Closed Aural Explorations [Alric]

[Oralie]

The more she learned about Auristics from Alric’s words, the more it sounded like a magic that would suit her well. Oralie had found that she was something of a social person. Having been so isolated before arriving in Syka, she had never had the opportunity to know that fact about herself. Crowds were another story all together but small groups of people, pairs and one-on-one moments delighted her. She enjoyed getting to know people and letting others know her in return. It seemed that Auristics would add more depth and layers to her relationships.

The possibilities seemed enormous. Outside of humans, she wondered what different races might be like. After hearing how Alric described herself, it sounded as though it may even be possible to discern a Kelvic’s animal form from their aura. And plants too were definitely something she would have to look into reading. If she did well with the lesson today, anyhow.

As she felt her djed within her, filling and warming her it was all she could concentrate on. Alric’s voice sounded far away. She closed her eyes, trying to minimise any distractions and listen to what he was saying. Don’t take too much… how do I…?
Oralie felt her brows knit together in a frown as she looked inwards again, trying to work out how to control the flow of djed she could feel coursing through her. She visualised it as the soil, imagining it first as the great landslide that had rushed along her arm and then shrinking it, taking the earth away until it was a trickle of soil skipping along in her blood.

It was difficult to gain control over, it felt like she was trying to hold the sea back with just her hands, but after a little while it became easier. She could still feel the potential of power somewhere deep inside of her, but the amount she let run through her was getting more and more easy to control as she relaxed into the sensations.

She tried to direct the djed with purpose now, first to her head where her eyes and ears waited. It seemed eager to go, wanting to be used. Alric was speaking again, and she could hear him better now. However when she focused on his words properly she felt something happen to the djed near her ears. As she felt it, an extra sound filled her hearing, layering itself under the man’s words. She smiled. “You sound like a fireplace.”

Oralie opened her eyes to see his hand in front of her. She took it and eased herself up again with his help. Heeding his warnings, and nervous to look up yet she focused on her own feet while she listened to the rest of his words. “It feels like… the only thing I can relate it to is what I imagine a seed must feel like before it sprouts. Maye a bit tense, coiled?”

Slowly she looked up, trying her best to concentrate on moving the little trickle of djed to her eyes as she did so. Her eyes were still the same honey shade, her pupils still cat-like slits, only now the irises seemed to be brighter, almost molten gold. Oralie looked at Alric only, ignoring everything else in the room.

He had a definite aura surrounding him. It was very bright, though it did flicker in and out. She wondered if that was something that it just did or whether it was her inexperience. She couldn’t tell if it was blue or silver. Her eyes narrowed in a squint to see if that would help her figure it out, but to no avail. In any case, she thought it was mesmerising and she watched it for a short time. As she let her eyes drift over Alric’s aura, she noticed a bright spot that seemed to be one of his hands. “Alric… why does your hand light up so much more than the rest of you?”

As she was studying Alric’s hand, something else caught her attention. The shadow being had moved around to hover directly next to the man. If it had been a person, she was sure that Alric would have been able to feel it brush the hairs on his arm as it was so close. She looked at it, forgetting to keep her focus on Alric, and as she did her stomach sunk. The being had no aura whatsoever. It made her skin crawl. Her mind well and truly distracted, she lost her grip on her djed and everything abruptly went back to normal.

Oralie blinked rapidly with the loss of her auristic sight. She noticed that her body felt a little tired, though not too much. She also felt a little chilly, which she assumed was the loss of her djed. She forced herself to look away from the shadow being and give Alric her attention again. “I uh, I didn’t manage to get to my other senses. I’ll try again.”
She mentally felt through her body, trying to locate the place where her djed lived. As she did so, she voiced another question, trying to make it appear a causal curiosity.
“Do you know if everything has an aura? Like, ghosts and things?”

+879

[Alric Lysane]

“A fireplace? Interesting, I wonder why. I suppose only you will be able to discern that, with time and practise” he told her, his tone as encouraging and calming as he could make it.

He was quite impressed with her, she was thinking about it deeply and though she had not told him that she was it seemed that she was quite a tactile person. She felt things in ways that would make auristics a good match for her, even going so far as linking it to herself personally already – a feat he had taken a little longer to latch on to. Then again, he wasn’t sure why he was surprised, she was a Kelvic and so was not only already partly magical but also possessed of senses tat were superior to his own. He listened to her and thought upon what she told him, turning it around in his mind.

“The sensations are different for everyone, from what I’ve got in my notes it seems almost personalised, like each practitioner will read the same person but sense them out in different ways. They can also see…the whole of the Djed underneath everything else, even if they can’t take it all in at once without damaging themselves. Which means that what you describe is valid, it’s just how the magic sings to you and you alone. All you need to do is figure out how to control the flow, how to direct it and…almost become one with it…I suppose. It sounds like you need to find a way of growing that seed, opening the petals…soaking in the aura you want to know like Syna’s rays” he suggested gently, but not wanting to force her to go beyond what she was capable of.

“My hand?” he asked, frowning in puzzlement for a few moments before he remembered that gnosis marks shone brighter with such vision, “oh that’s my Lykata mark, the gnosis from Eyris. They shine brightly, showing the power of the link with the deity I would imagine though I don’t know that for certain. Your own is the same. I don’t know if more marks mean it’s brighter, I haven’t had the thought to test it out yet…I probably should, though, one day” he told himself thoughtfully making a mental note.

When she told him that she had lost her magic he nodded in understanding, it was the way when learning new things, you couldn’t just do it all at once and control was difficult at first. He shook his head at her suggestion of trying again immediately and instead put his hand upon her shoulder and began to guide them both back down to the ground floor, where the food and comfortable seating was – she might need both for bit before trying once more. He had noticed, though, that she kept looking at points around him, almost as if nervous and her last question toom him by surprise and he paused, thinking it through before speaking as they were upon the stairs.

“No, ghosts wouldn’t have an aura as auristics reads the living djed of things and ghosts, being dead, wouldn’t have any I’d think. I mean, unless there’s a way of doing it that I don’t know about. But when it comes to ghosts apparently a Spiritist is what you want. Moritz is in Syka I think…he showed me how to make Soulmist. Never tried it myself but it means he’s a Spiritist so he might know more than me on the subject. Why do you ask, you got ghost trouble?”

“And no, don’t try for more just yet. Overgiving can be serious and the more you push the worse it gets. Let’s eat something, drink perhaps, and then you can try again from a more comfortable place now that you know where you’re searching for when it comes to your Djed. Hungry? I’ve got meat and stuff, salted and the rest. Magic has given me quite the appetite, surprised I haven’t grown fat yet. When you use your Djed you’re using…part of yourself. Burning it away to fuel the magic. Needs replenishing, otherwise you run low” he indicated to the kitchen that was stocked with all manner of things if she so chose.

As she decided if she wanted anything he put together a pipe and started to smoke from it, the cob pipe’s signature scent beginning to fill the room as he puffed away thoughtfully, watching her and noticing she still seemed to be glancing at places, as if expecting something to jump out at her.

“Hey Oralie, you okay? You keep looking around as if there’s something to be worried about. You think you’re being followed by your…old master was it?” he asked, wondering if something had happened since last they met to concern her.

[Oralie]

It was interesting to hear that what a person experienced through Auristics was unique to everyone. She had thought that two people using the magic and looking at a third person would read them in the same way, but it would appear that was not the case. She wondered idly if she then was the only one who would hear the crackling fireplace layered under Alric’s voice. She had never thought before about what things she would associate with people. The firs time she had met Alric it had been right here in the apartment. When she thought of the apartment she thought of its warmth. It was cosily furnished and Alric had taken care to tend to the fire that had burned for her entire visit. Perhaps that was where her association had come from. She then wondered how it would change the more she got to know him.

She nodded as he continued to speak on control and the flow of djed. While she had some sort of tenuous grasp on it at the moment, she could physically feel the struggle within her to stay in control. It seemed like it might work like a muscle – the more it was used the stronger her control would become. She would have to practice often, though in short bursts so as not to overdo anything. She didn’t want any of those horrible things happening to her if she did too much all at once.

Oralie’s eyes widened a fraction as the man revealed the vibrant spot of light she could see was actually a Gnosis. “Eyris…” The Kelvic knew the name from the Temple of All Gods, but she couldn’t recall anything specific. She returned her gaze to Alric’s. “I have two Priskil marks if that will help you with your test.”

She wasn’t sure if it was a comfort or not to know that a ghost probably wouldn’t have an aura. “Oh, you know Moritz?” Oralie didn’t know her fellow Kelvic well, but their adventure into the jungle the season prior was an event that had stuck in her mind. “He is in Syka, we went on a trip together a short while back to meet a Jamoura. He told me a little about Spiritism too, though didn’t show me anything like that.” She hesitated for a tick before shaking her head. “No, no ghosts… I was just curious.” It wasn’t a lie, for she was absolutely certain the being was not a ghost. She’d never actually met one, but she had an idea of what they were like and the shadow certainly was not it.

Alric’s suggestion of food was met with a nod and she followed him back down the stairs to the sitting area of the apartment. Nestled comfortably in one of the chairs Oralie reached for a banana and peeled it. She chuckled at the man’s words. “I’ve always had a good appetite – I happily eat as much as any grown man would in a sitting. I guess it’s being a predator Kelvic.” She shrugged lightly and bit into the fruit chewing as a thought, or a memory perhaps, stirred in the back of her mind. “I think someone told me something similar once before. I don’t remember who though, maybe Seladonna… When you eat something you eat it’s djed too and it becomes a part of yours.”

Her nose twitched at the sweet scent wafting from Alric’s pipe. “What do you put in there? It smells like a dessert.” She wondered for a moment about fixing something more substantial from the kitchen he had shown her, but she wasn’t quite that hungry at the moment. The shadow being moved jerkily to her right and she looked at it sharply. It didn’t do it again, remaining still once more though staring at her as usual.

Alric seemed to have noticed her wandering gaze, and she turned her golden eyes on him as he spoke up to enquire. “I’m okay, sorry.” She inhaled deeply and held it for a moment, wondering if she should tell him. Letting the breath out in a puff, she decided there didn’t seem to be any harm in it. “It’s not my old master, no. There’s this… thing following me around. It’s not a ghost and it’s not really a person. It’s made of shadows I think. It’s over there.” She pointed to the right of the fireplace where the being hovered silently.

“I was hoping it might be confined to Syka but it managed to follow me here easily enough.” She sighed. “It doesn’t do much, just stares at me. I have no idea where it came from either, it just appeared on the first. I did dream about it the night before… I don’t know, can you imagine something into existence? I’ve never heard of anything like it before. Have you?” She looked at the shadow for a chime before returning her attention back to Alric.

“The thing is, it’s not just me. I mean, as far as I know it’s only me who has a shadow. But weird stuff is happening to other people too. Even the new arrivals. One poor girl is growing really fast, and I’m pretty sure Randal is starting to sprout horns…” She hadn’t seen the carpenter for a couple of days, but he’d had some curious growths starting to emerge from the crown of his head the last time they had spoken. “It’s all so strange. I don’t know if everyone has a ‘thing’, but there’s at least a few of us who do.” She shook her head before trying to lighten the mood again. “I’m not going to be able to convince you visit now, am I!”


+955

[Alric Lysane]

“Then they would be correct…Djed is…everything. It makes up everything. So when you use your magics…personal ones at least…you’re using up your Djed pool…your overall amount. Once you’ve used it then you can still use magic but…you’re pulling for energy that isn’t there…and that will end in disaster. So, whenever I’ve use magic, I try to eat…replenish my Djed. Obviously, it’s slower than just using it…but it helps to make your practise sessions a bit longer. As for my pipe…normal tobacco…it is a secretly magical pipe that I found…along with other items. And that will be part of the second attempt of the lesson perhaps” he ended with a thoughtful musing.

Alric listened to Oralie speak as he puffed away, not answering for now and instead watching her and making sure she seemed fully able to try for her auristics again. In truth he was probably being overly cautious, certainly more than he had taken care for himself. It was different, though, teaching Oralie…or trying as best as he could to. He felt responsible after a fashion and wouldn’t know if he could forgive himself if she somehow injured herself. Still, she seemed healthy and strong enough in body, if in spirit her words turned somewhat dark and…fearful perhaps? He wasn’t surprised given the fact that she didn’t seem to be the only one suffering.

How would I feel, if I found out that my safe and happy village was suddenly filled with terrible tragedies…and a personal shadow staring at me throughout? I mean I have my on things…but not quite like she does he thought, smoke curling around his face as he wondered what to say, watching her with concerned eyes.

“Oh, but I do like a good mystery. And Eyris is all about knowledge and wisdom,” he said after a while, “perhaps it wouldn’t be wise to visit Syka, but by the sounds of it there are plenty of mysteries and things to be discovered. Your problems though…I do not know. It doesn’t sound like a ghost. Most ghosts tend to be visible to more than one, at least someone else would have seen it at some point perhaps. And black…like shadows? I’m afraid that’s a new one…but there is a library here at the Outpost…perhaps there will be something there. I can look for you, but another time. If Mr. Shadow isn’t harming you then we can continue with the lesson, if you’d like. In fact, perhaps we may even discover something about him along the way, no?”

“But first…the fact it all began on the same day…a day that I got a visit myself from someone we all keep forgetting…well that suggests a singular event I’d think. Something happened on that day. What usually happens on the 1st of the season in Syka?” he asked as he made his way to the letterbox and proceeded to unlock it, rifling through the letter stored within to find the two he wanted to find and retrieving them before approaching Oralie and handing them to her, “these are letters from Tazrae, the forgotten owner of an inn apparently. The first was the one you delivered to me last season, the second…she wrote it on the 1st along with a few other writings, a song…a bit more. Proof that it is more far reaching than perhaps at first seems. Go ahead, read them whilst I grab a few things”

He spent a few chimes gathering up his normal pipe, his magical gloves and his normal gloves for a demonstration of how auras could be different strengths. He also placed a banana upon the small table the items were placed upon for something that was food based as she had shown interest in that notion and might like to try it out. They were simple enough exercises, especially if each item we taken one at a time. He had a mind for them to both try looking at their gnosis marks too, to establish if things were brighter with more marks. He sat back down, finishing off his cob pipe and tapping the ashes out into the fire before placing it upon the table also. He waited for her to finish reading at her leisure before interjecting.

“What do you think? Sounds a bit strange doesn’t it? And not just because it is…but because it feels like something it out to get Syka more than it’s out to get you personally. I wonder if Syka has any enemies?”

[Oralie]

Oralie nodded to show that she was listening and taking Alric’s words seriously. She would remember to eat after she had practised in the future, pulling energy that doesn’t exist sounded like something she would definitely avoid.

She reached for another piece of fruit, her hand landing first on a fig. She twisted the stem off the fruit before biting into it, savouring the tangy sweetness that spilled over her tongue. The Kelvic met his gaze as he started speaking, finally responding to her words regarding Syka and the strange happenings of late.

A small raise of her chin showed that his words had jogged her memory regarding Eyris. Perhaps it was fortuitous then that Alric would be the one she had chosen to speak to about Syka if he was blessed by the Goddess of knowledge. She wasn’t sure if she should feel relieved or not that he seemed to agree it was not a ghost following her around. On the one hand, ghosts could hurt her if they wanted to and the shadow had not shown any inkling of violence. On the other hand, it meant she was dealing with an unknown entity. “Mm, it definitely looks like a shadow. In my dream it came out of the shadows in my room so…”

“A… library?” She frowned, trying to recall the name of such a place. “Oh… a book room? Do people write about things like this then?” Truthfully, Oralie had never read a book in her life. She had no idea what sorts of things a book would even have inside of it save for journals where people recorded their lives. “Oh, no it hasn’t hurt me. I’d very much like to continue.”

Oralie’s head tilted to the side as her attention was well and truly piqued. "Someone… we keep forgetting? From Syka?” She paused, recollecting her thoughts before speaking again. “Uhm, on the first of every month James - one of the Founders - he always brings the ship from Riverfall. We get supplies over for the start of the season and often some people too.” She watched Alric, turning her head to follow him with her eyes as he walked across the room.

Hesitantly, she took the letters the man held out to her. “Tazrae…?” The name was unfamiliar to her, a frown settling on her brow. “An Innkeeper? Oh!... Oh. Oh no.” She turned the first letter over in her hands, shaking her head slowly as she failed to recognise it. Thankfully, the Kelvic had learned to read the season previously so she was able to read through the page in front of her. It took her a little longer than it would have taken Alric, but she managed all the same.

As she read, a myriad of expressions flickered over her features. Once she finally reached the end of the first letter, an empty pit had formed in her stomach. “We were… are friends? Me and Tazrae? Gods the things that have happened to her…” She shook her head. “I can’t… I can’t believe I don’t remember any of this.” She looked up at Alric to see him arranging objects on the table in front of them. “This is similar to what you told me about, you two are connected? That’s why I know you, why I want to help you.”

She set the first letter down and moved on to the next. By the time she had finished reading her expression was forlorn. “Oh poor Tazrae… I wish I could remember her. I… I’ve never had a friend before. Oh it must be awful for her.” She looked at Alric again. “So, you forget her too? Even though you’re not a Sykan? Hmm.”

Oralie handed the letters back to Alric and leaned on the arm of her chair. “Even though these… curses? I don’t know what else to call them. Even though they seem to be very personal, you’re right. If someone had a grudge against just one of us, why bother to affect the entire settlement with this? If it is magic, then surely they would suffer for using so much of it, like you’ve been telling me. So… it can’t be magic then, right? What… who would be powerful enough to do something like this?”

She shook her head again. “I don’t know of anyone who dislikes Syka as a whole. Aside from the people in those letters, but even that is personal to you and I guess Tazrae. The Founders would have told us all if we had anything to worry about. As far as I know, there isn’t even anything that we have that’s valuable enough to take. We have to bring in so many of our supplies on the ship like I told you.” Oralie leaned her head forward and rubbed at her temples with a sigh.

After a while she motioned to the objects on the table. “An Auristics experiment?” She watched him expectantly, while trying to feel with her mind where the pool of her djed lay in preparation.


+842

[Alric Lysane]

“Yes…things seem to have grown very…complicated,” he sighed and took up the letters once more, flashing her a half-smile before returning them to their lockbox with care and consideration, they were precious, “I don’t know who…or what…is doing it. But I’d bet my last pair of trousers that they are very powerful. I don’t even know how much power such a thing would take…and entire settlement? It makes me shudder” he shook his head before returning to sit opposite her.

“I don’t know if anyone has written about such things, I have tried to find some references, but time is short and the library – yes a place of stored books – is large. I would say to search it yourselves too, but I imagine that there is need for a lot of work just surviving out in Syka…so I will do it for you. But I don’t hold out much hope for success. It’s like rolling dice and wanting a hundred sixes in a row…very long odds methinks”

He nodded at the talk about deliveries from Riverfall and the lack of obvious reasons for the situation they had found themselves in. When she spoke of the friendship forgotten with Tazrae he simply silently nodded, his own sadness at having forgotten what seemed to be even more meaningful a bond obvious. It wasn’t something that he meant to project about, but it was difficult not to have at least a slight aura of depressive emotion about the whole thing. It was just his luck, he had finally found a beautiful woman who looked past his more shady and dark character defects…and he couldn’t remember her. Whatever was doing it would have his hate in the end, he knew, and he wasn’t a particularly hateful person. But this…this was personal in ways he felt – at the very edges of his senses – were intentional…and that angered him.

“I don’t remember but…it’s difficult to explain…I feel like something more substantial has been taken from me. It feels like my lack of memories of my parents. Hints of something around the edges…a feeling of loss and sorrow…a more grey world left behind for the absence. I can only imagine what being with her is like until this is all sorted out, but the way I write about her…the song lyrics I terribly put together…I think she was more entwined with me than a friend…I don’t know” he sighed before frowning at the place where the Shadow was supposed to be.

“Alright…experimentation time…for both Auristics and this Shadow of yours. It’s over there right?” he asked, pointing and getting confirmation before pushing himself up and following Oralie’s directions until he was right beside it, “right…Auristic sight for you and you tell me what you see, if anything”

He waved his hand through the space, Flux punched it, extruded Res into ti before letting it flow away and die, to lose its lustre. He wove a shield of various kinds, passing it through the space and not getting any hit on anything for his efforts. Allt he while he looked at orlie to se eif she had discovered anything and continued to cycle through everything that he knew until he had sweat beading upon his brow and was panting slightly, forced to retreat and grab a handful of candied dates to munch upon greedily as he looked at Oralie.

“Anything at all? No? Hmm…then it isn’t real. It can’t be. If something was there then something should have picked it up, you should have seen something…a flicker of an aura or…I don’t know, the difference in the moving of the shields in fractions…it doesn’t exist. At least not on our plane of existence…which…hmm…I wonder if that means it isn’t from here? I remember reading something…something about other worlds in a book…maybe it has been brought here and so…we cannot affect it?” he asked to the air in general. He shook his head and set about eating more of his own bodyweight in food before returning his attentions to Oralie.

“Yes…these are an auristic lesson for you…but first I need to spread thme out so their auras are not jumble dnad you don’t accidentally focus upon them all at once,” he said, suiting his words by taking some time to spread them about the room for her, talking as he did so, “now everything has an aura right? But some things have larger auras than others. Sentient things – like people – are the biggest. Non-sentient things like say, a dog, is less. Other items like gloves…almost tiny and unnoticeable unless you really focus. Magic items…they have a larger aura than normal items…as you will see. Each of these pairs has a magical item and a non-magical. Take your item, look at them, tell me which one is which...and what you can tell me about each of them”

“Then, after that, you will look at me, after another break, for a longer time…and you will lay me bare for myself for your learning purposes” he grinned as he returned to the couch and watched, waiting for her deductions and magical explorations.

He was quite proud of her, though he would leave the telling of that for later, she had already conquered her fear of crowds, mostly. She was followed by a Shadow and soldiered on regardless. She thought she was lesser than shew as and that touched a sympathetic nerve within him that made him want to help her. He was powerless against such quiet humility. He realised, in the moments that he watched her, that despite the fact he might not ever give his heart to another, he could give his time and word to some as deserved it. He didn’t have fear she would push herself too hard, she didn’t even seem to realise her limits were likely beyond her concerns about her own weaknesses.

No, for Oralie, he’d spend days and days…if that was what it took for her to realise her own potential as a person.

[Oralie]

Oralie was quiet for a long moment as she looked at Alric standing by his letterbox. What on Mizahar was powerful enough to curse an entire settlement. “I mean… Syka is no stranger to magic. But nobody there is that powerful, I’m sure of it. Nobody there would want to curse everyone anyway, even if they were.” She frowned. “We do find magical items fairly frequently… I wonder. Could someone have uncovered a magical object that holds so much power? But then, would we have all had to have come into contact with it?” The Kelvic shook her head. There were so many questions and she had no idea which ones were the right ones to be asking.

Despite everything they were discussing, Oralie found herself smiling at Alric, the warmth of the expression shining in her eyes. “Surprisingly we often have a fair amount of free time in Syka. I mean, we use it to hone our skills and to learn how to be in the jungle, but it’s not all work. You don’t have to do this for us, but I have a feeling you will anyway so… thank you. I will try and get back here to look too, since I can read now.” She chuckled lightly and shook her head. If only she had known what the first use of her newly gained literacy would turn out to be.

Concern pushed lines into her forehead as her brows knitted together when Alric went on to speak of his memories, or lack of. She found herself nodding in agreement. “Yes I… I am feeling similarly. I was cooking just the other morning - bacon and eggs, one of the first things I learned - and I had such a strong feeling that another person should have been there with me. I couldn’t think who, but I know that it’s a meal I often had company for. I guess it is her.” Her heart ached with the thought that there was a great hole in their lives that they were unaware of and unable to fill.

Alric pulled their melancholy thoughts back to the task at hand, trying to point at the shadow being. “Closer to the shelf there… yes, there, that’s it.” Oralie took a moment to quiet her mind before searching inside of herself for the place where her djed lived, the lush clearing that burst with life. Cautiously she reached for it, and found that it came to her with more control than it had done the first time. Clearly the unlocking of it had been a landslide event, and now that it had been released it did not feel the need to rush.

With concentration Oralie directed a trickle of djed to her head and into her eyes. They shone, the golden hue seeming lit from within and she looked over at Alric and nodded. He was next to the shadow who had still not moved. It stared at Oralie, totally ignoring the man. Alric threw magic after magic at the thing, and the entire time the shadow simply hovered in place, watching her unblinkingly. It didn’t even flicker or fade, even when Alric seemed to fling pure djed at it.

The shadow also did not have an aura, at least that she could confirm. Alric’s pulsed with light as he worked at the shadow and it grew and shrank, flashed and then dimmed again as he cycled through his magics. When the man collapsed into the chair once more, Oralie let the djed trickle go, her eyes returning to their normal state and she looked at him. “Nothing. It doesn’t have an aura of its own either. It is quite literally as though it is a regular shadow given the vague form of a person.” She blew out a breath in frustration. “Your aura, the reach of your djed from what you were doing just passed through it as though there was nothing there.” She baulked as the man casually mentioned other worlds, her mouth working for a tick but expelling no words. She decided that it would be a question for another day, storing the tidbit of information safely away for the time being.

Once Alric seemed to have eaten his fill of food, she turned her attention again to the items he was spreading around the room. She listened carefully to his explanation of how auras were different strengths for sentient versus non-sentient, magical versus non magical. The pipes were on the table before her, so she decided to start with them.

Once more she reached for her djed, guiding a trickle of it up to her eyes. After a moment, the golden irises lit and she turned her attention to the pipes. It was easy enough to see how different they were, one having a very faint glow to it if she concentrated hard on it, and the other a clear but small aura. She pointed at the regular pipe first. “That is your normal pipe. I… it’s hard for me to see anything about it.” She touched the magical pipe, picking it up. “But this one… your magical pipe. The aura feels warm. Not to my hands but, I get the sense that it’s warm if that makes sense?” She inhaled, shifting djed into her nose. “I can smell that dessert smell. And… I don’t know but there’s no sound? There should be but there isn’t any, like it’s being covered up.”

Oralie shrugged and placed the pipe back on the table, rubbing her eyes afterwards but not letting the djed go just yet. She stood and went over to where he had placed the two pairs of gloves. Like the pipes, it was easy to tell which were his magical pair and she picked them up straight away. “These ones are magical. The others I can’t really see anything. These are… harder to read than the pipe for some reason. I get a sense of air, maybe? The aura is light and I think I hear wind? I smell…” She nodded. “Air… it’s a clean smell.”

The Kelvic carefully set the gloves back next to their mundane counterparts before returning to the table to be presented with a banana. She smiled with amusement before focusing her gaze on the yellow fruit. A small crease settled between her brows as she concentrated. She could see it had an aura without too much effort, but it was faint and she couldn’t tell anything from it unless she poured all her focus into doing so. “I can feel… energy. Not like magic but literal energy. Its aura seems clean, bright if I try hard enough.” She gently shook her head and let her djed go for a moment. “It’s difficult to read that, not like your magic pipe.” She peeled the banana that was still in her hands and ate it slowly. “Can you read things like this?” She waved a hand vaguely at the fruit on the table. “I guess I need to practice more before I can properly.”

After a break where she munched her way through several pieces of fruit, she turned her gaze on Alric again. “Now… you?” At his confirmation, she would pull her djed once more and focus on the man. “Your aura…” She shook her head lightly. “I still can’t tell if it’s blue or silver. It’s like water when the sun shines on it. It feels calm. I can hear the fire again too and… I can smell something like smoke… I don’t think it’s the fire though, something else. Maybe something to do with Sunberth? Like an ashy smell. I can feel…” She closed her eyes briefly, concentrating. “I can’t describe it, I get the sense of empty pages waiting to be written in.” Her eyes snapped open. “Oh! Maybe it’s your mark, you said it is to do with knowledge right?”

A twinge behind her eyes caused her to let the djed go and she shook her head and rubbed her temple. “That… it was easier that time to see you.” She smiled. “I never knew that things like this were possible… thank you Alric, for showing me.”


+1365

[Alric Lysane]

“Sunberth is an ugly place Oralie, I never did quite figure out why. It has all the makings of somewhere worth calling a city, built on the bones of an ancient civilization that performed wonders we will probably never know. For all its faults, though, it does value freedom,” he said, a distant look in his eyes before returning to her own, warmer gaze, “I don’t like that my friends have been attacked without warning, and in such an insidious manner. You can’t be free whilst this thing continues…whatever it is. So yes, you are right…I will do it anyway. I wouldn’t thank me though, as you have read in the letter I might end up making things worse given my…ancestors” he cleared his throat at that, what needed to be said having been said and moving on – he had never been particularly good with expressing himself.

Then came the experimentations with her curse shadow, trying anything to illicit a response that he could not see but only keep looking at Oralie for confirmation, or a brief shake of her head as she used her newly learnt magic. He tried to be quick, but he also wanted to be as thorough as possible – so as to gather every bit of evidence they might be able to. He formed balls of Res, converted them into shaped stone projectiles that passed through the space indicated, summoned up his Flux for various attempts at attacks. He formed Djed blocking shields in a sphere around the area, larger and then constricting until it was as tight as he could make it without the shield buckling under the pressure of the air – blocking all Djed but his own as the task assigned. In the end he gave up and Oralie told him of his failures.

“Hmmm, well I suppose there will have to be more thought put into yours then Oralie. I’ll think upon it. Still, you have the light of Priskil at least. Should be able to beat back the Shadow a little bit eh? No doubt you’ll be able to figure out his trial. Good training for you I suppose” he told her, despite the situation a twinkle of amusement in his eyes – she always did have the ability to infuse a certain amount of joy into any situation. Priskil’s gift, perhaps.

He watched her as she conducted her experiments, saying nothing as she felt it all out, letting her learn her own techniques and strategies. He was aware that every user of the magic had their own experiences, he could provide little reference in terms of how he perceived that she could use as anchors of analysis. He was there more to reign her back in if she looked to be straying too far from herself, from her strength, and to provide advice should she ask it of him.

“Remember, you can use all of your sense – though not everyone is good at them all would be my guess. It is unique to you. You are Kelvic, perhaps your sight is strongest, perhaps smell…or taste. You can taste things too, food in particular, if you seek it out – discover whether it will taste good for you or not…or perhaps get an underlying texture…or bitterness…indicating bad properties. I have never detected such, but given my experiences and how I read aura’s then it might work that way for me, perhaps”

“What you’re experiencing with the magic items is a reading of their properties, their magic…so for example the pipe can cause a smoke screen for a while if something specific is done. Very good indeed, you’re delving into more of what auristics actually is. So, we can sense the aura, but we don’t get magical words in our heads telling us what it means…we have to puzzle it out, discern and understand. It is a true seeker’s magic, I think. It takes a certain…investigative spirit” he smiled, a warm one than at her successes.

“As for me…well my Djed might be blue…the image of the well in my mind is always a mountain lake. But my Res…for Reimancy, is a silvery iridescence that shimmers in the light. Like a molten silver I suppose,” he said, frowning and conjuring up a small orb of it to float above his palm that she could look at, before converting it into a type of stone he had seen at market the other day that reminded him of her – tiger’s eye – and tossed it gently to her, “keep it. A memento of your first magic lesson. The ashy smell might be my smoking…but it might also be the Slag Heap in the city. I was there a handful of days ago…but it never goes out and so the smell could touch me always I suppose…sorry for the odour. As for the pages unwritten…I am unsure. It could be my gnosis. But it could also be my uncertainty about my future. I never really think that I’ll live that long” he said, tilting his head thoughtfully before snorting at his own maudlin tone.

“But no matter…welcome to the world of Aurisitics Oralie…you are a mage now. Use the power wisely. Too many have used power for evil ends. I know you won’t, but power can be…tempting. Guard against it” he imparted the last piece of advice he could think of.

They spent some time then talking and passing time in simple ways, no more magic was done as they needed the rest, but they discussed things more at length and he was grateful for her companionship. She was a bright soul, in his eyes, and he would give her whatever time she wanted. Simply because he enjoyed doing so. Eventually, though, she left and he was once more alone in the apartments with, Twilight curled in his lap, and frowning at the wall in deep thought, trying to puzzle out what the hell was happening with the settlement in paradise.