The dim light from outside her small window burned her eyes. “Mmm…” Emilie groaned from her bed. Her body was sore. It felt like she'd been tied to the back of that jail carriage and dragged all the way back to her room. Using mana to enhance your abilities was always risky, even sword technique users could suffer from it. Though, at least those users were used to using their bodies. They’d have muscle and bone built up that could handle the strain. Emilie was a scholar, not a fighter. At least, not a physical one. Stretching, she attempted to pull herself out of bed, an attempt that was thwarted by a sudden shock of new pain in her legs as they both cramped, tight. With a painful thud, it dropped her to the floor.
"Owww…" She groaned. Looking down at her legs, it was clear both were a bit swollen, and her right leg in particular had a modest size bruise on it. Certainly, from that speed spell she had cast in a hurry. Magic as always had its limitations, but even with those limitations it could far exceed what the human body could do. For better and for worse, and right now certainly for the worst.
Laying on the hard wood floor she ran over her schedule of the days ahead in her head, hoping to focus on something other than the additional pain she felt. This was the last day of the school week for Emilie, with classes done it was now time to test her skills in at least two of her classes.
Sanedeg and Ostarideg would be days off for her, or at least they would have been if not for the demerits. She'd have to spend at least part of each paying those debts off. Maybe she could find a way to drop more than one demerit in day? Then again, taking one of those days for resting would be nice, she still had a quarter of that book to get through too.
The tight cramping in her legs began to pull back as they twitched and finally stopped as the muscles released, leaving her legs even more sore than before. Her fist tapped on the wooden floor a few times in frustration. This college was beginning to seem harder than she expected.
It wasn't that the classes were particularly hard nor the assignments, at least not yet. It's that it would be so easy to just sleep in, so easy to just take a break and read something fun. Without anyone here to really check on her, why should she even go to class? If she was a prodigy, like some had said to her, then why care at all. She was already more powerful than most of the students here. Yesterday showed that much to her. Despite being caught and given the demerits, the fact that she had done what even the city's freelancers couldn't do floated to her head more than once last night.
Who cared if a few of the students were bullying her, surely, she could win in a fight against any of them!
"Be careful of arrogance, it can eat at you and undermine everything you've built." An annoying voice crept into her head as she lay on the floor daydreaming of her own power. It was a moral from one of Reese's many stories. A story she couldn't remember, because she hadn't been paying attention well besides that last part anyway. He would go on about the most pointless nonsense, that she learned to tune most of it out. But, that thought resonated with her right now. It still felt like he was injecting himself into her life, and she hated it.
Sighing, Emilie finally got up off the floor on shaky legs. All she was doing right now was sulking about yesterday and those damn demerits, she knew that. Things would be fine, she just had to keep moving forward.
Wrapping herself in her new cloak filled her with warmth in the cold room. Maybe she'd wear it even when inside her room, it was nice. Like a personal blanket that would follow her. It also let her wear something more comfortable than that unwieldy dress underneath.
Distant bells chimed the time, it was seven in the morning, a bit later than she’d usually leave her room. Despite the practicums today, there was no rush. No one who missed the week's classes would know what to do for them, so it wouldn't make any sense for them to show up. Tallin's class would be who was showed up for at least one of them, being it was outside it wouldn’t have the same capacity limitations as his classroom. At least, she hoped it wouldn’t. Maybe it would be best to arrive a little early, just in case.
The cafeteria was unusually empty for this time of day. Not that there weren’t any students there, because obviously there were. But many seats were empty, even a few tables had no one sitting at them. A strange sight indeed.
One table caught her eye because sitting at it, was a particular halfling girl with red hair tied to the sides, Morgan. Of course she waved over to Emilie despite being nearly done with her squash cakes.
"I heard about your adventure in the city yesterday. You ready for today?"
"How did you hear about it? Only Younehti was with me, I don't think she'd tell anyone."
"You kidding? Half the school saw you come in on the police carriage, and a few of the students working the library overheard somethings. Like you two taking out a bunch of bandits."
"Great. Something else for them to make fun of." Emilie's voice carried a sarcastic tone, but beneath was more than a little worry.
"Eh, I don't think they'll make fun of you for that. Your stories didn't sound believable, but a bunch of people saw you come in, and those rumors spread pretty quick."
Emilie played with the unusually bouncy cakes, "It's getting late, you don't think we'll be in trouble with Defensive Magics?"
“Nah, I don't think Tallin is going to kick people out of the practicums today. He’s going to want to show everyone how bad they all are at light and dark magics.”
“He seems like a real jerk.”
Morgan laughed, “Yeah, he is. Some of the older students have talked about him. He came from nowhere and doesn’t have any family.”
That was surprising, and Emilie took her attention away from the unpalatable mass in front of her to focus “I figured all the mages here were from well off families. I mean, books and learning isn't cheap.”
“He’s an orphan, it’s not just lacking a name, supposedly he has no family. But the other mages seem to respect him, something about the research he did when he lived in Aggeon. Or was it Mixx? Plus he's very skilled. There's a lot of rumors about him, not sure how much I believe, but that bit seems true enough.”
After breakfast the two continued to sit in the dinning hall, discussing trivialities of school life. Morgan was a wealth of information, it was like she had ears everywhere. "I have to make up for my lack of strength somewhere." Was her response to such inquiries.
The morning grew long and eventually, it was time to venture out into the snowy cold for the last events of the week.The ground outside looked very different from just yesterday. A thin layer of white powder covered the grass and dirt paths, and painted the world in white and gray hues. Around her, flurries continued to fall at a modest pace. Given a few hours, there would likely be several inches of snow on the ground, maybe even a foot.
A quick breeze caused Emilie to pull her cloak further into herself. Even her dress wouldn't have held up well to these temperatures. The demerits seemed ever more worth it.
"You coming?" Morgan's call brought Emilie out of her snowy trance.
The auxiliary amphitheater was another name for the front of the north Auxiliary building's exterior. The stairs were set up to act as seats and in the middle was a large stone circle where a mage might lecture from. At least, there should be a stone circle there, the snow made it hard to tell.
Tallin arrived soon after they did and wasted no time, "Ok, it's cold and it's snowing. I know none of you want to be out here anymore than me, so let's begin. You two, Culushus and Vvex."
The black panther and one of the elf students headed to the stone circle.
"As explained earlier, one of you will cast the dispel spell you were given on Dunladeg. You are expected to cast it in full, and disrupt your opponent's spell. Any failure to do so will be meet with a failing grade. Let's begin, Vvex attack Culushus."
Taking a moment, the panther pulled out a sheet of paper and read off the incantation. It was very subtle, but a small purple light seemed to emanate off the panther. Quickly following that, the elf girl tried to hit him with a rather strong wind spell that barely materialized. It carried a large gust that seemed to just piddle out before glancing across his body. " Culushus, acceptable. Barely. Vvex, your turn to defend, Culushus attack."
Vvex didn’t use an outside aid and tried to pull everything from her own memory. The cast seemed correct except Vvex spell didn't create any kind of glow. In fact, it didn't feel like anything happened. A fact confirmed as Culushus' own wind spell caused the elf girl to fall to the ground with the crunch of fresh snow.
"Vvex, fail… A reminder, you are allowed to draw a scroll to aid in your casting. Those that didn’t do that this time, remember for the future. Ok next students, you two…" For the next half hour Tallin pulled students seemingly at random and had them face off against each other.
“Fail… Fail… Fail… acceptable…” And so it went, out of the 32 students who managed to show up at the outside amphitheater, only seven had passed the test so far, all of them required self-produced scrolls to aid them. They were getting down to the last few, and Emilie was hopeful she'd be able to face off against her friend. But, it was not meant to be.
“You two next, Morgan and Lootan”
Lootan was a human and judging from how his cast felt not a particularly capable mage. Morgan’s water spell barely diminished as it left the boy rather wet, and quite a bit colder than a few minutes ago. “Damn it, I wasn’t ready.”
Tallin shot him down quickly, “Lootan fail. You failed to cast the spell Lootan, that’s all there is to it.”
The boy seemed to bite his tongue as Morgan threw up her own spell. He barely waited for her to finish before a small fireball shot forth and dissipated on Morgan’s dispel.
“Morgan pass… Lootan, you’re getting three demerits for that. I said no dangerous spells.”
The boy stormed off, leaving the group of students.
Emilie was still a bit disappointed that she wouldn’t be facing off against her friend but was at least a little happy that Morgan had managed to pass this practicum.
“Emilie, Chicello Your next.”
Emilie hadn’t talked or worked with the Anthro girl at all. In fact, she didn't see much of her either as she always seemed to wear a hood. When the girl finally pulled back her hood her mixed race heritage became more apparent. She was something of a humanoid cat, and her deep amber yellow hair and golden eyes showed where her name came from.
“Hmmm, you can hit me first.” The half Anthro offered to Emilie.
Taking a moment to think of a spell, Emilie knew that normal cats hate water, so that seemed like a good spell to try. Chicello spoke slowly and closed her eyes as she called forth the enchantment, unlike the other student, she didn’t seem to need or want to use a scroll. Her spell didn’t seem particularly strong, given how the mana was still flowing around her. Perhaps that was a mistake on her end?
Without any words, Emilie threw her fairly large water bolt forward and watched as it shrank and splashed away just a few inches from the cat girl’s body.
“Chicello, acceptable…. But don’t close your eyes when casting spells. Our focus is on magic defense, but closing your eyes just invites a physical attack.” Tallin’s chiding caused the other girl to look downward in embarrassment.
Now it was Emilie’s turn. In her mind, she could remember the glyph, and like Chicello didn’t bother to use any aid. She had spent some time last night and Dunladeg eve casting and recasting this spell. It was possible to do silently, but for some reason, it seemed to be more powerful when she said something with it. So that’s what she did, incanting the spell, mostly, correct.
A large burst of wind ripped towards her, carrying large clumps of surrounding snow. As quickly as her water spell dispersed, so to did the wind spell. In the end only a handful of flurries passed by her.
By all accounts, she had succeed in disbursing the spell. Why then did Tallin seem disappointed in the result?
"You didn't do the full incantation. Why?" Tallin's face held his usual scowl, it was hard to tell if there was anything else behind it or if it was just his resting pissed off face.
Emilie smiled, hoping her skills might impress the otherwise terse instructor. After all, she was impressed with herself. “I was able to cast the spell without it. Usually, I only say enough to cast the spell."
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"Do you remember what I said in class about experimenting and changing these spells?"
Of course she knew, but did it really matter? After all she had managed to cast a working spell. "Don't do it?"
Tallin lowered his head in frustration. "I can see you don’t understand. Chicello, please sit back down… Emilie, I want you to stay in the circle, and cast that spell again."
The flow of mana around Tallin showed Emilie she didn't have much time as she frantically tried to raise her dispel again. Tallin threw something at her, it was hard and it was fast. It was so quick; she barely had enough time to raise the dark spell. Never before had she felt a spell like it as it pierced through her barrier, all her nerves suddenly screamed in pain as her body was wracked by something horrendous. The impact itself was hard enough to throw her to the ground.
Throughout her body, foreign mana flowed, destabilizing her own. It felt like she was being consumed as her body twitched. Until, it just stopped. The spell felt like an eternity but in truth less than a second had passed. Laying on her back Emilie tried not to weep and cry; she wasn’t fully successful.
“I’m impressed you’re still conscious. Truly. You must have an enormous gate to withstand that hit, given how poorly you cast the spell I gave you.”
He wasn’t wrong, she could almost feel some of the attenuation in the spell when it hit her. The dispel effect was present, it just wasn’t complete.
A few snickers and laughs grew in the crowd.
Tallin locked eyes on two students Jasbin who was laughing and Villow who seemed far more solemn about the event. “I see most of you need to learn this lesson too. You two are next, but you'll be blocking my spell instead of each others.”
“Are we not facing off against each other?” Villow asked with more than a bit of concern as she watched Emilie hobble up from the ground on shaky, painful legs.
“No. You’re both going to help make the point for me.” Tallin turned to the usually smug Jasbin first, who finally seemed to have some sense about him as he fidgeted nervously in the circle.
“Uh, so I just need to cast this spell.” Jasbin mumbled as he read over his own scroll and tried to bring up the dispel effect with limited ability. It didn't seem to work. “No wait, let me try again-“
“No.” Tallin spoke as he fired off the same spell that hit Emilie.
“Eeiii-“ Jasbin wailed in a particularly high pitched squeal as he feel to the ground twitching in unconscious pain, seemingly dead and yet still breathing.
“Jasbin, fail.” Tallin turned to Villow and seemed to give her just a bit more time to properly cast her dispel incantation. A light flash emanated from her body, something Emilie didn’t see when she cast her own version.
Tallin didn’t give any notice before he fired that demandable spell again. It struck Villow's dispel barrier hard, and she almost fell from the initial impact, but then, it was over. There was no pain, just that damned impact.
Tallin nodded at the elf girl, “Villow, acceptable.”
“Class, I want all of you to look at this. Villow is by all accounts unremarkable in her spell casting abilities. Her gate isn’t particularly large, or that ordered. Yet, she is still standing after I hit her."
Villow huffed at what seemed like a back handed complement.
Tallin ignored her and continued. "Dark magic and light magic are not like element magics. Your mana alone isn’t enough. If you don’t craft your spells right, they will fail, and you will die. Those of you who laughed at either Emilie or Jasbin should be thanking them. They have given you two real example to learn from. Their example might have saved one of your lives.”
There were only four more students to go, and the results, were about what you’d expect, “Fail, acceptable, Fail, Fail…”
With the final students done, Tallin made a few last notes in his book, before dismissing everyone. The practicum was scheduled for a full hour, they had only used about forty minutes of that. Leaving plenty of time for lunch. Such as it would be.
“Emilie…" Tallin called to her before she could leave the theater, "You failed today. Do you understand why?”
“Because I didn’t follow instructions.” Her voice was flat, as she steeled her emotions.
“That’s half of it. You have one of the largest gates I’ve seen, but also not the largest. If you don’t cast the spells I’m giving you correctly you won’t just fail, you’ll die.” He didn't seem to expect or want a response.
But it bothered her, “How are you able to silently cast them then?” It didn't make sense how could you cast a spell exactly if you took liberties with casting it?
“A lifetime of practice, but even in my mind, I say the full incantation.”
The answer felt defeating. Her usual assumptions and methods weren't going to work in this class and she'd need to try harder in the future. It was just another painful lesson from this week. “I’m sorry.” Was all she could meekly squeak.
“Don’t be sorry. That helps no one. Just do better.” It was hard to tell because of how scared his face was, but it almost looked like Tallin’s natural smirk had grown. Like he was trying to smile. It was kind of creepy.
Tallin scratched at the scar on his face. It seemed like smiling was physically uncomfortable. “I understand you have several demerits from yesterday. I’ll have one taken off for being a willing example today.”
That at least was welcome bit of news and wasn't what she was expecting to hear. “Thank you! What about Jasbin?” Emilie looked at the pitiful student still laying in the snow, twitching occasionally.
“…That fool deserves demerits for his lack of skill.”
The walk back toward the dorm and cafeteria was a solemn one.
“Emilie, you ok?” Morgan had waited just around the corner of the library keep. Seemingly to check up on her.
It took her a moment to think about Morgan's question. Failure wasn’t a bad thing. Failure was how we learn, how we grow. The simple truth is, if you already knew the answer, there was nothing to learn. It was something Reese had said to her a few times or something like that. It still fucking hurt though.
“Failure isn’t a bad thing, so long as you learn from it. It still sucks.” She summarized her current mood to her friend. Morgan smirked in return, and gave her a friendly pat on the head. "Do you think they'll have anything good for lunch?"
The halfling snorted as she wandered off to the questionable substance, they would not doubt sever them today.
A bit over an hour later, and they were outside again in the snow. Which was coming down even faster now. Already there was almost a half-foot on the ground.
The yard's amphitheater was cold, no one bothered to set the fire magic enchantments. Or perhaps there was a deeper reason for them being off? Regardless, the stone theater was just as covered in snow as was everything else.
In the distance, an older student wheeled over a moderate size stone object, and a chalkboard. The stone was an obelisk of some kind. Given the pre-existing scorch marks and damage, it seemed likely to be the target they would be using.
Not far behind it, was mage Bragmond. Who appeared wrapped in both a robe and some additional clothing behind it. "Bah… I'm used to the tropics, not the cold of the north. I'm sure you'll all be happy to get these practical's done as quickly as possible. I know I will."
No one complained. As Bragmond, picked out a random student to start. "Remember, your goal is to fire off this glyph with your own incantation." He tapped at the already drawn symbol on the board.
A student who Emilie hadn't really interacted with walked up and began to cast his spell. "Come to me, heat and fire, flow to me fire and… flame. Twist and turn, flame twister!" Despite his stumbling, a small stream of fire mana spread from his hand and twisted it's way to the target.
Bragmond opened a book he was carrying and tapped at the inside, "… Student remind me of your name?"
"Uh, Asovolt."
"Asovolt, acceptable. But make sure you make a better incantation in the future, and don't pause. That was feeble for the mana you put into it."
"Next."
Student after student, all but a handful of were able to fire off something. Most of those passed, though a few couldn't quite hit the target."
"Fail."
Finally, it came time for Emilie's turn. Unlike the previous few days, there were no snickers or laughter, but there were still a few whispers. For a second, she thought about the glyph and incantation she came up with. Emilie knew she could silently cast it if she wanted to, but that wasn't the goal of this exercise. She didn't want a repeat of her last class.
The glyph started with a flame symbol, so that's where her mind went first, "Fire and flame" Another flame symbol added more heat and fire, "heat and vengeance. Burn and sunder," A set of three lines would manifest the mana, turned about by their own curves, "blaze forth and turn about." One final flame symbol ended the glyph, creating an asymmetry and pushed the mana forward, "Drill into the depths and burst forth. Fire Drill."
The flame was tightly wound, as she pushed as much mana into it as she could, it grew into a conflagration, a fire storm forced into a tight corridor that vaporized the outside of the impact spot, digging deep into the stone. The stone and marble obelisk quickly shattered from the stress. The detonation sent a small shock wave through the crowd of students. Several stood there in stunned silence as they watched the dust and smoke float away, from the once solid object.
A smile crossed her face. That felt good, particularly after her last class.
"Emilie, very good." Not just acceptable, but 'Very good'. Her smile only grew.
"But, there's no need to use that much mana in your spells. We aren't trying to destroy things in this class. You want to do that take a battle magic course in the spring and summer."
Emilie's smile fell a bit, but she was still impressed with herself.
Bragmon sighed, and waved over his teaching aid, “Go find a replacement, fast.”
Around her, the students continued to whisper.
"Did you see that?"
"Dude, I could barely cast mine."
"She had to cheat, didn't she?"
"How? You saw it. Plus, the bandits yesterday..."
The various conversations helped her to hold on to that smile for a bit longer.
A tap on her back, and Morgan was standing behind her smiling as well. "Feel better?"
Emilie couldn't laugh, but she did. A bit.
"Who cares… fucking dragon slayer." One voice in the crowd still seemed to mock her. The boy with the cat like eyes, Eoltan. Emilie was finding him to be a most unagreeable person. Not that it mattered. How powerful could he really be?
Three more students went, only one couldn't manage to cast anything, and then, it was Eoltan's turn.
The boy of mix blood held up his hand and spoke his own incantation, a sudden shockwave blew through the crowd. His mana was different from hers. It felt chaotic. Like it wasn't focused, but it was strong. The flame from his hand was unsteady, as it wavered but it was hot. Possibly hotter than hers.
She didn't want to think it, but it almost felt stronger than what she did. At least in terms of raw power, his gate was certainly massive, but it was also much less organized than hers.
"Looks like we're not that different, dragon slayer." Eoltan mock Emilie one more time as he walked away from the test to the back of the group of students. Yet, despite his words or maybe because of them, it felt like maybe they had crossed a point. He was unlikely to ever be friendly with her, but maybe that meant they could tolerate each other?
"Eoltan, very good. But again, control your mana output in the future. None of the spells we're casting here need that much power.” Bragmond watched as the stone obelisk collapsed in a broken pile. Again, he sighed and motioned for his aid to get a replacement. “The next student who breaks the target will fail and get demerits. Am I clear?”
Of course, there was no real risk of that. The strongest of the class had already gone.
With the final student done, Bragmond made the last mark in his book.
"Acceptable, barely…" A gust of wind and a sudden wall of snow impacted the group as the last student, barely casted their spell. "Ok, practicum is over. I want to get out of this damn cold, as I'm sure you all do too. Those that passed, good, if you didn't, try harder." Another gust seemed to push the mage back and away from the test.
Unfortunately, his teaching aid was not so lucky as he still had to clean up.
A gust of wind blew through the court yard again, kicking up clouds of additional snow. The storm was picking up, and even through her thick cloak she could feel the nip of the air. The walk back to her room was nice at least. No one was whispering behind her. A few glanced at her way but otherwise they seemed to leave her alone.
Maybe they'd all leave her alone now.
Back in the dorms, Emilie couldn't help but sulk a bit. She still had a couple dozen pages to read before Momadeg, and she should probably look at working on her demerits but she just couldn't bring herself to do anything at the moment. The thoughts of failing one of her first assignments still weighed on her mind.
A rumbling stomach took her mind away from the unsolvable issue at hand. It was early, but maybe some food might help clear her head. It would certainly clear other things out.
In the cafeteria, they were serving stew. It had bit of squash and as she swirled her spoon about, perhaps some kind of meat as well? It was hard to tell, maybe they were just stringy mushroom. She hated this cafeteria. Maybe she could sneak out again and visit that bakery. Emilie could feel tears welling up in her, at the loss of that soup and sweet bread. She should have at least taken the bread with her.
"Hey, you ok?" Younehti's voice caused Emilie's head to perk up.
"I was just thinking about that soup from yesterday… and comparing it to… this." She lifted her spoon out of the sloop and watched as it seemed to stick just a bit too well to the metal contrivance.
"Ha! I understand that. His food is good. Don't think it's worth crying over though?"
A sigh escaped Emilie, and her head suddenly felt heavy as it tilted down, “No, I also failed a practicum.”
“Oh? I wouldn’t worry about it. Each one won't matter all that much. They’re more for your own growth.” Younehti took little time before she began to literally gulp down the thick liquid right from the bowl.
The thunking sound of a bowl echoed next to the two of them "The goblin's right you know." It was the halfling, Morgan took up a seat next to her and began to eat the questionable substance.
“But if I don’t get an acceptable result?”
Younehti beamed and was able to answer this one from experience, “You’ll have to defend that at the end of the term, sure. But just showing your interviewers how you’ve grown and understand is all you need. You'd be in trouble if you failed everyone, but one or two, everyone does that.”
Morgan smiled across the table hoping for a welcome from the goblin, "I don't think we've meet yet? I'm Morgan."
"Younehti!" The green skinned girl held out a heavy arm to shake the much smaller halfling's.
The whole exchange was nice, and a small smile spread over Emilie as she watched her two friends talking with each other. It felt, like Wollseeth with Reese and Gezal or maybe Samil and Venginn.
“Mind if I sit here?” Another set of familiar faces as Noss and Kinkluie came up and tried to sit in the open seats next to them. Kinkluie didn't really seem that interested in sitting there, but it was clear that Noss was, enthusiastic about it.
"Noss, you and your short stacks." The white wolf whispered under his breath. Emilie remembered him saying something similar earlier in the week.
It left her wondering though, "What's a short stack?"
“Emilie, see this is what I mean when I talk about mana feedback.” Younehti nearly shoved the drawing in front of her as she tried to finish dinner.
“Oh, can I see?” Noss practically crawled on top of her to get at the drawing.
“You know Noss, Younehti would be happy to take you back to her room and show you the rest of them.” Kinkluie teased. But the smile on Younehti's face seemed, different then usual. Maybe she wasn't opposed to it?
Of course every day wouldn’t be like this every day. They weren’t best friends or anything like that. But, for today at least, this was fun. Being around the people she had started to trust. People that maybe she could call friends, one day.
The first snow storm of the year came down outside. It was still autumn, all be it late autumn, and still cold, growing colder each day. Maybe it was just her new cloak, but the cold didn’t feel quite so bad anymore.
At the final end of the day back in her room once more, she sat in front of the note to her family and for the last time added just a bit more too it,
“This week has been hard, but despite it all, I’ve made some friends. It’s going to be difficult here, I'm sorry today I already earned some demerits, but I think I'm going to make it after all. I just have to keep working at it.
I miss all of you, please write back,
Emilie"
Now it felt done.
Folding the letter, she sealed it with a tiny bit of wax provided in her desk. There was nothing fancy like a coat of arms or sigil. Just a lump of hard wax, and a destination written on the front. She’d have to find a place to mail it by courier. But that could wait till next week, she’d have to find time between her demerits and classes.
She wrapped her self up in her new cloak and with a smile she thought, ‘worth it.’