Liliana bowed her head slightly in a gesture of apology, but the mage refused it. Petra then picked up a sheet of paper from the table, holding it between her index finger and thumb—the note Liliana had given her on their first meeting.
“I was shocked when I first saw this. The last sentence is magical, right?”
“Yes. I wanted to speak with the mage assigned to accompany me, but I had no way of knowing your magical expertise without meeting you in person.”
On the surface, the last sentence of the note read, “May we have a pleasant journey together,” but it was actually enchanted with a spell that could alter its appearance. By focusing her magic on it, Liliana had rewritten it as “I shall come to your room tonight.” Undoing the spell reverted the change instantly.
During their first meeting, Liliana had watched closely to see where Petra’s eyes wandered. When she noticed the mage do a double take, clearly noticing the enchantment, she concluded that Petra could be trusted.
Having come clean about her intentions, Liliana got straight to the point, a broad grin spreading across her face. “There’s something I’d really like to ask a mage of your caliber.”
Petra returned the note to the table and smiled just as boldly. “I like people who don’t beat around the bush. Here—drink. I got this just for you.”
The mage took a bottle of lemonade from a box beside the table and offered it to her companion. Only then did Liliana realize that there were no glasses, and that Petra was drinking her alcohol straight from the bottle.
As a young noblewoman, Liliana had never drunk out of a bottle before. Perhaps she had in her past life, but no such memories came to mind. Bringing the lemonade to her lips, she took her first sip, her heart racing at the sense of doing something forbidden. The taste was cheap—but not at all unpleasant.
Liliana had already decided what to say to Petra. Not wanting to waste another second, she launched straight into explaining her predicament.
“I lost my voice after catching a fever during an epidemic.”
Petra nodded, urging the girl to continue. She already knew that Liliana had lost her voice.
“The doctor gave up on me, and my attempts at using healing magic on myself produced no discernible results.”
She quickly ruled out the possibility that she had simply miscast it. Her healing magic was strong enough to revive dying plants and restore wounded birds to flight.
Petra hung on Liliana’s every word. Even as her face flushed slightly from the alcohol, she didn’t interrupt.
“So I began to suspect I’d lost my voice to a hex, but I’m having trouble finding any literature on them...” For all the rare books her uncle had collected at her estate, there was hardly anything about hexes.
Petra nodded, unsurprised. “That’s because hexes are seldom studied in this country. They’re practically taboo, and new information about them is rarely made public. Learning hexes on your own is nearly impossible.”
The mage pursed her lips, eyes lowered in thought. Her usual manner made it easy to overlook her striking beauty, which surfaced only in moments of calm reflection—not that Petra seemed to notice. She cared only for magic and hexes; why else would she listen so intently to Liliana’s tale or regard her superhuman magical powers with curiosity rather than fear?
“It’s no surprise healing magic didn’t work—it’s suited to cuts and bruises, not colds or broken bones. It works by channeling the healer’s mana into the affected area, improving the flow of mana and boosting the body’s restorative ability.”
As if lacking access to modern medicine weren’t bad enough, the benefits of healing magic had their limits. They could never cure illnesses of unknown origin or heal injuries beyond one’s restorative ability. Even a known heart disease would require enormous amounts of mana for treatment—far more than any human could possess.
“Then again, I’m sure the healing magic you tried wasn’t exactly simple.”
Petra’s guess was spot-on. If Liliana had truly lost her voice from the fever, her speech-controlling cranial nerves would have been affected, and she had already tried using healing magic to restore them. Repairing the matter itself was far more mana-efficient than attempting to improve the flow of mana.
“Perhaps it was a bit different.”
“Figures. And if you couldn’t succeed, it’d probably be pointless for me to even try.”
Liliana could see the genuine admiration the mage had for her. “It’s an honor,” she said, keeping her happiness in check.
Petra squinted at her companion, crudely inspecting her mouth, then her throat, then her chest. Liliana remained silent, waiting for a response. Eventually, the mage’s violet eyes began to sparkle.
“Yeah—I sense a strange, lingering presence between your mouth and throat.”
At once, Liliana put a hand to her throat. She had felt something was amiss the moment Petra pointed it out.
The mage smiled reassuringly. “Don’t worry—it won’t kill you. It must be inconvenient, though.”
“Yes, it is.”
Liliana’s lost voice wasn’t much of an inconvenience for now, but she wanted perfect health to avoid a grim fate down the line. It was a perfectly natural wish.
Petra cracked an unreadable grin. “Well, I can’t imagine you, of all people, being stuck in a hopeless situation.”
The mage drew a ring etched with intricate engravings from her pochette, slid it onto her right middle finger, and murmured an incantation that barely made it past her lips. A haze Liliana took for mana formed over her eyes. Petra remained in her trance for a while, possibly unaware that Liliana was watching. Eventually, she returned the ring to her pochette, and the haze vanished.
“The most I can tell is that there’s a hex on you, and it’s probably why you can’t use your voice. I’d need to do a proper analysis to know more, but that comes with risks. Once this job is over, I’ll invite you to the Ministry of Magic.”
“The Ministry of Magic?” Liliana blinked repeatedly, taken aback by the suggestion.
“As much as I hate the guys there, it’s resistant to the effects of hexes and magic,” Petra continued casually. “It should be safe to analyze that hex of yours there, at least for anyone uninvolved.”
It was an attractive proposal—not just because Liliana wanted to analyze her hex, but also because it was a rare opportunity to enter the Ministry of Magic. To an ordinary person, merely setting foot inside was a pipe dream. Liliana couldn’t suppress a smile as her heart leaped for joy. A natural sight for a girl her age, it took Petra entirely by surprise, as Liliana had gone to such great lengths to hide her emotions until that moment.
Liliana leaned forward, oblivious to the mage’s surprise, and said, “I’d be most grateful.”
At first, Petra was speechless, but she soon erupted in throaty laughter. “You really are strange, you know that?”
Liliana tilted her head to one side, unsure what her companion meant. Petra rose from her seat in awfully high spirits and fetched a box from the corner of the room.
“What’s that?”
“A little something I picked up in town. Want some?”
“Oh my.”
Petra opened the box to reveal various fruits, all perfectly chilled. It must have functioned as a refrigerator.
“Don’t mind if I do.”
Liliana reached for a strawberry. Strawberries weren’t normally sweet in this world, but this one was. Indeed, all of Petra’s fruits were. The mage herself continued enjoying her meat and alcohol.