Battlemages the prequel

Five year old Agda-Mina carried her small basket, checking underneath each chicken for eggs her sister missed. Disappointment after disappointment soon wiped the happy smile from her face.

Miren noticed her sister's crestfallen face and skipped picking up three eggs.

When Agda-Mina set the basket with three eggs on the table, their mother's praise for braving the chickens left a radiant smile on the girl's face for the rest of the morning as she helped stir the cider and churn the butter.

After a small lunch, Agda-Mina sat down with her small piece of board and freshly made charcoal and began practicing her letters.

  ⁂

Agda-Mina smiled happily as she was awoken by the crowing of the rooster. Normally she would be up much earlier but today was her eleventh birthday. She was allowed to sleep until she wanted to wake.

Waiting on the table was a small stack of items and a thick pancake, smothered in butter, brown sugar, fried apple slices, with a thick slice of apple pie for her lunch.

She ate slowly, wishing her mother was still in the house but everyone else was out at the harvest.

Her presents were opened and she found she had gotten new cornshuck dolls from her older sisters, beautiful new hair ribbons from her father, a new cloak from her mother, and a rabbitskin cap and muff from her brother.

She wove the ribbons through a french braid then pulled the cloak on. Her leftover pancake and pie were placed in a small basket then she ran to join her family.

~•~ 

Miren smiled as Agda-Mina dashed past, trying to herd the chickens back into the enclosure they had escaped. Four were quite unwilling to be herded and seemed to be playing with the girl, waiting for her to close on them then they would run.

~•~

Agda-Mina's parents startled at the sound of horses with expensive tack.

Both looked up from fieldwork and saw four of the kings men watching them.

"Water, my lords?" He called out, reaching for a skin of water resting in a small stream.

"Nay, farmer. We are looking for the homestead of Rojan Damascus, son of Arin Damascus, the ironmonger."

"I am Rojan, my lord. My father is well?"

"As last we saw, his health was fine. Rojan, this is the Magecaller, he smells one of his kind amongst thy kin."

The Magecaller slid off the horse. An elderly man, he wore the armament of a battlemage. Long pleated leather robes and thin plate vambraces in gold covered with glowing gems of purple and green, showing he was a senior cleric. walked up to Rojan, touching his bare forearm. "Aye, you have the potential but not strong enough."

He walked to Mara and touched her cheek. "Aye, potential in you too. You smell familiar. I scouted you as a child, did I not?"

She nodded. "Yes Master Cleric."

"Then I expect you have a strong child."

"Our—our youngest m'lord. We've suspected for some time," Rojan admitted. "It will be of her will, yes?"

"If she's too strong, she'll be required but if she's middling, it will be her choice," he affirmed. "And the college has changed some. We now let them visit home more often. I never saw my family again for a decade. Your child will be able to visit home every few months."

~•~

Agda-Mina tossed the last chicken into the coop then made sure it was tightly latched. Glaring at the animals she said "now stay there and be good!" And turned away, only to find herself being watched by three scarred men in the king's livery, one man she thought was a battlemage, and her mother who had a worried smile on her face.

"Aggie, come. This man wants to meet you."

As she approached, the one she thought a battlemage sniffed the air then sneezed. He frowned and took out strange devices from the bag he carried.

Her mother held her by the shoulders as the old man knelt and placed a small stone on her forehead. He placed a small bit of something on her tongue after he told her to stick it out—to which she complied only after her mother said to go ahead—and it melted into a too sweet syrup on her tongue.

"How sweet is it?" He asked, looking at a gem that glowed softly orange.

"Too sweet."

"I'm sorry," he said. "But she has to come. She is stronger than I am."

Mara burst into tears and clutched Agda-Mina tighter who looked bewildered and started to get scared.

  ⁂ 

Agda-Mina stood in her new clothes, a thin shift and a heavy red robe. A warning to others. She was ranked first in her class. All others wore white robes.

She did not like standing out and wished she could just blend in. She held back the tears others let freely flow. All were eleven. All were away from home. Though they knew they could visit, they were still scared. The few who knew each other before they arrived had banded together to support each other.

  ⁂

Agda-Mina excelled in all her classes, growing in her ability as a battlemage as she also grew into womanhood.

In her final year of college, she was ranked first in power still, second in academics, and third in the arts of war.

On the day of graduation, she was surprised by her mother, father, and favorite sister visiting. Her brother had joined the king's forces and was a guard at an outpost on the Saurian border. Her other sisters had married and moved away.

A box was handed to her by her father once her mother and sister had finally let go. Inside were battlemage robes but white leather instead of black, the vambraces and off pauldron were white also, with the gems of power blue and black. "They said that as the ranking battlemage, you did not have to wear black. We thought white would be more fitting with a black cloak."

"But both are reversible," Miren said, demonstrating with the cloak

Tears dropped on the leather as she hugged them again.

  ~•~

Agda-Mina stepped out wearing her new robes with the white out, the cloak also white, feeling like she was finally ready to accept her new role. She was to be squire to the Lord Confessor, the third greatest Battlemage. And her grandfather.

He smiled as she appeared in his view. "Little one. Your robes look lovely. Your father's craftsmanship is telling. And my daughter's beauty is in your looks. Now, come, to the field of battle."

~•~ 

The two battlemages, grandfather and granddaughter, were on opposing sides of a field. Creatures began to rise up from the ground as the fog of war covered the field.

Agda-Mina's hands were wreathed in magic, her left fiery with sparks of green, the right encased in a globe of ice, purple miasmic skulls of flame dancing off it.

A flare of lightning hit the ground where she thought an animal had been, burning away the fog of war, revealing she had done a small amount of damage to the utahraptors her grandfather had field.

Her grandfather's first strike did significant damage to her horned lesser dragon, freezing it from moving.

Her next strike was ready. Finish off the utahraptors or try to find another target? she wondered.

She drank a potion and cast another attack. This one did splash damage, destroying the utahraptors and hitting her grandfather's gigantosaur.

  ⁂

Kneeling before the king, Agda-Mina smiled as he promoted her to the rank of battlemage squire. Unlike a knight's squire, a battlemage squire was the equivalent of a journeyman. Now she was to travel the lands, capturing and harnessing her own beasts, and to earn her mastery as an itinerant helper.