Author's note: a bit of a short chapter since I've been drowning in work the day I wrote it, and got cut on my leg pretty bad.
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Tolfdir sat on a worn stone bench near the edge of the Hall of the Elements, a simple wooden pipe clenched between his teeth, sending lazy curls of sweet-smelling smoke into the already-ozone-thick air. His gaze was fixed vaguely in the direction of a cluster of apprentices practicing their Flames spells on training dummies.
Some of the students, noticing the old master's eyes on them, puffed out their chests and poured more magicka into their casts. Jets of fire grew longer, brighter, more theatrical.
Tolfdir didn't react.
What they didn't know was that his thoughts were leagues away from their flashy, inefficient displays. His mind was preoccupied with a far more pressing mystery: where in Oblivion he'd left his good alembic.
Was it in his study? The alchemy lab? Had he loaned it to that new Conjuration lecturer? The question circled in his head like a sluggish skeever.
He was mentally planning his search route for after his supervisory duties ended when a tall, unmistakable figure cut through the shimmering heat haze of the practice area.
It was Torin, moving with that quiet, purposeful stride of his. In one hand, he held the Transmute Ore spell tome. In the other, he carried a fist-sized chunk of something that gleamed with a dull, buttery yellow under the hall's magical light.
The sight was so incongruous it finally yanked Tolfdir's mind fully back into the room. He took the pipe from his mouth as Torin stopped before him.
"Master Tolfdir," Torin said, his voice calm. He extended the hand holding the shiny mass. "I've learned the Transmute Ore spell."
Tolfdir's eyes, usually warm and crinkled, narrowed with scholarly scrutiny. He took the offered chunk. It was heavy for its size—the right weight for gold. But its form was… odd. It wasn't a smooth nugget panned from a river, nor did it have the sharp, crystalline facets of mined ore.
It was jagged and irregular like a common fieldstone, yet parts of its surface were strangely smoothed, as if weathered by wind and water over centuries. It looked, for all the world, like someone had taken a random rock and convinced every atom in it to believe it was gold.
But it's only been a week.
That was the timeline Tolfdir had given him, fully expecting even that to be insufficient just to grasp the spell's theory, let alone achieve a successful casting.
And depending on what this lump had been originally—a piece of iron? common granite?—the actual transmutation process alone should have taken another week of sustained, focused effort. Not for a novice. Not even for most journeymen.
This meant one of two things. Either the young man was trying to pull a fast one with a pre-made chunk of gold—unlikely, given its strange, unrefined appearance—or he possessed a terrifying trifecta of gifts: the intellect to grasp a complex spell's theory in days, the deep magicka reserves to fuel a sustained casting, and the monastic focus to maintain that intricate magical weave for hours on end without a single lapse.
Tolfdir's gaze lifted from the golden stone to settle on Torin's patient face. He presented the chunk back to him.
"Take it."
Though puzzled, Torin did so, cradling the heavy metal in his palm. He met Tolfdir's eyes, waiting.
Sure enough, the old master cleared his throat, his expression turning to one of gentle, undeniable challenge.
"Now," Tolfdir said, his voice dropping to a teacher's instructive murmur. "Turn it back."
Torin's brow furrowed. "Why? I spent four whole days turning it into this."
A slow, pleased grin spread across Tolfdir's face. Ah, not so meek after all. There was the flash of pride, the hint of possessiveness over his effort. Good.
"You'll find," Tolfdir explained, his tone conversational, "that convincing this… thing… to return to what it was is a much easier, far less time-consuming task than the original transformation."
He pointed a blunt finger at the chunk in Torin's hand. "It remembers what it was. It knows what it can be. The path home is always clearer than the path into the unknown. You don't have to build a new identity from scratch. You only need to… persuade it to remember its old one. To let go of the golden dream."
Torin let out a long, slow sigh. He was deeply skeptical. All that work, just to undo it? It felt like building a house only to knock it down. But who was he to argue with a Master of Alteration on his home ground?
"Alright," he muttered, more to himself than to Tolfdir. He closed his fingers around the warm metal, took a deep, centering breath, and closed his eyes.
This time, his magicka didn't push outward with creative force. Instead, it reached in. Like tendrils of light seeking the foundations of a building, his will slipped into the transmuted chunk, probing its new golden essence.
He didn't attack it; he listened. And beneath the brilliant, confident song of gold, he found a faint, stubborn echo. A memory of rigidity, of common strength, of plain, unassuming service.
The memory of iron.
His magic wrapped around that echo, not as a command, but as an invitation. Remember.
The luster began to fade first, the rich yellow dimming to a sickly, muted brass. Then the color itself bled away, leaching into a dull, dark grey. The smooth, weathered surfaces seemed to tighten, to contract, becoming rougher, more granular.
The weight in his hand felt the same, but the presence of it shifted, losing its noble sheen and settling into something humble, sturdy, and familiar.
Within a minute, the transformation was complete. Where a fist-sized nugget of raw gold had been, now sat a lump of crude, unremarkable rusty iron ore, still warm from the magic that had just rewritten its story twice over.
Torin opened his eyes and stared at it. A strange feeling settled in his chest—not disappointment, but a deeper understanding. Tolfdir was right. The journey back had been quiet, almost effortless compared to the grueling, four-day push to make it gold.
Torin sighed, turning the now-mundane lump of iron over in his hand. "The book didn't exactly mention how easy it would be to undo the work."
Tolfdir's grin was knowing. "Most who seek out this spell do so ignorantly, my boy. They see only infinite wealth, a shortcut to a heavy purse. What use would a greedy soul have for the knowledge of how to make gold… ordinary again?" He relit his pipe with a tiny spark from his fingertip.
Torin let out a dry chuckle. "I had that thought once. A long time ago. Then I read about the Empire's laws—and the High King's—regarding transmuted precious metals. They have whole divisions of assayers trained to spot it. It's a fast track to a prison cell, not a manor house."
He shook his head. "Not to mention, as you said… it's terribly inefficient. The magicka and time spent could earn ten times the coin on something else."
"Indeed it could," Tolfdir agreed, puffing contentedly. "Practicality is a virtue many aspiring mages forget. Now then," he said, his tone shifting back to business, "let us move on to the next lesson." He paused, a mischievous glint in his eye. "If it can even be called that."
Torin offered a wry, understanding smile. He wasn't under any illusions. Being handed a library slip and told to figure it out himself wasn't exactly hands-on tutelage. But it was a kind of trust, and it played to his strengths.
"I have the utmost trust in the process," he declared simply.
Tolfdir nodded, a flicker of respect in his gaze. "I commend your patience. It is rarer than any spell."
He turned to a small writing desk nearby, selected a fresh piece of parchment, and began to write in his neat, flowing script. Finishing the note, he passed a hand over it, leaving the same glowing, official College seal.
He handed it to Torin.
"Take this to Urag gro-Shub. Retrieve the Waterbreathing spell tome and learn it."
Torin took the enchanted paper, then tilted his head. "How long do I have for this one?"
Tolfdir chuckled, the sound warm and genuine. "As long as you need. I no longer feel the need to test you with arbitrary deadlines. You've proven your discipline."
He cleared his throat, his expression turning more pointed. "However, once you have learned it, do not come back to me. Go instead to Arniel Gane. Find him in his study or fiddling with things that might explode or the in the Midden. Tell him… I sent you to help him with his research. Getting acquainted will be mutually beneficial to you two, I imagine."
He gave Torin a significant look that was part instruction, part unspoken challenge. The real test, it seemed, was no longer in the learning, but in the application.
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