Coughing, waving away the smoke, Genie pursed his lips and squinted at what remained of the target…Ash and green flames.

"Well. That's a ten out of ten for effort," he said, summoning a strange red cylinder he called a fire extinguisher. Something Mal was becoming increasingly familiar with.

"And accuracy?" Mal muttered.

"Hard to say." Magnifying glass in hand, Genie bent over the pile of ash. "The corpse is a bit crispy."

Mal couldn't resist a huff of laughter. The giant blue being of myths at least took her failures well. She didn't have as many as she did in Magic Basics. Within a single week she was able to cast more of the spells Genie asked her to try. Some of them just wouldn't work and others worked only a few times. But she could consistently make a rock move now. Not always levitate–she still accidentally sent it flying more often than not–but she could make it do something instead of just staring at it for two straight hours.

Now that she knew she didn't need formulas, magic should be easier. But it wasn't. Just casting the spell wasn't enough. The results needed to be consistent. They weren't. And the inconsistency was starting to piss her off.

In for seven. Hold for four. Out for seven.

Seven. Four. Seven.

Seven. Four. Seven.

"So now what?" she groaned.

As he bent over, took a pinch of ash, and rubbed it between his fingers, Genie hummed. Then he frowned, licked it, and smacked his lips. What he was trying to learn was beyond her. But Mal honestly didn't understand a lot of what Genie did.

A snap and suddenly she was hanging upside from a tree next to a giant blue bat. "We need to change our perspective," Genie said as Mal righted herself. "Try a different angle."

"What are you talking about?"

Poof!

Dressed like a professor, a pair of glasses perched on his nose, Genie stepped from a cloud of blue smoke carrying a large book with the word 'Philosophy' across the top of the cover. There were more words, but they were too small to read and did absolutely nothing to explain what the book was about. Unlike the picture of a colorful brain…

"We need to go back to step one!" Genie pulled down a checklist using a string that appeared between them. Uncapping a red marker–something Mal had tried to steal before with no luck. The strange thing disappeared as soon as it was in her pocket. One day she'd get it, and then she could experiment with how to use it for her drawings–Genie checked several of the boxes lower on the list. "We started here." A second Genie appeared with a green marker and circled the first box. "When we should have started here."

More than a little confused, Mal arched an eyebrow as she studied the list. Meditation? Feel magic? Get in touch with her emotions?

"I already know how to use magic," she pointed out, crossing her arms. "How is any of this supposed to help?"

"Your magic relies on emotion," Genie said. As if that explained anything. "Happiness." He held up a smiling mask. "Anger." He let go of the smiling mask and it disappeared as he summoned an angry mask. "Fear." Another mask. "Sadness." And another. "Love." And another. "You can't use magic without emotion. But each emotion does different things."

"My emotions have nothing to do with my magic."

"It responds to them," he countered and she frowned.

"But I don't go 'Oh I'm happy let me cast this spell'."

"No," Genie agreed. "But you do unintentionally cast spells when your emotions are strong."

That…she couldn't disagree with that. It wasn't like she planned to use her magic to start fires or shove people away. It just happened.

Genie's expression softened and he rested a large hand on her shoulder. "That's why Queen Belle asked me to help teach you. Your magic doesn't work without your emotions and is influenced by them. And I don't think you were taught that."

Too kind. Too close. Everything about his expression felt wrong. Pulling away, Mal crossed her arms over her chest. "Fine. So my magic uses my emotions. How does," she pointed to the checklist, "'getting in touch with my emotions' or 'meditation' help me?"

"Excellent question." Another string appeared and Genie pulled down another chart with an outline of her mostly filled in with red. "This is you. And the red represents anger. As you can see, this is the emotion you use the most when you use your magic." Mal arched an eyebrow. A little race track appeared with tiny horses modeled after her spells. With a wave of his hand, Genie moved the one with a fiery mane and one with lightning streaks on its side halfway down the track. "As a result, these spells are stronger. That shield spell you showed me is more fragile." Picking up the tiny horse wearing armor, he handed it to Mal. "But I'm willing to bet it's stronger when you use it to protect your friends. Right?"

Careful of the tiny creature in her hands, Mal shrugged. "I don't know. It's not like I could test it on that stupid magicless Isle."

"Then now is a perfect time to test it." In a flash the race track disappeared and Genie was dressed in a strange striped outfit, some kind of helmet, and swinging a stick. "Give me shield."

Rolling her eyes, Mal drew a circle in the air, creating a shield. That shattered the moment Genie hit it with the stick. But that didn't make sense. No one ever broke it that easily on the Isle. She was supposed to be stronger off the Isle. Why was her shield weaker here?!

"Give me another," Genie said, swinging the stick again.

"You already broke it," Mal protested.

"The only way to improve is through practice," he smiled. With a snap of his fingers, Genie summoned a vase on a pedestal. "Now. Protect the vase."

"Wha-?"

Before she could finish her question, the large blue being was already swinging and without thinking, she threw a shield around the vase.

And the stick cracked the shield.

The vase didn't break.

Confetti filled the air and got stuck in her hair as Genie cheered, waving giant pom poms.

Okay. So maybe he had a point.

"Fine. We'll try the list," she muttered.

With a wide smile, Genie sat down and patted a huge purple cushion…"Come, young padawan. Let us learn the ways of meditation."

"This is stupid," she muttered, settling down on the cushion.

Poof.

Coughing, she glared at Genie as he sat cross-legged several inches above the ground across from her. Long hair fell over his eyes and bright flowers and strange circle symbols covered his strange blue pants and multi-colored shirt.

"Ya just gotta connect with your soul, man," Genie drawled.

This was stupid. But she closed her eyes anyway because his outfit hurt her brain. And if her eyes were already closed, she might as well try.