possible to predict what the interference pattern of two spells will be, but only the very experienced dare to do that kind of thing. Most of the results are explosive or have some other bad result. Very seldom is there a favorable results.”
Gage passed the bucket to Dylan. “Guess what,” he teased.

Dylan grimaced. Over the previous few weeks, his apprenticeship among a guild full of initiates had spared him from manual labor. “Yes master,” he replied as he took the dirty dishes and began his chore. “I don’t suppose there is a dish washing spell, is there?”

Gage laughed at the question. “No, there is not. At least there is no spell that I have ever heard of. If you ever develop one, though, you may be able to sell it to all the other apprentices for enough money to grow old on.”