Aww! He looks so charmed.

Well, soon enough she's got something she can at least do some rudimentary shaping to. She picks up some of her (magic) sludge with her (magic) spoon and slowly pours it back into her vat, holding a hand close to the stream of brown-grey sludge. Without actually touching it, she gives the falling sludge a magic shove, and watches the way it flinches away from her and splatters with a critical eye. Not a bad first pass, but not great. There's still a lot more work to do. But at least she has a better feel for what things she needs to spoon out of her mix and what things she needs to nurture.

She does this test several more times, with various stirring and spooning out of sludge (and, in one case, retrieving some spooned-out sludge) happening in between. It's a slow process, but the stream of falling sludge gets a bit more responsive each time she tests it.

He's kind of entranced by this process, now; he's even stopped dancing to watch.

Eventually the sludge is quite responsive, and willing to struggle against gravity to try to keep to the shape she's impressing on it. She gives a little self-satisfied hum, hops out of the sludge (telling it to please get off of her feet and stay in its vat) and sits at the edge to start shaping the things she needs.

"Do you want to try moving it around?" she asks, as she begins. "You'll need to bleed into it, and I can't promise great results at first, but shaping probably plays to all of your strengths."

"—eh?" he asks, blinking as if he wasn't expecting to be addressed at all.

"Do you want to try shaping the rock slurry? You look fascinated. Shaping this stuff isn't a bad start for a beginner, and there's enough for you to mess around with without worrying about wasting any or anything."

"...okay. I have to... bleed first?" He starts removing his silks and sandals and jewellery, presumably so they don't get dirty.

"A little, yeah. Sorry. But once it's tied to you, you won't need to do it again unless I start a whole new aggregate. Adding stuff into this one won't mess up the connection."

"Oh I have no problem with it, I was just making sure." He can procure a knife and then bleed, once he is naked and this will not mess with his silks.

Once he bleeds into the vat, she mixes it in with her magic spoon, then scoops out a glob of sludge for him to begin lessons.

“Okay, hold out both hands?” One hand gets the glob of sludge, and the other gets nothing. “This is for comparison, so you can feel the difference.”

"......one has it, the other doesn't," he says.

Saevetei snorts. “Yes. Okay, close your eyes and move your empty hand. Focus on how it feels to move the muscles. Then hold the feeling in your head and, without actually moving it, imagine moving the hand with the aggregate. Focus on the physicality of it, it’ll feel a lot like how you move your empty hand.”

He nods slowly, closes his eyes, then starts wiggling his right fingers.

It definitely feels like there’s something to move, over there with the glob of aggregate. Sort of like a phantom limb. The comparison between the two hands does make it a bit easier to see the differences, and soon enough...

The glob of sludge wobbles. That definitely felt like moving something. Not quite like a normal limb, but. Definitely in that vein.

“Oh, good job,” says Saevetei, “That was very fast, you might be a natural.”

He opens his eyes immediately, but grins widely when he is praised. "That felt very strange."

"Yep, it does! And from there it's just a matter of practice. Later I can show you about how to make and change the aggregate, but it'll be better if you get used to moving it around first. Changing it branches off from moving it around and takes more familiarity."

He nods and tries to move it some more.

It will wobble obligingly! Yep, this will take some practice to get right. It's not particularly strong or graceful when it's just sort of wobbling around like this. With some practice, he'll get more of the hang of moving it around. Interestingly, it's not just about directly moving it, it's sort of about having it press or brace against itself, so it has something to move against. He can slowly graduate from wobbling to purposeful wiggling.

Meanwhile, Saevetei gently forms her own goop into specific shapes, occasionally offering pointers to Sendhei as she works.

And that is more or less how Taharqi finds them when he returns.

"Having fun in the mud?" he asks, eyebrows knitted together in amused bemusement.

“Yes we are,” she sniffs, “do you want to join us? I’m teaching Sendhei magic. He’s very good at shaping, I think he’ll end up better than I am at it after some more practice.”

"...I'm actually tempted. Where should I leave the, ah, plants?"

“Oh, I’ll take them! If you think you can walk Taharqi through the basics, Sendhei?”

"Huh?" He looks up from his mud at Taharqi. "Oh, hi. Yeah, I guess I can."

Saevetei gives a little giggle, then says, "Thank you, it's appreciated."

First though: she needs to mix Taharqi's blood into the goop! Then, once that's done, she can claim the little plants and go place them in their new homes, in holes in the ground, with their fellows.

And Taharqi will figure out how to do some stuff probably. Except he is not anywhere near as good at it as Sendhei.

That's fine! There are a number of options for magic, and many of them don't involve shaping at all.

"Besides, not being as good as Sendhei doesn't mean you're bad at it, and also makes me feel less completely outclassed by a beginner!" says Saevetei, brightly.