An Arsonist and a Necromancer Walk into a Bar

Moth-Lady and Druidic Therapy

Palmira returned to the guild in a bad mood.

It wasn't that guard duty had been particularly strenuous. It was mostly just standing around chatting with the others on shift with her and occasionally giving people who got too close a stern look. The only thing of note that happened that morning was when the drakelings got tired of waiting for her to come to them and started swarming her. It had been more embarrassing than anything trying to convince them to calm down, though the others had consoled her that being surrounded by tiny hangry dragons was certainly a way to look intimidating.

She wasn't sure she believed them. They looked far too amused for her liking.

In the end she'd had to promise them to stay after an extra hour and feed them some stale bread Svani had been kind enough to grab from the barracks.

Barring that nothing bad had happened, so really there was no reason for her to be in as foul a mood as she was.

It was just…

Cherven.

She didn't see him again for the rest of her shift, but just knowing he was around pissed her off to no end.

She was pretty sure Ósma noticed, since he didn't even comment on her lateness. Instead she curtly gave him her report before slumping down to slump on one of the benches in the courtyard.

Morte tried a bit to cheer her up with bad skeleton puns, but after a bit of her not responding he just went quiet and let her sulk.

And sulk she did. She just laid slumped along the garden bench for many a minute as she waited for the old Kwari to arrive and start her lesson. However, while she was waiting someone came past and startled her out of her funk.

"Palmira?"

She started, twisting to see who it was. Standing there was Lorenzo, a dead fox in each hand.

"What are you doing out here?"

She blinked, giving her mind a minute to shake itself awake. "I'm waiting for… Rana, I think her name was? The bug lady?"

She wasn't sure she wanted to talk with Lorenzo right now. Well, she didn't want to talk with anyone right now, but definitely not Lorenzo. She remembered her conversation with Ósma from earlier that morning, and quickly checked to make sure her hair wasn't on fire. Finding it wasn't, she instead focused on something equally relevant.

"What are you doing with those foxes?"

"Oh, these?" he raised the things carelessly. "I'm just watering the crops. Actually, do you mind if I start while we talk? I've got somewhere to be later, so I need to get this done quickly."

"Sure?"

He gave her a thankful smile before getting down on his knees and holding it out over the base of some of the fruit trees. She watched with morbid fascination as he started wringing it out, letting the blood drip down to the base of the tree.

"So what's got you in such a mood?"

Palmira blinked, tearing her eyes away from the bloody fox. "…I don't know what you mean."

Lorenzo side-eyed her. "Really? Because to me it looks like you've dramatically thrown yourself across a bench in a fit of melodramatic teen angst."

"What?" she looked down at herself. Crap, he was right. Quickly changing to a sitting position, she coughed, shaking her head. "You must have been seeing things."

He shook his head wryly. "Sure I did. …is it Chiara? Did she say something?"

"Huh? Chiara?"

"I know you two don't get along that well, but if she said something that offended you I can get her to apologize."

"No, no!" Palmira waved him off. "It's not Chiara! It's, um, the guard captain from my new job."

"The guard captain?" Lorenzo gave her a surprised look, moving over to another patch of foliage. "Of the Ambrosi? I'll admit I haven't spoken to the man—uh, spider—but he didn't seem that bad?"

Palmira huffed. "He's an asshole who harasses homeless children."

"…ah."

"Don't worry about it," Palmira waved him off. "I only saw him for a couple minutes anyway. I'll have probably forgotten he's even there after a few days."

She wouldn't, but he didn't need to know that.

"If you say so," Lorenzo gave her a doubtful glance. Standing up, he cracked his back before throwing the now bloodless fox into another patch of bushes. A dozen green spiked mouths exploded out from behind them, snapping and tearing at the corpse. "That said, if you ever need to talk—or just an ear to complain into—let me know, yeah?"

Palmira was still staring at the carnage and could only absently hum in agreement.

"…Huh. You know, I thought those things went extinct."

Almost as soon as Lorenzo left the Kwari she'd been waiting for arrived. Asu Rana, the guild's economist, was tall even for the desert-bug-people she was a member of. Siting down as she was, Palmira didn't even reach her waist, and there was something intimidating about how her willowy form towered over her. The fact she was near completely covered by red and green silks didn't help, leaving the only place she could look into the Kwari's two large, buggy-blue eyes.

"Ah, hello, yar'uwa," Rana offered her a smile, mandibles twitching in a way that made Palmira involuntarily shudder. "Are you ready for today's lesson?"

She bit the inside of her cheek and nodded, rising to her feet. "Yes, um, is there a title or something I should call you?"

"Just Rana is fine, dearie," the Kwari chittered, waving at her to follow through the gardens. "Now, I know you've done this before with some of the others, but now that you've gone on your first quest I'd like to hear a bit about how you think you fight. For now, name one thing you are good at, and one you are bad at."

Palmira nodded, giving the mouth-bushes a lot of space as she passed. Fed or not, she wasn't taking any chances. "I'm good at dealing damage," she told her. "Fire hurts most things pretty badly, though the hydra we fought simply shrugged off a lot of it. And I don't think I'm very good at aiming. I hit a lot of my shots, but only because what I was aiming at was so big I couldn't possibly miss."

"Well, aim is something that gets better with practice, and I can assure you you'll be getting a lot of it. But that's the kind of thing that takes time. Is there anything else you'd say you struggled with?"

She frowned, thinking. "…I kind of… froze up, a lot. If Morte or Chiara weren't there to snap me out of it, I think I would have just stood there and died. Is there a way to fix that?"

"Ah," Rana nodded. They came to a halt at the far end of the courtyard, where she removed her segmented arms from her robes and adopted a lecturing pose. "Yes, I understand well that issue. Don't be ashamed—it's quite common with new warriors of all stripes. Most get around it with drilling discipline or experience, but I expect you want something more immediate?"

Palmira grimaced, but nodded. She didn't know how big a problem it would be, but she'd rather deal with it now than on the battlefield.

"Hey, moth-lady," Morte spoke up, getting both their attention. "Isn't there someone you forgot to ask? Someone who was with her for the whole fight?"

"…Ah, of course," Rana nodded serenely. "Thank you for reminding me. I'll have to ask Chiara to join us for our next session."

"…You know what I mean, moth-lady."

"And you should know better than to address someone as moth-lady, skull-man."

"Hah! Touché. But even if you don't ask for my help, I'll generously give it for free anyway! You see, Palmira here is a natural-born mage. She's also self-taught."

"…I believe I see. You're saying she lacks the discipline that proper schooling would teach her?"

"Not quite. Rather, her magic comes naturally to her, so everything she does on the battlefield is improvised. She doesn't cast spells—she just uses magic."

Palmira blinked. "Is there a difference?"

Rana, on the other hand, nodded, an enlightened look overcoming her face. "I see. It's not that she lacks discipline, but rather she lacks structure."

"Got it in one! Palmira, remember what I said about the three P's?"

"I think so. It was, ah, Physics, Philosophy, and Precedent, right?"

"Three P's?" Rana muttered, sounding confused.

"A-yup. Right now, you've got Philosophy down pretty good and you have an instinctual enough understanding of your element's Physics for it to not be a problem, but you lack any Precedent. Normally, when a mage uses magic, they are casting a pre-made spell. They complete a series of steps to achieve a predicable result, then they can teach those spells to other mages who can then utilize and refine them further. That's how magic can even be taught in the first place—most people don't cast instinctively like you do."

"He's right, in a sense," Rana shook off her confusion, instead focusing on the current lecture. "Chiara, for example, does not simply will her crystal horse into existence. Rather, she casts 'Mirror Steed,' a spell which she has repeatedly cast in exactly the same way hundreds of times before."

"…I think I get it," Palmira slowly nodded, taking the new information in. "It's like when I created a fire whip to attack the hydra, right? I'd already used it before, so I could cast it again without thinking. But when I rained sparks down on it, it took a couple minutes for me to come up with and execute the spell."

Rana nodded. "While the way you do it might come more naturally and allow more creativity, in a fight it is far too slow to be properly effective. Instead, you should come up with, say… three spells that you can use in a fight. Your fire whip can be one of them, so you'd only need two. That should be enough to start us off, and once you've done that we can begin drilling those for the rest of today."

"Okay…" she bit her lip, thinking. If her firewhip could be one, then maybe… "Should I make them all attacks? Or should I focus on other things?"

"Attacking is always better," Rana told her. "An adventurer who can't fight is barely an adventurer at all."

"I disagree. Utility may not appear immediately useful, but stacking buffs overtime is far more effective than just trying to deal damage."

"That may be so, but right now she doesn't know any spells. It's best to start off simple, and we can work our way up to more esoteric spells later."

"Didn't you hear what I said earlier? She's a self-taught natural. Esoteric is all she's got!"

Realizing that she wasn't going to get an answer to her question any time soon, Palmira just sighed. Tuning out the arguing adults, she began to consider what her two other spells could be.

The bright light she'd set off at the beginning of her fight had seemed pretty effective. But it had blinded her as well… maybe there'd be a way around it? If anyone could teach her, it was Morte.

And maybe those thermite-sparks she'd used? Wait, no, those were only effective because she'd been flying at the time. They were also way too slow. She didn't think they'd be that good in a normal fight.

People kept telling her she should learn fireball, and while she normally wasn't one to turn down something useful, she also found herself refusing to consider learning it out of spite. She could become a powerful mage without this 'fireball' spell.

So, uh… she had that thing where she set her feet on fire to go faster. But Rana seemed to think all her spells should be attacks… maybe she could kick people? Flaming kicks sounded like they'd hurt.

"I think I've got all my spells," Palmira announced, tuning back in. She blinked as she realized they were still arguing. "Hey!"

"…and that's why pirouettes are an important skill—oh, Palmira, done already? Excellent! And you didn't even need the old lady's help!"

"Old lady?" Rana scoffed. "I think I preferred being called moth-lady." She sighed. "Whatever. Well, show us what you've come up with, and don't worry, there's enough space for you to show off here."

Palmira glanced at the scorch marks that were still there from the last time she 'showed off.' She really didn't want a repeat of that.

Taking a step away from the old Kwari, she raised her staff up, before pausing. "Um, you might want to close your eyes," she told Rana, closing her own eyes.

"Oh? How come?"

"This spell is very, ah, bright."

"I see. You don't need to worry though, light is never something I've struggled with. Cast away, and don't worry about me!"

Palmira hesitated another moment, before shrugging. Well, if she insisted.

Flooding the staff with her magic, she winced even as the blinding light still bled through her closed eyes, and again as a moment later a loud 'POP' echoed through the courtyard.

She winced again as she heard a cry of pain from one of the upper stories.

"Who the 'ells—!? Rana!"

"Oh come off it!" Rana shouted back as Palmira delicately opened her eyes. Even though they'd been closed, spots still danced in front of her vision. "You knew what you were getting into when you came in today!"

"Ah came 'ere to relax with me drink! Not geht blinded!"

Palmira looked behind her, but there was a tree blocking whoever was yelling. She winced as she realized that if they couldn't see her either that meant the person probably thought Rana had been the one to cast the spell.

"Um," she muttered, "sorry."

"Oh, don't worry about it," she shook her head. "Matthias will have forgotten about it within the hour. The dwarf really loves his drink far too much. Ignoring him, however, I'm surprised. Most people don't think to target the eyes when they first start out."

"Yeah, well," she shrugged awkwardly. "The only issue is that I get caught up in it myself, so I can't really use it."

"Hm, I see how that could be a problem," Rana raised all four of her arms to rub her shoulders. "I would say for right now you should lower the brightness a lot. Remember, it only needs to be bright enough for your enemies to be blinded, and that requires much less light than you'd think. Now, what's your next spell?"

Palmira nodded as she took in the advice, before leaning down and tapping the butt of her staff against her heels, setting them on fire. Getting back into position, she dashed a quick line from one end of the courtyard and back, before letting out a couple of kicks into the air as she returned.

"Hm. Good enthusiasm, but if you want to add kicks to your repertoire you'll need a proper teacher. Mobility isn't a bad thing to have either, but from what I've seen so far despite your claims to the contrary you don't have very many damaging spells. You said your last one is a fire whip? How powerful is it?"

Palmira huffed, shaking off the embarrassment of apparently failing the kicks. Instead she raised Morte above her head as she'd done before, setting him on fire. Extending the firewhip out from his skull she brought the staff around in a few circles, whipping the massive tendril of flame around in the air while being careful not to let it touch anything. After about a minute of that she dispelled the flame, causing the whole thing to vanish in a puff of smoke.

"Well, that's definitely big," Rana hummed. "But unless you hit something with it I suppose I won't know how powerful it could be. I suppose that one's on me, though, I should have prepared a bit better. Ah, you know what? Next time I'll have you meet me in one of the training fields outside of town. The courtyard is good because it is free, but thinking on it now it's a bit too dangerous to be casting fire spells in."

"It took you until now to notice that?"

Rana waved him off. "Regardless, I believe that's good enough for right now. There are certainly things you can improve on, but let's wait on that until we have some more space to work with. Instead, let us work on an equally important part of combat—discipline. For the rest of today, you'll be casting spell after spell until you run out of steam or the dinner bell rings—whichever comes first!"

Palmira winced. "…Are you sure? I just got back from a job!"

"A job as a guard. Tell me, did you do anything more strenuous than standing around glaring at people all day?"

Palmira sighed, before setting her feet alight again.

It was going to be a long afternoon.