Lewis' POV
The same night, after the incident at study
"You said you will teach me spells!" Joel complains.
"And?"
"I am only reading things that I already know," she tells me. She has wrapped the long upper garment tightly and rolled the ends for the lower garment. The clothes have nothing to do with the training but I didn't comment on it.
When she came back with the curtains, and struggled to change them I realised one thing. She has no body awareness.
She fell with the rod hitting her head twice. Another thing about her. She is an unkillable roach. I won't have took her so far to the library if she weren't.
To put my theory to test, I asked the guards to flogg her for ruining the curtains. The result?
"You killed the guard who was punishing you. You have no integrity," I tell her.
"What good would integrity do to me? I know everything that I need to know!" She tells me.
This where she had gone wrong. It's not the one with most power who ruins the world. It's the one with the most power, and no integrity who does. The corrupt are those who have means but no motivation.
"Mana cannot sustain itself in a body that has a corrupt soul," I tell her.
"You've got to be kidding me. When Magus stole from Princess Xiealta, he was corrupt," she tells me.
"He might be corrupt. But he also, albeit briefly, made Princess Xiealta believe in him. She fell for him. Love overpowers all corruption, though only for a moment," I tell her.
And indeed it was true. "Magus was corrupt. When he stole the shard of magic from The Fates, he could only use it because he made love to someone with dragon blood. The love was reciprocated," I tell her.
"So anyone can steal magic, if they can make the dragons fall in love with them?" Joel questioned, her eyes curious.
"Of course you would think that. But love's not easy to come. Besides, the mana recognises the truth of one's soul. And even though it was sustained in Magus' body and passed onto his bloodline, there's still an irrevokable curse that haunts them," I explained.
"They don't write anything about love in the Theology of Great Magic - Understanding Magic For The Mortals & Mages," she argues.
"You can only expect them to write about things they understand. Not the ones that they don't," I add, watching the scrolls as she scribbled something on the paper.
"Are you writing down everything that I say?" that would be such a waste of paper.
"I am trying my hand at being a scribe. If you don't teach me magic, I shall write scrolls and become a scribe. Especially now that I have free access to paper!" She beams.
I could understand where that was coming from. Paper was costly. It was hard to get it. Most scrolls we had were on slates, engrained with symbols or embossed or carved. With paper it was easy.
"Shouldn't the curse kill Magus, because he stole the magic? If mana didn't sustain itself, how could he possibly harness magic?" Joel asked curiously.
"Here's the thing, Joel. Many believed that the Dragons could create their own magic. Which wasn't true. All they did was create an endurance within themselves that would let them sustain the energy of the elements. We call this, the mana," I explained.
"When mana is sustained, it gets accumulated and can be released in small pockets at will. This accumulation and release of mana is Magic. Magic, is not an entity. It's a process. Did you read that in your books?" I asked. She shakes her head.
"You can only sustain mana within yourself when you have either recieved the blessing of the Greater One. Or meditated for years upon the Spirit Of Greater One. And then of course, you can steal a shard from The Fates," she looked at me surprised.
"So you are telling me that Magus didn't really have all that? He just stole a shard from the Fates? How does that even work?"
You can read so much from the books but the truth was entirely something else. When I visited my mother, she had told me how it had all happened.
"The Fates are the source of all the Sacred Magic. The Blessing of The Greater One stabilizes a pool of mana that can be passed onto members of the bloodline by a simple ritual," I recollected.
"Then Magus couldn't have used the magic, unless he had performed it himself," she chimes.
"Mhm. Which is why, the curse got him. Because the ritual wasn't sacred," I tell her.
"What's known today as Black Magic, was Sacred Magic that failed to imburse itself truly within Magus' bloodline," I remember the stories that my mother had so elaborately taught me.
"The ritual is called Ascent. To initiate an Ascent, it's necessary to have the blood of a Dragon borne. When a shard of the fate is emulsified with the blood of a dragon borne, the sustained mana entwined with the Will of the Greater One can be easily consumed," I tell her.
"Once consumed, this Mana doesn't deplete. It only gets exhausted briefly and then it regenerates. Mana, when it enters a dragon's body becomes self sustained.
When a child is borne, the mana gets doubled and is passed onto the progeny," this was what had caused all the trouble for Magus.
"Magus had managed to get the shard. But he chose to use Princess Xiealta's hymen's blood for the Ascent. The mana sustained. When consumed, the mana entered Magus' body but as soon as it became aware of the deception, it backfired," and it was truly the darkest day.
"Magus' body had become stronger. But the mana seeked as escape as the Greater One's blessing could only be carried in a Dragon's hide.
Somehow, Magus' found a way to make the mana self sustain. He stole an ancient talisman from the dragons that helped him do so. However...
The Sacred Magic, morphed itself to something sinister. It was no longer guided by the will of Greater One. But by Magus' own will.
It turned darker with corruption. The mana created a sinister entity. The Obsidiana. The forebringer of all curses.
Like mana, it duplicated when a child was borne to Magus or his bloodline. And it sustained," I sighed.
"Nobody really knows what counter effects Obsidiana had. The mana still worked in Magus' favour afterall. His children stole the Spear Of Infinite Will, didn't they?" Joel no longer seemed bored.
I knew one thing so far. The three realms knew nothing about magic. All the books were faux de pas.
"The Spear could never reap through Obsidiana without killing the vassal. Magus' children, the mages. He took up the name of Merlin and disappeared. And they let the Human King take the bait for stealing the Spear," this was something that everyone knew.
"The mages didn't want the curse plaguing them. Of course, it did bring another one. But my father gladly took the fall."
"I was lied to! There's no way they could have taught me to use magic then," Joel wails.
"That's what I was coming to. You cannot be a mage Joel. But they did teach you how to harness magic. You are a witch," I tell her. "But your magic too, tends to be as dark as it comes."
"Wha- A witch?" She looked like all hell had broken loose.
"A witch can use mana for brief periods, after which it exhausts itself. Witches get their mana from simple objects. Like flowers. Or rats. Or killing people," I tell her and she looked so pale.
"Now we know why you secretly harbour murderous intents," I smiled, and she fainted.