Engineered Magic

This is the end of book one. This is where we are so far (Massive Spoilers!):

Not far in our future a generational colony ship leaves Earth. This ship is named the Speedwell. These people have technology and knowledge slightly more advanced than our own, but the constraints of living in a ship between stars means they make no advances during the trip and the use of some technology falls out of favor.

The Speedwell lands in a high valley in the mountains of a colony world with approximately 50,000 occupants. 10,000 of these are the last generation of flight crew, now in their eighties. The other 40,000 are the first generation of settlers. Born in sets, they are aged 16, 18, 20 and 22 years at landing.

Irene is a settler born in the last set, so she is 16 when the ship lands. Her father is a senior engineer on the ship’s engineering team. Her mother is a senior doctor in the medical department.

Soon after landing one of the exploration teams discovers a nearby ruined building. The mass of the building is covered with soil and vegetation. The entrance is situated on the side of a hill. It is a ruined courtyard with broken stone work with steel reinforcement. There are three hallways that lead deeper into the hill behind.

The exploration teams discover the ruins are inhabited by vicious animals. They give the animals earth names, but they have very little in common with the originals.

When several members of the exploration team are injured, Irene’s mother, Doctor Whitman, and Irene’s youngest brother travel into the ruins to treat them. Soon after her mother’s departure, Irene’s father unexpectedly dies, leaving Irene living alone in the family living space. All her older siblings have already moved out into single people's housing. Irene continues on carrying out the duties of her position as an apprentice in the engineering division.

During the execution of her duties Irene hears rumors of magic, of women getting unexpectantly pregnant and of settlers sneaking off to live in the ruins. In discussions with the night shift manager of engineering, Irene gets her first hints of what the ruin magic might be. On a side trip to pick up abandoned vehicles near the entrance to the ruins, she learns her first two spells, light and lightning.

Two years after the landing, the stress of unplanned children, the death of many of the flight crew and the loss of workers is threatening the survival of the colony. Irene’s new boss, Agatha, asks Irene to go into the ruins and get recordings of what life is really like inside. Agatha believes that living in the ruins has been romanticized and if the settlers knew it was just as much work as building the colony they would stop running to it.

Irene journeys through the ruined structure. She learns about magic and sees the beginning of a society forming inside. She discovers that her mother is senile and at the same time is the ‘healer’ of Londontown. Her brother Phillip is in a position of power in the settlement, controlling access to the healer. Irene doesn’t like how people treat her when they realize she is Phillip’s sister and decides to move on.

Thirty years later, a traveling wizard who calls herself Grandmother, saves a settlement from an “animal wave” called a migration. In the process she picks up four young companions. Grandmother’s new companions are two warriors, a crafter and a young child. They were all born inside the structure and have never gone outside of it. Grandmother teaches them the secrets of magic she learned over her lifetime as they travel.

At the exit to the structure it is revealed that this Grandmother is an older Irene. In her time in the structure she has come to believe that it is a kind of game. She thinks the control system is undecided if humans are a type of animal or a player. She fears what will happen to the human race if Control decides humans are just animals.

She leads her party to her home, the generational ship Speedwell, still sitting on its landing pad in the high valley. Grandmother’s companions call the ship the wizard’s tower in the east.

Be sure to catch the second volume, Quest Rewards.

Although it is posted under a separate cover, there is no need to change over. I reposted the whole thing here, so you can just continue reading.