“My Queen, you’re going to need to get used to the sight of blood if you’re to rule a kingdom in this world.”

“It’s not the sight of blood that bothers me, Thaddius. I just don’t want anyone to get hurt. Those are real weapons.”

“These duels are only until first blood, and the healing water should take care of any injuries. You’ve nothing to worry about.” The bearded warrior frowned and gave me a sidelong glance. “Besides, most of our villagers come from the northern tribes. Having a melee like this is part of the culture there. Northmen are savages like that. For them, it wouldn’t feel like a proper celebration without a dueling ring. Your people expect this.”

“My people are savages, then?” I replied, turning a frown of my own towards him.

Thaddius’ mouth popped open in surprise for a moment before he regained his composure. “I-- Forgive me, your grace. I misspoke.” He bowed his head in apology. “The northmen are not looked at favorably by people from my country. All the same, I shouldn’t levy my predispositions against them.”

“It’s fine, it’s fine!” I said, feeling a little bad for teasing him. “Raise your head. Just don’t let anyone hear you talking like that. I don’t want a wedge between you and our people.”

“Of course, my Queen.” Thaddius looked relieved.

One of the villagers was playing a flute-like instrument beautifully while others danced, kicking the air and twirling in pairs. Laughter and celebration filled our home island as the few children in our village ran and played. I spotted Mudpuppy’s children rolling in the mud by the pond and having the time of their lives while doing it. A number of our villagers were practicing with the collection of different weapons on offer near the dueling ring. Evidently they were volunteers for the competition.

The dueling ring had been made with a circle of small stones marking the boundaries. As a matter of some interest, stones from the forest outside of Enzirus had to be used, as stones gathered from our island had a tendency to float away.

I took a swig from my cup of beer. It was strong and bitter, and I must have made a face as Thaddius glanced in my direction and gave a disappointed click of his tongue.

“Where I’m from, a Queen would drink fine wine, not this swill. You deserve better than this.”

“I don’t need to be pampered. I’m happy with whatever food and drink the rest of my people have.” I gave the cup of beer in my hand a disparaging look. “That said, this beer is pretty gross.”

Thaddius laughed at that, downed the rest of his drink in one draft and turned the empty cup upside down, clacking it against the table. “Sure is. We’ll need to make sure to pick up some better spirits if we send a caravan down south.”

“Ah, speaking of that,” I set my cup aside as Thaddius turned to look my way, “I’d like to send a caravan sooner rather than later. I’d like to see the human realms for myself.”

“...Queen, I have to advise against going yourself. I’m afraid that the human realms may not treat you with the respect due to you. Maybe you could send one of your daughters instead?”

“No.” I said, turning to watch the villagers clumsily swinging looted weapons. “I want to go myself.”

“Mmm,” the bearded warrior grumbled in consideration. “Well, I doubt we could supply and send a caravan before winter comes in earnest.”

“How soon at the earliest could we send an expedition?”

Thaddius chewed his lip and looked up into the sky. “Maybe around three months? Right at the onset of spring, assuming we have supplies for the trip.”

I nodded, satisfied. “Then it’s settled. I’ll speak with Briham and Gwen about it tomorrow.”

Thaddius gave me a troubled look. “Queen, I still think you should stay here. The human realms aren’t safe.”

“I appreciate your concern, but I’ve made up my mind.” I met his eyes. “I want to see the human realms for myself. I think that the existence of a city of free beastkin will make us a lot of enemies down south and I want to see what we’re up against before we become a known entity.”

He ran a hand through his hair and heaved a discontented sigh before nodding his acceptance. “Well, I suppose I’ll just need to see to your safety myself, then.”

Two combatants made their way to the dueling ring, one wielding an axe and a shield with the other carrying a bizarre weapon that I wasn’t familiar with. The weapon consisted of two long-bladed knives that were linked together at the bottom of the hilt with a long length of chain. It certainly looked imposing

“Thaddius, what do you call that weapon?” I said, raising a clawed finger in the direction of the man in the ring.

“Chainblades, your grace,” the swordsman answered. “Favored weapon of the northmen.”

Now that he mentioned it, I remembered seeing a weapon like that from the document listing the caravan loot that Briham had given me.

A man stepped up on a stone by the ring and spoke loudly for everyone to hear. I recognized him as one of the members of the construction crew, but evidently he had taken on the role of the dueling ring announcer for tonight.

“The first match of the night will be between Dubbin,” the man with the axe raised his weapon up to the cheering of observers, “and Roland!” The man with the chainblades raised one blade into the air in salute for his opponent, the chains clinking with the movement.

The announcer looked to me, placed a hand over his heart and bowed his head. “With your leave, my Queen?”

Heads turned my way and I put a smile on my face, speaking loudly for everyone to hear. “Begin!”

~~~

Mudpuppy’s spear tore through the air to the sound of whipping wind. She was fast and graceful with the movement, clearly well practiced, but I could see the dissatisfaction in her face. She turned around, facing the opposite direction, and fell back into stance.

It was growing late now with a fat moon hanging overhead among a quilt of stars. The night was calm and quiet save for the light breeze and the gentle crackling of a low-burning campfire. The revelry from the earlier celebrations had since faded away as the revelers, one by one, found their way home.

Dusky and Gila, Mudpuppy’s children, had wanted to watch as their mother practiced with her spear. They had huddled up next to me under the orange blankets to watch her, but they had since fallen asleep. Stifling a yawn myself, I couldn’t really blame them.

The air rushed by as Mudpuppy soared over the grass. Once again, she carried a dissatisfied look on her face. She spun the spear through the air, turned around and settled back into her stance.

“It looks perfect,” I said softly, to keep from waking the children, “Why do you look so disappointed?”

Mudpuppy glanced over to me and stood up straight, planting the butt of her spear into the dirt, looking very much like a soldier standing at attention. She matched my soft tone of voice. “Doesn’t feel right. In the Nora-lealu spearform that I see in my memories, that charge would have lightning surging along my spear and should be as fast as blinking your eyes. But no matter how many times I try, it’s always too slow. Always. Not even a spark of lightning has ever appeared on my spear.” She frowned, looking down at the ground as she grumbled to herself. “I want that damn lightning.”

“Have you asked Thaddius about it?”

“Yeah. He’s never heard of techniques that could cover a weapon in lightning. That hairy old man doesn’t know how to help me.”

“He’s only in his twenties. Hardly old,” I pointed out.

“Hah?” Mudpuppy gave me a cockeyed look. “Isn’t that super old?”

“Maybe for someone who’s only been alive for a couple of months it would seem that way.”

Mudpuppy considered this for a moment before shrugging and settling back into her stance. “Mmph. Well, he’s definitely hairy.”

“No contesting that.” I watched as she charged again across the grass, tail trailing behind her like a streamer. Once again, there was no lightning, and once again, Mudpuppy looked disappointed.

I watched her pass back and forth with her spear multiple times to no result. “Maybe it’s magic.”

“Can’t be magic,” Mudpuppy answered as she prepared for another charge.

“Why not?”

“Because if it’s magic,” Mudpuppy launched forward, tearing through the air with her spear in hand. No lightning. “Then I’m screwed.” She planted the butt of her spear in the dirt, breathing heavily from her practice. “I can’t learn mana coalescence like you and Luna, I’m not ‘compatible,’ as the book says.”

Well, I couldn’t exactly blame her for wanting to figure out how to use that special ability. At the same time, though, it felt like it might be a waste of time to try and reach for something that she might never be able to attain. If this lightning spear effect was the result of magic, and she was incapable of becoming a mage, then it was just a wasted effort.

There was also the possibility that the lightning spear effect that Mudpuppy was reaching for came from some kind of enchantment, or even from another skill entirely. It’s difficult to say, particularly when all she had of the Nora-Lealu spearform were the memories that her Courage trait had given her. She knew nothing about their culture or their people; only their combat style. That really wasn’t enough to go off of.

My intuition told me that it was magic, though. Unfortunately, given what I knew of the Mana Coalescence skill, that made my daughter’s determined practice into a lesson in futility.

There was another possibility, though.

Thaddius, after fighting him in the woods and overloading his mana contract, had once explained to me that there was more than one skill that could allow a person to use magic. The example he had given involved ‘Hedge Wizards’ which use the Mana Convergence skill, as opposed to the Mana Coalescence skill that I use.

If there were multiple ways of casting magic, then this lightning that Mudpuppy was talking about could be the result of some kind of magic skill that I wasn’t familiar with. There were a couple things about it that made me think that whatever was causing that green lightning wasn’t the result of the Mana Coalescence skill, but something else. Something less random and varied, as Mana Coalescence could easily have two mages who use vastly different types of magic despite sharing the same skill; it wasn’t nearly as uniform as how Mudpuppy described the warriors she saw in her foreign memories.

This was just conjecture, though, and it was just as likely that it came from some kind of enchantment or specialized equipment. Still, it was worth mentioning.

“I have an idea for something you could try.”

Mudpuppy perked up, looking hopeful. “What’s that?”

“If your stance and execution are perfect, then it may have to do with your state of mind.” I held up a hand and pulled water out of a drinking cup, forming it into a globe hovering over the palm of my hand. “I think what you’re trying to do is a form of magic, different from what I use, but similar. And magic...”

Slightly shifting my mental image, the floating globe of water began to slowly spin. The ripples along its surface caught the moonlight and glimmered under the night sky.

“Magic is a gauntlet of mental acrobatics. Visualize what you want to happen and make it reality with control and persuasion.” Gently, I lowered the water back into my drinking cup and released my hold on the mana. I looked up at Mudpuppy, who had been listening intently, and gave her a sheepish smile.

“Persuasion?” She asked, a confused look settling over her face. “Who do I talk to?”

“No, no. It’s not someone… It’s…” I waved my hands about uselessly. How did Thaddius - the crotchety old book version of him, that is - how did he make this look so simple? “It’s your mana, you know? It’s alive. You show it what you want to do with visualization, then you say ‘Hey! We should do this!’ Except you don’t really use words.”

“Haaaaaah….” Mudpuppy scratched her head with her free hand, looking even more perplexed than she had before.

“Or at least, that’s my take on it. Sorry if it doesn’t help.”

“No, no, that’s very helpful!” Mudpuppy hurriedly shook her head. Despite her obvious confusion, she had a faint smile on her face and rekindled vigor in her eyes. “I’ll give it a try. Thank you, Queen.”

“Glad I could help,” I said as she returned to her practice with renewed enthusiasm.

My own skills hadn’t developed much since the attack on the slaver caravan. Skills levelled up fastest from combat, and fortunately, there hadn’t been any recent call for violence. Unfortunately, that meant that my progression was stagnating.

Mudpuppy might have had the right idea by going out to hunt and grow stronger, but that wasn’t an option for me just yet. My back injury hadn’t fully healed yet and while I could fight if I absolutely needed to, I still wasn’t anywhere near full strength. It was far too dangerous to go out looking for trouble in this condition, so I was stuck at home spending every day soaking in the healing water to gradually fix my lingering wounds.

That was fine, though; a rolling stone gathers no moss. Well, stones around here had a tendency to float about rather than roll, but that was beside the point.

The silver lining was that I had plenty of time every day to practice shaping both water and motion mana types as well as familiarize myself with the new skills and abilities I’d acquired.

One of those recent developments came from reaching level ten and unlocking the mastery system. I’d been excited to learn what masteries were, since one of the perks for having chosen the royal salamanderkin race was that I would have unique masteries and mana focuses available to me.

The mastery system, as it turned out, gave me a badge that I could attach to a skill to double the speed that it levelled up at as well as unlocking a perk system based around that skill. Evidently it worked the same as my mana focus perk system, though from my understanding, the perks from the mastery system weren’t nearly as powerful as what a mana focus could offer and were earned much more slowly. Essentially, it would allow me to master a skill much more quickly than would otherwise be possible while also unlocking new abilities and sub-skills. The catch was that not all skills would accept a mastery badge and I had to carefully select the skill to badge as the choice was permanent.

After consulting with Thaddius, who had long since reached level ten and selected swordsmanship as his mastery skill, I learned that masteries were restricted to combat skills like swordsmanship or dodge, with magic and non-combat skills excluded as a rule.

Because of that rule, I would have had to put my badge on one of my physical combat skills like tail attack, dodge or physical resistance. That would have been disappointing, because the mainstay of my power came from my magic.

However, I was a royal salamanderkin and had unique masteries to choose from. Specifically, my race allowed me to bend the rules and select the Salamancer magic skill as the target for my mastery badge. That was significant as every level in the Salamancer skill gave me a new perk point for my mana focus, and at skill level twenty I would unlock a second mana focus slot. With the mastery badge, I would reach level twenty twice as quickly and become an even more potent mage.

As always, there was a downside. By selecting the Salamancer skill for my mastery badge, I would be giving up the perk system that I could have on one of my other skills as I already had the Salamancer perk system through my mana focus. The mastery badge would only be giving me double skill experience without the other benefits.

I was in a position where I needed to decide if I wanted to exclusively focus my efforts on magic or if I wanted to split my attention and also develop melee skills. It was a hard decision to make, as placing the badge on a skill like tail attack would end up making me more powerful, or at least more versatile, in the long run. Of course, that meant I would need to focus on developing that skill to make it worth putting my mastery badge on it.

That indecision, paired with the knowledge that the consequences of this decision were permanent, had kept me from assigning this mastery badge for the two weeks since I had gained it.

I had almost just assigned the mastery badge to the Salamancy skill immediately. I thought, hey, I’ll just slap this bad boy on there and burn tail with my power levelling until Salamancy’s level twenty, then I’ll have a brand new mana focus to play with!

I stopped myself, of course. There wasn’t really any need to make a hasty decision, given that I was still hobbling about with a busted spine. Better to take a little time and think about it before making a decision.

Well, I thought about it and decided that I really didn’t want to be right up in the action like a melee fighter. I wanted to keep far, far away from the bitey parts of the monsters. Besides, being a jack of all trades was just another way of saying you can do a lot of different things, but you kind of suck at all of them.

The only other skill that gave me pause after coming to that conclusion was the physical resistance skill. That skill had the potential to be very strong at higher levels, given that every skill level reduced the physical damage I took by one percent. If I put the badge on that skill, it would level twice as fast plus I’d get whatever perks I could unlock through the mastery system.

Of course, I would need to focus on levelling that skill to make it worthwhile, and the only way I knew of to increase the physical resistance skill was to, well, let the monsters chew on me a bit. Exactly the opposite of keeping the bitey parts far away.

The potential reward was huge, making me a kind of tank-mage hybrid, but I wasn’t willing to become a salamander chew toy to make it happen.

Having made my decision, I pulled up the mastery section of my interface and selected the Salamancy skill.

Assign mastery badge to skill: Salamancy? Yes No

I selected yes.

With that finally settled, I looked up to find Mudpuppy with her face scrunched up in concentration while she stood in stance.

A muted “Pffft” escaped me as I couldn’t help but laugh at her ridiculous expression. It reminded me of when I first started out with mana coalescence.

Mudpuppy shot me an embarrassed look. “Queen, don’t laugh! I’m trying to do magic!”

“Right, right. Sorry.” I smiled up at her. “I’m heading to bed. You should sleep soon, too.”

Mudpuppy glanced toward me and gave a short bow of her head. “Night, Queen.”

“Good night, Puppy.”

After carefully extricating myself from the huddle of newly hatched salamanderkin, I found my way through our starlit village towards my home. Stopping at the door, I cast a glance over my shoulder to find my daughter, bathed in moonlight, settling into a spear stance with the grace and fluidity of water.

The faint rustle of leaves in the breeze ceased as the wind came to a standstill. There was a faint smell like the rain right before a storm as something like static gathered in the air, humming a faint resonance with the mana in my body. It was a calm, serene kind of power akin to nature when brought to its most extreme. A shiver ran over my skin as the power in the air reached critical mass.

In a single instantaneous movement and a shower of purple sparks, she charged.