Scylla and Charibdes

Sulis slammed the book down, and cursed, feeling terribly weary and drained "Not enough power." she muttered angrily "I need more power to complete the stupid spell, and now of course I've spent what I had stored away." She glared at the ancient, dusty tome. For a while, she was silent, wracking her brain for a faster, simpler way to regain the necessary power to accomplish the spell. But it was fruitless. She hadn't gotten as far as the various rites and incantations for drawing in raw ethereal energies for doing spells yet. She had to wait for her body to accumulate it naturally, which was an unfortunately slow process. Wordlessly, Sulis cursed Sageth, her mentor-cum-master, the deamon she'd indentured herself to in return for learning magik. She blinked, then smiled slightly. Perhaps she could get some small satisfaction for today's frustrations by pestering the incubus with this little detail. She pulled on a robe, and padded down the hall, stopping to rap on the heavy wooden door to the deamon's room.

"Come in, it's open, of course." came the reply, in that infuriatingly smug baritone. Sulis swallowed the temptation to make a wisecrack. It would be counterproductive for the moment. She pushed open the door and paused momentarily on the threshold, as always, a little wary of coming into the deamon's presence. Not that she was a coward, but dealing with deamons who insisted on clothing themselves in the form of a seven-foot-tall black tiger could be a bit disconcerting even for the hardiest of folk. And Sageth had the rude tendency of doing distressingly strange things at the oddest of moments. Fortunately at the moment, he was merely reading.

"I hope I'm not intruding, master." she inquired, in her best saccharine tone. As usual, it rolled off the demon's seemingly impenetrable hide. "I've reached a slight impasse in my studies."

Sageth closed his book, and quirked an eyebrow at the comparatively tiny female cheetah with thinly veiled humor "An impasse?".

Sulis controlled her irritation "Yes, an impasse. My lack of tutoring in the field of energy manipulation is interfering with my ability to continue my studies. Spells it should take me a few hours to learn are taking days because I can't call up sufficient power to complete them."

The tiger stroked his whiskers, a small smile playing across his muzzle "I see." he set the book down on a side table and stood. As always, Sulis controlled the urge to step back. The devil was so damned big! "There is a very good reason I have not tutored you in those areas, my dear. They are some of the most potentially dangerous spells you can learn. Even a slight error can cause the spell to run wild, and the energies you've summoned consume you."

Sulis glared and snapped "If you don't think me capable of performing your little parlor tricks then why in the many names of god did you even bother to take me on?!"

Sageth rumbled a chuckle "I didn't say you were incapable, kitten. I merely am stating that at your present skill level, you haven't learned the necessary discipline or control." he examined his claws idly "But if you are so determined to acquire the necessary energies to work on such spells, there are other, safer ways for you to do so. But I warn you, they are probably far less ... palatable."