The court was resumed. The Queen spoke directly to Callum.
"I have taken the advice of my council and have come to a decision. We will agree to your terms under certain conditions of our own. We cannot reveal these conditions however until you are able to demonstrate that it is possible for humans to learn to control magic safely. We will help you accomplish this in any way we can. It is our desire that humans do learn to control magic and can eventually live together with Xadians in peace," the Queen paused while Rayla translated.
"If you do not wish to proceed you are free to leave. We will escort you safely to the Xadian border. There will be no war regardless of your decision. I have already dispatched a message to the border notifying General Janai. She will let the humans know about this as well. If you agree I will dispatch another messege about your decision so that humans who are concerned about your wellbeing will rest easy." The Xadian audience murmured among themselves about this decision. They weren't certain about this decision. Most of them didn't support it. But they were willing to look deeper into the issue to try to understand why the Queen decided as she had. They knew there would be an audience later between them and the council to discuss this matter.
Callum was relived to hear that at least the war had been averted. He looked to Sol Regem, who nodded his approval. When he asked Rayla, she didn't voice her opinions and told him it would be his decision. He considered the conditions that were not revealed. He wondered exactly why they were hidden, it didn't sound good to him. He couldn't let it go and agree to unknown demands.
"Why are the conditions hidden?" he asked.
The Queen looked at him a moment and directed everyone to leave. They were a bit surprised but assented to the command. In the court only the Queen, her council and Callum's trio remained. She spoke then, "As a sign of our sincerity, I will tell you the truth. We consider humans learning magic to be a dangerous thing for Xadia. We don't know how humans will act with their new found power. It is our hope that with primal magic humans will be able to shun dark magic and we will no longer have a reason to be separated. I want to see a future where our two sides are united. However, the thousand year grudge between us will not evaporate overnight. We want humans to learn magic, but to do so in such a way that Xadia will not be harmed. We can't formulate plans for how to do that until we see exactly how you might manage to control magic. We intend for every human to eventually have the opportunity to learn magic, however in the beginning we will control how magic is taught in the human realms. That is our condition. We will determine who you can teach the methods we discover. You will be magically binded to prevent you from revealing magical secrets without our permission. This binding need not be for your entire life and will naturally unbind in the circumstance where human mages aren't a threat to Xadia. If you do not agree to the binding, your other option would be to stay in Xadia in perpetuity. We will ensure you are not able to reveal the discovered methods to the pentarchy. There may be other requirements depending on unforeseen circumstances. Should you agree, you will be a free citizen of Xadia otherwise and will be free to enter and exit as you wish. All of our laws will apply to you and so will all of our protections," the Queen explained.
Sol Regem wasn't surprised and thought the Queen was being very honorable revealing the truth. Callum had thought it would be something like that. He could understand Xadia's point of view. He didn't want to believe that humans would attack Xadia when they learned magic, but couldn't bring himself to deny the possibility given the recent past. He thought of his options. He could go home now and spend the rest of his days as he was. He could forget about magic, and help Ezran in what little way he could. He wasn't good at much. Magic was the only useful thing he had. If he agreed he'd have to become a Xadian quasi-prisoner for a very long time. However, if he could help bring about permanent peace between humans and Xadia, that had to be worth any price, even his own freedom.
"I agree."
Callum wrote a letter to Ezran explaining his situation and his decision. He hoped Ezran would understand. Callum was really worried about him and how being king was going for him. He wished he could be there to help him. He didn't understand politics all that much and doubted he would be of any actual help, but maybe he could have helped Ezran in other ways. He had to take consolation from the belief that his staying in Xadia would eventually help everyone. The messenger assured him that the Queen had instructed her to allow for communications to be established between Callum and the humans. His letters had to be written in the presence of a council member. He learned her name was Lilia, who was warm and asked him many things about his life and humans. She also answered his questions about Xadia.
Lilia was also the one who gave him a place to stay. It was in a village of elves and where she also lived. The villagers were mostly warm and didn't discriminate against him. He could tell not all of them were thrilled to be living with a human, but they didn't bother him directly or cause problems for him. He was glad to be able to walk around without any kind of disguise and hoped one day Rayla would be able to do the same in Katolis.
The villagers were mostly Skywing elves. They were also very communal. Everyone shared work and pooled resources together. Every meal at the village was communal too. Everyone in the village would gather at mealtimes, and there were usually great discussions about various things. He was asked many things about humans and they marvelled at his answers. He was also amazed by their magic. Callum had decided to help out in the cooking as it was about the only thing he had any experience in. Callum watched the Skywing cooks use their magic to cook massive amounts of food in floating clouds conjured from thin air. The 'cloud cooker', as Callum called it, somehow was solid enough to hold food and didn't evaporate despite the great fire that blazed underneath. The cloud rotated freely above the flame which they would guide with very fine control of air. Skywing elves could also traverse the sky as if they were walking on land. It was more graceful however, it reminded him had ice skated as a child. Skywing elves seemed to have invisible wings on their feet that allowed them to 'skate' through the air. They would take off with a running start like a duck and once in the air could jump against air itself to propel themselves higher.
Although he understood sky magic to an extent he had no idea how he could replicate their magic. He wondered if there was a difference between innate magic like the Skywing elves' flying and cooking, Rayla's Moonshadow magic, Lujanne's illusions and his runed magic. He'd never seen them draw any runes. What exactly were runes anyway?
The Skywing elves lived atop trees. These trees were quite different from the trees he'd seen in that other village. He'd never asked Rayla what kind of elves they had been. The trees here were much thinner and taller, they were also spaced further apert. They had given him a tree in the beginning, and had built him a ladder to help him get up and down, but he couldn't fall asleep atop a tree, even if he tied himself to the branches. With Rayla and the villagers' help he cleared out an area and constructed a house on the ground and slept more peacefully.
Rayla came to visit often. They talked about many things. They made plans to later visit various parts of Xadia once Rayla had setup her preparations. She was probably his only friend in Xadia. When he stopped to think, he realised, she was maybe the only friend he had even if he counted all the people he knew in Katolis. Her presence made his homesickness a little more bearable.
He had handed over the cube to the Queen. They had questioned him about the cube and had read the letter his father had written him. Reading the letter made the Queen stop for a long time. Rayla recounted how the cube came to be in their possession. They didn't seem to know what it was, but it was clear they didn't like the name Aaravos. The cube was stored away in some vault, he assumed. Nothing more was said about it.
A week after he had settled in, Sol Regem came to visit. Callum could now understand Sol Regem clearly. He asked if Callum was interesting in learning about Sun primal magic. Even if he hadn't been bored with nothing to do, he'd have jumped at such an opportunity. He nodded so vigrously, Sol Regem thought for a moment his head would pop out.
"I have been thinking about how to introduce Sun magic to you," he began. "To the untrained human bridge-mage, the Sun is one of the most destructive and dangerous primal sources. I imagine many humans have died in their quest to harness the power of the Sun. It's possible that you might be better off if you could learn about one of the of safer primal sources like the Ocean or the Stars. But I think if you can learn to control one aspect of Sun magic, it may help you in learning to control magic. We will have to be very careful and you are not to practice Sun magic in my absence," he waited for Callum's agreement. When Callum agreed he continued, "Those who practice the magic of the sun must learn to transform energy, that is, take the power of the sun and transform it into useful forms."
"Before we begin I must explain to you a little bit about how magic and nature works. All of the different forms of magic we see today originate from the Sun. All of the other primal sources are really transformations of the Sun Primal magic. Theoretically speaking, given enough time and materials, a Sun mage could perform any magic from any other primal source and all primal mages are really Sun primal mages."
"However, in reality, we do not completely understand the transformations enough to be able to replicate it. Take life for example, everything that lives is a transformation of the Sun. Sun magic allows trees and grass to grow, which allows the creatures to have food to eat. In some ways, the Sun is the source of life. However, none knows how to create life from magic. The main problem is that Sun magic reacts with things to create new magic. Without that thing the transformation can't happen. We have been looking at how the magic reacts to many things for a long time and trying to understand these transformations. The ocean is a container that holds Sun magic. The earth transforms with Sun magic. Without the sun, the sky would be still. The moon reflects the sun. The stars are just other suns unimaginably far away from us. All things begin with the sun, and that is why you should start with the sun."
Callum was lost. He had so many questions he didn't even know where to begin. Sol Regem realised maybe that was too much at once.
"It's ok. I'll explain things to you properly in time. First, we have to find a way to create a Sun bridge," Sol Regem said. "I have a plan."