Prince Boren was completely well again, no one would think that just a few short weeks ago he was close to his death bed with little chance of survival, then Haemish had shown up and not a week later a cure had been administered to the young Prince.

“Prince Boren, your tutor awaits.” Marasa Brean his main carer during his sick days was up and about getting things ready for Boren to resume his studies. It had already been put off long enough. The Prince was supposed to start studying magic as was a tradition as soon as he was nine years old. Unfortunately, he had spent his ninth birthday in his sick bed. It was becoming abysmally common for him to spend time there.

While most children his age might baulk at the thought of studying. Boren had had so little of normal in his few years that studying magic might be a nice change. Boren was all but jumping to get to his lessons. That was why Marasa found him pacing in his room dressed and ready for the day. Walking in on the unusual scene brought a smile to her face. She had told him last night that she would allow him to resume his studies today after making certain sure that he was well enough to get back out there.

“Thank you Marasa, I appreciate your coming here to get me. Not to worry though. I know the way. Happy to get to magic training, just turn nine!” Boren had tried to remain dignified, remembering his father teaching on how to maintain proper royal decorum but at the last, his voice went high pitched and he could not contain it anymore. Marasa, seeing this behaviour gave the Prince a stern but amused glance and nodded for him to be on his way.

Considering he had been sick the Prince took off like an arrow from a bow. Dodging, weaving and heavily tripping between the servants and other royals. Startling not a few as he made his way to the library. That was where he would be meeting Fenwin the mage who specialised in training magic.

“Well, well, well. Whom have we here? Hmmm….Young Prince Boren! Hope you have come here to learn a thing or two about magic?” Fenwin was a wizened old man Boren didn’t think he had seen anyone that looked older than this man before him.

“Yes sir! Mr. Zarge, sir! I am ready and eager to learn! Look, I can do this already!” Boren was eager. Too eager perhaps. Fenwin quickly jumped in and stopped Boren before he could progress too far.

“Easy, Boren! Don’t just jump with both feet! Magic is a dangerous business. You could hurt yourself in the attempt. The fact that you already have made some progress tells me you have been dabbling when you shouldn’t have!” Fenwin was stern as he looked down on the nine-year-old boy but couldn’t pretend to stay annoyed for long. It was endearing to see the youth of today working hard. There were precious few that worked at anything these days and an eager student was a good thing if they survived long enough. “Young one, I will teach you the basics and then you can train it up and play with it to your heart content. But first the basics!” Fenwin would not accept any messing around with dangerous elements, not only because this lad was the Prince but because he would not lose a student to recklessness.

Too many have been lost already with that. Fenwin’s mood darkened slightly at that, a moment later though after a steadying breath he was back.

“Ahem. First things first. Which of the four basic elements were you practising with?” Fenwin asked, furrowing his brow. The expression made his already withered face look even older.

“Huh?” Boren was at a loss and didn’t understand the question at all.

“It will be easier if I show you. Follow me!” Fenwin called to Boren as he shuffled off in the direction of the palace grounds, they were not far and so even hobbling along on his walking stick Fenwin and Boren arrive at the practice grounds of the palace located near the melee training area. Some dummies had been set up in a circular area for mages to practice. Fenwin continued the lesson.

“What I mean is that magic exists in nature in the four basic elements.” Fenwin’s voice took on a lecturing tone. “Watch carefully, the four basic elements are Water” a globe of water formed in Fenwin’s hand from mid-air coalescing and then dropping into his outstretched palm. “Air” here a gale suddenly started where there had been only still air. Visually Boren could see the air currents in faint lines in the air around him. See the influence that Fenwin exerted. “Earth” The ground beneath them rumbled and a small clod of dirt torn itself free of the ground and rolled to a stop at Fenwin’s feet. “And finally Fire.” Here Fenwin brought his two palms together and a visible look of concentration formed on his brow. Then as he moved his palms apart and a small spherical flame appeared there, growing slowly with the gap between his hands.

Boren just stared at the old man’s display with his mouth hanging open. Awe in his eyes and completely speechless. This was the first time he had seen such a display, his overzealousness before making everyone in the palace cautious of showing the youth too much. He might have gone off and started doing things on his own. The fact that he had sneakily seen something and working in his room to practice just proved that he was as reckless as they all feared.

“To make any real progress in any element you have first to have an affinity for it, there are ways to gain an affinity for elements but for our purposes let say that you need to be born with the affinity for now. As long as you are born with an innate affinity for an element you will be able to learn the first and most basic spell of that type. If you do not have an affinity then you cannot even do that. As you can see the first three elements are easier for me than the last, hence I have a higher Water, Air and Earth affinity and a lower Fire affinity. Do you understand what I have said so far?” Fenwin paused to confirm his lesson was getting through.

“Ummm… sort of.. so you are stronger with Water and the others but weaker in Fire?” Boren hesitantly confirmed, not sure if he was right.

“You are partly right, it is not just that Fire is weaker for me when I use it. It is also that I find it harder to learn more powerful Fire spells, also I am weaker against Fire-based attacks and that I learn Fire-based spells more slowly than someone with higher compatibility with the element, also any elements that use Fire as their basic element would be harder for me to learn. Since the four I mentioned are only the basic four and other elements are higher versions of those four. Apart from that though, there are other different elements such as Life and Death, Light and Dark, they usually come in pairs. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves…Hey! Will you pay attention!?” Fenwin had gone into professor rambling mode and Boren had started fiddling with some air in his hands. At that last Fenwin dropped a clump of dirt on the top of Boren’s head to get his attention. Boren jumped like he had been goosed and blushed while turning his attention back to Fenwin, suitably chastened.

“As I was saying…there are other elements, let's leave it at that for now.” Fenwin then gestured to Boren’s hands. “Now I want you to try but slowly. Fenwin raised his hands at the same time and a gentle light emanated from his hands.

At this gesture, Boren quickly set his feet and faced palms down towards the ground, as Boren focus he felt the ground shift imperceptibly, the tiniest of tremors directly below his feet. Slowly, ever so slowly, a single blade of grass shifted and then all of a sudden the blade of grass tore free of the soil and flew straight up and grazed past the Prince's forehead, cutting a few strands of his hair as it went sailing past, gaining speed as it went. Fenwin had not been able to contain the blade. The amount of mana that the Prince had managed to imbue into the grass was much more than he had expected!

Fenwin was staring at the Prince in stunned silence for a moment before he came to himself, just in time for the Prince to have jerked back and look up at him. Fenwin managed to regain his composure before the Prince looked at him.

Boren sighed, again his luck or lack of luck was rearing its ugly head. He wasn’t always affected by it but the tumbles he had taken on his way here and this blade of grass nearly taking out his eye were just a few examples of how it manifested. It was shocking how much of a role Luck played in one’s life. Something most people didn’t even think about but it was always with Boren, like a grim, dark cloud hovering just out of sight. It was a heavy burden for a young child to bear. Steeling himself from the close call and reminder Boren grinned up at Fenwin, only a hint of sadness in his eyes. He had become good at hiding his deeper emotions.

“Fenwin, how was that!? It was only a blade of grass though….” Boren pouted a little to further hide his feelings and stretched his mouth wider in a facsimile of a smile.

“Well done, Prince! I have to say, that was very impressive. I can honestly say that you are truly gifted in Earth magic, have you tried that before? How many times? Have you ever been able to do that before?” At first, Boren thought that Fenwin was trying to make him feel better for the abysmal performance but gradually through his tone and words Boren realised that the man was truly impressed.

But it was just a measly piece of grass, I didn’t even manage a clump of dirt forget about making it move around the way the Professor did… Boren was not impressed with his ability but the wizened mage in front of him had been doing this for a very, very long time.

Fenwin picking up on Boren’s mood and obviously fake smile, “Prince, I know that you think what you did was unimpressive, but I assure you that what you have accomplished here today is nothing short of miraculous. If you had been practising this I would have been informed. The fact that you are able to do this much tells me that you have a high affinity for Earth magic in addition you have good control over it, though that does usually go hand in hand with affinity as well. If you would like a comparison, I can tell you that for me to do what you have achieved in one simple unguided attempt took me several weeks to accomplish.” Fenwin nodded his head as if the matter was settled. “I believe we can begin with Earth magic for you. Less chance of you hurting yourself if we go that route I think.”

Boren was ecstatic over this development. He had finally found something he was not incompetent at, he might even allow himself to admit he was good with magic, Earth magic at least. He wasn’t sure about the rest. Melee was a complete bust with his poor constitution and weak physique he could hardly hold a sword let alone wield it with any finesse. Ranged combat whether it be a bow or cross-bow or even just a simple sling also required a reasonable amount of strength and even with his dexterity being reasonable his poor luck played a part in his chances of hitting the target. Luck played a part in everything in a small way. Which was why Boren was the way he was.

“Finally, something I am good at!” Boren raised a fist into the air as he did a celebratory fist-pump.

“Right, for completeness, it is important to make sure that we check your compatibility with the other elements, I do not expect that you will be able to wield them with as much proficiency as you did with Earth, though that is only because of my own past experiences that tells me that most people start with an affinity to one of the basic four elements and then they can improve or activate more with time and a lot of effort or a lot of resources,” Fenwin asked Boren to go through the motions of the other elements.

For each element, there was a different gesture to try to activate it. It seemed that Boren had instinctively known the one for Earth though they were all pretty intuitive. Earth as Boren had done was activated by facing the palms down and willing the Earth to come up towards the hand. Fire was done as Fenwin had palms together and then drawn apart. For Water, the two hands started side by side in front of the body and then with fluid motions the individual trying to control the flow needed to move their hands in the directions and flows that they wanted the water to go. Much in the way a fish swam through the water, guiding the water to either side of itself. Finally, for Air, it was a rapid jerky movement to send the air in various directions.

As he had expected Boren had absolutely no talent or compatibility with any of the other basic elements, it may have been the extremely high affinity he already had for Earth that then limited his ability with the others. Fenwin had been the same, but he had started with Water himself. Still, time and perseverance had changed his ability with Air and Earth to his current capability, Fire still eluded him but his Class of Element Mage help a little with compatibility as well. He would get there eventually, he just wasn’t sure if he had enough time, after all, it had taken him over three hundred years to get to this point and he had his other hobbies and passions….

Not something he talked of in public though, besides which Fire was not great to creatures of Death…

The higher elements that stemmed from the basic four did get some affinity from the basic ones but just because you were fully compatible with a basic element did not mean that you also got a full affinity with a higher one. Each new element had to be earned and learning the spells was only the first step to increasing compatibility. It was incredibly complex and something this old man had spent his lifetime researching and experimenting with to understand just a fraction more of what was possible in the field of magic.

Boren continued to practice. As soon as that blade of grass had flown past his head he had received a notification:

You have gained the Earth Magic Spell Soil Kinesis Level 1! You can manipulate soil and plant structures in soil with your mind. Control increases with Level. The area you can affect increases with Level. The range of effect increases with Level.

Alright! Boren was ready to go to work with this.

“Prince, you should have received a skill for Earth magic since you have a good amount of skill in it. Likely, you have not received anything else in terms of magic. However, I would suggest that even if the skill looks useless now it should improve immensely with time and Level and by extension your power will grow as well. Keep working, the next step will come once that spell is stronger and I will tell you a little more about Earth magic in what else will be possible in the future.” Fenwin would tell the Prince the information a small amount at a time otherwise even the nine-year-old boy, intelligent as he was would be overwhelmed with all the possibilities. It was time for Fenwin to take Boren to school.