Role

Chapter 6

"What this, Master Tohr?" Khar asked slowly, adjusting his glasses on
his face as he poked with one thick finger at a slender wooden stick
lying on the table. "It twig? Twig to burn, make fire?"

"Dont touch what not understand, Idiot!" Tohr said, not unkindly,
snapping his whip across Khars back where it drew a stinging line of
blood on the raw flesh (apparently the nickname had stuck). "Make
fireball, burn rest of felar!"

Khar turned from the very, very interesting stick, sighed, and
concentrated on the spell. Screwing up his face, he uttered the
mystical words he had easily memorized and sent a massive ball of fire
screaming through the air towards a singed and smoking felar chained to
the wall of the cavern. With a sizzling pop, the left side of the
felars body exploded, spattering the cavern wall with blood, gore and
charred fur. Tohr smiled and nodded in appreciation.

"Make good fireball. Felar thank you for granting good death, swift,
painful." He thought a moment, then nodded to himself. "You smart
mage, I show you stick trick." A pause. "Stick trick. You get? Ha!
Tohr make funny." Chuckling to himself, the master Anti-Paladin of the
Volcano grabbed the stick from the table and shoved it into Khars hand.

"You focus on stick, on magic inside. Point stick, focus, bring magic
out. No say words, focus. Focus! FOCUS!" Tohr shouted and Khar
screwed his face up tighter and tighter, engaging his considerable
mental energies upon the slender stick in his hand. At first, nothing
happened. Then smoke and sparks sputtered weakly from the end of the
wand.

"FOCUS IDIOT!" Tohr shouted in Khars ear.

With a final burst of mental energy, Khar felt the wand buckle in his
hand. Three blasts of pure mana streaked from the tip of the wand, one
at a time. The first soared across the cavern, impacting a plate of
Krons rare dwarf spareribs that disappeared in a flash of light, much
to Tohrs chagrin. The second blast bounced off the ceiling, the floor,
the southern wall and finally impacted the wall where the remains of the
felar dangled from two chains, completely cleaning the blood and gore
from its surface. The third blast streaked directly out the cavern
entrance, took a sharp left at the opposite wall, and disappeared down
the corridor.

"You focus good! Much good!" Tohr beamed, smashing Khar over the head
with a stout wooden stick. "Destroy my dinner, not good, but good with
wand. You take and go practice. Go!"

Khar bowed to his master, adjusted his glasses, and happily strode out
of the cavern towards his favorite lava pool to practice stick magic. A
loud howl of pain suddenly echoed down from two levels above, followed
by the bellowing voice of his former weapons master, "My nose! How
blast come here? How break nose! Look pretty good, though. I like."