"Mother, I never thought the fountain pen would draw such a frenzy!" Serena exclaimed, sinking into the velvet seat of their guild carriage as they traveled back to the capital after the auction.
Eunice tapped her fingers on the carriage armrest, her eyes sharp with calculation. "Nor did I. Orlando's reputation certainly lured mages in, but the pen's practical rune engraving and durability won their bids. Aldington confided the price would've been higher if we'd let them test it longer—they're cautious of new tools, but the demand is clear."
She leaned forward, voice lowering. "The pen will upend the quill market. Conservative mages might cling to their feathered tools, but most will jump at the chance to simplify rune work. We need to lock down the partnership with Leon before other guilds catch wind. Mages are a small market, but pens last for years—first mover gets the lion's share."
The next morning, Eunice and Serena set off for Orlando's tower, determined to finalize the high-end rune pen collaboration before rivals could intervene.
"Master, do mages have a spell to analyze herb components?" Leon asked, wiping down a crystal mortar after helping Im brew Focus Potion batches. He'd recently begun formal potion training, joining the trio of apprentice skills—runes, potions, and (eventually) alchemy. Apprentices only scratched the surface of each; deep dives came later, based on talent and interest.
Im paused, grinding a handful of ice crystal grass into a fine powder. "There is one, but you'll likely never cast it."
Leon blinked. "Is it a rare forbidden spell? Doesn't the academy teach it?"
"Not rare—just restricted to purple-robed mages," Im explained, setting down his pestle. "It requires reaching out to an unknown cosmic entity, sending the herb's essence, and waiting for a response. Below purple rank, you can't even make contact with that realm."
Leon sighed, disappointed. He'd hoped to shortcut the tedious process of identifying magic herbs—there were hundreds of rare varieties, and he feared missing valuable specimens. "What if I adapt the herb identification technique Eldrin taught me?" he suggested, describing how the old healer had him test tiny doses of plants to learn their properties.
Im's eyes widened in alarm. "How have you survived this long? That's suicidal! You could've poisoned yourself a dozen times over."
Leon shrugged, grinning. "I did poison myself a few times at first—vomiting for hours, feeling like my insides were on fire. But I learned to control the dosage, and I even used it to find new spices. Plus, we have universal antidotes now, better than Eldrin's herbal brews. Can't we use them for magic herbs?"
Im shook his head, exasperated but fond. "Don't try this in the wild. One wrong bite of a toxic magic herb, and the antidote won't reach your system in time. You value your life, remember?"
"Of course I do!" Leon protested, though Im's skeptical glare told him he didn't believe it.
Over the next two weeks, Leon experimented with "Herb Identification 2.0," poisoning himself twice and wasting two vials of antidote. Fed up, Im tossed him a new task: crafting glass mirrors to sell to the merchant caravans that flooded Sarneth each spring to buy winter furs. Im's Focus Potion stockpile had grown too large for his usual contacts to handle, and he needed gold to expand the herb garden.
Mirrors were still a luxury, circulating only among nobles and high-ranking mages. Leon's hand-blown glass mirrors caused a sensation in Sarneth—small vanity mirrors sold for a gold coin each, and a life-sized standing mirror fetched over 100 gold. He hired local carpenters to carve oak frames, unaware the merchants stripped them off and replaced them with gold-leafed ebony or gem-encrusted silver, reselling the mirrors for ten times the price. The standing mirror eventually sold at a noble auction for 1,000 gold, though Leon never learned the truth.
"These mirrors are flying off the shelves," Garin said, delivering a new batch of frames to the valley. "Nobles from three counties over are sending messengers to reserve them."
Im arranged for Lord Sainsbury's knights to escort Leon after two merchants tried to follow him back to the valley to steal his glassmaking secret. "10% of sales for the guards," Im said. "The rest goes to the herb garden and your personal savings."
Leon agreed, relieved to avoid further harassment. The mirror sales solved Im's potion storage problem, and by late spring, Leon halted production—flooding the market would drive prices down, and he didn't want to neglect his magic training. "Making mirrors is fun, but magic's my priority," he told Im, who nodded in approval.