Not many of the Demons were actually in the waiting room, as it was mostly intelligent magical creatures just relaxing for the evening. The Demons were, for the most part, untrustworthy jerks that their witches weren’t willing to leave unattended, especially around each other, when they could share ideas without supervision.
There were a few Familiar Cats, a couple of pixies and a Dryad who all looked like good company, though, as well as the Imp that Wolfe had met during his first visit to the training hall.
“Wolfe, good to see you again. And you’ve brought Gertrude. Good choice. She’s really sweet. Just pick a seat, we’ve got plenty of food and drinks, but my mistress forbade any alcohol. If I see it, I have to destroy it.” The Imp greeted him.
The Witch waved at the Imp and visibly relaxed when the door closed behind their group and latched in place with Professor Miranda on duty guarding it.
“So, can you tell me what the thing is now? Or did you bring me here to hang out with the Familiars? Because I wouldn’t mind if that were the case.” Gertrude asked.
“If you don’t want to tell her, I will.” The friendly Imp offered.
Wolfe smiled at the tiny creature and then turned to Gertrude. “The Academy, led by the Headmistress, is holding an official moon ceremony, with every Witch on campus invited to participate as part of one large Coven.
It’s a chance to attune your natural powers with the assistance of a much larger and more powerful group than most will ever have the chance to.”
“Seriously? Just the materials cost more than most of us commoners will make in a lifetime. But they’re inviting everyone?”
The Imp hopped up on a table to get a better view of her expression and began to laugh before he filled her in on what he knew.
“Everyone, like everyone. Even the First Years who haven’t stabilized their aura yet get to participate. The Professors hope that it will make for three years of stronger-than-usual graduates. They think it’s a secret that the Witches in the cities are getting weaker while everything in the wilderness is getting stronger, but the imps know it.”
“Why would they get weaker?” Gertrude asked, casting a furtive glance at the door with Professor Miranda just on the other side.
“Witches need Nature. Before you came here, when was the last time you saw the sun or the moon? How about a real, naturally grown tree? Wildlife?”
Gertrude cut off his list of all things outdoors. “I get the point. So, you’re saying their power is fading because they have moved inside the city, where everything is artificial?”
“Exactly. That’s only a part of the reason that they’re getting weaker, but I’m forbidden to talk about the rest. Plus, the cities aren’t as safe or as isolated as they seem. So they need to fix the situation. That’s why they wanted to marry Wolfe’s Witches into the Council, to make up for the weakness of their current candidates.”
Wolfe frowned. He had once entertained that thought, but it seemed so farfetched that he had dismissed it and forgotten about the possibility. He had thought it was more likely that it was a political power play.
While they were talking, the music from the room below them suddenly stopped, and Wolfe could feel the excitement and nervousness through the Familiar bond. The organizers must have just informed all the students of the event that was scheduled for tonight, but their voices weren’t loud enough to be heard through the floor.
The excitement faded into a feeling near panic and shock, with a hint of arousal as the announcer raised her voice enough to be heard in the waiting room and reminded them that the ceremony must be performed nude, under the light of the Full Moon closest to the solstice.
Wolfe heard someone grab the doorknob, so he took the opportunity while they were mostly alone and gave Gertrude a tap on the back of the neck with a jolt of mana to open up a small pathway so that her Aura could begin to form, finishing it fast enough that her brain couldn’t properly process it before the feeling was gone again.
The door opened, and Professor Miranda entered, then locked the door and cast a spell on it to prevent it from being picked or broken down.
“Since they already told you what is going on, follow me. You can undress at the bottom of the stairs.” She informed the lone Witch in the room, only to get booed by half the Familiars in the room.
“Shut it, you bunch of bored perverts. If you want to see a naked woman, ask your own Witch.”
“But I’ve already seen that.” One of the Imps called as the two retreated down the service stairwell.
They vanished around the corner, and the pull of mana through all the Familiars in the room suddenly increased by enough that it dropped most of them to the ground. The Witches would start the process, but it was up to the intelligent Familiars and Wolfe to keep it going once the ceremony began.
The initial casting should be the hard part, and all the Witches would be doing their best to activate the spell, so Wolfe added three-quarters of his stored mana to the process, taking some of the strain off the others in the waiting room.
The imps, along with the other Demons and Drakes, followed his lead, and the feeling of power grew steadily until it was thrumming like the bass at a dance club, hard enough to pull everyone’s heart rate into sync.
Wolfe knew that down below, the ritual intoxicant punch would have already been passed around, and the dancing had begun, so he settled in on a couch and pulled Stephanie into his lap.
All of the Familiar Cats were pretty out of it since they were treated as Witches by the spell, but the power seemed to be looking for something that it didn’t have yet.
It began to grow and focus on the area around Wolfe, drawing all the Familiar Cats to his side and redirecting all the mana from the Familiars in the room through him and directly into the totem that activated the spell.
That must be what the organizer and the Professor meant by the spell needing a conduit. The spell picked a Familiar as the focus instead of the caster, allowing the Witches’ auras to change without interference.
The mana moved through Wolfe like a river, just passing through, but the effect of the spell seemed to amplify everything that he was giving it, including what he received from the Familiars around him.
The power continued to grow for half an hour until Wolfe could feel that the mana density of his Second Focus now matched the first, increasing the amount of mana he could contribute to his Witches, or in this case, the spell, on a continual basis.
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From the stairwell, a half-meter-tall nymph appeared, seemingly drawn to Wolfe, and joined Stephanie in his lap.
The woodland Fae was also a Conduit, and with them together like this, the power of the spell was multiplied, becoming so thick it was visible to Wolfe’s eyes.
“While we have time, I have a question for the Demons in the room. I heard that there are no Demons, only the resurrected and corrupted souls of the Magi. Can you confirm if that is true?” Wolfe asked.
The Demons went silent, forbidden by either their curse or the Familiar Summoning from speaking about the topic, but the Nymph answered for them.
“It’s true. The Fae Queen told them to stop, but they wouldn’t listen. Now there are so many Greater Demons running around that even we can’t purify the more powerful undead.” She complained.
“What do those two things have to do with each other?” Wolfe asked, confused.
“Who do you think the Undead are? They’re the walking bodies of those who died soulless on the battlefields of the Great War and, of course, the ones they infected afterward. Mostly, that means they’re the Magi Commoners who lived in the area where you find them, but not always. The stronger Undead can still instinctively use some Magic, and if their soul is summoned back into the world, they can’t be banished.”
Wolfe needed a moment to digest that news. He had heard some really bad ideas in his time, but summoning back the souls of defeated enemies, while their undead bodies were running rampant in the world had to be one of the worst ideas he had ever heard, even if the witches were desperate for more power.
“And we can be sure the Demons are the souls of the Magi, even though they were all dead?” Wolfe asked, just to clarify, since the Nymph was being so helpful.
“Of course. They’re not even the same species as humans or Witches. For a Fae, telling their spirits apart is like telling a corgi from a wolf.”
That answered a lot of Wolfe’s questions, but it opened up a lot of new ones. Like why were there so many soulless corpses that they became the greatest plague in the world? Was stripping away souls really such a common attack?
He gave an expectant look at the Nymph, but she shook her head. “I know you have questions, but like the Imps, I can’t answer most of your questions. The curses that I am under forbid it. But like you, and unlike them, I was alive when summoned. Also, we’re both in charge of our bonds and let our Familiar Witches gallivant around for our entertainment.”
After the Familiars finished chuckling at that comment, the room settled into a comfortable silence, broken only by the sound of Familiars snacking on the provided treats. For the entire night, Wolfe, Stephanie and the Nymph sat like that, surrounded by Familiar Cats and drowning in energy, until the moon went down and the spell abruptly faded, leaving everyone downstairs confused, naked and disoriented.
“You did well for a rookie. But I should find the Headmistress. She will want me to sober everyone up so they can get dressed and go home.” The exhausted nymph pouted, then, in a gust of wind, she was gone back down the stairs.
“Now, we wait. Are there any more snacks left? We have earned them after that marathon, and I’m certain everyone’s Witches would agree.” Wolfe told the others in the room.
“Yeah, eat now because the Witches will be exhausted, and they’ll need to restore their modified aura when they wake up.” One of the larger Familiar Cats agreed, using some sort of Spell to overcome its body’s inability to master human speech.
Wolfe felt the pull as the four Armor amulets were activated using his minuscule amount of remaining stored energy. The effects of the Moon Ceremony spell had modified and depleted all of the Witches’ auras to the point they wouldn’t be able to cast anything without their Familiar’s assistance until they recovered, and he knew that everyone’s free time to relax and eat was running short.
Five minutes after the girls had gotten dressed, Professor Miranda was back, locking the door to the stairs and opening the one to the hall.
“You all can go wait in your rooms. Excellent work last night. I think it might actually have been stronger than the rooftop ceremony that the Coven leaders hold every solstice.” She congratulated everyone in the room.
Nobody moved, all too exhausted from the effort of the night’s channelling, but a few gave her a weak thumbs up, letting the Professor know that they heard her.