Elara didn't remember much of the walk back to her room. The entire time, she was trying to recreate the colors of the motes she had seen during meditation and match them to the black segment of the circle she had drawn at the examination table. Only after she shut the door behind her, set her books on the bed, and carefully placed the crystal ball beside them did she realize how tightly she was clenching her shoulders.
She slid down to the floor, leaning her back against the bedframe, and stared straight ahead for a moment, searching for a simpler explanation than the one that had been hounding her since she left the hall.
Maybe there were just very few Darkness motes in that room… If the surroundings affect what you can draw in, maybe there were simply more of the others.
She wasn't about to settle for a guess. She reached for her textbook, found the diagram she had chosen earlier, and lifted the sphere, attempting to slip back into a meditative state. This time, she focused entirely on observing her surroundings, fighting the urge to immediately pull in the nearest lights.
The motes corresponding to Darkness did appear, but they were sparse - fewer even than the white specks she associated with Light. Elara spent a long time searching for more, until she finally broke her focus and lowered the crystal to her lap.
The result didn't align with what it should be, assuming Sylvara's reading was supposed to dictate what she perceived most clearly during meditation.
Did she alter the test results?But why would she point to the wrong element when she clearly would have preferred not to let me study at all?
She dragged her right hand down her face, then stared at the pale skin, recalling the vial pressed to her lips and the chill spreading from her throat to her stomach. Vespara had altered both her hands, healed her wound, and ordered her to choose Caldra before Elara even stood in front of the testing equipment.
She didn't know if the potion could temporarily affect the test results, or if the reconstruction of the hand she used to hold the brush played a part. She couldn't even rule out the possibility that she was still confusing the two concepts Melyss had tried to differentiate.
One thing was certain: she knew far less about Vespara’s actions than she needed to feel safe around her.
She helped me get into the Spire as an apprentice, but she also made sure I picked a specific mentor…It would be nice to finally figure out why.
She sighed, set the sphere aside, and checked the hourglass. The time for afternoon meetings was approaching, and sitting on the floor by her bed wasn't getting her any closer to answers. She gathered her materials and stood up, deciding to do the only thing she actually had access to for now.
Go to Caldra Mourne.
She didn't run into Kelira in the corridor, so comparing meditation results would have to wait. She headed to the Ash Wing alone, then up to the fifteenth floor, where her new mentor’s private laboratory was located.
Apprentices seeking guidance came here, hoping Caldra would answer a few questions while she worked, though Elara had already heard that most preferred to exhaust all other options first. A visit might provide an answer to a problem, but it could just as easily end with the mentor asking why someone couldn't grasp such a simple concept, or whether they were even worth teaching at all.
After the morning classes and her conversation with Melyss, she couldn't muster any excitement about meeting a fully-fledged Magistra.
The moment she stepped into the laboratory, her eyes met Deyra’s.
Surprise flashed across the girl's face, followed by anger, and then a sudden caution that made her back slightly away from the nearest table. The bruises from yesterday's incident were still visible. Elara didn't need to say a word to remind her how their last encounter had ended.
She raised her left hand and carefully brushed a skeletal knuckle against her chin, adjusting her posture more than actually scratching an itch. Deyra immediately looked away.
Out of roughly twenty new apprentices, only three had chosen Caldra. Aside from Deyra, the third was Angeline Reth, a petite girl with delicate features, pale blue eyes, and incredibly long honey-blonde hair. She was observing her surroundings with a serene smile, acting as if the tension between the other two didn't concern her in the slightest.
An adult woman wearing a second-rank apprentice badge was working at one of the tables. She wore a practical uniform that draped loosely over a modest chest and was busy rearranging vessels and tools, though she occasionally paused, as if struggling to decide where exactly she should put the object she was holding.
When she noticed the three girls standing idle, she walked over.
“The mentor usually doesn't arrive this early. You may come around three o'clock.”
She gave a brief smile, then added in a tone that couldn't possibly be mistaken for politeness:
“You may also choose not to come at all.”
She didn't elaborate on the remark, simply returning to her work, clearly uninterested in further conversation. Elara waited a moment. When there was no sign of Caldra arriving anytime soon, she found an empty section of a table and opened her textbook.
Deyra and Angeline did the same, picking spots far enough away from each other that they wouldn't have to pretend they were studying together.
Elara tried to read, but every few paragraphs she realized she couldn't remember the last sentence. She kept restarting, checking the clock, and thinking about Vespara. Finally, at half past three, the laboratory door opened.
The older apprentice instantly straightened her back.
“Mentor,” she greeted the newcomer with a smile.
Caldra Mourne was a tall, bony futa with short dark brown hair and a haggard face that betrayed not a shred of interest in the greeting. Her simple uniform was unadorned, the fabric lying almost flat against her chest, accentuating the severity of her entire figure. Her amber eyes swept across the laboratory, landing on a few items left out on a counter.
“I ask for very little,” she said to the older apprentice. “Put the things you use back in their proper place. If you can't even manage that much, you can stop coming here entirely.”
The woman’s smile vanished.
“Yes, Mentor. I will organize everything today.”
“When is your next evaluation?”
“In a month.”
“In that case, I will evaluate whether you are capable of maintaining order in a laboratory.”
Elara noticed the apprentice accepted those words with relief, even though moments earlier she had looked as if she expected something far worse. She didn't have time to dwell on it, however, because Caldra turned to the new arrivals.
“Come here. Do you expect me to walk around my own workshop to inspect each of you individually?”
They quickly lined up in front of her. The mentor ran her eyes over their faces, stopping at Elara.
“Why do you have so little Aether?”
Deyra's head snapped up with sudden animation, her lips parting as if she were about to enthusiastically help provide the answer, but then she winced and clamped her mouth shut. Elara didn't look her way, reasoning that her condition would be hard to hide from a Magistra anyway.
“I have poor magic aptitude, Mentor, but high mental strength.”
Caldra didn't look convinced.
“There are plenty of scholars with sharp minds who cannot wield magic. Simply reading books will not make you a sorceress.”
She studied her for a moment longer, then grumbled in displeasure:
“Are we really so short on candidates that we're accepting anyone now?”
Elara felt a tight knot form in her stomach, though she had been bracing for a reaction like this ever since she left her room. What was far harder to swallow was the realization that if this mentor also considered her a waste of time, she would have absolutely no one left to turn to for help.
“I will work on increasing my reserves. Please give me a chance.”
“Work how? Flesh Reforging?” Caldra asked, shifting her gaze to the girl's hands. “Fine. Reach ten AU within three months, and you will pass the first evaluation. If not, the laboratory always has use for spare materials.”
Elara froze, listening to the casual ease with which the line had been drawn between continuing her education and becoming something to be stored on a shelf.
Aether Units were used to measure magical reserves. Reaching ten AU before the age of fifteen was generally considered a baseline indicator of aptitude. Her own reserves were clearly hovering far below that mark, if a single glance was enough to provoke such open disdain.
She was twelve years old, but instead of a few years to develop, she was given three months.
Just this morning I was thrilled to finally start learning…Now I have to prove it’s more profitable to teach me than to dismantle me.
She took a half-step forward, intending to ask how she was even supposed to begin, but Caldra raised a hand, cutting the conversation short.
“You two are coming with me,” she told Deyra and Angeline, then looked back at Elara. “You will stay with Mara.”
She didn't add anything else. She simply headed for the door, taking the other apprentices with her. The woman with the second-rank badge saw them out, shut the door, and returned to her table as if the presence of the girl left behind warranted no comment whatsoever.
Elara stood where she had been left for a moment, fighting back the crushing sensation of having just been discarded, even though she was technically still permitted to remain in the laboratory.
She had chosen Caldra according to Vespara's instructions, fulfilling exactly what was expected of her. Perhaps the older futa would contact her again, but Elara couldn't assume their next conversation would bring help rather than another demand.
The suspicion regarding the trial results remained unresolved. The thought of relying on Vespara’s backing grew less appealing every time she remembered that she didn't know the price of that protection.
If I just wait for her to tell me what to do next, one day I might lose the ability to say no…First, I need to learn something - anything - that will help me understand my own situation.
She looked at Mara, who was organizing tools on the counter, and walked closer.
“Can I help you clean up?”
The woman glanced back without surprise, as if she had been waiting the entire time for Elara to reach that exact question on her own.
“You don't have crystals and you don't have points, so all you have is labor,” she sighed. “For the next month, you will keep the laboratory organized, and I will dedicate an hour a day to teaching you.”
Elara looked around the room. Its sheer size didn't seem like much of a problem on its own. What looked far worse were the cluttered surfaces, unfamiliar vessels, and bizarre materials. Even figuring out which things were safe to touch would probably require a detailed lecture.
“The entire laboratory? I don't know the equipment yet. I’m afraid I’ll just get in your way instead of helping.”
“I’m not telling you to do everything right away. I’ll explain the most important things, and you’ll handle the final tidying up.”
For a moment, the proposal sounded reasonable, and Elara almost felt relieved to finally be offered a concrete exchange. A month of labor for a daily hour of explanations could be exactly the start she needed, especially if Mara also showed her how to handle the materials safely.
The older apprentice raised her hand.
A slit split across the middle of her palm and slowly opened, revealing the wet interior of a mouth. A red tongue slipped out from between the lips, darted forward, and stopped so close to Elara's face that the girl instinctively jerked her head back.
“But if you start slacking off or screw something up, I will flay you alive,” Mara said.
Elara froze, staring at the writhing tongue, then shifted her gaze to the items waiting to be organized. Only now did she connect the deadline Caldra had given Mara with the month of labor she was about to take on.
In a month, Caldra will evaluate whether she can keep this place tidy… And if I make a mistake, Mara just made it perfectly clear who will pay for it.
The open mouth in the palm was still hovering right in front of her face when she realized that while she had three months to reach ten AU, she might not even have a single day to learn how to safely clean this laboratory.