Chapter 2

Waking the next 'morning, ' James walked out into the main room of the house where his mother and Beth were already up and moving.

"Glad to see you up and alive," Beth said.

"Yeah, yeah. I know. I'm not a morning person," James responded.

"So what are we going to be doing today?" Sandra asked.

"Since James and I are bonded, and he is an untrained Dragon Mage, we need to travel to the city of Argos. We must visit the council of elders," Beth said.

"Who are these elders?" James asked.

"They are the eldest of the all the Mages. They may be able to help us find your dragon. They are the most powerful of all the current Mages. Because of this they rule all of Draconia. They rule until the Lord of Life can be found." said Beth.

"Who is the Lord of Life?" Sandra asked.

"He is the one destined to unite the five mage types as one. To put an end to the petty bickering that separates the mages," Beth stated.

"So when do we leave?" asked James.

"Not for a couple of weeks. I want to at least start teaching you some defensive and offensive spells. So that you can help defend us as we travel. I will also be teaching you more as we travel. It will take a month or more to reach Argos even at top speed," was Beth's reply.

They spent the next half hour eating breakfast and making plans for their trip. When they were finished Beth took them into a special room in her home. The room was quite a bit larger on the inside, than the whole of her house was on the outside. As they walked through the door and saw the massive expanse of the room, James and his mother gasped. The room (if you can call this a room) looked as if they were outside on one of the hill sides. There was grass and trees as far as the eye could see.

"What is this place?" James asked.

"This is my practice room,"

"Well it certainly is big enough. How is this done? It has to be much bigger than the rest of your house combined," James said.

"I used a spell to enlarge the space. It is one that is most difficult to perform. I myself had to study this spell for a month solid before being able to cast it," Beth said.

"If it takes that long to learn spells, how am I going to be able to help once we start traveling," James asked.

"Not all spells will take that long a time to learn. Some will be almost instantaneous. You will feel a burning in your blood as you learn each spell and have it mastered to such a degree that you can use it at will. Now the first spell I am going to teach you is the fire ball. Be very careful to get the words right if you don't it can have very disastrous results. Now the words are μπάλα φωτιάς this literally means fire ball in our language of magic.

"You will also need to picture in your mind the level of power you want to put behind the spell. Just remember that the more power you use the less you will have to use to fight with, later. I am going to place a target at the other end of the field and then I want you to try and hit it. Okay?"

"Okay just tell me when you are ready."

Beth walked out about one hundred yards, and conjured a straw target for James to use. Once she was out of the way she called out to James.

"Go ahead and cast the spell."

James closed his eyes and, believing that he would need to put most of his power into the ball to have any effect, he imagined the biggest fire ball he could, and said, "Μπάλα φωτιάς" ('fireball', in Greek).

The resulting explosion when the fire ball hit, was damn near nuclear. Looking at James, Beth asked

"What did you do?"

"I just figured that I would need a lot of power to do any damage so I imagined the biggest one I could,"

"Next time keep it very, very small! If I hadn't seen the size of that ball, and hadn't thrown up a shield, we would be dead right now!"

"Okay let's try that again and see if we can't get it down to the right size,"

As they were talking James noticed that the blast results were disappearing right in front of his eyes. He asked Beth about it

"Is this why you practice in this room because it will repair itself afterwards?"

"Yes it is just one of the great things about this room it will also record any spell cast, so that you can see if there is anything that can be improved on, in the spell casting. It will also show how much of the individuals power was used in casting the spell," Beth replied.

Having said that Beth places another target and said, "Let's try this again, shall we?"

After Beth was once again out of the way James once again closed his eyes. This time instead of the biggest he imagines the smallest fire ball he can. Having the image firmly locked in his mind he once again cast the spell.

"Μπάλα φωτιάς!"

This time the results of the spell were more to the liking of the group. Once the spell was cast James felt like his blood was boiling, and he cried out in pain. Looking back at him Sandra, and Beth, saw him crouched down trembling in pain.

Beth remarked "That is the burning that I spoke of every spell you learn will have that result the greater the power of the spell the greater the burn will be."

"If it gets much hotter I don't know if I would survive it," James said.

"The more spells you get under your belt the more you will become resistant to the burn," Beth replied.

"I sure hope so. That was pretty intense. If they are all like that it will be quite a painful experience," said James.

Beth leaned in and kissed James on the lips and said "That is a little reward for doing so well on the first spell. As you get better at them a greater the reward will be given."

Being the average teenage boy James replied, "What's the next spell! Let's get this done!"

Beth, and Sandra, laughed at James' antics before Beth said, "Since it didn't take you long to master the fireball, we will stick with fire spells, for now. This next one is both defensive and offensive. It is the fire wall spell it will keep enemies from being able to get to you as well as killing any that come into contact with it. It is a good spell to use if you need to have room to breathe in a battle. The only down side of the spell is that you won't be able to see in the direction of the wall. The words for this spell are τείχος της φωτιάς (wall of fire in Greek) you go ahead and give it a try ... and remember to keep control of the size of the wall."

James focus' on the target an imagines a wall six feet high and says the word to activate the spell.

"Τείχος της φωτιάς" (wall of fire)

Once the spell was cast James, once again felt the burning sensation in his blood signaling that the spell was mastered.

The resulting wall of flame was exactly six feet high, and six feet wide. The grass and trees outside of the wall were not burning. The flames were kept in check by the magic. Beth looked over at James commenting.

"That was a very well executed spell. Let's continue on and see how you do with other spells. Now this next spell is also a fire spell. It will come in handy with large armies. It's called the fire rain spell and it does exactly what the name says it does.

"The words for this spell are βροχή της φωτιάς (rain of fire in Greek) with this spell you need to keep tight control of the area of the spell. You must concentrate on not only casting the spell but also keeping the spell from escaping the spell area. Now I want you to go ahead and cast the spell on a twelve foot area around the target."

James concentrated on the spell. Trying to keep the spell contained within the spell area. Once he felt he was ready James cast the spell.