Elation flowed through her body, seeing the magic- her magic- in the air. Her body started shaking, her hand vibrated unsteadily. For a moment fear flashed in her mind: Her glyphs would dissipate if her movements were wrong. Then, her conviction returned, she wouldn’t let herself focus on anything but the spell. Her trembles grew, her arms unsteady, knees weak, her breath short- she would’ve stopped breathing if she could. It felt like she was barely holding in convulsions through her body. She finished. Three balls of orange-hued light appeared around her hand, pure radiant energy floated precariously, not rotating around any fixed point. Looking at the light- her spell- she barely stood, and her vision of the light blurred for a moment before clearing.
“Now, imagine one of the balls moving towards your head.” Volken stated. Eos nodded and followed. One of the three lights, the one nearest to her head moving linearly towards her face. It curved before hitting her head and began to spin around it. She imagined the other two following likewise, and they did. She knew the lights did not burn. Three balls of light spun around above her head, and sped up as she played with it. They kept speeding up, until like spaces between the orbs disappeared and all that remained above her head was a wreath of orange, much like the amber light of the suns above.
“Good job.” Volken said, approaching Eos as she turned her head. Volken was closer than she realized, and her head turned as he wiped a tear from her cheek.
“Ah.” Eos said, “I didn’t realize…” She stopped, collapsing into Volken. “I did it.” She repeated, pushing her head into him as unrelenting tears streamed across her face. She gripped his shirt, and he just held her, repeating “Good job.”
When Eos came up for air, Volken continued his praise. “You did it. You can cast.”
“Yeah. I can!” Eos said, still feeling like she’s floating, failing to contain her laugh. “I really can!” She leapt away from Volken, and began to cast again. The lines she drew in the air felt euphoric. Soon, three more balls of light appeared around her hand, and she threw them around the training arena. They flew from one side to the other, spun around, and soon the three around her head joined them as they all began to uniquely dance to her imagination. I’m doing this, she thought, This is my spell. Reality began to set in for her. The lights phased through each other during their dance, danced through weapon racks and armor stands.
“How many spells do you have to learn to catch up?” Volken asked.
The lights disappeared, leading Volken to lightly dread the answer. “A hundred… and something…” Eos said slowly.
“And something?” Volken asked.“I stopped counting after a hundred…” Eos said, the light slightly fading from her eyes.
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“A hundred and something minus one.” Volken responded, trying to cheer Eos up.
“No…” Eos responded, “This isn’t one of them…”
Volken let out a light “oh” before trying to cheer Eos once again, “Let’s get started then! What do you want to do first?”
Eos thought for a moment, settling on the perfect spell. The glyphs appeared in the usual toxic green, and she began to write them out and began a new chant- she had practiced it before, but not nearly as much nor as constantly as for balls of fiery light. Keenly, she knew what she needed to imagine for the spell. More light red lines appeared as she wrote out the glyphs in the air, until they disappeared when she finished- this spell required a full ritual circle to be written, unlike the previous. For the conclusion of the spell, she tapped the centre of the circle- and her hand lit ablaze. Heat radiated from her flame, but she didn’t burn.
“Very good.” Volken said, “I’m surprised you had that memorized.” Eos lightly felt bad- it felt lightly like cheating, having an encyclopedia during a test everyone else had to memorize for.
“I know them all…” Eos said, half-lying, “I just… didn’t know how to use them. I have some more besides them stored too.”
“Huh?” Volken looked shocked, “What do you mean? You’ve only needed to learn a few by this point. Hasn't it only been-”
Eos interrupted him by beginning her next spell. This time she drew in blue, another ritual circle constructed and carefully written in. Again the spell concluded with a gentle tap, and an orb of water coalesced from the air. She stuck her still-flaming arm in, a bevy of steam produced from the meeting of flame and water. “Why didn’t you just stop the spell?” Volken asked.
“I demonstrated a second spell.” Eos replied, before sheepishly adding, “and I don’t know how to stop a spell.”
“Just.. stop focusing on it? Stop imagining it, stop…” Volken began. “I mean that works in most cases.”
Eos, with her quenched arm still in the now-hot water, tried to imagine… what exactly? The water not being there? She stood there confused for a moment, trying to figure out what she was supposed to imagine. She was drawn out of her inner thoughts by the water splashing over her body, covering her.
Volken failed to suppress his laugh, “Very well done!” He said, clapping, “Good job.” Eos simply gave him a death glare, and he relented, swiftly creating a strong gust of wind to dry her, also causing her to get extremely cold.
“Couldn’t you have just taken the moisture out of my clothes?” Eos asked, shivering. She tried to begin casting to make a source of heat, but her shivers prevented her from focusing. She was, admittedly, dry though.
“And risk pulling it from your body?” He responded, passing a small flame he had manifested over in front of her. “You know that this isn’t an exact science.”
Eos warmed up in front of it, “And I still don’t appreciate being mocked.”
Volken quipped, “Be glad I’m the one mocking you this time.” Eos shot him another death glare, before the two of them continued their training. That night, the reality of what happened set itself on her again, and the only thing that stopped her elation was her exhaustion; a long workout into the crying and spellcrafting was too much for her to resist the will of sleep, even if she forgot dinner.