Vivian arrived back at the castle. She took a deep breath before going in. She practiced. She formed the balls of energy in her hands. It was almost effortless now. Getting them to shoot out, that was the tricky part. That part needed a yell. But that was okay. She could yell when the time came.
She entered the castle, and strode towards the throne room to meet Catherine.
Catherine was talking to Talon in the throne room. She looked different, Vivian noticed. Her transformation was almost completed now. She looked younger--almost like she had once looked when she was 19.
“Vivian, how nice to see you again,” Catherine said.
Vivian was so shocked by Catherine’s young appearance that she almost forgot her purpose. “Catherine? But how? You look so young.”
“Oh, it’s nice of you to notice, dear. Nothing a little magic couldn’t fix up. I’ve been trying to revert to the age I was when I first learned to control my magical powers. It has sentimental attachment for me. You know how it is.”
“Catherine, I’ve come to take the throne back.”
“Take it back? Take it back for who? My dear, you know I am the rightful Queen, and it is your father that was the usurper. And you know I’ve already named you my heir, so there’s no need for you to take anything back.”
The balls of energy were forming on Vivian’s hands. “This is your last warning,” she said.
“Ah,” said Catherine, noticing the balls of electricity forming. “You’ve come to do what your father never could do. You’ve come to fight magic with magic.”
“I don’t want to hurt you,” said Vivian, although her tone was threatening.
“Don’t tell lies,” said Catherine. “You’ve been fantasizing about hurting me all week.”
Vivian yelled, and the energy pulsed from her hand and travelled toward Catherine. Catherine spoke softly and waved her hand in an almost dismissive way, and the energy beam dissipated before it could touch her. “Not bad,” said Catherine. “That would have knocked the goblin army off their feet I’m sure.”
Vivian yelled again, but louder this time. The energy pulsated from her in a stronger form. Catherine spoke again and waved her hand. It was noticeable that Catherine was also speaking louder, and waving more energetically. “Good,” said Catherine. “You almost had me with that one.”
Vivian yelled a third time, and this time her yell was almost a shriek. The energy burst from her to fill the whole room. Both Talon and Catherine quickly chanted spells and waved their arms to dissipate the energy.
Catherine’s eyes lit up and she started walking towards Vivian excitedly. “What power!” she said excitedly. “I was wondering why you came to challenge me. Why would Vivian think she can defeat me when she hasn’t had any training, I asked myself. But now I can see it. You’re stronger than me. You’ve got more power than I do, and you know it. That’s why you thought you could defeat me. But all you have is raw power at this point. You can’t control it. But if you could combine your raw power with even just a little bit of training, you could be more powerful than I or Talon could ever be. You could be more powerful than all of the sorcerers and magicians in the whole forest.”
“I don’t want your help,” Vivian said.
“I know, I know. I know you don’t like being in the position where you need my help. But, let’s face it, you need my help.”
“I don’t need anything from you,” Vivian said, and the balls of energy began to form again in her hand.
“Calm down and think about this logically,” said Catherine. “You want to undo my spells, but you don’t know how to. Your father and your mother are still frogs. Your husband is 3 inches tall. I know you're angry at me, and I don’t blame you. But I can help you make it all better. I can teach you how to undo those spells.”
“Why don’t you just undo the spells yourself.”
“You know why. Because we’re bargaining right now. You want to undo my spells, and I want to teach you magic. That’s the bargain. Sounds like a pretty good deal to you, no? I’m not even sure why I’m making this deal. What do I get out of it?” Catherine asked herself with a questioning look up at the ceiling. Vivian was still standing there, angry. So Catherine softened her tone. “Let’s start with the simple ones. Your mother is still in her bedroom right now stuck as a frog. You want to turn her back into a human again, don’t you? I can teach you how to undo the spell.”
“Alright,” said Vivian. “It’s a deal.”
“Good girl,” said Catherine. “I knew you’d come around. Now, first let me teach you the spell that transforms anyone into a frog. It’s a basic transformation spell, and you just substitute in a frog for the object. And then because we want to transform your mother, we have to use a third person singular feminine noun in the nominative case, and make sure the verb agrees with this. And you have to do all of this in the ancient runic tongue.”
“The what?”
“It’s the language of the ancient peoples of the forest. I can’t teach you all of it right now, but it’s important that you learn the words for this spell. Talon, do you have a piece of paper?”
“I believe it’s traditional to practice the spoken form first,” said Talon. “You want to make sure she doesn’t mispronounce it before you show her how to write it.”
“Everybody’s a pedant,” said Catherine. “Very well, we will do the pronunciation first. But Vivian, my dear, please don’t say the complete spell outloud until you’re ready to use it.”
“Why should I trust you?” asked Vivian. “How do I know you won’t give me a spell to kill my mother, instead of changing her back.”
“Well, for one thing,” said Catherine, “Clearly if I wanted your mother Benevois dead, she would be dead already. But let’s not argue the rationality of it too much. That’s not the point. The point is, once you master a spell, you’ll be able to feel for yourself what it can and can’t do.”
“What do you mean?”
“I can’t explain it fully. No one can. But when people who are magically gifted have mastered a spell, they’ll be able to feel what it can and can’t do. You don’t have to trust me, you’ll just trust your own feelings.”
“Alright,” said Vivian. “I’m ready. Teach me.”
“Very good. Now, I’m going to teach you the basic form of the verb first. We’ll deal with the conjugations later. Are you ready? Repeat after me.”
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