Taking some kind of exam was the last thing that came to mind when thinking about this day. Davis was intrigued though and wanted to know what was in the ivory-colored box. It was to no surprise that he accepted to give the exams a shot. Weirdly enough he wondered why the Professor used plural.  

Smiling at the boy Roland opened the box to reveal a baseball sized arcane stone. Inside the stone seemed to be the same material the portal was made of. “It may not look like much but this is a primal arcane stone. Given that the arcane is rather neutral in relation to all the other natures we use these stones to test how great a person's innate talent is and where their specialty lies. The exam consists of two parts. A really short interview and we will instruct you to do five simple magic tricks, you could call them.” Hearing Gerrit talk about how Davis produced a huge blast of wind earlier made the Professor optimistic that the aptitude exams would at least reveal something inside of Davis. “Gerrit, you never were able to do the interview with somebody? Do you still remember the questions and got the riddle ready?”  

Gerrit was doing fist pumps in the air. “Thank you so much sir! I think I still got everything together from the last time I saw you perform it.” With an excited grin the apprentice grabbed the stone in his right hand. “Please extend your left hand and grip the stone firmly.”  

Davis’s heart began beating a thousand miles an hour as the redhead laid the stone into his palm. It was cold to touch but it invoked a sense a familiarity. Something inside of Davis was stirring. The stone itself felt powerful compared to Gerrit’s ring. Immediately after his fingers grasped the stone it began to glow in a dark purple. In his mind Davis also compared the light it emitted to a phone flash.  

“Not bad...” muttered Gerrit. “A few of the questions will be rather personal but please answer them truthfully. If you don’t want to answer we can stop but the exam won’t be complete.”  

Unsure how personal the questions were going to Davis nodded. “Sure. Let’s give it a go.”  

“Tell us your full name and where you were born.”  

Easy enough, thought Davis. “My name is Davis Wilson and I was born in Asheville, North Carolina.” The stone began to vibrate slowly.  

“Please describe your favorite place.”  

“Well...” His mind wandered back home to all the places he had ever visited with Maron. In the end it all came back to either his own or Maron’s room. “My room at home. It’s got a big double bed, a nice tv, one of my bedroom walls is painted in a bright green. When I was little my dad and I put some glow in the dark stars on the ceiling. From time to time, I still catch myself staring up at them. When I’m together with my best friend we had such good times. Some of my happiest memories were made in my room.” While he was talking the glow began to intensify.  

Gerrit smiled at Davis. “We’re not yet at the happy memories. Next up please tell us about one of your saddest memories.”  

“Oh. Wow that’s really personal.” Davis’s smile changed to a sad one. “I...No... When I realized that sitting next to him didn’t only make me feel at ease but also giddy and gooey inside. Since then, I’m always scared of losing our friendship.” The stirring inside of Davis and in the stone got stronger and stronger. An understanding shoulder squeeze made the boy feel better immediately.  

“I know how that feels, Davis. If you can believe it, I also fell in love with my best friend a few years ago. Shhhh......he made me feel like my heart was bursting out of my chest. We spend most of our days together. We even shared a room but after I confessed, he was gone the next day. Ever since we didn’t talk once. But you gotta have hope. Maybe Maron feels the same about you? You’ll never know if you don’t try it. Let’s forget about sad stuff, yeah? Tell us about a happy moment.”  

“Thank you Gerrit...I appreciate you. One of the happier moments in my life was just as I said. Maron and I spending time together. We sat on the floor in front of my TV, our knees and elbows constantly touching. When we beat wave 30 in Kino der Toten we started cheering. It felt good to achieve something together.” While Davis was talking the vibrations of the stone became stronger and stronger. In the end it was it was even humming loudly. “Is this good? This won’t explode in my hand, will it?”  

This made both the Professor and Gerrit smile broadly. Roland chimed in. “Don’t worry, everything is fine. You’re doing really well. Only one more question. It will be a riddle.”  

“Always known, sometimes feared. 

On our shoulder's civilizations were born,  

To our wrath they succumbed. 

Who are we?” 

Davis was stumped. “Yo...that’s hard. I was never really good with riddles. Ehm. Who was always with us and helped us? I don’t know. Maybe Forests? No... Farmers? They often started revolutions. Like in France or something.”  

Even though it was really interesting to see where people’s thoughts were going Gerrit had to instill a bit more confidence into Davis. “There is no right or wrong answer in this.”  

“Oh! I thought riddles are supposed to have only one answer...I’ll say teachers! Without their ability to share knowledge we wouldn’t be where we are now. I know that I definitely fear my math teacher. She could make me fail a year just on her own.”  

The answer made Gerrit giggle a bit. “Nice reasoning. Given how the stone reacted to all of your answers you’ve got some real potential. Do you want to continue with part two already or take a break?”  

Davis shook his head. “No need for a break, I can do this.” The interview gave him a lot more courage, he was determined to see this through. Davis wanted to get the most out of his stay in this world. Not being able to go home sucked but just sitting around and doing nothing wasn’t going to change that fact in any capacity. He even thought about trying the portal stuff on his own, maybe with Gerrit’s help. This lands government didn’t interest him the least bit.  

The Professor stood from his chair and went around the room. While his steps were echoing the two boys followed his movement. Roland grabbed a few things while making his round. When he sat down again in front of Davis were a fire iron, a small flowerpot and a glass of water. “As I said before we’re going to instruct you to do five simple tricks. All of it will be really basic so you should have no problems doing this. If one of the tasks doesn’t work immediately or at all, no need to worry. This will show us where your affinity lies. So please put the primal stone into your prominent hand.”  

Given that Davis was right-handed he switched the stone over. Its glow faded a bit but remained strong. “What’s so special about this stone? You called it primal?”  

The Professor was surprised about Davis’s thirst for knowledge. It reminded him of a young Gerrit back when he picked the boy up in a small insignificant village. “On one hand you got your normal stones. Fire stones are sometimes found near volcanoes or hot springs, embedded deep inside of other stones. Earth stones can be found in deep forests to the east. You get the gist. But then you have primal stones. They are touched or produced by primal forces. Some of the primal fire stones were born when a dragon’s breath hit rocks in a cave. We even had a case of a water stone found on a beach, presumed to be given to the locals by a sea goddess. Those stones are really valuable and more powerful than normal elemental stones. To easily deduct a student's prowess, we use primal stones to boost their innate talent.” Roland opened one of the drawers in his desk and pulled out the stone he had used earlier to open the portal to earth. “This here is another primal arcane stone. Please let us continue with the task at hand.”  

Hearing the word dragon made Davis’s eyes bulge out. “There are dragons in this world?! Where did I end up?” He shook his head. “Tell me what I got to do. “ 

“Please put your left hand over the plant. Try to get a feel for the life surrounding it.”  

Another one of those weird instructions. How was Davis supposed to feel life? After a short while there was something tingling in his palm. His eyes were squeezed shut but even he could see that the primal stone was glowing bright. This time there was a green tinge to it. “I think I got it.”  

Roland chuckled encouraging. “Well done. Now, don’t lose focus. Try to give back what you’re feeling. You WANT to make the plants roots grow. Amplify this feeling you got right now.”  

Somehow this made more sense every second. While the Professor was instructing him, Davis didn’t want to go full force like earlier. He felt the tingle reach out to the plant below his hand, making contact with the soil. The feelings of Ms. Lia’s familiar reaching out earlier came back to mind. Slowly but surely a root, creeping upwards like a tentacle emerged from the earth.  

“Impressive young man. Please open your eyes and concentrate over to this glass of water.”  

Growing a plant felt really awesome. It was mind boggling that Davis was able to do this so well. His thoughts didn’t even linger on his situation anymore, he was completely immersed in the test. “This is so cool…” he whispered to himself.  

“Once again, place your left hand over the water. This time you won’t have the advantage of the water being able to reach out to you. Instead YOU have to reach out to the water. Feel its constant movement. Do you understand?”  

From physics class the boy knew exactly what the teacher was talking about. “Yes, I know exactly what you’re talking about.” After the success of the first test it felt a bit easier ‘to reach out’ for stuff. Not long after the hand hovered above the glass a whirring went through Davis’s hand. “Oh wow, feels like a controller rumbling.”  

Even though the Professor had no idea what the boy was talking about he knew that whatever he compared it to helped. This was different for everyone. “Hold onto that feeling. It doesn’t matter how you compare. No right or wrong. This time grab the water as thinly as possible. We don’t want big drops but rather a mist.”  

Davis had a slight grasp what he was supposed to do but this felt trickier. Whenever he tried to bring water upwards it was always a pillar or some droplets hovering in the air. At one point almost half of the water hovered between glass rim and palm.  

For minutes the Professor and Gerrit watched Davis bring forth any amount of water from the cup but it barely ever resembled a mist. “Davis, you can stop if you want. There is no shame in not completing all of the challenges provided.”  

Failure was no option. “No, I can do this. A few more minutes.” But all the effort was to no avail. Even after five more minutes, no mist came forth. It frustrated Davis, which clearly could be read from his face. “Damn…I was sure I got it this time.”  

“As I said. No shame, no hard feelings or regrets. Look at me, trying to make travel easier for twenty years with no success. Just try the next thing. You can train your capabilities another day. Please pick up the fire iron.”  

Davis wondered what he was supposed to do with it.  

“With the iron in hand, please try to heat up the metal. It doesn’t matter how much or if you can do this at all. Just try it. Again you need to feel its vibrations. Make it vibrate faster to heat it up. Easy enough.”  

Lo and behold, not even a minute later the fireplace poker began to turn orange at the tip. Having the stick in his hand made it way easier to feel anything at all. More and more of the iron began glow. “Is this enough?” All of the frustration made way for a smile.  

“Well done. As you can see some things come more natural than others. It all depends on the person. Try to put the poker aside without burning my carpet please. Or wait-“ 

The iron hovered a centimeter above the floor boards. Davis looked up confused.  

“Bad idea. Keep it in your hand a while longer. We can combine this with test number four. While you’re sitting there, concentrate on your surroundings. Gerrit explained to you how to manipulate the air. Replicate this but look beyond it. All around us is the arcane. Nobody knows where this energy comes from but we can make good use of it.”  

“Just like with the butterflies I made earlier”, Gerrit chimed in.  

Taking deep breaths Davis concentrated hard. Just like the Professor said he tried to get behind the air. Indeed there was something tangible past all of the air. “Yeeees…I got something.”  

“You’re a natural. This is very good. Now whatever you’re feeling, form a bubble around your hand and extend it all around the poker. This should make it safe to lay down.”  

Surprisingly this was the easiest of all tasks so far. Without a hitch a translucent blue shield enveloped all of the fire iron and Davis’s hand. He just dropped the iron and without making a sound both the barrier and the iron landed on the ground. Despite some glowing orange spots remaining nothing happened to the shield or the floor boards. “That was easy. I think I got a knack for this stuff.”  

“Depending on how good you decide to study we can even think about having you skip a few classes. I don’t think that you want to sit in a room full of first grade students, right?”  

“Oh no” chuckled Davis. “Gerrit mentioned that already once and I’m getting shivers thinking about that. How would I enroll here, if I’m allowed to?”  

Some papers rustled while Roland searched for an empty one. “It should be rather easy to convince the headmaster. I will write you a letter of recommendation and in two weeks after the New Year’s celebrations we can test your knowledge and skills and see which year you will be seated in. As we only got another day of school you should be fine bunking in with my son Loran.” 

Gerrit’s face dropped when he heard that. “I had hoped that Davis could stay in my room. Maybe we could move my roommate to another room?”  

“Nonsense Gerrit. Loran has an empty bed already. No need to shuffle room assignments.”  

“I guess Gerrit and I can spend some more time together then, right?” Davis interjected. “There is still so much I want to see. We also get dinner later?”  

This made Gerrit smile again. Even if it meant having to get copies of the lectures later on, showing Davis around some more sounded much more appealing than sitting in a dingy classroom the rest of the day.  

“Of course. As Altair said, I can’t leave you without supervision. So go ahead you two. I need to visit the old man and get everything in order. After dinner please come see me again. Loran should be able to take you to your room.”  

Davis stood from the chair and Gerrit already made his way to the door.  

“But you need to leave the stone with me. I can’t have you play around with that in the yard.” Roland’s voice was stern while he shook the empty ivory box in the air.  

Smiling Davis put the stone back to where it belonged. “Sorry, forgot I had it in my hand.”