“I will take that as a yes! So now tell me about your life so far, I want to try and get to know you as much as I can in the short time we have so I can work on ensuring this ‘second chance’ for you with the judge.” Nauzet continued while writing some more notes on the page with Lu’s portrait in it. As he ran out of space where he was writing, the book subtly changed its shine to a green hue for a moment as a new blank page materialised itself.

  Lu swallowed and closed their mouth before asking. “How...” They frowned and reached forwards to the table, resting their elbows on it with their hands together and their head held between them. “So why in the fucking dragon’s ass you made such a big deal about me telling you my name if you already knew who I am?”

  “Oh, it was just an educated guess” Cheerfully answered the ever-smiling elf.

  “That was my old name anyways, I don’t like it any more. I go by Lu no”

  “I will make sure that is kept in writing, no need to worry.” Replied Nauzet while erasing the title of the page he was writing by simply wiping it away with his fingers and then writing ‘Lu’ instead. “So during the twenty-something hours you were indisposed I reviewed some reports of burglaries that would fit with your modus operandi in this province. Sure enough, there where three reports of incidents where store owners reported some of their valuables had been stolen but since there were no signs of tampering in any of these instances and the amounts were not big enough to warrant much effort they were classified as ‘misplacements of assets’ and closed. However, now that we know there is someone with the skills to Longstep it paints another picture.”

  Flicking through the pages of his book, eventually Nauzet reached one with a map of the province of West Plains, where they were currently located. In it, the city of Galara’s Hold was marked with a red X as were the towns of Riverside, Lebstean and Hammerdrop. Slowly dragging his finger over them, the elf continued.

  “And it just so happen that the three reports came from cities along The Pilgrim’s Way, which would make it very convenient to travel from one to the next with some intermediate stops. The reports are also dated to be roughly within a month of each other, the oldest one being the one from Hammerdrop.” Nauzet looked at Lu who was now resting against the back of the chair with their eyebrows raised and eyes wide open, their top lip pulled slightly upwards revealing a hint of their teeth. Their arms and legs were crossed and their sight was fixated on the map. “After that discovery we decided to ask the province of East Plains for reports of this kind, and sure enough there were some more!”

  Nauzet pressed with two fingers the opposite corners of the page and dragged them inwards. As he did so the map became smaller within the page and more areas became visible, as if they were looking at the Empire from high above and quickly gaining height allowing them to see more of the land. In the new revealed areas, there were more red crosses marked in different towns which made the pattern crystal clear. All the marks were on a continuous line with few breaks starting from the city of Galara’s Hold, meandering its way around six different provinces and three thousand kilometres, ending in the province of Dalia’s Crown.

  “So we got about fifteen reports we could match dating up to about a year and a half ago. Before that there is not much.” Nauzet continued. “And the last bit of my investigation revolved around your sword and armour, which are the same ones given to trained soldiers of Dalia’s Crown but there is nothing in the rest of this investigation that indicated you had stolen anything from military locations. I requested a list of enlisted soldiers that are no longer reachable and sure enough, ‘Lucy Lowfield’ was one of the first ones on the list as a known deserter with a picture matching closely your face. However, it said that you ran away about four years ago so I wasn’t convinced it would be you and since the last blood sample taken while in the army is too old to be used for Blood Resonance we couldn’t check for certain.”

  Nauzet looked up at Lu, who still was staring at the paper now with a fully open mouth. He waited until they finally reacted and looked up to ask. “What do you think? Did I do a good job? Be honest.”

  “No fucking way.” They answered after some seconds of awkward silence.

  “I am going to take that as a compliment.” Stated Nauzet as he returned to his notes on Lu.

  “Absolutely no fucking way you have managed to putting all of this together with just some research.” Repeated Lu, standing up. “Do you have spells for this? Did you look into my memories?” Lu was almost shouting.

  “Oh no, that won’t be necessary now that you are collaborating.”

  “...I don’t believe you just asked around for like crime reports and got all of this in a day.”

  “Paperwork goes really smoothly when you are a Highmage.” After getting ready to write again, Nauzet continued. “I have a few questions for you. First, how did you cast Longstep? Have you had any magical training? We have tested your blood for natural harmonies but it did not yield any positives and you also had no arcane devices on your person capable of that feat so you would have had to have training in order to learn and cast the spell yourself.”

  Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  Lu sat back on the chair, scratching their neck in the area the metal collar covered. Their fingers wrapping around it to reach the trapped skin. “Longstep? Is that the name of the spell? My father showed me how to do it when I was a kid, but I couldn’t really pull it off until recently.”

  “Yes, that spell.” Nauzet answered. “Are you being honest with me? It is hard for me to believe that you simply learned the spell’s incantation and motions and you figured it out by yourself without further training.”

  Scratching their head, Lu answered “Well, that is basically it.”

  “I believe that someone with talent could learn some basic charm, but any spells from the complex paths is another story even if it is just a simple one.”

  Lu at this point was sitting on the chair pushing backwards and balancing only in the back legs. They tilted their head while listening to Nauzet’s jargon and replied “I don’t know what to tell you man. I Only know how to cast that spell but I have no clue what all the magic fancy terms or things mean.”

  Nauzet sighed and rubbed his face with both hands, massaging his temples. “This is certainly… unusual. What is your focus? I would like to see you cast your spells. I didn’t see any dedicated focus on the items you had with you, do you use your sword by any chance?”

  “What is a focus?”

  “The thing you use to cast magic. It is usually a wand or a staff or something like that.”

  “No, I use my hands.”

  “In addition to your hands and other movements, which item do you use to channel the essence through”

  “Just my hands, I don’t know what essence is.”

  Nauzet opened his mouth to reply, then closed it. Looked down at the page where he hadn’t written anything during the last few minutes of the conversation and then tried to speak again.

  “Ah… I mean… I am not even sure where to start.” From a leather pouch hanging on his belt he pulled the small golden amulet that the inquisitor used to shock Lu during their fight. Nauzet whispered to it. “Release.”

  The collar clicked and unlocked, allowing Lu to take it off and finally have a good scratch on the irritated skin on their neck.

  “Show me then, do your magic.”

  “I can’t just do it, I need time to concentrate…”

  “Take your time, I have a few hours to spare.” Nauzet reached his hand into the pouch again, leaving the golden amulet in and pulling out a monocle which he carefully set up over his eye.

  Lu took a deep breath and closed their eyes, setting their hands in position to cast their spell, concentrating for a few minutes. As soon as they fell their eyes light up they began the incantation. Nauzet rose a finger and whistled and in that instant Lu felt as if someone had punched them in the stomach making them lose all concentration, falling to their knees. The knot in their stomach crawled up their throat and they grabbed their own neck in an effort to stop gagging, but it was useless. Lu threw up on the floor. Nothing came up salve for yellow bile.

  “Oh I am so, so sorry” Nauzet exclaimed while rushing to assist Lu.

  “What... What the fuck... was that?”

  “I wanted to test your stability with some soft poking first but it seems like it was too much.” He explained, holding their hand and helping them stand up.

  “Don’t ever do that again, I still feel sick.”

  “I am afraid this is part of the training of any mage. Have you never been counterespelled before?”

  “Fuck no. Not like this.”

  Lu straightened themselves and took a deep breath, finally stabilising their heartbeat. Nauzet walked back and sat on the edge of the table.

  “There is a lot wrong with your technique: You are mispronouncing the incantations and the gestures are not as sharp as they should, also your resonance takes too long and your concentration is weak. Oh, and you use way too much essence, the fact that you can even cast the spell while glowing like a torch is almost the most impressive thing about you.” Nauzet extended his finger as he listed the multiple mistakes they were making.

  Lu put their hands on their hips. “Thank you for the back-handed compliment, I guess.”

  “Oh sorry didn’t mean to berate you, old habits die hard.” He laughed.

  Lu let out a single chuckle and bowed their head down with a smile. “Oh sorry teacher, I promise I will do better next time.”

  “Alright, now please continue with the demonstration.” Nauzet sat down again ready to observe and take notes. “I assume you don’t own a spellbook either.”

  “Nope.”

  “Of course not. Please, go ahead, I won’t interfere again.”

  With a lighter mood to the situation Lu felt more confident and it took them barely a minute to fully concentrate and cast their teleportation spell. They tried to do sharper movements and clearer pronunciation but it didn’t seem to stop the glowing in their eyes or body at all. The spell was cast sucessfully and they teleported a few metres to the other end of the room.

  “Any complaints?”

  “Nothing new.” The elf replied. “You are just lacking in training, guided training from an actual master. And you said you learnt all of this from watching your father?” Nauzet asked, raising his eyes from the page to meet Lu’s.

  “He showed me the incantation and everything when I was little, but I don’t think he actually expected me to learn them.”

  “Well you are lucky to be so talented then!” Laughed the elf. “Do you mind putting the restrainer back on your neck please?”

  Lu reluctantly did as he said and the metal ring sealed as soon as they finished closing it. “What does this do exactly?”

  “If you try to use magic it will shock you. It can also be activated on command.” He then took a deep breath and looked up to meet Lu’s green eyes with his own. “So, other than your magic, tell me about yourself.”

  “What? Like, what exactly do you want me to tell you?”

  “As much as you can.” The elf leaned back on his chair without moving the quill from the paper. “I need to get to know you and you need to convince me that you are worthy of the mercy of the judge, that you can be reformed into a good citizen after being a criminal for so many years.”

  “...”

  “You need to understand, you were caught practising restricted magic without a license and you attacked an inquisitor…”

  “He attacked me first.”

  “...and that is without even taking into account the burglaries. I am not going to lie: I like you, and I would hate to see a person with such potential be lost, but I need a reason more than just my guts to argue that you can be redeemed.”

  “Do you want me to pinky-swear I won’t be naughty again?” Asked Lu, leaning back on their chair with their arms crossed over their chest.

  “You can start by explaining to me why you were stealing things on the first place. Or why you deserted from the army.”