Page 11 of Twisted Magic

“Then why must I repeat it, yet again?” Liat queried calmly, raising her brows into winged incredulity. “Let me follow that with another question: why do you refuse to learn? This is elementary healing.” She glanced at the moth, whose wing visibly filled in. It flexed its dusty silver wings, then fluttered away. So easy for her.

“If you’d let me use the widget, maybe I could—”

“The ability to heal lies within you, not in an enchanted artifact.”

“Demonstrably untrue,” he countered. “I sure as shit can’t do any healing without it.”

“I believe you can learn this,” Liat insisted. “You’re allowing preconceived limitations to cloud your thinking.”

“Perhaps I’m just that thick-skulled,” Jadren retorted.

“Or, perhaps, you’re just that afraid.” She bounced the words back at him in perfect mimicry, making his petulance wincingly clear.

“I’m not afraid,” he spat back at her, not caring how he sounded. “I’m bored. I’m out of my skull with boredom. When will we stop messing around with insects and do something interesting?”

“You believe you’re ready to do something interesting?” Liat queried, her wizard-black gaze going to Seliah also.

Seliah gave him a cagey look, measuring and assessing his mood. “I think it would be good for Wizard Jadren to vent some frustration,” she answered. “Maybe mix it up a bit.”

“Don’t patronize me,” he snarled at her. If Seliah cared about how he felt, she wouldn’t hurt him by keeping secrets from him.

Seliah looked to Liat. Though he couldn’t see her face, he could swear she rolled her eyes. “I would really love to discover my alternate form,” she said to Liat. “Is that something we could begin working on? I understand that it requires an open connection between wizard and familiar, excellent control and technique on the wizard’s part—all skills we’re working on—and it would be different enough to give us a fresh take.” She was very carefully not looking at him.

“For a wizard to put their familiar in alternate form and, more critical, bring them back to human form again, is advanced work,” Liat explained, shaking her head minutely. “Not all wizards are capable of it. Most, in truth, never master the ability. Those who do have already mastered other skills.”

Jadren would be annoyed by her lack of faith in him if she weren’t precisely on the money. “Too advanced,” he agreed, not at all excited to fail at yet something else, particularly a party trick so profoundly tied to Seliah’s wellbeing. “But I wouldn’t mind killing something. Let’s see if I can do that without the widget. Isn’t there a rodent infestation in your crops or something that you all would welcome having eradicated?”

“All life is valuable,” Liat answered with earnest serenity. “None here would ever take joy in the death of another living creature.”

Jadren refrained from pointing out that this wouldn’t stop them from doing it anyway. “It would be a public service,” he persisted, the magic rising in him, hungry to destroy. The evil monster wanting its taste of blood. “Come on, let me go red-mist a few rats.”

“Jadren!” Seliah gave him an astonished—and rather horrified—look. “Don’t say things like that.”

“Or what?” He rounded on her, the liar and traitor he’d held close to his breast. “Don’t pretend you don’t know what I am. You saw what I did to Ozana.”

“Yes,” she bit out, then pressed her lips into a white line. “And got the red mist you reduced her to all over me. You did what you had to do, but I can’t believe you’d joke about it.”

“I’m not joking,” he countered. Spreading his hands wide, he laughed. “Isn’t that what you all want me to learn? I’m here to reliably reproduce an act of devastating violence, with you—my darling, personal power source—fueling me to even greater heights. Why mince niceties now? Let’s go blast some rodents! Or, better, maybe a terminal patient or two who’d appreciate the fast, easy out.”

Seliah shot to her feet, face pale, amber eyes haunted. “I don’t even recognize you anymore,” she spat in a hushed voice, before hurling herself out of the room.

The thud of the slamming door echoed in the quiet workspace and Jadren told himself he was glad she was gone. Maybe she’d run all the way to House Phel and leave him to his downward spiral.

“Well,” Liat said into the fraught silence, “that was an interesting display. Did you accomplish what you wished to?”

“What made you think I wanted to accomplish anything?” he countered. “It’s not my fault Seliah has a soft heart when it comes to the necessities of her job.”

Liat said nothing and Jadren—realizing he still stared at the closed door as if it might reveal some fucking clue about what was wrong with him—wheeled on her. The healer wizard stood in the same place, hands folded inside the long, dolman sleeves of her robe, watching him with quiet compassion on her dark-skinned, beautifully boned face. “We both know you drove Seliah away, probably with the intent of ending an uncomfortable training session. Most likely because you anticipated another failure, which fills you with fear. I, however, will not be so easy to banish, nor will I let you off the hook so easily.”

“I don’t know why you bother,” he growled, pretty sure she was wrong and he could drive her away, too. If he possessed a true talent, it lay there. “I’m not at all afraid of failure, as it’s been my constant companion all these years. Failure is such an old bedfellow that I’m inured to being a hopeless case.”

She cocked her head. “Why do you say that?”

“Surely even you must acknowledge that I’ve made zero progress,” he answered with silky sarcasm.

“Not true. You’ve mastered all levels of warding and numerous basic spell techniques.”

“Hooray, I can do what any freshman wizard can,” he spat. “That’s hardly the point. I remain singularly incapable of actively controlling my healing magic. We understand nothing more about why I have the ability to heal myself—which continues to be beyond my conscious control—nor how I was able to reverse the healing to vaporize poor, sweet Ozana. I’m barely adequate at accessing Seliah’s magic, hardly better than an adolescent wizard at the skills beyond the ones I came here knowing. I can make a few magical widgets and that’s where my usefulness ends. My tenure here in House Refoel has been an epic waste of my time and everyone else’s.”

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