Chapter 18

Beras' eyes flickered open slowly as he groaned. His limbs were sprawled awkwardly around him, and the fall had kicked sand onto him. His hair was full of the stuff, and just touching it caused a tiny avalanche to fall towards the ground. He wasn't sure how long he had been out of it for, but the sun was setting by now.

Sitting up caused a surge of pain in his head, which had clearly taken most of the damage from the fall. Beras wondered if he had been concussed. Straightening out his clothes and standing up, he decided it was probably best not to use magic to fix his head injury.

Beras, blinking off the exhaustion, stumbled forwards a few steps before he regained his balance. He rubbed his eyes, and was met with a harsh stinging sensation; he had been sunburned. Sighing, he decided it probably would have been best if he had rested.

Cursing himself for being such a fool, he ran back towards the hidden shrine to Meridia. What if he was late? He probably was supposed to have gotten through another spell or two by this point, but instead he had been asleep on the sand.

He hastily brushed some more sand out of his hair before opening the door. Upon opening it, he saw Alix sitting across from Sabona with a concerned expression on her face.

"I don't know," Sabona was whispering. "He's just…" He stopped talking and turned around to see Beras standing in the doorway. It was obvious that he had been talking about him.

Clearing his throat, Sabona shifted so he was sitting to face Beras. "Oh, we were beginning to wonder where you were," he said, his voice sounding as though his throat were dry. He cleared his throat again. "Uh, where were you, actually?"

"Uh," Beras stammered, feeling his face turning red. "I was, uh, sleeping…"

Alix slapped her hand to her forehead. "By the gods! You don't sleep in the open sun when you're in Hammerfell! You'll burn to death, or worse!" She stood up, her hand beginning to glow with the golden light Beras now had come to associate with restoration magic. Alix holding her palm over his face, he felt as though the stinging of the sunburn was being drawn from him like poison from a snake bite.

Beras tried to thank her, but the words got caught in his throat. Instead, he just smiled for about half of a second.

"Now that that is over with," Sabona said, standing up and stretching. "Are you ready to learn another spell?"

A few minutes later, the Beras and Sabona stood in the light of the two moons. Hammerfell looked about as different as it could in the dark. The golden sand had turned silvery, and the shadows lay across the terrain in a peculiar manner.

"Alright," Sabona said with a tone of authority. "I'll be teaching you a basic ward spell now. Do you know what that is?"

Beras shook his head, feeling somewhat foolish.

"I'm not surprised," said the argonian. "They were barely used a few years ago, and have only just started to pick up in popularity amongst spellcasters." He held up his palm, and a shield-like shape appeared, shimmering like hot air. "This will block any low level spells that are being cast at you."

Nodding, Beras felt somewhat confident that he understood. He just wondered what defined low level, and what would happen if you attempted to block a spell more powerful than it.

"I trust you remember the learning process of the healing spell?" Sabona continued. "For this one, instead of making the 'water', which we will now call magicka, flow to your wound, make it spread outward from your palm until it forms what I suppose you could call a puddle."

Beras swallowed. He had no idea what that was supposed to mean but, too scared to ask, he tried what was asked of him. Naturally, it was a miserable attempt which resulted in an equally miserable failure.

"Alright," nodded Sabona. "I think you might work better through a more visual and tactile representation, like last time." He walked over to Beras and touched five fingers to the center of his palm. Then he spread them in each direction away from the center before pulling his and away. "Push the magicka along those paths, but continue to extend them outward until they are a bit larger than a shield. That should do the trick."

Using this new method, it only took him a few minutes before a ward flickered into existence. "I did it!" Beras exclaimed, surprised at his own accomplishment.

"Good!" Sabona praised. "Now whatever you do, don't stop." A ball of flame began to leap around in the argonian's hand, growing until it was the size of a fist. "Try to block this," he commanded.

The fireball flew a few feet and hit the ward, which instantly shattered. Beras was thrown off his feet, and he landed on his back a yard or so back.

Groaning and rubbing his hand up and down his spinal chord, Beras asked, "What happened?"

Sabona squinted his eyes. "I think you might have been putting too much magicka into the ward. The excess magicka reacted with the fire, and ended up increasing its effect instead of countering it."

Using too much magicka? That was an issue? This was going to be harder than he anticipated. Too little and the spell didn't work. Too much and its effect was different. Beras needed to find something in the middle.

"Try thinning out the shield. Make it as thin as parchment, not as thick as metal plating," Sabona suggested. "That might fix the issue."

Nodding, Beras held up his hand again. The ward appeared, but this time he was aware that it was filled with excess magicka. Turning the flow of magic into a thin trickle, he felt the extra getting used up. Suddenly, it flickered out and died.

Furrowing his eyebrows, Beras realized that he needed to switch to a balanced flow of energy just before all the extra was burned up. He took a deep breath, and tried again.

The magicka erupted in his palm, and the ward reappeared. He switched over to a slower input, and right at the last moment, sped it up. This ward was stable, and had just the right amount of energy. He was sure this was how it was supposed to be done.

"I'm ready," Beras said. "Send over another fireball."

Sabona nodded, flames already dancing in his hand. A ball of it flew out towards Beras, and burst into nothingness on impact with the ward. It had worked.

"You learn quickly," the agronian said, biting his knuckle. "I'm honestly shocked that you managed to learn two spells in one day. Especially since they were your first ones."

Beras smiled. "So maybe I do have a chance against this necromancer?"

Sabona laughed. "Not yet you don't. But maybe someday." He yawned, and stretched his arm into the sky. "Come on. It's getting late, and we had really ought to be sleeping." He turned in place, and began to walk back towards the shrine.

Yawning in turn, Beras suddenly felt sleepiness overtake him. Sluggishly, he followed his teacher, for once proud of his own work.