The Rifts of Psyche by Kyle West (i love reading .txt) 📕

her head. “It’s much worse than I thought. The only Aspect that’s somewhat pure, with the exception of Binding, is Psionics. You can learn to stream your secondaries and tertiaries more effectively, but it will take time, patience, and commitment. You can’t be known for being good at one thing, because your enemy will be able to counter it easily. As you get more advanced, you can learn to dualstream almost easily as singularly. And you can even learn tristreams and quadrastreams for the purposes of warding or branding.”

Lucian wanted her to elucidate further, but he also didn’t want to put himself in her debt.

It seemed, however, that the Queen sensed this reservation. “You should be asking more questions. I can tell when a pupil is lost.”

He hated being called that. “I’m not lost.”

“Except you are,” the Queen said. “You said you would learn, and you agreed that we need to work together.”

He repressed a sigh. “What do you wish to teach me today?”

Her gaze was icy, and her expression was forced patience. “If there’s any evidence that I think you’re the Chosen, it’s this. I would have obliterated anyone else by now.”

Despite himself, Lucian cracked a smile.

“You think this is a game?”

He was thrown against the wall, held there by a sideways Gravitonic force. He tried to peel himself from the surface, but the pressure only increased. The Queen stood close, an arm’s reach away, but Lucian was powerless to even move his finger.

“Let me go,” he said. He could feel the blood rushing from his head, his vision darkening.

“Can you extricate yourself?” she asked.

He reached for the Gravitonic Aspect and worked at the Queen’s stream with his Focus. At once, he could tell that it wasn’t much magic at all. So how was she holding him so strongly? He worked to unravel the stream, but his Focus kept slipping every time he tried. He tried streaming a greater amount of magic, but his Focus slipped even more. It was as if her stream were slicked with grease – a strange image, but it seemed accurate.

“How are you doing that?” he rasped. “I can’t cut it off.”

The pressure eased. He fell to the deck, gasping for breath. The Queen turned and left him there, flailing like a fish out of water. A few more seconds of that and he might have blacked out, or even had a stroke.

“Remember what I said earlier? You use brute force rather than finesse in your streams. I wasn’t using much magic at all, and yet it proved too much for you to handle. You were streaming more than twice as much as me. You should have tried warding yourself first before attempting to directly unravel my stream.”

He stood and brushed himself off. “How did you do it?”

“My Focus is stronger. My magic works twice as hard as yours because it’s streamed efficiently. Your Focus is what prevents Manifoldic toxin from polluting your stream. It works like a filter. The stronger your Focus, the purer your stream. You can do more with less.”

“So, I need to strengthen my Focus.”

The Queen nodded. “And that is something that can only come from experience. The Focus is the strength of a mage, not the size of your ethereal pool or the amount of magic you stream. I could feel your fear, Lucian. Some part of you believed you might actually die, especially at the end. Your Focus will insulate you from fear, from elation, from any emotion that distracts you. Emotion is the antithesis to a strong Focus.”

Lucian nodded. “Got it.”

“No, I don’t think you do. You are not diving deeply enough, Lucian. You are being lazy. You must fight that laziness with every breath. There is no short-cut to magic, even for the Chosen.”

She watched him for a moment, as if to see whether her point was connecting.

The lessons continued the next day, and each day after that. Under her watchful gaze, Lucian worked to deepen his Focus rather than stream more magic. At first, it was difficult knowing the Queen was right there, judging every move he made. But he needed to hold his Focus, even under pressure. He showed improvement in the next couple of sessions, but of course, he was far from being where he needed to be.

On the day they were due to arrive at Dara, during the fourth session, he couldn’t help but ask a question that had been hounding him.

“Doesn’t it bother you that you could be training me to challenge you someday?”

She considered a moment. “I’ve thought of that myself. But if you are indeed the Chosen, it’s in my interest to see you as strong as possible. And by that point, you should see me as an ally rather than an enemy.”

Lucian didn’t ever see that happening. But it did force him to wonder. Why go through the effort of training him if she didn’t believe him the Chosen? It made little sense to invest her own time and energy if she just planned to kill him later. Which left Lucian in the difficult spot of recognizing that the Sorceress-Queen was actually trying to help him. Just in her own way, where she had control. That was the part he took issue with.

“Are we done for today?” he asked.

“Almost. There is something I wish to talk to you about, first.”

Her violet eyes were soft, a rarity for the hardened Queen, though her expression was blank and neutral. “You are clearly a mage of great potential. And I don’t want that potential to be wasted.”

“It won’t be,” he said.

“I . . . have something in mind. No doubt you would be averse to it, but it’s the only thing that makes sense to me.”

Why was she hedging? That made him nervous. A change was coming. Her mannerisms had gone from cold, regal queen to a woman in need of his help. What could a woman of her power ever need from him?

“What did you have in mind?”

“I hoped that