Twilight and Fluttershy were quite in awe. Twilight was the first to pick her jaw up off the floor. "How can you be a sorcerer, Terra? You're not even a unicorn!"
Terra chuckled. As he released his mane, it popped back into place, hiding very well the fact that he had no horn. "I suppose that certainly is a valid question. Come, let's dicuss it over a nice cup of tea."
"Aren't you forgetting something?" asked Kai, blocking his path. Raising his hoof, he displayed the band that still clung to his wrist. "You need to end the trial before we leave."
"Right." Terra walked back to the center of the room and raised his hoof to the sky. "As a representative of the grand thaumaturgist, I hereby recognize your capabilities as a spellcaster, and bestow upon you his favour."
The bands flew from both of their wrists, colliding above Terra and forming an orb about five centimetres in diameter. Taking it in his hoof, Terra tossed it to Kai, who gave it to Nik. Nik inspected the orb, finding that it was mostly transparent. It distorted light like any glass orb would. This one had a bluepentagram inside it, a shape that Nik was becoming a bit bored with. However, as he shifted the orb around to view it from different angles, the shape remained unchanged. The pentagram would stare him in the face no matter how he twisted it.
"Hold onto that stone, Nikolas," instructed Kai. "That's your ticket to safety. There are nine others we need to obtain in order to release you."
"So, nine more magic duels?" Nik shoved the stone into his pocket, creating a bulge against his thigh. "I'm not a spellcaster of any persuasion."
Kai shook his head. "This is likely the only time magic will be entirely necessary. That doesn't mean we won't be using it, though. Through my research, I was able to find only three challenges. The trial at the Evereaper's tomb is just finding your way out, and the lakebed trial involves holding your breath underwater for half an hour. I don't know if you humans can do that, but we're allowed to use any means we like if not."
"Tomb?" Fluttershy looked worried. "We're not going to be around dead bodies, are we?"
Kai nodded. Twice, I'd wager. Once at the tomb, and again at the mausoleum. If you have reservations about that, you're free to sit those two out. Since those two are right next to each other on the map, we'll consider that a respite for you."
Fluttershy smiled. "Thanks, Kai. I appreciate it."
Kai pulled her in for a hug. "You're very welcome. Now, let's go have that tea."
The entire group adjourned to the commissary. There were still books and papers everywhere, but these were more akin to potion formulas and recipes. Kai and Nik set a kettle on to boil while Terra sat down next to the girls. "So, about my magic.."
"I've never heard of magic being performed by an earth pony," admitted Fluttershy. "Honestly, I thought it was exclusively the province of unicorns and alicorns."
"In most cases, you'd be absolutely correct," responded Terra. "I'm a rather special case. I was born to two unicorn parents, the youngest of four. All of my siblings were unicorns, and tracing back my family tree eight generations revealed only more unicorns. I'd have gone back further, but beyond that, what's the point? Anything that far diluted is buried so deep that it wouldn't matter. Less than half of a percent. Apparently, none of the doctors could explain how it happened.
"Anyway, I grew up being treated like a unicorn. My mother had me grow an afro to hide her shame. She even hid from my father the fact that I wasn't a unicorn. He was away on business often. So, since everyone assumed I was a unicorn, they had me study magic as if I was one. My teachers would be so irate when I refused to use the magic I didn't have. So, having no self-worth, I studied harder than anypony in my class. I could ace every written exam a year in advance, but when it came to practical exams, I would always come up short. That little indiscretion lead to my expulsion from magic school, because they assumed I was cheating."
Kai and Nik came back to the group. "We made mulberry and raspberry. We also have honey and lemon juice."
"That doesn't explain how you're able to use magic," said Twilight, taking a cup of mulberry tea. "That's just where you came from."
"I assure you, it matters," replied Terra, dripping some honey into his tea. "Thus far, I've been explaining how I learned the fundamentals of magic. Even if you have a horn through which to channel your magic, it won't do you any good if you can't control it."
Twilight calmed down. "You're right, I'm sorry. Please, continue."
"Thank you. Now, being in an illustrious family of unicorns, there was no shortage of magic textbooks floating around, both figuratively and literally. Despite the fact that I had no horn, I was desperate for any kind of magical ability. I knew I could do amazing things with it, if only I could grasp it. Every choice I made was in the interest of learning magic. I wanted my mother to not be ashamed of me. I wanted my father to know who I was. I wanted my siblings to stop covering for me. I was a stain on their existence, or at least, that's how I saw myself.
"That all ended shortly before my sixteenth birthday. I'd had a recurring dream for months, telling me that I could solve my magic problem if I went to a certain location. One night I just packed up my belongings and left, leaving behind a note that I would be back when I found myself. I walked for a week and a half, running myself ragged. I stopped at the entrance I brought you through, as that's where my dreams had lead me. When I fell asleep, my dream finally changed. A cloaked figure with a long beard and no face wrote out a series of runes in front of me, telling me to carve them into my hooves. I was convinced that I'd gone crazy, a thought that only became more convincing when I woke up to find them carved in the ground all around me when I woke up the next day. They hadn't been there when I went to bed. Thinking I had nothing more to lose, I spent the day carving them out as directed. Not deep enough to cause harm, it's just keratin. It would grow back. I had another dream, where the cloaked figure dipped my hooves in ink. When I woke up, this was what I found."
Terra showed his left front hoof. Countless tiny runes were carved into the keratin, and filled with ink. Unless you were looking right at them, you might guess that his hooves were simply a darker colour than his coat. Even if you were to give it a passing glance, you might think they were just weird freckles.
"Now, despite the fact that I had the knowledge of magic, and had just been given the means, I still had no idea what I was supposed to do with it. I considered giving up and going to San Palomino, as it was nearby, but I had no money. So I took a walk through the woods to clear my head, when I ran into a bear. I stood no chance against it, so when it began to charge, I held up my hooves in a flaccid attempt at self-defense, only for a blast of magic to come shooting out, sending it flying. After retreating back to my camp, I tried to recreate the blast. I found that the runes in my hooves would glow in the same way a unicorn's horn would when they cast spells. I found that I was capable of casting spells as long as I focused them through my hooves rather than through my absentee horn."
"That's amazing," said Twilight, now enamored. "I bet your parents were very proud."
"Actually," admitted Terra, "I never went back and told them. I've been here ever since. I've been trying to find some way of duplicating the results, or some kind of brilliant breakthrough that will change the field of magic as we know it. something that will cause my mother to forget that I was nothing more than a burden. Something that will impress my father so much that he'd be proud of me despite the fact that I spent my entire life hiding my race from him. That's all I want, and I'm not leaving until I've made some kind of noticeable difference."
"I certainly hope you find it soon," smiled Fluttershy. "And when you do, I'm sure they'll welcome you back wi--"
Their conversation was interrupted by a loud explosion from the far side of the library. Kai and Fluttershy flew into the air for a better view, and Nik climbed a pile of books. What they saw horrified them. The section just on the other side of the chamber of trials had gone up in flames, and ponies in black cloaks were approaching fast.