Rollalong Hill
Nattalie took deep breaths and asked the humid air to gather. Drawing water was something any three year old could do when they were thirsty. At seventeen it took great concentration and effort for her, and most times all she did was break a sweat. It was like the other kids just smiled and water sprouted into a spinning sphere in their palms. Nattalie felt like she was trying to pull water from the bottom of a sealed well, a drid up sealed well.
It was common in her town for the younger children to run up to her and show her every new thing they discovered of their ability. They weren't being malicious, but they were trying make her one of them. She would enthusiastically accept thier offer to demonstrate. Try as she might though she could not do easily what the children would try to show her. For ordinary children, they were born with the ability to need something and summon it from their surroundings. Nattalie had not been able to perform simple summoning skills until she had turned five. And they were just like the water.... Exhausting and miniscule. She had managed to pull a spoon across the table a whole inch at 6, and her father was so startled that he nearly dropped his plate of food on the floor. He was not pleased with magic, or those who used it. So she was his perfect daughter.
Nattalie was had finally filled the bowl with enough water to drink. In her world, electricity didn't get invented, because no one needed it when they could create light and fire from ashes and wood. In her world people didn't need cars, or to work laboriously to get anything they wanted. They just traded and gifted to each other their magical makings. Thinking no more about her peculiar inability to draw or summon, and her fathers peculiar need to push away anything that resembled magic Nattalie proudly carried the water to her dad. Babies had produced more liquid by accident. .
In their world, everyone used magic... except for Nattalie
Nattalie had given up talking her father into teaching her any of the great magic he could do. Some said he was one of the rarest wizards, able to draw not only from the land around him but from within his own body as well. You see, it was not rare because others could not do it, but rare because many had died trying, and others were left terminally incapacitated at the attempt.
Now she merely did small things the children taught her, and was satisfied with it. Her father would not explain why he had given it all up, but she suspected her mothers death had some big part in the story that he could not tell. Before she rounded the corner of the fence her father had made by hand and tool, she dropped her heat shield and stopped drawing from around her. Although she did not agree with her fathers wishes to use no magic, she would not disobey him in his presence.
In the lands where trees were sacred not because of their life giving air, or their ability to provide shelter and food for those about them, Allen chopped away at a young pine sitting in the way of his new plowing field. A few of the more nosey neighbors would wander by with their shimmering cloaks and scowl at him as their field of energy protected them from the heat. Allen dripped large pores of sweat down from his thick eyebrows smiling at them as they hurried passed his gaze.
Allen refused to touch the very thing that was ripping the land apart. For that he was kicked out of the Unitary Council for his lack of… they put it as “cooperation”. What they really wanted of him was his power and his presence as a wizard, and without the use of magic he was useless to them.
Allen could hear the sweet giggle of his Natt standing close, she sounded much like her mother but without the weight of sadness that burdened a heart. She held out the water for him and looked at the tree cleanly fallen over from the brute strength of her Dad. “The town council is going to fine us for that.”
Allen smiled and sat on the small stump as he grabbed the glass from her hand. “You didn’t use magic for this did you?” He sounded upset and glared at the liquid as if he could see very well that she had brought it out from the air.
“Awe Dad. You have to let me do a little, I’ll wither up and die if one more kid tries to show me how it is done.” Her father sighed, not with disappointment with her, but with the world around him.
“Natt, one day you will know why I do this and you’ll understand that magic means nothing if you can’t tend to the earth below you.” Legend stated that a single tree had granted mankind his magic, so to chop down a tree without pomp and circumstance was blasphemy. Nattalie's father had lost all love for Unitary ways when he left the military... Sometimes Nattalie thought he derived pleasure from blatently disregarding the traditions.
Nattalie sat down and turned suddenly to greet the family gnat. It was a pet that no other family had ever kept, not because of it’s ferocious facade (much like a small bear with a goat face and the temperament of a wolf) but because Gnat’s did not claim people, they avoided them and would not be tamed into any household, even if it meant death. That too was a story that her father had refused to tell. It had come to him on the day of her birth, and that was all she was ever told.
“Hello Jinx!” The large mass of fur shook happily and squeaked out the words “Hi-o friend!” Apparently no one knew that a gnat could be taught to speak and it was a well guarded secret in their tiny family.
Nattalie took deep breaths and asked the humid air to gather. Drawing water was something any three year old could do when they were thirsty. At seventeen it took great concentration and effort for her, and most times all she did was break a sweat. It was like the other kids just smiled and water sprouted into a spinning sphere in their palms. Nattalie felt like she was trying to pull water from the bottom of a sealed well, a drid up sealed well.
It was common in her town for the younger children to run up to her and show her every new thing they discovered of their ability. They weren't being malicious, but they were trying make her one of them. She would enthusiastically accept thier offer to demonstrate. Try as she might though she could not do easily what the children would try to show her. For ordinary children, they were born with the ability to need something and summon it from their surroundings. Nattalie had not been able to perform simple summoning skills until she had turned five. And they were just like the water.... Exhausting and miniscule. She had managed to pull a spoon across the table a whole inch at 6, and her father was so startled that he nearly dropped his plate of food on the floor. He was not pleased with magic, or those who used it. So she was his perfect daughter.
Nattalie was had finally filled the bowl with enough water to drink. In her world, electricity didn't get invented, because no one needed it when they could create light and fire from ashes and wood. In her world people didn't need cars, or to work laboriously to get anything they wanted. They just traded and gifted to each other their magical makings. Thinking no more about her peculiar inability to draw or summon, and her fathers peculiar need to push away anything that resembled magic Nattalie proudly carried the water to her dad. Babies had produced more liquid by accident. .
In their world, everyone used magic... except for Nattalie
Nattalie had given up talking her father into teaching her any of the great magic he could do. Some said he was one of the rarest wizards, able to draw not only from the land around him but from within his own body as well. You see, it was not rare because others could not do it, but rare because many had died trying, and others were left terminally incapacitated at the attempt.
Now she merely did small things the children taught her, and was satisfied with it. Her father would not explain why he had given it all up, but she suspected her mothers death had some big part in the story that he could not tell. Before she rounded the corner of the fence her father had made by hand and tool, she dropped her heat shield and stopped drawing from around her. Although she did not agree with her fathers wishes to use no magic, she would not disobey him in his presence.
In the lands where trees were sacred not because of their life giving air, or their ability to provide shelter and food for those about them, Allen chopped away at a young pine sitting in the way of his new plowing field. A few of the more nosey neighbors would wander by with their shimmering cloaks and scowl at him as their field of energy protected them from the heat. Allen dripped large pores of sweat down from his thick eyebrows smiling at them as they hurried passed his gaze.
Allen refused to touch the very thing that was ripping the land apart. For that he was kicked out of the Unitary Council for his lack of… they put it as “cooperation”. What they really wanted of him was his power and his presence as a wizard, and without the use of magic he was useless to them.
Allen could hear the sweet giggle of his Natt standing close, she sounded much like her mother but without the weight of sadness that burdened a heart. She held out the water for him and looked at the tree cleanly fallen over from the brute strength of her Dad. “The town council is going to fine us for that.”
Allen smiled and sat on the small stump as he grabbed the glass from her hand. “You didn’t use magic for this did you?” He sounded upset and glared at the liquid as if he could see very well that she had brought it out from the air.
“Awe Dad. You have to let me do a little, I’ll wither up and die if one more kid tries to show me how it is done.” Her father sighed, not with disappointment with her, but with the world around him.
“Natt, one day you will know why I do this and you’ll understand that magic means nothing if you can’t tend to the earth below you.” Legend stated that a single tree had granted mankind his magic, so to chop down a tree without pomp and circumstance was blasphemy. Nattalie's father had lost all love for Unitary ways when he left the military... Sometimes Nattalie thought he derived pleasure from blatently disregarding the traditions.
Nattalie sat down and turned suddenly to greet the family gnat. It was a pet that no other family had ever kept, not because of it’s ferocious facade (much like a small bear with a goat face and the temperament of a wolf) but because Gnat’s did not claim people, they avoided them and would not be tamed into any household, even if it meant death. That too was a story that her father had refused to tell. It had come to him on the day of her birth, and that was all she was ever told.
“Hello Jinx!” The large mass of fur shook happily and squeaked out the words “Hi-o friend!” Apparently no one knew that a gnat could be taught to speak and it was a well guarded secret in their tiny family.
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