Spell casters could cast spells from memory. The more difficult the spell, the harder it was to memorise all the details. Simple spells became common skills for spell casters. Lighting fires, moving objects, and the like. ALL were simple. More difficult spells required focus, and a spell book would be that focus. A well-written spell would provide a step-by-step process for summoning powerful magic to your bidding. Who knew what wonderful new spells a spell caster might have discovered? Daniel knew they would be in the spell book.

Daniel opened the book to the first page. Central to the page were the words “This book belongs to Eric Garcia, son of Duke Garcia of Lanceshire. If found, please return to the Dukedom." Daniel gaped at the words. That ass was the son of a Duke?

"Oh, fuck," he said to the mule. "We're fucked, buddy. Fucked. His death will be investigated. It will lead to me. Fuck. Fuckity fuck fuck."

The mule gazed at Daniel for a moment and resumed chewing.

After a time, Daniel calmed down. I should return this for a reward, he thought. Explain what I found. How I buried him. That won't look suspicious. I'm innocent after all. They can spell me to confirm.

Calmer, Daniel opened the book again. He turned to the second page and found a table of contents written out by hand covering four pages, followed by several blank pages. The table listed by hand all the spells in the book. Sixty-three spells in total. Daniel was amazed. His father had once told him that very good spell casters knew at least two dozen spells. Eric had sixty-three. He read some titles and didn't recognise most of them. The first one in the table, he knew of. It was called Charm Person. With it, the spell caster could charm his intended target and make them instantly like them. It had risks. For one, the person could fight off the influence. If the target won the contest of wills, the spell caster was immediately hated, and the target would know.

Suddenly Daniel thought of Grace and thought perhaps that was why she had hated Eric so much. He had probably tried it on her and failed.

The bastard. Grace deserved better than that.

Curious to see if he could read the spell, he turned to the page. He was surprised to see he could easily read the entry. He flipped to other pages and saw he could read them all. Excited, he turned back to the Charm Person spell. The spell first described what it did.

Daniel was pleased to see he had been right. But more specifically, it said each person had a will, some stronger than others. To charm someone, you had to channel your magic into the person and change that will. It was about distorting how the person viewed you. It even said strong-willed people could be charmed if the conditions were right. There were more details, but Daniel didn't read any further. He had no magic. He would never be able to use the book.

He turned to the next page and saw the spell was called Simple Levitation. The entry described what it did, and how it was limited to what the person using the spell could physically lift. Daniel frowned at that. Apparently, the mind could only do what it has done physically with the body. That made no sense to Daniel. Magic is magic, he reasoned. To lift something heavier than I normally can, I should only need to use more magic.

The next paragraph described how the spell caster channelled their magic to levitate objects. Daniel blinked. Written on the margin, Eric had cursed the spell. It seemed he had difficulty mastering the spell and had reminded himself how to properly channel magic.

This is arcane knowledge! With this, maybe I can do it. Maybe?

Daniel looked around him and spotted a pinecone a few feet away. He read over the instructions for channelling magic several times. This is not that hard. It just requires a focus of mind. I need to open my inner eye and allow the magic of the world to channel through me and bend it to my will.

So, Daniel tried. He tried for an hour until he gave up. I'm no spell caster. I'm just a farmer. He thought back to the instructions.

Eric had spelled out exactly how to do the spell. It should have been so easy. Open the inner eye.

What a strange phrase, he thought for the first time. No one has an inner eye. I need clarity. The only way I know to seek clarity is when I...

Daniel struggled to untie the rope holding his pants up. Finally, he undid the knot and shrugged his pants off his hips. He grabbed his cock in his right hand and started to stroke it gently. He brought up the memory of Grace kissing him, and his cock surged with blood and grew hard. He glanced down at his cock. It was a large one; he knew that. Veins bulged on the side and his head was enormous and already turning purple with excitement. He kept his eyes open and focused on building his pleasure. As his pleasure grew, he felt his clarity focus as well. There was only his cock and the memories of Grace. He felt his cum churn in his nuts and pre-cum suddenly made his jerking sound wet.

When he felt his clarity had peaked, he locked his eyes on the pinecone and followed the instructions from the spell book. To his amazement, the pinecone shot off the ground into the air and disappeared behind the trees. Gasping, his orgasm hit him, and his cock pulsed in his hand and shot rope after rope of thick, creamy-white cum four feet from him to lie soaking into the forest floor.

But Daniel cared nothing for that. Absently, he sucked the cum off his thumb and forefinger and dried his hand on his tunic. He rose and pulled his pants back up and tied them. He was thrilled. I did it! I worked magic!

He looked at his mule. "I, uh, did it by jerking off. Shit."

He sat and thought about what had happened. "Maybe I don't need to jerk off? Maybe just thinking about sex, finding my focus, and then using magic will be enough?" His mule was ignoring him.

Daniel found another pinecone lying on the forest floor. One of hundreds lying about, he chuckled. He closed his eyes and thought about Grace again. He thought about her hand squeezing his cock. The promise of more later. Her tongue dancing in his mouth. He felt his clarity refine, and he opened his eyes and stared at the pine one and activated the spell. The pinecone lurched a foot off the ground and fell back down again.

"Yes!" screamed Daniel. "I can do this!"