Chapter 20: Morning After and Discoveries 2 (Sophia and Samantha)

(Pov Sophia)

Sophia leaned back in her chair, letting out a sigh that came from deep in her bones. The cushioning on the back had worn over the years, lumping in places and, in others, removing the soft material between her back and the chair's metal frame. It made the thing uncomfortable, though it was still about as good a chair as they had, at least of the ones that worked with a desk. It had been Jason's at one point, but after her last chair broke, he had decided he could use one of the old kitchen chairs.

Her frustration, however, had nothing to do with the chair, though it certainly didn't help. No, the blame lay with the book in front of her. Turns out that a language created to accurately describe and employ witchcraft, proper theurgic ritual magic, was really fucking hard. It was mostly because the language was so different from anything she had ever encountered before. Sure, bending verbs was easy normally. But when all of a sudden every verb had an extra form for if it was before, during, or after magic had affected a thing, it got more difficult. The sentence structures were also weird. But she had eventually gotten more used to that.

No, the real problem was the fact that it wasn't based on English at all. Instead, it was based on an odd combination of modern Norwegian, Swedish, and Viking-Age Old Norse. Leaning heavily into the Old Norse of it. To say it made deciphering anything on her own difficult was an understatement.

Still, the book had been a godsend. It had given her actual rituals- full-on rituals, with the incantations, the gestures, offerings, and everything, even how to make the god damn magic circles needed to pull it off. 

Her original findings had been right. Suck it, Reddit. It wasn't nearly as simple as just drawing a pattern on the ground with chalk. Specific materials did specific things in a magic circle. The details were beyond her, far beyond her, but the basic premise still mattered. She didn't know why the first circle needed to be made of bronze, only that it did. The exact reasons she could figure out later. 

She fidgeted with her pen between her fingers. It caught on her pinky and was sent rocketing towards the door. The thing landed only a foot or so shy of it. 

“I need a break.” She spoke, mostly to herself. 

The stairs squawked as she walked down them. The sound of the washing machine shaking menacingly against the wall- she gave it a wide berth as she walked past it. The damn thing should have been replaced years ago, but their cousin had managed to “fix it”. She was fairly sure he had just found some way around the safety that prevented it from running when it was unsafe. But it hadn't exploded. yet.

She filled her glass with water, a strange thumping sound coming from her right. Not that she noticed it. The water tasted divine, reinvigrating in a way she could only imagine the Spanish thought the fountain of youth would have been had they actually found it. 

“Thirsty?” Sophia almost dropped the glass. Barely catching it before it was sent hurtling towards the ground. 

She leaned heavily on the counter, steadying herself as her heart rate settled, as she looked at her mother. How did I not notice her when I came in? “Yeah.”

—---------------------------------------------------------------------

(Pov Samantha Smallers)

Something was wrong, or at least something had her daughter distracted. She had had some obsession lately; she tended to switch between them like a hummingbird between flowers. Maybe it's boy trouble? That, though, briefly made a small warmth bloom in her chest. She could help with that. 

“Penny for your thoughts?” She tried to keep her voice as casual as possible.

Her daughter hummed. “Yeah, I am just thinking about something I have been reading about.”

Well, no shit. Teenagers, you gotta love them. She glanced at her, her eyes sunken in slightly. She hadn't been sleeping enough, too cooped up with her research probably. It wouldn't be the first time that had happened. 

“What have you been looking into recently? You have seemed particularly set on something.” She gave her daughter a soft smile.

Her daughter's eyebrows furrowed deeply, emotions seeming to conflict on her face. She must really have been tired; Sophia was by no means hard to read if you knew her, but it was rarely this easy. 

The girl needed time; she would decide soon enough. In the meantime, it was best not to pressure her too much. Samantha let her knife move rapidly through the vegetables in front of her. She had more than enough for dinner tomorrow, but she would find a use for the rest. What was needed now was for her to seem receptive, but not too attentive. Slightly busy. 

It took perhaps close to a minute before Sophia's voice broke the comfortable silence that had settled over the kitchen, barring the sounds of vegetable chopping. “So I found a profession I want to go into. But I am not sure I can actually do it. There aren't that many spots in the one place that teaches in, and supposedly it's really, and I mean really, demanding.”

Samantha's hand tightened briefly around the knife. She hated it when they did that. Sophia was perhaps one of the brightest people she had ever met, and she had met a lot of smart people in her years. She might be a college dropout, but when you date your professor, and he worked on the Manhattan Project, you did meet smart people. Her daughter also wasn't a slacker; God knew she had raised her better than that. It might not be guaranteed that her daughter could get into whatever she wanted, but it certainly wasn't unrealistic. 

“Are you thinking about the curriculum? Or the other students? I think it would help if you talked it out loud. You don't have to, of course. But it might still help.”

Much to Samantha's shock, her daughter actually shared. Launching into an explanation of theurgy. It wasn't like she didn't already know what witchcraft was. She had been alive when the entire thing had been a giant media circus some twenty years ago. Sure, she didn't know the details, but a general overview was something she had. Not that Sophia needed to know that. It had been years since she had seen her daughter so animated when talking about anything. Even if the topic might border on sacrilegious, that was fine; the things this type of witchcraft dealt with weren't the same as those explained in the bible. At least that had been the conclave's conclusion.

A small smile bloomed across her face. She used her glass to hide it. 

“However, what I am kinda worried about is if I have the actual discipline to pull it off.” Sophia studied the floor in front of her with what seemed like no interest at all.

“What makes you say that? You're a studious girl. I wouldn't say you're lacking in discipline.” 

Her daughter hesitated for a second. “That's not the type of discipline I mean, Mom.”

“Then what do you mean?” 

“So for the rituals themselves you don't have a lot of room for mistakes. You need to do them correctly… regardless of what else goes on around you.”

“Sophia, I don't think that will be as big of an issue as you think. It won't be easy, but you can learn how to do things like that.” She gave her daughter a meaningful look. “But to learn that and to do anything difficult, you need to get some sleep. You hear me. Other than that, you won't know if you don't try.” 

“Thanks, Mom.” The girl actually hugged her, and Samantha leaned into it. After all, it might be weeks until next time her daughter started the hug.

“And if it's a tuition thing. Just don't worry about it; we'll figure something out.”

“Yeah. The weird thing about the one place that teaches this stuff is that the government pays for the entire education if you can actually get in.” She said offhandly as she left the room.

She might have preferred it if her daughter had pursued something far less demanding. From what she could remember, theurgists sometimes developed strange quirks. It also carried risk, more so than veterinary science at least. Boy trouble had been so much simpler. Still, the entire situation made her chest swell with pride while simultaneously creating a deep pit in her stomach. 

—---------------------------------------------------------------------

(Pov Sophia)

Her mother was right; she would never know if she didn't try. Of course she had meant something different, but that didn't mean it wasnt true here too. There was one ritual in the book, a simpler one. Or at least it looked like that to her. A deal with a tomte. They were supposedly benevolent or at least helpful things. 

She sat down heavily in her chair. Flipping through the pages. The ornamentation in the margins no longer held her interest. Those magnificent drawings of creatures of magic, spirits, and beasts alike. She eventually came to the page she wanted. 

The magic circle was much the same as it was for most of the others' rituals. Unlike what other superstitious magical traditions believed, a magic circle wasnt an invocation or a way to summon some spirit or other. It wasnt even a way to bind it. No magic circles regulated offerings. They were material through which the spirit could use its magic to more easily access the thing being offered. As such, offerings came only in very limited forms. Either emotion, sensation, or something innately magical. The latter category she simply couldn't access. Even if they sold the farm, they couldn't afford magical components of any meaningful quantity. So that left her with the two others. 

This ritual specifically wanted qualia. A deal: the spirit wanted a specific sensation, a powerful one, in exchange for what it did to change reality. 

She could do this. It was only a tomte after all. It wasnt a major thing either. It was one of the smallest rituals in the book. Not the smallest, but it was one of the less powerful ones. The offering might be embarrassing, but it wasnt like anyone outside the profession would ever know what it cost. Still, if she offended the thing. The thought sent a shiver down her spine.

Sophia felt her heart pound in her chest. She was really going to do this, wasn't she? It was illegal, extremely illegal. But still, even if she was caught, they were far more likely to give her a spot than throw her in prison until she turned eighteen. 

Of course she didn't have an actual reason to be afraid. There was no way the federal magic regulatory board could monitor enough places to actually catch her in anything. The risk was near zero. She had to actively suppress the shaking of her hands.

She opened her computer and looked over her Amazon basket. Or one she had prepared earlier in case she was actually going to do this. 

She hit buy.

So Sorry if this is abit of rough edit, I will go over it again later today.