The forest was flooded with warm sunlight and the birds were up to their highest notes, as Garrett was chasing Nannade through the forest. He pushed her hard during their runs. She might stumble and try to give up, but he wouldn't let her. He clenched an arrow's shaft in his fist and every time she dared to slow down, he whacked her behind.

She needed to learn that her body had far deeper reserves than she allowed herself to tap in to. When it was a flight for life, she could not decide to give up, and getting out of a confrontation was more important in his profession that standing one's ground like a brave and stupid knight. There would be no ballads sung to Hidden Hands, their names would not be remembered, except by their own. Their death served no purpose, they were hired to end their target, not to die an honourable death.

She finally started to pick up her pace again, even to outrun his leisurely trot and so he took after her.

"Do you feel that?" He asked her while jogging next to her.

She nodded, fatigue and pain gone from her face.

"That's your second wind. Remember it well. That is what you need to be able to hit reliably when death is on the line."

Her second wind eventually faded as well and she collapsed to the forest floor. Her pulse was visible on her wrists and her little chest rose and fell more than it seemed possible for such a small girl, as if her ribs were spreading apart much farther than they should. Garrett had quickly taken note of her skeleton's flexibility. He had read that crolachans were able to fall from great heights onto hard ground without significant injury. Even their skin was thicker, probably a good thing when the entire race had sharp claws that could easily open veins.

"Can you walk again? Not run, just walk." He asked her after her breathing had calmed down.

She nodded wordlessly and got up.

She wobbled still a bit but found her equilibrium. They walked back to the hut and he told her to get up on the chopping block, where she would skip from one leg to the other. He threw small pebbles at her from various directions to distract her, but she kept her balance. Hard to believe this little girl was the same that had problems walking straight without tripping over her own feet just a month ago.

After lunch, Elissa took the girl to her study to give her writing lessons, while Garrett went down to the village to take care of a few things for his continued stay in the area. Nannade sat hunched over a wax tablet, endlessly drawing wavy lines, straight lines, curves, corners, dashed lines, dotted lines, circles, squares and much more. Elissa was reading to prepare her own work and occasionally checking on the girl.

"It's so ugly. I can't do it like on the picture!" the girl said full of resignation.

Elissa looked over. The wax tablet was a mess of crooked and jagged lines. Nannade dropped the stylus and massaged her fingers. She tended to cramp up really fast. Her dexterity was decent, but she lacked control and steadiness.

"You don't need to cut all the way through the wax. Just gently scratch the surface, let the stylus glide over the wax."

The girl made a pouty face and picked the stylus back up. She tried again with Elissa's advice in mind and it did already look better. It made Elissa wonder; the girl was nine years old. Most nobles and other mages had their children tested for any of the magic gifts by the age of five or six. And those often already started learning how to write around the same time. Garrett had mentioned that the girl was quick on the uptake and had some sort of intuitive wit, but Elissa didn't know whether that would be enough. Garrett had studied at four different universities, but his best skills did not come from "book smarts". They came from endless training, fierce determination and painful experience. The girl didn't even understand the concept of knowledge and skill. To her, things were either possible or impossible, no line between.

Suddenly, Nannade tore Elissa from her thoughts with a loud "Is this better?" while shoving the tablet almost up to Elissa's face. She had drawn the patterns many times, with much more elegant lines, although she seemed to have cramped up again later.

"Not bad. But still a way to go. If you mess a single glyph up, it can have disastrous consequences for the spell."

The girl's expression turned disgruntled again. "Why do I even have to learn that if I can't cast spells myself?!" and let the tablet slump on the table.

Elissa sighed, put down her book and put her elbows on the table.

"Just like you, I have the Mystic Gift, that means I can call on spirits or ask my familiar Faan to cast spells for me. But those spells would have to be written down first. I can cast spells myself. Like Garrett, I have the Arcane Gift or Arcanist's Hand or whatever you want to call it. That means I can 'weave' spells without writing them down. But you do not have this gift. You will never be able to 'weave' your own spells. You must write them down on paper as a formula."

She took her little book from her dress' pocket and showed it to Nannade. It was square, about as big as her palm and held together by a metal ring through a hole in one corner. "This is our little palm book, or cast book, or whatever you want to call it. In it are many, many spells we prepare in advance with special ink." She flipped through the book, tore out one of the papers and showed it to Nannade. In very fine script many glyphs were written, connected by geometric shapes and lines, all in a dark ink with a peculiar iridescence. She put the paper face up on the table, put her thumb and middle finger together and imagined in her head the same two fingers of her Arcane Hand.

SNAP

The ink flared up, engulfing the paper in flames and smoke. With the smoke, a ball of soft, white light rose upwards, bathing the entire room in a soft glow, finally hitting the ceiling with a hint of a thud.

The girl's mouth stood open in awe as she watched the spell work. Elissa called her name to get her attention. "I wrote this spell down in advance, like many other spells. Sometimes even people who can't cast magic at all carry such a booklet because they can have someone else cast them. Your Teacher Garetas prepares his spells in advance, I can guarantee you that. And you will probably have to prepare them for him when your training has reached that point."

"Even if I can't cast spells myself, I can do magic?"

"Sure. Here, I'll show you." Elissa called Faan's name and the cat came around the corner. "Faan, the young witch needs a demonstration, please do me a favour..." she flipped through her palm-book, tore out a paper and handed it to Nannade. "Hold it out to him." Thens he reached into a pouch on her belt and put a few grains of a dark iridescent powder onto her other hand. "Close your fist around it."

The girl did as told and Faan attentively looked at the paper. His ears twitched and the paper went up in flames and smoke. But a tiny flame remained, hovering in the air between the girl and the cat. "Look!" Faan said with his disembodied voice as the flame slowly hovered towards him. "Now I can take care of it for you."

Nannade's eyes were full of wonder. "WAAAAH! I did this?!"

Faan purred and his ethereal voice chuckled. "Well, Elissa wrote the spell down and I cast it, but when you can write spells down and have your own familiar, then sure, you could say you did it!"

The girl's face grew more determined than ever. "I'll try again, really hard!" And got back to her tablet with new vigour. Faan used this opportunity to jump into Elissa's lap and get some attention while she was reading her book.

Garrett returned well before dinner. He greeted them, walked over to Nannade and handed her a leather bundle.

"Open it, it's yours."

She opened the bundle. A comb – a regular one, not for lice – a small pair of scissors and a stoneware bottle. "That's a special kind of soap for your coat." He said, gesturing to the bottle.

The girl brought forth a friendly "Thank you." and put the things into her part of the cabinet.

"Doting on her?" Elissa asked with a smirk.

"Be still, you didn't have to spend half a dozen days delousing the fur ball. You know nothing. Also, she should be brushing every morning or her coat will get all frowsty."

"You weren't in the village just for that, were you?"

"Aye, I set up my correspondents. I should be receiving a few jobs offers soon."

Nannade turned around to Garrett as if he had announced a tragedy. "Does that mean you'll be leaving me?"

"Only for a short while. Maybe a month, not much more."

Her mood did not seem to improve, so Garrett put his hand on her head and tussled her hair. "Don't worry, I'll bring back a present for you."

"But who will train me then? I did so well today!"

Garrett turned to Elissa. "I'm sure she can chase you through the forest too." He gave Elissa a knowing glance that told her without words I know you'll stick to the regimen!

He sat down at the table. "Tell me, Nannade, what did Elissa teach you today?"

"She cast a spell. A bright light. It was so pretty!"

Garrett looked to Elissa.

"I showed her how important spell construction is."

"So, do you want to see some more spells?"

Nannade nodded enthusiastically.

They went outside, Garrett put a wood billet on the chopping block. He stood around twenty feet away from it, Nannade stood to the side outside the window while Elissa was leaning outside through it.

Garrett took a broad stance, clenched his fist and then, with a step, brought his fist forward like a crossbow releasing a bolt.

SCRACK

Splinters burst through the air behind the chopping block, larger pieces and chunks of wood rained down as the finer remnants of the billet remained suspended in the air for a while. Garrett remained in his stance, fist outstretched like a sign post to obliteration, his shoulders in a straight line like a ceiling beam, his feet solid on the ground like pillars, as the last echoes of the spectacles were swallowed by the forest. Probably a good thirty feet away lay the furthest parts of the target, no bigger than Garrett's fist.

Nannade's eyes were almost bulging out of her skull, her mouth agape. Garrett looked over to her. "This is what you'll be up against. This and much, much more."

She took a moment to look at the last fibres and splinters raining on the clearing's floor. "Can I really do that?"

"In good time, yes." Garrett came over to her, knelt down and put his hand on her shoulder. "And I am up against this every time I set out for a contract. It is a dangerous, but a good thing we Hidden Hands do. We are called when especially wicked and evil people are about and we bring justice with our magic. That is our duty, our privilege and our honour."

The girl had a look of heavy contemplation about her as she let the words sink down on her. Then she brought forth "Hey, you didn't use a paper. Is that weaving?" she looked to Elissa as if expecting praise for her remark.

"Correct, Nannade. Garrett is rather good at weaving his spells freely." Elissa looked to Garrett and he nodded.

"I use this spell it very often, so I memorized the spell's construction perfectly and weave it with my Arcane Hand, or Arcane Gift or whatever you call it. But it takes concentration and practice. Weaving spells is not that different from constructing them, but... It is sort of different." He seemed to think for a moment and looked to Elissa, words failing him to explain it to the girl.

Elissa picked it up. "It's like the difference between speaking and writing." This did not help much either, the girl could not write yet. "You'll understand in good time. But as I said. You do not possess the Arcane Gift."

Garrett walked over to a barrel full of rain water. "I possess that gift. You possess the other one, the Mystic Gift. But Elissa possesses both of those. They are given and cannot be taken or acquired. This is the world we have to live in, and we are lucky to do so with these gifts. Almost everyone else out there has none of them, they are entirely mundane." He put his hand in the water and closed his eyes in concentration. When he lifted his hand out of the barrel, the water clung to it like honey.

A swipe of his arm, The water shot forth and with a sudden SSNNK, sunk into the soft soil as an icicle.

"You will remain forever unable to do that without writing the spell down. It is hard to do so freely even for those with the gift. But the grandest and most powerful spells have always been written down, because the more power you wield, the more care you must take." He wiped his hand off on his shirt. "And I will never be able to speak to spirits as you do. I would have to prepare a grand ritual with ample sacrifice just to coax them from beyond the veil. You only need to speak a word, as simply as you speak to me or Elissa, if you know what you are doing. So, listen to Elissa when she warns you of something. It will probably save your life in the future. Or your soul." As he finished, he bored his words into Nannade with his stern eyes, which she eagerly absorbed with mouth open, as this man with power over the elements was standing before her to give her advice.

He picked up another billet and put it on the chopping block, then got back into position. This time Garrett didn't clench his fist or even assumed a combat stance. He just stood there, inhaled slowly and then exhaled in a sudden burst. The sound of splintering again exploded on the clearing.

Nannade turned to Elissa. "Why didn't he punch this time?"

Garrett answered her before Elissa could. "That punch is what I call a hook. It is not necessary. The only thing necessary is the spell formula, the construction in my head. But doing that hook helps me to remember the spell more easily. It's hard to memorize entire spells accurately, so many wielders of magic use hooks. They do the hook over and over again while learning the spell. It's what Elissa does when she snaps her fingers or speaks a certain word. The magisters from the universities use incantations and gestures to seem more ominous and secretive. It's as much mnemonic association as it is showing off."

Nannade had a confused look on her face, tilted her head, flicked her ears up and down. "Nemottik assosishun?"

Elissa couldn't help but chuckle. "Mnemonic means relating to memory and remembering. An association is a connection between two things."

The girl had a look of realization, as if another secret was revealed to her. Elissa wondered how much Nannade had ever been allowed to ask. Whether her mother could answer any of her many questions.

Garrett spoke up again. "Well, none of this is worth that much flux either way, so let's call this little demonstration over." He checked the level in that special flask with the dark iridescent liquid.

Nannade turned to Elissa. "What is that?"

"Thats flux, that which flows through a spell to make it a reality, like wind blows over a windmill to drive the gears, like the powder I gave you earlier. It is like the life force that the spirits draw on and that is contained in your blood, but pure, without taint. In older times, mages used rock salt or grain or other things containing life force. These days, alchemists distil this life force from those things into the dark oil you see there in his flask or a powdered form, that's easier to handle for some things." Elissa pointed to Garrett's left hand, where he wore a ring, connected to the flask's neck by a thick yarn soaked with the liquid. "With his ring there and the yarn, he doesn't have to reach for the powder every time, it's handy for those that cast in hectic situations."

Garrett held up his flask and shook it to show off the oily dark liquid. Then he assumed an attentive pose, legs together and hands behind his straight back, like an obedient little student. "Whether it be the sweat on your skin or the flux in your flask, all that is to happen in this world takes energy, even magic." The he relaxed and smiled. "That's what my Tutor in Halonnes always said."

Elissa decided the time for dinner had come. After they had all finished, Elissa took the girl to a fresh spring pool in the forest to have a bath together. As they got into the water, Elissa saw welts on her rear as well as her tail.

"What happened here?"

The girl looked unsure and her eyes darted left and right before she answered. "Teacher Garetas hit me with a stick when I was running too slow."

Elissa tried to keep the outrage from showing on her face. "WHAT?"

Nannade winced, as if she had done something wrong. "I run faster, even though I was really tired out, so it worked, it's all good now."

"That's no excuse!"

Elissa did not bother to even get to bathing, instead putting their clothes back on and taking the girl by the hand to storm back to the hut, clothes and hairs clinging to her wet skin. She told the girl to wait outside while she would have a talk with Garrett.

She made sure the door and window shutters were closed before confronting him.

"I've seen her back, how dare you cane that little girl?"

"You mean during training? It's training, what part about that do you not get?"

"What kind of excuse is that?" She took a cup from the table to smash it into his smug face trying to sell her his self-evidence.

He caught her by the wrist. "The only one necessary. Elissa, you don't see me work, but running and escaping from a more powerful caster or some monstrosity is literally the most important skill in our arsenal, even more important than killing them!"

"You cannot be serious about caning a little girl!"

He let go of her wrist and breathed in. It was as if his chest grew threefold in size before he took half a step closer to her and spoke calmly but determined. "If she doesn't catch up in terms of fitness, she will fall behind and die. You only saw a sliver of how painful my training was, especially before you met me."

She had to admit he was right. She had seen the scars all over his body when they were both still so young. "But why does it have to be this brutal?"

"Because the world will be even more brutal." He put his hand on her shoulder and looked deep into her eyes with those blueish-grey stones of his that enthralled her. "Elissa, we are the ones who oppose the unopposed, the ones who prevent the impermissible. We are called in to exterminate that too dangerous for soldiers or guardians to face. We are the last option, and those whose bidding we do see us as contracted specialists. They have no problem sending us to die. As my Teacher always said: Better sweat than blood, better pain than death! Do you understand that?"

She swallowed, then nodded slowly.

The tension in the air disappeared. "Now, let's get her back inside." He smiled. A cold spike remained in Elissa's heart like an arrow.

Before Elissa opened the door to let Nannade in, she already expected the girl to have an ear pressed against the wood, which made her all the more surprised to see not a single hair of her. She called out the girl's name but got no answer. She checked around the house but couldn't find her there either. Dread unfolded in Elissa like a frosty flower.

"Faan, are you on the roof?"

A moment of silence, then the cat leisurely strolled out of the study. "What? I was taking a nap."

Elissa wanted to tear her hair out by the roots.

"Nannade's gone!"

Garrett stood up from the table. "I'll go look!"

Elissa stopped him by the door. "Take Faan with you. If a spirit is with her, you won't be able to do anything."

Garrett nodded and the cat jumped on his shoulder.

"You go look more towards the edge of the forest. I'll go in deeper!"

Elissa ran through the forest, calling out the girl's name and hoped Nannade had just seen a squirrel and chased after it. If a spirit had enticed her to go deeper into the woods, maybe even to the Glade, she feared the worst could have already happened.