Anna’s friend Kate was surveying him with a smiling face. Will rearranged his face quickly so that he would look less like a gawking idiot.

“Kate is here to help us identify why you’re having problems with spells” Anna said. Will had already resigned himself to the conclusion that the problem was him not being a mage. But obviously, Anna wasn’t there yet.

“Hello Kate” said Will in a subdued tone, not really feeling up to having one more audience member watching him miserably fail. Kate seemed to have taken note of his tone as she replied “Now, now Will, don’t lose heart so soon. You’ve just become a mage. You still have plenty of years to go before you become a pessimistic hag like me”.

Will chuckled. Kate looked a long way from any kind of hag in Will’s opinion. She didn’t look older than mid thirties and was extremely attractive with an hourglass figure accentuated by the tight fitting dress with plunging neckline that she wore.Kate was certainly well endowed and her cleavage was like an attention magnet. While Will could appreciate and admire her figure, he couldn’t find any trace of sexual attraction which really bothered him.

“Now, let’s have some dinner before we get started” Anna said cheerfully.

They headed to the kitchen and sat down while Will fetched food and mead for everyone and they sat down to eat. Will learned that Anna and Kate had known for a very long time and were very close

“Kate is the only person I’ve told about what really happened to you” Anna said.

“Anna will have you believe that’s because of deep friendship, but it’s only out of necessity. It would’ve been suspicious if she went around collecting as many books on dark magic as she did. She needed an accomplice” said Kate playfully.

Anna acted like she was deeply hurt by this statement before they both laughed. After dinner Anna headed up to her study because she had to set up something while Kate stayed behind in the kitchen to help Will.

“I really should thank you Will”.

“What for?”.

“For Anna. I haven’t seen her this happy in decades”.

Will didn’t think he’d done anything to make Anna happy, unless for some reason she secretly hated the raven painting and was now glad it was gone.

“I haven’t really done anything to make her happy”.

“You didn’t have to do anything. Just the fact that you exist is reason enough”.

Will didn’t understand what Kate meant and the confusion showed on his face.

“I’m talking about you choosing her as your magister primis. That means your first teacher” Kate added seeing Will’s eyebrows raised.

“I didn’t really choose it. It just kinda happened. Anyway what’s the big deal about maji..prim or something?”

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As an answer to this, Kate raised the sleeves of her gown and closed her eyes. After a moment, Will could see patterns emerging on her arm that looked like a coat of arms.

“The connection between a young mage and her magister primis is a special one. It never leaves you. These coat of arms belong to my magister primis”.

“Who was your magister primis?”

“My mother. You see, a young mage almost always chooses his/her parents as their magister primis. More than anything, this bond is something that symbolises magic being passed down from generation to generation. It’s the small bit of magic, a part of you, that survives into the next generation even after you’re gone. It carries a great meaning for mages”.

“Didn’t Anna ever have any….”

“She tried Will, for many years, with her former partner Ralf. Anna was heartbroken when she learned she couldn’t have children. It broke up their relationship. Anna put up a brave face, but she slowly drifted away from everyone and I was one of the few that she kept in touch with. I think she was resigned to the fate of never being anyone’s magister primis. Then YOU happened” Kate ended with a smile

Will was silent for a moment as he digested this. Although, now he could understand why Anna was so glad to have him as an apprentice.

“Kate, were you ever anyone’s magister primis?”

An expression that was both dark and sad crossed Kate’s usually cheerful face “I was, a long time ago”.

At that moment they were interrupted by Anna opening the kitchen door and announcing that the setup was complete. All three of them made their way up to Anna’s study. This time, there was a large transparent sphere on the table with another similar sphere inside it. On closer inspection, there was a third sphere inside the smaller sphere.

Anna and Kate touched the spheres and suddenly they realigned themselves as concentric spheres kept aloft by no support.

“Will, I want you to place your hands on the sphere and try to fill the smallest sphere with water” Anna said.

Will nodded and moved to place his hands on top of the sphere. First he summoned his physical energy and the space between the outer and middle sphere filled with shadowy wisps. Then Will concentrated on imagining himself filling the central sphere with water and tried pushing it out into the central sphere. Nothing happened. After a minute, Will let his hands drop from the sphere.

When he looked up, he was surprised to see satisfied smiles on the faces of Anna and Kate.

“That was good Will” Kate said while Anna nodded.

“How was that good? The sphere looks bone dry to me”.

“Oh the spell failed. No doubt about it. But, we’re closer to finding out the problem” Anna said

“We are?” There was obviously something that Will was missing.

Kate had a calming expression as she said “The space between the outer sphere and the middle sphere reacts to your physical energy, the space between the middle and inner sphere reacts to your mental energy while the inside of the smallest sphere shows the result of the final step of the magic. Now we know that there is nothing wrong with your physical energy collection. The problem lies in the second step”.

“That means my mental image is not proper. But I swear, I wasn’t imagining anything other than the water filling up the sphere”.

“Were you imagining Will, the crippled stable boy filling up the sphere or was it the young, beautiful mage?”

Anna’s question made Will’s breath catch in his throat “What do you mean?”.

“I mean that a mage needs to have a clear mental image of him/her to successfully imagine the changes they need to bring to the environment around them. If a mage’s mental image of himself/herself clashes too much with reality, they’ll be unable to perform a spell”.

Will couldn’t believe his ears, he was barely holding on to his past self. Now, it sounded as if he had to give it up completely to become a mage.

Kate had a somber expression as she spoke “You’re no longer a stable boy. You need to accept who you are before you can bring changes around you with magic”.

“NO” Will shouted. He was surprised at the tears that sprang to his eyes. Will dashed out of Anna’s study and fled to his room. He needed to be alone.

It seemed that in order to gain what he wanted he had to lose everything all over again.