Gem sat with her eyes closed. She put aside her mother’s teachings on control and focused on simply feeling her aura. How it moved and responded to her mental commands. How it waxed and waned slightly, as if it were breathing. The exchange of Aether between it and her surroundings.

Where her mother had taught her to treat her aura like a pond of Aether to be scooped off and poured into magic, Gem realized her aura had more of a sense of agency. To her it was magic incarnate; brimming with potential and just waiting for her to give it a task. Then something clicked, and she realized how she wanted to proceed.

“It’s like soldiers waiting for orders.” Gem finally spoke softly.

“What?” Sparky asked, not having quite heard Gem.

“My aura. It is like a legion of soldiers awaiting their orders.” Gem reiterated.

“Glad to hear you’ve made progress. And it’s only been… four-and-a-half hours. We should get lunch.”

Gem then realized that she was, in fact, quite hungry. So they had a quick lunch. It was nothing fancy; just some meat, cheese, and bread; but it was filling and gave them the energy they needed to continue.

“Now that you have an idea for how to continue, I want you to figure out how to pin that light spell to your aura. Once you can reliably do that, we’ll move on to the next step.”

Gem moved to a more normal sitting position on the soft. She still didn’t want to entirely give up the decadence of the dozens of pillows, but she did need to be mostly upright to practice with her light spell. She began her practice, her spell would bloom into existence above her left shoulder, then wink out when she withdrew her attention.

Meanwhile, Sparky and Abigail were able to continue their conversation.

You see, unlike most sapients, there is no distinction between my aura and my mind. Thus aura-pinning and aura-automation techniques are redundantly useless to me. My mind already exceeds the capacity of the average sapient spellcaster’s mind and aura combined. Therefore I use my extra mental capacity to maintain direct control over any spell or formation I create.

“Ok. I get it now. You don’t use them both because you can’t use them, and because they would worsen your abilities. You’ll be more efficient that way too.”

And efficiency is the name of the game for me.

“Small Aether capacity?” Sparky asked apologetically.

Worse. Over-purified. I started purifying my Aether once I reached the limits of my original form, but that makes it ridiculously hard to recharge or advance now.

“Ah. But your current form has much higher limits, correct?”

Much, much higher limits. And I’m pretty sure my upper limit also scales along with the amount of knowledge I have absorbed. So not only do I grow stronger now when I consume books, I gain more potential strength in the future. I’m reasonably certain that the difference between the two will eventually reach an asymptote, but I’ll need a lot more data to make any accurate confirmation.

“Data you get from eating books, right?”

Yes. Not data from the books themselves, mind you, but by observing myself as I grow. When I was a newly bound grimoire (I’m referring to the binding of a book, not the Binding of an Artifact, by the way) consuming new books was so rapturously incredible that I didn’t have the presence of mind to watch myself change.

“If you don’t mind my asking, what was your original form?”

I don’t mind. I was:

The Comprehensive Basics of Aetherial Manipulation, 4th edition

By K’thern, Grand Archmage of the Wandering Tribes

Before you ask, yes, I was a woman before I became a book.

Abigail proceeded to explain her encounter with the Flow to Sparky.

Halfway through her explanation Abigail was interrupted by Gem.

“Look! Look! I did-” the light over her shoulder winked out, “it.”

A beat passed.

“Holy fucking shit. You actually did it. You actually fucking did it.”

“What is that supposed to mean!?” Gem objected.

“I have never, never, seen someone learn how to pin spells in a day. It’s completely unheard of. You really have quite the partner here Abigail, you really do.”

Of course I do. I’m just that awesome, and so is Gem.

“So I’m some kind of prodigy then?” Gem asked.

“I mean, you did take a really unusual path to where you are right now, and you only really needed a little push to figure things out, but yeah; you are really gifted. Do me a favor real quick. Make another Aether-ball.”

“An Aether-ball? Why-” Gem stopped and stared at the Aether-ball that had formed at her gentle prompting.

Instead of the loose, wispy, and weak ball of earlier; her current ball was clearly defined and hummed with power.

“Wow.” Gem and Sparky breathed.

“Now, gently push it at me.” Sparky ordered.

At Gem’s subtle prod the ball zipped forth from her fingertips and towards Sparky. It stopped mere millimeters away from his face.

“Whoa. You have some control girl. That wasn’t easy to catch. That would’ve hurt if I weren’t ready for it.”

“What did you just do?” Gem queried.

He caught your Aether-ball with his aura.

“Indeed I did. And now, I’m going to teach you how to do the same.”

“What do I need to do?”

“Just stay still and use your aura. I’m going to aim near you, but if you move they could hit and these things smart something fierce.”

“Wait, why?”

“It’s a foundational technique used by battlemages for honening speed and precision in the victim-I mean subject’s aura.”

“Where did you even learn such a thing? And why are we moving on when I haven’t even managed to pin a spell for more than thirty seconds!?” Gem fiercely objected.

“You can train your spell pinning on your own, but you need another spellcaster to throw the Aether-balls at you, and Abigail certainly can’t do it. So you need me. As for where I learned it, while, I learned it from a book.”

“Abigail!” Gem barked in realization.

To be fair, I only reminded him of the technique. It’s in the C-BAM.

“Only in the fourth edition. It was one of the first things they removed.” Sparky spat sourly.

Gem blinked.

“Do we really have to do this now?” She pleaded.

“You want to be a battlemage, right?”

“Yeah, but-”

“No buts! Ready yourself! Sending in three, two, one, HUP!”

A deliberately fuzzy ball floated towards Gem at a sedate pace. She squeaked in alarm and flinched out of the way. The ball hit a pillow with a soft *whump*. A few feathers poofed out. Gem had only a few seconds to process before:

“And in three, two, one, HUP!”

This time Gem threw herself in front of the ball. She let out a cry as it smacked her flank with a pop.

“What in the infernal are you doing!?” Sparky cried.

“Ahhh. Not the couch! I like the couch. Shouldn’t we take this somewhere else? Like outside?” Gem pleaded.

Sparky looked to Abigail.

👍

“Nah, this is good.” Sparky replied to Gem flippantly.

The next hour passed with Gem desperately trying to protect the poor innocent sofa and its pillows from the diabolical Spaerekel’s assault. But finally, after dozens of bruises Gem managed to catch one. Sparky started to pick up the pace, until he was throwing a ball each second.

“ENOUGH!” Gem roared.

The several dozen balls stuck in her aura combined into one tightly compacted sphere that wavered in barely contained fury. It shot out at Spaerekel faster than the eye could see.

“Oh shi-” Was all that came from his mouth before it slammed into his chest with a loud *CRACK*.

“By the gods! I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to! I was just so angry.” Gem quailed as she rushed to Sparky’s side.

“Oooooh. That hurts. I think you managed to crack a rib. With an Aether-ball too.” He groaned.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry…” Gem repeated until a white tendril smacked her face hard enough to pull her attention away.

Abigail sat next to the two injured spellcasters, a spell formation proffered to Gem. Gem hesitated, but powered the formation. She was too distraught to notice how much easier it had become, but Abigail noticed.

Healing magic enveloped the two, most of the energy that reached Sparky settled into his damaged rib, although a few wisps made their way to his face, healing the remnants of the welts Abigail had delivered earlier. The energy failed to heal her, held at bay by her aura.

Gem. You have to let the spell heal you.

Gem instructed her aura as such and the energy quickly washed over her, erasing her bruises. In only two minutes the spell, having no valid targets left, ended itself.

“Marry me.” Sparky swooned.

Sorry, I’m already seeing someone.

“Right.”

It was quiet for a long moment.

“It’s quite alright dear. I just wasn’t expecting it. But hey, it looks like we can play catch now.” Sparky assured Gem.

I think it’s time to be done for the day anyway. We’ll just have to pick this up tomorrow, after Rodrick’s crash course on how not to die. Gem looks dead tired now, and just really needs a hot meal, probably a nice chat with Dani, and then a nice warm bed for the night.

Sparky opened his mouth to protest, but then decided better.

“Alright. I’ll see you two tomorrow. Sleep well, and say ‘hi’ to Dani for me.”

“Ok.” Gem replied, still a little overwhelmed.

The next two days were going to be very long and draining as they pushed Gem right up to her limits in preparation for her first real combat.

After eating dinner and a nice chat with Dani, Gem and Abigail had retired to the former’s room. Gem was doing much better, the brightness and curiosity having returned to her eyes. She was still rather tired after so thoroughly exercising her aura, though.

You’ve already managed so much. I don’t know how much you can tell, but while your aura hasn’t gotten appreciably stronger, it is so much more focused and orderly. While it certainly isn’t a razor’s edge yet, it is no longer a vague haze around you.

“Thanks. And you are right. It doesn’t feel as significant as you make it sound like. But I believe you.”

Gem twirled an Aether-ball through her fingers, marveling at her newfound control and precision.

Hey now, no more of that tonight. You can practice tomorrow morning while we wait for Rod.

“Fine.” Gem yawned. “I do need the sleep.”

OH FUCK!

I totally forgot to ask for those books to-go. I was looking forward to the snack.

Dammit.

Gem giggled at Abigail, then crawled into bed, and snuffed the light.

“Goodnight.” Gem told the book on her nightstand, who replied with softly glowing text.

Goodnight.