"Wouldn't it defeat the point, if she had to co-cast it? Or did he expect her not to be able to do that, either? Or maybe co-casting is just as hard as not doing that?"

"She did the diagram, that's the hard part. And co-casting is just as hard."

He nods. "Well, she did it, so I guess even if she doesn't get to rub me in anyone's face she can still feel proud about it."

"I don't think she really feels proud about stranding you here."

"I'm honestly okay being stranded here? 'S long as it's temporary, and I expect it to be. It's not out of the realm of possibility that I can do more good here than back home, or at least do it more quickly and efficiently."

"I'm glad you're okay about it. It'll probably be fixable once I can get a familiar, those increase channeling capacity and then I can send you back myself - Saasnil probably can't clear the bar alone and it'll take her longer to graduate anyway -"

"What's a familiar? That sounds like a very interesting avenue of research on how I could get a channelling capacity, myself."

"They're sort of like pets? You have to cast a spell to get one, though."

"Still, if I could watch someone cast that spell and watch their channelling capacity and the reservoir at the same time and see how they interact, I might find a way to replicate the effect on myself, or maybe get a spell that would do it. That might double as a way to make people get more channelling capacity, too, without needing the familiar."

"- that would be really cool."

"I really like my kind of magic. Can't generate more, sure, but I can do all sorts of neat things with my home magic and if it weren't for the cultural taboo everything would be much better."

"There's a cultural taboo?"

"The size of the continent. Place I'm from is a theocracy and my kind of magic is banned and if you're found using it or hiding someone who uses it you're excommunicated and sentenced to death."

"Oh. We border this one theocracy that doesn't allow magic at all. And it's next to another one but they're a different religion and I don't think they ban any kinds of magic but I'm not an expert."

"Biggest problem is there isn't anywhere to flee to, because of historical reasons the whole continent has exactly three countries and the three are under the same religion. The planet's north hemisphere—planets in my universe are spheres, all of them—is mostly inaccessible because of a magical storm, and there's a pretty much unexplored continent to the west where some people live but not many."

"Huh, spheres. Why hasn't the west continent been explored?"

"'Cause it's mostly mountains, lots of mountains."

"And people in your world don't like living in mountains?"

"And we don't really have the, ah, technology and the magic to do it safely? Only one out of, like, two hundred people or so turn out to be magical at all, and magic has finite but infinitely recharging fuel back home, and it doesn't do permanent effects."

"Wow, that's hardly anybody with any magic, even lights and sorcerers are more common than that... I think potential mages are too but they have to activate and if you don't have wizards you can't really do that on purpose..."

"What's a mage?"

"They have control over an element. Fire or air or water or earth."

"Oh. 'Potential,' is that something you can be without knowing, then?"

"Yeah, people are born with the potential for it but they only get the actual power if they need it to save their life. Wizards can check for potential and then if you have it you can go jump off something or take a lot of painkillers and catch fire or whatever."

"Huh. That's a better analogue for what my magic's like than the other kinds I've seen. The one in two hundred figure is more or less how many people do turn out to get their magic, but how many people are born mages is less clear, because to get magic you have to—try to use it, and it's a primitive mental action but it's not obvious at all and it's different from person to person and kinda ineffable. When someone manages to figure it out we say they've Expressed their magic, 'cause it's something they always had before and just had to release. Metamancers—my kind of mage—can detect magic early on, but, taboo."