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The Lexomancer

By Robert Lynch

“Alright class,” Mr Alvion said, “Today we have a special guest. Wizard Zachariah Pinde is a lexomancer. Can anyone tell the class what a lexomancer does?”

“They use magic to write stories?” Glinda Macavy asked.

“That’s right Glinda.” Mr Alvion said. “Wizard Pinde, why don’t you tell the class about yourself?”

“Thank you, Mr Alvion.” Wizard Pinde said. “When you read a story you feel the magic in it, my job is to put the magic into the story in the first place. Can anyone guess how much magic is needed to make one story?”

One hand went up. “Yes, how much do you think?” Pinde asked Maximus Alwyn.

“1,000 Thaums?” he replied.

“That’s a good guess,” Pinde replied, “But it’s much more.”

“10,000 Thaums?” Maximus asked.

“The average novel requires nearer to 350,000 Thaums.” Pinde told the class.

There were audible gasps. Only two of the boys had been able to cast a 200 Thaum spell; A 350,000 Thaum spell was inconceivable.

“Yes, it’s a lot of work, even once the magic is gathered, it takes me almost three months to cast the spell.” Pinde turned to the board and started scribbling out the formula for the spell. “The spell itself is simple enough, you should all be able to try it to write something small, like a haiku.”

“Alright students, take out your Wode stones and start charging up for the spell.” Mr Alvion told the class. They took out the small purple amethysts from their desks and started concentrating. “It will take them a little while.” He told Wizard Pinde.

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“Perfect,” Pinde responded. “While you get ready I’ll tell you what my average day looks like. I get up eat morning and have a hearty breakfast, then I spend the day gathering magic into my Singasteinn Stone. You can gather the magic many ways, Authors from the ages have used many methods; everything from tapping lay lines, animal sacrifice, even blood magic. Personally, I Correspondency. I have several cats that I have taken adorable photos of and put them on the Viribian’s internet. Each photo gets thousands, sometime millions of views a day. I can use the correspondence with the cat from each photo to create a powerful link to a massive outpouring of Viribian emotion and convert it to magic.”

“You get your power from cat videos?” Maximus asked.

“That’s right. I pull around 2,000 Thaums per day from the practice, assuming the cats cooperate.” Pinde replied. “After six months of gathering, I begin the spell and call it for three months. This allows me to create a new story every year or so.”

“Um… Excuse my Wizard Pinde?” Glinda Macavy asked. “If it takes as long as it takes a Viribian who has no magic, and you’re on a computer anyway, why don’t you just type the story out.”

The aged wizard stared blankly at the young girl for a minute. “I don’t know, I’ve never tried it.”

END

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