“Let’s add a little rose water,” Silvaria Dupree mused as she poured the ingredient into her cauldron. She pulled her long, raven hair back and tied with it a faded purple ribbon as she glanced at her grimoire. “A drop or two of vanilla extract could add that right amount of something. Oh, maybe some foxglove?”

Seconds later, Silvaria’s boyfriend Killian Crowe crashed into the room, panic in his usually calm hazel eyes. “No, not that!” the half-elf exclaimed. “If you plan on ingesting that concoction you absolutely should not add foxglove!”

Silvaria put her hands on her hips, her sky blue gloves a stark contrast against her black dress. “And why not?”

Killian stared incredulously at the small woman for a moment before replying, “Because it’s poisonous, Silvy... You’ll make yourself, or whatever test subject you’re using that on, very sick.”

Her arms dropped to her sides as her face paled, “Oh. Oh, right, of course. No, I wouldn’t dream of poisoning anyone.”

“You mean like that guy you ‘accidentally’ poisoned in that prestigious magic school you got kicked out of?”

Now Silvaria’s face turned red, either from embarrassment or anger or both. “I really didn’t mean to poison him! And I didn’t get kicked out of that miserable place, I left of my own volition.” She turned her emerald eyes back to her grimoire, not really looking at the words on its pages.

“Sure, sure,” Killian waved her off, sitting down in the chair on the opposite side of the room. He’d heard this tale a hundred times and knew better than to argue with her.

Try as she might to cover it up, however, everyone in and around the school, as well as back home in Ampus, knew what really happened. Silas Gilford, Silvaria’s long-time bully from back home, had picked on her for the final time. It was mid-term exams and Silvaria had caused an explosion in the potions room. Later, after everyone had been evacuated, Silas overheard her explaining to the headmaster what ingredients she had used. Which were nowhere near the correct ones. 

“My gods! You could have killed us all with that amount of incompetence,” he had exclaimed. “It’s astounding you even graduated from high school, especially knowing how terribly you did in our finals. There’s no denying it now. Your father must have paid your way into this college. I reckon he just wanted to send you as far away from the estate as he could.”

Hearing this, Silvaria could do nothing but cross her arms and cast her gaze to the floor. She couldn’t deny she was lucky to get into Gloxwerry Institute of Magics, though she couldn’t say if it was her father’s doing or not. She herself had had her suspicions that her father had used his wealth to influence the college interviewers’ decision. The proof of this stared her in the face every time she received her test scores. 

Up until now she had managed to skate through her classes without raising too many of her classmates’ eyebrows. She always sat in the back of the lecture halls and did whatever she could to go unnoticed. But now everyone was looking at her, whispering to each other as she passed, and it was because of Silas. Anger coursed through her where there once was embarrassment as she concocted her revenge.

That weekend, she gathered her ingredients and baked a batch of pastries. They were designed to cause mild digestive upset to whoever ate them. Or such was the plan. Silvaria believed she had done the proper research to ensure she merely inconvenienced her bully and not accidentally cause him real harm. However, she had used the venom from the Drihia subspecies of basilisk when she should have used it from the smaller, much less deadly Dhusamo. 

Perhaps if they had not both been given names that start with ‘D’ I would not have confused the two, she had thought when the mistake was discovered. 

Unfortunately, the mistake was caught too late. Fortunately, being the renowned institution that it was, the school had the finest doctors on staff and recognized the symptoms before it was too late for the unsuspecting student. Silvaria, knowing it wouldn’t be difficult to find the culprit, decided it had been best to admit fault. The school subsequently expelled her. When her father caught word of her ill conceived notion of vengeance, he had refused to let her into their home in Ampus as she had sullied the Dupree name. Nor could she walk those city streets without meeting wary eyes and hushed murmurs.

Not knowing where else to go, she wandered the countryside of Gloxwerry, the city in which lies the school that had changed her life. That was when she met Killian. A half-elf, half-human sellsword whose home in Arkbridge had never felt like home. There, at the edge of the forest, they made their own home in a cozy cottage.

Sibyl, Silvaria’s feline familiar, jumped into Killian’s lap and gave a rather demanding meow, jolting him from his thoughts. The young halfling absentmindedly stroked the cat's head, tawny fur accumulating on his clothes, as he watched the raven haired woman ground ingredients in her mortar. Being only half elf, Killian could only do low tier spells, but he knew his way around a cauldron. He just preferred not to get involved in any sort of magic. His prowess laid more in the physical realm than the arcane. While his girlfriend spent her time trying to create new potions and incantations-when she wasn’t making ordinary ones for clients-he spent his time out in the forests collecting bounties and aiding adventurers in the local dungeons. Typically with a sword and shield, unless the situation called for something more long range.

The cat turned her pale green eyes toward her master and the twitching tail caught Killian’s attention. “Silvy, when did you last eat?” He asked, reading Sibyl’s motions.

“Uhhh… Breakfast?” She didn’t bother to look up from her concoction.

“Breakfast!? That was nearly eight hours ago!” He sounded shocked, but he shouldn’t have been. He knew all too well when Silvaria got into her experiments, it was like nothing else existed. Especially not hunger or thirst. Not until she was satisfied with the results.

Silvaria on the other hand was genuinely surprised. “Oh, really? That long? Well, now that you mention it I am feeling lightheaded. I thought it was just from breathing in the vapors.”

“All the more reason to take a break.” Killian stood from the chair, Sibyl climbing onto the bookshelf next to them. “You should really step away and take a seat. I’ll go make you something to eat in the meantime.” 

Silvaria heard the concern in his voice, but she could feel her concoction was nearing perfection. She scooped a spoonful of the mixture out of her cauldron and funneled it into a phial. Now all she needed to do was find something to test it on. Long ago, the three great nations came together and created a treaty of peace. They formally became known as the Kingdom Alliance. To minimize havoc that unsanctioned spell crafting and potion making brought upon their cities, it was decided that anyone with new magic would be brought before a council chosen by the High Monarchs and plead their case as to why their creation should be allowed to be used by the masses. Silvaria had decided the currently approved invisibility potion was mediocre at best. It turned the one who consumes it transparent, but they had to remove their clothing to go undetected. She hoped for a potion that could somehow extend to whatever the consumer had on their person. Of course she had her own ulterior motives for creating such a thing. However, she wouldn’t have any idea what kind of potion she had brewed until she tested it on something.

She knew she needed to sit down or Killian would chastise her for not taking care of herself, so she had to move quickly. Not that him wagging his finger at her ever deterred her from making risky decisions. She tightened her ribbon in her hair and set to work searching the cottage for a viable candidate. She thought of using a small item such as a feather which she had an abundance of. However, if it was in fact an invisibility potion, she needed to know that it worked on something living without adverse side effects before she could submit it for approval to be sold to and used by adventurers. She’d already been in enough trouble.

Silvaria scoured every corner and every nook in the cottage, save the ones near the kitchen, but couldn’t find so much as a spider. For a sellsword or often came home covered in blood, Killian was infuriatingly tidy. He must have swept all the cobwebs away. How was she going to test her potion now?

Suddenly a flash of fur raced past her feet, stopping short of the couch. Sibyl pressed herself against the floor, eyes fixated underneath the furniture. Her tail slowly swung side to side.

“What’d you find, Sib?” The young witch gasped in excitement. As she stepped closer to the couch, though, a smaller ball of gray fur scurried out of its hiding place and towards the hall. “A mouse? It’s perfect!”

She grabbed the phial off her desk and began to chase the creature. In hindsight she probably should have corked the vial until she caught her subject. As she ran through the doorway, unbeknownst to her, Killian was just turning into the room a tray of breads and meats in hand. Silvaria stumbled at the last moment in an attempt to prevent a crash. Killian, anticipating the need to catch his clumsy girlfriend, dropped the tray and held his hands up to catch her in one swift motion. 

Instead of coming to a stop-or falling forward-Silvaria’s knee high midnight blue socks slipped on the wooden floor. As she fell to her knees, the phial flew from her hand straight at the stunned elf. Silvaria looked up in time to see the pinkish liquid splash Killian, and then he was gone. His clothes piled up on the floor amongst the meats and breads strewn across the floor.

The little witch rubbed her eyes, not believing them for a moment, then put her hands on her hips. Standing up she complained, “I don’t believe this. All that work and your clothing just…fell off of you? They were supposed to turn invisible with you.” She groaned in defeat as she began picking up pieces of bread before the mice had a chance to snatch any.

Silence.

“Hello? You’re invisible, not intangible. Help me pick this stuff up and then I’ll fix you!”

Exasperated, she threw a hunk of bread in the direction of where the young man once stood only for it to hit the wall on the other side. Confused, she stepped forward, nudging a pair of trousers, and waved her hands in front of her to confirm he truly wasn’t there.

Little did she know, to the misfortune of herself and Killian, the potion had not worked in more ways than what she believed. Beneath her, Killian barely managed to avoid the socked feet pushing aside his garments. Her concoction had not made him invisible but simply hard to see. Where he had once stood six feet tall, he was now a mere two inches!

“Silvy!” The tiny elf called, waving one arm and using the other to grip a piece of cloth over his exposed self. But it was to no avail. He was completely beneath her notice.

She put her hands on her hips and groaned. “Listen, I get that you’re mad, but it was an accident. Not helping me clean up as punishment is just prolonging your condition.” She waited a moment, listening for a response. When she heard none she continued, “The least you could have done was put your clothes back on!”

Suddenly, Killian was engulfed in the shadow of the woman’s hand reaching down. Realizing her intention, he quickly dropped the cloth and attempted to flee, but trying to wade through the sea of cloth was more akin to walking in quicksand and he soon found himself tangled in the folds of the fabric. When he felt weightless, he knew it was too late to try to get out. Silvaria had picked up the pile and he dared not move lest he fell from that height. If he were to somehow survive that, surely he would not be so lucky being stepped on. Would she even notice?

Silvaria began walking down the hallway to put Killian’s clothing in their bedroom, if he had to guess. Of course, he didn’t have the luxury of thinking about anything aside from gripping the fabric that bound him as tightly as possible. He was sure all the bouncing from her steps would jostle him loose. 

Sheer panic took hold and he yelled from the top of his lungs, “Silvaria Dupree, I am not invisible! Please, for gods’ sake put me down!”

Luckily, being louder and closer to her ear, Killian did not go unheard. “What in the seven hells do you mean put you…down?” She finally glanced down at the wad of clothes in her hands to spot the tiny man entwined in them. Wide-eyed, she exclaimed, “Oh gods, that was not what was supposed to happen. Well, I mean none of it was supposed to happen. It should have been the mouse, but I-I got careless. I could have crushed you! I’m so sorry, Love.”

“Please, do me a favor and save your apology for after you’ve put me down!” He tried his best to look stern, but his anger was greatly overshadowed by terror.

“Right! Of course.” Silvaria knelt down and put the clothing pile on the floor, then-as gently as she could-untangled Killian. 

Now free from his prison and safely on the floor, Silvaria took a moment to explain just how he came to be his accidental test subject, apologizing profusely all the while. 

“Okay, it seems you’ve learned your lesson about running around with open phials, but how did it do this to me? I thought it was supposed to be an improvement on the invisibility potion?”

“Uh, yeah, that’s the part I don’t know,” she replied, looking everywhere but at him.

“What do you mean you don’t know? Wait, don’t tell me, you didn’t use the original potion as your base ingredient did you? That’s the only explanation as to why it went so far off track.”

The witch looked at him now and it would be so funny to be scolded by such a tiny man with his arms crossed over his naked chest if the situation had not been so dire. “No, no I didn’t.”

Realization suddenly struck him and his face grew pale. “Oh, gods. You don’t know how to fix this do you?”

“Uhhh…” She looked away from him again, her mouth turned up in a sheepish grin, though tears were welling up in her eyes.

“Did you at least write down every ingredient you put in it?”

“Yes! Yes, I did do that. Which means we can look over the properties of the ingredients and figure out which one caused the shrinking effect. Then I can go from there to figure out a reversing potion or spell or something.”

She looked down at him at this last part, hoping to get his approval. Instead her gaze was met by an unconvinced glare.

“I’m gonna be stuck like this for a while.”

Silvaria shrugged, “On the bright side, this size is really cute on you.”