076 – Passing And Being Listened To

Rox had to draw on her past personal training to hold her balance and not collapse as she suddenly felt as if she had run a marathon in ten seconds. After a moment, her equilibrium reestablished, Rox looked around.

Master Iver was scratching with a quill pen on a sheet of paper.

Rox waited until he finished, then spoke up. “What did you find?”

Master Iver turned to her, and held out a cane to her. “That you inherent ability is approximately equal to your progenitors. This is a mild surprise, as most cross-breeds usually loose that in successive generations.”

Rox took the cane in one hand and his proffered hand in her other and stepped the long wobbly step off the stool. “When The Sorceress did this same general thing in Veradale, it was not anywhere near so intense.”

“My apologies for that. I expect I used a much more detailed and advanced spell than was used on you previously.  It has told me several things. Do you know much about genetics?”

“Some,” Rox answered.

“Well, your genetics show you to be exactly one half elf. If I were to unravel your genetic molecule, one half of it would be of human stock, the other of elf stock. This is mildly unusual, as most cross-breeds eventually dilute in favor if which ever side is most dominant in their lineage.

“This has also revealed that your potential for magic is that of your progenitors, not just of your immediate ones, but of the lineage that my top student Rodira, and I myself, are from. I have noted this and will pass it on in my report to Sharlot and Rasgan.”

Master Iver looked at her with a studied neutral. “Now, the questions are: how much do you know? How much do you need to unlearn? How much can I teach you in the time available? And how much are you willing to do?”

At this last, Rox smiled, remembering a similar circumstance in Veradale. “Don’t tell me what I can’t do. Though you may want to advise me on why I should not do some things.”

Master Iver almost smiled at this. “Your progenitor told me almost that, once.”

As he turned to use the counter to keep from falling as he knelt on the floor, Rox waited a moment then asked the hanging question. “And what happened next?”

He turned to her, looking her almost in the eye from his knees. “She blew a building from its foundations. Help me clean up this mess.”

Both of them crawled on their hands and knees as they picked up the few bits of stuff, and wiped up the chalk from the floor. He started into her knowledge of theory as they tidied. He did not ask her to belabor anything, but simply quizzed on what she had learned. She started with what The Sorceress had taught her, and continued with what Caspian had taught.

The mess back on the table, he got onto a stool, and she likewise, and he asked what spells she had cast on her own, and how well. She mentioned her spell on her children, and then moved into what she had done since arriving on planet. This brought Rox to the tools: the chains and the staff. Rox explained about them, as best she could. He examined the staff, noted a familiarity with its design, but was otherwise unimpressed. He checked the chains over, and again was not impressed.

“Tools are useful, but the best measure of skill is in how they are used. Time to go show me what you can do.”

Master Iver led Rox to a larger room with assorted things piled about its walls. Rox felt she was in a dojo or similar training room. The next while Master Iver quizzed her on her practical magic skills, by having her do. Rox showed herself to be a shaky novice by his standards, but game to try all she could do. First she was able to light any candle or torch on command. She could push or pull things with ease, in focused efforts or wide areas. She could sense the flow of power, but was not yet using that sense as effortlessly as her others. She could shield herself, and anchor herself with her shields. She could do some low level energy projection, i.e. small energy balls of assorted temperatures and destructive capacities.

The main problem, he told her at the end of the lesson, was that she kept skipping the buffers that normally kept spells from getting out of control. She was putting plenty of power into the spells, and they were generally doing what she wanted, but she was akin to trying to manage a river as one would an irrigation ditch.

At her insistence, he let her put on the chains, and then run through her spells again. He noticed that the chains acted as amplifier and buffer to her efforts. But she was less dependent on them than he feared she might be. They did nothing for her senses.

Finally he called an end to the lesson, citing it was approaching lunch. Master Iver led her back to the work room, and sat on a stool as he began to write on a piece of paper.

“I am instructing Master Eklund to have your chains reworked. As they are, they do adequate, but they could be better. Allow him to do so. I can correct any damage his journeymen do to the magics on them.”

He pulled another sheet and began to fill it out. “Have you been introduced to what a Talent is?”

Rox nodded. “Yes, Master Iver.”

“Good. I will have one here this evening. Stop by on your way from Master Eklund’s. I am not sure which will be showing up. That is irrelevant. The Talent will be imparting into your mind a lot of information in a very short period of time. Have your mind at rest when you come, things will go easier that way. We are done for now. You may show yourself out.”

He kept writing as the young male elf reappeared, carrying a tray with lunch arrayed on it. He set the tray on a table and began unloading it.

“What about language, Master Iver? You said I would need the local language for Master Eklund, but we have not addressed it. It seems to be the one thing you deliberately avoided addressing.”

Master Iver did not look up from where he had paused in his writing. “What do you propose be done about it?”

Rox had taken time to consider this the night before, and had her options ready. “Well, there are three methods: teaching me as one does a child, but that will take too long. Using magic in one of two methods that have been used on me previously, to give me at least a temporary command of the language. Or that Talent you mentioned installing the knowledge in me. However that is not viable for the moment, as you say the Talent is not here just now.

“In relation to the magic forms, Caspian tried to cast a spell on me, and my husband, that would draw on the minds around to glean their language knowledge and copy it into me. But apparently the spells intrinsic to this city have not allowed that process to take permanent hold the way that the same spell did previously to provide me with the language of those I was among in Veradale. As I stand, I can comprehend the local language as well as every other language I know. But I cannot speak the local language. I have comprehended this language every time I have heard it spoken, even before I had it introduced into my mind by magic.

“Mallob suggested I take this up with you, when I asked him about this yesterday.”

Rox stood her ground and waited, uncertain what nonverbal cues she was seeing Master Iver give. Master Iver looked at his assistant, apprentice, whatever who simply continued setting up lunch for two and then sat waiting for Master Iver to join or give leave to begin.

Finally Master Iver gave his almost smile. “Fine.”

He turned to Rox and pointed at her, chanting in quiet rapidness. She felt a spell organize around him, then transfer to her.

He put his hand down. “You evidently have not realized that the spell you put on your children, and your mother put on you, was not a new spell of your own creation, but rather a transfer of an existing spell. This spell was created and cast by Rodira on herself, then transferred to her offspring. You did not need to mention it much, as it is most likely the typical spell done to change physical features, and runs off the energy of the current host. Knowing what I knew of my student, she probably put her knowledge of a few things into the transference. This would include her fluency with languages. I surmise by the age of the spell, or by her choosing, the spoken fluency has not obtained. That is simple enough to fix, but as you have reported, it will not permanently take if the spell is cast within the boarders of this city.”

Master Iver paused. “The talent this evening is apparently the quickest remedy. In the mean time, I have restored the spoken fluency, from the mages previous spell. It may not last long, but should last at least through the afternoon.”

Rox made a conscious effort to use the local language now. “Thank you, Master Iver.”

He finally let the smile out, briefly. “You are welcome, Student Roxanne.”

He turned to his lunch and his notes, and she to the door.

Rox went outside, and was startled briefly by how much brighter it was outside than inside. Blinking her eyes to adjust, she looked around and spotted the same cab from earlier, and had it take her home, for lunch and her gear.

Lunch was unremarkable, as was the trip back to the shop of Master Eklund. As she went, Rox felt that this was a bit more superfluous than the meetings she had been subjected to. But she was willing to humor things. She had packed up all her clothes she had worn on the trail and the gowns and under things that had been made in the last few days here.

She was wearing her skirt this day, as her trousers had been damaged during a sparing session with Caspian and Steven; the inseam on the crotch had been ripped out, and there was not enough material to properly repair it a third time.

The shop had bolts of fabric on tables and shelves to one side, rolls and laid-out furs and leather to the other. There were a few elves gossiping, as they purchased fabric. Rox was shown to the back area of the shop, and between a pair of tables chest-high to Rox.

A younger elf approached. “You are the niece of Sharlot?”

Rox nodded through the pile in her arms. “Yes I am.”

“Good. You can lay out all your things here. The Master will be with you shortly. He is helping to fit an unruly child.”

Rox put her pile down, and then lay everything out. The four gowns, white, blue burgundy and motley; then the elf foundation garments with five of the thongs. Rox had anticipated being told to strip again, so she had put on a pair of spandex shorts with one of the elf-thongs under it under her skirt. She put down the stockings and slippers that came with the gown next to them. Then she put down her freshly washed tunics, her irreparable trousers, her poncho, her spandex bras and shorts, her socks, and her leather equipment in its various subgroups. As Rox put it down, she spread it out just to keep it in discrete groups. She had not brought her bow or arrows. The tailor who had made the four gowns and other things showed up with a list of Rox’s measurements.

Rox was leaning against the table as this older female elf approached.

“Good day, young lady.”

Rox inclined her head at the taller elf. “Good day, Ma’am. Are you to help here?”

“Yes and no,” the Tailor responded. She put her list of numbers down, and then looked at Rox’s trousers. She picked them up and examined the seams, and the fabric.

“What happened?” She had the trousers inside out, looking at the repaired and ripped out seam.

“Jumping high kick split the seam the first time; a dodge the second time; a kick the third time. By then, as you can see, there was not enough good fabric to repair the seam. If it was constructed the way my clothes at home are, with a piece of fabric here in the form of a bellows, it would not have ripped.

Rox described what she meant using a scrap of fabric, as the Tailor watched intently. As Rox finished, she noticed that a tall, skinny older male elf had shown up and was respectfully watching.

The tailor turned to the older elf. “Master Eklund.”

“Master Senisith.”

“This delightful young woman was just explaining how these trousers were not constructed correctly, and how they could be.”

“So I observed as I approached.” He turned from the tailor to Rox. “You have a letter of introduction?”

Roxanne produced the letter that she had earlier presented to Master Iver. Master Eklund did not even give it a first look. He took it and set it aside.

“So much for formalities. Now, tell me young lady, what can we really do for you?”