The morning cry of the rooster was piercing to Adrian’s ears. A yawn and a stretch popped his joints as he rolled out of bed and into the hallway, still in his clothing from the day before. Still cottonheaded, his morning routine came up short heading to the chamber pot, confused as he was. The pregnant moment stretched out as his mind slowly tried to piece together what he saw.

“You’re letting a draft in,” the gruff voice grumbled.

With a yelp, Adrian slammed the door shut on the completely nude man.

Maybe Samuel wasn’t such great company after all.

Samuel disappeared before breakfast. Passing by, Adrian glanced in and saw his few belongings were still in the guest room. So it wasn’t that kind of disappearance, the kinds the stories speak of, where the mysterious expert up and disappears at the last moment. Or some fell-thing occurs.

Which, was fairly good and all. Despite the rough start this morning, Adrian was still keen on having Samuel talk to his parents and get him out of his commitments. But then his own morning chores caught up to him. Between the barns, fields, animals and crops, the hours flew by as the unlimited tasks of a working farm.

He didn’t mind it. Not that much. No, really. He was rather good at it all and all. Farming ran in the family so to speak, and there was perhaps something wholesome and contemplative about such a profession.

But, magic!

It was lusty and seductive. Not that there were many girls nearby that Adrian even knew what that meant. But it was a farm. And animal reproduction was profit to a farmer. So he wasn’t totally clueless when he said that magic was a lusty and seductive cow.

No, wait, perhaps that’s not a good metaphor, he thought to himself absently as he worked his tools that morning. The hens perhaps? Or do the sows make better sense?

It was late morning as he was hauling a bucket of scrap that his ears picked up on the chunking noise. The noise was out of place, and a puzzled look came over his face before he consciously even knew that something was wrong. His father should have been out in the fields, and his mother rarely chopped wood. And besides, that wasn’t the sound of the family axe being swung. It was too light and airy.

Setting the heavy bucket down, Adrian turned his head from side to side and he slowly followed the sound back to its source. A minute later and he found himself back behind the woodshed, Samuel basketweaving with his back turned to him. Adrian opened his mouth to speak to the man’s back, wondering what a great mage was doing basketweaving, but clamped it shut again as split wood drifted past his peripheral vision. What?

And not just one piece either, he finally noticed. A line of unsplit logs floated casually from the seasoning pile, towards the stump, and from there towards the split pile.

Chunk.

Chunk.

Chunk.

It took several logs being split before Adrian even noticed that the axe was working itself, unmanned by any, well, man.

“Are you just going to stand there all day?” Samuel grumbled out again, as he carefully made another knot in the basket. “Or are you going to tell me what’s on your mind?”

Adrian’s mouthparts flapped a few times as his brain failed to understand what he was seeing. “Magic can… wood chop?” he tentatively got out.

“Magic can do almost anything if you put your mind to it,” Samuel remarked offhanded as he tossed the half-completed basket overhead, and stood up to face Adrian. When it didn’t come down, Adrian glanced up, watching as it too began to float and then inevitably begin to weave itself. “The trick,” Samuel continued, “is getting it to do what you want it to.”

“But… why?!” Adrian cried out as his emotions unbundled themselves in shock, as he desperately gestured towards the flying wood. “Fireballs, lightning, maybe the odd ritual. I get those! But any farmer can chop wood and any wife can weave.”

“Two reasons I can think of off the top of my head. One, practice for fine magic control. And two, because if I didn’t do it with magic, I’d have to do it by hand. And doing it by hand is always less satisfying. So, tell me farmboy: why not?” Samuel paused, as if to give Adrian a moment to reply, but continued anyways. “Oh, you’ll meet plenty of mages who won’t deign to do either. Degrading, they’ll say. Beneath my station, they’ll say…. Well, most of them end up dead sooner than later. So I’ll stick by my methods, thank you very much.”

Adrian finally turned his bedazzled gaze away from the casual flex of arcana. “Speaking of which, Samuel, I, um…” he stumbled over his words a bit as doubt overrode any surprise. “I was hoping that perhaps, if you wouldn’t mind, if you would—could you perhaps, maybe, talk to my parents about whehter I could learn/apprentice to become a mage?”

“Oh really?” Samuel raised a mischievous eyebrow at him.

Um, yes?” Adrian asked, uncertain in the face of humor.

“Absolutely not.”