Tarissa’s laughter was like water, flowing forth despite Srennia’s muttered curse and quick retraction from the pond. Her finger was bleeding slightly, not even enough to form a bead or cause pain, but just enough to be annoying. A pinprick of humiliation.
”Do not worry,” Tarissa said finally, her face well set into laugh lines.
”The first time I tried this spell, it was with a skunk… and I was not successful for very long either.” She chuckled.
”And you were not completely unsuccessful – it did not fear you, enough to consider you a food source! Here.” The druid leaned forward, her long white hair falling into her face as she took Srennia’s hand in her own and frowned at it. The blood droplet stopped growing, and when Tarissa wiped it against the rug, she saw that the bite mark was gone.
”Pay attention and I will teach you,” the vysstichi promised, and then Srennia felt the cool touch of another mind against her own, less jarring this time but mind-changing nonetheless.
”The spell is Heal,” Tarissa explained,
”and there’s an animal in the pond that could use your assistance. He’s hiding, but fortunately there is another spell I can teach you to find him.” This one didn’t hurt either, Srennia’s mind slowly giving way and yielding to Tarissa’s as the mage imparted her knowledge.
”Oh,” Srennia said, a little dizzy.
”Enter clara, detect the injured animal and heal it. Then you’ll be done for the day.”
Deep breaths in and out, focus on the breathing, then the sound. It was getting easier and easier, taking only a few minutes now rather than the abysmally long time it did before. It felt like every time she entered
clara she rubbed an edge off it, smoothing her mind into the shape it needed to be.
She found the thud of her own heartbeat and chose a lovely viola strain to go with it, mixing as much as she could until she was thrust into the liquidy sound of Nature. Channeling as much essence she could, she used the magic to search, sending out tendrils of her power, questing and curious. It wasn’t a specific spell, and she found that it revealed all animals to her, including Tarissa and the fish. They all felt fine, but there was someone in the corner, behind the pot, whos song resonated with illness.
The spell evaporated and her eyes flicked open and to the pot behind which hid a salamander. Seeing her gaze, Tarissa reached for and scooped up the salamander, which wiggled ineffectively in her grasp. It was tiny and brown, slimy from the water, and one of its toes was missing, a tiny red stub in its place.
”I think this guy met the same fate as you,” Tarissa said, stroking him on the head. The salamander calmed at the touch.
Srennia closed her eyes again and fell back into clara. She began to combine the ara and vis, finding that there wasn’t a whole lot of the latter left. She ignored the sensation of tiredness and the strange feeling of emptiness from casting two spells in rapid succession, and thrust herself into the Plane of Nature. She couldn’t channel as much essence, and hoped it would be enough for a toe. The spell was easy enough to shape, for the salamander wanted to heal, and it was the nature of Nature to want to help him. She encouraged the cells to grow, to repair themselves, for the bone to grow and muscles to knit themselves back together. It seemed overwhelming and strange, like reprogramming a creature from the inside out, large and all-consuming.
The spell finished and her magic lost from her grasp, Srennia opened her eyes. It didn’t look the same, the new skin paler than the old and the toe a bit longer than it should have been, but it was healed. Tarissa smiled and put the creature back into the pond, where it dashed off without a trace of reluctance or lingering affection.
”Very good,” she said.
”Carmelya is proud, I am sure of it. But you must be feeling tired, no? Yes, it is very exhausting these first few times. You will get better.”
Tarissa moved herself to her feet, her knees creaking with the motion, and offered Srennia a hand.
”You should read the third chapter tonight. We will not meet again until the 21st, as I have some business I must attend to, but I expect that you will practice those spells and be prepared to make something substantially larger than a fish your friend in the future.”