The meeting had gone on for a little while after that, with Cass getting a description of the layout of the Voni palace and the location of the garden that contained Magesbane. It wasn’t a very large area, but with the potency of Magesbane it did not need to be. This worked out in the rebel’s, and cass’s, favor as she would not need all that many plants to fill the needs of the rebellion.
However, they did not want to make Klein suspicious, so they had asked Cass to delay asking to meet the Voni for a little while. They hoped that as Cass settled in she would not be under as much scrutiny after her initial jaunt outside her room had been discovered. Unfortunately, they had been unable to provide any information on the orb that had been used to knock Cass out… She was still worried about that and could only hope it had been a single-use magic tool, but she doubted she would be so lucky.
Cass slipped back into her room closed her window, now came the had part though… She had to concentrate through her exhaustion to undo the changes she had made to the alarm system and just barely managed it. By the time she crawled into bed, Cass was hardly conscious… Well, they had asked her to delay, so the tomorrow she would sleep in…
Except that Odal woke her up early… Cass snarled and chased him off, then went back to bed. She ended up sleeping the entire day and the next day Elder Klein came to visit her in the morning, concerned about her health.
“I am fine,” Cass insisted. “Really. I was just tired, there is no need to worry.”
“Well if you need anything don’t hesitate to let someone know,” it was hard for Cass to believe this man was the current ruler of Beergmutar. She had never met someone so important before, but she made sure to act like she didn’t know.
“I am still a little tired…” She wasn’t, but again, not something he needed to know. “I was hoping I might find something to read…”
“Oh? A reader of fiction are we?” Klein smiled, probably thinking that it was appropriate for her age.
“Ah, no actually…” Cass pretended to be embarrassed as she told a mix of lies and truth, “I wanted to know how you knew I left that night and so I tried to see if there was a system attached to the window… And it was beautiful, but I could not understand it… But it was a triggered system using a catalyst, so I wondered if it might just be that my knowledge of catalysts is incomplete…”
Cass doubted there was a way for him to tell that she had altered the system, but she was not sure. She wanted to portray herself as a girl whose curiosity would get the better of her, not a threat looking to put a knife in your back, but an over eager student who doesn’t quite understand consequences. If she could really sell that image of her Klein might let her walk into the garden without her even needing to sneak in as long as she asked the proper questions.
“Now Cass,” the Elder admonished. “That is placed there for your protection, you need to be more careful and respect your new place in society.”
“Yes Elder, I apologise…” Cass hung her head, careful not to let her smile show.
“There is much that you still have not told us,” Klein continued musing. “But you did share a good deal with us already, so I think it will be ok to let you see some of our work as a show of good faith.”
The Elder smiled at her and continued, “You may not know this considering your… Background… But most every kingdom develops magic in different ways and have different skills. Those in Haj are known for their glyphs and for their ability to create systems on the fly. Further south, in the desert, the mages are skilled at designing magic tools, and here in Beergmutar we excel in the use of catalysts.”
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
Interesting, Cass thought. But so few mages travel… In Haj they were nobles, and so were tied to their domains to a certain extent, here in Beergmutar they were restricted from leaving the country, and though she was unsure about other kingdoms, she suspected that there would be reasons that mages rarely left them as well… And with the general hostility between countries there was no exchanging of information… So each land would probably develop magic subtly different ways… Cass wondered how much information was out there and what could be learned…
“I will have an introductory book sent over,” the way the Elder emphasised ‘introductory’ made it obvious that she would not get more until she shared her knowledge. Well, her plan was to take if after he was dead so it didn’t really matter to Cass… Still, she was excited to read this book, if she could gather enough of their literature and research materials to bring back to her Master… She could only imagine what might be accomplished… Cass missed him, and she hadn’t even been away from him for all that long… But still…
The Elder was good for his word, and a Stone messenger brought over the book a little later, Odal came back around then as well, or to be more accurate, he came in from outside. Apparently, he was her personal ‘guide’ for the foreseeable future, even when Cass had snapped at him, he had just been waiting outside the mansion for her to come out. In other words, between the trap on the window and Odal, she was being watched at all times. Undoubtedly they had simply been taken by surprise that first night by her ability to jump out the window at that height… If she left after triggering the alarm system… Cass bet that someone would be ready to follow her…
Still, Cass felt a little sorry for Odal… She doubted he even knew he was being used to spy on her, after all, he was not that bright… So she apologised to Odal and invited him in, if he was going to sit around doing nothing he might as well do so in a chair.
A few hours later, Odal asked, “Is it really that interesting?”
“This book?” Cass said distractedly as she read, “yes it is quite fascinating, in particular the opening theories… The mage, pardon me, Strioi, who came up with that idea… Simply brilliant.”
No wonder they had such skill with catalysts, this very concept was so simple, yet such a revelation… Cass wondered how she had never thought of it before, but knew that it never would have crossed her mind if she had not been introduced to it.
“Everything is magic, and nothing is.” Cass quoted from the book, “Everything that can occur already has, every potential already exists. The world is flowing, and rather than try to build within its current, be swept away and direct it in return.”
Odal looked at her like she had been speaking a different language, and Cass laughed. “To a ma- sorry, Strioi. This makes sense with how we see the world. What it means is that surrounding us is infinite energy, and that something, somewhere has used that energy to do what the mage wants to occur.”
“I’m sorry,” Odal shrugged. “I still don’t get it.”
“If I wanted to create light,” Cass held her palm up and created a little flame within it. “I could do this, using a system to create a flame from the air itself. Both the fuel for and the air for the fire are being gathered and supplied by me, but it is far easier than forming this flame out of pure mana.”
Odal nodded, but his face was still confused, Cass continued anyway. Perhaps he would understand when he could see the full picture…
“However, if I was to take a honeycomb and use my mana to replicate its form and use it for the fire, it will use the gathered and replicated material from the honeycomb as fuel, like a candle, and it will burn brighter and longer with less mana.”
“In short, people already had an answer to needing light that worked,” Cass concluded excitedly. “So by copying the ideas behind that, magic can be made far more efficient!”
“I… See…” Odal said slowly, clearly struggling a bit with it. But that was ok, without magic there was not really a point to him understanding after all. Cass, however…
“There is something I am missing here…” Cass mumbled to herself, “I feel like there is something more to this…” Maybe she would find it in their other writings…