He busies himself opening the drawers, all empty. Damn. And here he thought he'd found something. He can't seem to stop slipping into teacher mode, though, shades of training Billy showing through. And it's nice to be able to show off a little, too.

"Depends on the magician, more often than not. You can learn it by rote, even if you were born free of inherent magic, if you know the right rituals and spells. You can find it, sometimes, in artefacts. You can call upon certain beings for it, if you know how to approach them. Some people contract it, unwillingly. Or- you can be born with it, in my case. A freak of nature, essentially." He sounds a little ironic, because few people here know the myths, know exactly how much of a freak Loki is back home. Magic isn't common among frost giants, either- and magic on Loki's scale, the ability to bend the universe in interesting ways nearly on command, is rarer still anywhere in Loki's universe.

Still, he looks up at the mention of a locked drawer, head cocked in interest. "Ah, now we're talking. Let me see... a purely mechanical lock, is it?" He adds a word in another language that even the translator can't seem to catch, one that hangs oddly in the air, and the lock clunks open. He bows slightly in Miles' direction. "After you?"