Falyn
The box still hadn’t moved. Falyn groaned in frustration as she stared at it lying in the middle of the carpet. It was a small box, one just bigger than a jewelry box. It wasn’t anything fancy, just a pale green color with a few beads glued on top. She was supposed to have made it levitate. It should’ve been suspended in the air right in front of her eyes.
“This is pointless,” she huffed as she collapsed into the nearest chair, a rather large, soft armchair next to a bookshelf. Why there needed to be books in a training room, she had no idea. “I’ve tried five times already. Nothing is happening.”
Zeke crossed his arms. “You’re not putting enough effort into it,” he said, his eyes never leaving the box. “It’s all in your mind. You’re second guessing yourself.”
“Yeah, because I’ve never done this before. I can control the energy of the box, but I can’t make it move with my mind.” She wondered if Zeke was the best person to be teaching her this. Phillip had assigned him to train her, but at the moment she would’ve preferred Phillip over Zeke. At least then someone would understand the magic she knew. Zeke seemed to assume that she could just use her magic differently like it was second nature. It wasn’t.
Zeke sighed. “You’re thinking of the wrong things. Tell me what you were imagining that last time.”
Falyn rolled her eyes. “The box levitating, just like you told me to.”
“No,” he responded, finally looking over at her. “Magicians can’t levitate things. That’s what Layna can do. Are you a telek?”
She gaped at him. “But that’s what you told me to do! You told me to levitate the box!”
“I did.”
“Then what else am I supposed to think of?”
He paused for a moment, and then reached out his hand. She took it and he led her back into the center of the room. They were standing in front of the box in silence. Just as Falyn opened her mouth to say something, the box rose in the air. She watched as it climbed higher and towered over her head. It hung for a few seconds before it slowly lower to the ground.
“Think of the air underneath it,” Zeke said as he turned to face her. “Imagine it pushing up on the box.”
“But the box is heavier than the air. That won’t work.” Falyn argued.
Shaking his head, Zeke responded, “It works though. You have to control the air. That’s when you can make the box levitate.”
Falyn looked at him, not sure whether to believe him or not. It didn’t seem like it would work. Air was thin and basically useless. There was no way that anyone could conjure enough air to move a box. She had to try though. If she wanted to learn more, she had to master this.
Closing her eyes, she cleared her mind and focused on the box. There was nothing around it, just darkness. Something tried to sneak into the image to her right, but she focused totally on the box and forced it away. No distractions.
“Focus on the box.” She looked up to see Zeke stepping into the picture across from her. His eyes locked on hers as he continued. “There’s nothing here to keep it from moving; no floor, no obstacles. Just you, the box, and the air.”
It was then that she felt the air. It hadn’t been there before, but there was no mistaking it as it blew passed her. She took a deep breath and let the air surround her. She tried to catch it, but she wasn’t able to. There wasn’t an idea in her mind how to accomplish that.
“Don’t force it,” Zeke said. His voice was close to her ear, but when she looked up, she still saw him across from her. She shook her head. There was no time to focus on anything but the box.
“Wait for it to come to you,” he continued. “You have magic inside of you. Everyone does. Everything is attracted to you because of it. Show the air that you’re willing to work with it.”
Falyn couldn’t help it; she laughed. “Like the air has feelings.”
“Everything has feelings,” Zeke countered. “It can feel your magic, Falyn. You have to convince it that you only want to use it, not control it. The air is free, it doesn’t want to be contained.”
The explanation didn’t make much sense, but she knew that she had to do something different. Whatever she was trying wasn’t working. And Zeke had been doing this type of magic for years. Probably since he learned to walk. Or earlier. He knew what he was doing.
She let out a breath and relaxed her shoulders. Instead of reaching out for the air, she forgot about it, ignoring the feeling of it all around her. If it wasn’t there, she wouldn’t feel the need to control it. A few seconds later, the air disappeared. There was again only her and the box. When she looked up, she realized even Zeke was gone from her vision.
Slowly, the air began to pick up again. She tried to fight against it, to make it disappear like she had just done, but it wouldn’t listen to her. It only kept coming, circling her like she was its prey. But it wasn’t aggressive; it only wanted to help.
It didn’t fight against her as she reached out to it. She willed it to surround the box. To her surprise, it obeyed. Slowly, the box began to rise. It hovered a few inches off of the ground before it fell again.
The darkness faded back into the light and she was pulled form her mind. The training room was surrounding her once again and the box was still lying in the center of the carpet. Zeke was standing by her side, his arm wrapped around her shoulders.
“You did it,” he said, a smile plastered on his face. “You made it move.”
“Not far enough,” Falyn pouted.
Zeke chuckled. “That’s not the point. You made it move. You have to learn to control things before you can do anything impressive. That box moved because you made it move. The wind obeyed your magic and did as you requested. Doesn’t that count for anything?”
His explanation made her feel better. After watching Zeke float the box above her, she had expected the same results. All magic was the same to her and if he could do it, she could to. The lack of height she made the box rise didn’t help her confidence. She had wanted it to fly straight to the ceiling. But that wasn’t going to happen on the first try.
There was a lot she still had to learn.
“Shall we move on?” Zeke asked, not waiting for an answer. He picked up the box and placed it on the closest bookshelf. He returned to face her, his face contorted in thought. “I’m wondering what the next step is.”
“Shouldn’t I learn how to levitate the box higher?” She asked.
“No.” Zeke answered quickly. She raised an eyebrow in response. Wasn’t the point of learning magic to use it correctly? If she could only move something a few inches, she wouldn’t have much of an advantage over anyone, or anything, Rhys threw at her.
“At least not now,” Zeke continued. When she didn’t seem convinced, he sighed. “Look, you’re not going to become a master magician in a few hours. What I’m getting you to do is learn how to control your magic. Once you learn that, you can do almost anything. If you spend all of your time learning how to move things, then you won’t have any time left to learn how to, say, conjure fire.”
Falyn eyes lit up at the prospect of doing magic that grand. “Can I really learn how to do that?” She noticed the corner of Zeke’s lips curl. He was suppressing a grin.
“You can. It’s actually a lot easier than you’d think. Do you want to do that next?”
All she could do was nod her head. While Zeke was able to hide his enjoyment, she wasn’t. She broke out in a smile as Zeke began his explanation. She felt like a kid again, learning magic for the first time. It was exhilarating.
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129,434 Literary Works • 671,505 Reviews
Here now! Finally. xd
Now let's think about this for a quick moment, kay? She's doing her training, gets tired, drops into a comfy chair, beneath her is carpet - and she's wondering why there needed to be books in the training room? To be honest, it doesn't sound like much of a training room at all. More like a living room Zeke took her to. So if that's my thoughts about it, perhaps hers would be closer to that?
And yes, I'm heading straight into it - no introduction. Sometimes I wonder how to open the review, so I don't. I start in the middle.
... The box is sitting on the floor. Even with carpet, there's like no air beneath this box. xD Maybe more like think of the air around the box? Which would make more sense to me, at least - more like gripping the sides and picking it up. I love this approach to the levitation, by the way. How Zeke explains it over how Falyn thought it worked before is perfect - makes more sense, in a magical sense. I love it! The way you have your characters use magic has always been so original and fun. Keep it up~
Typo: lowered
Hm. I didn't get this much. The rest of the world really... disappeared? I like the idea tons, and I think it'd work amazing like all of your ideas do, but it needs to be built better. Right now, I get tripped up when I read that, because I'm not expecting for her entire world to vanish besides the box. So perhaps you could build that image better, or lead the character up to it better? Just a thought~
I didn't like this, only because it makes the smile seem fake and, well, plastered. xd
Typo: could, too
This was a very good chapter - still not up to par with that ahmazing, aaamazing chapter a few back, but very close. I think it lacked the tension the other had. c: Actually, that is something you could work on in this chapter - tension. There's like nothing here to keep the reader reading onto the next chapter, save for the good writing and continuing the story. Perhaps it'd be a good idea to put something in here that makes the reader hold their breath in anticipation or worry for the character. Maybe something wrong with the magic? Or just Falyn being more upset than you show her? These are all suggestions, and this chapter still reads quite nicely, but I think it'd be just as good as that just perfect, perfect chapter before if you somehow found a way to put tension in here. Because there should always be a layer of tension in everything to keep the reader, well, reading. xd
I don't think I have anything else to say. >< Except to tell you this was an enjoyable chapter to read, and I love your way of doing magic. It's so simple, and yet so original and brilliant. I love it! Keep up this kind of wonderfulness, Noelle. It's one of the many things that gives your novel life. c:
~Darth Timmyjake
Hey Noelle! I think I'm finally back.
This is going to be a bit short, sorry about that. :/
I'm really happy for Falyn; at least she's having some fun before her... death. At this point I'm really not sure what you have planned for her, if you'll be finding a way to keep her alive, or if she really does die. :/
Just five times? That seems like not enough times! Like I'd think that she'd be practicing all afternoon to raise the box, or something like that- at least judging by how frustrated Falyn was.
I love that line, I'm not sure why. It's just an interesting thought that the way to levitate something is not by picturing moving the object, but rather moving the object with what is surrounding it; air.
This is a bit confusing. I know the air kept disappearing from her vision, but that's air; you generally can't see the stuff to begin with. Zeke disappearing is a whole other story, isn't it? He's a very large object - or you know - and it just kind of makes you go "What? O_O". I mean obviously there's magic involved, but what's the point of Zeke disappearing anyway? If you were trying to say that she wasn't conscious of him anymore, because she was completely in a different awareness or something, than maybe it would have been better to use a word such as 'conscious'. It really isn't a huge deal, but it seems a bit odd.
Overall I quite enjoyed this part! ^_^ It was a nice light scene. :3
Hey, there! Ready for some review spam? (While doing this, I won't read many of the other reviews, so pardon some repeats ^^)
Alright, the first thing that I thought of while reading through this is where did all of Fayln's problems go? What I mean by that is that none of her issues are prominent in her mind, which seems a little hard to believe. Is she not stressing that Rhys is supposed to attack that morning? Or that she's supposed to die...? While she's trying to focus, it would make sense that all those fears and problems would be getting in the way.
Speaking of getting in the way, is seems like the whole focusing thing comes so easily to Falyn. She just 'clears her mind'. Surely it can't be that easy? Even if she's not thinking about all her other worries, wouldn't she worrying about how she would do it? With her previous attempt failing, wouldn't she want to impress 'Zeke' (>.> I know your secret.)? Perhaps go into even a little more detail about how this mind clearing goes about. What does she have to push out? How does she do it?
Final thing about this little part involves this line:
This seems too generic of a phrase. For some reason, I'm curious as to what is trying to sneak into her mind. What is trying to distract her? Just saying something could mean, well, anything. Is it something trying to take control? Something that's worrying her? Just a stray thought invading her newly cleared mind? You could add so much more meaning to it by specifying what. Maybe have a slight struggle :3
One thing that came up in my head at this point is why did it suddenly stop? Why did she suddenly get thrown out of her mind? What is the reason that she couldn't keep going, because the entire time she seemed perfectly fine to me. It felt like a random occurrence just so you could say Falyn's not strong enough. Did the wind decide it had done enough? Was he magic not developed enough? Perhaps you could clear that up some?
Apparently this is the review of questions, because I'm wondering why Falyn isn't remembering any of the magic she learned in the school. Because it's literally been a week since she left, right? It feels like so much longer, even though it hasn't been. A lot had happened though. But, my point is why can't her knowledge from the school help her any in learning her magic? She was able to conjure magic before, and since mages and magicians are similar, why can't their knowledge intertwine when learning control?
Final questions that came up during this are things like, what makes one magic one magic? I mean, what makes a magician that and not a telek? Is it just the thing attracted to their magic they're born with? I feel like this would be a perfect time to explain this, as when Zeke tells Falyn she's not a telek why she's not. And also, what are their limits? We always hear about what they can do, so many amazing things, but what about not? This is a good start, but I hope to see more of that soon ^^
Alright, enough questions! I really loved seeing the magic process, how it feels to Falyn and what's going on in her head while it's going down. And seeing Zeke pop in like that was also rather interesting, showing his quote advance d expertise... Not suspicious at all
Can't wait for more! Hope I helped. Happy writing,
~Wolf
Hi Noelle!
Back again to read another chapter! I am going to try and stay away from nitpicks and focus on the actual story of the chapter. I found this one to be almost flawless so there isn't going to be too much for me to say. I liked the idea of Zeke actually teaching her and you did such a good job of taking us through the steps to her controlling the magic as well. It was very easy to connect to her experience, feel her frustration and her gradual understanding as she was able to reach out to the air. It read smoothly and easily, and I have to say I am pretty impressed by this chapter ^.^
My only complaint was that at the end of the chapter you gave us the impression Zeke was going to take Falyn somewhere new and important and secret to teach her these tricks. But in the end it was just a simple training room, and that bothered me a little bit because I wanted him to take her somewhere special even if it was for a mandatory case such as teaching. It would've been a nice touch. Oh, and after you described the training room having something as peculiar as a bookcase in it (not that strange seeing as there could be all sorts of spells, potions and othe magicking rules and things in there) I wanted to have more of a detailed description as to where they are. We did get one of the box but beyond the box as well would've been nice.
I like that Falyn is having such a good time now and is seemingly focused on the task at hand, but I also find it a bit unrealistic. I mean, her death is impending and she isn't getting along well with her sister or who new birth parents which she has only just met. I feel like at the beginning when she is too distracted and focused on the wrong things to get the box to levitate, then maybe it could be the swirling thoughts of all that has been going on for her lately getting to her head and pulling away her focus. That way when she clears her mind later on, there is an even bigger moment there because it shows her overcoming all those thoughts. Just an idea!
I don't have very much else to say because this was a perfect chapter in itself. I am looking forward to when I get to read the next part of this chapter!
Deanie x
Hola! I'm not sure if I've reviewed chapters of this before so just presume I haven't and if I question anything which you feel you've covered in an earlier chapter, you can ignore me!
Just a small thing, but this would read better as 'should have' instead of 'should've'. That feels awkward and like it only belongs in dialogue or a book where the narrator is speaking directly to the reader. The same goes again when you use 'would've' later. It really pulls me out of the story because it's not a common conjunction.1.
2.
3. You've probably covered this in earlier chapters, but I'm feeling a bit lost on the differences between the two magic groups and I thought I'd mention it. If you've distinguished them already then that's fine but if I say anything which makes no sense, it's probably because I'm coming in so far through.
4. How come one moment Zeke is saying focus on the air around the box and then he's all about focusing on the box again and the main character is alright with this? I'd be like 'But you just told me to focus on conjuring air, how am I meant to do that and focus on the box?'. It feels a bit contradictory, which is fine, if we see her get frustrated as well or at least have her thinking internally that she can't do both.
5. This one used to give me trouble as a kid so it might be more helpful if I explain why this is wrong than just fix it. The use of passed is the past tense of 'to pass' so it should be used when indicating that an object has been passed to someone or that a person has passed an obstacle. However, when a verb which indicates movement is involved, then past should be used instead.
The girl passed the corner of the shop.
The ball flew past the boy's head.
The ball passed the boy's head as it flew through the air.
These are all correct so the change is only made when the verb comes before the use of past or passed. There's a site here which may explain it a little better than I am!
6. It feels a little fragmented without.
7. This isn't a way of speaking so it should be: "Not far enough." Falyn pouted." Which still reads a little awkwardly but at least makes gramatical sense. You shouldn't use an action as a dialogue tag. Maybe consider re-working this?
8. You may need to ask someone to read through the book when it's done to see if they can find these kind of things which the spell checker will miss. You may not be able to pick it up yourself - it's just harder with your own writing - so ask a friend or family member to take a look.
9. Here, 'answered' is a dialogue tag - a way of speaking - so it should be a comma and not a period/ full stop.
10.
Overall
This chapter's pretty solid and it's an easy read but there's just one thing missing. How does the main character feel about Zeke? I don't mean in a lovely dovey way, I simply mean that at no point does her opinion of him enter her thoughts and that gives this a very static feel. Every conversation of any length causes us to re-evaluate how we feel about the person we're speaking to. Maybe they edge up a little in our respects or maybe they say something we're not sure we agree with and suddenly they drop just a little bit. Even as you read this review, our interaction might be changing how you feel about me, or confirming it. Maybe you think I'm being nit-picky and suddenly my opinion matters marginally less, or maybe you think I've made a few good points and you're more likely to listen to the next thing I say, even if it does sound a bit bizarre.
We judge people and a lot of these scenes which are advancing the plot should also be advancing character relationships and we want to see that happening. Just a line here or there so that we can see the changing feelings toward Zeke, however marginal they might be.
Other than that, this was fun and pretty action packed. Thanks for the read!
Heather xx
I will start by saying I haven't read any of your previous chapters, that said, this was really good. I look forward to your next chapters. I will have to go back and read the previous chapters at some point Bubbles. I personally never saw what made fire magic so awesome. I was always a bit of a pyromaniac playing with fire since I was about 5. But if I had to pick a single element of magic power I would probably choose water or lightning. I see the appeal of fire, but it's the easiest to make without magic so I prefer another.
But as for your story it was really good, and I look forward to your next chapters. I will be following it now.