Chapter Eighteen
“Wait you guys have more than one gift?” Cole asks cautiously as we step into our room having said goodbye to the guys.
I share a look with Erin as I go to the kitchen area to get us drinks.
“Yep.” She says simply.
“How do you not know what gifts you have?” He asks Erin, unsurprisingly sounding concerned.
“That’s quite a story, let’s go to the practice room, warm up and we’ll tell you.” I say knowing that I’m taking a gamble in telling him but it feels right.
“Sure.”
“Do you mind if Erin and I drop our glamour?” I ask as we enter the training room, “I know it’s not usual but for supernaturals but it’s more comfortable for us to be in our supernatural forms.”
He studies us for a second.
“Sure,” He shrugs, “so long as you don’t mind me doing the same.” He asks trying to sound casual but his tone wavers slightly giving away his nervousness.
“Of course.” I reply smiling and immediately drop my glamour, hoping that it will put him at ease. His eyes widen when he sees my fully coloured hair and changed eyes.
Centres aren’t supposed to have glamours since there’s not normally any difference in their outward appearance.
It’s clear when he looks at Erin that her appearance is more of what he was expecting.
He drops his own glamour revealing the blue tipped hair and stunning jewel blue eyes with flecks of gold in them from my vision.
I grin at him, “I love the hair!” I complement, trying to break the ice.
“Back at you, but how!?” He exclaims simply.
“Right that’s part of the long story.” I chuckle.
Me and Erin spend the next twenty minutes filling him in on what’s happened leaving only a few things out. He doesn’t need to know about anything that’s happened before I arrived at the academy. Once we’re finished, we just sit in silence as he gapes at us trying absorb what we’ve told him.
“Ok, holy fuck!” He exclaims and we chuckle.
“You’ve been honest with me though and although I don’t understand why I do appreciate it so I’m going to be honest with you.
” He takes a deep breath as if preparing himself.
“On your first day, you remember that Rebecca said that I had no gifts,” We nod and he continues, “obviously you’ve seen me use air and not to toot my own fucking horn but I’m not exactly a novice.
” I return his grin as he continues, “Well I can also travel through the void and I have a gift with weapons, meaning I can pick any weapon up having never used it before and wield it like an expert. Air is my strongest gift though.”
“What is the void?” Erin asks.
“It’s like this dimension, I guess, of absolute nothingness that runs parallel to our world but there are loads of small splits in it that bring you out in various different locations.
If you’re strong enough you can make your own spilt and instead of a journey taking hours or days it can take seconds.
I’m still experimenting with it and I can’t take anyone with me yet so it’s pretty useless for group travel.
It’s very easy to get lost though and isn’t something to be toyed with.
If you can’t create your own paths through the void and don’t know exactly where you’re going then you run the risk of either wondering the void for the rest of your life or exiting somewhere you really don’t want to be.
Most of the splits have wards on them that prevent you from stepping through them.
Otherwise any void traveller would be able to get in or out of anywhere.
The academy has wards preventing people from using the void to get in but not stopping them from using the void to move around once they’re inside. ” He explains.
“I knew it!” I suddenly exclaim making him jump since it was clearly not the response he was expecting. “That’s how you keep fucking appearing out of nowhere, literally!”
“Dude!” Erin admonishes me as she nudges me in the side.
“Sorry.” I say sheepishly. “What I meant to say was that is pretty fucking awesome. I have five gifts, I think,” I frown.
“Five!!” he exclaims wide-eyed. “What do you have?”
“Yep, goddess mission remember.” I chuckle and he just rolls his eyes. “Fire, earth, telekinesis, premonitions and telepathy. Although I haven’t heard anything from anyones head but my own since my gifts were unbound.” I finish curiously, I actually hadn’t given it a second thought until now.
“You are far to nonchalant about that whole goddess thing.” He grins.
“From what I understand your telepathy will work differently than your other gifts. It’s like a muscle that won’t work properly until you stetch and use it.
It’s the hardest one out of all of them to master.
” He explains and I nod. That makes sense although it is annoying, he turns to Erin. “How many do you have?” he asks Erin.
“I don’t know. Since Sage turned us, we haven’t had a chance to explore what gifts I may have, apart from the water obviously.”
“What are we waiting for then?” He asks excitedly.
“Good question.” I agree and we all stand up.
“So where do I start?” Erin asks.
“I don’t know.” I shrug.
“So helpful.” She chuckles and we both turn to look at Cole, hoping he has any sort of suggestion.
“All I can suggest is that you try to use them and see what happens. Like you try to create a SMALL,” He emphasis the word, “tornado using air or lift something of the ground with telekinesis. You’re strong enough that if it doesn’t work we can assume that you don’t have that gift, not that you have a lack of power. ”
“Ok that sounds doable. What do we start with?”
“How about Telekinesis? That way Sage can practice too and I’ll give you a quick demonstration of how my void powers work?” Cole offers.
“Do that first!” I say excitedly, making Cole chuckle and Erin roll her eyes grinning at my impatience.
Cole grins wider clearly happy that he can finally share his gifts with someone.
A black split opens up in the vacant air next to him.
I share a look with Erin, the inky blackness looks like what was spread out behind the creature we fought last night.
Cole steps through it and pops back up just behind us.
“Ok I thought you’d have a better reaction than that?” He says, “What’s wrong?”
“You know the creature we told you we fought in the instructor wing of the castle?” Erin says.
“Yeah,” he replies sounding confused, “what about it?”
“Well the whole corridor was blocked off with this inky darkness that looked exactly like that. Only way bigger and when we finally defeated the thing the inky darkness disappeared taking the serpent with it.” I explain.
“How is that possible?” He asks shocked, “That absolutely sounds like someone using the void in order to transport that thing but as far as I’m aware the academy is heavily warded, which would mean someone would have to use the void to move it within the school.
Which begs the question, how the fuck did they get that thing on campus in the first place?
” He says pacing as he tries to puzzle it out.
“Another mystery to add to the ever growing pile. I have a feeling that whoever is behind it is the same person that Nicole warned us about.” I say.
“There’s not much we can do about it now so I suggest that we get back to practicing. I really want to find out what gifts I have.” Erin says.
“Yeah you’re right. Come on then my witchy bitch move stuff with your mind.” I chuckle trying to lighten the mood.
“You realise you’re a witch bitch too right?” Cole grins.
“Yep and you!” Erin smirks, making us laugh.
“Alright stop stalling, here I’ll go first.” I say.
I focus on my magic and not really knowing how to do it on purpose I just ask it to lift our coke cans off the floor. Sure enough they do so easily and I grin getting excited.
“Whoa Sage remember your gift’s are connected to your emotions.” Cole yelps as an over excited can smacks into the wall by his head.
“Whoops!” I say wincing as soda drips down the wall.
I focus on calming my emotions and lower the cans to the floor with a thump, a lot less gentle than I had intended.
“Note to self, you may be on a goddess mission but you need to learn control and finesse just like the rest of us.” Cole smirks and I stick my middle finger up at him in amused retaliation.
“Go on Erin, just don’t get too excited or anything.” I say, ignoring her smirk and Cole’s snicker.
Erin takes a deep breath and focuses on the cans. After a few seconds it’s clear nothing is going to happen.
“Ok next one.” She says not deterred in the slightest.
We spend the next hour or so running through as many of the gifts as possible none of them triggering anything and by the end of it, she’s become extremely frustrated and I don’t blame her.
“Why isn’t this working!” She yells getting worked up as me and Cole watch her pace.
“I have an idea. There’s a couple of others that are rarer that we haven’t tried yet. It’ll take more than just trying to bring them out though, I have an idea of how to do it but just don’t smite me ok?” He mutters quietly so Erin can’t hear and I nod.
I trust him.
He picks up a spare soda can that we brought in and throws it at Erin.
“Erin!” He yells at the last second.
Erin’s eyes widen as it comes soaring towards her and I itch to stop it but I hold firm in my trust in Cole.
Less than a second before the can makes contact with Erin’s face and no doubt knock her the fuck out, she flings her hands out and a dome of gold and red magic surrounds her, the can hits with a harmless thud but dents, showing exactly how hard Cole threw it, I turn and raise my eyebrow at him.
“I had to throw it hard or her shield wouldn’t have come out to protect her,” he explains and I nod in agreement.
“Fair enough.” I smirk, “You’re fucking lucky I trust you though.” I chuckle making him blanch.
“Guys!” Erin yells and my attention switches back to her, still surrounded by the red and gold dome of her magic. “What the hell just happened?”