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head. “Hold perfectly still.” I did as instructed and soon felt as though he was tickling me. I resisted the urge to squirm, but it was very difficult since I hated to be tickled. He finished and stepped back to lean against the tree again. The silence stretched on for so long I almost sat down. “What types of magic have you tried to perform?” he asked me instead of telling me what he had seen.
    I knew it. I didn’t have enough magic power. “I have tried all the basic spells that they teach us in school. I passed the journeyman’s test.”
    “Can you light a candle?” he asked. I nodded my head despite wanting to say something rude because you had to do more than that to pass the journeyman’s test. “Can you move an object with your mind?” I shook my head. “Can you manipulate water?” I shook my head again. “What spells can you do?”
    “Light a candle, unlock an item, and heal a minor injury like a scratch, but nothing deep or too long in length,” I said in embarrassment. I had barely passed the journeymen’s test because I had only been able to heal a portion of the tester’s injury.
    He rubbed his jaw as he thought about my responses. What went on in the head of a man like him? Did he think of everyone else as pitiful compared to him or did he just view others as potential experiments and use them to advance his own knowledge?
    He stopped rubbing his jaw and looked at me in shock a moment. “Wait, you can unlock an item? They don’t teach that at school. Can you unlock anything?” he asked.
    I resisted the urge to smile. “Yes.”
    “Doors? Padlocks? Chests?”
    “Yes, yes, and yes.”
    “That’s interesting,” he murmured, “Do the Queen and King know?”
    “No,” I said softly.
    “Have you tried lighting anything bigger than a candle on fire?” he asked as though my withholding information from my aunt and uncle didn’t matter.
    “I tried lighting multiple candles at the same time, but could only light one at a time,” I said.
    “Try lighting the apple stem on fire,” he said, indicated an apple that had fallen from the tree and was lying on the ground between us.
    I rubbed my hands together, blew into them to warm them up, and focused on the apple’s stem. A few seconds went by and nothing. I looked up at him and said, “You’re staring at me.”
    “I’m watching to see how you perform your spells,” he explained.
    I exhaled and focused again, trying to forget that he was watching me. Finally the stem caught fire, but only burned for a second before going out.
    “Wonderful,” he said with a smile, “now try lighting this tree on fire.”
    “What?!” I asked in shock.
    “Don’t worry you won’t get in trouble,” he said with a smile, “And I can control it if it gets out of your control.” He stepped away from the tree and stood beside me. “Focus on the tree like you did the apple stem, but this time picture the entire tree lighting on fire at the same time.”
    I didn’t think it would work, but I faced the tree and focused on it. I imagined the tree bursting into fire which covered the entire thing at once. I imagined the fire burning hotter and hotter and the tree turning to ash. I replayed the image a few times and then leapt back when the tree caught fire, burned white hot, and turned into a small pile of ash at our feet.
    “Well, that’s not exactly what I had in mind, but is very explanatory,” he commented.
    “Why can I light a tree on fire, but not two candles?” I asked curiously.
    “Some people can’t ever target multiple objects at once and others just have to practice for years to acquire the talent,” he explained, “and some people can focus on an item and make it burn no matter how large it is. Sometimes their visual ability, that is the ability to visualize an item burning or exploding or such, is easier than them focusing on multiple items.”
    “So you’re saying I can’t light two candles on fire, but I could probably light