"The guard refused to help while I was alive, and Gaedren has evaded the law for decades, but you can have my testimony if I can have your promise to see him pay one way or another."

"There is one thing... My heirloom harrow deck, the one that started all this. If you can find it, that could be enough to let my spirit move on. Eran was my only child, but you seem worthy enough to inherit it."

Sad sigh. "I agree, the cops and courts- Trying to get justice from them is like trying to get a refund from a merchant... But you can't not even try. I don't want to promise to get revenge, it's- I can talk about it if you want to. Or not, if you don't. If this person is still hurting people I'd do something, if he's repented maybe not... Is that like Tarot? The Tower, the Lovers, the Sun?"

"Oh, you can consider yourself free of the oath should he sincerely repent." Her dry tone suggests how likely she thinks that is. 

"That sounds similar. The Keep, the Courtesan, the Big Sky?"

Snort. "Different names maybe. Twenty two major arcana, and then four suites?

-I'll investigate. I kind of hate dealing with people and try not to make these kinds of promises, but Korvosa is nastier than back home so I'm less worried about dancing on my moral lines."

"No, fifty-four cards spread across six suits and Pharasma's nine alignments. You can see for yourself when you find it. ...You have my thanks. I could not have stopped them by myself."

Nod.

"Well, tell me everything you can about this Gaedren, and I'll write it down, and we'll see what I can see."

She has a Mage Hand hold a pen and paper at the ready.

"It all began a year ago, at the Dock Trade market..."

"Evening, Seska. You said you had a rich new cantrip-student for me? The venue fits."

One of Headmaster Ornelos' displays of power is the Magnificent Mansion he maintains, with space enough to hold over a hundred and luxurious food prepared and served by scores of magical servants in the white, blue, and green Ornelos livery. Ever since his ascent to seventh circle, this has been the place to lodge for the very richest students, many of the faculty, and any important guests of the Acadamae.

They pass through the security of a few tiefling guards and magical wards down one of the corridors of Ornelos hall, and take a step through the shimmering portal set into a frame on the wall while giving the day's password.

"Or is this all another ruse like the Founding Festival last year?" He leans in and whispers once they're through into the extradimensional space.

She elbows him. "We agreed we wouldn't speak of that again! Anyway, your newest pupil is rich, but you'd find her a rewarding student even if she wasn't."

Seska leads him not down the branch for the student bunk rooms but instead to the visitor suites, and knocks on the door to Sinnah's room before he has a chance to reply.

"Feel free to come in!" 

In Notal. She's currently reading a book on arcane summoning, and also infusing ink with one hand without looking at it. Always need more prepared ink, especially if students are going to be practicing with it.

She picks up the herbs with her tail, surprisingly dexterous with the curling tip, and baps the guy accompanying her.

"Hello Seska. Did you manage to cast Light? And hello, I didn't get your name but eagerness is cute, hm~?"

"This is Maganrad of Kalsgard, from the Lands of the Linnorm Kings, in his final year," Seska supplies. "And I managed a few brief flashes, but holding it is hard."

"Why, hello," Maganrad says with a graceful bow, matching her tone. "It's truly a pleasure to make your acquaintance more formally. Seska tells me you'd like to improve your grasp of cantrips; I'm told I'm a better teacher of them than most of the faculty. How would you like me to address you?"

(Seska steps behind him to cast a Message for a discreet byplay: "How in the Abyss have you put your charms on her already? I haven't left her side between her landing and going to collect you!"

"There's your problem, waiting for her to land," he retorts.)

Amused ear-twitch.

"Show me? I think previous arcane experience is helping... Sinnah. Just Sinnah. And yes, cantrips first- They're fully reusable, reversible. Elegant, really." A bit more light of excitement enters her eyes. "It looks like you could cast a cantrip every six seconds or so all day if you wanted to, without drawing down an otherwise limited resource of mine... Not that recharging isn't fun."

He takes a knee next to her, as though about to recite some romantic poetry, and casts a Silent Image to produce some three-dimensional visualizations of spellforms in front of her. 

"Have you cast a cantrip yourself? They are designed to be caught and reset, but that is something that the caster learns to perform reflexively, they do not flow back into their original form by themselves as much as it might appear so to an outside observer."

"As you might be aware, we prepare our spellforms with a mnemonic matrix, like the headmaster's memory palace. Through rigorous exercises of the mind we learn to exert a very weak grasp on the material and mental essences. That grasp is too feeble to produce any noticeable effects, lesser than even Prestidigitation, but with diligent effort we can use it to build up knots of tension that when released do accomplish something more significant. Every complete loop increases the power and complexity of the spell's effects, and it needs to be a complete loop or else the spell won't stabilize. That's why there are no spells of two-and-a-half circles."

"But the most basic spells at all are those weak enough that they don't even need a single loop. These zero-circle spells, or cantrips, rely on that weak grasp alone to supply the force. You maintain the tension just by holding them ready to cast, and when you release them they can be caught again once the effect has been produced and before they fully disperse, squeezing them back into shape."

That will be accompanied by a visible version of the spellforms being assembled and released, the cantrip one then returning to its original form with a disconcertingly realistic human hand pushing one of the bends back into place to illustrate how it is 'caught'. 

"If you were a [Tirran-kitsune] kneeling like that would be an invitation to scratch your ears, by the way. Which feels very nice."

She looks at the spellforms. "I haven't cast a cantrip yet, was reading theory. Yes, this is clearer than trying to watch the magic unfold, thank you... A moment."

She turns off her ink-preparation rig, the tiny titrtation-like setup stopping its steady drops, and removes her other hand from it after capping the infused and empty inks separately.

Then she starts trying to mimic the hand motions and start to tug on magic, watching for the effects. "I presume you want to learn the Tirran style like Seska, too?"

"Yes, we can trade lessons to start with, you scratch my ears and I'll scratch yours?"

He's never heard of this Tirran style but if it doesn't suit him they can always renegotiate. 

"You'll need to try and prepare a spell first, before going through the motions of casting can do anything. For that, the visualization is the most important part, the hand movements more mnemonic and something we're encouraged to do without if we want to learn to cast without them too. Here, let me show you my spellbook, is there any cantrip you'd like to learn first?"

He takes a seat next to her and it appears in his hand from an ethereal pocket, a thick heavy tome bound in blue-dyed leather. The pages are full of notes in a cramped but neat blocky script, illustrated with diagrams and a geometric knotwork border.

"Definitely prestidigitation. Visualization is the only strictly necessary component of preparation...?"

Arcane Sight should help then. Though apparently people get it eventually even without the help.

"That, and having a spellbook to guide you, and being of at least average intelligence, not that the latter will be a problem for you."

He flips to the relevant page. Among the cantrips Prestidigitation is at once minimal and complex in structure. 

"The central part is a sort of spring or reservoir, and that can then be harnessed for one of the different applications of the spell, the different shaped spindles radiating out."

On the opposite page a simplified version is annotated with what effect each of them correspond to: lifting, coloring, cleaning, soiling, chilling, warming, flavoring, and creating small objects. 

She's following along; She opens up a little notebook to a diagram of the same spellform she made earlier just from observing and starts adding notes and detail. 

"One makes their own spellbook, I'm presuming. There's something magic in the ink..."

"Yes, the inks are expensive. Some of that is the simple quality required to illustrate anything with enough detail, but they also often include magical ingredients that can help to anchor parts of a spellform while you assemble it. A calligrapher's inks are good enough for a cantrip, but you need a greater variety of increasingly rare substances to juggle all the parts of a higher-circle spell with any chance of it all hanging together at the end."

From his satchel he'll unroll a lovingly-maintained writing set, the bodies of the pens polished by careful use, and a round bottle of a deep dark ink held in a woven wicker shell to cushion it from impacts, wordlessly offering them for her use. It's a gesture of intimacy in the Acadamae to do so, and Seska turns aside to focus on her Light practice. 

She seems to recognize something in offering a personal tool as slightly marked, at least. You treat others' property with respect. Mostly.

...

"Will have to read about that more later. Doesn't feel right to use them without recompense - I need to pay you back too, Seska. If I knock out a couple of wands of first circle equivalent Sinnah's Fly later, would that be appreciated? Three to five charges on 'em probably, if I'm using the less expensive materials I have on me. Maybe two, three hours of work. Refillable easier than that, at least if you're me. Do note that my version of Fly knocks out all the safety and control features. Wouldn't want you to brain yourself on a wall, and this spell will let you- It's stripped down to the absolute minimum, which is why it's so light."

"For learning more, the textbooks on scroll-scribing are surprisingly useful: Most of the principles are the same, you just take it a step further by anchoring the whole spellform down with ink so that it doesn't take up any of your focus afterwards, and anybody else can pick it up and release it. That's why almost every wizard can scribe a scroll in a pinch."

"This ink isn't so valuable as that, it's the most basic spellbook-grade quality and all subsidized by the Acadamae as part of our tuition. Besides, we're trading lessons, aren't we? Consider the materials part of my teaching."

(Message: "Stop being gallant, Magnarad, I want to fly like she can.")

He smoothly continues despite Seska's interjection. "Then again, if you decide that your lessons with us should include how to fly with your wands and you don't need the leftover charges afterwards, who am I to object?"

"Oh, you cast the spell into the wand. They're reusable. Letting you practice and refilling it is an easy ask."

She'll take the ink, then. And has her own papers to try to copy the spellbook page with. She asks frequent, animated questions.

What a good student. He'll respond with detailed answers, illustrated with spells and gestures, coupled with suggestions for where she can learn more in his absence. And praise, when he can see with Detect Magic that she's starting to meld the material and mental essences in the right way, and perhaps leaning against her a little when they are both paying close attention to how to get a fiddly part of the detail work arranged just right. 

He has a routine, and Seska is familiar with it. She'll make her excuses and go to leave when one of the mansion servants rings the dusk bell on the hour. 

-She hands Seska a wand and details the command word. It's a loaner, please return it, but it has a 3.5rd circle equivalent Sinnah's Fly, which is much like the 1st circle equivalent one except it lasts about 32 minutes instead of about 4, and does a Feather Fall-alike at the end of the duration. It's concentration to stay in the air, and you have to slow down after speeding up. Slow and careful for practice. Up to her if she wants to try it (but Sinnah expects she absolutely will).

Magic is very cool and very absorbing. Praise is immaterial, though she will acknowledge it; What matters is that she is ~learning~. She has mostly forgotten to be flirting, in favor of learning Prestidigitation (really rather quickly, all things considered).

Then Seska will accept the wand and immediately start attempting to activate it, so that she can fly back to her dorm instead of walking.

Maganrad often had pupils who get completely engrossed in their studies. That type tends to be overrepresented among the top wizards. In this case, he'll approach it by setting an achievable stopping point, letting her know that they'll wrap up for the night once she's managed to get the core and a single one of the spindles stabilized. Which function of the cantrip would she like to learn first?