Chapter Text
It was early in the morning when Euini heard a knock at the door. He rubbed his eyes and opened it to find Qifrey standing there smiling.
“I hope you slept well, Euini. I figured we could have our first lesson today?”
“Of course master!” Euini replied quickly, “what spell am I supposed to practice?”
“Well, I’d like you to draw any spell you like. You passed the second trial and modified the borrowshade cloak, but that’s all I know about your skill. So I’d like to see a few spells you can draw. They can be your favourites, ones you want to work on, or anything really. I’ve heard you don’t like casting in front of others, so I talked with Olruggio and convinced him to let you work in here today if you want. Olruggio’s sign should make it clear that you’d rather nobody else in here.”
“You want me to draw any spell?” Euini looked shocked.
“Of course. I can’t exactly see where you struggle based on a spell I choose. Take as much time as you need, and if you want help, I’m sure the girls would be happy to help if I’m busy.” Qifrey waved goodbye before closing the door behind him.
Then the room was silent. A spell of his choice… he could draw anything? No, that was obviously a test! He’d have to figure out what Qifrey wanted him to draw. What could Qifrey want? It’d have to be something from the primer, but what? Well if he had to make something from the primer, why not draw all the primer spells? Or at least as many as he could manage before the end of the day. Grasping wind, pyreball, a light ball, the Sylph shoes seal. Euini kept drawing them on his quire, then when he finished, crumpled them up and threw them away. None of them were good enough. Qifrey was an amazing witch, but Euini? He was just a lowly apprentice who couldn’t even figure out what his new master wanted… then he heard a knock on the door. It had to be Qifrey, there wasn’t anyone else who cared about him. His time was up and he had nothing to show for it except crumpled paper! “C-come in” he started to comb his hair in worry only to see Richeh enter. She picked up a piece of crumpled paper, looked at it, and simply said “a pyreball? It’s almost complete.”
Euini panicked. “Why are you looking at my bad spell? It’s barely worth even looking at, much less casting to show my skill.”
Richeh just looked at him, "I wouldn't use a fire spell to show your skill. If it goes wrong, Qifrey won’t be able to see why. What’s this one?”
She picked up another crumpled paper, this time the seal was for a ball of light. “This one isn’t you.” And another “this one would leave the ink running after it’s cast.” Euini panicked as Richeh mercilessly tore every single one of his seals down for being not his, or destroyed after casting, or any number of other comments on his abilities. Only to watch her pick them up, walking out of the room with at least a good dozen in her hands. She must be going to throw them out, like his drawings deserved. Just because he could draw, doesn’t mean he could draw well. He couldn’t figure out Qifrey wanted him to draw, and now Richeh had shown him he wasn’t even on the right track. He was going to fail, and his apprenticeship would be a disaster, he wouldn’t even be able to get another master. He’d probably get his memory of magic erased by the knights Moralis because he was such a liability!
Then there was a knock at the door. He couldn’t bear to open it, and so it opened itself. Then Richeh came back in, with Qifrey right behind him. Richeh still held the pages of useless spells which was odd, but Qifrey caught Euini’s attention more. There was a glint in his eye that Euini had never seen before, as Qifrey rushed up to him.
“Euini, I asked you for one spell and you gave me 33!”
“I-I’m s-sorry m-m-master, pl-please don’t be mad…”
“Mad? I’m happy you were willing to show me exactly how you draw so well! Mind if I go over them with you?”
“S-s-sure, I-I’m s-sorry.” The words only just registered “you’re happy about it?”
“Of course, I love seeing what my students draw. Richeh said a lot of them would destroy themselves when cast though, so we’ll have to look at the drawing first then cast them.”
“You mean you want to see them all cast?”
“Of course, first I’d like to see your drawing hand though. I had a quick look and something seemed odd with your penmanship.”
“I-I’m sorry…” Euini held out his hand, it was shaking with fear.
Qifrey grabbed it gently, “try to make it stop moving for a moment please Euini.” The shaking slowed as Euini tried to calm his nerves enough to stop it. “I see.” Qifrey let go. “That explains the extra lines. Your hands are always shaky aren’t they?” Euini nodded, his heart racing fast enough he felt it all throughout his body.
“Well I’ll have to do some research on how to help with shaky hands then. I’m impressed with how you use more sigils to counter the shaky lines, that’s clever. Now should we look at some of these seals? And I won’t worry about the shakiness, that’s something we can try and figure out later, okay?”
Over the next few hours, Qifrey reviewed each and every spell with Euini. Asking questions of how Euini made each spell, what he hoped to accomplish with them and even offered a small break when Euini was starting to panic. All the while Richeh watched, practicing some spells of her own when there wasn’t anything better to do. Euini never asked her why she watched him for so long, he didn’t want to know the answer. Why would anyone be curious about him? Especially Richeh, the one person he considered a friend even if that relationship was one way.