So You Want to Be a Wizard, New Millennium Edition Read Online Free PDF Page A

his head sadly. “Some day? I’m tired of seeing you hurt right now.” He looked at her again. “Sweetheart, I don’t know… if you could just, I don’t know, pretend to be a little more like them…” Then he trailed off, running one hand through his silver hair. “What am I saying?” he muttered. “Look. We’re going to have to stop this, one way or another. We’ll sit down and make a plan when you’re feeling better. But for the moment, if you do think of anything I can do to help, you’ll tell me?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Okay. Let’s think about tomorrow. Will you be up to raking up the backyard a little? I want to go over the lawn around the rowan tree with the aerator, maybe put down some seed.”
    “Sure, Dad. I’ll be okay by then.”
    “My girl.” He got up. “You finish that up and then get some rest.” He got up and headed out the door, forgetting to close it behind himself as usual.
    Nita ate her supper slowly, for chewing made her jaw ache, and she found she had to work to think about something besides Joanne or the book that now lay there on the bed beside her. The Moon’s at first quarter tonight. A good night for the telescope — the shadows in the craters will really show up. Or there’s that new comet. Might have a little more tail than it did last week…
    It was completely useless. The book lay there on her bed and stared at her, daring her to do something childish, something silly, something absolutely ridiculous.
    Nita put aside her empty plate, picked up the book, and stared back at it.
    “All right,” she said under her breath. “All right.”
    She opened the book at random. And on the page to which she opened, there was the Wizard’s Oath.
    It was not decorated in any way. It stood there, a plain block of type all by itself in the middle of the page, looking serious and important. Nita read the Oath to herself first, to make sure of the words. Then, hurriedly, before she could start to feel silly, she read it out loud.
    “‘In Life’s name, and for Life’s sake,’“ she read, “‘I say that I will use the Art for nothing but the service of that Life. I will guard growth and ease pain. I will fight to preserve what grows and lives well in its own way; and I will change no object or creature unless its growth and life, or that of the system of which it is part, are threatened. To these ends, in the practice of my Art, I will put aside fear for courage, and death for life, when it is right to do so—till Universe’s end.’“
    The words seemed to echo slightly, as if the room were larger than it really was. And as she finished reading the Oath, Nita suddenly realized something. Without her glasses, everything else in her room was a little fuzzy—but not the words she’d been reading, the words in the book.
    With the realization, a chill went down her back. Nita sat very still, wondering what the ordeal would be like, wondering what would happen now. Only the wind spoke softly in the leaves of the trees outside the bedroom window; nothing else seemed to stir anywhere. Nita sat there, and slowly the tension began to drain out of her as she realized that she hadn’t been hit by lightning, nor had anything strange started happening to her. Now she felt silly—and suddenly tired, too. The effects of her beating were catching up with her.
    Nita took another look at the Oath. The page was as fuzzy to look at now as any page should have been without her glasses to help. She shook her head at her own gullibility, then shoved the book under her pillow, lay back against the headboard and closed her hurting eyes. So much for the joke, Nita thought. She’d have a nap, and then when it was dark later she’d get up and take the telescope out back. But right now… right now…
     
    After a while, night wasn’t night anymore; that was what brought Nita to the window, much later. She leaned on the sill and gazed out in calm wonder at her back yard, which didn’t look the same as