THIRTY-SEVEN. Training

POV - Lillia

We watch as Dad walks back inside the building.

“Hmm, you don’t look much like a princess to me. You definitely don’t walk like one,” Dandelia smirks, looking up and down at me. I stand there stupidly, not saying anything.

“I bet you don’t have any powers, either. Good luck with that,” Dandelia states, smiling malevolently at Siofra. The other two girls giggle, and I shake my head.

“Come on, Lillia, let’s get out of here,” Siofra says, taking my arm and leading me away.

“What a loser,” Dandelia says as we leave. Penny growls in my head, and I try to calm her down.

“What’s with her?” I ask when we enter a small clearing.

“She has power issues. Her clan is one of the biggest,” Siofra says, shrugging her shoulders.

“I wouldn’t take it to heart,” Siofra says, finding a spot and sitting cross-legged on the ground.

“Come, sit. I want to view your channels,” Siofra adds, indicating that I sit opposite her.

“My channels?”

“Hmm-Hmm. I’m an animus fay. Now close your eyes, and concentrate on your breathing,” she tells me. I do as she says, picking the blades of grass as I go.

“Stop,” Siofra smiles, tapping my knee with her hand.

“Put your hands on your knees and breathe in, counting one, two, three, and then breathe out, one two three,” she tells me. I nod, place my hands on my knees, and close my eyes again.

I breathe in through my nose, one, two three, and out through my mouth, one, two, three. I begin to feel my body calm, and relax, as I continue to concentrate on my breathing. As I breathe, I notice the glands under my jaw, armpits, and groin begin to heat up. It’s not painful, but it’s a bit of a surprise. I furrow my brow as the heat increases in temperature, and I open my eyes to see Siofra sitting opposite me, a smile on her face.

“Shit!” I yell in surprise as Siofra opens her eyes, the blue pools of colour glowing.

“Wow, you were blocked up,” Siofra smiles at me.

“What?” I ask, making Siofra laugh.

“You may be a strong half-wolf, but your fay half is also strong. It just needed a bit of cleansing. All good now,” she smiles, getting up.

“Is that all?”

“For today. I’m hungry; let’s get some lunch,” Siofra smiles, offering her hand to help me stand up.

“But I just had breakfast,” I complain.

“Breakfast was hours ago. It’s almost two,” Siofra says, looking at the watch on her wrist. I must look puzzled because Siofra laughs again.

“Fay watch. We have time here too, you know?” she grins.

Siofra leads me away from the castle, following pathways leading towards houses.

“I’m not a Duchess, unlike Dandelia and her friends. I’m just a plain fairy who lives in the Royal clan with my family,” Siofra explains when I ask her where we are going.

As we walk past houses, I see children playing in the front yard, and they smile and say hello to Siofra as we walk past. She introduces me to Mrs Woodbloom, who smiles at us.

“Can you tell Finch to come home?” Siofra asks.

“Will do. Nice to meet you, Lillia,” Mrs Woodbloom says.

“Nice to meet you, too, Mrs Woodbloom,” I agree.

“Oh please, call me Darla,” Mrs Woodbloom replies. I smile and nod as we leave.

“Who is Finch?” I ask.

“One of my brothers,” Siofra explains.

“One of?”

“Yup. I’m there’s Bear, my brother who’s the oldest, me, then my sister Tansey, Nyx, my brother who is fifteen. My sister Petal is twelve, and then Finch is ten.” Siofra says as we walk into her house.

“Hi, I’m Petal, mum set a plate for you already,” Petal says, running up to us. I raise my eyebrows at Siofra, who smiles.

“Mum has the power of premonition. We knew you were coming for lunch weeks ago,” Siofra explains.

“Yes, which is why we all had to be here,” a teenage boy with short black hair and blue eyes like Siofra complains.

“That’s Nyx,” Petal says, grabbing my hand and leading us to the table.

“Lillia! Welcome to my home. I’m Bryla, Siofra’s mother. Unfortunately, my mate, Elliot, can’t be here,” Bryla, Siofra’s mum, greets.

“Hi,” I reply, taking a seat at the table.

“Help yourself,” Bryla says after each of Siofra’s siblings introduces themselves. I nod and grab a bread roll from the bowl, buttering it and filling it with salad and ham for a sandwich.

//\\///\\\//\\

“Just imagine the molecules of everything around you. Notice their properties. Can you see them?”

“Aha,” I reply. I’m meditating, sitting opposite Siofra again.

“Good. Now see their differences? I want you to identify them. Tell me what you see.”

“I see spheres, linked together… they’re… they’re different colours, and, and they smell different…I see them floating around me, underneath me. Some are squished together… some not…”

“Good, good,” Siofra says, a smile in her voice.

“Now think of what they are; identify them. What are they?”

“Um. Dirt. Rocks. Seeds. I see water… flowing. Forming. I see dust in the air, pollen… floating on oxygen bubbles, and carbon dioxide. It’s beautiful,” I remark. Everything has a colour, a slight hue that differentiates them.

“Good, now reach out with your mind, with your body. Imagine moving a small amount through your fingers. Without touching, imagine picking up the dirt, forming a wall….”

As Siofra talks, I listen and follow her instructions. It’s taken days for me to get to this point, and each time we meet, I feel myself getting stronger.

“Build the wall around us. Keep building it. Higher. Taller. Keep going.”

I imagine a wall of dirt forming around us. I imagine its height and build a roof from the walls. Then I imagine the dirt going hard, turning into rock. As I imagine this, my senses are on high alert. I can hear the sound of movement around me and feel the shade of the wall as it blocks the sun.

“Open your eyes,” Siofra instructs. I flick my eyelids open, and my wolf senses kick in. Everything is dark, but with my wolf’s night vision, I can see Siofra clearly. She’s smiling.

“Dam, I think you’re my best student yet.”

“Thanks,” I say, looking around the rock bubble I’ve encased us in.

“Now for phasing,” Siofra mumbles.

“What?” I ask, hearing her.

“Close your eyes again,” Siofra instructs. I close my eyelids shut.

“Now I want you to imagine the ball we’re in floating.”

I open my eyes and look at her.

“Everything is fluid. It’s just your perspective, remember?” Siofra tells me. I nod. We’d talked about how faeries’ perception of the world enables our powers. This is at the root of fairy power. When I asked why fairies could only control one element, Siofra explained that this has much to do with the fairies’ genetics and DNA. It’s when fairies believe they can that their powers ignite. If I think I can, I can.

“Close your eyes again. Imagine the ball beginning to float.”

In my mind’s eye, I see the particles shifting around the ball, and I push the ball upwards by moving air below it. I hear the ball shift from its position on the ground. The ball is heavy, and I concentrate, furrowing my brows as I will it upwards.

“Okay, how high are we?” Siofra asks.

“Uh, a metre, I think,” I say, looking outward at the circular rock floating in the air. I can see Fay walking towards us. The ball has caught their attention.

“Higher.”

I nod and furrow my brow again, concentrating on pushing the ball upwards, higher in the air.

“Stop,” Siofra instructs. When she places her hands on mine, I open my eyes and look at her. She looks excited.

“Okay, now I want you to phase. Think about floating through the ball, settling us back on the ground again. You can go slow or fast; it’s up to you.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“Phase. Perception, remember?”

I nod and close my eyes again. With Siofra’s hands on my own, I imagine our bodies floating through the bottom of the sphere, the particles supporting us as we sink to the ground.

The sound of applause catches my ears, and I open up and see the fairies I had previously seen through my mind’s eye clapping as they watch us. Siofra is clapping too. We’re both sitting on the ground in the middle of the field, in a slight dip of the earth made when the ball of rock began to float.

“That was wonderful!” Siofra laughs. I smile at her enthusiasm.

Looking upwards, I see the sphere I made hanging above us. If I think it, I can do it, I tell myself. Lifting my hand up, I imagine the particles making up the sphere stirring around each other, breaking apart, and then I send the particles swiftly to the ground. The earth underneath Siofra and I rumbles from the impact, but Siofra grins.

“We can work on your execution later,” Siofra smiles.

“Let’s go see the guard. Bear tells me Elijah is doing well,” Siofra tells me as she offers her hand to help me stand up.

“He’s enjoying the training,” I reply as we walk to the training rooms. As we walk, Siofra tells me about her life growing up in the Royal Court. She is more informative than any of the books I studied back in my realm.

My naivety regarding my father’s position in the Fay world is an embarrassing but distant memory. To me, anyway. Elijah and my grandmother teased me about my mistake a little bit afterwards, and Dad just shook his head and hugged me affectionately. Anyway, I learned that the girls that Siofra were with when I first met her were all daughters of Dukes and Duchesses. Dukes and Duchesses are the equivalents of Alphas and Lunas (and I did not reveal to Siofra at all my differing thoughts when I first arrived!).

Unlike wolf packs, Fairy clans do not have a second in command. They do have groups of fairies with different titles of nobility, like a caste or class system. After the Dukes and Duchesses are Marquess, Marchioness, and then there are Barons and Baronesses. Every fairy after them is considered common fay, which Siofra told me she fell into. In my realm, Siofra explained, they didn’t have Marquess or Barons. This is because they are appointed by the King only, and the few there live in her realm.

“What about clans? Who helps run them?” I ask.

“Each clan has a council of representatives. They are usually the Elder Fay from their clans. Council representatives are interviewed in, kind of like humans do it.”

I nod, trying to understand what she means. Because my old pack treated omegas the way they did, we were told what our jobs would be; we never got to choose or try out for them. Even at Redwood, I didn’t interview for the position I worked in; I just asked if I could and was accepted.

We walk into the training arena, and I see two fairies sparring in the pit below.

“Do you think Elijah is here?” Siofra asks. I scan the crowd and shrug my shoulders.

“Okay,” she says. We watch two fays sparring; one is an air fay and the other an earth fay. The air fay kept throwing wind balls at the earth fay, who responded by creating walls of dirt to block him.

“That is so cool,” I comment.

“Yeah,” Siofra sighs, looking over at the males.

“Have you found your mate yet?” I ask.

“No. He’s not from the Royal Clan. But it’s cool. I’m only nineteen. Some Fay don’t find their mates till they’re eighty.”

“What?” I ask, making Siofra laugh.

“How old do you think my parents are?”

“Um…”

“Mum is fifty-six, and dad is one-hundred and three. They met when Dad was seventy. Fairies live a long time, you know,” Siofra tells me. I picture Siofra’s mum in my head. She doesn’t look in her fifties, but I guess that’s considered very young for Fay.

“Hmm,” I say, taking in the familiar scent of lavender and pinecones. I watch Elijah enter the arena, dressed only in black cargo pants.

“Oh, this should be good,” Siofra says as her brother Bear walks in after him.

~

Edited with Grammarly

~~

Síofra (phonetically: she-off-ra)