The Mystical Axes
by A. E. Lanier
Dad didn’t teach me much about magic, but he taught me plenty about timing and showmanship. I know a good opportunity when I see it; the trick is getting others to see it too.
When people say the market for arcane diagnostic tests is saturated, they miss one key component. All of the big tests — the Seven Schools, Twelve Houses, even the Hex Scale — provide distinct categorization. Your magic is either in the fourth house or the ninth, no room for nuance.
I paused — fingers hovering over the keyboard — trying to figure out how honest to be. ADTs are bullshit of course, but a good magic test still makes people feel things. The trick is figuring out how much to tell them.
Enter my Mystical Axes: the four quadrant model is easy to understand and infinitely customizable to match your arcane ability.
A knock at the door jolted my attention from the pitch. I straightened up, trying to think if I’d pissed anyone off lately.
“Come in.”
The door slammed open and I relaxed. It was only Felix.
“Aves,” he said, sitting down in my client chair, eyes locked on mine with uncomfortable, characteristic intensity. “You’re brilliant. This mystical axes stuff is brilliant.”
I grinned; it was nice to be appreciated.
“Yeah Fe’, it’s pretty promising. It’s some convincing bullshit.”
Dad would have hated that admission, but it was important to keep the professional and personal separate. I’d test things out on Felix, but I wasn’t about to sell him things.
“It’s not bullshit.” He ran his fingers through his hair, which was even more disheveled than usual. “Your reading has completely shifted my relationship to the arcane. Thinking about things along the corporeal-incorporeal axis. It’s been — ”
“Felix, please.” I knew I should be trying to get a testimonial from him, but it just felt wrong.
He leaned in closer, practically vibrating with excitement.
“Seriously, Avery. The last three days have been the most productive of my life. Your test completely reworked my understanding of my abilities. Your stupid marble was right. It’s not that my charms lacked follow-through, it’s that my charms were actually illusions. Look.”
He pulled out his focus and muttered a few words. A tiny bridge appeared on the desk between us: an exact replica of the one where we’d spent so much time as kids. The intricacy was stunning.
Illusion magic is usually overlooked because most illusions suck, but this was like a whole little world had opened up on my desk. I could see the individual leaves on the trees, the wind blowing across the water. Movement, full color, nuanced detail. Everything. It was the kind of thing full mages spent years crafting.
“You’ve been working on this for, what, a day?” I asked, watching little ducks swimming in circles on the illusory pond.
“Day and a half,” he sounded practically smug.
I tore my gaze away from the bridge. “Fe’, this is incredible. You’re incredible.”
“It was all your reading. I never would have tried it on my own. ” He held up a hand before I could respond. “Not arguing with you. But you should consider taking this seriously. At least do a reading on yourself.”
I snorted. “Please, I’m not that desperate.”
“Coward.”
He said it playfully, but it still stung. Which was the point.
And then he was gone, and I was alone again with his stupid suggestion rattling around my stupid head. I couldn’t focus on the copy. Couldn’t think about anything besides the question only the foolish or the desperate even consider: what if the thing I made actually works?
I resisted for a few hours, but I know a lost cause when I see it. So I set out the different sands and lit the incense — dollar store shit, not even proper arcane grade — slit my finger open for some diagnostic blood and chanted for a bit.
Nothing happened; so I did it two more times.
Still nothing.
Each time, I set the sand: black and pure silica to the north and south for the corporeal-incorporeal axis, greensand and coral to the east and west for the generative-necromantic axis. Then I waited for the blood-smeared marble to roll towards a quadrant. It wouldn’t.
Which meant I was making the same mistake repeatedly.
Or that I was a poor showman as well as a hack.
Or… That my magic existed at the exact intersection between the corporeal and incorporeal and the necromantic and the generative. Which made a kind of sense if my ability was diagnostic in nature.
I thought about my own arcane history — never disappointing but never quite promising either. Not unlike Felix’s.
Dammit.
So far the diagnostic process had been effortless, some of the easiest magic I’d ever performed. I’d assumed that was because it was fake. But Felix’s sudden ability required explanation. It was possible the ritual felt effortless because it was exactly what my magic was designed to do.
I rolled the stone marble thoughtfully in my palm, fighting a grin. Dad had always said to never believe your own shit, but he hadn’t seen this. Maybe I had something.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
A. E. Lanier is a middle school history teacher and fiction writer from Central Texas. She enjoys caves, silent reading, and other people’s cats. For more about her work, visit aelanier.com.
