The training room turned into what looked like a huge gym hall, in fact, huge doesn't describe it, it was about six hundred feet from wall to wall in each direction and a good hundred feet high. Big enough for several football pitches and still room for a burger bar in each corner. The floor was very strange, it moved, it was like a massive bouncy castle.
This time his dad joined him.
“Right,” he said as his staff appeared, “flying and levitation are one and the same. But we start with levitation as it is easier not to fall when you’re not moving.”
“Don’t we need broomsticks?”
“No, you don’t, you watch too many wizard films. All you use is your staff. You don’t have to, but when flying it is good for directional control. Some female wizards ride a rather awkward side-saddle position, but most don’t, all us men sit astride with the stone to the front. Two reasons for that, at night you can use it to illuminate your way if you have the right stones, and in battle, you can unleash some mighty magic when flying. Observe.”
Llewellyn sat astride his staff and gently pushed up with his legs and rose a few feet in the air.
He landed. Stowed his wand and said, “Now watch.”
This time he just stood there and just floated up into the air.
“See, you can also easily levitate without a staff as well.”
Llewellyn landed again.
“Just think up and imagine yourself floating when you push off with your legs, as I said, you don’t need your staff, you can just float, but most people are more comfortable using their staff.”
Tom sat across his staff. Up, he thought, and up he went. Right up to the ceiling! He then thought down, and down he plummeted. Llewellyn caught him before he hit the ground.
“Don’t worry, the floor would have caught you if I didn’t. Think up but think about a couple of feet this time.”
Tom tried again, this time more successfully, but his balance on the staff was very unsteady and he wobbled and then plonk. He fell off...
“Don’t worry about the wobbles, it’s just like when you learnt to ride your bike, a bit shaky at first, but you soon get used to it and then you never lose it.”
“How would you know?” Tom said, bitterness returning, “You weren’t there. Father Seamus O’Reilly taught me to ride.”
“Oh, did he now?” his dad said, in a thick Irish accent, “Did he really now.”
Tom fell off his broom.
“What, you sounded just like him there,” realisation dawned, "it was you; you came disguised as Father Seamus O’Reilly every week to see me and mum, it was you wasn’t it?”
“That it was,” he said, keeping up the accent and at the same time morphing into Father Seamus O’Reilly.
Tom welled up, he had thought his father had deserted them, when in fact he came every week to check on the two of them. He picked himself up and fell into his dad’s arms for a long hug.
“Now try that again and keep trying until there’s not a wobble in sight," he said still in his Irish accent.
“You can drop the Father Seamus act now.”
Llewellyn morphed back to his normal self.
Tom soon had the lift-off and hold position, but not until he had hit the ceiling a few more times, hung upside down several times and fell off the staff altogether many times more. But after a couple of hours, he was there, he could sit astride his staff with only a slight and occasional wobble.
“Right," said Lewellyn, “almost there, now we will try some actual flying. Keep it low and slow. Have you ever ridden a Segway?”
He knew the answer but still asked anyway.
“Of course not.”
“Well, you know the principle of it. You lean slightly forward to go forward, slightly back to stop and go backwards, lean left, or lean right for directional, control, but on a staff, you also must envision forward, back, left, right. Okay?”
“No, not really, but I’ll give it a try.”
Tom leaned forward slightly and thought about moving forward. But instead of moving slowly off, he shot forward like a greyhound out of a trap, and he was heading straight for the wall, he panicked and couldn’t think how to stop. He hit the wall, but as he did, everything slowed down, and he sank deep into the wall and bounced back out again. The wall had looked solid enough, but, like the floor, was soft and sponge-like, absorbing his impact and returning him to the hall.
“Let’s try that again, but maybe not quite as fast.”
Tom tried again, and again, and again, and again. He was really having trouble controlling speed. He was either shooting forward like a bolt from a crossbow or slower than a slug in a salt marsh. The concentration was immense, beads of sweat appeared on his forehead. He was not going to give up easily, and eventually, he started to have some control. He could finally keep a good height, hold a good pace, and turn from left to right.
“Enough!” said Llewellyn, "we’ll call that a day slightly more than a day, we started after breakfast and it’s now way past supper time. We’ll return tomorrow.”
“What! We didn’t even stop for lunch!”
“How time flies when you’re having fun.”
The vast hall faded, and they were back in the classroom again. Llewellyn opened the door and they stepped out into the living quarters. Jon had prepared supper and eaten, so he sat with them while Tom and his dad recounted the stories of the day. Jon was full of admiration for his little brother, but also just a little jealous, so he especially liked the parts when Tom hit the wall, fell off or was left dangling by one arm a hundred feet up in the air. Jon always liked to hear about Tom’s little failures. Brotherly love and all that!
Eventually, they started talking about home.
Jon started, “So what was going to school like? From what I’ve heard it must be great. All that learning, and friends, and rugby, what’s it like?”
“Oh, it’s not that great. After a while, it gets a bit boring. The teachers are bossy, and it doesn’t end with school, then there’s homework as well.”
“Sounds like fun to me," said Jon.
“Don’t you have school then? Can you read and write and stuff?”
“Of course, I can. It’s simply different here. I have what’s best described as home school, but it’s not anything like what you did, dad does some of it, Flintock does quite a lot, even Howel does some. But a lot of stuff just arrives in your head. One day you know nothing about a subject, the next day you wake up with it all swimming about in your brain. Weird. Oh, and I also get to visit other people my age in Flintock’s town for what they call ‘social interaction’,” they both sniggered but didn’t know why.
“Where’s Flintock live then?”
“He lives in a place called Wrth y Môr, it means ‘place by the sea.’ It’s great there, you can go boating, fishing and of course swimming. No rugby though. I tried to show them, but they weren’t interested.”
“Perhaps we can go together and teach them!” they both laughed at that idea.
They talked for a couple of hours together about life in Wales and life in Trymyll, comparing, exaggerating, boasting, and arguing about which was best, right up until bedtime.
That night Tom had a fitful sleep full of dreams about flying, crashing, falling off and awkward landings, so he was not exactly fresh and ready to go when called for breakfast the next morning.
The next day was better than the last, Tom didn’t fall off very much, he didn’t crash into the ceiling, he didn’t crash into the floor, he didn’t crash into the walls. By the end of the day he was able to control his flight quite well, swooping, turning, climbing turns, diving turns, stall turns and even a loop the loop as a finishing flurry. Tom was quite pleased with himself. His dad was incredibly pleased. Jon was indifferent.
Day three of flying lessons was a disaster. This time the training room morphed into a green forest with hills, caves, and rocky outcrops, with birds, deer, wild pigs, toads, hares and rabbits roaming about, even the odd weird wolf. Tom had to fly at staff height avoiding all these obstacles. Tom hit trees, he hit a deer, the deer then chased him until he hit another tree. He argued with his dad, he shouted at his dad and his dad shouted back... He bumped into just about every obstacle he could find.
“Why can’t I fly above the trees? I won’t keep hitting things then,” he said.
“Three reasons, one, it’s dangerous, if you come off you have a long way to fall. Two, it’s dangerous because you are too visible above the tree line, someone watching out on a hill, or a lookout platform would see you and could bring you down with a spell or an arrow. And three, because I said so!”
Tom’s shoulders ached from collisions with trees, his arms were bruised, his legs were scratched and chaffed, and he had twigs and pine needles in his hair, his knuckles were split, and bleeding, and his pride was hurt. He had done so well the day before, even finishing with a victory loop the loop, today, he was rubbish.
Tonight, over supper, Tom was disappointed and angry, his dad wasn’t feeling sorry for him at all, and Jon was loving it.
After supper, Tom had a long hot bath to soothe his aching muscles. He felt so much better afterwards.
The next day Tom was on his own. His dad had business elsewhere. Tom was let loose in the forest to learn to fly all on his own.
Tom found that with his father watching, he tended to get flustered. He couldn’t see him watching, but he knew that he was still there, and he was so afraid of his dad seeing him fail, that he failed. But without his father, he could get on far better.
He mounted his staff and kicked off. Moving forward through the forest he flew, not too fast, swinging left and right around the trees. He kept his level, one staff height in the undulating landscape.
It was not long before he picked up speed, his confidence was growing, he was beginning to enjoy what he was doing, he was beginning to enjoy himself… when crunch! Headfirst over the end of his staff, laying on his back looking at the sky. He had hit a tree stump. He was concentrating on the trees around but had not seen the stump of a tree left from when it had been felled. That’s not fair he thought. This isn’t a real forest, just a magicked up one, so there should not be a felled tree here anyway. He heard the crack of a twig. ‘Wand’, he thought, his staff disappeared, and the wand was in his hand. He rolled slowly over onto his front and then raised himself up being careful not to make any noise. He peeked over the top of the bracken and saw a man walking and whistling with a woodsman's axe slung over one shoulder. The man stopped. Looked directly at Tom and spoke.
“Well, hello young Tom, your dad said I might see you here today.”
“How do you know who I am?” said Tom, then thinking it was a silly question, the woodsman had already answered it by referring to his dad.
“What are you doing here?” Tom asked.
“Well,” he said, “I look after the woods, I cut out the dead and diseased trees, keep the undergrowth tidy and generally look after the place.”
“But it’s not real, it’s not a real forest, just one my dad magicked up.”
“Oh no, it’s real alright. It’s not part of the training room, when your dad wants to come here, he apparates you in from the training room, so it’s a very real forest. I live here in a cottage over yonder with my dear wife and we both look after the forest. I was just on my way home for a brew, care for a cup?”
“Yes, I’d love to, but dad said I have to learn to fly and learn to fly well.”
“I know that, but you’ve got to rest up a bit or you’ll exhaust yourself. Come on, I expect Mrs Cadwalader’s made some cakes too. Oh ‘n by the way, my name is Traveon, Traveon Cadwalader, keeper of the Forest of Llewellyn the Brave. But you can call me Traveon, cos that be my name, and you can put your wand away, you’ll come to no harm in these parts.”
Tom’s wand vanished.
They walked a short way down a valley and Tom could see a small cottage, smoke coming from its chimney, set in a clearing, and surrounded by a pretty garden, roses over the door and a white picket fence. They soon arrived. Inside, Mrs Cadwalader was just taking cakes from the range and had already brewed a large pot of tea.
“Ooh, young Tom,” she said almost excitedly, “been expecting you, so I made some cakes and a big brew.”
She spoke with a very funny country-folk accent.
Tom was both thirsty and hungry, and he hadn’t had a cup of tea since arriving in Trymyll. Let’s face it, when is a thirteen-year-old boy not hungry when there is cake involved?
“Milk and sugar?”
“Yes please, two sugars please.”
Mrs Cadwalader gave over a mug of hot tea and a warm rock cake.
“Well young Tom, what brings you to the forest? Learning to fly I expect, that’s the normal reason people come to these parts.”
“How do you mean? What people?”
“Oh, your dad’s a very generous wizard and possibly the best in the land.”
“Not possibly Lynessa, he is the greatest wizard in all of Trymyll,” interjected Traveon.
“Well, as I was saying, your dad is very generous with his time for such a busy man. He’s trained several acolytes here in Trymyll and they all pass through these woods at some time or other while they tries to learn how to fly. But none of them can fly, not well anyway, not very well at all some of them,” she said as if trying to emphasise the point, “they hits trees, hits boulders, gets stuck in caves, they scratches ‘emselves, bruises ‘emselves even breaks the odd bone here and there. But no matter, I patches them up and then I shows them how it’s done.”
Tom looked quite shocked at that suggestion. Mrs Cadwalader was short and plump with rose-red cheeks and thick, thick spectacles. She just looked altogether the last person you would imagine on a staff flying through the forest.
“Oh, I knows what you’re thinking. She don’t look like a first aider,” she laughed, “no, my little joke, you're thinking, she don’t look like a flyer, aren't you?”
Tom didn't answer, he didn't have to...
“Come outside when you've had your cake and drunk your brew and I’ll shows you.”
A few minutes later, the three of them stood outside.
“Staff,” she said, and a most elegant staff appeared, no more than a pencil in width and with a large pearl stone set into the end.
“And before you ask, yes it will take my weight.”
She then burst out laughing with such joy that Tom couldn't help but laugh too. She pushed off and went into a vertical climb at such speed she became just a dot in the sky. Then followed the most magnificent aerobatic display, complete with vapour trails and coloured smoke and even stars. Multifarious loops and barrel rolls. She wrote letters in the sky then dived down at what looked like the speed of sound into the trees, then away, weaving, ducking, diving corkscrewing around trees rocks and boulders and all at a speed that made her just a blur, then she headed straight for Tom but before he could duck, she stopped dead in front of him not an inch from his nose and stepped down from her staff.
“That was unbelievable,” said Tom, “may I see your staff?”
“Of course, my dear, here.”
Tom took the staff in his hands, gently as if it were fragile and he was afraid he would break it, it weighed, well, it weighed nothing. It was as light as the air that surrounded it.
“What’s it made of Mrs Cadwalader?”
“Well, it’s not wood, it didn’t come from the wand tree, it came from an old wizard who lived over two millennia ago. He was completely blind and yet could see better than anyone else of his day, where his blind eyes were there were two large pearls. One of those blind eyes is held at the end of my wand. The wand itself is fashioned from the fourth finger bone of a Golden Dragons wing, so it has incredible strength but is exceptionally light in weight. This was the wand and staff of his son who was the greatest flier ever to grace the skies. He was my ancestor, and the wand has been passed down through the generations to the oldest child be they male or female. Now it is mine. Alas, we are without children, so when I pass on to the other side, the wand will choose a new owner. But it will be owned at a price, whoever next this wand claims as its own will also be blinded in both eyes from that moment, and yet they too will be able to see more than they ever saw before.”
Tom didn’t understand what she meant and nearly dropped the wand when he heard it. He instantly thought that he hoped it didn’t pick him. But then he thought, why would it? There are many, many wizards in Trymyll the wand could pick. Anyway, Mrs Cadwalader was still relatively young, she still had years before she would die. He hoped.
“Will you teach me to fly like you can Mrs Cadwalader please?”
“That’s the thing young Tom, you already can, you just have to conquer your fears.”
“How?” he stumbled over just that one word.
“Belief,” she said, “just believe. Believe you can do it, and you will do it,” she paused, then surprisingly said, “here, mount up on my wand and fly.”
Tom sat astride the thin and delicate looking staff and kicked off. He too shot up into the sky at breakneck speed until he was just a dot, then down to the forest floor, he sped on, he skimmed around the trees, around boulders, down caves and out the other side, he had never flown so fast in his life, yet he had no fear of falling off and he didn’t even touch, let alone hit any of the obstacles he was coming across. Then he shot up into the sky and did exactly what Mrs Cadwalader had done, giving an impressive aerobatics display, zooming down again and along the forest floor right up to Mrs Cadwalader and stop. She didn’t move, she didn't even blink. She just stood there holding her staff. Tom looked down.
“What? But I had your staff, how come I’m sitting on mine?”
“Oh, deary me young Tom, I don’t lend my staff to no one, I just makes them think I does.”
“But I was holding your wand, I sat astride your wand, I rode your wand.”
“No, no dear, you may have thought you did, but my wand is very magic indeed, so, even though you have a really closed mind for suggestions and that, it ain’t no match for my wand. It is, after all, the fourth finger of a Golden Dragon, and you knows how magic they are," she said laughing, "that my dear is all your own work on your own stick. And a fine one it is too. Never saw a wand before with four kinds of wood for a starter. Very handy having yew in your wand.”
Tom started, "how do you know about the yew? It wasn’t meant to be yew, after I stuttered out the oak, elm and willow, which wasn’t an answer, but part of a question, I started to say, ‘You got to help me here’, and the wand tree mistook the word you for yew.”
“Oh no deary, the wand tree never makes mistakes. It were yew for a reason.”
“But why, what good is yew anyway, the wand tree said it was only good for making bow and arrows.”
“I suppose if no one knows, then no one will tell you.”
“Tell me what?”
“Bet they told you three commands, wand, staff and wand away, either spoken or thought.”
“Well yes, there aren’t any more."
“Try bow,” she said.
“Bow?” said Tom as a question. His staff disappeared and he was holding an Old-English Longbow, and he had a quiver at his side with three arrows in.
“Now deary, see yonder on that apple tree. There be three apples left on it. See?”
“Yes”
“Take one arrow and take ‘em down," she chortled.
“How can I hit three apples with one arrow?”
“Like I said earlier. Believe.”
Tom took an arrow from his quiver and noticed that as he did that it was at once replaced with another. He pulled the bow back and lifted the knock to his eye to get a straight aim.
“Don’t aim at one apple, concentrate on the three of them, imagine them all being hit.”
Tom loosed his arrow. As it sped towards the apple, the arrow seemed to split into three and all three apples exploded into fragments.
“No need to look for your arrows dear boy, you’ll always have three in your quiver.”
“How do you know these things? Who are you really?”
“Who me? Oh, I’m me, without a doubt, Mrs Lynessa Cadwalader. But don’t be fooled by appearances. I may look like a woodman's wife, ‘cause that what I am. But you can be a Woodman's wife and a wizard all at the same time you know. You see, me and Traveon, just want a simple life out here in the woods. You’ll learn soon enough, those wizards in the outside ain’t all they seem. High Elders are worse. They all be conniving, backstabbing social and political climbers. We’ve been there and done that. Now we want none of it. So, your old man, the gent that he is, set us up here to look after the forest.”
“Traveon, are you a wizard as well?”
“Oh yes, course I am. Used to be an Elder an’ all, we both were. People wanted Lynessa here to be a High Elder, and she was for a while, but we soon realised, they wanted her to move up just so she’d look out for them, do them favours and like. So, we just decided one day to quit. Oh, the commotion that caused, no one ever quit before. Up till then, elders stayed elders or moved up a notch. No one ever went down on their own, unheard of. You can be stripped of your position, they said to us, but you can’t quit, ‘specially not a High Elder. So, we asked them to show where it says that in the rules. Well, they couldn’t, ‘cause they makes up the rules as they goes along. So, me and Lynessa here, just disappeared, with the help of young Llewellyn of course, and here we are.”
They heard someone approaching and Tom turned to see his dad walking down the valley.
“Business all done then?” asked Mrs Cadwalader.
“For today, but more tomorrow. How did young Tom do at his flying today?”
“He flew like a good ‘un. Not seen a flier like him for thirty odd years. Can’t think who it was now, but I’m sure you’ll remember him,” she said laughing.
They all knew exactly who she meant. Llewellyn blushed, just a little bit.