Chapter 23: The Boy with the Shield, Part 2

"Now, tell me everything you think you know about your abilities."

List drew a deep breath. She and Arden were alone in a field on the outskirts of Shadefall, nothing but grass and gently sloping hills in every direction save that of the town itself. In the past weeks, this place had become their trio's training ground. In that time, List had sparred and drilled with Valerie, begun physical conditioning, and explored her familiarity proficiency with weapons beyond the whip.

Arden's original protege was leaps and bounds ahead of List in tactics, coordination, and physical conditioning, thanks to a combination of a headstart in training and better living conditions, as well as Valerie's generally far more analytical mind. When it came to straight combat, armed or unarmed, List was Valerie's equal, if not her better. Though she had no concrete memories attached to it, she had an instinctive intuition for weaponry and fighting that came to her as she fought, which Arden theorized to be some kind of muscle memory her body could access even despite her amnesia. Taken together, it all put the two more or less on even footing in their training sessions.

But from the day List had officially signed on under Arden, he had wanted to incorporate an exploration of her more supernatural abilities into her training as well. So far, she'd been dismissing or avoiding the idea. And with a degree of good reason.

I can make this energy, or something. It looks like red lightning, and it makes whatever weapon I'm using . . ." she already found herself groping for words. " . . . better, I suppose.Everything just hits harder, cuts deeper, hurts more. I can make the lightning come on its own too, not that it seems to do anything."

She demonstrated by holding out her hand. Her tattoos lit up bright red, and small tendrils of red lightning danced between her fingertips.

"Just on the hand with the tattoos?" Arden asked.

"No, either hand." She switched which hand was generating the lightning. "I guess it looks neat? Glows in the dark. Sort of tingles. I assume it's magic? And . . . that's about it."

"How do you bring it out?"

"I don't know. It's like moving a limb. I don't really think about how I do it, I just . . . do it." 

That wasn't exactly true, but it was the closest she felt she could get to describing it. The power did come naturally to her—so long as she wasn't thinking about it. When she did stop to wonder at what she was doing, the power would suddenly feel alien to her. Like someone else was guiding it around for her.

This was why she didn't like talking about her power. To have something so clearly a part of her, and yet feel so foreign to her, was unsettling. It made her feel like a stranger in her own body, a sensation that had once plagued her every waking moment, and even now still haunted her at times. 

"Fascinating." Arden's eyes never left the crackling power on her fingertips. "When did you first discover it?"

"Knife fight." List was surprised at how easily the answer came out of her. She'd always thought she'd be ashamed of the first time she'd killed someone. Or at least that she should have been. But in the moment, it had felt so routine. Like it wasn't the first time she'd done it. "Somebody tried to grab me off the street one night. Chopped his hand off in one go."

"I see." Arden stared for a while longer before nodding to himself. "I have a theory, but it requires testing. How accurate can you be with your whip?"

"Very."

"Well then—" Arden took a few steps back from List before holding his left hand out to the side, palm toward her. "—put your power into the whip, and strike my hand."

List gawked at him, even as she uncoiled her whip from her hip. "Are you sure that's a good idea?"

"I have prayers to reinforce myself against harm," Arden said. "And in the unlikely event you do injure me, I can—"

He was interrupted by a whip crack, and a sudden flash of pain across his palm. A shocked gasp escaped his lips, and his hand retreated on reflex. Already, blood was running down his arm, as a prickling sensation spread out from the new gash on his hand.

"You were a  little eager to do that, don't you think?" Arden hissed.

List shrugged. "You told me to!"

"Indeed I did," Arden said. "Though, I expected you to wait until after I'd called on my defensive prayers."

"Oh. Had you not?"

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"No."

". . .sorry."

"Quite alright," Arden said, still clutching his injured hand.

He could heal the injury simply enough. Even if she'd lopped all of his fingers off, which Arden suspected she very well could have if she'd hit even slightly differently, it wouldn't have been too much of an inconvenience. But before he healed himself, he a theory to test.

Though the wound looked like an ordinary laceration, as a priest of Saint Hedwig, Arden's awareness of the metaphysical was heightened, especially pertaining to matters of weaponry and offensive magics. He focused that awareness into the injury on his hand, and on the faint, lingering stain of magic left by List's weapon.

It was fading fast, but what he felt from that stain was a barrage of activity. Zipping, darting, speeding up and slowing down. Constant, restless, and erratic change.

Only then, when he understood what he was dealing with, did Arden say a prayer to heal his hand.

"I believe I understand now," Arden said. "Chaos magic."

"Pardon?"

It was Arden's turn to draw a deep breath. "All arcane magic is, fundamentally, the transfer of energy from other planes of existence to our own. Depending on where these energies are drawn from, they'll contain different aspects and properties which interact with a mage's will to create what we know as magic. The energy your magic is drawing on is rife with fundamental forces of motion, change, and destabilization. Chaos. It's not a very common form of energy, at least in the concentrations you're using. Usually, it has to be drawn from unstable, primordial, or particularly violent planes." 

Arden rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Because of its broad nature, the full potential of chaos magic is . . . frankly beyond my expertise. But my working theory is that your weapon enhancement ability charges your implements a form of chaos that changes either your weapon, your target, or perhaps both. Either the weapon is changed to be stronger, or perhaps at the moment of contact, the target is weakened, allowing the weapon to be more effective. Or both, as I said."

"You got all of that from one crack across the hand?"

"Well, I may be employed by the University of Olwin, but I was educated at the Academy in Sasel," Arden said. When no understanding materialized on List's face, he clarified, "The Academy is the foremost place of arcane study in the world. I learned a great deal about the nature of magic there, and that education has severed me well over the years."

"Right." List looked from her own hands to Arden. "So what does all that mean for me?"

"It means you have an affinity for an extremely potent form of magic that you are likely only scratching the surface of," Arden said. "I'm still not sure if that affinity is similar to your proficiency in combat, and it's some drilled technique you've retained in spite of your memory loss, or its more sorcerous or scionic in nature, and it truly is a part of your body. But if I'm right, and I very much believe I am, then with time and training, you will be able to do so much more than make whips 'hurt more.'"

"You think this might be like how I know how to fight?" List asked.

"It could be."

Fighting was a strange experience for List. In battle, technique and reflexes simply came to her from somewhere in her mind. She didn't know how she knew any of it, just that she knew it, and knew it well. It was like touching a piece of whoever she used to be, and it felt . . . good. Like she was whole again, and exactly where she belonged.

If her magic was like that, a missing piece of herself she could touch and reclaim by diving into it . . .

"Well, the food and bath's not going anywhere," List said, genuinely no longer in a hurry to get to them just yet. "Where do we start?"

Arden kept himself from smiling, though he gave List a nod of understanding. Truthfully, he'd intended to only get a basic grasp of the nature of List's power today, which they'd already done. He'd intended to also touch base with Valerie about proper forearming in the face of a known adversary. But this was the first time ever that List had expressed an interest in training that didn't involve direct competition with Valerie, and he saw no reason to waste the opportunity.

Valerie would be fine one her own for a little while longer.

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