"Um – not that you are a bad knife, at all, you're a very good knife, and so useful, and anyone would struggle with the pressure you're under." 

- Annisa looks at Malak. 

Puts the knife away. 

"You're right. Sorry. I wasn't planning to make a habit of it but I'll put something else together this weekend. - when I say I'm bad at languages I mean I have to hurt myself to focus on them. Which I can do! It's not a huge deal! It's just annoying!"

"It kind of seems like stabbing yourself whenever you do language homework might make you learn that language homework means getting stabbed? Which seems maybe not altogether helpful for learning French."

...

...Julian is going to be helpful! 

"Okay, what part of languages is hard for you? Learning languages for spell-casting is way easier than trying to get fluent." 

"I mean, not doing language homework means getting eaten. And weapons I made to a first approximation don't go bad on me, though I wasn't planning to count on it."

And to Julian, "uh, literally all of it that you can't - replace with arbitrary symbols and treat like logic practice?"

"Isn't that... all of... writing...?"

"Okay. We can work with that. Does anyone want to help me find a French syntax textbook?"

This is extremely worrying! She though Annisa was cool and smart and competent but now she's planning to make a weapon to hurt herself with and expects it to understand exactly how much hurting and when is appropriate.

...well, that sounds kind of like a pain, but that means it'll generate mana, so - 

"Sure. Do we know if the library adheres to any sort of, uh, organizational structure besides tending to stack books with other books of the same language?"

Oh, right, this is going to suck.

"Probably, but I've got no idea what. We should probably figure that out soon, actually – but maybe get our actual homework done, first." 

Malak has decided Annisa is insane. Understandable; Annisa would decide Annisa was insane, on this evidence. "My sister and I had sparring daggers, before we came here," she says to Malak quietly. "With an enchantment so they'd leave a red line, but not cut. The dagger I came in with has a similar enchantment, so I can't cut myself on it, though unlike the sparring daggers it'll absolutely hurt someone else I cut it with. You can be a lot freer with a weapon that knows how to be selective, that's what I put into them, a vision of - a room full of mals and students, and knives that can whir through it destroying the mals and not touching the students -"

"If you make something with the intention that it will hurt you -" she hisses back

" - okay, fair, even if it's the exact same design as the sparring daggers I'd better only do it when I want sparring daggers." Sigh. "I don't suppose you want some sparring daggers?"

"...Yes, actually, but - I don't know if you're safe to make them right now. Magic's not stupid and it probably knows what you're really after. Let's just - see if the Group can help you learn French without doing anything unusually dangerous? We could try talking in it, I need the practice too - "

"Feels like a lot to expect of the Group before I've even - made us all some knives -"

""Hi, I have a stupid language disability, you still want to be a Group, right?"" 

"I wouldn't say 'yes' to that!"

" - I think 'let's practice speaking in a language you all have and some of you want to practice anyways' is in fact a pretty small ask but if you want to give us knives for just that I think we'd all be delighted to start paying you in advance. Especially if it means you spend less time struggling on French homework and more time working on our knives."

"Everyone speaking in French - won't actually teach me French. Because of the stupid language disability. I was in an immersion school for English obviously and until we added eight hours a day of practice on top I spoke it very poorly. If we hadn't discovered the affinity by then and if I wasn't great at everything else I think my father would've given up on me as just clearly not bright enough."

"Well, you don't need to speak French, do you? You just need to be able to cast spells in it. That's a different thing. And you're an artificer, it's not like you need a million languages anyway." 

"Yeah, speaking's barely necessary for spells anyway. We'll find a book on syntax later. Just owe us all magic knives and don't die before you make them."

"I don't need a million languages! My plan was to hopefully not acquire any, or not until junior year or something when buying my language homework for knives doesn't suggest 'has a weakness', just 'has priorities'. And I considered walking out of lab as soon as it gave me the worksheet and asking one of you to cover it in exchange for a prospective knife but even if you'd have gone for that, and I don't actually know that you should, if it's trying to get me into French on the first day then running from that for four years sounds incredibly doomed. So - yeah. I'll owe you knives." Knives aren't hard. Kids without the affinity make them in the first couple weeks in shop. Annisa's are better but nonetheless, they're a manageable commitment, for getting to stay in the Group, which she - thinks is good for her survival. 

"Oh, I don't think we should do it for you. It's going to give you spells in French, and I assume you're going to want to be able to read them?"

"I have a knife already but it's not even remotely safe for practicing with and I'd really like to be able to practice in situations that aren't live combat. We'll help you get enough French that you aren't spell-choked, you'll pay us back, some day I'll have a problem and I'll pay you for your help. Stop freaking out about having one weakness, we've all got areas that aren't our best."