"The key to drawing a proper ritual circle is intent. You need to believe that you will make a perfect circle. Doing so will help compensate for subtle flaws in your drawing," Olivander said.

Cooper focused mana into the tip of his nose and then drew a perfect circle.

"Hey! You never told me that!" Gregory complained.

"I said subtle mistakes, Gregory. Besides, it's the mark of a good teacher that they tailor instruction in a manner that will most benefit each student. Cooper needs to be guided through and shown that he can do anything he sets his mind to, and you need to fail several hundred times before you believe you actually learned something correctly."

Gregory rolled his eyes at Olivander with an exaggerated roll of his head.

They were sitting in the common room of the inn. The breakfast crowd had thinned out to just a couple of tables. After Olivander's generous tip the previous morning, they had no more problems with the innkeeper.

After completing the contract last night, Gregory had done some footwork, claiming that he was bringing the strangleroot vines to the apothecary. In reality, he had paid a visit to a lakeside manor and done some awkward explaining. It had worked out though, and now he just needed to bide his time.

"What can I do with it?" Cooper asked about his circle of light as it faded away.

"With a simple circle? Nothing, I need to teach you some symbols. They are the heart of any ritual!"

Gregory listened with interest. He had expected Cooper to catch up to him, since he knew basically nothing about rituals. He hadn't expected it to take less than five minutes.

"Now, I'm going to teach you a very simple ritual. It's an identification ritual. It's great because it's simple. As far as rituals go, however, it is basically useless. It's one of the powers we call 'Natural Skills.' You won't see them listed along side your class skills, but they're shared by virtually everyone who can use magic or has the potential to learn to use magic.

"When you pick up an item, you get a sense of what it is. You already have the magic of this ritual inside you. The skill is part of your soul and you can use it without active thought. It's the same for the messages that we all can perceive."

Olivander demonstrated the symbol. It was quite a few lines nestled into the ritual circle, but there was a pattern to them. It proved to be fairly easy to draw. Particularly once Gregory figured out the trick of intent.

"We can test out your new rituals quite easily. I have a spell that will suppress your natural skills. It will be disorienting, but they will come back quickly. When I remove your natural skills, simply touch and try to identify the item I put onto the table."

They both nodded in acknowledgement.

Olivander's grimoire appeared and he found a particular ritual, sketching it out quickly.

If a circle of mana was simple, and the ritual for identifying they had just drawn was easy, then the symbol Olivander constructed in mere seconds was impossible.

Now that Gregory knew the trick, he guessed Olivander's intent must be doing a sizable portion of work while he drew.

Olivander activated his spell with a word.

"Suppress."

Gregory felt a sudden vertigo. He could no longer tell so many different things about the world, or even about himself. He couldn't bring up his stats or see his health. Being confronted with that was mildly terrifying. How would he know how close he was to death?

"It's disorienting, but you should still be able to sense your mana, health, and stamina in the same way I showed you both how to sense mana. You just need to dig a little deeper. No spell can prevent you from sensing those, because they are a fundamental part of your body."

When he focused, Gregory could indeed still see his mana, and as he looked within, he could sense his health and stamina as well. That relieved some of his worry.

"Now, activate your rituals," Olivander said, pulling out a brown pouch and emptying some sort of orb onto the table.

Both rituals flashed. When Gregory touched the orb, he got a sense of its properties. It would enhance earth effects. It would make the wielder heavier. He couldn't use it.

They were somewhat vague impressions, but he though he learned enough about the item to be able to use it, or to know that he couldn't.

"You sense its properties, correct?"

"I do! It has earth enhancement and makes the wielder heavier."

Gregory noded along.

"Very well done. It seems you both performed the ritual correctly. Now, it's not the exact effect that you can naturally use, that natural skill is significantly more specific and can be combined with your messaging natural skill. But it is still a good learning tool. Practice this ritual. You will both show me tomorrow, and I will move you along to the next ritual if I am satisfied. We will try to learn one a day for around two weeks. At that point you'll be ready for almost any ritual."

Olivander excused himself and told the pair to meet him downstairs at third bell, so they could head to the manor to get set up for tonight's catering.

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Cooper and Gregory practiced the ritual a few times, but Cooper didn't yet have the stats to practice multiple times, his mana was pretty low.

They were both more than happy to head upstairs and relax until the afternoon.

* * *

The manor was a sprawling house on a relatively small property. This close to the lake free land was a very scarce commodity, and most of the large homes were only separated by a thin strip of grass. The manor they were visiting was an exception, having a path that deliveries could take to the side of the house.

Olivander led his students around the side of the house, as they had been directed by Burt when he told them the details of the job.

Burt himself was unloading a small cart near a door when they arrived.

"Oh, good. You showed up. Here's all the food you're going to need for tonight. There are going to be eight guests at the party, so nine total. Don't forget it!"

"I thought we were cooking for eight?" Olivander could have swore the man had said eight total. It wouldn't really throw off his plans if there were an extra person, but he might have swapped out one of the harder to prepare vegetables for time's sake.

"A late addition. It happens. Nine should be the final number though, so don't worry about that. There should be enough food here to feed yourselves after the party if you want. I'll swing by late tonight to pick up anything left over. You can just leave things in the kitchen, but make sure you clean up! You're doing this as a service to me, don't you forget it!"

They helped Burt haul the food into the kitchen, then the man departed.

"Alright you two! I'm going to be handling the cooking, but you both will need to find the host and get any pertinent information. Introduce yourselves, and try not to embarass me."

"Really. You don't want us to embarass you?"

"Yes, Gregory, congratulations on being able to understand a basic request. Now, off you go."

Once he had the pair out of his hair, he considered the ingredients gathered around him.

"Hmm…three courses. An appetizer, entree and dessert for each guest. Yes…this will do nicely."

Burt was kind of a terrible person, but his produce seemed second to none in the city. He must buy directly from farms in the morning and have his goods brought in to sell and use by the afternoon. Everything was exquisitely fresh.

Olivander conjured himself an apron, mentally thanking Helga. His earliest class was a variation on conjurerer, but for some reason, conjuring anything clothing or clothing adjacent had always failed for him. After Helga had showed him a few of her spells and he had used his abilities to translate them into ritual magic, he had spotted the error in how he was constructing the conjured clothing.

Now it worked in synergy with his existing conjuring abilities, so he was able to conjure clothing of all kinds instantly.

He put on the apron, smoothing it so anyone who happened to check on him would easily be able to read the words embroidered onto it: "Praise the Cook for his Intellect and Wit."

He came up with the idea after seeing one in a shop that said "Kiss the Cook." While he did like the alliteration that version offered, he, under no circumstances, wanted anyone trying to kiss him without warning. Except maybe Cooper. He did have a soft spot for dogs.

* * *

Gregory and Cooper found the host without much trouble. She was in the dining hall, directing some men to place the main dining table in the correct location.

"A little more…keep right a little more. Stop! Perfect. You can leave it there gentlemen."

The woman turned a red gaze onto Gregory and Cooper.

Gregory had seen her red eyes before, but they still made him flinch for a moment. Cooper didn't seem to notice, and Gregory wondered how different her eyes looked to him. He knew dogs saw colors differently, but had never asked him about it.

"Ah, Gregory, nice to see you again. Thank you for stopping by yesterday. I am very interested in meeting your friends. You must be Cooper. It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance. I am Lady Leviana Rhodes. Welcome to my home."

"Thank you! It smells very nice in here."

"Wonderful. I've never met a telepathic dog before. How interesting," Lady Leviana said. Then she turned back to Gregory, "What of the other member of your group?"

"Olivander. He's already in the kitchen, preparing for dinner, I think. Is there anything we can do out here to get ready?"

"Certainly. I have linens for the tables, chairs to bring in, then all of the place settings as well as some decorations. Then there's some setup for the night's activities."

"Activities, Lady Rhodes?"

"Yes! I'm quite excited. There's a scavenger hunt, a trivia game, and after dinner, a private lesson from a premiere user of illusion magic. By the end of the lesson, all of my guests will have learned a powerful illusion ritual that is incredibly useful and rare."

"That sounds like a lot of fun!" Gregory said. "I guess we should get started with your setup."

The pair negotiated some chairs down a long hallway from a storage room. Cooper couldn't carry the chairs without damaging them with his teeth, so he began trying to get the tablecloth on the large dining table.

He decided that not having hands was a pain. He needed to get some people of his own to help with everything. Eventually Gregory finished bringing chairs out, and they got the tablecloth into shape.

An hour later, and the dining hall was looking great. Lady Rhodes had been coming and going from the room since they arrived, setting up clues and items around the room and the rest of the house. Then she hung more decorations.

The theme was something Gregory couldn’t identify. Tropical maybe? He had never been to the tropics, so he wasn’t sure. He knew they had large colorful birds like the paper mache one Lady Rhodes was hanging up.

"Thank you, Gregory, Cooper. Everything looks set. Feel free to take a short break. I'll have you greet my guests and take their coats by the door, and direct them to the hall here. They won't be arriving for another half hour."

"Thank you, Lady Rhodes. Let's check to see if Olivander needs any help, Cooper."

They found Olivander in the kitchen with his grimoire glowing brightly, and several conjured knives and other tools floating around above his head. Some knives were even chopping vegetables by themselves.

"Wow, you've been busy!" Gregory said. "Do you need any help?"

He looked into a pot and moved to try some of the bubbling sauce with a spare spoon, but Olivander slapped his hand away.

"That is for the paying guests!"

"I don't think they're paying to come to a dinner party."

"Well, someone is paying. You can get started on those dishes for me. The cooking is well in hand."

Gregory walked around the wall of stoves and kitchen equipment to find a small side room with several sinks.

Every one was piled high with dirty dishes.

"How did you make such a mess already?"

"I had a few false starts. Don't eat anything; it might be dangerous."

Gregory groaned. He looked to Cooper for support, but he just curled up in the corner.

"Sorry, no hands."

Gregory started filling the sinks, grumbling something about good help.