You want to, what now? To learn the ways to make spells? To become a wizard? Pfah!
Ah, you see, the fools who call themselves "wizards" in the Isen School, they'll tell you that it's all an exact technique, they think the formulas and the rituals they stole from the ruins of the empire are all they need. In quadrata numerus primus de ordo Averrinae, in triangulus numerus secundus de ordo Academae - fools, all of them! Do they not realise that the imperial scripts and codicils they so treasure are themselves bastardised copies of the originals from the Hidden Isles, forged when the empire marched over and burned the mystery cults to the ground?
Of course not. You won't find a single one of their so-called high wizards or lore-masters who can even tell you the history of practical magic. Theirs is not curiosity, but a lust for power. They do not seek to understand, but rather to master, and in doing so ensure that they will fail at both. A child given a toy does not ask where it comes from, after all. Their so-called metrics and laws have limits, limits that the mystics taught and respected, limits even the imperial mages understood, limits that they have forgotten. Yea, with every forced spell they channel the fabric of the weave wears a little thinner, I shouldn't be surprised if their entire sky-fortress disappears into nullspace one day or the other in the near future.
Still want to learn magic, eh? Fine. But don't call me a wizard. I'm not fool enough to misuse the old names like that. You know, the word wizard used to mean someone too smart for their own good. Wizards disappear, wizards are cast out, wizards get burned at the stake, and for good reason. When a wizard goes bad, they take entire nations and islands with them. Me, I'm in no hurry to go any time soon.
A spell is like a pot, you see. How big is a pot? Should it be clay, or copper, or steel? Should it have handles, decorations, ridges to mark the water level? The answer is, it depends. Do you want your pot for water? For wine? For cooking? All of this is your decision - except, of course, when it is not. If the pot is too thin it will shatter, if the pot is made of copper and placed in a furnace it will melt, if the pot has holes it will leak. The making of a pot is a negotiation, one that occurs silently between yourself, your needs, and the elder laws of the universe. So too the making of a spell. And remember, if it ever comes to choosing between your wishes and the elder laws, the elder laws always win. You cannot negotiate with a hurricane.
To understand the elder laws, you must first observe what you wish to manipulate. To summon fire, first light a candle. In time you will understand the comings and goings of the fire spirits, the ways in which the lamplighter makes his benediction known. Then you must meditate upon them, and find the secret language by which all things are described. No, I can't tell you the language. If you're of the right talent, they will come to you. Once you see it you will realise that magic runes and elven script and even the bastardised imperial longhand of the Isen wizards are all the same thing. You may find some other notation easier, I don't know. Do what suits you. Do what feels natural.
The next step is to understand the distance between what is and what you wish to be. Where there is no light, you wish for light. Where there is stone, you wish for flesh. Where there is a lock, you wish for a key. The difference is what you must bridge with your art. Aye, it's easiest to just do the thing by hand first until you find out what the difference is. It's harder than you think. The first time you make a pebble shatter with magic will feel like a triumph.
But it's still not over yet. the spell now lives half in your head and half in this mess of observations and notes that you've built up. Then you must refine your words, over and over, until they cease to be symbols and the higher thing, the spell-construct, descends from the Theoretic plane and enters your mind. This will be brutally uncomfortable, mind. Many a magic user-to-be has died trying to intuit their first six-hundred dimensional eigenconstruct. I never said learning magic was easy.
After all that, if you still have your wits about you, I'd say you have a spell.
One last piece of advice. Magic, well, the more you learn about it, the less you want to use it. Even if you're a first rate talent, especially if you're a first rate talent, you'll know how strange a thing magic is. The mystery cults allowed themselves to be wiped out by brutes with spears and bows, rather than fight back with fireballs and lightning bolts. Think on that, if you want to keep your skull intact and your family safe.
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