The wooden floor groaned. The local government had turned the logging town's massive public hall into a temporary medical ward.
Rows of thin canvas cots stretched from the front doors all the way to the back wall. The air smelled of sharp rubbing alcohol and boiled chicken.
Elodie sat on the edge of her cot. She was ten years old. She held a dented tin bowl in her lap. Her little sister, Margot, sat pressed tightly against her right arm. Margot was seven.
Their names belonged to a distant, warm province in the south. The bandits had stolen them from their village a year ago. Now, they were just two small girls hiding under a thick gray wool blanket.
A woman walked down the narrow aisle between the cots. She wore a dark blue combat dress. A wide-brimmed pointed hat hung from a thick leather cord around her neck, resting flat against her back
She carried a heavy iron pot filled with hot soup. She stopped at their cot and ladled a thick scoop of broth into Elodie's bowl.
Elodie blew on the soup. The steam curled upward. She looked at the woman's dirty boots, then up at her tired face.
"Lady," Elodie said, her voice small and shaky. "What is going to happen to us?"
The woman stopped and set the heavy iron pot down on the wooden floor. She knelt so she was at eye level with the two girls and offered a soft, tired smile.
"You do not have to worry anymore," the woman said. "The government is taking care of this building. The knights are registering your names right now. They will find good people in the capital to adopt you. You will have a real house with a warm bed. You will never go back to the dark basement of that orphanage."
Margot peeked out from behind Elodie's shoulder and wiped her nose with her sleeve. "A bad man owned the basement. He was scary. Who made the bad men run away?"
"An Adventurer," the woman answered. "A very famous one."
Margot tilted her head. "What is an Adventurer?"
The woman sat back on her heels. She thought for a second, trying to find the right words for a seven-year-old.
"They are people who do the hard jobs," she explained slowly. "When a monster attacks a village, or when bad men hide deep in the woods where the imperial guards cannot find them, the people call an Adventurer. They are heroes who walk into the dark places. They carry heavy swords and big shields. They protect the weak."
Margot's blue eyes widened. "Are you an Adventurer too?"
"I am," the woman nodded. "A strong one. I am off duty today. I just came to help pour the soup. My job is a Mage."
"What is a Mage?" Elodie asked, entirely forgetting her hot broth. "Is it like a knight with a heavy sword?"
The woman shook her head. "No. Knights fight with heavy steel. Mages fight with staffs. But we both do things normal people cannot do."
Margot tilted her head. "Like what?"
"A knight can shatter a giant boulder with a single punch," the mage said. "A fire Mage can blow up that exact same boulder from across a field without even touching it."
Margot frowned. She looked at the woman's arms. They were not thick or covered in heavy muscles. "But you look normal. Why are you so strong?"
The woman smiled. "Because the strength does not come from big muscles. Whether you are a knight swinging a sword or a Mage casting a spell, every single Adventurer gets their power from the exact same hidden place."
Margot leaned closer, her voice dropping to a whisper. "Where does the power come from?"
The woman pointed a finger at Elodie's chest. "Put your hand right there. Do you feel your heart beating?"
Elodie pressed her small, callused hand flat against her own chest. She nodded.
"Inside your chest, right next to your heart, is a biological center called a Mana Core," the Mage said.
Margot tilted her head. "A manna... apple core?"
The Mage laughed softly. "Just Core. Think of it like a furnace. A big, heavy iron stove you use to bake bread. Inside that stove is a coal fire. We call that fire, Mana. Every single person in the world has a fire inside them."
The Furnace that the Mage told them was just a simplified metaphor, of course. A child's mind could not comprehend the complex, microscopic network of etheric tissue and pressurized biological energy. But comparing it to a heavy iron stove made the strict rules of casting easier for them to picture.
Margot put her hand on her own chest. She gasped. "I have 'fire' inside me?"
"You do," the Mage smiled. "But fires are not all the same size. Most normal people only have a tiny spark. It is a very small 'fire,' just enough to keep them warm and alive. Because their 'fire' is so small, they keep their furnace doors—the pipes we call Etheric Veins—locked tight their entire lives."
The Mage sat up a little straighter. "But Adventurers are born with large furnaces. We have roaring, heavy 'fires' inside us. We have a huge amount of fuel. Because our 'fire' is so big and strong, we learn how to grab the heavy iron handles. We learn how to crank the doors wide open to let the heat out."
The two girls stared at her, completely captivated. The scary basement was forgotten. They were learning the secrets of the heroes.
"When we open the doors," the Mage continued, "the 'light' spill out. We call that light, Aura. It is pure energy that goes out of our skin."
The Mage stood up and walked over to the tall glass window near their cot. She pointed outside to the muddy street.
A large man in shiny silver armor was yelling at a group of soldiers. He carried a big broadsword on his back. His voice was loud and rough.
"Look at that knight commander," the Mage told them. "He is a great fighter in this country. He is what we call a melee type."
"What is a melee?" Elodie asked, pronouncing the strange word carefully.
"It means he fights up close," the Mage explained. "He uses his fists. He uses heavy steel. When he fights a monster, he opens his furnace doors. The Aura spills out of his chest but he does not throw it away. He keeps it close from his body."
The Mage raised her arms, hugging herself tightly.
"The melee fighter lets the Aura wrap around his skin like a heavy, glowing blanket," she said. "He coats his arms or legs. The Aura acts like an invisible suit of armor. It makes his bones hard like rock and it makes his muscles lift things a normal man could never lift."
The Mage walked over to a small wooden crate near the wall. A pile of dry kindling sat inside. She picked up a thin, brittle brown stick. She walked back to the girls and held the stick out.
With a quick flick of her wrists, she snapped the stick in half.
CRACK.
A sharp crack echoed in the quiet ward.
"This is a normal piece of wood," the Mage said as she dropped one half onto the floor. "It breaks easily. If you hit a monster with this, it will just snap. But a melee fighter does not just coat his body. He coats his weapons as well."
She held up the remaining half of the stick.
"If that knight commander held this tiny stick," the Mage said, her voice dropping to a serious whisper, "he would let his Aura crawl up his fingers and wrap the 'light' completely around the wood. It would glow brightly. If he swung this stick at a giant rock, the rock would shatter into dust, but the stick would not break because the Aura makes the weapon sturdy by reinforcing the shape."
Margot clapped her hands. "Wow! That is amazing!"
Elodie stared at the broken piece of wood on the floor. "Can you do that? Can you wrap the stick in your Aura?"
The Mage shook her head. She dropped the other half of the stick. It clattered against the wood floor.
"No," the Mage answered bluntly. "If I tried to swing a sword like that knight, the sword would shatter, then a monster would bite my head off. I am a Mage. I am not a melee fighter."
Margot frowned. "But you just said you have a furnace too. Why can't you wear the glowing blanket?"
The Mage knelt back down and pointed a finger toward the far end of the medical ward. A man wearing a white cloth band around his arm was kneeling next to a crying boy. The man was gently pressing his hands over the boy's bruised shoulder.
"Do you see that man?" the Mage asked. "He is a Healer. He fixed the cuts on your legs this morning. Healers and Mages are very different from the melee fighters like knights."
The two girls leaned forward and listened closely.
"Melee fighters are born with thick, heavy veins," the Mage explained, keeping her words plain and simple. "Their bodies are built to carry the weight of the Aura. If I try to wear my Aura like a heavy blanket, my soft bones will crush under the pressure. I will burn myself. Mages and Healers cannot keep the 'light' on our skin."
"So what do you do with it?" Elodie asked.