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[Mevius]

Her mission accomplished, the little faery made a quick escape from the Blood Alley Gang Headquarters. During her flight to the White Night's Drink her Convoke Shadows spell disappated, but the danger had passed. In the dracon tavern Amber was met by Rogaku with one of his rare smiles. The vysstichi quickly walked to the back to open the secret trapdoor leading to the underground cult.

When Amber was down, Spirotyn pretended not to notice her. He was undergoing the stages of acceptance of the faery: first she was a weakling, now the light elf blatantly ignored her. The future would tell which form the next stage had. In any case Amber had free access to Aribeal's chambers, the small wooden door next to the massive granite double Second Door.

[Amber Brightwing]

For the second time, the nightwraiths summoned by the Convoke Shadows spell turned away from her, resuming whatever business it was that they did when not making mages invisible. But this time she didn’t bother calling them back. She no longer had any need for them at the moment.

When she entered the tavern, she was rather surprised to see the Vysstichi smile. He normally didn’t smile at her did he? She couldn’t remember him ever doing that. Perhaps he had peeked into her mind and seen that she had been – or at least thought she had been – successful? Or maybe he was just in a good mood today. Whatever it was, she certainly didn’t mind a warm welcome. Even Spirotyn was friendly enough to keep his mouth shut and spare her his insults. Not that had managed to really insult her so far, but it was rather annoying nonetheless.

Arriving at the the small wooden door of her masters chambers she knocked hard on it, trying to at least produce enough sound to be heard on the other side and then waited for an answer. She knew he was most likely expecting her, but she didn’t find that a reason to be rude.

[Mevius]

"Enter." Even through the thick oak door Aribeal's strong voice was clearly audible. Then after a few moments the mer opened the door himself, apparently knowing that it was Amber whom knocked on his door and realizing she had trouble opening the heavy door. "Ah you're back, come in." The master necromancer was donned in his usual black robe and appeared neither happy or disturbed. He stepped aside to let Amber fly in and closed the door of his quarters behind her.

A single candlemark on the desk lightened the dark room, in which nothing obvious had changed. "Sit down." The necromancer pointed at the table where Amber had taken place once more. Instead of diving and hearing her out from his pool, the master seated himself on the chair. He said nothing, waiting for Amber to tell of her foundings.

[Amber Brightwing]

When she entered the room she was greeted by master Aribeal. She quickly followed his orders and landed on the border of the table. For a moment she waited, expecting him to ask how it had been or what she had found out, but the mer stayed silent and just watched her, waiting on her to tell what she knew instead.

It took her a moment to figure out where to start. There was quite a lot she had seen, although most was not very interesting. In a first reaction she just wanted to tell everything from start to beginning, but after a short moment of considerations she decided against it. Instead she would just give an overview and sum up the most important info and she could go into the details where needed afterwards. She took a deep breath and started talking.

Well, their headquarters have four stories on top of the ground floor. The ground floor is accessible to all that pay a small sum, as well as the first. The second appears to be for members only. Fourth floor is storage room and connected to some kind of basement. I didn’t enter it, so I don’t know exactly. The third floor is where I think the bosses are. I didn’t dare staying long enough to be sure as there was a chance on discovery, but all seems to point at it. No visible entrances to the floor and I saw to men that looked rather important. One of them – a guy with an average build and brown hair – was dressed way to expensive to be a thug, and the other – tall guy, strong build, red hair and a bit of a beard – simply looked like one who was in charge.

She paused for a split second before continuing.

I could have attempted to investigate further and more detailed, but the main reason I have not is that along the way I overheard a very interesting piece of information and I didn’t want to take any risks yet. It seems you have a spy among your ranks and he goes by the name of Rejik. From what I’ve heard he’s doing so for the big boss himself.

She waited to see what Aribeal had to say about her report and whether he had any further questions.

[Mevius]

Aribeal sat calmly on his chair as Amber spoke of her experiences in the Blood Alley Gang Headquarters. When she was finished, he still made no signs of approval or disapproval. Finally he complimented. "Well that was roughly the basic information I was looking for. Good work."

At the mention of a spy in the cult the master necromancer did not seem surprised. "We have noone named Rejik in the cult", he said with certainty, "but he uses a different name ofcourse. I kept him within the cult to retrieve counter-information from their gang, but he is good enough of a spy to avoid any mention of his true boss." Aribeal stood up from his chair and walked towards the door. "Fetch Vurovich at once." He said to one of the armed cultists who always stood before his door. The guard nodded and went to do his master's bidding.

"Did any of your new spells come in handy?" Aribeal asked, whilst they were waiting for the spy to be brought in.

[Amber Brightwing]

Amber patiently waited for reaction and when it finally came she smiled broadly. It was always nice to get some confirmation on a job well done. The smile was quickly replaced by a look of wonder though. She had assumed that since she had been send on this mission, the spy hadn’t been revealed yet. Even while they had a lot of mystics running around she could see someone that could keep his mind of his true task at the right moments slipping through the mazes of the net. Although it was probably very difficult, it had seemed much more likely then the alternative.

Can’t a master mystic force the information out of someone?

Even if he could avoid mentioning anything important she had thought a master would be capable of finding that information anyway. After all, if it was present in the mind, then why wouldn’t it be accessible to one so attuned to controlling minds?

No, I managed to do easily enough without. Actually, I only used Convoke Shadows twice to stay hidden and Acid Sphere once to be able to get into a room I didn’t find any doors for.

[Mevius]

Mystics were still people, and unlike the Aeternians themselves, had their faults. With proper training or enough luck one could evase even the greatest mindmages. "He can..." Aribeal nodded. "But that is hardly as much fun as extracting information the old way." The master necromancer grinned cruelly.

"No matter, you will have plenty of opportunity to unleash your spells upon our spy." When the master said that the door to his quarters were opened and a young man entered the chamber. With his brown hair he was actually quite handsome. He shot an insecure look at Amber, then bowed humbly before the seated merman. "You summened me, master?" "I did, Rejik." At hearing his true name the spy moved but a muscle, but it was spotted by the master necromancer. "Excuse me, master?" He brought out, but it was too late. Aribeal rose from his seat and did his casting. The already not so very bright chamber seemed to grow darker still, as shadows from all directions descended upon the human. The shadows wrapped themselves around his ankles and wrists, and pushed him against the wall. One shadow wrapped itself before his mouth, muffling his screams. Not that anyone from above could hear them, but Aribeal wished to instruct his apprentice without disturbances.

"There, we now have an excellent training dummy to our disposal." Aribeal turned to Amber. "One of my favourite spells as an Apprentice was Coagulate Blood. Why don't you try it?" Rejik seized his screaming, seeing the folly of it. Instead his eyes widened of death fear even more so. Not that he was going to die anytime soon...

[Amber Brightwing]

Amber couldn’t help but to grin back. That explanation actually made a lot of sense. Odd how she never had thought of that before. After all, the mer was a necromancer, so there was no point in taking the easy way if you could take the painful way.

After the spy had entered, she watched fascinated how the mer used the shadows to pin him down and gag him. She had been thinking of a very similar spell lately, one she hoped to be able to piece together herself one of these days. She knew that she would get access to the Reshape Mana technique at this level, and she was hoping that would be enough for her to accomplish that goal.

But first things first. She scanned her mind for what info had been imparted on the Coagulate Blood spell. From what she could see it seemed a fairly dangerous one – for the target that is – and possibly even a lethal one. For a moment she considered trying to cast a lessened version of it, just to make sure that she wouldn’t kill the target. You couldn’t interrogate dead people after all. But on second though, Aribeal would know what he was doing, so she was confident he would prevent the spy from dieing – at least at the moment – if the spell proved to be fatal, so she decided not to bother and possible mess up the spell altogether.

The first part she had done several hunderd times by now. First Meditation to enter Clara, then mingling Vis and Ara and Focus on the Infernal Plane to Channel the Essence of Death into the mixture to create Mana. Once that was done she would start to Shape the Mana into the spell she wanted. In this particular case she would try to Evoke the Death essence right into her target. If all went well, that should cause his blood to solidify briefly.

[Mevius]

Meditating and reaching Clara was hardly a trouble for the magically inclined Amber in this calm environment. Like she had done hundreds of times, all stages in preparation of spellcasting were done succesfully. Shaping Coagulate Blood did not form a problem either; it was a relative easy spell. After a few moments of shaping her spell, Amber cast it at her target.

The effect of the spell was immediate, and quite thrilling to behold. Rejik's eyes widened even further as his body started to shake. Due to the shock of the sudden pain he forgot to scream. All he could do was gaze at the little faery who Drops of sweat ran down his in pain contorted face. But just as sudden as the spell took in effect, the human stopped to shake. He panted heavily, broken down spirit. His body was still quite alright, being young and quite healthy due to the feedings of the cult. A trickle of blood ran down the corner of mouth.

Aribeal grinned as he saw the spy squirm. It was obvious he enjoyed the effects of the spell. Only until they had completely worn off he turned to Amber again. "That is the only pity of Coagulate Blood; it's so short. You can slightly alter the length of the spell by decreasing it's power. If you become adept or higher the spell can even kill instantly. I still use it regularly", the master admitted. "Ofcourse the drawback of the spell is that your target requires blood for it to be effective."

Aribeal had enough of pretending to be a landwalker again, and sought the solace of his cool pool. Stepping into the dark water he said over his back to his apprentice: "Why don't you try Poison Bolt as your next spell? But- make it a little more challenging this time: Do it flying." That said the merman dove underwater.

Rejik shook his head and looked with pleading eyes at Amber as she prepared herself. The words that he uttered were unaudible through the gag of shadows, but quite easy to guess.

[Amber Brightwing]

The effects were indeed very entertaining to see and she could see why it was one of Aribeal’s favourite spells. She had used the Venemous Touch once for very similar reasons. It was a bit unfortunate though that she wouldn’t be able to actually kill someone with it, otherwise it would have been a far more useful spell. That was a far bigger drawback then only working on those targets that had blood. Especially since she couldn’t immediately think of targets didn’t have blood.

His pleading eyes were answered with a grin. They pleased the fae rather then bringing up any feelings of compassion. It was even pleasant that this guy kept enough of his wits to feel the full effects of what she had been doing. Her previous victim had just passed out on her and even when woken up she had barely been conscious.

Poison Bolt seemed to be fairly easy. She already knew how to cast Acid Sphere and Venemous Touch, and this spell was in a way only a combination of the both. But then there was the flying part. That shouldn’t be too difficult either. At least, that was her assumption. Hovering at the same spot was about as easy as standing still, but so far she hadn’t tried to do so while casting a spell. Mostly because the long casting times had required her to take her time anyway, so there had been no need for it.

Starting to fly not to far above the table – just in case something went wrong – she started on her last spell of the day. She altered the created mana into a simple cone shaped bolt and cast it into the material plane. Given that nothing had gone wrong up till then she wouldn’t wait to launch it towards the waiting victim. By then he would have been waiting long enough for his next treat.

[Mevius]

As a necromancer in training she would meet many persons, beasts, beings which did not rely on blood to keep them up and running. Amber would find out soon enough.

Rejik's worst nightmare was beginning to take shape. The one wherein he was being tortured by evil faeries who casted painful necromancy spells at him with gleeful smiles. This was wrong! This was a corruption of nature! Faeries were supposed to be kind little creatures who replaced the teeth under your pillow with silvers. Alright, sometimes they caused a little mischief, but only against very bad people. Certainly torturing him with arcana went too far. Ofcourse Rejik had known where he had gotten himself into, infiltrating the cult. But the rewards had been grand and all other risky endeavours he had undertaken always came out nicely. Not this time. He screamed...

Amber did not notice, occupied as she was reentering Clara again. Although flying and hovering was second nature to a faery who was flying around all her life since the beginning of childhood, gaining the required concentration was still slightly more difficult than when sitting. It mattered only about half a minute but it was something to remember. After a few minutes of time, in which Rejik had the time to build up his dread for her, she was done and the shaping of the spell could commence. Aribeal's head appeared above the surface of the water. The master necromancer watched her, no doubt in Clara aswell.

Poison Bolt could be explained as a combination of the two initiate spells and as such Amber had some base to build on. Her cone shaped bolt of poison formed nicely, it's shape about half as large as the faery herself. Her aiming was a little off though, perhaps due to her hovering. The Poison Bolt hit the stone wall just above the head of the spy, bursting into seperate drops of poison. Not few landed Rejik's head, burning into his skull and roasting his brown locks. One sizeable drop of poison slowly trickled down his forehead and over his cheek, leaving a trail of burning red skin, disfiguring the young man's pretty face.

Aribeal giggled like a little merboy. "Good work apprentice. I believe your Vis capacity has been taxed to the limit for this brightening. You are exempted from other duties for this brightening." The master rose up from the pool. "If you have any questions, you may ask them now. Otherwise I will see you in two brightenings at dusk to continue your training and... fun... with this man." He grinned and looked at the squirming Rejik.

[Amber Brightwing]

One could argue that Rejik was a very bad person, given he was a member of a large gang of thieves and murders and that had joined a group of necromancers and Jorel lovers. But then again, what she was doing to him couldn’t even remotely be classified as ‘a little mischief’ and certainly none deserved to be tortured like that. Unfortunately for the spy, Amber couldn’t care less about what other people – excluding those that she wanted dead – did an did not deserve. The world hadn’t cared a single bit about her, so why should she care about the world?

Feth.

She cursed silently as she saw the bolt miss. Aribeal seemed to be happy nonetheless and she could both blame the flying and the end of her vis reserves for affecting her concentration, but she still thought that wasn’t a real excuse and she shouldn’t have missed. Better take a second longer to aim more carefully next time. Still, even while she had only hit him with a little drop she could imagine that both the bolt exploding next to his head and the poison slowly running over his face were very effective as well.

Before answering the master she made a quick mental note to train more on casting while flying. She didn’t have anything to actually measure the time, but she could tell that it had taken significantly longer. It would be good if she could get used to casting while hovering at the same spot now, so that the time difference would be worked away by the time it would actually become useful.

Thank you master. I don’t have any questions at the moment. I will come back in two days then.

Before leaving she passed by the poor guy pinned against the wall and gave him a last grin with a wink. It seemed that he would live a little longer then expected, but whether that was a good or a bad for him was questionable.

~ ~ ~

Two days later, at dusk as she had been ordered, the little fae would be back and eagerly waiting to continue. She had been tempted to already try out some things the day before, but had decided against it in the end. There was no need to hurry things after all, so she could just as well follow the pace the mer had in mind.

[Mevius]

"Good, good. You may leave me." He said to Amber, although his gaze was fixed on the thief. The master necromancer had a big smirk on his face. He barely noticed the faery leaving.

***

While Amber was essentially free to arrange her studies in necromancy as she pleased, sapping her Vis reserve before a visit to the master was unwise. A mage's Vis, irregardless of which sphere he or she followed, took a full brightening to recharge. Between the heavy sessions a complete day off was even better.

Without a word one of the cultists opened the door to Aribeal's chambers. Amber was beginning to earn to make name for herself within the cult. By now about everyone knew that the little faery was one of them. The master's room hadn't changed a bit. Even Rejik hung on the same place against the wall. Without a doubt he had been worked on, judging by his shred clothes and numerous bruises and wounds. A few blood sucking flies were attracted by the dried bloodstains on his face and tunic. Normally they bugged the human endlessly, but currently the spy endured a seemingly restless sleep. Maybe his nightmares were even worse than reality.

Aribeal was dressed in a heavy ornamental black robe this brightening. The mer sat at his desk, reading a book. Without looking up from his text he addressed the faery. "Welcome apprentice Amber." His voice boomed through the chamber, but Rejik slept on. "What would you like to learn today?" He asked, looking up to the faery.

[Amber Brightwing]

Although she hadn’t cast any new spells, she hadn’t taken a complete day off either. It had only been a few initiate spells though, and she had rested sufficiently after it so she had her entire Vis reserves to put to use today. So far she had used her magic daily, even if it was just a single spell before going to sleep, and it had become a habit by now.

The cultist opening the doors for her was a pleasant surprise. Doors were always a bother given they were not made for one of her size. Hopefully she would be able to find a suitable solution for that – or more accurately, hopefully the solution she had in mind would work out as she hoped. After entering she gave a short smirk in Rejik’s direction. It seemed she had been wrong in her assumption he would get a day off as well.

Serale master Aribeal. What I would like to learn today? The Reshape Mana technique.

It was by far the most interesting thing to be learned at the apprentice level in her opinion. The ability to tweak spells to her own liking and a first step towards the creation of a completely new spell. But of course, that might not have been the answer the mer had been looking for.

But if you meant for me to choose a spell, then I would say… Summon Undead.

The other spells in the apprentice arsenal still had some comparison with the initiate spells, but the summoning was that was very new to her. And most intriguing as well. Reviving the death was a major taboo in the faerie society, so it was something that she definitely had to try out.

[Mevius]

Asking Amber what she wanted to learn this brightening and then dismissing her suggestion would forgo his question in the first place. Since Aribeal was not one to waste words or time he ment everything he said, although even the master necromancer made mistakes sometimes. The mer put his book aside and turned to the apprentice.

"The Reshape Mana technique allows you to add the effect of one spell you know to that of another in your repertoire. Thus you create a new spell which has the properties of the two old ones." An example might illustrate his words better. "Take for example the spells Impotence and Blindness. With the Reshape Mana technique you can add the effects of Blindness to the Impotence spell, thus blinding your victim in addition to sapping his strength."

"Essentially you create a new spell by taking the components of two other spells. This means you are limited to the spells currently in your repertoire. Don't let that get you down though. Even with the limited number of spells you have under your belt there are many, many possibilities." It was time for Amber to do something. "Why don't you try it right now. I suggest you start with an initiate spell and add an effect from another initiate spell to it. What will it be?" Maybe Amber had thought about this earlier, but if not Aribeal was very patient.