"Experience and experimentation. How many spells of a certain power you can cast, and so forth."

"Sounds a bit fiddly but not much worse than just how good your endurance is, I think."

"It is much the same principle, yes."

"What does running low on mana feel like?"

"It's like mental exhaustion, and you won't be able to cast spells."

She nods, thoughtfully. "Is it hard to do other mental stuff too, if you're out?"

"Somewhat, but not excessively so."

"If I'm in a fight I might not want to run down my mana too much, though, since the Song takes concentration and that's my best weapon so far."

"A sound idea. Running out of mana is never a good thing."

"Good to have a bunch of options, too."

"Just so."

Grin. "I wanna learn more magic."

Ellisaria can accommodate this desire. For the more complex spells, she shifts to her human form.

"Is changing forms a spell?"

"Technically, yes. But it's fiendishly complex to learn from a standing start, and such things are almost always bestowed through grace or by application of sheer power. My shapeshifting is a draconic birthright."

She tilts her head. "It really sounds like dragons in your world have more in common with Maiar than dragons here do. I could probably manage shapeshifting through Song, though, since Maiar do it..."

"Possibly, I know little about Song."

"I think most people in this world don't know that much about it," she says, cheerfully.

"But you know more than most."

"Yeah. Mostly what I've gotten from just playing around, though, the stories are mostly 'and then he did this impressive mythical thing' and not instruction manuals."

"Where does one start?"

"Once you can carry a tune... There's kind of a lot of intent behind it? And a lot of experimenting. It's easier if you think of something as yours, for me, or at least - that it's your right to influence it, or that it's good for it to be influenced. A kind of focused surety. And then you hold that mindset and play around with lyrics and tunes until one works better than the others. If you get really good you can just make up new Songs on the spot."

"Hm. That sounds... poorly specified."

"The magic's hard to make do specific, consistent things."

"Inconvenient."