4.  A Day in the Life


    I woke up slowly and moving even more slowly due to the wonderful crick in my neck.  Ahhhh, seems I had not so wisely decided to pass out on the couch with its neck wrenching shortness.  When my journey began I had been much shorter,  scrawnier and unhealthier all around really this couch would have been fine. Now it was too short was never the best option for me to pass out on.  Finding out that the world was a much, much bigger place had changed a lot of my views on fitness and health surprisingly.


    I got up and tossed the few empties from the night before into the recycling bin, did the morning routine, my mouth tasting foul from not brushing last night.  Then my day truly began, much the same as most days without work did now.  First I pulled out my yoga mat and started going through the poses.  Slowly working my muscles and keeping my mind focused on the form and keeping my thoughts clear.


    I started yoga actually at the suggestion of Carveor, it had been maybe ten days or so after I had been opened when I had stormed into The Home of True Magic in all my not quite 16-year-old glory.  Thinking back I''m still amazed at the patience Carveor and Lena had had when dealing with me.


    I had stomped up to the desk full of righteous indignation and seeing Carveor behind the counter shouted: "It doesn''t work, you must not have opened me properly!"


    "Oh, do tell," Carveor said with an infuriatingly calm smile.


    "Look!"  I pointed my hand palm forward and shouted "Fireball!" Nothing happened, I looked at Carveor angrily, "I''ve been practicing every day and it''s been ten days and nothing!  It must be broken!"


    Carveor started laughing, Lena by this point had come out from the back and was doing her best to hold back a laugh, "Oh, so you want to be able to do this?"  She held out her hand and a grapefruit sized ball of fire appeared above her palm.


    "Well, obviously," I sarcastically replied.  "I''ve been practicing non-stop, at least 50 hours and I''ve got nothing!"


    By this point neither Lena nor Carveor could contain themselves, they both broke out into open laughter.  "You do remember that I told you that gaining true power required similar effort to becoming a doctor, right?" Carveor said.


    "Yes," I sullenly had replied, "but, this is just a fireball, should be easy!"


    The pair looked at each other and Carveor indicated that Lena should answer this.  "Well, Will, you have just been opened and what would make you think that a fireball would be easy?"


    "In all the games..." I started and then looked at the ground as my mind suddenly came to the conclusion that any of the video games I was basing my knowledge off of were almost certainly wrong.  I had had the idea that I would simply grind a skill and become a master of it in a week.


    "Will," Lena said softly, "The fireball that I showed you, that takes years to master, and I''m from a family of opened, this was not the first magic I learned.  In terms, you might find to be more clear, let''s see that fireball would be about the equivalent of having gone to university, more or less."


    I must have visibly deflated as Carveor said "Don''t worry, we see this happen sometimes with the newly opened.  Have you tried telling anyone about all of this yet?"


    I shook my head in a negative. Carveor went on "You should try, see the effect of the binding, that binding I used with the stone is another example of what could be considered university level magic, well in terms of time commitment and effort anyway."


    I was kind of reeling at this point, these two flakey looking people were capable of high level magic?  I could hardly believe it, anyone else would have been able to hear the sound of my preconceptions of wizards hit the floor.   Maybe my sitting in my room for the last ten days saying fireball had not been the best use of my time.  Maybe I should have instead asked how to improve.  Huh.


    "So," I said, "How exactly should I go about learning something like that?"


    "Funny you should ask," Carveor replied with a smirk.  "Well, I''ll give you some hints anyway.  First to try to improve or gain any skill requires focus."


    Now we were getting somewhere I had nodded enthusiastically and waved him to continue.  What followed was another couple of hour long quasi-lecture on magic.  Similar to when Carveor had introduced me to this side of life, except this time both him and Lena had focused on some basics tenets required for any kind of growth of my new potential.  The basic ideas I had left with a few hours later were that I should take up yoga, apparently, the body and breath control I would learn would help with focus.  I had also learned that day that being opened meant I could learn to do just about anything given enough time and effort, but any dreams of being my own pyrotechnic show would have to wait years.


    "Most people when they first start focus on creating light," Lena explained.  "It''s a fairly easy thing to do, well in comparison to others but tends to be one of the first things kids in opened families learn when they get access to their potential," Lena had continued.


    Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.


    My well mature 16 year old self had nodded sagely, "Of course, light! Why didn''t I think to start with that."


    Carveor laughed again, "So do you want some advice on where to start?"


    I nodded again and Carveor began, "First get to a place where you can clear your mind, hence the yoga and meditation if it helps you.  Then once you have cleared your mind, focus on one of your hands, doesn''t matter which and think of every heartbeat, every pulse carrying something extra and collecting it in your palm,  when you can do that come back."


    I snorted in displeasure, "That''s it? Hahahaaha," mock laughter issued from me.  "I''ll have that done in a day, maybe two, oh and how will I know when I''ve got it down?" I asked.  This was going to be easy, no problem.


    The couple sighed, then Carveor spoke again "Okay, Will the new Merlin!  We''ll see you in a day or two and trust me, if you make it happen you will know."


    I had waved goodbye and walked out sure that I would be back in a day, little did I know that I wouldn''t be back for much longer.  The yoga had definitely helped, it had taken me two weeks of trying without any focus before I gave up and signed up for a yoga class at the community hall.  This had also led to first part-time job to pay for it, my parents had quickly balked at paying for something so esoteric to them.  This had, in turn, led to a meditation class that a couple of the people in the yoga class went to.  At this point, it had already been a few months and I hadn''t had success but I could properly clear my mind and focus like nothing else.


    My parents actually began to approve as my grades went way up, a little more focus goes a long way in high school, besides the added bonus of the better and faster I dealt with everything else the sooner I could try to get this light thing to work.  It continued on like this for another month when one night meditating in my room, I felt it.  I lost it immediately but I had felt it!  A similar feeling to the pressure from when I had been opened, not to the same extent but it was something.  I had never really lost hope as I had personally seen Lena conjure a ball of flame above her hand and now I had felt it!  It was like a turbocharger for my efforts.  I was on my way.


    I came back to myself and the present as I completed my hour or so of yoga.  My neck and back feeling a lot more human than they had after waking up on the couch.  I then sat down crosslegged and meditated, still to this day after all these years I continue the same process.  Focus on bringing something from the rest of my body and coalescing it in my palm.  I had eventually achieved the light skill/spell about six months after first trying and first being opened.  This same process is the basis for developing a lot of new skills so I trained at it always.


    After meditating, I had to clean my tools.  I was not a powerful opened.  I had a few good skills but normally anytime I had to face anything unknown I brought my Glock.  I know it seems cliche but even odd things like a dryad or a goblin will go down if you shoot them enough.   Therefore I always made sure it would work and after using it last night I had to clean it properly.  I wasn''t worried about the dryad''s body from the warehouse, they tended to return to the earth (i.e. rot) in record time.


    I looked at the clock on my kitchen wall and realized I was going to be late for work if I didn''t hurry.  I locked up the Glock and headed out, I worked at an inner city community outreach center for a few hours a day.  Hence my need to relieve the dryad''s thralls of their money, the center had good people and programs but not good funding, which for me meant little pay but I made out okay-ish.  I liked it though and helped out extra if they needed it,  today was quiet.  After the excitement of the previous day that felt fine for me.


    As work ended I concluded that Carveor would want to know what had happened.  Turns out he and Lena both were relatively powerful and well known, and whenever something odd went on in the area they were the ones that kept things calm.  It was early evening when I pulled up in front of the surprisingly well named The Home of True Magic, the name might be correct but I still thought it was a stupid name for a store.


    I went in found Carveor sitting at the counter reading some book on crystals.  I looked pointedly at the book and he said with no shame, "I have to read these or at least skim them, most of them are useless to an opened but some people find meaning in this sort of thing and I try to help them out."


    I nodded tersely and gave him a quick report on what had happened last night.  He followed along as I told how Fleetfoot had asked for my help and I had used some of Ringer''s fur to track her out to the warehouse/greenhouse complex.  Then I told him what I had found there and my battle with the dryad.


    As I was just getting past that I heard a loud voice from the back, "William!"  I ducked my head and tried to make myself small as Lena stormed out of the back.


    "A dryad!  What were you thinking!"


    And my day had been going so well...