“Mom, have you considered when you’re going to teach the locals a few lessons?” Luna asked me one morning, when I was just about to head out once more, planning to do exactly that: teach the locals yet another lesson. Not that they’d know they were being taught, but the eventual explosion would be all the lesson, and destruction, the people of the Blessed City needed.

  “What do you mean, dear?” I replied, just a little confused, “Your sister and I are constantly delivering small lessons to those people.”

  “Not what I mean,” she sighed, “I didn’t mean a metaphorical lesson, nor some sort of punishment disguised as guidance,” she paused, looking exasperated, “I meant an actual lesson, you know, with pupils who want to learn Magic from the great Jade Morgana, as you promised Maggy. Liam and Sandy have both been here, trying to show off their progress, but you were never here.”

  For a moment, I felt myself flush with embarrassment at the misunderstanding I had suffered from. Then, once that moment passed, the embarrassment had a different reason, namely, I felt embarrassed that I had discarded a promise so easily, just because I was distracted.

  “Oh,” I mumbled, “They’ve been by?” I asked, unable to admit that I hadn’t even realised people had visited the tower; I had been so wrapped up in my campaign of magical manipulation of the Blessed City’s citizens, sparing only the odd day to check on the Giants near the Nexus Tower.

  “Yes, Mom, they have been,” she paused, “I tried to teach them some simple divine magic and pass on some of the lessons you taught me in the past, but you know just as well as I do that I’m not as deeply immersed in the Arcane as you are. Not by a long shot.”

  “True, you were never as interested in the fundamental parts of magic,” I replied with a grin on my face, “Always with that pesky biology and the impact magic could have on life and its development,” I paused, my grin widening as my mind flickered back to the Tallest’ Guardian and the spirits we had encountered on our journey.

  “I mean, why do we even need a body in the first place? And a biological one at that, why not use magic to pull together a construct and infuse one’s soul into the construct, leaving the body to rot, quite literally?” I wondered, the idea feeling strangely appealing. An undying body, one I could alter at any time and at will, no longer subject to the numerous biological issues one occasionally suffered from. The idea was quite appealing.

  “In the first place?” Luna responded, the grin on her face already poking fun at me, “In the first place, we need a body to reproduce. You know, call up the Stork to have a baby delivered, Oh Divine Mother?”

  “I’ll have you know, neither of my daughters was delivered by some avian; I did that all on my own. No need for outside help, be it from males, storks or any other actors,” I huffed, though I was well aware that my argument had some deep and significant holes in it. Namely, that neither of my daughters had been born to me. Hel, Lia hadn’t even been conceptualised as a daughter in the beginning, but as a servant.

  The look on Luna’s face was more of a response than I probably deserved, and said it all. She was fully aware of the fact that I hadn’t truly brought either of my daughters into the world; I had merely adopted them. So far, we haven’t been able to create life magically, although it was a major topic of our research. After all, Mastery over Life was one of the milestones on the path to bring back Sigmir.

  “Anyway, back to the lessons that need to be taught,” Luna changed the topic, quite aware that our previous discussion wouldn’t yield any results, only amusement.

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  “I will teach them a lesson they shall never forget!” I said forcefully, deliberately hamming things up. I even managed a cartoonish, evil laugh, although I had to forcefully suppress the giggles that tried to break out and ruin the effect. Luna, on the other hand, didn’t look overly amused at my antics, tapping her fingers on the table in a show of impatience.

  “Mom, can you please grow up?” she sighed, her tone so utterly teenager, I couldn’t help but laugh.

  “Why, yes, my dear, I can grow up. I grew quite a bit last year, as you know, and I might grow some more at some later point, if the draconic aspects of my being require me to increase my height some more. Somehow, dragons aren’t allowed to be short for some reason,” I replied, trying my best to keep any glee and amusement out of my voice. “It’s truly discriminatory, you know? Just because I used to be short didn’t mean I was any less of a dragon,” I paused, placing a finger on my lip, before rhetorically asking, “Well, there was less of me when I was shorter, but I’d like to think that any draconic qualities aren’t tied to mass. Otherwise, I might have to gorge myself on food for a while, and that would ruin my figure.”

  “Really, Mom?” she sighed again, now sounding almost defeated.

  “Yes, really, I don’t want to ruin my figure, I like being slender,” I nodded, my voice still completely calm and serious, “Can you imagine how I’d look if I were being overweight? They’d call me Smurfette, or something like that, instead of Pale Lady,” I groused, quite happy that my skin tone wasn’t sky-blue but a lot paler, keeping people from that particular association.

  “You’d just kill anyone calling you Smurfette, and you know it.” She still wasn’t amused, but the defeat started to fade from her voice, making me wonder if she was back to engaging with the bit of nonsense I was peddling right now. When I placed my finger on my lips again, she sighed, and a bit of annoyance crept into her expression. As I was feeling a little guilty, I dropped the whole game, and my finger, looking at her with a regular, serious expression, not the slightly exaggerated one I had put on before.

  “I’ll set something up for lessons,” I promised, “Do you think I should recreate the schoolhouse we used last winter, or try something entirely different?”

  “Thanks, Mom,” she replied after blinking a few times, as if uncertain if I was still playing around. “The schoolhouse from last year would work, but it might not be enough. It might be best to wait, maybe write a bit more on the fundamental magical skills, things that aren’t covered in the texts downstairs, and go from there. I’m not sure what the locals want to learn at the moment, so they might be interested in skills that don’t really work indoors,” she explained, and I quickly realised her logic was sound.

  Something like Earth Magic, the stuff I used to create houses and structures, was something these people would undoubtedly want to learn, simply because of its immense utility. However, trying to teach large-scale Earth Magic indoors was a recipe for disaster. Someone just starting their training was liable to remove all doors, windows and everything else, turning indoors into outdoors. Other disciplines had similar issues, especially when it came to their bigger, more powerful battlefield expressions.

  “I see what you mean,” I admitted, looking out of my tower, down on the open area that used to be a quarry. “I think I’ll clear parts of the quarry, maybe use a bit of Rune and Earth Magic to make things more durable, just in case I decide to teach them a few of the more interesting lessons.”

  “When do you think the people who wanted additional lessons will be by? Do they have a schedule or something like that?” I asked, before explaining, “I don’t want to lose the progress Lia and I have achieved with the people of the Blessed City but you are right, it wouldn’t do to break my word and not continue teaching the locals who wish to follow the Arcane Path.”

  “Well, I’m pretty sure they’ll be by later today,” Luna replied with a cheeky grin, “So, Mom, better dust off some lesson plans and get cracking. You’ve got work today, not just playing around with the Blessed Fools.”

  I could feel my face fall, that was a little earlier than I had hoped. But there was nothing to it, if these people came by for a lesson, I would have to make sure it would be a lesson they didn’t forget. Though I should also make sure not to turn them off the arcane path and have them become monks or something like that. The world could use all the arcane spellcasters we could get our hands on.