Hunted Sorcery (Jon Oklar Book 2), B.T. Narro [digital book reader txt] 📗

my time first. Are you actually capable of adding a fifth note?”

“Definitely.”

“Good. Each note of mana seems to have its own properties. We’ve already discussed mtalia, earth and vtalia. The other notes aren’t as strong on their own, but they still alter the state of mana.”

“How do you know?”

“When you’ve been using mana for as long as I have, you start to notice patterns. It’s easiest to see what these notes do when you tack them onto an existing spell that you’re familiar with. Let me show you with water, for example.”

Leon walked over to the large window and opened it.

“You’ve seen Kataleya cast Water enough times to recognize it,” he said as he faced the open window. “You don’t need to see me do it again now. Instead, I’m going to show you what happens if I take the normal spell of water, C, E, G, and I add uD as a fourth note. Remember earlier? I said the school of water goes up to uD. I’m about to show you proof.”

I was a little excited as I took my place at his side.

He breathed deeply as he lifted his hands and contorted his fingers. A wall of water grew outward from the size of a brick. It hovered outside, with perfect square edges and enough density to stop an arrow.

When Kataleya practiced casting Water, the water she created out of her mana was spherical and about a third the volume as Leon’s spell in front of us. But Leon didn’t even seem strained as he checked to make sure I was watching.

“You see how much denser the water is than usual?”

“I do. That’s just because you added uD to the spell?”

“Not only because of that. The density also has to do with the power I’ve put into it, but just like with your healing spell, the power I can put into it greatly depends on the notes of mana I use. By adding Upper D, I don’t have to work as hard because the mana already knows to form a dense wall. That’s how we know uD is part of the water school. The same experiment has been done with fire, but obviously I’m not going to show you that. Now look down to make sure there’s no one below before I drop this.”

I leaned out the window and saw my friend leaning against the wall of the great hall, taking one of his many breaks.

“Michael!” I called down. “Move out of—”

The sudden falling water startled me. Michael was just starting to look up as it crashed down onto his face. He was knocked onto his back as the water drenched him.

He spat water out of his mouth. “What the hell!” he yelled as he sat up.

Leon leaned out of the window beside me. “Get back to training!” he yelled down. Then he pulled me back into the room and closed the window. “Given that same logic, one might say that uD, which is already in the core of dvinia, is a requirement for energy from mana to become hard enough for the spell of dvinia to work.”

It was hard to follow his words because of how quickly he’d transitioned back into the lesson. Also, I could still hear Michael loudly complaining.

“Is dvinia hard, Jon, or soft?” Leon tested me.

“It’s somewhat soft, like a cushion.”

“Normally a learned sorcerer would try adding uD to Expel to harden the energy, but like I just said, it’s already there. You cannot cast Expel without uD. But what happens if you had another D? Let’s say Middle D?”

“Ah, that would be interesting.”

“Now are you starting to see the right way to learn mana?”

“Actually, yes.”

“Don’t sound so surprised,” he chided me.

“It’s just that I haven’t had any real lessons from you yet.”

“Because you haven’t been good enough for any of them to help you. Now you finally are.”

I supposed he had a point. I wouldn’t have been able to use any of this knowledge a week or two ago.

“So you’re telling me to experiment with various fifth notes and see how it changes my spell? And depending on how the notes change my spell, it will teach me what the notes do individually?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying. And that concludes the lesson.” He surprised me by starting to leave. Just we were finally getting somewhere.

“But you also told me that a sorcerer could injure himself through experimentation!” I said to stop him.

He kept on going. “So what? You can heal yourself now.” He did turn around, at least. “Before I forget, I’m taking you to a healer after lunch for you to carry out two hours of your new ‘punishment.’ That’s why I have to run. I need time to figure out which healer to take you to.”

“Aliana’s mother is a healer. I could speak to her about the possibility of visiting her mother.”

“Yes, do that at lunch.”

“So that means you can stay and help me train.”

“I need to have a word with Michael. I heard a few phrases spoken in my name that need to be addressed.”

Yeah, I had heard them, too, after Leon had closed the window, but I was hoping they might’ve passed by Leon’s ears.

CHAPTER EIGHT

When it was time for lunch, I couldn’t leave the library book in my room because I wasn’t allowed to visit my quarters. I didn’t want to leave it unattended either, so I took it with me and set it down near my plate as I ate beside Michael.

He was dry now and didn’t seem like he wanted to talk about whatever Leon had said to him. But I had to say something.

“Leon figured it out on his own.”

“He told me, along with a few other things.”

“I do really appreciate you helping me sneak in some sleep.”

“You’d do the same for me.”

Reuben and Charlie soon joined us. All the sorcerers sat at the same enormously long table, but there was plenty of space between the group of boys and the group of