Off to Be the Wizard (17 page)

Phillip rubbed at the mark with his boot. It wiped away easily. “It stands for ‘moron’,” he said as he finished removing it.

“He seems friendly,” Martin said.

“Yes, that’s the problem with him. He
seems
friendly.”

Martin knew that the wise move would be to leave it alone and get on with their day. He also knew that he wasn’t going to do that. “It’s obvious that you detest him.”

“Obvious to everyone but him.”

“Oh, I think he knows.”

Phillip turned to face Martin, his eyes full of hope. “Do you think so? You think he knows how I feel? Oh, I hope that’s true. Maybe he even feels the same way about me?”

“I think he may. What’s your deal? Are you mad because he’s Merlin and you’re not?”

Phillip sat down at the table and slumped over, as if tired from the exertion of hating Jimmy. “No, I hate him because he’s
not
Merlin. There is no Merlin and there probably never was. Look, when I came to this time, I knew I’d be disguising myself as a wizard, and hoped I’d be known as a good one. I thought that was a pretty good goal. Good enough for me, at least, but clearly not good enough for Jimmy. When Jimmy came back here, it was with the intention of making people recognize him as Merlin whether they wanted to or not, and he proceeded to scramble countless people’s lives so he could bend reality to his will.”

“You’re angry because he changed the past.”

“Yes, you could boil it down to that.”

“But you’re changing the past too.”

“Yes, but on a much smaller scale, and for very different reasons. I made small changes in hopes of making a better life for myself and others. He made huge changes to create a much better life for himself and a slightly better life for everyone else maybe, if they were lucky, but if not, he’s not really bothered.”

A long silence passed as Martin tried to understand and Phillip tried to find a more elegant explanation. “Shortly after I got here, I decided the repository,
the file
, as you call it, would be much more useful if it had a simplified interface. I started working on the shell. I told Jimmy about it. He helped a little. When new wizards would turn up, he’d show them
our
shell that
we
made. Later on, I’d meet new wizards who had met Jimmy first, and they’d ask me what it was like helping Jimmy invent the shell.”

“Ah,” Martin said. “You want more credit.”

“No, it’s not about credit. It’s about theft.”

“Theft of credit,” Martin said.

“Look,” Phillip said, “The world can be described as a war between two sides. The problem is that everybody has a different idea of what those two sides are. Liberals versus Conservatives, Star Wars fans versus Star Trek fans, people who see the world in terms of us-versus-them and people who don’t. There are thousands of different two kinds of people. The way I see it, civilization is a war between people like me and people like Jimmy.”

“Okay, who are the people like you, and who are the people like Jimmy?”

“Martin, did you ever play basketball?”

“Yes.”

“Tell me, what’s a foul?”

“It’s when a player breaks one of the rules. Do it three times and you’re kicked out of the game.”

Phillip smiled. “Good. The best way I’ve ever summed up the war as I see it is that one side, our side, sees a foul as being against the rules, and if you do it too many times you have to be removed. The other side, Jimmy’s side, sees fouls as things you’re allowed to get caught doing twice, and if you don’t, you aren’t trying hard enough.”

“So you’re mad at Jimmy because you think his side cheats at life.”

“Partly. Mostly I’m mad because I’m pretty sure his side is going to win.”

They spent the rest of that day covering the creation of macros, and they got a lot of training accomplished, but Phillip’s mood never really recovered. It wasn’t until the next day, after a good night’s sleep, that his smile seemed genuine again. In fact, as Phillip roused Martin from the hammock, Phillip’s smile seemed a little too genuine.

“Get up, me lad! I’ve got something special planned for you today.”

Martin rubbed the sleep from his eyes as he carefully dismounted the hammock. “What is it? I was hoping to work some more on macros. I have a few ideas.”

Phillip shrugged theatrically. “Well, we could spend the day at the computer if you’d rather and just leave learning to fly for another day.”

“No, no,” Martin said, quickly grabbing his staff, “If you think it’s time to try flying,” he continued, struggling to pull on his robe, “then I as the, uh, um … student,” he stammered, realizing that pulling on the robe would be easier if he weren’t holding his staff, “should defer to your expertise,” he said, setting down the staff, and successfully donning his robe, “and learn to fly today.” Martin had gone from sleep to standing, ready to leave, in ten seconds and one run-on sentence.

“Now, now, don’t be so hasty. You haven’t had any breakfast,” Phillip said. “Here, have one of these. It should tide you over until lunch. He handed Martin a palm sized rectangle of something wrapped in cloth.

“What is it?” Martin asked.

“It’s something I’m experimenting with. Are you familiar with the idea of a breakfast bar?”

Martin unwrapped it eagerly. “Yeah, in my time we tend to call them energy bars. I didn’t know you had chocolate.”

“I don’t; this is much healthier. It’s a block of dried stew.”

It did tide Martin over until lunch, in that it made him lose all interest in eating. He and Phillip went outside. Phillip held out his hand, and Martin willingly put his hand in Phillip’s. Phillip held his staff aloft in his free hand and pointed its top, with the decorative glass bottle of Tabasco sauce, toward the sky. Phillip looked upward, said, “Flugi!” and they were soaring into the sky.

They flew about fifteen miles. In modern times that was not far, but in the Middle Ages, it was a huge distance. They flew over the forest until they came to a large clearing full of tall grass. In the middle of the clearing, two men in wizard robes were waiting for them. As Phillip swooped in for a landing, Martin could see that it was Gary and Jeff.

“Guys! Good to see you! I didn’t know you were going to be here,” Martin said.

“We wouldn’t have missed it!” Gary said. “We wizards always come out for an apprentice’s first flight.”

“Where’s Tyler?” Phillip asked.

“Dunno,” Jeff answered. “He went out yesterday for some book research and hasn’t come back. Some farmer’s probably telling him a story about yams that he thinks he can make into a tale of high adventure. He loses track of time.”

“He’s gonna be bummed that he missed your first flight,” Gary said. “It’s a tradition.”

“Yeah,” Jeff said, “it’s like when they launch a ship by breaking a bottle on its prow.”

“But instead if a ship, it’s you.”

“And instead of a bottle, it’s the ground.”

“And there’s no breaking involved. Just bouncing.”

“Bouncing?” Martin asked. “I’m gonna bounce?”

Phillip shook his head. “Only if you crash.”

“Which means yes,” Gary added helpfully.

“Don’t worry, though,” Phillip said, scowling at Gary, “thanks to the various protective spells I applied to you, you can’t be injured.”

“Oh,” Martin said, visibly relieved. “Good. As long as I can’t get hurt.”

“Oh, you’ll get hurt,” Jeff said, “just not injured. Your skin won’t cut and your bones won’t break, but you’ll still feel pain if you run a knife across your skin, or you get poked hard with something sharp.”

“Or if you fall screaming out of the sky at terminal velocity and land on the hard, rocky ground,” Gary said, stomping on the ground to emphasize its hardness.

Phillip put his hand on Martin’s shoulder. “Don’t listen to them, Martin. They’re just trying to scare you. Oh, they’re not lying. You will probably fall, and bounce, and it will smart like mad, but they’re just telling you about it to scare you. Now let’s get you up in the air, shall we?”

Moments later, Martin was standing alone. The other three wizards were watching him intently, but giving him plenty of room. “All right,” Phillip said, “we fly using our staff.”

“Rule one,” Martin said reflexively. “Don’t make the obvious joke.”

“Indeed,” Phillip said. “Have you ever ridden a motorcycle?”

“Yes.”

“How’d that go?”

“I crashed.”

“This is gonna be GREAT!” Jeff said. Gary giggled.

“Ignore them,” Phillip said. “That doesn’t just mean today. In general, it’s best to ignore them. Anyway, flying is a lot like riding a motorcycle in two ways. It’s more about leaning than steering, and if you look at something, you’re going to steer into it, even if you don’t want to. Now, put your hand about half way down your staff and hold it over your head.”

Martin did.

Phillip said, “Good. Now, think of the staff as your controls. Point the head of your staff forward and you go faster. Pull it back, you slow down. Tilt it to the left and you’ll bank left. Tilt right, bank right. Tilt your wrist up and you’ll angle upward. Tilt your wrist down and you’ll angle down. It sounds like a lot to remember, but if you think of it like you’re letting your staff lead you, it’s very intuitive.”

Martin said, “Kind of like riding a Segway.”

Phillip and Gary said, “What?”

At the same moment, Jeff said, “Yes.”

Martin asked, “How fast can we fly?”

“There’s no theoretical limit, but the shell keeps us down to a hundred miles an hour, which, believe me, is more than fast enough when you’re up there in the wind with nothing but a robe and hat for protection.”

Martin took a deep breath, then raised the staff over his head. He held it there for a moment, then lowered it again. “Do I have to say
flugi
?” he asked. “It’s the least dignified magic word ever.”

“Right now, yes. Later you can make a macro and set any word you like, make sparkles trail behind you, whatever. During training we’re focusing on basic flight, and to do that, you say
flugi
.”

Martin raised the staff above his head again. He shook the tension out of his left hand, which was hanging by his side, paused a second to work up his nerve, and said, “Flugi.”

Nothing happened. He was still standing firmly on the ground. He looked at Phillip, fearing that he was yet again being messed with. Phillip smiled and said, “Point the staff upward a bit. JUST A BIT! You want to start slow.”

Martin tilted the head of the staff upward and he smoothly raised about thirty feet before he panicked and tilted the staff back, stopping all upward progress. He hovered there, oscillating between laughing, shouting, and being too stunned to make a sound. He had known intellectually that he was going to fly at some point, but now he knew that he was flying, and that was a different matter. He was sure it looked like he was hanging by one hand from his staff, but that was not how it felt. It didn’t feel like he was weightless either. It felt as if every atom in his body had simply decided it was time to move in the same direction, and that direction just happened to be straight up. He looked down at Phillip, Jeff, and Gary. They looked delighted as they cheered Martin on.

Phillip raised his staff, said, “Flugi,” and drifted up to meet Martin.

Jeff produced his magic wand, pointed it at the sky and shot upward with an eerie humming sound and distorted shock wave emanating from the spot where he had stood.

Gary whipped his staff around in an arc, chanting, “Mi estas mizera spektaklo ekstere.” He held his staff aloft and rose slowly but forcefully on a pillar of black smoke so thick you could not see through it. Soon, all four of them were hovering there, thirty feet in the air.

“Okay,” Phillip said. “You’ve got hovering down. Now it’s time to fly. Remember, just sort of point your staff where you want to go. It’s that simple.”

Martin pointed the staff a degree or two upward, then tilted his wrist downward and he gracefully leveled off. His staff led and his body trailed behind. What had been pointing his staff upward now felt like it leading him forward. He turned his head to look behind and saw the others following him. He experimented with some turns. He tried gaining and losing altitude. He swooped. He spiraled. He went as fast as he comfortably could, which wasn’t all that fast with the wind in his eyes.

He shielded his face with his free hand and tried for a high speed swoop. He swung down within a few feet of the ground, then gave it the spurs as he angled back toward the sky. He was fifty feet in the air and accelerating upward at a steep angle. Between the speed he was moving, the hand shielding his eyes, and the squinting in the wind, he nearly didn’t see the duck.

Later, Phillip told him he probably would have missed the duck entirely if he hadn’t reacted, but he had, involuntarily cringing and pulling his staff arm in to shield his face. In doing so he dropped the staff’s air speed to nearly zero, then to full reverse, banked a hard right turn and stuck the staff into a steep dive all at the same time.