“Fair. Okay. Can I ask you to start some sorcery lessons with Sera and myself tomorrow? We can try a few experiments and see if she can manage anything.”
“Sure, but I wouldn’t get your hopes too high. Even for a normal student back at home, it usually takes months before you can cast a single spell. You’re not going to learn overnight.”
I nodded. “If nothing else, it’d be interesting to lean the theory behind it, and maybe some training exercises?”
“We can try that.”
“Great, thank you. Any other ideas on what I could offer Sheridan if you’d rather not have me tell them about how your sorcery works?”
He considered that. “I have a few magical items in a safe place I might be willing to part with, since it’s for a good cause. But it’d take me some time to get back there and retrieve anything. The things I have on me would be too dangerous to give away.”
I wasn’t even going to question that. If Keras said his items were dangerous, I’d take him at his word on that. “Okay, what’s ‘some time’ mean?”
“A couple weeks, at least? They’re in another country.”
I grunted. “We’re meeting with Sheridan in two days.”
“I don’t have anything on-hand, then. I could get something if Sheridan is willing to help Sera in exchange for payment at a later time, though.”
“Okay. I’ll make the offer. Hm.” I thought about the Jaden Box again. “Do you know anything about enchanting with your type of sorcery?”
“A little bit, but I’m no expert. Why?”
“I was thinking about the Jaden Box, and—”
He leaned forward abruptly. “Do not give away the Jaden Box.”
I raised my hands defensively. “Okay, okay. I won’t. But could we make a copy of it?”
He shook his head. “No, you’d need an expert for that, and types of sorcery I don’t have. Travel, stability… Nothing I’m skilled at.”
“Hrm. Could you help me enchant something else with…what did you call it, dominion sorcery?”
“I’m not particularly well-versed in enchanting theory, unfortunately. But I suppose if you have an Enchanter attunement… Combining our types of sorcery might be possible, yes. It’s dangerous, though. When I’ve tried to combine my sorcery with local magic before it’s usually backfired.”
He winced, seeming to remember something. “We’d need to be extremely careful. And this isn’t something you’d want to rush. We can try to get something done in a couple days, but I doubt it will work that fast.”
“Okay, I can accept that. We can talk about alternate plans if we can’t finish anything in time.” I took a breath. “You’re doing a lot for me and my sister, and I appreciate that. Is there anything I can do in exchange?”
He shrugged a shoulder. “You did help me break out of a prison once. But, if you’d like to keep filling me in on things about your culture so I avoid any more heresy trials, I’d appreciate that.”
“Deal.” I grinned and offered him a hand.
He clasped me on the wrist, a little hard, and made some kind of twisting motion.
I laughed. “Lesson one — that’s not how we shake hands here.”
Keras pulled his wrist away, looking mildly scandalized. “…it’s not?”
I had several ideas on what I could offer Sheridan. The problem was that I didn’t particularly like any of them.
The Jaden Box sounded like the best idea, but Keras clearly didn’t want me to give it up. I knew he wanted to use it himself when it was finished recharging, so that made sense. I had my own reasons for wanting to keep it.
Selys-Lyann might have been worth Sheridan’s attention, assuming it really was what Lars thought it was. Tristan had given it to me, though, and in spite of my conflicted feelings about Tristan, I didn’t want to get rid of it.
Sera still had Ceris, the Song of Harmony, but that wasn’t mine to give. I brought it up as an option to her, but her scribbled reply was clear enough.
Not giving this away for a chance at a partial cure. We’ll come up with something else. Also, let me know if you figure out how this sword works. I’ve been reading up about it, but it’s all just legends. No details on the functions.
I agreed with her logic, and I agreed to let her know if I found out more about how Ceris functioned. Keras seemed to recognize it, so I’d ask him later.
I still had the ring of regeneration…and the rock of regeneration…but I doubted either would interest Sheridan. The ring would be valuable, but it was still a standard magical item. The rock was unusual, but inferior to the ring in almost every regard. True, I could activate it on someone who was unconscious, but it was nowhere near as powerful. I’d charged it with the life mana crystals I had on-hand, and those were strong enough to make the runes function, but not enough to make it as potent as the original ring.
So, that left me with either making a new item as I’d discussed with Keras, or maybe providing forbidden knowledge or a service that Sheridan needed.
I wanted to have options in all three areas.
I decided to do a little research next. I sat down next to the stack of books I’d picked up from the library and the Divinatory and got to reading.
I had a lot of things I wanted to research, but restricted attunements were first on the list. I both wanted to know more about my own attunement, and perhaps more importantly, I needed to see what I could find about Necromancers.
It wasn’t that I didn’t trust Derek.
It was more, well, that I didn’t trust anyone completely. After what had happened with Orden, I was going to be a little more careful about taking the first thing that anyone told me on a subject as reliable information.
This didn’t mean I was planning to spend hundreds of hours verifying every little thing that they were teaching in classes, of course. But knowing if a Necromancer actually had the ability to deal with scarring, or if Necromancers even existed?
That was pretty relevant.
Derek didn’t have a lot of motivation to mislead us on this subject that I was aware of, but I knew painfully little about him in general. That was something that I could remedy over time.
But for now? Books. Lots of books.
I read through the few sections I could find on restricted attunements first.
It is commonly believed that there are eight restricted attunements. These may or may not be the same attunements as those housed in the theoretical Spider Spire, which is assumed to exist, but has never been found. Or, at a minimum, never publicly disclosed.
Below, we discuss what little we know about these unusual attunements. Due to their rarity, we cannot promise that the information below is reliable or complete.
The best known restricted attunement is the Hierophant. The Hierophant attunement is generally only bestowed upon the current leader of the priesthood for each of the visages.
Hierophants are known for their ability to effortlessly extend their shroud over a large area, while imbuing it with a spell effect. This is generally referred to as an imbued shroud. For example, a Hierophant could imbue their shroud with healing magic, passively healing everyone in their proximity.
Paladins are the next most common of the restricted attunements. Holy champions of the goddess, Paladins have the unique ability to draw additional power from their patron visage during times of great need. These abilities are referred to as divine invocations.