1A/N: There have been some changes to Chapter 1! Please take a look at it again if you're read it already.
Chapter Two—The Journey to Manseker Academy
Almost a year later, Ben was on his way to the mage school. Or Academy, as Mrs. Cache corrected him. Invitation Day was the next day, and it was his one chance to get into the school that year.
He'd been in the forest for three days, and he had just a few more hours of travel left before he reached Meridas, the town bordering the school. He'd stopped by at Tremlin and said hello to Sal before heading into the forest.
The White Forest was aptly named. The tree barks were white, the leaves were white on one side, and the sun shone white for most of the day. It got tiring after a while. There weren't many animals. Thankfully the path he was taking went straight through the woods, and there wasn't much he had to worry about as long as he stayed on it. He only left the path to make camp each night.
On that last morning, he was woken up by the sound of hoofs. Groggily, he pushed himself up and rubbed his eyes. The trees rustled behind him and a goat jumped into the clearing, landing just a few feet from him.
Ben hurried to get up, heart thudding in surprise. He was still half asleep, and the goat had scared him. He was just calming down, trying to convince himself it was nothing serious when he heard the sound of thundering hooves behind him. The clearing was small and the trees were thin, so he could see clearly through them.
There were many, maybe dozens, of goats rushing towards him. Gasping, he grabbed his rucksack, and stumbled back, tripping on his sleeping bag. He tried pushing himself backwards and out of the way of the stampeding herd. How were they even running at full speed through a forest?
Trying to get up, but panicking, he put his arms over his head and tried to protect his face. He wasn't thinking straight and the sound of hooves kept getting closer.
"Fuck," he whispered and tried to curl in on himself. The first sound of hooves in the clearing made him jump and he curled in even more. Goddess, there should be something he could do about this.
He groaned. Of course there was. He was a mage who could control the elements. He just needed to use them to scare the goats away.
The first thing that came to mind was fire. Fire scared away animals, he knew. Without thinking it through, he called on his magic, finding the strings that connected to fire magic and pulled on them. Immediately, there was a ball of fire in front of him. He breathed out and pushed the magic, and the ball grew in size. He heard the goats braying and pushed the fire out, throwing it over the clearing and towards them. If he scared them away from the clearing, they would just run another way and he would be fine.
He heard the startled braying of the goats and chanced a look up from under his arms. He blinked. He had not meant to make a fireball that large. It was almost half the size of the clearing and there were goats everywhere. They jumped into the clearing and immediately veered off.
Gritting his teeth, he resolved to keep the fireball going until all the goats had left. But a bray really close to him startled him again and he pushed more magic into the fire. Instead of growing in size, the ball exploded. Sparks and flame shot from the center of the clearing to all sides. The air grew hot immediately and the trees caught on fire as if they were just tinder.
That had definitely not been what he meant to do, but he was panicked enough that his magic was reacting to it. He put his head down again and tried to even his breathing. It helped that the sound of hooves and braying had disappeared.
Maybe it had something to do with the fact that the forest was on fire.
Pressing the heel of his palm to his eyes, he groaned and pushed to his feet. He pulled on his rucksack and surveyed the space. Thankfully, the only things he had pulled out of the bag were his sleeping things. Unfortunately, there was no salvaging those from the fire.
He wracked his brain, trying to fix the problem. Already, all he could see was smoke and flame. Water would be the best option to stop the fire, but there was none around him. He couldn't really bury the fire under the earth, not when it was this big. That left air.
He trudged roughly to the center of the clearing and took a deep breath. He stared at the burning forest. The fire surrounded him in all directions, and he knew it had already started spreading away from the clearing. It licked the ground around him. It lapped at his fingers, nudged at his shoes, and blew at his back. It was like an eager pet, excited to be let out after so long. A pet that was so excited, it tugged the leash out of its owner's hand and bound away.
What had been created out of his fear seemed almost cheerful now, crackling away and dancing.
Ben closed his eyes for a long moment, and opened them again. The scene remained the same. He was still breathing acrid smoke, and possibly the remains of burned down trees. He gave a thought to the animals living in the forest, but then reasoned that they could have escaped by now, if there were any near him. Perhaps. The goats were definitely gone.
"Well." he muttered. This was not how he'd expected his day to go. He shook his head, shaking away the flames that threatened to burn his hair. He reached up, fisted the straps of his rucksack, took a deep breath, and blew.
The air around him shifted immediately. As he blew, he concentrated on the feeling of the air, imagined it swirling around him as if he was in the center of a gentle tornado. He lifted his arms and swept them right to left and back again. The wind grew in force and spread through the trees. He grit his teeth and continued the motions until the gale was strong. The wind was over the flames now. The fire brightened when it first met the wind, but it was too strong for it. Slowly, the fire blew out, like a candle.
It seemed like a long time before all of the fire was stopped. Ben turned around the clearing, searching for sparks and flame. But there was nothing. He let out a slow breath and rested his arms. The wind died down gently.
He swallowed and looked around the clearing again. The white trees he'd walked across to enter it were black now. There were charred branches and leaves everywhere. Both his fire and wind had done great damage to the clearing.
Licking his lips, he crouched down and placed his palms on the floor. He closed his eyes and tried to feel the magic around him. It took him many long, deep, breaths, but he finally felt the strings of earth magic buried under the ground. He reached out and plucked them gently, urging them to grow. He pushed on them, lending energy to the existing magic. He felt the string multiply and branch out under him, and he kept encouraging them until he could do no more.
Opening his eyes, he took a deep breath and looked up. The clearing was still burnt, and most of the trees were dead. But he had definitely helped. There were new plants and trees everywhere, glowing white. Leaves sprouted from charred bark. There was new life all around him.
He hadn't completely destroyed this part of the forest.
He let himself fall onto his butt and leaned on his arms, finally breathing freely for the first time that day. He was tired, almost as if he hadn't slept at all. But he had expanded quite a bit of magic, so it made sense that he was tired.
Goddess, he still had a lot of walking left to do. With a groan, he got to his feet and started trudging through the trees and in the direction of the path. Soon, he was on it and he started walking towards Meridas.
He glanced back behind him and squinted through the forest. It was barely visible, but he could see hints of black through the trees. He swallowed and looked in front of him again. There was nothing he could do about it now. The damage was done. He had fixed it as best as he could, and he needed to be on his way.
Maybe he would come back someday and work on helping the trees again. But for now, he had to focus on getting to the Academy in time for Invitation Day.
Ben let out a deep breath as he stepped foot outside the forest. He turned around and studied the white bark that had surrounded him for the past few days. He raised his hand and waved at the trees.
"See you later," he said to them. "I will come back someday and I will do my best to help you heal. I hope you know that I'm truly sorry for what I did."
He let his hand drop. Sweeping his eyes over the forest one last time, he turned around and started walking. Just a few more hours, and he would reach Meridas. As he walked, his mind wandered to what he was going to do for the rest of the day. He had kept himself from thinking about it before, mostly to stay the yearning that had developed in the past year for Manseker and what it could promise, but he needed to get ready to be around other mages.
He wasn't too bad at thinking on his feet—usually, it was discomfort more than anything that soured situations for him. But still, it would help if he had a basis to work from. A solid background story to weave to the others. He had a plan for that, something that he'd thought of while sleeping in a barn a few months ago. What it entailed was that he claimed to have lost his mother to an accident a few years ago, and was wandering from village to village, working odd jobs for a living. At the Academy, they would probably ask him for some ID or the other, and he could claim that his mother had never registered him. She'd gotten pregnant with him at a young age and ran away to avoid angering her parents. They'd lived on their own after that, always wandering and never stopping to make a home. He even had a name for his mother, one they would find to be registered.
Another thing that helped with fooling others, and this was remnant from his days of running, running, and never stopping until he passed out, was his ability to change his appearance.
At first, when he had just realized what he could do, it was a way to keep hiding. To make his attempt at escape solid. But over the years, he took comfort in hiding behind different faces. He never changed too much, just his hair and eyes usually, but it was enough. It helped him feel like a different person, like he wasn't the scared kid whose parents were chasing him.
It helped him avoid attachments and relationships. When he left a village, he usually left the alias behind as well. It helped him start anew wherever he went next.
He had been goatherd Sanex who'd lost his family at age nine; fiery, independent Jason who ran away from home and worked in villages for food and stay; and sweet, quiet John who worked his days away in a restaurant. Sanex was an earth mage, Jason an air mage, and John had been a water mage.
But it was time for a new identity. A fire mage, perhaps. With Great Fire Mage Azareth running the school, it might help if he enrolled as one. Fire was definitely his weakest element; the blaze in the forest was evidence of how he could easily let it go out of his control.
He hoisted his bag, and reached up to flick hair out of his eyes. He squinted at the black fringe that hung over his forehead. John had been blue-haired and blue-eyed, a common hair and eye color for water mages. He'd donned that disguise before entering the forest for his meeting with Sal. But apparently starting—and ending—that fire had destroyed his glamour. He now looked like himself. Ben made a mental note to change his appearance to reflect his new identity. Red hair, perhaps, and bright eyes would definitely state fire mage.
When he reached Meridas, he would find somewhere to sleep for the night, and take the time to change his appearance then.
Set with some sort of a plan, he continued walking to the town.
He arrived at Meridas late in the afternoon. It was a busy town, filled with streets of shops. He saw restaurants and boutiques everywhere. Of course, it probably catered primarily to students and the other residents of the Academy, and didn't need other means of supporting itself.
Ben passed two cafes and a huge bookstore on his way to find an inn. He was hoping to find cheap accommodation somewhere. The first inn he walked into was fully reserved. The second inn was too expensive for him. By the time he came out of his third attempt, the sky dark and streets even more crowded than before, he realized that people had clearly made reservations for their family in anticipation of Invitation Day, and he wasn't going to find a room.
He could always sleep on the streets. The thought didn't bother him all that much. He would have to find someplace to change and work on his glamour, though. The only problem was that the streets were filled with people. Ben could see more people his age than he had every seen before. Well, as Manseker was a school that primarily catered to the ages from sixteen to twenty, he knew it was something he would quickly get used to.
Ben tried not to get jostled as he walked down the street. It wasn't that he was afraid of people, or that it bothered him to walk in a crowded street. But he had spent the last four years largely on his own and Meridas just made him…uncomfortable.
It didn't help that most of the people were loud and crass, and that there were several families walking around amazed and excited. He's spent all of his life on his own. He was an only child, and the only person he'd been around in the manor was his nursemaid. Well, she had been his nursemaid, but then stayed on as an attendant when his parents realized just how good he was with her. He still considered her his nursemaid, though.
So, discomfort in large groups had always been a part of his personality.
But, he thought as he eyed another big and happy family, discomfort at the thought of relationships, familial or otherwise, was a recent development. He'd lost the ability to trust easily and unconditionally the same night his parents had tried to kill him.
"Alright there, lad?"
Ben started and turned around. It sounded like that had been directed towards him, which was confirmed when he saw the furrowed brows of a man walking towards him. The man was tall and solidly built. His broad shoulders and muscles were clear to see. But it wasn't the same kind of strength he saw in the men at the villages he had spent the last few years in. This didn't seem like strength from physical labor.
"Ah, yes. Thank you. I was just looking around."
"And what's a young man like you—ah, you're here for Invitation Day?" the man gave him a smile and glanced behind him. There was a girl, probably around his age, that was coming up behind the man. "My daughter as well," the man continued.
"Yes." He fidgeted slightly, before forcing himself to calm down. The man did not seem threatening in the least. In fact, he seemed like a bigger version of Sal.
"That's great, lad! I remember my own Invitation Day. I was so nervous! Frightened out of my mind that I wouldn't be invited and that I'd have to go back home. But there's nothing to worry about, really." The man grinned and reached out, holding his hand between them.
"The name is Lynel Shae. I work with the Guardians now, but not too long ago I was in your shoes." Ben had no idea who the Guardians were, but it seemed like, felt like, a job for mages. Something for him to look into when, if, he got into the school.
Academy.
Ben reached out and shook his hand. "Uh, nice to meet you."
"And you, son. What's your name?"
Ben wracked his brain, trying to come up with something. He didn't look like Sanex, or Jason, or John. He couldn't fall back to his old aliases and he hadn't had a chance to look like a new one. He looked like himself. "Ben, sir," he said finally. "Ben Mack." He hadn't planned on giving his true name. But at least he'd given thought to his last name before coming here, and could fall back on it.
"Well, young Benjamin, fancy some dinner with the family?"
Ebenezer, actually. But he would go with it. "That would be great, sir. Thank you."
They had dinner at the Lelar Inn. It was crowded, and filled to the brim with families. Ben wondered if this was what Liam Cache, Mrs. Cache's grandson had felt when he was here last year, eating dinner with his family the night before Invitation Day. Mrs. Cache had asked him to look out for Liam, in case he needed any help. Ben had no intention of doing that, of course. Least of all because he was no longer the John she knew.
"What kind of mage are you, if you don't mind me asking?" Lynel was sitting across from him on one of the tables in the inn. His wife, Clara, sat next to him. Leana, the girl from before sat next to her and Kaleb, their son sat next to Ben.
"Fire," Ben answered.
"We're earth mages ourselves," Lynel told him. "Been that way for generations. Leana is one too, of course. And I like to think Kaleb will be the same in a few years."
The girl gave him a small, pained smile. Like, 'Sorry my dad has been bugging you for so long. I don't know what he's doing, and I find it really hard to care.' Her mother smiled at him and he heard Kaleb grunt next to him.
Ben nodded to her to show he understood the sentiment and turned back to her father. The man was providing him dinner and lodging. Lynel had been very kind to him so far, and he couldn't bring himself to dislike the man.
"I don't know what my parents were," Ben told him. "I've only ever lived with my mom, but I think I was the first mage in my family in a long time."
"And where is your mom, dear? I know sixteen is the age of adulthood, but you're all still really just children. You shouldn't be wandering around all on your own." Clara looked at him worriedly while simultaneously looking reproachfully at her son. He wondered if it was a talent mothers had, and then dropped the thought when it reminded him of his own. Ben turned to Kaleb and found him scowling into his plate. He had the impression the boy had been excited to get a room on his own, and was now sullen over having to share it with a stranger for the night.
"She died," Ben informed her, thinking that after having lived on his own for four years, it was almost funny to hear such words. "A few years ago. I've been on my own since then. I've learned how to do it."
"Well, no one should face Invitation Day alone," Lynel told him. "It's a momentous day. A turning point for mages. It's the day their lives as mages start."
Ben had always considered himself a mage. Even when he'd been a kid, and using the elements came as naturally to him as breathing, so naturally that he didn't know how different he was. He wondered how others felt, how other mages felt.
"You'll come with us, of course," Lynel continued. "We will stand by you when the Gates open tomorrow." Next to him, Leana rolled her eyes, absently twirling a finger on the table. Ben felt the ground under him shift almost imperceptibly, rolling in a circle like her finger.
"Leana," Lynel chastised softly. "Stop that, child. You will upturn the table if you keep doing that."
Leana glanced up, startled. She lifted her hands off the table and tucked it on her lap. It looked like she hadn't noticed what she was doing. "Sorry," she muttered. Her mother laughed and patted her shoulder. She looked proud of her daughter.
When Lynel turned back to him, Ben kept his face blank, like he hadn't felt the ground shift. "Thank you," he told him. "You've been very kind to me."
"We could all use a bit of kindness in our lives," Mr. Shae said.
Ben agreed.
He excused himself as soon as dinner was over. Kaleb took him to their room and then left immediately. He heard something about a pool. Leana and her father were back on the streets again, taking a walk to help digest their heavy dinner. Clara had given him a soft smile as she walked into the room next to his, possibly retiring for the night as well.
He sat down on one of the two beds and brought his bag closer to him. He opened it and took out everything inside. He took off his clothes, leaving him in boxers, and folded them neatly. He placed them on top of the two other sets of clothing he had. He set a small knife, water bottle, jars, and box of matchsticks next to the clothes. He thumbed through his few books and placed them aside as well. He had collected whatever books he could find on mages, but they were rare to find in the villages. He looked forward to Manseker, hoping that they would have some sort of library inside. If nothing else, he could come back to Meridas and look at the big bookstore he had passed.
He smiled at the small pile of key chains that decorated his bed. He tried to get one, or something similar, in every village he stayed. They helped him remember his travels, mementos that showed him how much he'd grown. As much as he didn't want to get attached to any place, they key chains showed him that had existed there, had hopefully made a mark. He didn't want to give away his trust, but he also didn't want to be invisible. He wanted to be alone, but hated being lonely. The key chains showed him that for a short period of time, he wasn't.
Finally, he fingered a silver bracelet. It was very plain. The silver braided beautifully in some places. He rubbed his thumb against it and exhaled. Fiona had dropped it that day in the play room. He'd found it and put it in his pocket, intending to give it back to her the next day.
But then he couldn't because he was trapped, and then he was running, and also because there wasn't anybody to give it to.
He turned it around and stared at the carved letters that personalized the bracelet.
F.M.—Fiona Mack.
He shook his head and dropped the bracelet on the bed. He went through his things again, confirming that everything was there—other than his sleeping bag—and put everything back inside his bag. He put his bag on the far side of the bed, between where he would sleep and the wall, before climbing into it. He flicked his fingers and extinguished the lamps.
It was time to leave the past where it was. It was something he told himself often, but he was determined to follow through this time. After all, he had never done something like this before, never been so close to hoping for something. Hoping that Manseker would give him that something.
Well, he would soon find out. If he ever got to sleep, that is.