Damien immediately sprung out of bed, mind racing and heart pumping. His excitement slowly boiled up through the night preventing him decent rest. He was learning magic! His small feet glided down the wooden staircase, then waited for his mother to return from her morning shopping. Barely keeping still, the cool detachment that was typically overlayed his personality was nowhere in sight. As he waited he calmed himself to suppress his jitters.
Elian finally returned, and Damien suppressed the urge to pester her. as she refilled the pantry and prepared breakfast, Damien's virtuous patience wore thin. After he finished eating, she finally asked Damien if he was ready to begin.
Elian grabbed a variety of herbs and items and ground them up before setting them alight. An aromatic scent slowly filled the air intensifying. The smell amplified as she used magic on the incense. Suddenly, Damien found it hard to breathe. He was reminded of one of his old co-workers and the gallons of perfume she wore. As he struggled to avoid choking on the scent, Elian calmly gave her first instruction.
“You need to calm down, " she started, "I want you to sense the magic around you.” Damien followed her instructions and it felt like he was seeing for the first time. Before, sensing fae magic was a vague sense of otherness that he could just barely perceive. Like something jumping around your peripheral vision. Now he could clearly sense the fae energies settled around him, Feeling it resonate within him. He could clearly picture the incense fuming off the energy causing a build up inside of the room. His brain interpreted it as a monochromatic static. The more energy there was to more frantic and compact near Elian; there was a thin line that was going between her and the incense as she powered the effect. The sheer amount of new information was overwhelming.
The next few minutes were spent allowing Damien to adjust. What he didn’t know is that the method Elian used was generally despised for all sensations he just dealt with. This alchemical incense would temporarily improve detection of fae energies, making it useless for creatures and races that couldn’t naturally or manipulation them. Thankfully it was overall a harmless experience, albeit still very unpleasant.
“Spend the next few minutes adjusting to sensing the natura around you.” Elian finally continued. As Damien continued to slowly adapt to sensing them and became absorbed in the process, feeling the dancing and swaying power flowing nearby, he noticed that he could feel when Elian was, like feeling where his arm was near him. Even as his intimate connection began to fade, he could still roughly feel where Elian was while she watched over him. His senses also felt slightly sharper, though he also recognized that may be a placebo. He opened his eyes and smiled.
After a breather, a small snack, and a water break, his practice continued. Next, the two family members hiked out to the nearby forest east of the village and sat in a small clearing.
“You have gained awareness of natura now you should try to wield it.” Elian sagely explained, “There are swathes of wildlife near us, though mostly small animals and insects but many animals in the forest have some affinity with natura. You should be able to focus and detect them with effort.” Damien tried just that. It was extremely mentally taxing, like straining to see something without your glasses. Eventually though, within a few inches of him, he felt a small creature. Opening his eyes, he dug ever so slightly into the ground and found a small worm. Now, try to probe it with natura, if you do it right it should react.
Damien diligently followed her directions; he felt a bit of energy leaving a source of power inside of him that he was unaware of. It flowed out of him leaving that power source feeling energy but this change had a haunting of familiarity, of his body back on Earth. But the action worked, the worm seemed to start making its way underground the moment Damien's probe hit him.
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“Good job!” Elian said smiling softly, she was proficient at detecting signatures with fae energy to the point she could even tell the differences between different creatures and plants that were natura-attuned. This meant the being in question needed fae energy so it was situationally useful, but she hoped Damien could learn it as it may be useful. She could even feel him slowly learning his way around this ability, feeling the small ripples of natura radiating from him as he searched around. His method was fundamentally different from hers. While her's was more like sight, he used something closer to echolocation.
His probe was fairly standard. fae magic strongly reacts to intent so once he got a feel for it, simple effects were extremely easy to accomplish.
Elian wasn't sure if she had any spells she could teach Damien. Fae magic wasn't geared towards structured spells in the same way arcane was. The weakest "spell" she had was one that regenerated damage and that was closer to raw manipulation. This was of middling use for elves as they already have a strong natural generation that improved by simply being in an area of strong natura. 'It could help in an emergency,’ is what convinced her. Even an elve couldn't walk off more extreme damage without directed magic use.
Damien had spent the last few minutes recovering. The training was extremely taxing mentally, so he had lied down in the grass after putting the worm down. He didn't disturb Elian as she was busy pondering something.
“Damien, this is the final thing we'll be doing today.” Elian finally replied, snapping back to reality. Damien quickly bounced into an upright position snapping to attention. “Alright, so first you need to practice moving natura. Focus, then try pulling it towards you.” Elian instructed. Damien began his attempt. With the growing familiarity, he has gained over the past two days moving the fae magic around him felt relatively easy. Sure it still felt like swimming through molasses, but at least now he could move it, unlike when he attempted Saria's hiding technique. It occurred to him he should retry it now that he can actually interact with fae magic.
He suddenly lost control of the energy as his focused slipped, luckily wild fae energy was extremely harmless so he only suffered damage to his pride. Mustering his focus once more, he tried once again to move the natura near him even closer. It slowly coalesced into a shell around him.
Elian was watching in silence as Damien practiced. She noted he had difficulty control fae energy. It was unfortunate as most elves had an easier time, but that can be improved greatly with practice. Though this balanced the scales, as he seemed to have a fairly strong perception of fae magic. He hadn't exactly interpreted her instructions correctly, she had wanted him to pull the energy inside him but he made it surround him. This could be useful as a magic shield against holy or infernal energy. She decided to act like this was her intention all along and explained how this could be used. Next, she instructed for him to pull it inside him.
As Damien followed her next instruction, he suddenly felt energized. Though the feeling was fleeting. As he burned through the energy that adhered to him, he couldn't pull more to him fast enough to keep up his consumption. Elian smiled.
Despite his relatively weak ability with the far Damien showed extreme focus and determination Elian had seen in very few children. She had cracked open a book on herbs and reagents as he dedicated himself to refining his newfound abilities. She finally glanced back up as she realized the sun was setting. Had time passed that quickly? She quickly gathered her materials and snapped Damien out of his focus.
“Damien sweetheart, it is time to head home.”
“Alright.” Damien dejectedly responded. He felt like he was reaching some sort of breakthrough but he could always continue tomorrow. He glanced over and noticed the alchemical tools she was placed into her bag. Maybe he could convince her to teach him how to do that too? A thought for another day, he decided as fatigue hit him. One of the problems of being a child again was how hard it was to deal with exhaustion. He nearly dozed off on the walk back before Elian picked him and carried him. He would soon gently nod off as Leian placed him into his bed, a smile forming on her face.