It had been over three decades since Kalina's personal days had been so occupied by something or someone else, other than spending her time on the ever-burning desire to improve her magical craft.

Teaching Tercius, Penelope, Aurelia, and Leo had been like that first breath taken upon returning from a week spent collecting resources in one of the Infernal Planes — so utterly and completely refreshing. Skills, spells, and enchanted items managed to make the lung-searing environment bearable, but no mage ever had managed to make a skill, spell, or enchantment that came close to the real thing.

The beginner's stumblings of the energetic Aurelia with the flute and those of the composed Leo with the small drum had caused a lot of resurging emotions in Kalina’s long steadied existence. She couldn’t remember even when she had last been smiling so much without knowing why.

Teaching Penelope how to morph had been an echo of the old days at the Academy and if Penelope continued to practice as Kalina instructed, the girl would become a mage as soon as she managed to collect enough Energy for a part of her Anima to become Mana Metamorphosis. Between four to six months, based on Penelope’s current age, would be Kalina’s estimate.

And Tercius…

Teaching Tercius had been somewhat different from a source of laughter and joy, like in the case of teaching his younger siblings, and nostalgia, in the case of Penelope. With Tercius it was mostly about surprises and revelations.

From his ocular mana observing skill to his telekinetic skill, Kalina had just experienced one surprise after another, seemingly daily.

When Master Perdinar advised her that she shouldn't treat Tercius like a child, Kalina had been somewhat reluctant to take his advice for many reasons. But she still considered it and concluded that testing Tercius cost her nothing.

Instead of delving into physiological tests which she only read about long ago, Kalina decided to teach Tercius how to make his mana appear on the visible spectrum of colors. She wanted to see where the boy would fail exactly and based on the point of that failure she would then reconsider Master Perdinar’s suggestion.

Only the boy didn’t fail at any point. As soon as he learned what she had taught him, Tercius succeeded. Even now, weeks later, Kalina had to say that she was still a bit unsure if that had actually happened.

The test was rather simple. In the process of making his mana visible, Tercius would unwittingly have to purify his mana. The morphs for purifying mana were simple to do, but the reality was that purifying mana was one of the more difficult things taught to a student or a mage, psychologically.

Some mages compared purification to cutting a completely healthy limb by yourself, while completely ignoring the instincts that screamed otherwise, and while Kalina was reluctant to concur with that precise assessment, as she had never experienced some of the more extreme symptoms that mages spoke of, she had to say that there was still this sensation that her actions were wrong, that she should stop what she was doing immediately. It had taken her younger self a cycle of constant practice to learn to go against that instinct and she was sad to say that some never could.

Tercius had taken his mana — attuned closely to his body, mana channels, stone, and crystal — and on his third try managed to, through metamorphosis, halve the influence of those traits that tied the mana to him in the first place, leaving behind a mana that was in a more pure, powerful, and physical state than ever.

Tercius did all of that without blinking as if it was no morph off his spellform.

It had taken every bit of self-control that Kalina had had, just to keep herself acting as if nothing at all had happened when his mana first appeared in the color of bright red. The test had confirmed Master Perdinar’s words, completely and utterly so. Tercius’s sense of self was at least developed as that of a standard adult, likely even more so. And the boy was just twelve.

A twelve-cycle-old with the ability to purify his mana, Kalina repeated to herself in disbelief.

Overcoming those dreaded sensations repeatedly was a journey in itself, one taken more rarely in this day and age when purifying enchantments were there to do the job. Invented millennia back, the supremely complicated enchantment of mana purification itself was mostly done on musical instruments, as had been the wish of the group of mages who made the ingenious enchantment, but the enchantment itself could be embedded into all kinds of objects, from necklaces worn around the neck to staves held in hand.

While the students of the Academy got the chance to learn the use of these mana purifying instruments, the students were also taught not to rely on these enchanted objects — self-purification of mana was obligatory for each student to learn before the end of their basic training. But the reality was that mages chose the enchantment more often than wrangling with their instincts when they needed to share their mana with another mage, or for their spell to last longer and contain more power.

That Tercius was able to purify his mana effortlessly spoke highly of his mental development, of his control over himself, all of which were excellent signs to be found in a budding mage.

But… When Kalina had taken Tercius’s wild magic incident into account, things became conflicted and nothing made sense. How can someone have so much control and then have none at all?

After Tercius had his second wild magic episode, one that Kalina observed much more closely, he explained to her how he was in the habit of taking a "mental step back" while under powerful emotions or pain. If what the boy shared with her was true, then the conflict she found earlier was no more.

If anyone asked Kalina for a short answer on what wild magic was, she would say that wild magic was a “lashing out” of magic. Well, in Tercius’s case, it would be an “unleashing” of magic.

Essentially, he was leaving a void that was filled up for him by his own agitated body. Kalina immediately saw how this ability could be a powerful tool for Tercius, both for research of two specific magic branches and otherwise, but she also had to wonder why would a boy of his age have a habit like that? What had led to that development?

Kalina had interacted with his family and while she did see Tercius's mother hit him a couple of times, a technique prevalent in the lowlands methods of rearing children, she saw no signs of molestation or trauma. Tercius showed no signs of shying away from the touch of his mother or grandfather, and while she had yet to meet the often mentioned father and grandmother, Kalina doubted that someone like Petra and Ciron would allow for molestation of any kind to be done to their progeny. Kalina had tried talking to Tercius's mother to learn more, but the woman was not forthcoming about that kind of detail. She also had brought this up to Master Perdinar, who denied possessing any knowledge of that kind.

Kalina knew that she would have to talk on this topic with Tercius and yet she had never had to do something like this. How would one even go about starting that kind of conversation?

She had no idea…

All in all, she found Tercius to be a good student.

When she taught, he listened. Since she had a small number of students, she had allowed for questions to be asked at any time and Tercius took great advantage of that. The level of deduction and reasoning that he exhibited with his questions indicated a sharp mind, one more mature than his age would indicate. One issue that Kalina found repeatedly was that as soon as she turned to teach Penelope, Aurelia or Leo, Tercius would drift off in his own mind, and then, when Kalina turned back to him, it would take time to get him back to where they left off.

Their stay at one of the Everstorm Towers showed Tercius as possessed by his quest to finish learning all that she had given him to learn. Even while they ate, Kalina noticed that Tercius’s eyes were somewhere else, likely practicing the spell over and over again. It was that kind of dedication that Kalina had to her craft and she was glad that her future Disciple had the same quality in spades.

Dedication which some mages, unfortunately, gave to the wrong thing.

The Keeper of the Everstorm Towers, the persistent fool of a man, had continued bothering her. He kept speaking to her during meals, often offering wine, inviting her for walks, or asking for her opinion on some strange book he had. The celebration for the start of the new calendar cycle had been especially heavy for Kalina. She should have done as Tercius did, and just not show up for the party…

Why her unresponsive attitude kept failing to work on this man, Kalina had no idea, but Mistress Prime’s words kept coming to her any time she wanted to tell the man off.

Find a little romance Kalina, Mistress Prime had advised and then sent her all of those arousing feelings and sensations…

Romance was time-consuming, by all accounts, and she was about to get one new person in her life who would be time-consuming. With her schedule, another would be too much. But… Kalina found herself feeling the surge of that strange Energy through her, making her body experience the pleasure to which few sensations could compare to…

How about something small to start with? She could just have sex. It had been a while since she had sex with a man…

From the records she found of him before she chose this place, Keeper Kayonga was sixty-seven cycles old and a Master of Building, which like Warding was a mix of a few magical disciplines. He had some commendations to his name, but from what Kalina managed to observe in the days since her arrival, his Well size was lacking for his age. He likely spent too little time on Well Expansion in his youth and too much on other things.

An unfortunate trap that many a mage fell for, despite many warnings along the way.

The thing that worried her the most, as she daydreamed about this stubborn idea further, was that her cover could somehow become compromised. Her cover as a Constable was one that she and all of her peers maintained. She truly was a documented Constable working under one of the Enforcers, only she happened to be that same Enforcer as well.

Her logic told her that doing this would be a mistake of enormous proportions and yet her body was more than willing to make this—

A knock at her door made Kalina jump up from her comfortable seating.

“Mistress, it’s Tercius.” the voice from the other side said.

She cleared her throat. “Come in,”

Tercius opened the wide wooden door and gave his customary nod as he came in.

“I came to inform you that I’m ready, Mistress,” he said.

Kalina blinked at him. She had given him his part of the Rite just yesterday and when the boy chose his method of performance she had been astonished to find out just how well Tercius understood and spoke Magik. The Rurds that came from him were spoken slowly, but they were crystal clear in meaning. She knew that the boy had learned Magik on his own, along with some help from various Mistresses and Masters, but she didn’t imagine that he learned it to such a degree in less than a cycle.

Kalina shook her head, clearing his mind. The question now should be: could Tercius maintain the spell for the duration of the performance while he also recited the Rurds correctly?

“Already?”

To her doubt, Tercius responded with a nod. “I can recite it for you, Mistress, if you’d like,”

Kalina sat and leaned herself back, as she cast close to a dozen spells of privacy around the two of them. Kalina knew that she would have to make corrections to any errors, so she made sure that all of her skill-enhanced attention was focused solely on Tercius.

“Go ahead,”

Dressed in the robe Kalina provided him, Tercius had the look of a real mage about him as he cleared his throat into his fist. Seemingly prepared, he positioned his hands into a resting position in front of his chest, as if holding a large object between his palms. Kalina smelled the mana accumulating in each of his ten fingers, pulse after pulse pulled out from the rest of the body and his Well.

Then his hands and fingers moved in a rehearsed dance, as Tercius used Mana Metamorphosis to change the mana positioned in the tips of his fingers. Trails of purified mana were made with each finger stroke in a display that showcased Tercius's ability of control and spatial awareness. Twisting, turning, snapping, and making seemingly impossible positions, Tercius created the spell ten-fingers at a time, going over the older sections one pass at a time, morphing once more what had been morphed before. His irises were glowing with mana, a bright green color that reminded her of her own eyes, observant of the changes he made.

Uttering a spell under her breath, by habit more than any real need, Kalina’s eyes were lit by mana and she saw Tercius’s creation.

The spellforms were fifteen rings in three different sizes and made of two dozen colors, all intricately woven from the many Runes that told the story of what the spell would do, and by sight and smell, Kalina found no errors there. Tercius had done the spell just as she taught him. The rings themselves were almost visible with the naked eyes by now, as if heat was being trapped and making the air itself too hot to keep still.

Using Mana Manipulation to move the largest spellform to his neck, Tercius finally showed some form of nervousness by repeatedly clearing his throat. Then, with a deep inhale, the ring was moved through his neck, and then made to rest on his vocal cords. Of the four medium spellforms, two rings were moved around the wrists and two around the ankles. The ten small ones were meant for his fingers so Tercius led them there. Then, after making sure that each of the rings was in place, he activated the spell.

His presence flared to life as his mana went into turmoil around his body, but Kalina swatted the tiny mana pool away from her body, while at the same time keeping it contained inside the privacy spells.

Tercius started speaking, each Rurd making the very air around them vibrate with the power of the mana unleashed through his spellforms.

And yet the way he spoke and that slouch that appeared as soon as he started…

The spell facilitated mana to ripple with power on a physical dimension, a sort of vibrations which when bonded with the voice or movement of the caster. The voice got empowered and went either deep or high, while any gesticulations and movements seem to etch slow-moving ripples in the very space around the caster, effects which would make anyone the center of attention.

She had to say that the spell was far from a favorite of hers as well, but still…

Kalina gesticulated to her throat and pointed upwards, indicating for him to speak up. The boy obliged her immediately, but even as heard the first few Rurds she knew that she would need to instruct him a bit more firmly.

“Why are you whispering? Just speak normally, let the spell do its work.” Kalina said, making the familiar spell with an afterthought and overpowering Tercius’s voice without effort. “And push those shoulders back. Head up and look at me. That’s better,”

The improvement was immediate, but as the recital went on she noticed that the slouch had made a small return and as the recital was near the end Tercius’s voice went a bit lower.

Tercius activated the last part of the spell, making the surrounding mana surge back into the empty void of his body and Well and as soon as the last drop went in, the rings were unhooked from Tercius and he just moved out of them, leaving the morphed mana to dissolve.

Holding a hand to his throat as he kept clearing his throat, Kalina suddenly realized something and she almost cursed herself. The boy had shown tactile sensitivity to mana and she had forgotten about that! And now, for the first time, he had used the spell for a lot longer than the tests which lasted mere seconds.

“Tercius, does your throat pain you?” she said as she stood up.

“It’s a bit dry, that’s all,” Tercius said, swallowing some saliva. “And… it’s not exactly painful, but… it's my fingers, Mistress. All of them are… itching… is the spell supposed to do that?”

How this boy didn’t get a skill in the form of a tactile mana sense, Kalina had no idea.

"No, it's not. Let me find you something for both of those," Kalina said and after a moment of searching through her Amulet, a small lidded container appeared in her hand and a small flask. "Spread out those fingers for me,"

Tercius protested when he realized that she intended to apply the cream herself, saying that he could do it on his own, but she insisted and he caved. This was her mistake and she would remedy the aftereffects. After she let him take a few sips from the flask, she took his hands and massaged his slightly inflamed fingers. She noticed that Tercius was giving hesitant glances at her as she was doing that.

“What is it? Is the coldness biting you?”

He opened his mouth, the question almost coming out, yet he promptly clamped back up. This was a standard affair with Tercius when his questions were related to sensitive matters, Kalina came to learn.

“Well? Did your tongue start itching too?”

“No, Mistress. It’s the witnesses. Who are they? Do I know anyone?”

“You know Helfira and Master Perdinar,” Kalina said and then hesitated. “The third… is a Mistress you’ve yet to meet. She, on the other hand, has known of you for almost as long as I did. I’m sure that she would like to introduce herself to you, so… I’ll let her do that.”

Tercius's cream-covered fingers stiffened briefly in her hands, but his face was blank as he nodded and bowed his head down.

Tercius did seem and act older than his apparent age, Kalina reflected, even with occasional maturity reserved for someone who saw much more, but even so she was not sure how he would handle what was to come soon. Yet she had no way of stopping it.

All that she could do was to be there for him as a Mentor.

With a wry shake of her head, she realized that those exact words were written on the first page of Grand-Master Tfenn’s book.