Both Arthur and Calavia had a few minutes of fun talking about everything they had gotten up to since they last saw each other. Calavia had apparently spent a bit of time with her brother as he came to visit for a few days before he returned to his post, other than that however she simply continued her job as a healer in the slums of the southern district.

“What about you Arthur, I hope you went as boring as I was these past few months.” Calavia inquired after explaining what she did over the last three months.

“Well, I did quite a few things actually. Some of which were a little less than legal so I would appreciate it if you kept quiet about it.” Calavia looked at Arthur with confusion at that statement, while he didn’t say what he did was illegal the phrasing definitely insinuated that.

“So you know those criminals that have grouped together for their own mutual gain.” Calavia nodded, she had to deal with some of those that they injured quite regularly for a while, though it did stop almost abruptly and hadn’t quite picked up to where it was before. “Well I killed their leadership all in one swoop, I did this by ambushing them when they were having a meeting in a cheap tavern nearby.” Calavia’s eye opened wide at this statement, if he was telling the truth then this would mean that Arthur practically shut down the strongest resurgence of the criminal underworld on his own.

“Wait, you killed them? What happened after that?” While she was happy that the criminals were shut down she was also a little worried about who Arthur even managed to kill them all.

“First I figured out when their meetings were, then when I was ready I disguised myself and snuck to the tavern around an hour before the meeting was scheduled to happen. To blend in and keep my cover I had breakfast and waited until they arrived, when each one was upstairs in the meeting room I went up behind them and launched a surprise attack with a large barrage of earth bolts, then I slowly picked them off one at a time. One did have talismans with him, but he didn’t know what he was doing since he bought a magic barrier rather than a regular barrier talisman.”

Calavia was rather shocked by this causal explanation of how he killed so many people, though she did recall that Arthur was a mercenary for the captain of the southern guard for a period of time to earn a little extra money, so she probably shouldn’t be all that surprised.

“So why exactly did you do this? Did the captain pay you to take care of them in such a permanent way or was there some other reason?”

“Actually it was because they kept trying to collect ‘protection’ money from me. They sent two groups to try and take my money from me, so I got fed up with them and went out of my way to kill them.” Arthur said smiling while keeping out the detail of who he got spooked on his first attempt when the criminal suddenly showed up behind him.

“They were collecting protection money!? Well that explains why so many people that came to the clinic had broken or bruised arms and legs, that must have been their way of ‘encouraging’ people to pay up.” Calavia nervously shifted in her hair as she recalled some of the wounds now understanding their true meaning and not the excuses that those same patients would give to avoid explaining.

“Yeah, it was pretty bad since they felt so confident to just come right up to me and demand money from me even though I didn’t hide the fact that I am a mage. They were also getting into the drug trade when I killed them, they were discussing something called swamp weed and a variant of it that doesn’t need to grow in an actual swamp.”

“Of course they were getting into drugs, half of the rich in the kingdom consume drugs on the regular, excluding mages of course. Drugs just make casting spells a lot harder than it needs to be regardless of what rumors about magic drugs you might hear. But that does mean there is a lot of money to be made in the drug trade.”

“Add that the criminal underworld was also purged of all the major players leaving a power vacuum where nothing has changed except for who is handing out the drugs. I guess I didn’t really think about that before, but good thing I stopped them.”

The room quieted down as the reality of what Arthur’s actions had done settled into both of their minds, Calavia opened her mouth to say something but before she could a loud knock could be heard from the front door. While Calavia was a little confused and looked to Arthur he just smiled and walked over to the door and opened it.

“Good morning sir.” A young voice said once the door opened and a young wood elf entered before Arthur closed the door behind him. “This here is my apprentice Gaelin, say hello to my friend Calavia Gaelin.” Gaelin turned and looked at Calavia and practically froze where he stood, he could tell by her mages guild robes that she was a powerful mage.

“Um, hi miss. I am Gaelin.” Gaelin said awkwardly while Arthur walked over to the kitchen area and picked up three cups from the cupboard where he kept his plates, bowls, cups, and utensils. Then he extracted some moisture from the air and placed it into the cups filling them each with water which he then placed on the table.

“Thank you Arthur.” “Thank you sir.” Both Calavia and Gaelin thanked Arthur as he brought them each a cup. While this happened Gaelin was trying to avoid eye contact with Calavia out of nervousness of meeting one of the close friends of his teacher, Calavia on the other hand was studying Gaelin trying to understand why Arthur would go out of his way to take on a literal apprentice. The young boy he spoke about teaching several months back wasn’t quite the same as this as he only taught him the basics of hydromancy before leaving.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

When Arthur sat down with the cups of water she was forced to avert her gaze and decided to instead ask Arthur directly. “Hey Arthur, out of curiosity what made you pick Gaelin as your apprentice? Was he already skilled in magic by any chance?”

“Not really, and since he is a wood elf he already has a disadvantage compared to most others in terms of arcane magic.” Arthur plainly stated, making Gaelin perk up. He certainly didn’t know anything about racial magic aptitudes or that it didn’t affect Arthur’s decision.

“Really? Then why did you pick him?” Now he had Calavia curious as well, she hadn't taken an apprentice yet and was wondering what trait made Gaelin a good apprentice.

“He is a hard worker and was dedicated to collecting herbs for me everyday for months beforehand, since he was so hard working I offered to teach him and so far he hasn’t slacked off for even a moment while he is here. I've shown him both alchemy and magic and he puts his whole mind into learning what I can teach him.”

Calavia opened her mouth to say something, but she stopped herself. She had to admit that working hard for magic was likely a better indicator for a good apprentice than if they were just naturally attuned to that type of magic. “Hmmm, that is a good point.” Calavia said as she leaned back in her chair thinking about the possibility of taking her own apprentice far more seriously than she would have before.

Gaelin was both a little insulted and happy with what Arthur said, on one hand he was quite insensitive by just outright saying that he was at a disadvantage because he was a wood elf, something he had no control over. On the other he made sure to point out that being a wood elf had no change on his decision to teach him. He also appreciated being called a hard worker, it was something he hadn't heard anyone say about him since he was expelled from the grove.

“Are you by any chance looking to take an apprentice of your own?” Arthur asked, suddenly shaking Calavia from her train of thought. She fixed her posture and sat properly before thinking for a moment about it. “Maybe. I haven’t really put a lot of thought into it, but since you have one I might do the same and find someone young and willing to put in hard work.”

Arthur simply nodded and took a sip of his water while Calavia watched Gaelin’s nervous fiddling. Abruptly he realised they should all do something together if they didn't want an awkward science to fill the room. “Does anyone have something they want to do as a group since we are all here?”

“Well sir, I should probably brew up some more potions to sell later in the day. I only have around two and a half hours before Jofami leaves for his lunch break and I can use the stall for selling my own potions.”

“You are going to spend a whole two and a half hours just brewing potions, and I thought my job was boring and tedious.” Calavia commented while taking a sip of her own water.

“Well no, I was only going to spend an hour and a half like I always do. I was hoping that I would use that last hour to practice my magic like I usually do.”

“Well I don’t see any reason why you can’t practice magic after you return from selling your potions. And besides I do actually have something I've been meaning to do for a while now, it's a board game that requires two people to play so we can take turns playing against each other.” Calavia gave a large smile as she reached into her bag and pulled out a large wooden board that was covered by black and white squares in a checkered pattern. She also brought out a cloth bag that was inside her other bag that was shaped similarly to a coin pouch, inside were these small coin shaped wooden pieces that were set up on the black squares with two colors. One set was white while the other was black and each color occupied each side.

“The merchant I bought this from said the game was called checkers, basically you need to use your own wooden coin shaped pieces to jump over your opponents pieces if there is a space open diagonally. You can only move your pieces forwards until when they reach your opponent's end of the board where they are crowned and can move back in the opposite direction, the game will continue until one person has no more pieces to move.”

Arthur was looking at the game with great interest while Gaelin looked quite overwhelmed by all the information on the rules. Calavia pushed the board towards Arthur in a sort of challenge towards her good friend vis this new game, Arthur smiled and sat up straight in the chair he conjured from earth. “Very well, I accept your challenge.”

******

Two hours later Arthur and Calavia were both seated at the table with the board game before them, by this point Gaelin went off to brew his potions after playing a few games against both Arthur and Calavia losing each time. The games between Arthur and Calavia on the other hand were a lot more even and varied. The two treated the game like a battlefield where they both used the pieces at hand like soldiers in, they made sacrifices and had strategies and changed accordingly when things didn't work out. For the duo it was basically a dream come true.

“Ah ha ha, victory is mine once again!” Arthur exclaimed as he took the last piece belonging to Calavia on the board while having only three of his own still on it. Calavia on the other hand was frowning as this was the third time in a row of Arthur winning against her. “I have no idea how you do this Arthur, but it is really bothering me. I mean you literally have no memories of your life before the beginning of the year to the exact day, if anything I should be the skilled strategist between us.”

“What can I say aside from that I am naturally gifted in the art of checkers?” Arthur said with a large grin on his face, while Calavia had won for the first several games the two played, Arthur managed to close the gap to around half wins and half losses. Now he was winning significantly more and more each time he played, part of that was because Calavia had very predictable strategies that became more and more apparent as he watched.

Suddenly Gaelin walked back into the room carrying his bag with him filled to the brim with all sorts of potions, with a quick look on Arthur’s part he noticed around twenty potions of various types. Gaelin has learned a lot of different potion recipes, he could only imagine what he would do once he was able to create magical potions with actual spells.

“You're heading out already?”

“Yes, I am. Jofami will be getting off for lunch in around twenty minutes, it normally takes around ten minutes to get there but given the terrible weather I should probably leave earlier than normal just in case the snow is bad in certain areas. He only gives me around an hour to sell my things while he is on break. I once tried to get a little longer there but he just glared at me and didn’t say anything, I don’t think he liked my suggestion.”

“Alright then, just be back as soon as you are done ok. I don’t know a lot about the weather and how it all changes, but I have a feeling that it isn’t just going to start getting nicer all suddenly. And make sure you wear gloves, it's cold as hell out there already, without gloves your hands will freeze into blocks of ice.”