In the world of Cala, magic is split into three separate types: Mental, Elemental, and Fundamental magics. Anyone who has a magical affinity is a mage. Those who have an education and training become sorcerers and sorceresses. Mages, particularly the powerful ones, have a lower life expectancy than sorcerers or normal people. Without training, magic quickly grows unmanageable and can kill the user by accident. The greater the education of the sorcerer, the stronger and more dangerous the magic. Even a weak sorcerer can outmatch a powerful mage.

Mental

Telekinesis & Telepathy

In its most basic form, every mage can use telekinesis to manipulate objects around them. The amount of effort involved varies with the strength of the mage. Sorcerers all start their training with mastery of telekinesis. The most proficient telekinetics are referred interchangeably referred to as air sorcerers.

Telepathy is a rare skill, yet all sorcerers train to protect themselves from an encounter with one. Self discipline is a core tenet of magic training. As part of this, a sorcerer trains to build walls around their minds. To feel the auras of others around them and to understand if/when another is trying to influence their mind.

Telepaths live under different rules than other sorcerers. While sorcerers are allowed to live freely in Shai’Khal, telepaths are confined to sorcery schools. Those who refuse to live in schools are put to death.

Elemental

Earth, Fire, and Ice magic fall into this category. There are air sorcerers, these are powerful telekinetics and not included in the elemental category. The most powerful elementals are able to control these elements on a grand scale (such as the weather and environment reacting to unconscious stimuli such as emotions).
Elemental affinity overlap, where a sorcerer can control more than one, has only been noted when a sorcerer has been possessed by a djinn.

Earth

Earth mages and sorcerers are able to control and change the stone, dirt, sand, etc around them. While unable to conjure stone out of thin air, they are able to manipulate most of the world around them (from natural to man-made structures). These sorcerers are highly sought after as architects and miners. Their magic is the most stable and permanent in the effect it has on the landscape and world around them.

Fire

These mages and sorcerers are able to create, control, and dispel flames. An unpredictable magic, it is the easiest magic to lose control over. While dangerous, it is an extraordinarily useful magic. From practical uses in cooking, to more artistic collaborations with earth sorcerers for glass and pottery, fire magic is rarely viewed with terror.

Ice

Particularly in the deserts of Shai’Khal, ice magic is highly coveted. Defined by the ability to create water, all but the weakest mages can turn water into ice. Ice sorcerers are favored by merchants and travelers, able to preserve fresh food for longer and summon drinking and bathing water for long journeys. Traversing the heart of the Sarafi Desert would be impossible without the help of ice sorcerers.

Fundamental

Fundamental magics work off the foundations of the world: Time, Light, Death (Necromancy) and Life (Healing). Healing magic is the only commonplace fundamental magic. Time and Light are opposite fundamentals and will not be found in the same mage; neither will Necromancy and Healing.

Time

Those with time affinity can affect the speed of time around them, slowing it down or speeding it up accordingly. No one has been recorded with this ability other than the Gods.

Light

A rare ability, mages with this affinity are able to bend light and create shadows at will. Sorcerers with this skill are coveted spies, thieves, assassins, and guards. The skill is quite rare, most born with this affinity are never properly trained into sorcerers.

Necromancy

Second only to telepathy, necromancy is the most stigmatized magic and likely the most feared. Magic manifests in the young, which causes most necromancers to go insane at a young age from the voices and oppressive feeling of constantly being surrounded. For the few who find appropriate schooling, they learn the voices are ghosts and the feeling is the soul of others around them. Necromancers have the ability to draw on the powers of Alhanem, to create portals between the world of the living and that of the damned. As such, they are often prey to the influence of djinns. Well trained sorcerers may be able to reverse decay, making them sometimes useful to healers handling gangrenous limbs.

Healing

Perhaps the most coveted and useful magic, healing magic is the only prolific fundamental magic. healing magic works with the body to repair damage caused by illness or physical injuries. While generally a safe magic, it can only be used in short bursts on any given person or else run the risk of killing both the user and recipient from exhaustion. Healing magic cannot fix everything, and with an unskilled healer can create more problems than it solves (such as accidentally growing tumors).