Fan fiction:The Mage Academy of Gea Kul/Chapter Six

The Mage Academy of Gea Kul is a fan fiction piece by Flux, originally posted in the Diii.net Fan Fiction Forum. You can find more information on The Mage Academy of Gea Kul article.

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Chapter Six

The troubles began with a small argument in the kitchen. From what I learned after the fact, Zia was reading while carrying a plate to her table, when she bumped into Grace, a sixth level female student. No real harm was done, and Zia immediately apologized, but Grace had had a very rough morning in a conjuring class, and had quarreled with her boyfriend. Who, she rightly suspected, had something of a crush on Zia. In that mood Grace was unforgiving, and after raising her voice, she slapped Zia, scratched her face, seized her by the hair, and spun her into a wall, while dozens of students watched, cheering on the fight.

Three Maesters intervened, sending Zia to her quarters and Grace to Maester Shien for punishment. If that had been the end of it, things might have blown over. Zia, however, was not so easily dismissed. She'd been too shocked to fight back at the time, but once she was alone in her small room in the novices' dormitory, she began to simmer. Literally simmer; I responded to the frantic summons of a pair of Fifths who saw waves of heat glowing from the walls.

The door into the novice dormitory was too hot to touch, and wasting no time, I blasted it open with several frost spells. The great room beyond was as hot as an oven, and I took a moment to hurl a winter's worth of snow and ice into the glowing maw before I dared enter. Within I found two unconscious novices sprawled on a wooden table, the legs of which had been charred black from the heat rising from the floor.

The boys were covered by the snow I'd created, though it was already turning to slush on the burning floor, and hot gusts of air were blowing out from the creaking doors that led to private bedrooms. I wasted no time in seizing them and teleporting out into the hallway, depositing them in the arms of the older students who had gathered. Returning at once to the dormitory, I threw blasts of ice in every direction, blasting open the doors that were billowing open and closed like the bellows of a blacksmith's furnace. One door remained shut, and sent enough ice to shatter it. Through the broken wood I saw Zia, sitting on a smoldering bed, her head in her hands, her body literally glowing with heat.

She was unaware of my presence, and even as I filled her room with ice, literally coating the floor and furnishings, she remained motionless. Picking my way carefully over the jagged, melting ice that covered the floor, I made sure my hands were well shielded by a layer of ice before I dared touch the girl. She was unresponsive but malleable, and when I lifted up her head I saw her eyes glowing silver. She did not react in any way, not even when I scooped her up into my arms.

It was a mark of my concern that I did not revel in the feeling of her petite body against my chest. Standing up, I saw Maester Jennin, who must have entered the dormitory while I was approaching Zia. His eyes were wide, and when he spoke he was almost sputtering. "Such heat, coming from her. Without casting a spell! And her eyes! Were they not silver?"

I did not answer him, merely gestured for him to follow me as I raced down the hallway, teleported into the main gallery, and then up to the highest furnished level of the great palace that housed our Academy. I chose that level since a large and private Maester's lounge was located there, and I did not want any students or servants intruding at that point. Few Maesters were there at that hour, and I left Zia under the watchful eyes of Maesters Jennin and Shien, two of the few I could trust to keep quiet and to control her heat with powerful ice enchantments, if necessary. Zia was no longer glowing like a stone pulled from a fire, and remained motionless and silent when I laid her down on a couch, but I feared that she might still be highly agitated, and thus prone to another outburst of heat.

References

• Flux
• Original Post