I watch Mr. Self-Made as he stomps down the road, grinning to myself as I listen to his vicious mutterings.

“Saints damn that devil woman. Not a threat. I’ll show you not a threat. I’ll take your power and then I’ll take Kierra. We’ll see who’s not a threat then—”

Really, the things people say when they think no one can hear them. Has no one ever told him that the wind is listening? Of course, that’s a warning against wind affinity casters who specialize in espionage and can listen in on conversations across the city if someone leaves a window open. I’m just someone with a good pair of ears, heh.

Everything I said to Callan is true. I don’t mind Kierra and her project, even if her followers feel a little cultish. She’s has my interests at her heart, wanting to train a human force for my future estate. Personally, I think it’s too much. I don’t need a small standing army like most noble houses with her and Geneva around. Saints, I’ll include myself in the list of ‘reasons not to fuck with Lourianne Tome’. But she enjoys it, so I indulge her.

That is the main reason I spared Callan’s life that day. It really was shocking. I thought I’d grown numb to the advances on my wife but to have an admirer simply waltz up to my front door is too much. I doubt a saint’s patience could withstand such an insult. I’m rather proud that I managed not to choke him to death. As little as I care for the human weasel, killing someone at the Hall would be breaking the rules, which means coming to odds with Dunwayne. I rather not do that, most of all because I genuinely respect him.

Thankfully, Geneva managed to ease the blow by giving Callan another use. She’s convinced the poor fool that if he learns the art of summoning, he can defeat me, woo Kierra, and, well, I suppose live like a high noble.

Complete garbage, of course. Sure, even a weak young man with an underdeveloped mana pool can master the art of summoning but the truth of the matter is that he has nothing to offer a creature with the strength to make his ambitions reality. Something of the magnitude that he desires will levy so many conditions for their contract that he might as well be the slave and the elemental the master.

However, in his pursuit of my demise, he is very serious about learning summoning. Better, he has drawn his friends into it, hoping to substitute quantity for quality. It warms my heart to see my family’s art spread. Warms it enough to counter my disdain for the ambitious artisan, most days. He truly is lucky. I’m not so callous to think I could kill him without any bother and today I want to be at my best. It is time for the long-awaited qualifiers.

My initiate year at the Grand Hall is coming to a close. It’s been fun. Actually, it hasn’t. It’s been quite a pain. Between the torture sessions poorly disguised as foundation training, the troublesome characters I’ve had the misfortune of becoming entangled with, and the tedium of study complicated by the other two factors, it’s been tough.

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All over now. Once I’ve passed the final tests, I’ll be an official acolyte, a title that has its own power, and I’m free until spring. Normally, the winter break is meant for instructors to return to their research and for acolytes to ‘gain experience’, which really means work like madmen to earn enough money to continue paying tuition. Seeing as I’m currently being sponsored by Marquis Guiness, I’m in no need of money and can spend my time doing more rewarding things.

But first, the tests.

“What have you sent him off to do now?” I ask Geneva as we re-enter the house, heading for the kitchen. She gets back to packing breakfast.

“He is in need of summoning records and a teacher to guide his study. He wants my help recruiting someone from the Summoning Hall to his cause.”

“Hm. A teacher. I hope he doesn’t think there’s an easy-to-follow guide to summoning.” Unlike casting, summoning is an art of intention. No matter who uses a spell, if the formula is the same, they’ll produce the same result. Two summoners drawing the same circle might not have the same success. They’ll be a different in the way they carve it, a difference in the way they entreat the elemental. I’ve read records that claim absolutely everything can influence a summoning, including a summoner’s voice.

Having a teacher to hold his hand and make sure the first couple of elementals he summons don’t eat his brain is fine, but beyond that, it’s nothing more than a crutch. In the worse case, a hindrance.

“It’s fine. Go ahead and grant that request. Try and find someone who won’t take advantage of the poor bastards.”

“As you wish, my summoner.”

“Has he figured out what you are yet?”

“Disappointingly, no. For all his bluster, he certainly lacks initiative. I suppose he expects for all the answers to simply waltz right in front of him, as Master did.” She chuckles. “For all his supposed ambition, he is quite comfortable with his circumstances. He wants more but isn’t confident or desperate enough to bet what he has.”

“Not motivated then, hm.” I grin. “Then I suppose we should motivate him. For his own good.”

“A bit of stress can be beneficial,” Geneva says with a sinister grin of her own. “External, internal, or both?”

“I imagine external is simpler than internal. Also involves involving others.” Making him desperate financially means coming after his family’s store. Injuring him means involving the authorities sent to investigate. “What are our options for internal?”

“Callan Atkinson has a strong ego. He believes himself to be far more important than the world recognizes him to be, which is the root of a very volatile anger he just manages to keep control of. The only emotion I’ve felt that rivals it is his lust for Master, though even this ties back to his ego. He believes that she exists solely to elevate him, their paths crossing nothing short of a destiny ordained by the universe itself.”

“…seriously?”

“I doubt he would say so himself. Callan is simply a young man in love. But I can hear the voice of his heart.” She chuckles, tail whipping lazily. “The dark, greedy voice of a man who feels slighted.”