Chapter 24
Tino
Altair looked all too pleased with himself as we made our way towards the training grounds.
He’d decided on one nipple ring, asking Wilston kindly if he could add stones to both ends.
Niam had been ready to remove his pain, but since it was such a small hole, the skin healed almost instantly on his body now that he had a little magic again.
This caused him to be even braver and much to my dismay, but also my hidden pleasure, he’d made himself a piercing alone in the bathroom, one I’d yet to see for myself.
But also one which I had a good idea where was located.
“This is huge!” Niam exclaimed, his excitement obvious as he almost ran the last feet into the training grounds. It had to be twice the size of the last place and with over one hundred dummies. It must’ve taken them hours to make all those.
Nujik laughed, pleased to see how excited we were to get started. “We’ll make sure the dummies get replaced every night so you can train daily.”
“Cool,” Xarius grinned, looking all too pleased seeing Niam light up from excitement.
“Julie, you stay here with me. I want to explain a few things about your role while they practice.” She simply nodded and stayed with Nujik while the rest of us entered the grounds.
We had our familiars with us, but we still weren’t certain if they should be training with us until tomorrow, so for now we decided to let them watch as we tried different combinations of our magic.
The book seemed to be our biggest help in knowing what we could do with two elements at once, and together with all four.
It even said that if we were all connected by touch, we could reach the fifth element, it just didn’t say what the fifth element was.
“I think Altair and Tino should go first,” Xarius said, smacking Niam’s ass when he reached him.
“Show us what you got!” Silver cheered, making us all laugh.
He hadn’t said anything, but I knew Tair was worried about messing up again.
He’d at least tried out his elemental magic twice today, which had both gone extremely well.
Or at least it seemed that way. I’d yet to see the evidence in his pants, after all.
“Together?” Tair asked, reaching for my hand and looking so nervous, I couldn’t do anything else than grab onto his hand and show him I was with him. He had my support. Always.
A laugh escaped me before I could stop it.
“What?” he asked, grinning, too, without even knowing why.
“That was the exact words I spoke to you before we rode down the hill and I broke my arm.” He burst out laughing, the memory clear in my mind was now undoubtedly playing in his too.
“Let’s just hope this doesn’t end up like that,” he said, wiping a hand over his face.
“I’ll protect you if it does,” I said, meaning every word. I would gladly break my arm if it meant he wouldn’t be hurt.
The smile he gave me was everything. So full of love and trust. It was one I’d seen many times before today, but each time I felt like I’d been given a gift. Having that smile aimed at me? It was love.
“Let’s start with earth.” Ignoring my fluttering stomach, I refocused on training. “I can add wind to it. Say if you make tiny wooden stakes, I can use wind magic to throw them at the dummies.”
His eyes lit up and he nodded eagerly. With his hand in mine and a clear picture of what we wanted to make together, small dark wooden stakes were created and then, I willed my wind magic to dart them forward.
As fast as possible they flew through the air, making a swooshing sound just before impact.
The dummies broke apart from the force, causing ten to be cut open at once.
“Damn!” Silver exclaimed proudly behind us. “We’ve never tried that before.”
“The book,” Tair grinned proudly.
“I think we all need to read that one, then,” Niam said thoughtfully.
“We can do a reading every night, perhaps one of us can read aloud and the rest of us listen?” I suggested. “It would save us time doing it this way, and then we could discuss what we learn and what to practice the next day.”
“That sounds good to me,” Xarius said, while the others nodded in agreement.
“Should we try lightning now?” Tair pointed to the far left of the dummies.
“If we focus on those, it should be safe.” Nodding, I got into position, hoping we wouldn’t do any damage to others.
Lightning was one of the most powerful things we could do together, heat and cold mixed and then wind magic to steer.
The book had said it took focus and precision to master lightning, something I hoped we could do perfectly.
It wouldn’t be good for Tair if we messed up our magic today.
He needed more wins to erase the earthquake error.
I grabbed his hand and followed his gaze, focusing on what our target should be. “The middle one,” I said, hoping he caught on to what I wanted to do.
“Even after all these years we still think alike,” he said, amused.
I focused my energy on the one I had in mind, making its head catch fire. “Ready?”
“Ready,” he agreed, and then we merged our magic.
Hot and cold. Raising our free hands, we directed our building powers and then we let go.
A booming thunder sound reverberated around us followed by a crackling sound accompanied by our lightning strike.
It only took a split second, but the dummies were all torn to shreds, eviscerated by our powers alone.
“That was amazing,” I breathed in awe, looking at the burnt ground that held the fried dummies.
“I want to try with ice this time,” he said, a determined glint in his eyes as he refocused on the dummies. “I can make ice spears and then you’ll do the rest.” Chuckling and feeling so much pride for my man, I nodded and got into position again.
We trained for five hours before Willow told us it was time for dinner.
She’d thankfully known we wanted privacy so she had our food delivered to our house.
We were now sitting around our dinner table, enjoying a delicious roast with potatoes and gravy.
Julie was asked to join Willow and Nujik for a conversation about her role in this, so it was only us six in the house.
“Do you think Julie will be able to do it? Help us win, I mean,” Niam asked.
“I doubt others have ever been in her position,” Xarius said. “All of this is trial and error. But one thing I’m certain of, is that Julie will do everything in her power to help us win.”
“Do you think they’ll try to convince her not to do it?” Silver voiced the thought I had myself.
“I hope not,” Xarius sighed. “I want our anchor to be someone we all trust, and even though all the mages here are with us that doesn’t erase the fear that they could betray us in the middle of the fight. Julie, on the other hand, I trust with everything I am.”
“I want it to be Julie, too,” I said, needing the others to know I was all in with her, too. I was the one who knew her the least, so it was important to me they knew I trusted her.
“So, we agree to tell her we still only want her no matter what they say tonight?” Silver asked, looking at all of us as we nodded in agreement.
“But we might need to practice with her, so we know how much she can manage,” Wilston said.
“Fuck,” Xarius muttered. “What if she can’t do it?”
“Then we’ll figure it out before we face the council,” Niam said, taking his bonded’s hand affectionally. Xarius grabbed on and gave Niam a soft smile in return.
“Now,” Silver clapped his hands excitedly. “Who wants to be the one reading to us?” His eyes sparkled with humor as he watched all of us. It seemed none of us wanted the honors. He sighed. “Fiiiiine. I’ll do it, then.”
I shared a relieved smile with the others as we followed Silver to our new living room. It had three couches, which meant that for once we could all be comfortable. The cabins had served their purpose, but some of us always had to sit on the floor, which wasn’t comfortable at all.
The light outside was dimming, something I’d forgotten about our home world.
The sun was always setting around eight pm this time of year.
A few small lamps were neatly placed around the room, making it cozy and warm.
I grabbed the blankets from a basket that stood to the side, and threw Xarius and Wilston one each, then grabbed the last one for me and Tair to share.
Silver had grabbed the book from our room and was now sitting next to Wilston.
We’d each grabbed our own couch, snuggling together like it was a movie night.
I found I loved this, and wanted more of it.
All six of us together in our own home. I hoped they wanted us to live in one big house in the future.
The thought of us living apart was hard, which should’ve been weird, but considering our long history together, being reborn with our souls the same, it made sense we needed to be together. Maybe Julie could move in too.
Silver opened the book and began reading.