Requiem for an Unpublished Novel

Void and Unicorn

All in order to find the answer to the only, but the most important and difficult question. This is already part of the answer to it. The books received from the 'headmaster' helped not only to find out what her family was, but also in which direction to work with the wand: 'Rereading the descriptions of movements many times and peering into the air after their implementation, I mentally experimented with various potential consequences of these actions. But it was only when I superimposed the image of the feather rising up with the vision of a curved grid of space in which it ought to take place that I finally saw magic. In the room, I exercised transferring my discoveries completely into the realm of the speculative, using only my imagination as a tool.' As well as to understand the problem with verbal magic: 'After analysing what precisely was happening in my mind during attempts at nonverbal witchcraft, I came to the conclusion that pictures were. "They must express more truthfully what was required to get as an outcome than a short exclamation. However, ... the words of a high-quality spell should be pure essence. Thus, the problem of interpretation has to be completely eliminated. Perhaps, it's because there is no agent in my wand to heed them." ' (Chapter 4 First year).

Or because she didn't really trust words and often had to read between the lines: 'Then they enquired about the friend who was mentioned. And that was really offensive. Therefore, magicians do not consider it self-evident to attend to their own words, just like ordinary people.' (Chapter 2 Sorting); '... people realise how intelligence plays this game of instincts and consciously choose the sharpest and most immaterial of all arms.' (Chapter 4 First year); "Don't worry, his poison doesn't work on me, let him bite as much as he wants." (Chapter 8 Traitor); 'How I longed to maintain my faith that these were not his words, that he said them out of frustration, rather than he did think so.' (Chapter 16 Before Christmas); ' "... But it's a legend... and besides, it happened before we were even born!" "Well, yes, before." I smiled bitterly at how easy it actually is to play with words. How easy it is to say nothing with them and herewith to hint at a lot. People do this when they want to hide something important, but at the same time not burden their conscience with falsehood. ... "Before you were born, more accurately, and probably a little more than half of our fellow students. ..." ' (Chapter 18 Deal); "The headmaster says a lot of things! And keeps silent about even more..." (Chapter 21 Mark). "What if we stop believing words? Since we use them so carelessly. Won't we then lose everything we have achieved with their help?"; "I will give answers to all your questions." "I will find them myself and then I will be sure of their veracity." (Chapter 4 First year).

The answers found in the books were already a big step forward, but neither knowledge nor diligent practice brought the desired result: "I inquired in school: at first she wasn't outstanding; on the contrary, she was among the weak ones. Albeit, in the second year, she somehow could defeat three upperclassmen at once. Significant changes occurred only in the third year. ...when she got serious troubles with her house." (Chapter 17 Unicorn). Aggression from a large number of people, especially yours, is not just an inconvenience - it is a sign that something has fundamentally gone wrong. You can't just dismiss such things or wait until everything goes away, maybe it won't. For her own sake, it was necessary to dot the I's and cross the T's, and for this - to tame her 'an extraordinary, but still unbridled power' (Chapter 4 First year).

'One more time my thoughts went back to the ghost on the train, to the feelings it stirred within me. They arose again when I had a look into my father's eyes. "But that being wasn't my father, it was my fear. Fear of the same void in myself. Not in the wand - in myself... My charms execute best when the situation is 'very emotional' and when I 'want to'. That is, to some extent they are spontaneous, and they are strong due to their naturalness. 'More important is what is inside you, not inside a wand... If you're conjuring, you must be sure of the result, you must be sure you want to get this particular result'". It turned out that the craftsman had given me all the instructions, I simply hadn't taken them. For two years, I had aimed to overcome the passivity of my wand, but I needed to overcome one within myself. ... I didn't want a war, it wouldn't have led to anything good. I wanted to show my housemates that it was futile to struggle with me because the roots of my behaviour did not lie in them. I didn't strive to hurt them, but I also wasn't going to change. ... Based on this message, I found a suitable spell surrounding myself and the things I touch with an invisible protective shell. Its goal was not to give back the curses sent to my address, but to neutralise them. It cost me a lot of strength to maintain it permanently, but I decided it was the thing to do.' (Chapter 8 Traitor). The experiment was a success, which prompted the girl to pay closer attention to her feelings, past and current.