Chapter Eighteen

“Forgive me for asking, but what did your captors do with your eye? The one they took?”

“Excuse me?” Jasper couldn’t believe Merlin was asking something so ridiculous. It wasn’t as though he tracked his eyeball when it was forcibly ejected from his eye socket. “My apologies. I didn’t realize a detail like that might be important. Unfortunately, the eye they left me with was filled with blood at the time, and it restricted my vision.”

“Why is that important, Merlin?” Avalon asked, as if it was a perfectly normal question. Jasper didn’t think it was.

“Different societies have different beliefs,” Merlin explained. “You already know there were a vast amount of studies done at the Magical University in ways to enhance magical ability.”

“Why would they do that?” Jasper briefly wondered if he was dreaming, but no, he wasn’t because while the mountains where he’d been held were off on the horizon, he couldn’t see the fires or smell the spices that had impacted him so negatively. “People assume anyone with magic comes from pirate stock, or from cult-type society. If anything, you’d think the World Council would be looking for ways to eradicate it completely from all human beings.”

“The general line of thinking, by the Magical University,” Merlin said slowly, “is that originally a lot more people had magic in generations past. But there’s no record, no one has been able to pinpoint why magic in humans died out or has, at least, been reduced to those who live on the fringes of society.”

“I can think of a few reasons,” Jasper muttered. It wasn’t as though anyone except Avalon, Duncan, and Merlin could hear him. The soldiers they were traveling with were setting up camp for the night while the four men were seated at a table under the shade of a large tree. They could be seen, but unless any of the guards had lip reading abilities, their conversation would be private.

“What reasons?” Jasper’s magic let him know Avalon was genuinely interested. His read on Merlin and Duncan wasn’t as clear. “You said you used to read a lot and study prior to being taken – did you study magical history in any way?”

Jasper shook his head. “I imagine if there were any magical texts in Lowenthorp, they were hidden in somebody’s basement. There definitely wasn’t any in the castle. But I did read a lot of regular history, about how the countries developed, the harshness of rulers back then, and how they conducted themselves prior to the creation of the World Council. It seemed like every country was at war with their neighbors.”

“That was a long time ago.” Duncan shifted his weight from one elbow to the other. He had both of them planted on the table. “I don’t see what any of that has to do with the lack of magic now.”

“Probably nothing,” Jasper admitted. “But think about how far society has progressed, how regimented, and controlled it is now, most countries are affluent, and their people live and work in peace. I’m not denying the positives that have occurred since historical conflicts were stopped. Even the people of Huditit and Hooit live in relative comfort to the way they used to exist prior to the World Council implementing their form of governance.”

He glanced at Avalon and then added, “But if you think back to just a few nights ago when a dream from a magic user caused huge creatures of the sea to congregate peacefully in one area where they are not usually seen… of the impact that could have…” He couldn’t complete the sentence. Jasper didn’t want Avalon to think his magic was some uncontrollable force but in a lot of ways, it was.

“Wait.” Merlin seemed excited. “So, you think the World Council had something to do with why there are so few magic users now?”

“It was the only reason I could think of why I’d never heard of another magic user among society families or royalty.” Jasper felt his face heat. “If people talk about having extensive magical powers, for the want of a better term, they are always restricted to those who live on the fringes of society like back-hill tribes and pirates.”

“People who don’t conform to the rulings of the World Council.” Duncan nodded. “That makes sense. If magic was distrusted or discouraged back when the World Council was first formed…”

“And people in society families and royalty were strictly managed as to who they married and had offspring with… Yes. Yes.” Avalon was nodding, too. “That does make sense.”

“With royal and society families only marrying each other,” Merlin added, “Magic would die out. Not every child from a magical couple would be born with magic themselves, so over generations, by steering clear of those who bred in the hopes of keeping their magic…”

“If you think about it, if any commoner was born with magic, they would likely be hidden by their families, or at least discouraged from marrying, causing the magic in that family line to slowly die out. Purely and simply because the people setting the examples of how to live – royals, society families, and the World Council believed the only useful magic came from the crystals mined at Marinkaw.” Duncan looked at his husband. “That doesn’t explain why you wanted to know about the consort’s missing eye.”

“There are no modern texts about magic in humans,” Merlin said. “But anecdotal evidence, used by the World Council, I might add, to boost the reasonings behind the laws decent people live by today, suggests that the old beliefs about magic were not scientific.

“There were stories, considered old wives’ tales but recorded nonetheless, about how a magic user never cut their hair for fear the magic could be harvested from the hair taken, or that the taking of hair would weaken the person’s magic when it was gone. Likewise, the removal of body parts of a magic user, like an eye or internal organ – that were either kept as a way of trying to use that magic by non-magic persons, or people believed the removal of that body part would drain the magic from the person it was taken from.

“There have been stories about how if a person was suspected of having magic, those powers could be drained by an individual if he had repeated sex with that person – always ensuring the magic user was controlled and tied down at the time. In some communities, the bodies of magic users were burned after death because there were those who believed those magic users would rise from the grave and drain the spirits of innocents if their remains weren’t disposed of suitably.”

“Luigi made you get your hair cut just before you were taken.” Avalon slammed the table with his fist. “They suppressed your magic and took your eye, and that’s without…”

“Don’t say it. Don’t you dare say it. My eye was the last thing they took.” Jasper flung up his hand as he jumped out of his chair. “Excuse me. I’m about to be violently ill.” Slapping his hand over his mouth, he ran for the nearest cluster of bushes, determined no one would witness someone raised as a prince expelling the contents of his stomach.