CHAPTER 97 – In Perfect Silence, Accompanied

Although great was her exhaustion, rest eluded Saphienne as she lay within the cool sheets of her bed staring up at the colder, celestial hallucination. The challenge waiting for her was equally as astronomical where it loomed in her mind, but both the false sky and the real demands of her apprenticeship were as dwarves beside a remote, luminous star.

What did High Master Lenitha want?

Saphienne had told herself that she’d amused or impressed the High Master to earn her first intervention; her second had been by the petition of Celaena’s father, who both cared for his daughter’s future and was important enough to have the ear of a senior member of the Luminary Vale.

But she couldn’t dismiss the implications of this latest intercession. The powerful wizard had either scried or augured that Saphienne would copy the contents of her master’s library, and had allowed her to proceed — with a warning.

“‘Take care that restricted works will not be read by any other,’” Saphienne mouthed into her pillow, “‘for vigilant observance of our shared principles is necessary to maintain trust.’”

She was now responsible for keeping the books secure: that was the condition on which she’d been permitted to copy them. And while the stipulation was reasonable, what had followed changed the meaning, for other writers in the Tome of Correspondence had asked whether any controlled texts had fallen into the wrong hands.

“‘Not yet.’”

Saphienne had tacitly been given consent to read ahead, but that sufferance was contingent on her succeeding. Should she fail to cast her first spell then, the moment she was no longer an apprentice wizard, she would have no right to own the books she had copied. She had unambiguously been informed that she was accountable — and would be held accountable.

But why? For what reason had the High Master reached down – on three separate occasions – to excuse her? Saphienne’s inescapable inference was that High Master Lenitha had plans for her… and wanted her to be aware of the debt she owed.

“We’ve never even met, and you’re deciding my life… what purpose do you have for me… to do what…”

 

* * *

 

Yet she slept without dreams, and woke refreshed in the pale afternoon.

No answer had arisen to her question, but as she went through her routine of bathing, dressing, then eating her breakfast, she nevertheless felt better about her situation. One more message had been insinuated in the Tome of Correspondence; recognising it gave Saphienne hope as she brought bread, fruit, and tea up to the study in which she was to be cocooned.

“This will work,” she reassured herself as she sat down to study, lifting the thick former playbook that now concealed ‘Meditations on the Aether.’

For whyever would High Master Lenitha have allowed her to continue, if her plan was doomed to failure?

 

* * *

 

Two hours later, as Saphienne stared at the daunting pile of references she’d noted down, she was forced to concede that the possibility of success didn’t make the achievement any likelier.

“A ‘foundational’ theory of magic? Bullshit.”

According to the preface of ‘Meditations on the Aether,’ High Master Elduin had completed the work shortly before being elevated to the uppermost echelon of the Luminary Vale. This meant he had been an accomplished wizard for over a millennium, and the treatise he’d written was directed to his peers, all of whom were conversant in the existent theories of the time.

To say it was impenetrable to Saphienne was not literally accurate, but it functionally might as well have been.

How to proceed? She could try to find the referenced works on the table before her, but unpicking the knot of arcane esoterica without following the thread seemed, to her, a losing battle. What she needed to do was start from the bottom and build upward, which meant she had to catalogue all she possessed.

Tossing her outer robes onto the floor, Saphienne readied a fresh sheet of paper.

“Title; cover title; author; subject area; bookcase, and then shelf.”

Life could be funny: among the many lessons Filaurel had taught her, how to organise a library and build an index for it had never appeared so crucial.

 

* * *

 

Reading enough to put her collection in order consumed the remainder of the day, but left Saphienne with a camouflaged hoard of magical theory mixed in among the commonplace texts that hadn’t been overwritten. The only clue that anything had changed was the disorder of the shelves, which she had further muddled so that the mystical works wouldn’t stand out from the existing scheme.

Intentionally leaving books in disarray? Filaurel would have been aghast.

That thought made Saphienne tiredly smile as she marvelled at the arrangement, glancing between the bookshelves and the sheaf of papers that revealed where to find the tentative sections she’d made. Another page detailed her proposed reading list, arranged by decreasing accessibility, through which she might come to grasp the fundamentals necessary to comprehend more advanced discourses.

She stretched, and settled back against the table, crossing her arms as she contemplated the books. “Upon this soil, I will grow my tree…”

Thirty-five days remained.

 

* * *

 

Wizards, Saphienne soon learned, were necessarily poets.

There were no words that could wholly capture the experience of magic, no utterance of syllables that could ever express what it meant to exceed through will and learning alone. Certain measurements were made – resonances diagrammed, sympathies charted, changes recorded and tallied and arranged in columns – but these were secondary to the moment where a talented magician beheld what was, and decreed otherwise.

The language of magical notation? Mere vagary, shorthand that served as a common yet superficial touchstone between wildly differing approaches to the Great Art. The structure imposed by elves was for coordination, descriptive rather than prescriptive, mapping features of a landscape that was ever-shifting, untraversable other than alone.

 

By a route obscure and lonely,
Haunted by ill archons only,
Where an Eidolon, named NIGHT,
On a black throne reigns upright …

 

Over the hours and days that ensued, though she had not reached the summit, Saphienne related to the sentiments expressed by her predecessors as she climbed after them, labouring late into the darkness of encroaching winter.

What did she uncover?

Beyond the simple test that she had been set, each degree of magic made possible feats that were inconceivable to magicians who had not yet attained them. The spells of each degree grew not only in sophistication, but in mystery, each extending from a ruling secret that first had to be obtained. These key intimacies with magic could not be immediately conveyed, and all wizards and sorcerers defended their path to attainment most jealously — for it placed them beyond the reach of lesser magicians.

She who attained the Third Degree was nigh untouchable to wizards of the first, and so too she who attained the Fourth Degree was invincible to direct assail by sorcerers of the second.

How many were the degrees of magic? Five were attested; a sixth was inferred from the deeds of the High Masters; a seventh proposed by the contests of historical record; an eighth whispered; and a ninth surmised in the symmetries of the occult, for the number nine was among those that held magical connotations.

That seemed like wishful thinking to Saphienne, as did the significance that wizards attached to certain numbers. ‘One’ was supposedly the most potent number, the unity from which all other mysteries proceeded; ‘two’ was reflection, the foundation of all sympathy; ‘three’ their synthesis, that gave rise to the physical dimension; ‘four’ the square of sympathy, magical structure expressed as resonance; ‘five’ the intersection of life and magic in the magician; ‘seven’ the perpetual arising of spirits from the world to change it; and ‘nine’ the square of the physical dimension, symbolising its transcendence. Numerology made much out of their additions and divisions.

Why no meanings for ‘six’ and ‘eight’? She had no clue. Nor could she see any useful purpose for the symbolism.

She hurried on through similarly dubious arcana, hungrily consuming a syllabus that was intended to be taught across decades, striving to unmask the theories of what magic was, and how it flowed, and so why she could not keep a sigil in her mind.

Peacock brought word that the next lesson was cancelled: Almon had taken sick. Twenty-nine days remained.

 

* * *

 

None of the answers were definitive.

Almon had described ‘Meditations on the Aether’ as one of several competing theories that described magic, but what he’d omitted was that all of them had deficiencies that struggled to explain what wizards observed.

The eldest conjecture, so old that it lacked an author, was that the world was governed by belief, and that magic emerged when stronger faith won out over weaker. This was the tenet upon which the ancient elven cults had warred with each other — for to eliminate heresy was to empower the magic of those who remained.

How did this theory accommodate discoveries that no one had known before, let alone believed in? Very poorly.

Corytho had refined the old, belligerent dogma into a supposition that the world unfolded as a consequence of perception; that magic was the art of learning to witness this unfolding from a different perspective, and that it was not faith but rather clarity of vision that reigned supreme. The subjectivity of his theorem offered little explanation for how radically different yet equally effective magical praxes could coexist.

Varith contended that the world was itself a spell, and that spellcasting was attuning oneself to the world-spell to alter its manifestation. How a part could exceed itself to encompass and thereby change the whole was unresolved — as were the theological implications arising from the established relationship between spell and caster.

Feneath’s theorem was presently the most popular, appealing to wizards and sorcerers alike by separating magic from the mundane world. She posited that magic poured down from a domain of pure truth, and that magicians immersed in these flows could inscribe the truths they carried upon the world — for it was less real than the higher realm. Metaphysical questions about the nature of truth aside, there was absolutely no evidence to substantiate the existence of a supernal plane.

Galuin returned to Varith to reject the notion that magic was distinct from the world, but he differed in how he conceived of their interrelation. His hypothesis was that magic was entirely comprised of the as-yet unknown, nature merely not yet codified. From this he supposed that it was possible to unify all philosophies by deducing an underlying structure that bound them together, and so he advanced the existence of an immanent ‘aether’ that served as the conduit for magic. Alas, and to his chagrin, his aether was unfalsifiable.

And so, a then young contemporary of Galuin had penned a response, writing ‘Meditations on the Aether’ as an exploration of the different theories that the soon-to-be High Master had examined. Saphienne could barely fathom the point he was driving at, for he agreed that the aether existed, but disputed every other assertation Galuin had made, perhaps invoking the concept metaphorically. As best she could discern, High Master Elduin interpreted spells as the point where magic touched the world, but she couldn’t determine more than that without spending days mulling over his words — days that she didn’t have.

More recently, some eight hundred years ago, Rovalia had caused a stir by insisting that magic resisted all comprehension because it was wholly composed of endlessly distinctive, eternally emerging, unrelated phenomena. Every wizard or sorcerer’s Great Art was, so she insisted, entirely unique, converging only insofar as they shared similar initial preconditions, and otherwise irreconcilable. Everything that was had never been before.

All the theories were mutually incompatible; all were equally defensible, yet flawed; all were thoroughly perplexing to Saphienne, who had a headache by the time she had finished writing out her notes.

Twenty-three days remained.

 

* * *

 

Once she had assembled her tentative understanding of what magic might be, Saphienne focused on works that were concerned with the inner experience of wizards and sorcerers, desperate to find any suggestion as to how she was impeded. Ironically, she eventually found herself reading the very first book she’d copied, ‘Mysteries of Flesh and Spirit,’ by the invoker Myathaen.

 

… What comes forth from the union of elf and spirit is greater than the sum of both, each half attracted to the virtues of its opposite and disdaining its flaws. When two join as one, the insurmountable shall be no impediment: the mysteries of flesh and spirit shall open the closed way. Verily, to walk with a spirit is to have frailty of character stripped away, baring the good wood that grows true beneath rotted bark …

 

Halfway through eating her toast, Saphienne nearly dropped it on the page as insight struck her, and she fumbled to set both down as she leapt up from the table and ran to the door. Realising that she couldn’t talk with her mouth full, she reluctantly returned to sip tea and choke down the crumbs in her throat before she headed out and down the hall with urgency.

“Celaena!” She knocked the door to her sitting room. “Are you busy with Hyacinth?”

“…No…”

Saphienne entered. “I’m borrowing her flowers–”

Celaena was curled up on the windowsill, her eyes red, used handkerchiefs all over her lap, uncaring that Saphienne saw her so miserable. She pointed wordlessly to where the plant pot – unoccupied by the spirit – had been set on the floor nearby.

“…Celaena?”

She shook her head. “I’m fine.”

Having not seen much of the older girl of late, Saphienne worried that she’d been remiss as a friend. Cautiously, she eased up beside her on the sill. “What happened?”

Celaena wavered, torn between her instinct for privacy and her loneliness. She sniffed noisily as she looked out the window. “…Laewyn visited this morning.”

“…Are you–”

“She wants to get back together.”

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While the news sounded positive, Saphienne wasn’t a fool. “But?”

A hoarse, shuddering sigh broke from Celaena’s lips. “…She gave me an ultimatum. She said that she wants to sleep with a boy, too.”

For all that Saphienne was increasingly immersed in the nuances of wizardry, she recognised she was completely out of her depth with regard to relationships. “…I don’t know what to say.”

“She said she loves me,” Celaena whispered, “and she wants a future with me, but she’s curious about… boys. Sleeping with them. Fucking them.” Her smile was wry and pained. “She said it’s not to punish me… that it’d been on her mind for a while. Laewyn wants me to accept her for all of who she is.”

“…Who–”

“I didn’t ask.” Celaena lowered her head. “I just said yes.”

Saphienne blinked. “But, this hurts–”

“Yes.”

“Shouldn’t you have talked–”

“No.” She shut her eyes. “I’m just afraid. What if she likes whoever she’s with more than me? What if they fall in love?”

Lost, Saphienne’s gazed drifted to the flowers at her feet. “…Did you talk to Hyacinth about it?”

“I did.” Celaena blew her nose, then wilted as she stared at Saphienne. “Hyacinth thinks Laewyn does love me, and she doesn’t think this will change that. She said that most elves aren’t monogamous across the whole of their lives, and that we have forever, so why be jealous about such things?”

Biting her lip, Saphienne crossed her arms. “Is it jealousy, though?”

“…No.” She slumped. “I just… want to be enough for her. Which is childish.”

Part of her desired to flee, but Saphienne made herself shift closer. “Could it just be curiosity? And maybe her way of testing how much you love her, after all the… confusion?”

“…I don’t know…”

Dark memories stirred in her mind; Saphienne clasped Celaena’s hand. “Promise me you won’t do anything rash–”

“Don’t be silly.” Celaena’s smile was more genuine, though shattered. “If I didn’t do it then I won’t ever do it, especially not over teenage heartache. A hundred years from now, whatever becomes of me and Laewyn, I’ll be a wizard… and none of this will have mattered, will it?”

Saphienne wondered. Unlike the High Master, she couldn’t prophesy the future — and she had just as little clarity on the grand wizard’s motives as she did Laewyn’s. All she had for Celaena, and for herself, was hope.

For want of more to say, she squeezed her palm.

 

* * *

 

Opening the window to call Hyacinth made Saphienne aware of how stale the air had become in the study, and she did her best to fan the room with her robes while she waited — only to be noticed by the bloomkith when she arrived, whose mirth was almost audible as she effortlessly stirred up a cleansing breeze.

“Very funny,” Saphienne smirked, pleased by the fresh air as she closed the pane and pulled the curtain back across. “Come, talk to me.”

She held her hand up, steeling herself–

 

* * *

 

Hyacinth was not yet proficient in direct possession, and the sensation of her transition into Saphienne’s mind was disorientating enough that the girl had to sit down on the floor and hang her head between her legs. When the vertigo had passed, the two met together by the steps of the imagined library, Saphienne leaning on the table after regaining her unsteady footing.

“How do you fare, my child of elves?” Clad in yellow blossoms, the bloomkith was grinning ambiguously. “And more: how fare your art, o’er which you do so pour?”

Saphienne massaged her temples, both within and without. “Hyacinth, I simply do not have the cognitive capacity to handle your rhymes — please don’t make me beg for mercy.”

Relenting, Hyacinth alighted the steps and hugged her. “Then I shall speak with neither rhyme nor rhythm, and urge you to your point.”

Sitting down with the spirit, Saphienne leaned against her as she surveyed the field. “I’ve been thinking quite hard about what my issue could be. According to the theory of Galuin, I don’t have sufficient presence to agitate the aether; according to Corytho and Rovalia, a deficiency in my perspective or being is to blame; and Feneath implies that I’m too metaphysically distant from higher truth.”

“I am magical, and you are very agitating to me,” Hyacinth retorted, amused. “So too, to me you are closer to truth than most elves, not further away. As for any elf who would call you deficient? They would be a fool.”

“You’re close to my line of thinking.” Saphienne confirmed as she interlinked fingers with the spirit. “I’m considering several possibilities, and you can help me test them.”

“How so?”

“Hyacinth, if you’re to have any hope of being my familiar one day… can you give me a spell to hold? Just to see if it will last?”

The bloomkith’s mouth dropped open; she remained speechless.

“I know that woodland spirits bestow spells on priests–”

“It is not so simple.” Hyacinth withdrew and stood to pace, the snowflakes thickening where they fell upon her field. “Priests must learn to hold space for our cuttings, and then how to embrace them as like you have described your sigils. So too, we must learn how to make a part of ourselves into a cutting that will serve… and this art is not easily done.”

Saphienne could feel the reason for her fretting behind her words. “You’re bad at it, aren’t you?”

The bloomkith’s petals flushed pink, and a wall of snow descended so heavily that it was as though the white clouds had tumbled down. “…Wretchedly so. Faith eases the act.”

“Then,” Saphienne changed tactics, “could we try walking together, and memorising my sigil? If we can do together what I can’t alone, that would imply the fault is in the way I’m approaching the problem.”

There, Hyacinth stopped, and crouched down as her flush lessened. “Wormwood cautioned me against this. No. Doing so would be a hinderance, not an aid.”

Glancing toward the book she had been reading, Saphienne reflected. “…Adding your magic to mine would only complicate things?”

“Were I your familiar, or had I studied long to incorporate the sigil into myself? Then it would not be so; or so sayeth Wormwood.”

“Leaving only one grove left to explore,” Saphienne concluded, the sky above them darkening.