Smirk. That is possibly a knowing smirk, except what could she possibly already know about his magic?

"I'd like that."

He nods. "Well, I'm busy right now, but maybe this afternoon if you're free."

"We'll see. Until then."

And with that, they part ways.

He heads back to the room and casts his spells; it's harder to get them to go through than he'd expect with a simple planar difference, but that's not especially surprising, and he does get one off, to a fellow cleric of Fharlanghn who'll send the message the rest of the way for him.

That taken care of, he checks the angle of the sun and decides that he has time for a quick bath before lunch.

At lunch, Scyelen arrives in the dining hall looking a little disheveled and noticeably more upbeat, though for her that isn't saying much. She's only slightly less wan and twitchy than usual.

"Hey, sweetheart. Feeling better?"

Small nervous smile. "I figured out how to cast Explosion. On purpose, I mean, without trying to evoke any other spell first."

"Oh, that's excellent. Congratulations."

She smiles a little more, and sits down to eat.

"It seems strange, if... um, that I was able to do that implies that Explosion really is the rudimentary dot-class, um, Void, spell. But... that doesn't fit, right? How are those two things related?"

"I have no idea. What are the other dot spells like?"

"Um, the simplest earth spells cut or fuse stone. The simplest fire and water spells just create fire or water. The simplest wind spells just make air move."

"You're right, that doesn't sound very related. Unless an explosion is what you get when you make Void, I guess, that's not so different than getting ashes when you make a fire. Do you know much about it in general?"

"I've studied the theory of every spell in the curriculum?"

"Impressive. But it's not going to help if that doesn't tell you anything about your kind of magic, does it?"

Scyelen fidgets with a sudden nervous uncertainty. "That wasn't what you were asking about?"

"You need to learn Void, first, right? And they don't know how to teach you, but there might be something in some of the theory about it that you can use to figure things out. Or maybe not, if it's taboo, and then we're stuck guessing until we find a scholar who knows."

"There aren't many shared evocation foundations between the elements, but there are some? That is how I figured out how to cast Explosion on purpose..."

"That'll help too," he nods. "But it's not really what I meant. I think I'm going to need to know more about your magic in general to be much use, though."

Scyelen nods, and nibbles at her food.

"Classes resume tomorrow. I'm not sure I'd be any good at explaining the basics, but I could try?"

"Sounds good. It might help for me to have a look at a textbook, too. I assume it's the wrong time of year to sit in on beginner classes."

"Um, so, the process of casting a spell. First, you key to an element, to gather up the ambient power that gives substance to a spell, then you use either an incantation or a very clear mental image to evoke your Element, and finally you expend what we call willpower to fuel the release of gathered power through your evocation."

She pauses, as if reviewing what she just said for traps.

"Um, dot-class spells can only use an element in its pure form. But the pure elements are... balances between forces. By combining two elements you can compound or cancel out aspects of one with aspects of another. Like, a line-class fire spell can produce just heat, with no flame, which is completely impossible to do with a dot-class spell?"

"Oh, interesting."

Lunch proceeds and Scyelen finishes eating without incident.

Raafi does to. "Did you have any plans for the afternoon?"

"I... didn't have any plans that... I still have."