by Andrew Rowe
“I understand. That is...quite reasonable, given what happened.”
I sighed, putting a hand on Sera’s forehead. She mumbled something unintelligible and rolled over, but didn’t wake. “Go on. I’ll see you soon enough.”
“I’ll have the owners bring you her share of the winnings.”
I nodded. I wasn’t going to thank him for that.
I turned my head away, and Derek left us in silence.
Chapter XV — Recovery
By the next morning, Sera was almost ready to move. Her legs wobbled as she tried to stand, though, and I had to catch her from falling backward.
“I want to go home.” Sera frowned, burying her face in her hands.
I stood up, awkwardly putting a hand on her head. “I’ll make it happen, then. Don’t try to get up without me.”
She grumbled a little bit, but finally slumped back down on the couch.
It took me about a half hour to find someone in management and convince them to send a couple of the staff to help me carry Sera home. We were fortunate that injuries and mana exhaustion were common enough events that they always had overnight staff.
While we were heading down to pick up Sera, one of the staff members — a bouncer, from the look of him, remarked, “At least she didn’t get torn up like the last team.”
“What happened to them?”
“Ogre nearly tore one of the guy’s arms off, then smashed his partner in the face. Had to rush them both to the hospital.”
That revelation did wonders for my mood.
I decided that next time, I’d put my gauntlet back on before punching Derek.
All in all, three of us took turns carrying Sera until we managed to get her back to her dorm. And by “taking turns”, I mean the two of them took turns, and I “supervised”. I wasn’t strong enough to carry Sera more than a block at best.
The medic deemed her “stable” before we left, but advised me to keep a close eye on her, and to take her to the hospital if she started coughing blood.
A lovely image, that.
All in all, we were both in a pretty terrible mood by the time we set Sera down in her own bed. She looked pale, like she’d suffered serious blood loss, but I hadn’t seen any bleeding.
I thanked the two staff members that helped carry her — it wasn’t their fault she’d gotten hurt — and grabbed her some food from the cafeteria. By the time I got back, she’d fallen back to sleep.
***
A few hours later, Sera woke in a ravenous state. I handed her the food I’d retrieved. It wasn’t fresh, but I still deemed it edible. She devoured it.
“How are you feeling?” I tried to put a smile on my face, but it was one of those obviously fake ones that I knew she’d see right through.
“Terrible.” She took another sip of the mana potion that I’d put next to her food. “This tastes like burning.”
At least she was feeling strong enough to complain. “You’re going to be drinking that lovely fire for a while. Your arm is in the worst shape, but it looks like you were drawing from other mana sources, too.”
She shrugged. “Maybe.”
“Which ones? It’s important that I know in case I need to get you to a hospital.”
Sera took another sip of the potion, grimacing, and then whispered her reply. “...all of them?”
“What was that? I’m not sure I heard you.”
“I said all of them, Corin. And, before you get into a lecture—”
I folded my arms. “You seriously risked drawing mana from your heart and your brain, Sera? That’s dangerous enough for people who have attunements in their locations. You could have killed yourself!”
She slammed the potion bottle down hard. “I am not in a mood for this argument, Corin. When your arms are hurting too much to move them, and your legs are drained to the point where you can’t stand, you’ll do what you need to do.”
My jaw tightened. I wanted to argue, but this wasn’t the time. “You’re hurt, so I’m not going to fight with you. But I’m not comfortable with you pushing yourself like that.”
“You don’t have to be. That’s the great part about this being my body, Corin. I can do whatever I want with it.” She jabbed a piece of egg with her fork. “And I do appreciate your concern, I really do, but I’m not a child. And I’m not your retainer. You can’t give me orders.”
I leaned back in my chair. “That’s fine. I know I can’t order you around. But you’re...my sister, so I was worried about you.”
Sera’s eyes narrowed. “Sister, eh?” She took a bite of the egg, setting her fork down. “I think this might be the first time you’ve called me that without sounding sarcastic.”
I ran a hand through my hair. “You’re probably right. I’m sorry. I’ll try to be twice as sarcastic next time to make up for the lapse.”
***
It took days before Sera was walking unassisted again, which meant I got to spend a lot of “quality” time with her.
Normally, the mana in her legs would have recovered in hours, but she’d drained herself so significantly that her body was having to prioritize what it restored first.
The first mana potion helped speed the process along a bit, getting her to the point where she could stand, but she refused to drink the other two, claiming that they made her feel nauseated.
I looked into that a little — it was apparently a pretty common side effect. I decided to dig into how mana potions worked a little later. They wouldn’t offer permanent improvements like the enhancement elixirs I had tried to research before, but I knew it’d still be useful to figure out how to manufacture them.
We were heading to the dining hall when it occurred to me to ask a critical question. “Did they ever end up paying you?”
She shook her head. “I got a letter explaining that I’d get my cut in about three weeks. It’s pretty significant, though.”
“How significant is pretty significant?”
“Two hundred silver sigils.”
I let out an appreciative whistle. “I’ve never had money like that.”
She chuckled. “No kidding. I don’t think I’ve ever had a quarter of that. I’m still trying to figure out what to do with it.”
“Might I suggest investing in one of your favorite Enchanters?”
Sera let out a snort. “I’ll think about it. It does mean I can afford to have you make me a gauntlet, at least.”
“I could make you something much better than that gauntlet with two hundred silver. But it’d be smarter for me to practice on some smaller things first, so I was sort of serious about the investment.”
“I’ll think about it. For now, food.”
It was her first day back at the dining hall — I’d been bringing food back to her room while she’d been unable to make the journey — so she set into the hall with reckless abandon.
By the time we sat down, she was carrying two full trays, and I was carrying another tray for her, in addition to my own.
There was zero chance she’d be eating all this, but fortunately the dining hall did let us pack up any left overs. Which, by the look of it, would be virtually everything.
We hadn’t talked much about the fighting. She’d been pretty miserable during the recovery, so I tried to keep us focused on other topics. Now that she was back on her feet, though, I had some questions.
“That binding thing you were doing. That’s how Summoners get their new spells?”
She looked contemplative, even as she eviscerated a potato. “Sort of. The binding spell teaches my attunement how to make an inferior copy of whatever I hit with it. It’s not like having a real contract with a monster. A real contract is much more versatile.”
“So, if you can make a copy of something that easily, why don’t you have dozens of things you can summon? Wouldn’t your teachers just summon things in class for the whole class to copy?”
She shook her head. “Every binding we make takes up a little bit of our mana, for a
s long as we maintain the bond. If I had a whole bunch of them, I couldn’t summon anything at all, so it’s only worth it to keep a few.”
Sera paused, tearing off a piece of bread with her teeth. “We did learn a couple of basic summoning spells in class, but most of the teachers consider bindings worthless, since the monsters are so much weaker than the real thing.”
She took a breath. “Most people focus on making real contracts, since they have a similar cost in mana to bindings, but contracts give you more options. For example, if you have a contract, you can draw on the creature you’ve contracted for power without summoning them. That’s how I use my ice spells.”
I prodded at my own food, but I wasn’t nearly as hungry. “I remember you — or Teft, maybe? — saying something about summoning modified versions of things you’ve contracted?”
“Yeah. Like, if I had a real contract with an ogre, and I had some fire mana, I could summon a fire ogre.” She grinned. “A fire ogre. Now I want one.”
I rolled my eyes. “Okay, I get the idea. And you’re still not going to tell me what your contract is with, right?”
“Nah.”
I picked up a piece of one of her potatoes with my fork. “Well, if you’re going to be that way...”
“Hey! That’s my third favorite potato! You give it back!”
I popped it into my mouth.
Sera put a hand over her heart, giving me a lamenting expression. “Alas. It was so young.”
I chewed. “And salty.”
Sera tightened her lips. “I do want to tell you what my summoned monster is. But I can’t.”
I raised an eyebrow at that. “What do you mean?”
She sighed. “It’s part of the contract. The creature is... eccentric. I’m not allowed to tell anyone I have a contract with it until it agrees that I’m ready.”
I blinked. “That seems like a pretty bad deal.”
Sera shook her head. “No, it’s a great deal. You’ll see why eventually. But in the meantime, I can’t tell you what it is.”
“Fine, fine. But it gives you ice magic in the meantime?”
She nodded. “Yeah. And some degree of control over ice magic, which is pretty useful.”
I’d noticed that when she managed to stop the karvensi’s spell in the arena, but I hadn’t realized the ability was from her contracted monster. Interesting. “So, different contracts offer different benefits, in addition to summoning. Could you contract an ogre to make yourself physically stronger?”
She made a ‘hmm’ noise. “Maybe? I’m not actually sure about that. I’ve only looked into summoned monsters that give me enhanced magical abilities, but it sounds possible, yeah.”
“Could that be how Derek was so strong?”
She lifted up a cup of juice and took a long sip. “Ahh, something that isn’t mana potion. Delicious.” After a brief moment of savoring the beverage, she continued. “Anyway, no, he’s not a Summoner.”
“But I saw him—”
“Not sure what exactly his attunement is, but it’s different. I think he stores monsters in items, then gets power from the objects. He wouldn’t tell me about it before the match, he just said he could take care of things. It was pretty frustrating.”
“Yeah, I’d be pretty frustrated if someone who I was fighting alongside didn’t tell me about all their abilities.” I gave her an exaggerated wink.
“Oh, shush, Corin. When I can summon it, you’ll be one of the first to see, okay?”
I nodded. “Acceptable.”
“If you want to see it any faster, you could make me a mana storage device...”
We spent much of the rest of the meal talking about enchanting options. All in all, it was a pleasant change of pace.
***
I lifted up the product of three weeks of agonizing labor — a single crystal of gray mana, still trapped within the practice shell.
I might have slightly overestimated myself when I’d planned to figure out how to make the more advanced version in a week.
Even so, I was proud of my results.
Over the following few days, I finished filling the remaining practice molds. It was considerably easier after my first success — but I still had a pretty significant problem.
I always stopped as soon as I started feeling a headache.
I knew from speaking to various Diviners that I was being overly cautious. After a cursory test of my mana levels after finishing one of the crystals, I knew I was nowhere near the point where making one was going to put me in danger.
But I remembered what had happened to Sera after the fight, and how long it had taken her to recover.
And, more importantly, I remembered what happened to my great grandfather. The story of his broken mind echoed in my thoughts every time I considered using any significant amount of mind mana. The more I tried to fight the thoughts out of my head, the more I reinforced them.
But I needed to make my attunement stronger. I was nowhere near Carnelian yet — and I was rapidly running out of time to get there. I knew I’d never make enough progress if I kept stopping at the slightest hint of discomfort.
And that was why, if I couldn’t scour the fear from my mind, I needed to beat it through other means.
I needed to outsmart it.
And with that goal in mind, I began my next project.
***
I handed the four completed crystals over to Vellum.
“Oh, you’re still enrolled here? I thought you might have dropped out from shame a couple weeks ago, since these took you so long.”
I grinned. “Sorry to disappoint you, professor. I do have other things to keep me busy.”
That was about seventy percent an excuse, but a fraction of truth was good enough to keep the smile on my face.
She just shook her head. “And I suppose you’ll be wanting the mana out of these?”
“Yeah, and I’d like to see the extraction process, if you don’t mind.”
“Very well.” She nodded, laying out the crystals in a line on the table. She opened a drawer, reached in to withdraw something...
...and hit the first crystal in the line with a hammer.
The quartz casing exploded, chips flying everywhere.
As I gawked, Vellum took a deep breath, and then smashed the next one.
And the next. And the next.
At least the mana crystals themselves remained intact.
“Ah, much better.” She set the hammer down on the table amidst the quartz powder and debris.
I stared blankly. “I...thought you said I wasn’t supposed to damage the casing?”
“Of course not, dear. I enjoy doing it myself far too much to let you do it. Let an old woman bask in one of her few remaining joys in life, hmm?”
I sighed, taking a seat in the chair across from her. She was obviously having a little fun at my expense, but that was tolerable as long as I got the results.
I reached across the table and began to retrieve my hard-earned crystals. “Of course, professor. I would never want to deprive you of such simple pleasures. You wouldn’t happen to have any more practice crystals that I could use?”
“Oh, no, that was the last batch. You can buy them at some of the supply stores on campus, though. They’re cheap or I never would have given you any.”
“Right.” I rubbed my forehead, feeling the grit of powdered quartz dust that had stuck on my fingers when I picked up the mana crystals. “I’ll keep working on those, but I do have another question in the meantime.”
“Oh? Need some advice on how to woo a young lady, perhaps?”
I blinked. Where did she get these absurd ideas?
“No, Professor. A rune-related question, and I think you’re the only one here who might know the answer.”
“With those younger ladies, flattery will get you everywhere — but with me, Corin, you’re better off just keeping me entertained. I do hope this is an interesting question?”
I nodded. “Is it possible
to use runes to perform mathematical calculations?”
She steepled her fingers. “That is an interesting question. If you’re thinking about making a magical device to make it easier to perform math in class, however, I’m afraid that the designs required are quite complex — and most common methods are patented, so it’s not something you could easily make and sell.”
Huh. I hadn’t been thinking of something of that level of complexity, but it was good information to have. “Nothing quite like that. Basically, I’m going to have a divination rune that checks for a value, and then I need to run it through an equation and display the resulting number on a surface. I found the runes for the first step, and I think I know how to make the number display, but I couldn’t find anything on the middle part.”
Vellum leaned back in her chair. “That’s not terribly difficult. You want to run the number through the exact same equation every time?”
I scratched my chin. “Yeah. I think so? I’m pretty sure the underlying equation stays stable, but I admit I haven’t dug into it very deeply yet.”
For the first time in my recollection, Vellum looked stymied. I felt a pang of victory — I think I’d actually managed to confuse her.
“Whatever is this for?”
I tapped the attunement mark on my forehead. “You know people go to the Divinatory periodically to learn how much mana they can use safely from each part of their body?”
She waved a hand dismissively. “Important for students, certainly. Most advanced attuned learn to evaluate that by feel.”
“But that’s a flawed approach.” It was a bit of a provocative statement, but I was confident. “Even experts sometimes push themselves beyond their limits, sometimes without realizing it, and suffer permanently for it.”
Fortunately, she didn’t seem offended — just contemplative. “And you think you can solve this by...”
“Every time that I’ve gone to the Divinatory, they’ve cast a single spell to check each part of my body — then scribbled down some math and given me the result. I think they’re checking the total amount of mana flowing through each area, then running it through a simple formula to tell me how much is safe to use. I could make items that do that.”
