Disclaimer - the characters and the OZ aren't mine and I'm not making any profit off of this (although I'd be tempted to say yes if someone wants to offer...)
DG stared at her mother, not understanding the words that seemed so abrupt and so final. "Wait, what? I have to leave? Why?"
Cain reached out to grip DG's hand in wordless support under the table. Her hand was cold and trembling inside of his own. "You want to remove the princess from public view and that only makes sense. If no one knows where she is, it is harder to make her a target," he reasoned aloud for her benefit. "Do you expect another attack so soon that she cannot rest and heal tonight in comfort?"
"No! I don't want to leave," DG protested, ignoring Cain. "I'm not afraid!"
Her father reached for the Queen's hand in much the same way that Cain held DG's to offer her what comfort he could. "We don't particularly want you to leave either, spitfire, but it's for the best. You are the primary target because you have more magic."
DG's mouth dropped open. "What? That's not true! Az is stronger than I am," she cried out. "You've always told me that." Again, there was that exchange of enigmatic glances. DG wanted to scream in frustration. She felt like she didn't understand anything that was happening and she was still so tired she had a hard time keeping up. It wasn't fair of the others to keep confusing her. She felt so left out.
"That's what you have always believed, angel, not what we have told you," the Queen said softly. She hesitated for a moment, then gave a tiny shrug. "The question of actual strength aside, you have more magic because you have mine as well as yours. It was not a temporary giving of strength, but a permanent giving of life. For a Gale, because of our bond with the OZ, strength and magic and life cannot be separated. You must have felt this for yourself."
DG stared helplessly at her mother, not knowing what to say or even what to think. For months she had been giving her mother and sister the impression that more and more of her magic was coming under her conscious control. In reality, she made almost no progress whatsoever, except in learning magical theory. So I can what, theorize these assassins to death when they come after me again? she thought wildly. It was an effort to suppress the laughter that the random thought conjured. She felt no bond to the OZ. Hell, she didn't even feel a bond with her own magic. The moment of uncomfortable silence lengthened, and she squirmed slightly, praying for some kind of an out.
"DG has no bond with the OZ, your Majesty," Tutor rumbled in his low voice. It was her mother's turn to look shocked. Az, DG noted in a corner of her brain that was still capable of thinking, just nodded as if having an idea confirmed.
"I don't understand," the Queen said flatly. "I have regular reports from both you and DG concerning her lessons. How can you have not shown her the bond that links her to the OZ? Without that bond, she surely cannot access her magic."
"DG has not been able to do anything beyond the basic control exercises she mastered at six years old, my Queen. Believe me when I say it is not from the lack of her own effort. I have never seen anyone work so hard and tirelessly at learning a skill. Until I could figure out why DG could not access her magic, I concentrated on magic theory, with an emphasis on how that would relate to the intended practical lesson. The princess has learned the lessons well, but has not been able to use the knowledge in a hands-on fashion."
The Queen looked blankly at Tutor for a long moment. "I don't understand," she repeated, sounding frustrated. At least I'm not the only one, DG couldn't quite suppress the momentary smugness she felt. "Of course she can't practice her magic knowledge without the bond."
Azkadellia suddenly sat up straight. "She isn't grounded!" she exclaimed. "But I don't understand how that's true."
Everyone looked at DG and she squirmed some more. "Will you stop looking at me like I'm some weird bacteria under a microscope!" she cried. Everyone gave her blank looks except for Ahamo and she finally just threw her hands up. "Fine. Talk over my head. Don't tell me what you're talking about. Hurt princess over here doesn't care anymore."
Her father just grinned and patted her hand. "Now you know how I felt when I was courting your mother," he stage whispered.
The Crown Princess ignored the byplay and stared off into space, thinking very hard. "Wait...Deeg is an elemental mage, right? And elemental mages need to be grounded more solidly than any other type of mage. But I killed her." She flinched a little bit and DG hopped up with some of her old energy and wrapped her older sister in her arms. "Then Mother gave her own life force to revive her."
"Whoa, Az." DG pushed a tendril of escaped damp hair back behind her ear. "You're going a bit too fast for me, here. I mean, I know what you're talking about in general. A ground is the base of any use of magic, right? Like a stand for a patio umbrella, or a stake keeping a tree upright."
Az nodded doubtfully. "I guess so, although I would not have ever described it quite like that."
DG waved that off. "But we're born with the magic, right? Isn't that why the Lourden are so underground to begin with? Because their ideas are so way off base? I mean, the OZ is giving us the magic inherent in it, so don't we naturally have that bond with it?"
Azkadellia, the Queen and Tutor all started speaking at the same time. After a moment of trying to talk over each other, Azkadellia and the Queen nodded to Tutor. "You seem to have a way of explaining things to my angel," the Queen said wryly. "By all means, continue, although I believe I understand the difficulty of the situation now."
Tutor thought for a moment. "DG, when the Witch killed you, she did so by sucking out your life. In essence, she was also draining your magic. In the normal way of things, the Witch would have absorbed your life force, and thus your magic, for herself. She was not able to do this with your life force because as a Gale, you held a very strong bond with the Outer Zone and it resisted her attempts. As a child in body and mind, she did not yet possess the strength of will to force the absorption despite her prior experience." He glanced briefly at Azkadellia for confirmation. She nodded curtly. "So she could not use your life force for herself, but she was able to remove it from your body. Technically, you did die."
DG listened in horrified silence to the explanation of her death. She had seen what had happened, of course, thanks to Raw, but it was somehow very different to hear it broken down so mechanically. She tightened her arms about Az in reassurance, silently comforting her against the grief she could feel emanating from her older sister.
Tutor cleared his throat roughly. "I believe that when you died, your bond with the OZ was severed. Your mother gave you much of her life force, but not all of it. Even had she been able to do so – and thank Glinda she couldn't! - the bond with the OZ is not transferable in that manner, being a deeply personal, blood-bound connection with the land. It took me many months to realize this, DG. In fact, I did not fully understand why you were having such difficulty with accessing and mastering your magic until this morning. That is why I bent over to touch the earth – I was trying to feel for the presence or absence of that bond. I can feel the potential in you to be one of the greatest elemental mages the OZ has known. You understand the concepts and the theories of using that magic well...however, you have no link with the OZ. Without that link, you cannot consciously reach your magic."
Cain stood up and started to pace around. "DG, er, the Princess, has used her magic many times," he protested. "For most of those situations, I was right there with her and I saw her use it."
Tutor was nodding. "Yes, the magic will never go away under normal circumstances. The magic will also not be used under normal circumstances, but at no time during DG's first week or two in the OZ can those circumstances be considered normal."
DG rolled her eyes at the ponderous explanation. "Thank God you're not normally this obtuse, Toto, or I would not have managed to pass the lessons I did sit through. All you're trying to say is that since most of the time I was running around scared for my life, the OZ was able to use that emotion to create a link with me when I needed it the most. That's why when I was grabbed the earth with my bleeding hand I was suddenly able to access the magic. The blood served as a temporary link."
"That is, not so incidentally, the heart of the Gales creed. 'We are one with the OZ.' The full creed is somewhat longer and more lyrical than that, but that's what it comes down to." Az pulled off her signet ring. "See? The circle represents the OZ and the symbol inside it is a combination for the ancient glyph for 'one' along with the traditional Gale marking."
DG gave it an impatient glance then turned back to Tutor. "So I can access it in a mortal emergency, but that's about it?" At his nod she sank back into her chair shaking her head slowly. "So much for me as a powerful mage," she said dryly. Deep inside, she did not know how to feel. Relief, disappointment, amusement and anger all swirled within her. She had gotten used to expecting that she would have magic despite her initial disbelief and now that was being taken away.
"Can't she just re-establish the bond or whatever with the OZ?" Cain asked, still pacing. "Not every magic user is a Gale, after all, and there must have been some point in history where this bond wasn't so regular as to be nearly forgotten."
"It does not quite work that way, Captain," Azkadellia sighed.
The Queen cut her oldest daughter off with a wave of her hand. "Actually, it does. The Captain's question has merit. There is a way for mages to establish or reaffirm a deep personal connection to the land, but it is ancient knowledge and almost lost to myth and legend."
Azkadellia sat very still for a moment. "You could have told me this earlier."
Her mother met her eyes very calmly. "You did not want to listen, just as you did not want to tell others what you knew of that no one else did." Az remained quiet and the queen continued. "You are my daughter and I am very proud of you. You have overcome trials that no one could imagine to stand where you are today. You will be Queen one day – I do not allow you your position simply to make you feel better. For all that you have learned from the Witch though, her magic and knowledge follows a different philosophy than that of the Gale legacy. You must stop allowing her experience to deceive you into believing you have learned all there is to learn. It is time to step fully out of her shadow and reclaim your own birthright, lest it is lost forever."
The Crown Princess accepted the rebuke gracefully, but the sheen of tears told everyone that it had the desired effect. "My apologies, Mother, Father. If you would please continue, I will not interrupt unless I have a concrete point."
DG glanced back and forth from her parents to her sister. Apparently, more had been going on during Az's own lessons with their mother than DG was aware of. Unsure how to dissolve the tension, she cleared her throat. "Well, okay, then," she said uneasily. "So I can re-
establish this link with the OZ. Something tells me it's not that easy." She ignored Cain's mutter of, "it's never that easy with you, Princess," but suppressed smiles from everyone else told her that it was heard and agreed with. "Hey," she whined and tried to jab the Tin Man with her elbow. "It's not my fault that I always end up in trouble." After a few more dodged jabs, she subsisted with a huge sigh. "So what do I have to do, anyway?" I only hope this doesn't turn into another adventure...
A/N - mwahaha, we all know where these sort of thoughts ultimately lead. I know there is a discrepancy with the knife and how it has been used so far, but that will be explained later. Thank you so much for the reviews. I am glad you are all enjoying my story.