Princess Etheria and the Battling Bucks Page 4
CHAPTER 3
Magical Theory: Part One
Do you know what the purest form of magic is?
I’ll delay a bit now in order to give you a moment to think about this question. That is, unless you’ve already scanned the next few lines with your peripheral vision to read the italicized answer.
OK, that’s long enough, here’s the answer:
The purest form of magic is a thought.
Yes, it really is that simple.
All of those tiny thoughts that are ricocheting around inside your head right now are little tiny bits of magic.
Each one of them has power.
Each one of them has potential.
Find it hard to believe? Well, you’re not alone.
No doubt you find it easy to suspend disbelief long enough to accept that the inhabitants of a fairy tale’s enchanted forest can not only speak, but can also perform magic. But did you know that you can do magic in your own world as well? Right now, you’re in the world that the King and Princess would call the ‘waking world’, because, when you’re in it, you’re not—strictly speaking—dreaming.
It is the world in which this book is now open before you.
It is the world in which this book is simply a solid mass of symbolically enhanced paper and cardboard.
Consider this for a moment: You perform magic each and every time you take one of those thoughts from your head and turn it into an invention, or a speech, or a story, or a drawing, or a painting, or a dance, or a song.
Every time you release a thought, you are creating something beautiful, and several new thoughts rush to replace the old one. It’s like turning on a water faucet. The first few drops of water rush out, and enthusiastically pull out all of those that are behind them.
When you are creating something, the ideas that used to live only in your mind are given a vibrant life outside of it in the physical world.
When you are creating something, you make your imagination manifest.
That’s magic.
Still don’t believe me? Well then think about the story that you’re reading right now. My words have created images in your mind that are unique from those of anyone else who has read this story. You’re sitting there in your chair, or at your table, or in your bed, and your imagination has been in another place the whole time you’ve been reading this. This kind of thing happens every time you read a book or a story.
That’s magic.
Still think that your thoughts can’t make things happen in this world?
Have you ever been so excited the night before a major event that you’ve thrown up? The big event hasn’t even happened, yet you were reacting, and feeling nervous about it simply by thinking about it. You thought yourself nervous while lying in bed unable to sleep. You thought yourself sick.
That’s magic.
Did you also know that you can learn how to do something complicated just by thinking about it?
Researchers have recently proven that people can learn to play a piano simply by thinking about playing the piano? What’s more, they can do it just as quickly as those who use the real thing.
That’s magic.
You see, magic in this or in any other world or reality begins with a thought. This thought is cultivated by imagination, tempered with knowledge, and made manifest through strength of will.
Any one of us can do magic and, contrary to what you may have heard, it is not necessary to remember incantations in some strange language, or recite a rhyming verse, or utter an arcane word, although you still can if you like. Etheria, for instance, likes to speak the same word whenever she’s casting magic that requires a level of concentration. The word is Ava Cado.
No, it’s not about what you say; it’s about what you think.
While they’re doing magic, practiced conjurers like to gesture dramatically with their hands, or blink their eyes or twitch their nose. Many like to think that they do this in order to help them focus their concentration, and sharpen their timing, but the secret is they do it mostly because it attracts attention and gives fair warning to observers that magic is about to happen. Now, having said this, Etheria’s father, King Rowan, rarely makes any outward signal at all, and magical events are always springing up around him in exactly the opposite way that rain falls to the ground. Some people, especially those who are still learning magic like Etheria, find it useful to use a magic wand to channel their will.
As the bucks suspected, Etheria’s wand was indeed a gnarled stick. What they didn’t know was that it was a very special stick, taken directly from Pneumena, the Great Maple Tree in the center of the Thenken forest.
There were legends in Thenken that, in times too ancient to calculate, and when the still primeval forest had been home to as many people as animals, this maple tree had once grown in the middle of a grand courtyard in the center of Marmoras, the large city of stone, and capital city of the Ancients.
In Thenken, trees are nurtured by the knowledge that they glean from the collective consciousness of all those who are linked to Thenken. This particular maple tree knew no limits, and it soaked up any and all knowledge it could find within its root system. It did not discriminate or judge. For it, knowledge was simply fact, not truth.
As the maple tree grew taller and wider, it eventually filled its courtyard. And still it grew. Over the centuries, it swelled out over the courtyard walls, swallowing the adjacent huts and houses in the process. Eventually, it spanned the surrounding streets, and eventually overcame entire buildings. In time, the whole city, and the river that ran through it, was engulfed within a tree that had grown to the size of a mountain.
So, to this day, the tree continues to grow, and it continues to collect and store knowledge. That is why twigs from the Great Tree make such perfect magic wands because they each contain some of the collective knowledge from the tree, and the user can sense this when they are holding it, and it assists them in casting their spells.
It’s important to point out that the magic wands from the Great Tree aren’t magic in and of themselves. They don’t create magic. Instead, they help the user channel and focus their thoughts and make manifest whatever it is they imagine. The magic isn’t limited by the power of the wand, but instead by the imagination and strength of will of its wielder.
As the squire-els well knew, Etheria had more of this than most adults, and in her hands, the wand was a powerful tool indeed.
Still, there are some things that even the most powerful magic cannot do, and Etheria was about to find that out for herself.
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