Mar 1, 2016

First I wanted to thank everyone again that is helping spread the word about the novel. I’m in the process of putting together some additional promotional material and redesigning the draft page in the hopes of converting some of those following it into readers.  

Here is a first person view into the world of "The Girl Who Blinked" that I typed up fairly quickly for the Facebook page the other day. I’ll be typing up more of these when able as I continue to make content passes on the manuscript, and will be sharing them with you readers first from this point on. Hopefully you find this in universe tangent entertaining and informative. 

"So, you want to know what it feels like to be a Mage, eh? Well you can put the blade away. I’ll tell you what you want to know as long as you compensate me for my time."

The old Barsivian gestured across the table in a gesture that could be mistaken as being directed at either his cup or at you. He worked the six leathery fingers on his left hand as he gestured. The incandescent scaling of his skin cast the light from the bar’s neon sign about in a dazzling fashion. For a moment his eyes flared with dull gold power.

A wry smirk crawls slowly up the left side of his craggy face as a server came by and filled his glass. Even as he raised the glass to throw back the dark harsh liquid the smile never made it farther than that one corner of his faces real estate. He paused and let out a satisfied sigh before speaking again.

"Now I can only speak as an old Auger, but I understand it’s the same no matter your discipline, from a lowly Magpie like me all the way to a Worthy or even a Burner. Being a Mage is to feel the power of the universe around you and channel it. You’re a conduit. A vessel for the power to flow through and a forge to shape it based on your will. It’s a burning cold that pulses through your soul. It’s just waiting for you to reach your fingers into the bones of reality and pull it out for you to work.

That’s what the forms do. When you see a Mage’s hands moving and your stomach starts to churn, we’re pull the magic out. You don’t have the Art so your little brain can’t comprehend what you’re seeing, but to another Mage it’s plain as a super nova. There’s rumor of some that have figured out how to work without using forms and chants, but I sure as the void have never seen it. Magic just ain’t that subtle.

I can tell your question just by looking at you. No, that doesn’t mean we can do whatever. Each of us has a medium we work in and a specific way we can work. Augers are the most common. To be honest we can’t shape magic much, but we sure as hell can use it to find our medium. Sure, Shapers and Makers can do it too, but not nearly as good as an actual Seeker. We don’t get distracted by any of that other stuff so our senses are more attuned, can reach farther.

To be honest I never much liked Shapers. They tend to look down on us since their skill is rarer. Never actually met a Maker, but I’m sure they would do the same. The worst are the Ship Worthy. It’s right there in their name. Worthy? Pah! Just because they can shape energy and light they think the whole world should be theirs. Bunch of spoiled brats is what they are."

The Barsivian mage traced the tattoos around his right wrist idly with his left hand. He eyed the empty glass for a moment.

"Doesn’t matter none, though. No matter how much those Leaves or Sparks look down on me for being a Stone or a Seeker, I still have the Art, which means as far as all the corps and combines I still mean more than the lot of you. A Mage will always be worth more than an ungifted. That’s why I’ll give you this one for free. If you ever meet a Burner, you run.

What, never heard of them? Not surprised. I’m not even sure if their real. A Maker who can call up power from nothing seems pretty far fetched even to me, but if they were real they would be the most dangerous thing you’ve ever seen. Even more dangerous than that Quillian destroyer that was setting out a week back. If you can’t understand why a living dynamo is not something to mess with, I can’t do anything else for you."

With a wave, he dismissed you out from his dark corner of the station’s bar out into the sterile white lights of the promenade where vendors peddled all manner of goods. He may not have told you much you didn’t know, but he had finally put a name to that thing you had seen back on Parlion wreathed in flame as your colony was destroyed. Burner. Can’t be many of those around, and with the proper planning a bit of steel can put anyone down.