The Ezrin Quale Trilogy

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Spindle of Slumber

6th-level Enchantment

• Casting Time: 1 hour
• Range: Touch
• Components: V, S, M (a spindle)
• Duration: Until triggered
• Classes: Bard, Sorcerer, Warlock, Wizard

You enchant the spindle with an ancient magic while speaking the name of a specific creature (a pseudonym, title, or nickname doesn’t work.) The spindle appears ordinary and harmless until it draws that creature's blood. When pricked, a willing creature falls asleep automatically. An unwilling creature must succeed on a Wisdom saving throw against your spell save DC or fall into a deep, magical slumber for one day. Then the spindle reverts to an ordinary spindle.

While asleep, the creature is unconscious, incapacitated, and unaware of its surroundings. It does not age, require food or drink, or dream. A creature immune to magical sleep is unaffected by the needle.

The sleeper cannot be awakened by normal means. The slumber can be ended with Remove Curse cast using a spell slot of 5th level or higher, Dispel Magic, or Greater Restoration. At the discretion of the GM, the kiss of a true love may also end the slumber.

At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 7th level or higher, the duration of the sleep is determined by the slot used:

Slot Level	Duration
7th	7 days
8th	1 year
9th	100 years

Ezrin's Notes

This one was a lucky find. It was documented in a tome of folklore I was idly perusing.

I wonder if the creator considered that it could also be used for one-way time travel?

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The Wizard's Wager (Part 2)

The Endgame

So, there I was – seven new spells in hand, but less than 3 days left in my unwise bet. I had traveled half the continent by then, charming spells out of eccentrics, recovering them from ruins, and acquiring a few through entirely legitimate (if not strictly conventional) means. But as I checked schools of magic off from my list, those that remained became harder and harder to obtain.

With time running out. I was wrapped in panic. There was no way I'd find the final spell in time. Then it hit me: the wager was to document eight undiscovered spells. If I couldn't find the last spell... I could make it myself.

A frantic weekend later, with the wager itself as my inspiration, I managed to craft a spell of my own design. I do hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed my winnings.

• Ezrin Quale

Presenting... Quale's Wizard's Wager

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Quale's Wizard's Wager

5th-level Conjuration – Casting Time: 1 minute – Range: 10 feet – Components: V, S – Duration: Concentration, until the game is finished – Classes: Bard, Warlock, Wizard

The caster describes a game for two players that can be played on a tabletop. Examples include card games, chess, or liar’s dice. They must clearly explain the rules such that both players understand them, as well as the consequences of losing. If either participant is unwilling, coerced, or controlled by an outside force, the spell fails.

A large table, two comfortable chairs, and any game pieces required are conjured from thin air. Though magical, these objects are subject to damage as normal. They vanish when the spell ends.

The player who loses is reduced to 0 hit points. A draw results in no effect. If the caster loses concentration or the game is interrupted by an outside force, the result is considered a draw.

A player who refuses to take their turn, abandons the game, cheats, enlists outside interference, or engages in other unsportsmanlike behavior is disqualified and loses by default. (At the GM's discretion.)

The Game Master will determine what rolls, if any, are required to resolve the game.

Ezrin’s Notes

It is unwise to attempt a role-playing game. Not only do they take an extraordinary amount of time, but you also run a very real risk of recursion.

If you find yourself short on suitable games, I recommend Elhromane's excellent tome: “Tabletop: Games for Elves from Twelve Years of Age to Seven Hundred and Fifty, and for That More Intelligent Sort Who Likes Elven Games and Books.”

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Ahoy, my fellow hunters of improbable magic.

It seems my last collection of spells was far more successful than even I anticipated. Successful enough, in fact, that shortly after its publication I received a rather official-looking letter. To my astonishment (and alarm), the Arcane University of Highmark offered me a formal position: Professor of Inadvisable Spellcraft.

It is as if I cast detect thoughts upon you, dear reader: The famously eccentric Ezrin Quale, doing something as cliché as teaching at a school of magic?

I admit it took some convincing. But the promise of fully funded expeditions (rather than relying upon the contents of my dwindling coin pouch) and access to a restricted library wing labelled “Dangerous” won me over.

Also, in no small part, I assumed that very few students would sign up for a class called “Application of Inadvisable Spellcraft”. Alas, that assumption was very incorrect.

My students are bright, enthusiastic, and occasionally combustible. They interrupt constantly and argue enthusiastically. They smuggle familiars into lessons, attempt to clumsily reverse-engineer my research, and once – memorably – summoned a gaggle of geese mid-lecture.

I admire their spirit.

So here I am: funded, employed, bafflingly legitimate... and once again compelled to share my findings with the wider world.

Which brings us neatly to this new volume: The Ezrin Quale Addendum, beginning with my work on Inverted Invocations.

I do hope you enjoy it.

And if any of my students are reading this: please return my spectacles. They are not a “focus component” for anything, no matter what you’ve convinced yourselves.

• Professor Ezrin Quale

The inside of the cover contains several handwritten student notes.

• For reference, Professor Q's class filled up in six minutes – his spells are a prank gold-mine. The dean had to remove two members of staff from the list. – A.A.
• You can sneak in to the library's dangerous wing – climb over from the rafters near the assembly hall. You're welcome.
• Word of advice – The Professor's extra-credit field trips are actually just searching dangerous old ruins to find scrolls for his collection. – Kaz
• Pretty sure it's impossible to get a “C” in this class. I've gotten every other grade. Is this some sort of life-lesson? – J.S.
• Whoever keeps feeding the mimic under his desk is going to get us all in trouble.

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1st-level transmutation

Casting Time: 1 action Range: 30 feet Components: V, S Duration: Instantaneous

All nonmagical food and drink within a 5-foot-radius sphere centered on a point of your choice within range becomes spoiled. Food affected by this spell is foul or rotten, and drink is sour, stagnant, or otherwise unfit for consumption. Any creature that eats or drinks the affected items must succeed on a Constitution saving throw against your spell save DC or becomes poisoned for 1 hour.

Ezrin's Notes The inverted form of Purify Food and Drink. I devised a field test for this spell with a tavern stew, and the results were as messy as they were educational. I’m still banned from the establishment.

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1st-level enchantment

Casting Time: 1 action Range: 30 feet Components: V, S, M (a small knotted cord) Duration: 10 minutes

You twist a creature's grasp of language. Choose one creature that you can see within range. For the duration, the target cannot understand any spoken language that it hears, nor any written language that it sees. The target also cannot speak or write any language.

This spell does not prevent the target from making inarticulate sounds, using gestures, or providing verbal components for spells.

In the likely case the target is unwilling, it can make an Intelligence saving throw against your spell save DC. On a successful save, the spell has no effect.

Ezrin's Notes Inversion of Comprehend Languages. Good for silencing troublesome witnesses, annoying bards, or people who insists on talking while you're trying to read. Does nothing to stop interpretive dance. I learned that one the hard way.

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1st-level illusion

Casting Time: 1 action Range: Self Components: V, S, M (a small gilt fan) Duration: Concentration, up to 1 hour

A flourish of magic heralds your arrival. For the duration, you and up to nine creatures you choose within 30 feet of you gain a touch of illusory splendour. The first time an affected creature enters a space where it can be seen or heard by other creatures, that creature is accompanied by a brief magical display, such as a rising fanfare of invisible trumpets or a swirl of coloured lights. The display is visible to creatures within 120 feet.

The magic of the spell gives you instant perzazz. The first time an affected creature makes a Charisma (Performance) check before the spell ends, that creature has advantage on the roll.

Ezrin's Notes

Inversion of Pass Without Trace. Works wonders on stage performers and royalty. Not advisable for rogues and assassins.

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2nd-level enchantment Casting Time: 1 action Range: 60 feet Components: V, S Duration: 10 minutes

You create a magical zone that enforces deception in a 15-foot-radius sphere centred on a point of your choice within range. Until the spell ends, a creature that enters the spell's area for the first time on a turn or starts its turn there must make a Charisma saving throw. On a failed save, a creature can’t speak a statement it believes to be true while in the radius. You know whether each creature succeeds or fails on its saving throw.

An affected creature is aware of the spell and can avoid answering questions. Lies may have a kernel of truth – so long as the statement is in whole untrue.

Ezrin's Notes Needless to say: the inverted form of Zone of Truth. Potentially useful political manoeuvring, sabotage, or absolutely ruining a game of twenty questions.

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I have come to believe that – save for a small number of perfectly symmetrical spells* – every spell possesses an inverse. My theory is simple: if there is magic to light a flame, there must be magic to snuff it. Nature, after all, abhors imbalance.

Furthermore, I posit that these inversions are not theoretical constructs awaiting a clever mage to invent them. Cosmic balance demands that they already exist.

Some of these reversals are already well known. Cure Wounds and Inflict Wounds are classic examples of magical mirroring. Others are obscure, often because they are niche, impractical, or discovered by a mage with the good sense to immediately put them back where they found them.

This work is, in no small part, a response to Professor Greymüter of the Arcanum of Respectable Magic, whose recent critique suggested that many of the spells predicted by this theory “do not, and could not, exist.” Given his institution’s distinct lack of appreciation for unusual spellcraft (my previous book is banned from campus after a single incident) his scepticism is perhaps understandable.

While I cannot claim to have found every spell's inverse form, I think you'll agree this work presents a compelling pattern.

– Professor Ezrin Quale

* A spell is “symmetrical” if its inverse would be identical to itself. Misty Step is a common example. Spell symmetry is a well-established (if previously uninteresting) arcane principle. See: Thamior's Treatise on Arcane Parity.

Under the text is scribbled several handwritten student notes.

• Didn’t Thamior already predict this? – Rowan
• No, he insisted most inversions were “theoretical curiosities”, not actual spells. – Kaz
• Bet he regrets that now. – A.A.

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1st-level transmutation

Casting Time: 1 reaction, which you take when you or a creature within 60 feet of you falls Range: 60 feet Components: V, M (a small iron weight) Duration: 1 round

Choose up to five falling creatures within range. A creature affected by this spell falls normally, and if it lands before the spell ends, it takes falling damage as if it had fallen twice the distance it actually fell, to a maximum of 20d6 damage. The spell ends for a creature when it lands.

While a creature is affected by this spell, it can't benefit from any spell or magical effect that slows its fall or prevents it from taking damage from the fall. If this spell is cast on a creature already affected by such a spell or effect, that spell or effect ends for that creature.

If a spell or magical effect that slows a creature’s fall or prevents falling damage is subsequently cast on a creature affected by this spell, this spell ends for that creature.

Ezrin's Notes

Inverted form of Feather Fall.

My students have suggested this spell is too situational. I think it's just too mean.

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