White Hall (The High King: A Tale of Alus Book 10) (47 page)

“You’re also friends with that girl who can fly and helps teach that new magic with the gargoyle, aren’t you?”

Nodding, Katya replied, “Cheleya is my friend and Kel’lor is the mar’goyn’lya, though many people still use the term gargoyle instead. I’ve asked if I could learn the magic too. It would be so fun to fly, don’t you think?”

Belina’s blue eyes seemed to glaze over a moment as they lifted towards the ceiling and the older girl replied, “I’ve ridden the winds already with my mind, but to actually fly... yes, I think that would be very fun.”

With the apprentice being an air wizard in training, it wasn’t a surprising answer for Katya. She had guessed that many of the air wizards would be lining up to be in the dragon magic classes Kel’lor and Cheleya were providing the school in exchange for the dragoness being allowed to learn Southwall’s various types of magic.

“Cheleya said that she shouldn't begin teaching me yet. I need to learn the basics or whatever.

“You’re an apprentice, so maybe if you asked to join the class you still could,” Katya replied watching the older girl for her reaction to the idea. It wasn’t her job to recruit wizards for her friends and there had certainly been a fair amount of interest based off the amount of wizards that had been tested by Kel’lor from the heights of the tower, still she was curious if Belina was one of those who would be interested. The younger girl knew that she wished she could be learning the interesting magic from Mar’kal.

“My teachers said that I need to master my air magic before I go off trying something new. If that was the case, then I am surprised that there are other apprentices who have been allowed to try their tests for aptitude,” Belina mused with a slight frown. She was one of those who would like a chance to at least try to learn dragon magic. Katya saw a kindred spirit in the apprentice, at least from that point. “Oh well, maybe they simply mean that I am not advanced enough to divide my attention from my school of magic yet.”

Katya nodded reluctantly thinking that was more or less the impression Ylena and the other teachers had for the novices, who both knew Cheleya and wanted to learn from their friend. Though she was made to wait, the little, blond haired girl hadn’t given up trying to persuade Cheleya to teach her in private; but so far short of using magic on the dragoness to coerce her, Katya hadn’t figured out a way to convince her to do so.

As the two girls found a place to sit with their meals, one of the thoughts in Katya’s mind was how well the classes were going so far. They had tested a lot of full wizards and apprentices nearing the ending of their initial training to be promoted to full wizards. Surely they had managed to put together a class of promising future dragon mages here in White Hall.
 

Chapter 24- The Challenge of Flight

Cheleya looked to the blue sky with its scattered white clouds feeling the cool breeze of mid spring. She stood on the roof drawing some stares from those gathered there as the pretty dragoness stood barefoot on the chilly stone. Spring in northern Southwall was still considered pretty cold even to the stalwart people of North Continent.

Her sleeveless blouse of light blue was short exposing part of her midriff above a skirt that looked more like a scarf tied at her right hip. Most of the others gathered wore long sleeves or lightweight jackets. Their wizard robes and mage uniforms were all still warmer clothes, but unlike them, Cheleya barely felt the cold. Even during winter, the dragoness had found her human body had much of the physical resistance to heat and cold that her che’ther body had before she had become stuck in the little, blond haired form she now inhabited.

In comparison to the human looking girl, Kel’lor was a massive piece of stone. A gray skinned mar’goyn’lya, heavy cloth covered his body as well as a leather coat. While Cheleya knew that the weather didn’t bother her giant friend anymore than it did her, she had finally rubbed off on him enough to make the mar’goyn’lya wear clothing that was intimidating and complimentary to his giant form. He had wanted to look the part of a teacher of dragon magic. Though the girl still wasn’t sure that was necessary. He was already an intimidating physical presence whether in his original gargoyle form or that of a human.

The girl took her eyes off of the sky and looked at their first class of wizards and mages. Only six remained of the hopeful candidates now. The first day had weeded out many even though by the end they knew what was going to happen at the tower.

Cheleya remembered her first day and thought that the humans had gotten off lightly. The che’ther had been a student of other magics up until then, but was still quite young when she had been given her transformation amulet. For many, just having to give up their original bodies to change into the fragile human ones was enough to make them reconsider and that was before being shoved over a rail five hundred feet above the valley floor.

A transformation amulet could make the massive che’ther and large mar’goyn’lya instantly human. Physical laws and questions of mass and the like meant little to magic. A few tons of a light blue che’ther body became the little blond human girl she remained today.

It was said that a creature’s mind and heart created what they looked like after the transformation. Even playing around with things like the color of her hair did little to change what her first and only choice of bodies looked like. She had always had the same face and her diminutive form was actually similar to her perception as a che’ther, which was also small for her age, even if she was a twenty foot long dragon. Only once had she become something that anyone would truly call ferocious.

In her anger and need to defeat the one who had cursed her, Cheleya had called upon the magic of the broken amulet to become a massive black dragon, nearly a myth even among her long lived people. That had been when she still had the pieces bonded to her bones, however, and now Darius had removed those. While the pieces were gone, the curse remained and Cheleya wondered if she could still transform if she were in great enough need.

A massive black dragon, her wings had blotted out the night’s sky with their length and breadth. Fear took over men and drove them to flee before her. Normally, the girl was among the sweetest of creatures but that night the blackness of her hatred for the one who had betrayed her had made Cheleya something of darkness and anger.

Sighing, the girl evaluated the group before her. Two battle mages, a man and a woman, had survived the first test and those which had followed. The tests had determined the strength of character which would be needed to harness dragon magic and flight. The man was a falcon. No cadets had been invited to try since their corps didn’t have a separation like the wizards from their novices. Cadets were cadets until they proved themselves worthy of being falcons.

Falcon Milar was one of a handful of mages who had come. They were less abundant in the school since mages were needed to teach and didn’t keep a surplus of members in the school beyond those numbers. Only he and Falconi Martina had survived all the tests. While the man was fairly tall compared to Cheleya, he seemed frail next to the falconi despite being quite a bit larger than the woman.

Why the falconi had chosen to become a student once more was never stated to Cheleya or Kel’lor as far as he had been willing to share. She was far from old, but a falconi was even rarer than the falcons teaching in the school. Being among the leaders of the falcon corps, the dragoness would have assumed that she would be too important to become a student once more.

Yet the dark haired falconi stood there ready to learn. She was slightly taller than Cheleya, but was still rather slim for one trained to the hard standards of combat that falcons attempted to achieve. They were often confused for soldiers possessing magic, and while it wasn’t completely incorrect; battle mages were an entirely different kind of soldier.

Moving from the two dressed in mage uniforms, Cheleya looked to the four wizards and thought that they were an interesting selection of people. She had been unfamiliar with the two ranked wizards. Edwar was from the school of air which wasn’t a surprise. Everyone had assumed air wizards in particular would be more comfortable with heights from using their wind riding spells.

On the other hand, Wizard Wellar being a water wizard was more of a surprise. Only finding an earth wizard among their number could have been farther from one’s mind, she supposed, but water was less ground based than those wizards and water was in the air as well at least.

The two apprentices were both more familiar to her. The first was Iris, a second air wizard, and only a surprise in that Cheleya had not realized that she had been interested in learning the magic from Mar’kal. Last, was the fire apprentice Arrimus. His motivations were apparent on his face almost from the start. The young man hoped discovering the new magic would give him an edge against his old friend and rival, Magnus.

Clearing his throat, Kel’lor stated, “We have been working towards learning that which you have all asked about from the first time we have met. For you battle mages, our shield spells and simple casting might feel more familiar to you. You have learned the first few spells already, but now after the tests and training we come to the stage that can only truly be learned one way.

“In Mar’kal over the centuries, this is where many che’ther have met their end.”

Arrimus and the others looked both frightened and confused. For those who were mostly confused, the apprentice asked, “The end of their attempt to become dragon mages?”

Kel’lor’s stone like visage never softened as he remarked darkly, “The dead rarely continue such classes.”

Cheleya turned her head covering her mouth trying not to laugh as she felt the others tense. Kel’lor was certainly playing up the danger. While many fliers, both those of the che’ther and even the mar’goyn’lya, had died while flying, few if any actually died during their first tries. Their teachers allowed their students to attempt to fly, but they usually dove in tandem to be there in case they should fall. It wasn’t like unsupervised baby birds falling from the nest, though it could look that awkward.

Wanting the six to be nervous helped make the first flights a little more challenging, but no dragon mage master avoided telling the harshness of what could happen to a dragon mage once they were flying hundreds of feet above the earth. If their nerves made them back out or fail in their attempts, then they shouldn’t be allowed to fly. It was why they had been tested repeatedly for a fear of heights in more ways than one over the last couple weeks. Dragon mages spent several months to a year training to fly, but the spells took rarely more than a month to pass along. Flying and fighting while flying required tactics and nerve that few who walked the ground could handle.

“Call up your wings, class,” Cheleya ordered trying not to smile but her joy at getting to fly again often outweighed her attempt to be stern like her brother was.

Before they could attempt to create the magical wings that they had been working on for a week to maintain and manipulate for flight, a trio of wizards walked out of the north tower, which was closest to the class. Leading the way was a young man in red, who received a full scowl from Arrimus.

“What are you doing here, Magnus?” the apprentice questioned angrily.

The tall blond haired man looked at Arrimus with his silver, blue eyes and retorted coolly, “I am here for my next lesson of course, though it is none of your business, apprentice. Since I am a regular teacher here right now, I don’t usually get time to train with the rest of you, but Master Kel’lor insisted I find time to come today. It is important, he said.”

The massive mar’goyn’lya nodded his head. Even Cheleya was surprised. The man she had called brother since shortly after beginning to train together in Mar’kal, had been noticeably busy; but then again the little blond haired dragoness was equally busy trying to study with battle mages and healers, while also assisting Kel’lor with dragon magic classes.

Apparently, these six weren’t his only students after all.

The two men backing the Winter’s Edge champion were two of those she had met and traveled with since Hala. Embrell, another fire wizard, bringing the total trying to learn to three and Wellas, that of the air tying that school with the audacious fire wizards for numbers, was the other.

Even after returning from the tournament, Magnus and the two wizards had been working to spread what they had learned both from the tournament and the battle mages before leaving to try combining both kinds of spells and casting. The three men were all teachers and had trained with one another for nearly a year as Magnus had chosen to learn from those who most wizards had once considered inferior and many still did.

Kel’lor pointed to the line even as his assistant noticed the apprehensive and sometimes cold looks exchanged between the nine students of dragon magic.

“Call up your wings," Cheleya repeated after her order had become lost in the tension of the belated arrival of the other students.

A chorus of two words repeated along the line even as Cheleya used her magic to create her pretty pink wings. Like her human body, the petite girl seemed to prefer things most would consider beautiful. They were dragon wings. More bat like than bird; but they glimmered in the early afternoon sunlight making her almost like the mythical faeries the humans from the southern continent professed were no myth but simply magical creatures one had to discover in the depths of the great forest of Taltan.