The daily meeting between the members of Jon's little circle had become pretty much a routine in the last couple weeks, but for Jon it was a rather frustrating routine. With everything that they now knew was going on around them, it felt like more stuff should be happening. She'd heard, from Becca telling her parents, that the "Numbers" were engaging this "Enemy," or creatures somewhat like it, on a fairly regular basis - but there hadn't been any major incidents since that thing with the Dark Moon. All four of the Keepers had shown up in Lakeside - but the only one who seemed to be doing all that much was Lucas, who seemed to be always darting in and out of various places and perpetually in the middle of something when Jon did run into her. And Brittany had had Jon's whole little group attempting to practice magic, but none of them had managed to do anything with it yet, even though she and Karyn at least had been at it for weeks. It was like everything was in some sort of perpetual holding pattern...she'd said as much to Brittany, who'd been of the opinion that periods of not much happening were better looked at as a chance to prepare for the times when things were happening, but the slug-girl still found it frustrating...
Karyn looked around the table in the little study room they'd taken to meeting in. Jon and Brittany were present, as were Haru and Tim. Ken was an off-and-on attendee, but was more part of the group because Haru was than because he particularly wanted to be; apparently today he had something or other that'd kept him away. She leaned forward, a couple tentacles propped against the table, speaking in a hushed voice even though they were the only ones in the room.
"I...I managed to...to do magic," she said.
Everybody stared at her. Brittany was the only one who didn't seem a little shocked. "Y-you...you did?" Jon queried, her voice trembling. It was...she knew she should be glad for Karyn, but...the idea that her own best friend would...would show her up like this...hadn't she been practicing just as much, just as long? And on top of that she found herself feeling bad for being jealous, too...
The cecaelia-girl nodded. "Last night. Only a little bit - just something simple. I..." She laughed. "I did my hair with it, that's all. I was just trying something silly...honestly I was kinda stunned when it worked."
Brittany smiled. "Wonderful," she said. "Simple as it may seem, it is a first step."
Jon stared into space, trying to say something, but she couldn't quite form the words. She turned back to the group, trying to force herself to offer her congratulations, but she couldn't get past a flustered stammer. She started turning a little red. "I-i...I gotta..." she said, then turned and fled the room.
The slug-girl sat in a stall in the girls' room, feeling angry and hurt and stupid and nauseous and as tense as she'd ever felt. It wasn't fair, it just wasn't! She'd been working at this for as long as Karyn had, and she still couldn't do anything with it! She knew she wanted this more than Karyn...Karyn just thought all this was interesting, but Jon wanted it to be real, wanted to be a part of it... She...she was the Keeper of the Earth Stone, damn it! Didn't...didn't that count for anything!? Or was it really that she only got that by chance? Brittany hadn't thought so, but...but why did Karyn get to get there first? Oh, and now she had to feel like a horrible person for being jealous of her own best friend...she hated this, she hated it! Why did it have to be this way?
"Lady Jon?" The voice came from behind her - from the wall - in an otherwise empty bathroom. Jon being already tense and upset, being startled like this didn't help. She screamed and vaulted off the toilet as best as someone with no bones in their lower body can, hitting the stall door rather uncomfortably. She whirled around to see Brittany hunkered atop the toilet tank, halfway out of the wall. "The HELL!?" she yelled. "D-don't they have bathrooms where you come from?" She immediately winced, realizing how she was sounding, but Brittany let the remark slide. "It frustrates you, to be beaten?" the Briton girl asked.
The slug-girl nodded, staring at the floor and flushing hotly. "I...I didn't even realize I was thinking of it as a contest," she said. "I...I want to fix what I messed up, I want to make things better, but I can't even manage something as simple as...as doing hair, and my best friend - one of the people changed by what I did - beats me to the punch...and then I have the gall to be jealous..." She groaned, burying her face in her hands. "God, I'm such a failure..."
Brittany put her hand on Jon's shoulder. Her touch wasn't quite the same as that of a fully corporeal person, but it was comforting nonetheless. "Yet you ignore all the things you've done right," she said. "Sister Haru, and all the others whose body you've brought into a closer accord with their soul? The ancient people you've brought back from extinction? Or that you have allowed the world to raise up defenders for itself against this Enemy? Or that you have brought magic back into the world at all? Do these all count for nothing, because you've yet to master it yourself?"
Jon sighed. "N...no..." she murmured. "I just...I mean, how can I be your wizard or whatever, when I can't even do magic? I've been practicing just as much as Karyn, and...I think I want it more, but I can't even do something as simple as that. You're more qualified to lead this group than I am. You've seen things I've only ever daydreamed about...you even know how to do some of it. But me...I'm just some schmendrick." (The word had been on her mind since she'd read The Last Unicorn, and it just seemed to place itself here of its own accord. She wasn't in any mood to argue.) "What am I even doing here, Brittany?"
The ghost girl sighed. "Lady Jon, will you come with me?"
Jon nodded. "S-sure. Look, I've told you, you don't have to address me like that."
Brittany nodded. "You have indeed."
She led Jon to one of the workrooms that was used by the Home Ec classes and drama department for sewing and costuming, where she reached into a locked cupboard, unlocked it from the inside, and withdrew a garment. As she unfolded it, Jon saw that it was a tunic or dress sort of thing, not unlike the one that Brittany herself wore under her outer robe, only this one was a soft, clean white with golden trim, looser and a little more flowing. Jon stared at it. "That's...um, you made that? Is...is it...?"
Brittany smiled and shook her head. "It's not enchanted. It is only fabric; it has no power to make you anything other than what you are." She held it out to Jon. "But you may think of it as a symbol of office, of sorts. Here."
Jon gingerly took it, realizing that Brittany meant that she should put it on, but not quite willing to acknowledge that. "It's...very nice," she said. It wasn't a lie, she did think that, but...that didn't mean she wanted to go around in...in this... "Is it, uh...I mean, is this casual wear, for your order?" she asked.
Brittany smiled knowingly. "I don't mean that you are to wear nothing else," she said. "It is, as I said, your robe of office - and you would think of it as formal. But I think it would be appropriate, for this occasion. One of your charges has just made her first real step into the practice, after all."
Jon nodded slowly, running through a list of rationalizations. "Well, yeah," she said. "But...it's just..." She trailed off, slowly shaking her head.
"Lady Jon," Brittany said, "if I may...you said that you desire magic more than Sister Karyn does, and I believe that to be true. But...in another sense, I think that you may not be letting yourself accept that. You seem to hold yourself back from truly committing to this...to your station, to this order." She sighed. "The magic that I've taught you of is based on communion and persuasion, Jon - but how can you truly commune with the spirits of things, or convince them to do your will, if you can't accept what you are? If you can't be honest with yourself, how can you be honest with them?"
Jon opened her mouth to protest, but...well...actually, she couldn't really deny it. She had used to daydream about this stuff, she had wondered what it might be like for the fantastic to break through into mundane existence...it was what had led her to make that fateful wish. But...when it came to doing this, to embracing it, if she thought about it honestly, there was a part of her that held back. A part that wanted to hold zealously onto what dignity she still had, that didn't want to become silly, that feared becoming some sort of...of velvet-faerie-painting-owning, incense-burning, Enya-listening New-Agey touchy-feely weirdo girl...
...but...well...this wasn't that, was it? Not if she looked at it honestly. This was...about as simply straightforward an introduction into the world of magic as Jon could have asked for. There was no pomp or ritual, there was no incense - heck, even while Brittany was of Celtic background, she wasn't the "pacing moodily by the sea in long white dresses on an album cover" variety. (From what Jon had heard of her voyage to the New World, probably closer to the "giving the Romans a run for their money" variety, though she was too well-mannered to seem as intimidating as that would imply.) No, this was...not that. That was only her own fear talking. She gripped the robe a little more firmly, looked it over, and nodded to herself, then went over to one of the little curtained changing rooms.
Her fear was still talking, asking if she really wanted to go around the school in that, but she ignored it. She was already half-slug, for God's sake; in a school full of people just as strange as her, was she really going to stand out that much more for wearing a slightly anachronistic outfit? Letting out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding, she took off her shirt and skirt, folding them up and stuffing them in her purse, and slipped the robe over her head. It was surprisingly comfortable; the exterior was a rougher felt that was more intended for crafts, but it'd been lined with cotton. It was pretty warm, as a result, which Jon wasn't going to complain about, not at this time of year. She did wish it weren't so low-cut - in reality, it wasn't, very, but as she'd been wearing close-necked T-shirts ever since her change, the square-cut open collar felt more revealing than it really was.
Feeling a little embarassed, Jon left the changing room. Brittany smiled at her handiwork, and produced a little circlet woven out of fake leaves, which she set on the slug-girl's head. "They should be real," she said, apologetically, "but I couldn't leave this place to get any."
Jon shrugged. "It's okay. Um...thanks." The other girl nodded.
Jon felt more self-conscious than was probably merited moving through the halls back to the meeting room. She did get some odd looks, but nobody was really blatantly staring. She tried to soldier through and ignore them, tried to remember that, in a sense...no, in perfect, literal reality, this was what she was - the Keeper of the Earth Stone, the reviver of magic, the restorer of the ancient people, the leader-figurehead of an ancient order of magicians - but it was difficult. Thinking of herself as anything special didn't really come naturally to her, and certainly not when she was still struggling to live up to any of it. But...she managed.
When they entered the meeting room, Jon went over to Karyn, feeling contrite and embarassed. "I...I'm sorry," she said. "For...for being a jackass." She looked up at her friend. "It's great that you got to start doing magic. Really, congratulations."
Karyn smiled and hugged her. "It's nothing," she said. "You're going to be better at this than me, mark my words. I'm just dabbling for the heck of it."
This settled, Jon turned to the rest of her circle. Tim and Haru were staring in a bit of surprise at her get-up; the drow-boy in particular seemed a little lost for words. "Y-you look...um, it...it really suits you," he said.
Jon smiled, more than she thought she would, for reasons she wasn't really sure of. "Th-thanks," she said. It was a nice robe, and it was a very nice gesture on the part of her temporally-displaced counselor; she just wished she could do something fitting for the part. Even just lighting the candle they kept on the table...but...all in due time, she supposed. "Brittany made it for me. I know I can't really do anything yet, but-"
She stopped, suddenly. She had felt power go out of her. It was...it was like when two people come to an unspoken agreement, and each knows the other consents without having to say it. Her eyes widened, and she turned to the candle - which was now burning brightly. Jon stared at it, and the rest of them stared at it, and she felt herself trembling slightly. She had done it. She had...had done magic. It was...it was...
She remembered a bit from The Light Fantastic, where Rincewind, having spent decades unable to cast a single spell, finally manages it, and understands "why wizards didn't have much truck with sex." That...that wasn't exactly the right way to put it. It wasn't a sexual feeling (a relief to her, as she didn't want to have to deal with that, in this body,) or something that seemed like a suitable replacement for them, but there was a certain similarity (at least in her limited and wholly personal experience) in the giddy rush, the feeling of being caught up in an activity the very act of which draws one on to its conclusion almost of its own volition, the sheer naturalness of the thing. There was something in it that made her want to keep doing it, to climb higher and higher and higher until she was shaking the very foundations of the earth, to be filled with Power and working great wonders through that which was in her...
Jon snapped back to reality, gaping slightly as she realized the kind of things she'd just been thinking. The others were staring openly at her, now. That was...to get that caught up in something this simple...was it always like that? If it was...she could understand why so many wizards in stories were downright mad with it. It was a sobering thought. She looked to Brittany, who nodded knowingly. "You will grow accustomed to it," the Briton girl said. "It's part of the process, to learn to control one's desires, rather than being ruled by them." The slug-girl nodded and sat down, feeling a little shaken - almost winded. She'd never imagined...
"While we're talking of that," Brittany continued, "I have been thinking...it might be good for you to begin taking apprentices."
The others stared at her. "You...you really think that's a good idea?" Karyn asked. "I mean, we at least have you to show us the ropes, but if we start spreading this to the whole world..."
Brittany shrugged. "But magic is in the world," she said. "It has been returned to the world altogether - not just for those who know about it. Many people will not pursue it, as I've said before - but those who would will discover it sooner or later, and isn't it better that they should be taught how to handle it? Sister Karyn, you and Lady Jon both understand the allure of its power."
Jon nodded thoughtfully. "I...yeah. Wow. You're...you're probably right. But...I think Karyn's got a point. I mean, do we really want to just hand this out to anyone? Some of the kids in this school alone..."
Brittany shook her head. "No; you are right about that. We must use our own good judgement. Such a school as we might found would need to teach its students not only how to attain power, but how it should be used. That is best done from an early age."
"So...like, teaching kids magic?" Haru asked, a little flabbergasted. "Are you really sure that's a good idea?"
Brittany nodded. "Isn't that what schools like this are founded for? To prepare the children of this country to live a good life?"
"Actually it's more about getting into a good college..." Tim muttered snarkily, but Jon shot him a look and he dropped it.
"So..." the slug-girl said, half to herself, "we could...if we could find some of the right kids, who're interested in it and seem like good sorts, then we could start to teach them how to use it for good?"
Brittany nodded. "It will take careful, sound judgement," she said. "But I think it is something we should consider."
