Oz tossed the pearl in his hand as he walked, humming under his breath. Even after all this time in his pocket, it still exuded a faint coolness, as if it sat under a cold vent. He rolled it around on his palm, then slid it back into his pocket. Out the door and into the grassy realm, pausing a moment to see if Fflyn was waiting to attack.

“Oz. Are you ready to try the enchantment?” Linnea asked, a bundle of squirming silk under her arm.

Oz looked at the bundle. “Fflyn wanted to see if you would take him as a student.”

Linnea turned to the bundle, her brows lifting in a bemused expression. “Huh.”

“So, uh… thoughts?” Oz tried.

She hefted the bundle. “Escape training. It’s good for a young assassin.”

The bundle thrashed harder. A frustrated, yet muffled, scream escaped from the depths.

Sounds like Fflyn doesn’t agree. Oz glanced at the bundle, then at Linnea.

Linnea stared at him deadpan, daring him to say something.

Oz smiled. “Quite so. Excellent training idea. Then, shall I get down to the business of enchanting?”

Linnea grinned. She patted the bundle. “I’ll keep this one out of your way. Get to work.”

Oz nodded. He took a deep breath, patting his pocket where the stones sat. “Will do.”

With that, Linnea walked off, carrying Fflyn over her shoulder.

Oz drew out his stone, pearl, and list of words. Setting them down in the grass before him, he summoned the fey language dictionary, the fey magic manual, and the enchantment book. He sat down cross-legged, looking at all the things he’d brought.

Abruptly, he reached out and opened the fey magic manual. The pages turned on their own, flipping open to the page he needed.

From a place far away, under conditions different from yours, acquire a pair of stones. Take them to a place distant from your home, different from where they began and different from your home. Imbue the spell equally into both stones. Sitting within your victim’s dwelling, cast the spell. Wherever they are, you will see from their eyes, speak with their voice, and move with their limbs. As long as you remain within the dwelling, holding the spell, the victim remains yours.

Oz nodded. He’s not a victim, but that’s the idea. Okay. He took in the grassy land. Different from my home, different from the icy land the stones came from. All the conditions have been met.

He turned the page. The manual gave a detailed diagram of how to stand and circulate qi to cast the spell. As Oz read it, the information took a life of its own and poured into his brain under its own initiative, faster than he could even read it. Taken by surprise, Oz stiffened, then quickly schooled himself into a meditative stance. Allowing the knowledge to flow in, he followed the book’s instructions, circulating his qi below the level of activating the technique, but just high enough to practice the flow. As the qi flowed, he entered an enlightenment state, entering an illusory world.

He sat in a small room. Nothing stood out about the room. Simple, a wooden floor stretched underfoot, and wooden walls stood around him, while a simple cot sat in the corner. One stone in his left hand, one in his right, the qi arcing from one palm to the other without flowing through him. From deep in the earth, dark energy flowed out, congealing into the stones. Like tar, it clung and dripped, wrapping the pebble, but not completely. A droplet dangled from the bottom of the stone. It hung there, on the verge of dripping, trembling as he breathed.

Oz watched it, unable to move, unable to shift without exploding. The black droplet grew rounder and rounder, distending longer and longer from the pebble.

The drip came free. It touched his hand.

Instantly, Oz’s skin absorbed it. Black spread across the surface of his palm, deeper and darker than the usual poison or the control tattoo. Ice cold, it chilled to his bone. Pain shot up to his elbow, sharp and electric, as if he’d jabbed his funny bone.

Oz tried to retract his hand, but the flow of qi locked his hands in place. Matching the flow above, a flow of black energy swirled from below, rushing up into the stone. It rushed through his hands, staining them pitch black, that bone chill aching at his whole body until he withered, withering from the hands inward, until nothing remained of Oz but a blackened skeleton. Icy air rolled off the black bones. The two stones fell down, the spell no longer active without anyone to cast it.

Oz jolted back to life, gasping a breath. He sat forward, lunging out of his sit, hands to the ground. He stared at nothing and everything, his chest heaving.

That—that—what was that?

Words came to mind, springing unbidden from a book he barely remembered reading.

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Fey magic takes as much as it gives, gives as much as it takes. A price must be paid. The greater the power, the greater the price.

Cold sweat dripped down his back, slipped down his brow. He wiped his forehead with the back of his sleeve. Breathing heavily, he pushed himself back into a sit. A price. A price.

Damn. I can’t pay with my life! I need my life. The whole point of this is to keep my life! What’s the point of this stupid spell if I have to pay for it with my life?

He crossed his arms, staring at the pearl and the stone. How do I trick it? How do I cast the spell without paying the price? There has to be a way. Some way I can reap the benefits without, well, dying.

That black stuff. Whatever it is, I can’t let it touch me. That was the failure point. That was where it all fell apart. Where the skeleton started coming out.

It’s not going to be that easy, though. No way. Otherwise, fey magic wouldn’t be notorious for taking a price.

He put a hand to his chin. The flight spell didn’t cost anything. Is it because the possession spell is evil? Is it because it’s more powerful? It’s undoubtedly more powerful, so maybe that’s all there is to it.

Lifting his hand, he called the fey manuals to his side, and alongside them, the human writings on fey magic. I refuse to believe there’s no way to work around this failing. The manual wouldn’t have warned me about it if there was no bypass.

One after another, he read through the manuals. Immersing himself in the world of words, unhesitating, leaping from one book to another. Pages turned. The grass rustled. Overhead, clouds scudded by. In the distance, Fflyn burst out of the cocoon and attacked Linnea, only for her to backhand him into a new cocoon. On and on, book after book.

He slammed the final cover shut and sat back, staring up at the sky. Of course. Obviously. How could I not guess it?

Human. Human writers!

Every time a human writes about fey magic, they bring up the price of fey magic. Fey writings on fey magic never mention such a thing. Is it because the price is unique to humans? Or is it because humans fundamentally misunderstand something about fey magic and teaching methods?

He frowned. No, that still doesn’t feel right. Fey magic… there’s something about fey magic—

Oz’s eyes widened. He slapped his leg, nodding to himself. Conditions! Fey magic requires the right conditions. Without the right conditions, you can’t cast fey magic.

What if it’s the same for fey manuals? Unless they’re under the correct conditions, they won’t show the proper technique!

He looked at the manual before him, excited. A moment later, a frown passed over his face. Oz put a hand on his chin, stroking an imaginary beard. Right. But what are the proper conditions?

Flipping idly to the book, he came to the back leaf. Sighing, Oz went to shut the book, then paused. He opened the back cover again, peering at the leaf.

In thin, spidery script, a note read: Indirect light, outdoors. A parasol will suffice.

“Madame Saoirse?” Oz murmured, tracing his finger over the words. Ossian did say these books contained Madame Saoirse’s notes. I wonder if this is one of them?

Oz patted himself down, frowning. Anything in my pockets? Wait, hold on. He chuckled, pulling the thick black fabric he wore away from his body. I don’t have a parasol on me, but I do have these voluminous robes. They’ll probably do just as well.

I wonder why the book needs to be read in indirect light, outdoors? There aren’t many… situations of…

He looked over his shoulder at the shady stand of trees near the distant lake and sighed at himself. So maybe it’s meant to be read in the shade of a tree. Shoot me.

Hunching over the book, Oz held his cloak high to cast the book in shade and flipped back to the page with the possession technique in it. Once again, the book drew him in. This time, though, he paid attention to the process. Resonance welled up in his left eye, a faint ache and heat building up in his forehead like the first moments of a migraine. Blue energy in an unusual blue-green shade swirled from the book toward his face. Information followed the blue-green energy, and once more, Oz found himself immersed in an illusory world.

Once more, the illusion circulated qi from hand to hand. Again, the dark energy welled up from within the earth. Rather than allowing it to accumulate in the stone, however, the illusory version of Oz circulated his qi through the stones, creating a shell of qi that staved off the dark energy. Without the stones to ground onto, the black energy fell back into the earth. Once it dropped away, a secondary type of energy emanated from the air and surroundings of the illusory Oz. Colored a pale red, it swirled into the stones and vanished, swallowed up by the stone in his left hand.

From his own body, pale blue energy swirled into the stone in his right hand. He grew weaker, but didn’t wither as he had in the first illusion. Equal amounts of red and blue energy vanished into the stones. In the illusion, he continued to sit there, carefully circulating qi, while faint traces of red and blue energy emanated from the stones, through the window, and out into the world. The red led the way, the blue energy tagging along after it to fly out, back to wherever the red returned.

The illusion faded, dropping Oz back into the grassy lands.

Oz grinned, clenching his fist. Yes! I’ve figured it out! Er, figured out how to read the book, that is. But hey, a victory’s a victory!

At a guess, the blue energy is my energy, and the red is the energy of the person I’m possessing. Gather the energy of the person I’m possessing from the place they live and put it in one stone, then put my own energy in the other, and use the flow of qi to send my qi back to the person I wish to possess.

He looked over his list of words. Possess, body, take, have, control. All things considered, after all that experimenting I did, they’re actually good picks. The only major modification I’d make is… He crossed out ‘have’ and replaced it with ‘conceal.’ Twisting his lips, he nodded. ‘Have’ and ‘Take’ overlap and add nothing. Instead, ‘conceal’ can help hide my technically-maybe-not-very-legitimate-and-possibly-dark magic from scrutiny. It will add a little complexity to the spell, but one layer of additional complexity to dodge immediate recognition as a dark mage by higher-realm mages is a risk I’ll take.

Hopefully I don’t run into any mages at all in the mortal world, let alone higher-realm ones, but better safe than sorry.

Oz took a moment to look up the fey equivalent of ‘conceal’ in the dictionary and marked it on his note paper, then paused once more.

What else? I’m pretty much done. Traces of Fflyn’s qi, maybe?

Luckily, Fflyn has been here for a while, so I should be able to gather traces of his qi. I have my stones—my stone and my pearl. I have my words for the enchantment, and I know how to cast the spell. All I need now is to engrave the stone and the pearl and actually cast the spell, and I’m good to go.

Oz took a deep breath. He nodded to himself. Here we go!