Theo walked over to the College of Spells, alone.

Finn had understandably not wanted to go after what had happened, and Astor and the other musicians decided that playing music in the Arts Exchange was a better use of their time to practice their skills.

Even now, their playing drifted over the courtyards, and he was sorely tempted to join them.

It seemed that focus magic wasn’t a very popular class to audit. There were far less people than at the offer magic audit class (but Theo had finished lunch ahead of schedule and was early, so maybe others would arrive after him).

The only other people there currently were a few warrior students, and one priest student that didn’t look how Theo expected.

They wore a priest’s robe, but were also built like a warrior – broad-shouldered, muscular, a jawline sharp enough to shave with. Frankly, they looked more like what Theo thought of when he heard the word warrior than the warriors did.

There were three ‘warriors’ (Or at least, Theo assumed they were warriors. They didn’t look like wizard students, and he didn’t recognise them from class, and they weren’t wearing anything priest-like, so he assumed that was what they were through the power of deduction).

One lanky figure was in loose clothing with a bow strapped to their back that was almost as tall as they were. Another was a monk dressed in light leather armour with a shaved head. The final person had long hair with toned and exposed arms in ripped sleeves, facing away from him.

They were chatting, and they all turned to face Theo as he approached.

“You here for the Focus audit?” Theo nodded, as the one with long hair cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted in his direction. She turned to the monk.

“Okay, you have enough people. Can I go now?” The monk shook his head. She sighed, and by this point Theo had walked up to them.

Theo didn’t like the way she looked at him. “On second thought.” The monk rolled his eyes.

She stuck out her hand, and smiled (in a way that left Theo feeling wary). “Jenny.”

Theo slowly reached his hand out, almost hesitating, before grasping her hands with his.

She began to crush his hand, to no effect.

It wouldn’t do justice to the force involved to describe the grip as anything less than a crush. There was, frankly, an inordinate amount of power in her hands. Much more than one would presume she had at first glance (but then again, muscle wasn’t a good indicator of strength or physical capability when internal magic existed).

Theo felt the pressure, but with all the body strengthening that he had undergone it was merely unpleasant, and not bone-breaking. Jenny’s eyebrows lifted.

“Theo.” He tried to withdraw his hand, and it took a moment longer for her to realise that and let go, impressed.

“…Striding Wind, Iron Bones, Stoneskin?” Theo was slightly taken aback by how direct her question was (and considerably more taken aback by how accurate she had been).

Before he could respond (or begin to formulate one beyond “yes”), the monk had silently slipped in front of Jenny and pushed her back a step. “Bruce. Sorry about that. You don’t have to answer anything she asks if you don’t want to.” Jenny protested behind him, but Bruce just ignored her, occasionally reaching an arm back to block her in and stop her from approaching him again.

His arms twisted, pushing Jenny back when she tried to go around, and twisting around her arms and leading her around when she tried to push him.

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Theo finally found some words that would do. “Nice to meet you. But yes, those three among others.” Jenny’s eyes lit up and continued trying to approach and ask more questions more fervently than before, but Bruce nonchalantly held her back as he had done before.

One hand occupied with Jenny, he gestured to the third warrior, who was almost hiding behind his bow (and hair). “That’s Simo.”

Simo gave a half-hearted wave and smile, and Theo returned them (but less hesitant). Simo opened his mouth, about to speak, before thinking better of it.

Theo tilted his head. Simo flushed, and took a deep breath. “I just thought I- nevermind, I just-“

Simo had started mumbling to himself by the end, rubbing the back of one hand with the other.

Theo patiently waited, trying not to let his (slowly growing) impatience show. His patience paid off, as Simo eventually found the right words.

“Do you sing at The Pub? I think- I think I saw you once.” Theo paused, wondering why so many warriors knew about The Pub. Sure, Rick and Sean drank there, but he thought of them more as part of The Pub than warriors.

“Yeah, I sing there most nights.” Theo tried to wrack his memory for when he could have seen Simo, but nothing at all came to mind. He made a mental note to properly learn Tome of Memories as soon as he could.

Bruce stopped rebuffing Jenny, turning his head towards her, arms intertwined (more vines competing for space than intimate hand-holding).

“What place are they referring to?”

Jenny kept struggling, even as she answered. “It’s that place with the decent food and terrible beer in the Outskirts that all the old warriors go to.” Her eyes flickered over to Simo, as Bruce nodded his head in recognition. “And a lot of warriors, y’know, in general. It’s a good place, now that I think more about it.” She finished lamely.

“Right, the affordable one near the Guild of Magic that wasn’t the Guild itself.” Bruce filed that away, and then went straight back to restraining Jenny as she redoubled her efforts.

Theo absentmindedly wondered what Bruce was capable of, considering how strong Jenny seemed to be, and how easily he dealt with her.

“Hello, I’m Duncan.” As that near-wrestling match continued, the priest who looked like a warrior introduced himself, reaching out his hand.

Theo eyed it for a moment, then reasoned that he couldn’t be worse than Jenny. Shrugging, he extended his own.

To his relief, it was just a perfectly normal handshake.

Duncan stood next to Theo, as they watched as Jenny seemed to challenge Bruce, now requiring his full attention to deal with (as they goofed around in an almost-relaxed spar). “So, what magics do you use?”

Theo paused. The fact that he was here at an audit, and that he didn’t know the warriors, made it a reasonable guess that he used multiple forms of magic.

“Mostly action magic and internal magic.” Duncan nodded in understanding. “You?”

A smile formed on Duncan’s face. “All magic. Offer, focus, action, internal.” Theo looked carefully at Duncan.

“Wouldn’t it be very hard to maintain progress in all of those?” Theo’s mind went to a master priest-wizard-warrior-bard, and what that would look like. Was that even possible?

Duncan’s smile grew wider. “My focus is offer magic. Part of my worship is learning and using magic. So anything I learn helps my offer magic.” He looked very proud as he explained (and Theo thought he deserved to, if it actually worked the way it sounded like it did).

Bruce pinned Jenny, and took a moment to catch his breath as she swore and tried to escape.

Theo tore his eyes away. He looked directly at Duncan, making eye contact to make sure he heard what he just heard.

“So, if you were to spend some time learning focus magic, like at an audit class, that would also improve your offer magic?”

Duncan nodded. Theo let out a low whistle.

“So, what internal magics do you practice anyway?” Theo almost jumped out of his skin as Jenny appeared next to him, draping an arm across his back.

With his height, it looked more like she was permanently keeping an arm raised as she hooked it around his neck. Theo unconsciously started to hunch his back a little as she dragged him down to her level.

Looking around, he saw Bruce lying on the floor, sweating and chest rapidly rising and falling. Simo was next to him, watching over him with some degree of concern.

Duncan was pointedly pretending she wasn’t doing this, and with that Theo’s last rope back to the ship sank to the depths of the ocean. Theo hesitated to answer.

“I uh, I’m not sure I’m entirely comfortable sharing all the magic I know.” Jenny paused upon hearing this, before resolving her mind to do something else.

“Well, if I share first then it’s okay right? Okay, so-“

“Ahem, I believe you are all here to learn about focus magic, not discuss internal magic?” Their teacher for the audit class was here. They stared at the odd scene, of one student clearly exhausted before class even started, another student harassing another, and two others awkwardly wondering what to do.

Jenny looked at the teacher, and opened her mouth.

She promptly shut it again, as they stared pointedly at her. She also let go of Theo’s neck (which he was immensely grateful for), crossed her arms, and turned her head, looking away from everyone and off to her side.

“Hmph.”

Theo had never considered that pouting could be intimidating before this.