Ideworld Chronicles: The Art Mage

Day in the story: 2nd October (Thursday)

Did you know that the name Thursday comes from the Norse god Thor? It literally means "Thor's Day." Fitting, really, because today, October 2nd, mine began with a thunderclap loud enough to rattle the windows and a crack of lightning slicing the morning sky. It was still raining, harder now and the clouds were tearing themselves apart under the weight of the storm.

I reached for my phone.

A text from Thomas, he got home safely.

A message from Mr. Penrose, Monday evening meeting confirmed.

Jason wanted to know if I was up for a "friendly" volleyball match (those are never just friendly with him).

And Zoe asked if I was feeling any better.

Was I?

I lifted my pajama shirt and checked my ribs. Still bruised. Still purple. Hurts like hell, maybe a bit less than yesterday. Still not ideal.

I texted everyone back:

Thanked Thomas again for everything.

Told Jason I was in, despite the soreness. Playing with friends is always worth it and I could give myself a little magical boost if needed.

Invited Zoe too, but she'd already heard about it and replied immediately that she, Peter and a few others would be there.

And I just thanked Mr. Penrose for the confirmation. No need for more words with him.

My plan for the day was packed. Between classes, Performance Art, Text in Art and Contemporary Art Critique, I'd find time to check in on both the overlook and the camper. I also now had volleyball in the afternoon and after that, some sewing practice to keep progressing on my suit.

Thor's Day, indeed, a day of thunder, battles and stubborn persistence.

It was wild to think I'd only awakened my powers five days ago. Just five. I hadn't passed the test for my second soulmark at the start, but I'd been offered another and this one fit me better anyway. Still, I couldn't help but wonder sometimes: what was the original soulmark meant to be? What did I turn away from without even knowing it?

Now, though, my soulmarks felt like they'd always been part of me, like they had always been waiting, patient, quiet, until I was ready. I could already do so much with them, but something told me this was only the beginning. I could feel it in my bones. These powers weren't static. They would grow, change, like I would. I was curious, maybe even a little hungry, to see how far they'd take me.

**********

When I stepped out of the bathroom, refreshed, dressed and ready to face the day, Sophie was already perched at the kitchen table, sipping her latte like a queen holding court. Peter sat across from her, scrolling through something on his phone, but I knew the moment I walked in that Sophie wasn't about to let last night slide.

"So, honey," she began, eyes gleaming over the rim of her mug, "you gonna tell your girl what really went down here yesterday?"

Last night, I'd just laughed her off and locked myself in my room without a word. But today? That wasn't an option. A thunderclap cracked outside, rattling the windows. The sound rolled through my chest and a chill snaked across my skin.

"He's a work colleague," I said evenly. "We had a nice evening. That's all I'm going to say."

I could explain more, but not without dragging Sophie into the magical mess of my world. And denying that anything happened at all would just make it weirder. So I let her believe what she wanted to believe. Unfortunately, that only lit the fire under Peter.

"Oh, come on," Sophie said, leaning forward. "You could spill a few more beans, Alexa. The guy was pretty big, wasn't he?" She arched her brow, this wasn't about his height.

"Who are you talking about?" Peter finally looked up from his phone, unable to help himself.

"Thomas was here with me last night," I said casually, knowing it would land like a dropped match on dry leaves.

Peter blinked. "Thomas Torque?"

His voice tightened. He knew Thomas, of course. Just like he knew Phillip. Back when they'd picked me up from the orphanage. They helped Peter too from time to time, mostly as a favor to me. He'd never liked Thomas, called him a bully with a hero complex more than once. I didn't see it the same way. To me, Thomas was a good person who acted like a bully when he had to. But Peter never saw the side of him I did, so I didn't blame him for the impression.

"The very same," I confirmed.

His face darkened. "You slept with him?"

The words were sharp, not judgmental exactly, but full of something close. Worry, maybe. Anger? I don't know.

I lied.

"Yes."

It didn't feel right. Not the lie itself, I'd told plenty of those before to smooth things over, but saying this lie to him? It felt like a betrayal. Like desecrating something I hadn't even realized was sacred.

But it was done.

"You know this guy?" Sophie asked Peter, her voice cautious now.

"Yeah," he said flatly. "I know him. He was already an adult when he and his employer started visiting the orphanage." He looked at her, not me. "So yeah, you might understand now why it feels wrong to me."

Ouch.

"So… you think he groomed her?" Sophie asked, softer now but still poking around in the dark.

"Hello?" I snapped. "Still in the room. And no, he did not groom me. I'm an adult too, in case anyone forgot."

That shut them both up.

Sophie went quiet, her shoulders stiff with embarrassment. Peter, though… Peter just looked down. He didn't lie, but he knew how to stay silent when truth would cut too deep. His face said it all, tight with restraint, eyes flickering with something that looked like grief.

"I can't," he said at last. "Sorry, Lex."

He stood, grabbed his coat and bag and left the apartment without looking back.

"I'm sorry," Sophie said after a beat. "I didn't know it'd blow up like that. You know I didn't."

"Yeah, Soph, I know." I gave her a tired smile. She'd only been teasing, doing exactly what I would've done in her place. "Peter's got his own baggage. Don't put it on yourself."

"It seemed fine yesterday. It was fine, right?" Her tone shifted, more serious now.

"It was." I winked. "Don't worry, girl. But you were out the night before, weren't you?"

"Yeah. Nothing exciting, though. Just clubbing with the girls. We wanted to bring you, but you weren't around."

Right. While she was out dancing under neon lights, I was being clubbed, literally, by a wench-wielding giant in the castle..

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

"I see," I said and let it drop.

"You're coming to volleyball later?"

"Of course. It's gonna be fun." She grinned. "Girls vs. boys? We're gonna smash them."

Jason had a way of turning every event into something worth showing up for and yeah, she wasn't wrong. We were going to crush them.

"Yeah, we will," I said, smirking. I'd need to layer on some magical reinforcement before the game, my ribs still weren't thrilled about movement. "When do you leave for Uni?"

"In about an hour."

"Damn. I leave in five." I grabbed the sandwiches I'd prepped, slung my bag over my shoulder and made sure both Ella and my Travel Grimoire were tucked inside.

As soon as I closed the apartment door behind me, I touched the anchor for campus and in the next breath, I was standing under the shadow of three tall trees, right beside the university wall.

**********

Performance Art always began with silence. Our professor, Marla Dresden, had this rule: no one spoke until she did. We all filed into the studio, bare floor, high windows and the smell of charcoal, glue and sweat from rehearsals past and settled into whatever pose felt most honest. Or at least, most tolerable.

Some sat with closed eyes like monks, others fidgeted on yoga mats. Me? I leaned against the far wall, arms crossed, ribs aching under my sweatshirt. I didn't need movement to perform just then. Existing was a kind of resistance that day. I didn't feel like forcing my body to do anything at all. The pain had dulled into something manageable, but it was still there, bruised, pulsing under each breath. It grounded me.

Marla entered without fanfare, hair tied up. She wore the same ink-stained overalls she always did. She stood in the middle of the room and looked at each of us like she was scanning for cracks in our skin.

"Your body is the first truth," she said, finally. "Let's start there."

And so we did. Warmups. Breathing. Tension and release. We rolled across the floor like creatures molting out of human shape. I moved slower than usual, part pain, part caution, part focus. There was also something about being in a room full of people intentionally breaking themselves open that made it stir beneath my ribs.

That day's prompt had been "internal geography." Marla had wanted us to translate something invisible into movement, a map of grief, or joy, or memory. A few weeks earlier, I would've scoffed. But now?

Now I knew my soul had a terrain.

I carved out a corner of the room and made it mine. I began moving, slow and deliberate. My hand sketched invisible sigils in the air, my body folding inward, curling around pain that felt layered, mine and not mine. It had been hard to explain. Like I was carrying echoes of something older than me.

I felt it stir again, that flicker of authority. My magic. My domain. It didn't rise to the surface like it usually did when I called on it to shift my face or cross the threshold between places. This time, it stayed within. Like light winding through the veins of something deeper.

Did a soul have veins?

[Authority flows through the soul.]

I paused, mid-motion. Looked around. No one was near me. Everyone else was lost in their own small storms of motion and memory. Only Marla watched me, her head tilted slightly, as if she saw something the others couldn't.

Had she heard it too?

Had I?

I pressed on, using the rest of the session to experiment, not just with my body, but with my magic. I moved with purpose, but without destination. I wanted to feel how it responded. Up to that point, I had thought of the light that flowed from me during invocations as just that, light. Pretty. Functional. A byproduct of what I did. But maybe it was more than an aesthetic artifact.

Sometimes it left me like mist, soft and slow.

Other times, it streaked like static, white-hot and alive, running down my arms or between my fingers like molten wire.

And then, occasionally, it cracked. Electric. Aggressive. Something primal. It even changed color.

I'd assumed that was just artistic interpretation, my own flair, given the nature of my domain. But what if it meant something? What if the color, the form, the texture… what if all of it spoke to different aspects of the magic itself?

Could I produce the light without aiming it at something? Without transformation or teleportation or concealment?

Could I just let it rise, undefined? Would it affect the world in some way if it had no command attached?

I wished I had a teacher. Or a guidebook.

But no.

For then, I learned through breath. Through pain. Through instinct. Through art.

Marla walked past me once before the session ended. She said nothing, but I felt the pause in her step. I wondered, again, what she saw.

When class was over, the others chattered quietly or shuffled toward the doors. I stayed a moment longer, still kneeling on the floor, palm pressed flat against the boards as if the space might whisper back.

Nothing did.

**********

I was on the overlook now. I used a moment after my first class to slip into a restroom and once I was finished, I portaled straight to this place. I held my umbrella up above my head to shield myself from the pouring rain as I looked down at the mansion.

The number of guards hadn't changed since yesterday, they still patrolled in the same predictable patterns. But now I noticed something I missed before: a small section of the compound turned into a parking area. The cars were all black and last night they'd kept the lights off, so I hadn't seen them clearly. But now, in the rain and grey daylight, I counted four black pickup trucks, the same kind, maybe even the same ones, as the one that followed me and Thomas. And to my quiet delight, there was a fifth vehicle: a white car that looked exactly like the one we used.

They took the bait. My Trojan Horse had made it through the gates.

I watched for at least ten minutes. No one entered or exited the camper. The doors were still shut and the windows showed nothing new. I doubted they'd installed cameras inside, probably not their style, but still, it didn't hurt to be careful. I took one of my scarves and tied it around my face like a bandana, covering as much as I could.

Then I reached for my Travel Grimoire and touched it, not opening it this time, just letting my fingers rest on the cover as I focused on the camper. The leather was worn and familiar and in my mind, the whole book felt like a living piece of art. My soul filled in the blanks. It was harder this way, less precise than using the painted anchors, but it still worked. A strain passed through me, sharper than usual, but the jump happened.

And I was inside.

The living space of the camper was empty. Rummaged through. Each drawer, every cabinet, opened and picked clean. They had clearly gone through everything. But the good news? No one was inside and I didn't see any cameras either.

I stepped carefully toward the window and peered out. From this angle, I could see the side entrance of the mansion clearly, probably around a hundred feet away. Just a few people moved around: what looked like staff. Some cleaning. One woman, maybe a cook, giving quiet orders. No obvious guards. No one armed.

I'd need binoculars or something enchanted to get a better view inside the house. If I could see enough, I could paint it. And once I had an anchor, I'd be able to get in easily. I needed to do it soon, I couldn't count on them keeping the car here for long.

But for now, it was almost time for my next class.

I opened the Grimoire again, this time flipping to the page with the campus painting. I focused on it and a moment later, I was gone, portaled straight to the shadowed spot beneath the three trees just outside the university wall.

**********

I had texted Mr. Penrose to ask if he had a decent pair of binoculars I could borrow in about an hour and a half, then rushed off, Performance Art was starting soon. He replied before I even reached the proper building, letting me know that he'd ask Miriam to leave them in his office for me since he was otherwise occupied.

If Performance Art had been instinct and impulse, then Text in Art was precision, razor-thin edges of language stitched into canvas, walls, or books. That class took place in a seminar room that felt like it was on the verge of collapse under the weight of too many books. Shelves were stacked to bursting, corners filled with half-unpacked boxes of journals, the whole space vibrating with dry, intellectual chaos.

Our professor, Emilio Harnett, spoke like every sentence was a question wrapped in sarcasm. Despite chain-drinking espresso, he somehow always managed to look both exhausted and electrified at the same time.

I took my usual seat by the window, where I could see both the class and the trees outside. I liked that. It reminded me there was a world beyond all this and not everything could be caged inside words, no matter what Emilio believed.

That day's topic: text as object, when words weren't just message, but material. A Basquiat piece was projected on the wall, all chaotic scrawls and fragments, like a manifesto that had exploded mid-sentence.

"This," Emilio said, tapping the screen, "is not about poetry. It's about power. Why do you think artists use text when they could just use image?"

Hands shot up around the room.

"Language is direct."

"Language is disruptive."

"Language carries history."

I thought about my Grimoire.

Would it still have worked if I had written down where I wanted to go instead of painting it? If I had described the place in flowery, metaphor-heavy language, would the spell still have taken root? Would an address hidden behind artistic intent have been enough for the soul to follow, or would it have just — refused? Shut down? Rejected it as not artistic enough?

When my turn came, I spoke without raising my hand.

"Because images suggest. But text? Text declares."

Emilio grinned. "Very militant, Alexa. I like it."

It wasn't hard to win his approval. He acted like a complicated thinker, but in truth, Emilio was a creature of simple devotion, he worshipped language. Precision excited him. Clarity turned him on. But for me, that same precision cut off something essential. It stripped away the spirit I needed to make my magic work. Words, as tools, were too rigid for what I could do now. Too literal. And maybe too bound to reality.

We spent the rest of the class unraveling artworks that used text to reclaim identity. Slurs inverted into declarations. Testimonies scrawled in lipstick across cracked bathroom mirrors. Messages stitched in red thread across soft, flesh-colored fabric. Words made physical, made intimate.

And all the while, I couldn't stop thinking about my Grimoire and whether there was a way to write a door instead of painting one.

I found it kind of funny, though, how I struggled to believe that words could ever function as portals, but a perfectly round, black-filled circle? That was art enough for my soul to register as a hole in space. Maybe it was the Looney Tunes effect. Maybe I'd watched Bugs Bunny slip through too many painted tunnels on brick walls to question it anymore.

I guessed I trusted absurdity more than precision. Or maybe I just liked the kind of magic that didn't take itself too seriously.