The Iron Trial Essay
Introduction
In The Iron Trial by Cassandra Clare and Holly Black, the authors write about a known troublemaker named Callum, who figures out he can do magic. Callum has no control in the beginning, but he puts his mind to it, and succeeds- which is the main idea of the book. In this companion book, you will read about the main characters, Tamara, Aaron, and Callum, the Magisterium, Constantine and Callum, Chaos Mages, and the Elements.
“All great changes are preceded by chaos.”
-Unknown
The Magisterium
The Magisterium is an underground magic school in Luray, Virginia. It is the primary setting in the story. There are many other Magisteriums in the world, but none are mentioned. It was founded by Phillippus Paracelsus. There are also safe …show more content…
houses and supply lines in other locations. In the Magisterium, there are complex systems of rivers, corridors, and tunnels. There is a grand and magical mood. “The floor was the same glittering mica he’d seen in the illusion back at the airplane hangar, but the walls were covered in flowstone, which made it look like thousands of melting candles had slicked the walls in dripped wax. Stalagmites rose up all along the edges of the room, and huge stalactites hung down, nearly touching one another in places.” (Black and Clare, page 62.) In order to get into the Magisterium, possible students must pass the Iron Trial. If they show signs of magic, they automatically pass, although some students try to get very high scores in order to get with the most prestigious master, Master Rufus. (Although Callum had no control over his magic and would be a quite a pain to teach, Master Rufus took him in as penance for something that happened to one of his students years ago.) Each student also gets a wristband with a piece of metal around it. Depending on what year you are, you get a different piece of metal. Each year also has different tunic colors.
Year
Metal
Tunic Color
1
Iron
Gray
2
Bronze
Green
3
Copper
Blue
4
Silver
White
5
Gold
Red
On each wristband, a student may have different colored gemstones. Each colored gemstone represents an element they have mastered. Red for fire, blue for water, white for air, green for earth, and black for chaos. There are four Masters by the end of book 1. They are Master Milagros, Master Rockmaple, Master Rufus, and Master Tanaka. Master Lemuel was fired because Drew lied about how he treated him.
Nature
There are five types of components to nature. Fire, water, air, earth, and chaos. “Fire wants to burn, water wants to flow, air wants to rise, earth wants to bind, and chaos wants to devour.” The author created these to contribute to the context of the story.
The mages at the Magisterium use magic to control these elements to make life easier, and to battle elementals. (Which will be explained.) But if used in the wrong way, (drawing too much power out of the elements) animals or people can be consumed by these elements. They are then called the Devoured. When the Devoured were human, their soul was burned away and replaced by the element they were consumed by. This shows the power of the elements. Because of the power, using these elements takes great concentration and control. All mages can eat something from an element to make them closer to it and perform the magic with ease. But this is dangerous. They can be overcome with the power and become a Devoured. Each mage is better at using magic to control one element than all the others. They are called [dominant element here] Mages. Fire, water, air, and earth mages are all pretty much equally common, but chaos mages are rare.
Master Rufus’s Apprentices
In this chapter you will read about the stories and the motivations of the three main characters and protagonists, Tamara, Callum, and Aaron.
Master Rufus is the most prestigious Master in the Magisterium. His students were Tamara, Aaron, and Callum. Even though he knew Callum would be hard to teach, because he had no control, he took taught him anyway as penance for another student. As you already read in the chapter about Callum and Constantine, Callum Hunt and Constantine Madden are technically the same person- Callum’s body has Constantine’s soul in it. Master Rufus had Constantine and Callum as students.
Aaron Stewart’s mother died when he was young, and his father left him, so he grew up in foster homes.
When he learned how to make dust mites dance, a girl saw him and told him about the Magisterium. He was excited, so he practiced magic and went and took the test. He passed. He and Tamara ranked first. He was very good at magic, even with zero teaching from a Master. He did well during his first year at the Magisterium. During a hike in the woods to find the missing Drew, him and other students (including Tamara and Callum) were attacked by a pack of chaos-ridden wolves. In an effort to save them, he accessed the void and learned he could perform chaos magic. This made him the Makari that everyone was waiting for, after the death of the last Makar, Verity Torres. But when Aaron was walking Callum’s new chaos-ridden pet dog outside, was taken to an abandoned bowling alley and tortured by Drew, who was actually a spy for the Enemy. Callum and Tamara realized he was missing, and, after killing Drew, rescued him. After being given time to recover, he walked through the Gate of Control with Tamara and Callum, making him a Copper Year. One of Aaron’s motivations is to become a great chaos mage on the side of the
Magisterium. Tamara Rajavi came from a strict family, with two older sisters, named Kimiya and Ravan. Because Ravan became a Devoured because of her magic at the Magisterium, Tamara didn’t want to cut corners as her sister had done, which is one of her motivations. Her parents are two Assembly (a group of high-ranking mages) members, so high expectations are put on her. When she was twelve, she went to the Iron Trial and ranked first, alongside Aaron. She is also skilled at magic and very smart. She was also a student of Master Rufus, and is now a Copper Year.
Callum Hunt was very young when his mother and uncle, Sarah and Declan, died in the Cold Massacre during the Third Mage War. Declan died protecting Sarah and Callum. His father, Alastair was still alive, so he was raised by him. He was known in his town to be angry, troublesome, and cranky. Because Sarah knew that Constantine Madden’s soul was in her child, she dropped him on the ice, causing his left leg to be permanently broken. No physical therapy or surgery could fix it. This caused him to walk with a sliding limp which makes him a slight target for teasing. At school, when Callum was provoked by bullies he accidentally made a small earthquake, Alastair found out. So he wouldn’t go to the Magisterium, Alastair made call hate magic and be afraid of it. But Callum’s mind changed once he got there. (After failing all the tests and ranking last in the Iron Trial.) When Callum was being taken away, Alastair threw Sarah’s knife, Semiramis, at him. (It would have hit him if Aaron wouldn’t have caught it.) Tamara later nicknames it Miri. Callum tried not to make friends at the Magisterium because he thought he wouldn’t be there long. But after his mind changed about magic he decided he would stay, even after figuring out he had the soul of Constantine Madden, which made him a chaos mage. After defeating wyverns and saving Aaron he realized that he wanted to stay for sure. He walked through the Gate of Control, then starting his Copper Year.
The prologue is a timeskip backwards, and it tells the scene of the Cold Massacre at La Rinconada, which is explained in Callum and Constantine’s chapter. The author did this to foreshadow what happened to Callum, and the Cold Massacre is mentioned numerous times during the book, so it is also to explain what happened there.
Constantine Madden and Callum Hunt
In this chapter you will read a summary of Constantine Madden and Callum Hunt, and why they are so similar. Constantine was a student at the Magisterium (until he escaped) and a chaos mage. He and his twin brother Jericho were obsessed with chaos magic, and knew practically everything about it. When Constantine was alive, he did lots of experiments with chaos, because back then, not much about it was known. He experimented with putting parts of the void into people and animals. He succeeded and created the first chaos-ridden humans and animals. He wanted to live forever, so people called him the Enemy of Death- the creator of the Enemy. But one of his experiments never worked. He could never figure out how to bring a dead person back to life. This drove him insane, because he desperately wanted Jericho to live again. Jericho, who was Constantine’s counterweight, was accidentally killed during an experiment. Jericho and Constantine were very good at magic- they were both in their Silver Year at 14. Callum Hunt is currently a student at the Magisterium. He is a bronze year at the end of book 1, having walked through the Gate of Control. Before he came to the Magisterium, he was a known troublemaker and also had a bad left leg that hadn’t been fixed so far. At his first couple days at the Magisterium, he is powerful but had little to no control over his magic. But there is something very similar about Constantine and Callum. They have the same soul. Constantine’s soul is in Callum’s body- making him a chaos mage, and the Enemy of Death. During the Third Mage War, in the Cold Massacre (in La Rinconada, South America), Constantine is laying in a cave with mortal wounds. In a last hope to stay alive, he transports his soul into a child also laying in the cave- Callum Hunt. Callum’s mother Sarah knows this is happening and scratches KILL THE CHILD into the cave floor with a dagger she made at the Magisterium, Semiramis (which Callum later gets when Alastair throws it at him). When Alastair reaches the cave, he knows what Sarah had meant. He had to kill Callum, but didn’t have the guts, so raised him to hate magic and be afraid of it. He also told Callum to fail the Iron Trial (but he failed at failing) just so Callum wouldn’t discover who he really was. However, Callum’s attitude about magic changes, and you can tell because he walks through the Gate of Control, which means his magic can’t be bound. Even though one of Callum’s best friends is Aaron Stewart, the other Makari (technically the enemy of Callum), he seems determined to not “become” Constantine, so he will use his magic for good. There would no longer any easy way to make the world safe from him. “To make sure he could never turn on Aaron. To Make sure he would never become Constantine Madden.” (Black and Clare, page 294.) Because Callum is not siding with the Enemy, this could be the final defeat of the Enemy of Death.
Chaos Mages
Chaos is by far the most powerful element of the five. Chaos mages are very rare and only one or two known chaos mages are born during a generation.
They are called Makari, or in singular form, a Makar. Chaos is harder to control and more rare, but is more powerful than all the other elements. It is a power feared above the other elements. When someone becomes a Chaos-Ridden (Devoured) their eyes swirl. Chaos-Ridden have no memories or personality. They are blank. Implementing parts of the void (Chaos) into someone causes them to go blank and mindlessly follow the commands of the person that “created” them.
Chaos magic is the void. Drawing from it is dangerous and hard. When a Makari is performing chaos magic, they need a counterweight, in case that they are about to be consumed by an element. Fire’s counterweight is water, air’s counterweight is earth, and the counterweight for chaos is another human’s life- the soul.
The known Chaos mages are Verity Torres (deceased- beheaded), Constantine Madden (body is deceased, soul is in Callum’s body), Callum Hunt, and Aaron Stewart.
The first chaos-ridden animals and humans were created at the Magisterium by Constantine Madden.
There is usually one chaos mage alive at one time- with the exception of Aaron Stewart and Callum Hunt. Verity Torres and Constantine don’t count, because Constantine was a chaos mage for six years before Verity was born. He would have been a chaos mage for 21 years once Verity showed affiliation with Chaos.
Conclusion
I hope this companion book informed you about the Magisterium, Nature, the three main characters, Constantine and Callum, and Chaos Mages.
In The Iron Trial by Cassandra Clare and Holly Black, the authors write about a known troublemaker named Callum, who figures out he can do magic. Callum has no control in the beginning, but he puts his mind to it, and succeeds- which is the main idea of the book. In this companion book, you will read about the main characters, Tamara, Aaron, and Callum, the Magisterium, Constantine and Callum, Chaos Mages, and the Elements.
“All great changes are preceded by chaos.”
-Unknown
The Magisterium
The Magisterium is an underground magic school in Luray, Virginia. It is the primary setting in the story. There are many other Magisteriums in the world, but none are mentioned. It was founded by Phillippus Paracelsus. There are also safe …show more content…
houses and supply lines in other locations. In the Magisterium, there are complex systems of rivers, corridors, and tunnels. There is a grand and magical mood. “The floor was the same glittering mica he’d seen in the illusion back at the airplane hangar, but the walls were covered in flowstone, which made it look like thousands of melting candles had slicked the walls in dripped wax. Stalagmites rose up all along the edges of the room, and huge stalactites hung down, nearly touching one another in places.” (Black and Clare, page 62.) In order to get into the Magisterium, possible students must pass the Iron Trial. If they show signs of magic, they automatically pass, although some students try to get very high scores in order to get with the most prestigious master, Master Rufus. (Although Callum had no control over his magic and would be a quite a pain to teach, Master Rufus took him in as penance for something that happened to one of his students years ago.) Each student also gets a wristband with a piece of metal around it. Depending on what year you are, you get a different piece of metal. Each year also has different tunic colors.
Year
Metal
Tunic Color
1
Iron
Gray
2
Bronze
Green
3
Copper
Blue
4
Silver
White
5
Gold
Red
On each wristband, a student may have different colored gemstones. Each colored gemstone represents an element they have mastered. Red for fire, blue for water, white for air, green for earth, and black for chaos. There are four Masters by the end of book 1. They are Master Milagros, Master Rockmaple, Master Rufus, and Master Tanaka. Master Lemuel was fired because Drew lied about how he treated him.
Nature
There are five types of components to nature. Fire, water, air, earth, and chaos. “Fire wants to burn, water wants to flow, air wants to rise, earth wants to bind, and chaos wants to devour.” The author created these to contribute to the context of the story.
The mages at the Magisterium use magic to control these elements to make life easier, and to battle elementals. (Which will be explained.) But if used in the wrong way, (drawing too much power out of the elements) animals or people can be consumed by these elements. They are then called the Devoured. When the Devoured were human, their soul was burned away and replaced by the element they were consumed by. This shows the power of the elements. Because of the power, using these elements takes great concentration and control. All mages can eat something from an element to make them closer to it and perform the magic with ease. But this is dangerous. They can be overcome with the power and become a Devoured. Each mage is better at using magic to control one element than all the others. They are called [dominant element here] Mages. Fire, water, air, and earth mages are all pretty much equally common, but chaos mages are rare.
Master Rufus’s Apprentices
In this chapter you will read about the stories and the motivations of the three main characters and protagonists, Tamara, Callum, and Aaron.
Master Rufus is the most prestigious Master in the Magisterium. His students were Tamara, Aaron, and Callum. Even though he knew Callum would be hard to teach, because he had no control, he took taught him anyway as penance for another student. As you already read in the chapter about Callum and Constantine, Callum Hunt and Constantine Madden are technically the same person- Callum’s body has Constantine’s soul in it. Master Rufus had Constantine and Callum as students.
Aaron Stewart’s mother died when he was young, and his father left him, so he grew up in foster homes.
When he learned how to make dust mites dance, a girl saw him and told him about the Magisterium. He was excited, so he practiced magic and went and took the test. He passed. He and Tamara ranked first. He was very good at magic, even with zero teaching from a Master. He did well during his first year at the Magisterium. During a hike in the woods to find the missing Drew, him and other students (including Tamara and Callum) were attacked by a pack of chaos-ridden wolves. In an effort to save them, he accessed the void and learned he could perform chaos magic. This made him the Makari that everyone was waiting for, after the death of the last Makar, Verity Torres. But when Aaron was walking Callum’s new chaos-ridden pet dog outside, was taken to an abandoned bowling alley and tortured by Drew, who was actually a spy for the Enemy. Callum and Tamara realized he was missing, and, after killing Drew, rescued him. After being given time to recover, he walked through the Gate of Control with Tamara and Callum, making him a Copper Year. One of Aaron’s motivations is to become a great chaos mage on the side of the
Magisterium. Tamara Rajavi came from a strict family, with two older sisters, named Kimiya and Ravan. Because Ravan became a Devoured because of her magic at the Magisterium, Tamara didn’t want to cut corners as her sister had done, which is one of her motivations. Her parents are two Assembly (a group of high-ranking mages) members, so high expectations are put on her. When she was twelve, she went to the Iron Trial and ranked first, alongside Aaron. She is also skilled at magic and very smart. She was also a student of Master Rufus, and is now a Copper Year.
Callum Hunt was very young when his mother and uncle, Sarah and Declan, died in the Cold Massacre during the Third Mage War. Declan died protecting Sarah and Callum. His father, Alastair was still alive, so he was raised by him. He was known in his town to be angry, troublesome, and cranky. Because Sarah knew that Constantine Madden’s soul was in her child, she dropped him on the ice, causing his left leg to be permanently broken. No physical therapy or surgery could fix it. This caused him to walk with a sliding limp which makes him a slight target for teasing. At school, when Callum was provoked by bullies he accidentally made a small earthquake, Alastair found out. So he wouldn’t go to the Magisterium, Alastair made call hate magic and be afraid of it. But Callum’s mind changed once he got there. (After failing all the tests and ranking last in the Iron Trial.) When Callum was being taken away, Alastair threw Sarah’s knife, Semiramis, at him. (It would have hit him if Aaron wouldn’t have caught it.) Tamara later nicknames it Miri. Callum tried not to make friends at the Magisterium because he thought he wouldn’t be there long. But after his mind changed about magic he decided he would stay, even after figuring out he had the soul of Constantine Madden, which made him a chaos mage. After defeating wyverns and saving Aaron he realized that he wanted to stay for sure. He walked through the Gate of Control, then starting his Copper Year.
The prologue is a timeskip backwards, and it tells the scene of the Cold Massacre at La Rinconada, which is explained in Callum and Constantine’s chapter. The author did this to foreshadow what happened to Callum, and the Cold Massacre is mentioned numerous times during the book, so it is also to explain what happened there.
Constantine Madden and Callum Hunt
In this chapter you will read a summary of Constantine Madden and Callum Hunt, and why they are so similar. Constantine was a student at the Magisterium (until he escaped) and a chaos mage. He and his twin brother Jericho were obsessed with chaos magic, and knew practically everything about it. When Constantine was alive, he did lots of experiments with chaos, because back then, not much about it was known. He experimented with putting parts of the void into people and animals. He succeeded and created the first chaos-ridden humans and animals. He wanted to live forever, so people called him the Enemy of Death- the creator of the Enemy. But one of his experiments never worked. He could never figure out how to bring a dead person back to life. This drove him insane, because he desperately wanted Jericho to live again. Jericho, who was Constantine’s counterweight, was accidentally killed during an experiment. Jericho and Constantine were very good at magic- they were both in their Silver Year at 14. Callum Hunt is currently a student at the Magisterium. He is a bronze year at the end of book 1, having walked through the Gate of Control. Before he came to the Magisterium, he was a known troublemaker and also had a bad left leg that hadn’t been fixed so far. At his first couple days at the Magisterium, he is powerful but had little to no control over his magic. But there is something very similar about Constantine and Callum. They have the same soul. Constantine’s soul is in Callum’s body- making him a chaos mage, and the Enemy of Death. During the Third Mage War, in the Cold Massacre (in La Rinconada, South America), Constantine is laying in a cave with mortal wounds. In a last hope to stay alive, he transports his soul into a child also laying in the cave- Callum Hunt. Callum’s mother Sarah knows this is happening and scratches KILL THE CHILD into the cave floor with a dagger she made at the Magisterium, Semiramis (which Callum later gets when Alastair throws it at him). When Alastair reaches the cave, he knows what Sarah had meant. He had to kill Callum, but didn’t have the guts, so raised him to hate magic and be afraid of it. He also told Callum to fail the Iron Trial (but he failed at failing) just so Callum wouldn’t discover who he really was. However, Callum’s attitude about magic changes, and you can tell because he walks through the Gate of Control, which means his magic can’t be bound. Even though one of Callum’s best friends is Aaron Stewart, the other Makari (technically the enemy of Callum), he seems determined to not “become” Constantine, so he will use his magic for good. There would no longer any easy way to make the world safe from him. “To make sure he could never turn on Aaron. To Make sure he would never become Constantine Madden.” (Black and Clare, page 294.) Because Callum is not siding with the Enemy, this could be the final defeat of the Enemy of Death.
Chaos Mages
Chaos is by far the most powerful element of the five. Chaos mages are very rare and only one or two known chaos mages are born during a generation.
They are called Makari, or in singular form, a Makar. Chaos is harder to control and more rare, but is more powerful than all the other elements. It is a power feared above the other elements. When someone becomes a Chaos-Ridden (Devoured) their eyes swirl. Chaos-Ridden have no memories or personality. They are blank. Implementing parts of the void (Chaos) into someone causes them to go blank and mindlessly follow the commands of the person that “created” them.
Chaos magic is the void. Drawing from it is dangerous and hard. When a Makari is performing chaos magic, they need a counterweight, in case that they are about to be consumed by an element. Fire’s counterweight is water, air’s counterweight is earth, and the counterweight for chaos is another human’s life- the soul.
The known Chaos mages are Verity Torres (deceased- beheaded), Constantine Madden (body is deceased, soul is in Callum’s body), Callum Hunt, and Aaron Stewart.
The first chaos-ridden animals and humans were created at the Magisterium by Constantine Madden.
There is usually one chaos mage alive at one time- with the exception of Aaron Stewart and Callum Hunt. Verity Torres and Constantine don’t count, because Constantine was a chaos mage for six years before Verity was born. He would have been a chaos mage for 21 years once Verity showed affiliation with Chaos.
Conclusion
I hope this companion book informed you about the Magisterium, Nature, the three main characters, Constantine and Callum, and Chaos Mages.