Zeek leaned on the sword like a walking stick, causing the old knight to yelp in frustration. “It’s not a damn toy. You’ll dull the blade doing that.” Zeek nodded absently while placing the weapon back in a brown leather sheath on his hip. With nothing to do, he crossed his arms and watched Sirius go through forms while Old John whacked him with a long strip of wood. The three stood in the center of a dirt square surrounded by curved archways and open windows. Old John’s house wasn’t much smaller than the earl’s, but instead of using the open area in the center as a tea garden, he’d turned it into a personal training room.

“Haven’t you been exercising? Why are you so tired? I told your father you needed to run and do a few swings each day,” Old John chided.

Sirius, barely managing a reply through staggered breaths and red cheeks, said, “I did the first day. But mother asked what I was doing.”

Zeek smirked while Old John pinched the bridge of his nose. “And what did you tell her, kid?”

“That I was doing knight training like father asked. She was upset and told me to stop,“ Sirius said innocently.

His face bent in confusion as Old John muttered curses under his breath and Zeek doubled over laughing. “Why wouldn’t you just lie?” Old John shouted, staring into the sky.

“Oh, I couldn’t lie to Mother,” Sirius said, frowning at the knight, as if the old man ought to know better.

“Old John, aren’t you a professor sometimes for the war mages?” Zeek asked from a shaded side of the yard while Sirius guzzled water from a bucket nearby. The knight nodded.

“Why don’t you just assign it as homework?” Zeek said as he held up two fingers on each hand and crooked them in tandem. “You know, so if Lady Yenson asks what he’s doing, he can tell her it’s for school.”

Old John barked at Sirius, “Hear that? Your homework is to exercise properly.” The young noble grinned back wickedly, as if they’d embarked on a complicated ruse to fool his mother.

“Another secret mission! You honor me, Sir Sampson.”

“Yes, yes, secret mission. Good boy.” Old John patted him on the head. “Now finish your water and get home before that demo…mother of yours starts wondering where you’ve been.” He turned to Zeek, “You too. I don’t know what in the Goddess’s name you’ve been eating this past week but you’re trimming up quicker than a lecher in a whorehouse.”

“Language, Sir Sampson,” Sirius stage whispered.

Old John closed his eyes briefly, in clear frustration, before finishing. “Either way, good work. Another week or two and we’ll start getting into advanced forms. Might have to get you a sparring partner sooner than I thought.”

“I’ll spar him!” Sirius offered.

“Without magic, he’d wipe the floor with you.“ Sirius pouted while Old John went on. “Besides, I want you to practice when I’m not around. There’re a few retired knights who work for the city guard now. I’ll start looking into it.”

Zeek and Sirius thanked him as they left the home. It was only a few blocks away from the fortress, which was no surprise given Old John’s real job. But Zeek liked it anyhow; the rooms were decorated like an adventurer’s museum. Suits of armor, often more fantastical than practical, lined the walls or stood silently by the doorways. The paintings were all depictions of major battles in the kingdom’s history or famous stories of knights fighting monsters. Plenty of walls were adorned with stuffed heads, bizarre pottery, and trinkets that Old John had brought back over the years.

If not for the pretty young maid who blushed every time Old John winked at her and several feminine furnishings, the house would have been a proper man’s cave. Zeek’s shoulders shook as he held back laughter when Sirius asked where Old John’s wife was. The knight replied, ”Dunno, never met her,” without missing a beat.

Zeek and Sirius walked side-by-side through Lem on their way back to the earl’s house. Sirius was treating his and Penny’s visit like a sleepover among children, not realizing it was all arranged by the earl and his wife. Zeek couldn’t help but feel impatient while they moved; he wouldn’t use mana manipulation in the open, but it had become second nature to practice every waking moment. Holding his mana in like a new mage felt a lot like holding your breath, but the few clergy they passed reminded him he had no choice.

Sirius chatted without stopping to draw breath. “Father is very excited you and Penny are coming back. He and Mother were talking about it last night.”

“He probably wants me to become a war mage candidate, now that Penny is looking into healing,” Zeek lied.

“And? Do you want to?” Sirius asked.

Zeek put his hands in his pockets and pretended to deliberate for a moment. “I do. Old John’s stories are exciting and I’d like to go on adventures of my own someday.”

Sirius threw an arm around Zeek’s shoulders, talking excitedly. “That would be great! A group of friends out conquering the world just like Father did. I’ll help you learn your first spell. Did you pick one yet?”

Zeek had actually picked a spell model to fake, although he wasn’t sure what “faking” it entailed. Another few weeks of practice and he’d have no problem guiding his mana easily through a spell model. But the book was clear: he couldn’t use spell models. He had to know how the spell was formed and do it on his own while appearing to use the model. He’d asked the book about it, but it just showed him the mana manipulation and mana ball techniques again.

He figured it would give him more information once he started finish tasks again, so he picked a spell that sounded close to mana ball.

“Stone ball,“ Zeek answered.

“An earth mage! Great choice! The captain is an earth mage, I’ll ask Father to introduce you once you’ve learned a spell. Your skill with a sword and earth, my fire magic, Penny’s healing; it’s just like Father’s team,” Sirius said, squeezing Zeek’s shoulder and shaking him.

“Didn’t you tell me your father had three other companions?” Zeek asked.

“Ah, true. Aunt Irith is a shadow mage. Mother said she handled their bags and daily necessities mostly. But you’re right, we’ll need a fourth friend. That’s for later, though! How much progress have you made with Stone Ball?”

Zeek shrugged. “None yet. I have to pick up the training model after the weekend.”

The walk between Old John’s house and the earl’s was a bit over a half hour, and Sirius used every second to explain how best to learn your first spell. Zeek found it interesting how different the common method was from his own. Sirius described throwing your mana against the spell model until you put just enough in to make the spell work. It was supposedly an exhausting process, making new mages go through all their mana each day. Zeek thought it sounded like beating your head against a wall until you loosened a brick.

Sirius didn’t use any terms like mana manipulation, core circulation, or things that explained the inner workings of mana. His descriptions sounded like a person trying to recall something from a distant memory. A pinch, a squeeze, a swollen arm, and fever were used as technical terms for what Zeek should experience when he was practicing. Once he’d managed to learn his first spell, then began the very long process of shrinking the spell model and doing it all over again.

It all built up to what the archmages did so easily when Zeek met them: learn to create a hole in your mana flow, like a gate, and use it to control how much mana escaped your body into the spell model. That’s not to say archmages were weak, Zeek had seen that himself. The best of the best could use dozens of spell models, but they had to be touching skin to function, and they could only use one at a time. Antone was the exception since he could use both arms.

Whether they could use a spell model on the other parts of their body was unclear. Zeek figured the three he met ought to be able to use any spell model that rested along their path of mana. One thing he couldn’t figure out was the mana limitations to learning spells, so he asked Sirius to explain.

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“Well, mana regenerates very slowly. The more you move the slower it is, the more you rest the faster it is. Father can regenerate his mana several times in a day, but he’s at the top of archmages. Most graduates regenerate their reservoir once per day,” Sirius explained.

“Doesn’t that limit how many spells they can cast?” Zeek wondered.

“To a degree. Higher-level mages focus on efficiency with their spell models. At least for someone like Father, he’d be able to cast at full force for a few hours continuously. It takes him two or three hours at rest to fully regenerate. If he has a knight battalion with him, he can cast indefinitely in a battle,” Sirius answered.

Zeek nodded absently, thinking. He had no issues with mana. He’d never even felt like he was running out when practicing his various techniques. He knew, with advanced mana manipulation, that he’d occasionally lose mana as he cut off strands or half-formed orbs in his practice. But he never lost mana fast enough to feel anything, his body just replaced it somehow. So how did it work? Why were there limitations on mana regeneration for sorcerers?

By the time they arrived at the earl’s house, it was lunch time and Lady Yenson had Penny captive in a parlor room. Zeek could feel the discomfort as he walked in to see Penny fidgeting with her robe and absently playing with the ends of her hair. Zeek pushed Sirius out of the doorway before he could greet “Mother” and shooed him off to get cleaned up. No sense in starting a fight with the prickly woman about mages and combat. Zeek greeted them and asked where the earl was.

“He asked that I send you and Penny to his study,” she replied, sipping tea from a porcelain cup. “But before that, I need to speak with both of you.” She motioned for Zeek to sit next to Penny on an upholstered couch. The two watched her patiently as she set her cup down and crossed her arms.

“This business the earl has you both involved in, Sirius is not to be part of it,” she said, not leaving room for debate.

Zeek frowned. “I don’t see how that’s possible forever.”

“It’s not his time yet. He’s a good boy, still very innocent. I want to keep it that way as long as I can,” she replied.

Zeek started to protest but Penny stopped him. “You don’t plan on letting him know until he’s strong enough to stand up for himself,” Penny added, more for Zeek’s sake.

“Correct.“

Zeek raised an eyebrow/ “What if I could make him like me?”

She pursed her lips. “Hunted by some cabal of zealots and constantly in danger of disappearing? No, I don’t want that for him.”

Zeek, on a whim, turned on his mana vision. He noticed Lady Yenson was a mage, though much weakerthan the earl. “Why? You’re a mage. What if there’s a way to make him stronger than anyone else? Why wouldn’t you want that for him?”

Lady Yenson smiled. “Power isn’t the gift you believe it to be. If you really become a mage of legend, we can discuss this further. Right now, you’re just a country boy learning to swim in new waters. Now go, the earl is waiting for you. I’ll occupy Sirius.” Zeek didn’t press the point as he left, taking Penny further into the mansion until they came to a room with oak double-doors bearing the letter Y in the center. They knocked and a voice beckoned them inside.

Turgi’s office looked like a bookstore got in a fight with an ink maker. Shelves lined the walls, some even blocking light from the windows. Comfortable chairs and end tables were scattered haphazardly, the seats filled with books and parchment. Some shelves held strange objects, or phials, or crystals between the aged tomes. Turgi was sitting behind a massive chair near his wooden desk that rivaled the size of the cold fireplace against the wall. Antone was sitting on top of the desk, next to Turgi, leaning in and discussing something. They both got quiet as Zeek and Penny entered.

“Greetings, fellow conspirators,” Turgi said with a smirk. Zeek, with his mana vision still on, noticed a shadow glowing under the curtained windows. He put his finger to his lips and pointed at it, but Antone just laughed. Irith rose from the shadows as a cloak of darkness squirmed away from her body and collapsed into her back. Penny yelped as Irith approached them and looked at Zeek.

“Fascinating,” she muttered, as Antone motioned for her to sit.

“Don’t mind her. She likes to lurk, spy things and all that,” Turgi explained as Zeek and Penny pulled chairs up to the desk. “Now that we’re all here, let us discuss our progress and plans going forward.”

Antone stood up from the desk and faced the room. “I returned to the room we explored with Hendricks,” he said. Irith leaned forward in her chair. “It was collapsed and all the items inside were gone. The door was still there, probably made of other material that couldn’t be destroyed. But it might be under surveillance, so we can’t risk using that entrance.”

Turgi gazed over the bookcases as he spoke. “That will be difficult. We didn’t find any other entrances. Hendricks relied on that journal he had, but it was taken after we lost him.”

“About that. I have a book I think you should read, Turgi,” Zeek said as the archmages watched him. “It’s called Treatise on Lem’s Waste Disposal Infrastructure. There’s a copy in the academy library.”

“A study of the sewers? How would that help? The room is located beneath the sewers at the level of the catacombs,” Antone asked.

Zeek scratched his head. “I’m not sure, exactly. I used my source to find any books related to true magic left in the library. This was the only one I found. I was hoping Turgi had some idea.”

Turgi adjusted his glasses. “Tell me about it.” Zeek gave him a summary of the findings; the materials, design, structure, and differences from other systems. He finished by mentioning there was a map of the sewer system at the end of the book.

“Interesting. Irith, could you get me a map of Lem from the government?” Turgi asked.

“It would be no trouble to get one from a few years ago, why?” she replied.

“He mentioned the book might mark cave-ins. If I overlay the two maps, we may be able to find another entrance to the lower level. But if this relates to true magic, how could it go undiscovered?” Turgi wondered.

Irith tapped her chin. “Treatises submitted by independent researchers are subject to less review. It’s possible some librarian noticed it dealt with history and filed it away without sending it for examination.”

“Could we meet this source of yours?” Antone asked suddenly.

“No,” Zeek replied, ignoring the awkward silence that followed.

“If we had some way to study how your abilities work, we might make progress in unraveling this mystery,” Turgi offered.

Zeek glanced at Penny. “I think I could teach Penny.”

She stared back at him with her mouth open. “You can teach me how to do magic differently?” she asked after a moment.

“Yes but there are some risks,” he replied.

Irith interjected, “Why can’t you teach us?”

“Your mana cores are too strong for the parts of your bodies that haven’t used mana before. I don’t know how to teach you to slow your cores enough to train your bodies to handle mana,” he explained.

“Would you let us watch you teach her?” Turgi asked.

“Yes, if she agrees to learn,” Zeek added.

The three archmages and Zeek looked at Penny, and she started squirming in her seat. “What risks?” she asked.

“It could take several months before you can control your mana core and pretend to be a sorcerer. If anyone caught you in that time, well…probably something very bad would happen,” he explained.

“Months? How could I possibly disappear for months?” Penny asked.

“It can be arranged,” Irith said quietly.

“I don’t know. I just want to learn the normal spells and get a good job. Maybe earn enough my family can live with me. You’re telling me I could be hunted if they found out what I’d learned?” She stumbled over her words under the archmages’ gaze.

Antone walked over and patted her on the shoulder. “We understand. No one here will force you to do something you don’t want. Just give it some thought before rejecting the idea. If he could teach me, I’d fake my own death to hide in a hole and learn it all.”

Penny looked at him. “But why? You all have everything you could ever want. You’re strong and powerful.”

Turgi opened a drawer in his desk and pulled out a book, tapping the cover as he set it down. “Part of our obsession is revenge for what the kingdom did to our friend. But that’s only part of it. Have you ever read about the Lost Age?” he asked.

Penny shook her head, so Turgi continued. “Buildings that touched the sky, magic that could cure every illness short of death, platforms that could transport thousands of people across the continent, carriages that moved by their own will, fields tended by complex golems, wells that summoned water in the desert, foundries that smithed weapons on command. The stories are filled with magic that only exists in dreams. A world where people’s lives were enriched by magic. If even a fraction of that is true, we want it back.”

Penny turned to Zeek. “Are you really capable of all that?”

He shook his head. “Not yet. Maybe never. But I think it’s possible if there were more people like me. Hold out your hand.”

Penny raised an eyebrow and stretched her arm towards him. Zeek raised a palm and slowed his core till he was at the level of a new mage. He pushed the mana through his arm slowly and methodically, like he’d practiced, and guided it out of his hand. A whisp of blue smoke rose from his hand and swirled into a line of gentle light. He tested it carefully, as he had before, and moved the line as if it was another finger. He didn’t try forming a ball, that wasn’t the use of this technique. Instead, he put his hand on Penny’s arm and guided the mana into her mana channels. There was some resistance at first, but he methodically ran his mana along her channels from the base of her hand to her core.

Penny gasped. “What is this?”

“The forced awakening you went through damaged your mana channels. They atrophy without use, that’s why I can’t teach the others. The feeling is them being healed. This is how your body should feel. It won’t make you a mage like me, though. I’d have to teach you more.”

Penny pulled her arm away lightly. “I’ll think about it.”

Turgi’s whole body was leaning over the desk as he stared at the exchange. “Do it again! Do it to me! Show me!” He laughed wildly as he charged around the desk and grabbed Zeek’s hand. Antone was staring over Turgi’s shoulder, and even Irith was hovering close to Zeek now.

He grinned. “One at a time. We have all weekend.”

The book vibrated.