Chapter 6 #5
He’s still looking closely at me, but he grins.
“I’m excited too. I don’t want you to feel like a guinea pig or anything, but I’ve never gotten to help someone discover their abilities before.
Well, someone who isn’t a sorcerer. And if our theories are right, we’re going to redefine what human magic is. ”
But no pressure, hey.
The room darkens a lot when Andrew closes the blinds over the big windows. I can still see everyone, but mostly just silhouettes and shadows. If I manage to create any light at all, it should be vis—
“Motherfucker!” Andrew’s howl of pain makes me glad there’s a ward preventing sound from escaping the room.
“Did you trip on something?” David asks, and I’m surprised to hear a little waver of satisfaction in his voice.
He’s the responsible member of the team, so I would’ve expected him to be more sympathetic.
I guess it just goes to show that Andrew doesn’t just annoy me—he’s an equal opportunity annoyer. Annoyance?
“I’m going to chop that table up for firewood,” he snarls, and I can’t help it—I laugh. The image of GQ clotheshorse Andrew chopping wood just does not compute.
“Are you laughing at me, puny human?” he asks, and the silky tone in the darkened room makes me shiver.
“Not exactly. I thought of something funny.”
There’s a thud, which if I’m interpreting the shadowy movements correctly is Andrew throwing himself onto the couch. “Oh yes?” he asks silkily. “Perhaps you could share it with us.”
“Another time,” Percy interrupts—thankfully. “I have other meetings this morning.”
“Let’s get to it, then.” David takes back the reins. “Noah, can you feel the magic?”
“Yes.” I don’t even need to concentrate. It’s back to sliding along my skin, making me incredibly aware of my every breath.
“Great. That’s where most people struggle, I’m told, and have to spend days practicing. Okay, so I want you to close your eyes and visualize a ball of light in front of you. Not too big—something that could fit in your palm, maybe. Once you’ve got the image— Fucking shit!”
I open my eyes, but I didn’t need to. Even through my closed lids, I saw the light. I also felt the heat.
“Uh, David, weren’t you supposed to tell him not to imagine a fireball? I’m sure you did that with Sam.” Andrew is leaning away from me and my absolutely fucking badass fireball. That I created. With my magic powers.
This is so cool!
Although it’s actually kind of hot. Who knew a fireball put out so much heat?
“I was getting to it,” David says, taking a cautious step closer. “I didn’t think he’d get to this point so fast.” He leans in, squinting in the light of my fireball. Because creating fireballs is just what I do now.
As if the ball can feel my smug satisfaction, it flexes and grows a little. David scrambles back.
“Okay, uh, Noah, tell me how this feels. Do you have control of the ball?” He sounds a little apprehensive.
Oh, fuck me… I’ve created a fire inside an office building. This is not good.
“I… think so?” I concentrate on the ball, trying to shrink it. It instantly becomes a little smaller, but sweat breaks out on my forehead and my heartbeat picks up. “Uh, yeah, I do, but it’s not easy.”
“So what you’re going to do is extinguish it.
Percy’s keeping an eye on the magic and will let us know if it looks like you’re losing control, and I can always contain it with sorcery, so there’s no risk, okay?
You’re safe. We’re all safe. If you start to feel unwell or like you can’t manage it yet, that’s fine. Just say so.”
I want to nod, but it feels like it might be too much effort. “’Kay,” I say instead and concentrate on reducing the fireball, making it less, smaller, until it’s nothing but a spark that I snuff out.
Whew.
I collapse back in the chair, resting my head against the high back. The room is dark again without my awesome light source, but I’m glad to have a few moments to collect myself.
The blinds go up, flooding the room with daylight. Moment over, I guess.
Andrew glares at David. “Why’d you make me get up before if you could’ve done it this way?”
David rolls his eyes. “I needed to talk to Noah and wanted you out of the way.” He turns to me. “Wow. That was incredible!”
A grin breaks across my face, and I wipe the sweat from my brow with the back of my hand. “It was, wasn’t it? My fireball was awesome.” I reach for the bottle of water Andrew brought me earlier. There’s still about half left, and man, do I need it.
“How are you feeling now?” Percy asks.
“Great,” I reply instantly. “I feel amazing.”
“Tired?” he persists. “Hungry? Headache?”
I make myself actually think about it. “Not bad tired. Tired like I’ve been for a run or something. There’s adrenaline too, but I’m not sure if that’s from what I did or just finding out I actually can do it.”
Percy looks at David, who shrugs. “It sounds like the same effects we get when we’re learning to use our abilities.
” He turns to me. “The run analogy is a good one. When you first start working out, you can only do so much before your body gets tired and sore. The more you do it, though, the more you’re able to do.
The mind works a lot like the body does in that way. ”
“So next time it will be easier?” I hope so. My fireball was badass, but it existed for less than two minutes. I need to be able to do more than that.
Percy nods. “I believe so.”
“Can I try again?” I ask. “Not a fireball this time,” I promise hastily.
There’s a moment of hesitation, then Andrew says, “Of course. Let him have another shot.”
David looks doubtful, but finally Percy nods, so he sighs and capitulates.
“Sure, why not. We know it’s not going to be a pinprick, so let’s not bother with closing the blinds this time.” He winks, and I grin. “Do you want to try with your eyes open?”
I nod. “Yeah. Yesterday, I couldn’t manage to… to… influence Andrew unless I had them closed, but this feels different.”
Andrew shrugs. “Projecting emotions probably uses a different part of your brain,” he suggests.
“Exactly,” David agrees. “While it’s a beginner exercise for vampires learning charisma, it’s probably much more advanced for humans using magic.
I’ll add it to my list of things to research.
Now… what we want this time is a cool light.
Or rather, something that doesn’t have any temperature at all,” he adds quickly, probably afraid I’m going to create some kind of ice ball that sucks the heat out of the air.
Huh. That could be a great alternative to air conditioning in the summer.
Pushing aside thoughts of my future empire in the HVAC industry, I concentrate on visualizing a lightball.
And one pops into existence in front of me. It’s about three inches in diameter, white, bright, and kind of shimmery at the edges.
“I am a god,” I whisper.
“There’s only one god, and she can’t do this,” Andrew points out, getting up and coming closer to peer at my super-fucking-cool lightball. “That’s pretty cool, Noah. Can you move it?”
I don’t bother to answer, just will the ball to smack him in the forehead.
It does.
He yelps.
“Andrew, sit down and stay out of the way,” David says, sounding like a beleaguered parent. “Noah, tell me how it feels.”
“Easier than the fireball,” I admit. “That was harder. This takes less effort. And moving it was easy too.” I make it spin and dance about for a second, admiring how pretty it is.
“It seems to be using less of the magic too,” Percy says, that strange unfocused look on his face that he gets when he’s watching the magic. “Can you increase the size?”
It only takes the tiniest bit of concentration, not at all like when I was changing the size of the fireball. Percy and David have me play with size and movement for a while, constantly checking in to see if it’s wearing me down, but I feel like I could do this for hours.
“All right, I think that’s enough for now,” David finally says.
“This seems like a pretty good exercise to flex your magic muscles, so try to do it a few times a day for a few minutes—maybe right after meditation. Keep notes about how it feels and what you do, in terms of the size of the light and movement. I’m going to talk to my friend and do some research, and we can meet up again in a few days.
” He levels me with a steady look. “Call me if anything unusual happens. You’ve got my number, right? ”
“Yeah,” I assure him. “Sam put everyone’s number in my phone.”
“Am I allowed to speak yet?” Andrew asks snippily. “Because you’re all being very short-sighted.”
David rolls his eyes. “Speak, then.”
I wish I was as patient as David, because I’m tempted to throw one of the empty coffee cups at Andrew’s head.
“Right now, Noah is doing basic data management that’s not time sensitive, is that right?” He raises a silver eyebrow at me, and I shrug.
“I guess.” Way to make me feel like my job isn’t needed, douchebag.
“Instead of that, why don’t you put him to work on some of this research? Nobody’s got more of a vested interest than him, and it would be better than having you die of exhaustion, David. When’s the last night you slept for more than a few hours?”
I look sharply at David. He doesn’t seem that tired. Can Andrew see something I can’t?
“I don’t know what you mean,” David replies. “I’ve been sleeping.”
Andrew crosses his arms over his chest and says nothing.
We all just sit there in awkward silence until Percy sighs. “David, I’m so sorry. I should have noticed.”
“You mean Andrew’s right?” The words burst out of me. “He doesn’t look tired!” It’s so fucking unfair. If David’s only sleeping a couple hours a night and can look well-rested and put together, why can’t I?
“Well, puny human,” Andrew begins, and I shake my head.
“Nope. No. Don’t talk.”
David snorts with laughter. “Noah, you may just be my favorite person. As much as I hate to say it, though, Andrew might have a point about the research. We’d get more done with another set of eyes. Are you interested?”