Chapter 31 – Conversation

“I know how you can enjoy the snow, without earning demerits for dress-code violations,” Mirian told Lily the next morning. “Spell of traction. It puts force-spikes on the bottoms of your boots. Then you don’t have to worry about ice.”

Lily rolled her eyes. “Right, totally drain my mana on my way to class. Great idea. I’d rather it just didn’t snow.”

“Well, come to Arriroba. Does not snow there at all. Barely even rains.”

Lily laughed. “I’d like to visit. It sounds like a cozy little village.”

“It is,” Mirian said. “Maybe too cozy. And a bit primitive. Everyone gawked at the first glyph lamp that they installed in the market square. And I don’t think they’ve installed a second one yet. At least it has the standard spellward protecting it from myrvite attacks. One day, maybe it’ll get a rail station. I am not a fan of the long walk from Madinahr to my village.”

They crunched through the blanket of white snow on their way to class, and despite Lily’s concerns, there was no ice to slip on. After the plaza, they parted ways, Lily on her way to Alchemistry, Mirian on her way to Artifice Design.

True to her word, Professor Torres was there early.

“Any word from you-know-who?”

“No,” Torres said simply.

Then Mirian brought out her completed spellrod, which Torres examined. She used an item of her own design that had various metal prongs and glyphs on it to conduct some sort of test. “Simply channeling mana through a student product with no precautions is suicide,” she said. “Not that I don’t believe you’ve done it right. It also gives me more quantitative data on the components. I can look for inefficiencies in the mana channels or problems in the crystal capacitors. Or flaws in the glyphs.”

Mirian watched her use the device curiously. Of course, the testing device had to be magnitudes more complicated than the rod she’d just made. She wondered if Torres had designed it from the ground up. “Your use of parallel mana conduits on the sixth circuit is wasting mana. It becomes bottlenecked by the capacitor and the subsequent smaller channels after it runs through the uliman glyph. Glyph inefficiencies are minor, but present. The crystal capacitor supporting your force shield spell appears to have a flaw degrading performance. Otherwise, this is good work.”

Only three problems? Now that was high praise.

“Let’s see your next plan.”

They went over it together, and this time, Torres had a lot more to say. She wasn’t an expert on illusions, which meant she knew about twenty-times more than Mirian did. By then, several students had begun to trickle in, so Mirian took her seat and Torres prepared for her lecture. Mirian busied herself in the back on new sketches and designs. She’d also written down the titles of three more textbooks that her professor had said might be useful, though Gods knew when she’d find the time to read even more books. The stack of books on her desk in the dorm was already monstrous and threatening to tip over.

Torres gave a modified version of her presentation. What Mirian had told her seemed to have changed it considerably, though the basic framework was the same.

She walked in early to Castner Hall, where Illusion Spells 281 was being held. Apparently, the hall had once been a lavish manor of a rich noble before the Academy took it over. It had been completely remodeled on the inside so that the rooms were proper classrooms, but the entrance hall still had some of the original luxury. Elaborate crystal and silver chandeliers hung from the ceiling, while the sides were decorated with glass banisters. Along the hall was a series of modern stained-glass portraits framed by mirrored glass. It was, like most of the buildings of the Academy, strange in its own special way.

The classroom, thank the Gods, was significantly more subdued. Professor Marva was not.

Most of the professors wore their university coat with trousers or a dress in somewhat matching colors. Professor Marva wore her jacket unbuttoned, revealing the high collared shirt beneath. It was striped with clashing oranges, blues, and yellows, with white frills running down the center. Her pants were equally garish, dyed red, yellow and white. She wore a beret decorated with at least five different kinds of feathers. It seemed like clothes that would better fit a court jester, but she seemed quite at home in them. She was also one of the few people Mirian had seen in Torrviol with red hair and green eyes. In fact, Mirian strongly suspected the illusionist teacher was using… illusions. She didn’t say anything though.

Mirian was a little embarrassed to be in a 200-level class; most of the students were third or fourth years. She had to start somewhere, though. A few gave her strange looks, but she ignored them.

“Welcome,” Professor Marva said to the class once they were settled. She had a rich, deep voice that was pleasant to hear. She proceeded to tell the class what Mirian already knew: that if you were in this class, you better have spellcasting basics down, and you better know how to perform spells with a mental component. Then she went on with a very poetic introduction about how illusions were the key to seeing the world as it really was. Mirian was disappointed that the first class was lecture-only, and they wouldn’t actually practice illusion spells until the next day. Still, it seemed Marva was a proficient illusionist, and certainly knew the subject.

In Spell Engine Alchemistry, Mirian made sure to repeat her conversation with Nicolus. This time, she noticed Calisto eying her suspiciously as she did. Again she wondered what the history was between the two. Not enough to actually ask about it, though.

Combat Magic was run by Professor Runer, the only professor on staff who was Akanan. He’d been with the Academy forever, though, and though he probably wasn’t as old as Viridian, he had to be close. She’d seen him marching with the professors during the exodus last cycle, so she was sure he wasn’t in with the spies. Again, the class was full of younger students, but that was just going to be how it was. As with Marva, the class was mostly lecture and introductions. Then she was off to her next class.

At the end of Artifice Physics, Mirian approached Professor Endresen with the conundrum she’d discovered. “Professor, why do illusion spells with a mental component require more mana?”

Endresen’s blue eyes lit up and she smiled. “What a wonderful question! Right up there with the Divir Gravity Anomaly as one of my favorite problems. Do you want the textbook answer, or the real answer?”

“Well, both,” Mirian said.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.