"Right, Niana here has some lots," said Claudius and gestured to his demon.
The leopard took the sign and transformed into a black human form with four hands, each holding a pot with small stone tablets in them. The pots were labelled with a symbol of an element each.
"You will be given the choice of an element to take but the demon itself will be selected at random. I would suggest sticking to your affiliation; it will make it much easier. Amber, you may go first as I like you the most, then Iatus."
The rest of the class looked down in shame and the dark stares started up again, this time they were also directed at Amber though. Niana moved over to Amber and she selected from the air bowl without a second thought. Then Niana moved over to Iatus. He thought for a minute. Now, what would Aelith want me to do? He came to a decision and reached for the air bowl but Aelith clamped his talons into his shoulder and he withdrew his hand sharply. He glanced at the bird and followed its gaze. It was looking at the water bowl intently. Iatus gave a mental shrug and began to pick up each of the lots in turn.
"Come on, hurry up," the voice called out again and this time Iatus saw it was the fat boy he had seen at the start of class.
Iatus shot a look at him and continued rummaging. Eventually Aelith clamped down on his shoulder again and Iatus withdrew the tablet. On it was engraved the image of a newt like creature and on the back was the name 'Gopple'. Aelith gave a small, owl smile and closed his eyes contentedly.
"Ha, he took so long he even sent his owl to sleep," the fat boy interjected again and those closest to him laughed into their hands.
The Tribune gave them a look and they all fell silent again, "Iatus is doing the right thing by carefully selecting his demon. Were you not listening to what I said earlier? Impatience will get you nowhere in this school."
Niana moved her way around the semi-circle of students, each drawing a stone tablet.
Once everyone had drawn a tablet, Claudius continued his lesson.
"Now, I will show you how it is done first, then you may each have a go, that will do for your first lesson, do not be disheartened if you do not succeed first time, it takes practice as the wording and pronunciation must be EXACTLY right. Niana will be on hand to assist you if you succeed in summoning but fail in binding it, now watch. I take my lot, then turn to the correct spell. On the first page of these books is the general summons spell, as you can see it is only two words: not very specific, it literally means 'come demon', thus it takes the most mana of any spell, however it is better than being wrong. So, now, we turn to imps, lesser imps, fire imp summons. There are a few different types of fire imps here but I shouldn't bother with that for an imp, unless you are really struggling for mana. Now I simply read it and insert the demons name at the end."
Claudius spoke the words and as he said the name a fire ball spun into life.
"Now we bind it. The binding spell we will be using is again short, it literally translates too 'I name you and bind you'."
He spoke the words and the fireball spat out a smaller fireball and then disappeared. The smaller fireball seemed to float in the air for a moment then grew a fiery set of arms, then legs, and then black eyes and a mouth painted themselves onto it.
Claudius turned back to them and gestured to the fire ball, which was running around madly in the circle. "That, is a fire spirit, a lesser imp but it is useful in large quantities as a decoy or as part of a swarm tactic. Don't underestimate them, they can be dangerous if you let them, sure a jinni will eat them whole one on one, but a summoner can summon eight of these for every lesser jinni he can summon, so watch out. The most common tactic is to use a trusted jinni as a squad leader and have it manage your imps for you, thus giving you time to look at the big picture and manage any human cohorts you might have with you. Now, Iatus, your turn."
Iatus swallowed and stepped up to the circle, Claudius spoke the dismissal and the fire spirit vanished in a puff of smoke. Iatus picked up his book, and flicked open to the correct spell. He ran it through in his head once then spoke the words as clearly and precisely as he could. When he said the name a ball of water expanded into existence. It swirled and rolled like winds swept across it. Iatus stated the binding spell and a newt was spat out of the water, landing feet up in the air. The water shrank back to nothing and the newt righted itself.
Claudius patted him on the back, "Well, done Iatus, very good job, you can be proud, faultless. I suppose you've done it all before though. Now, you can order the demon out of the circle."
Iatus did as he was told, the demon righted itself and scuttled over to him, then it stopped.
"Hey, I remembers that owl, tis dat you Aelith?" the demon said and some of the students gasped in shock, although Iatus was surprised for a different reason than they were.
"Nah, it can'ts be," the demon decided and continued to scurry over to sit at Iatus' feet.
"Oh, by the way, imps generally have the intelligence required to speak, if not problem solve or plan ahead, or even use correct grammar, be warned though, they can also be quite rude. Your turn Amber," Claudius informed them, a smile on his face.
Amber didn't blink, she stepped up with a determined look on her face. She opened her book and read. However she slipped on the last word, she stuttered it out like it had got caught on her throat. She stopped and looked at Claudius.
"Hmm, disappointing Amber."
"No, sir, I can do this," she said quickly and began again.
The Tribune frowned but made no move to stop her. She spat the words out but they were all correct. A ball of flame rolled into existence, she didn't pause and dived straight into the binding spell and out popped what looked like a dust devil, a little tornado about a meter high that swirled about. It then settled down and became what looked like an armoured mouse but it was about the size of a cat.
"Well, done Amber, but never speak to me like that again or there will be consequences."
She nodded her head respectfully and went back into the line, the armoured mouse trailing behind her. The rest of the student body went in turn. Nearly all of them failed, apart from the fat boy, whose name turned out to be Capitus. He had summoned a mischievous little air spirit who liked to pull faces. The boy grinned cruelly when he saw his demon. He took the strain well but Iatus could see him pale as he bound the demon.
"Right," said Claudius, "Well done to the three of you who have managed to summon something. Next lesson you may wish to try and summon a greater imp or move straight onto spell work. The rest of you, you will do nothing in these classes until you summon at least an imp. Class dismissed."
Iatus made his way back to his rooms, proud of what he had accomplished but apprehensive as to the what the rest of the class clearly thought of him. The newt was constantly jumping up at him, although he never really got above his knees it was still annoying, the newt also wouldn't shut up.
"Wow, you got some fancy threads there boss, no questions you were the smartest dressed there, and you were definitely the smartest, the rest of those clowns got nothing on you boss. Now, about my living quarters, you wouldn't happen to have an aquarium would you, I'd like that, or even just a paddling pool. Nothing fancy, mind you, unless your greatness could stretch to it. I'm Gopple by the way."
Iatus ignored him but he did not miss the predatory look Aelith was giving the little suck up.
As soon as they had climbed up the stairs and went into their rooms Aelith fluttered off to the bedroom. Ava was tending the fire and she looked round as she heard the door.
"Oh, master Iatus and your new demon, I knew you would do it first time, most people take three or four attempts to get it right. And aren't you just the cutest thing?" she said, as the newt came running up to her, "Do you talk or are you one of the lesser ones?"
"I most certainly do talk, ma' lady, it is honourable to make your acquaintances."
Ava laughed, "I like you, polite little thing."
Iatus smiled at the two of them, "Thank you Ava, can we get some lunch please if you have finished with the fire."
Ava nodded, put one more log on the fire and went off to get food.
"I'll have the seafood platter if it wouldn't be too much trouble!" called Gopple after her.
Iatus ordered Gopple into the bedroom and followed him in and shut the door. Iatus looked up and saw that Aelith was now a fully grown snowy owl with a sharpened beak and razor like talons. Gopple hadn't noticed and was spurting off more grammatically incorrect flattery. Aelith looked at the newt for a moment then swooped down and pinned it to the floor.
"Hey, what, master please control your... hey, it is you Aelith, I knowed it was you when I first sees you! Hey!" the newt whined. Then it screamed loudly as Aelith lifted it into the air and shook it violently, ripping off its tail.
"Oh shut up, that doesn't hurt, you're a newt you stupid impling," Aelith snarled menacingly, throwing it to the floor.
Iatus watched wide eyed at the exchange, "Aelith, would you care to explain?"
Aelith looked up from his attack on the imp, "Well, last time we met we were both under the command of a Celtic druid fighting a war against a rival tribe, this little rat had wormed his way into our vain masters heart, so much so that the master had removed all binding instructions, so when he had been put with me on the master's personal bodyguard, in case anything went wrong, he was perfectly content to turn tail and run, leaving me to fight off an entire army of shedu and bloodthirsty humans," he emphasised this last point with a vicious twist of his claws.
"So why choose him to summon now, if he is as useless as you say?" Iatus asked.
"Heys," the demon interjected, "Aelith is exaggerating with hugeity, I went off to engage them from the behind, but there was so few there Aelith had defeated them all by the time I gets there. I am so not usefulless."
Aelith looked at him with widened eyes, which looked quite comical on owl sized eyes. "Oh shut up, the only reason the both of us are still here is that the master was killed first, and that's a fact."
"So why give him to me? So you could strangle him?"
"Oh, no, first you should make sure he stays silent about me, then I think you should put him on domestic duties, any opportunity you get for heavy lifting, domestic chores or anything hard, time consuming, painful or just plain dull, give it to him," Aelith smiled sadistically, "Oh, and if you ever get in a fight, make sure he is in the front lines."
Iatus nodded, Ava would appreciate a hand he supposed and it was only an imp, he could afford to indulge Aelith a little. "Very well, but Aelith, don't use me to get revenge again. Okay?"
Aelith gave a shrug and Iatus took it as an agreement.
"Oh, and Gopple," Aelith leered into his face, "if you ever reveal that it's me, I'll rip off more than your tail, got it?"
The newt nodded emphatically and Aelith let it out of his grip. The newt made a great show of gasping for breath but slunk off to a corner once he realised no-one was giving him any attention.
"Aelith? If my power is so spread out then how was I able to summon a shedu?"
Aelith pulled a face that might have been recognisable to an owl but was lost on Iatus.
"What was that?" Iatus asked.
"That's my 'I have no idea' face. Don't worry, I doubt you will see it again."
Iatus just rolled his eyes.
"Aelith? There was also something else in there... in the crystal... a purple colour..."
Aelith turned his head so sharply his features blurred, "What?"
"A little purple, right at the bottom of the crystal. What element is that?"
"Purple... that's the colour of the ether, the source of all magic... that explains why you could summon me, and why all the other colours showed up as well. Ether mages are by far the most powerful of magi. A tiny amount of ether magic is worth a thousand times as much as elemental magic! Did anyone see it in there?"
"I... I don't think so, did you see anyone?"
Aelith frowned, "No, I was watching the crystal too... Don't tell anyone about this, best let them think you weak."
Iatus nodded and got into bed, smirking under the covers.