They both took a turn in the shower and broke off to the training rooms. Sylph took Delph’s book, and Damien called on Henry once they were alone.

“Well?” Damien asked. “Care to share your all-knowing thoughts?”

His shadow twisted up, breaking away and forming into a tiny sphere that sprouted three tentacles. Henry’s sharp-toothed face formed upon it, followed by two eyes and a pair of amusingly small wings.

“I think about a lot of fascinating things,” Henry said. “But on the topic of new spells, I have more than you could possibly learn. What we need to consider is not the strongest spell, but the one that would suit your style of fighting the best. It’s about time for you to start specializing.”

“Wouldn’t it be better to be good at everything?” Damien asked.

“Sure, if you had a thousand years to practice,” Henry said with a laugh. “And that would only be by human standards, not those of the Void or the Corruption. No, we don’t nearly have that much time.”

“Fair enough,” Damien said. “So what do you mean by specialize? I’m already mostly doing space magic. I could just keep doing that.”

“That’s just limiting your options,” Henry corrected. “Specialization isn’t the nature of the magic you use, although that can still tie into things. It’s the way you fight. Look at Sylph. She’s an assassin through and through. She has a few tools outside of that skillset like that black gauntlet, but her magic is either fast, stealthy, or survivability. The Corruption isn’t exactly something she chose, so we can’t count that.”

“I see what you’re getting at,” Damien said, rubbing his chin. “I don’t think I’m an assassin. That seems neat, and I could see myself fighting like that with Warp Step, but it doesn’t feel right. Space magic, particularly gravity, is really destructive. I’ve taken to it quite a bit.”

“That might be because you haven’t learned much outside of the field,” Henry pointed out. “But I agree with your first point. While you could learn to fight like Sylph, your talents could be used better elsewhere. You should be in the thick of the fight throwing Ether everywhere, not saving your energy for key moments.”

“I thought I was supposed to decide this,” Damien grumbled.

“Do you disagree with me? I’m only coming to that conclusion by reading your surface thoughts.”

“Well, no,” Damien admitted. “That sounds about right to me. But isn’t that kind of what I’m already doing? You control my mage armor which gives me defense, and the Gravity Spheres and Lances do a lot of damage in a large area.”

“They’re also slow and easy to avoid if you know what you’re doing,” Henry said, floating back and forth as if he were pacing. “Delph is right. You’re too predictable and your repertoire is too… flat. To my displeasure, I’ve come to realize that my own fighting style is partially at fault for this. For a Void creature, overpowering strength is an easy default. While I love discovering magic, I didn’t have a real need to worry about anything beyond crushing an opponent through sheer might.”

“Is that something we can use against that old Void guy that escaped the cave because of Delph and Dredd?” Damien asked.

“It Who Stills the Seas? Absolutely,” Henry confirmed. “Whenever he makes his move, that is. It’s impossible to say how long it’ll be until he does, though. We need to focus on you for now.”

“Fine. So I need some magic that’s good in the middle of a fight and is either fast or difficult to avoid,” Damien deduced. “And considering you probably had this whole conversation planned out already, I trust you’ve got a suggestion?”

“Two, actually,” Henry said with a smug grin. He crossed his tentacles in front of himself. “They’re called Haze and Wake.”

“Haze is probably something that makes it harder to hit me,” Damien guessed. “No clue about Wake though. It wouldn’t make sense for it to be another movement style spell, I already have Warp Step.”

“Wake is offensive,” Henry confirmed. “It’s a step up from what you’ve done so far, probably around the difficulty of Devour and Expunge, except it mixes two schools of magic. Namely, Dark and Space. Its purpose is to make a bunch of particles behind you. You’ll be able to control them as you get better at the spell until you can form a shadow that essentially mimics your attacks. It should be very disorienting and difficult to fight against.”

“That sounds strong,” Damien said, rubbing his chin as the familiar flicker of excitement welled up in his chest once more. “What about Haze?”

“It uses Dark magic to obscure your movements, making it harder for people to see where you are. If you get good enough at it, you can black out people’s vision of you entirely.”

“Eight Planes,” Damien said, considering the possibilities. “That would be incredible against anyone who doesn’t have spells with a big area of effect. I want to learn both of them.”

“I thought you would,” Henry replied with a chuckle. “But you’re going to have to choose one first. Try to learn too much at once and you’ll mix things up.”

“Wake, then,” Damien said after a few moments of deliberation. “Being hard to hit would be nice, but I’ve already got you and the mage armor. A new way to attack seems more prudent.”

“Not a bad conclusion.”

“Was that the one you were going to suggest I start with?”

“I wasn’t sure which one you should start with. This is your fighting style, not mine. These two spells work together pretty well, but the importance you place on them is entirely your gut feeling. Now, let’s get started.”

Henry sank back into Damien’s shadow, then sent his will out to take control of Damien’s body. Damien mentally took a step back, observing carefully as Henry cast out a net of mental energy, illuminating the room with golden strands.

“It occurs to me that you’ve yet to draw on Dark Ether,” Henry said.

How is that any different than just grabbing Space? Ether is Ether.

“Not exactly. I’m most practiced with Space magic, so your vision leans toward it as well. If you want to use Dark magic, you need to find the corresponding strands of Ether,” Henry said with Damien’s voice.

Damien’s eyes furrowed in concentration and the Ether around him rippled. He reached out and grabbed a golden line. “This has Dark Magic instead of Space. Can you tell the difference?”

Not even slightly. It’s just gold.

“Look at the pattern within it,” Henry said. “It’s tiny.”

He squinted at the line, bringing it right up before Damien’s nose. Even with Henry’s help, it took him a moment to spot them. Miniscule runes representing Dark flickered within the golden glow, pulsing in and out of existence.

Eight Planes, I never noticed this before. They’re so small.

“That’s because they weren’t necessarily there,” Henry said. “I’m using my mental energy to call to Ether with Dark energy in it. The runes are my own energy identifying the strand. Since my natural state would call to Space instead of Dark, you don’t need to do more than you already do.”

I see. So how exactly are you using your mental energy to do that? Is it just like direct casting?

“Not really,” Henry said. “You aren’t actually communicating with the Ether when you do this. It’s more like you’re telling your own mind what to look for. It’s just a matter of practice. Let me get through the whole spell, and then you can ask questions after.”

Damien gave him a mental nod and Henry resumed, drawing the Dark Ether into Damien’s body. The mote of energy felt clammy as it ran down Damien’s arm and into his core. It floated a short distance away from all the Space Ether, as if it didn’t want to mix.

“Ether types reject each other,” Henry said. “That’s why casting spells with two different types is more difficult. However, with sufficient mental energy, we can force it to bend to our will.”

He took the Dark Ether and a mote of Damien’s normal Space Ether, then pulled them out into his palm. Henry worked the tiny sparks of energy, melding them together into a churning ball that sent jolts of lightning racing through Damien’s body.

Two tiny orbs of black and purple light formed above Damien’s hand. Henry’s mental energy plucked and pulled at them, forcing the light together and creating a pair of interlocked runes.

“Keep the shape in mind,” Henry said. “I’ve forced each type of Ether into a rune, then forced them together so that neither can diffuse because it’s trapped by the other. You’ll obviously have to do this within yourself, I’m just showing you what to do as an example.”

Henry let the magic disperse, then drew another mote of Dark Ether into him and restarted the process. This time, he left the Ether in Damien’s body. It was difficult for Damien to tell when his companion finished the spell, but Henry eventually brought the magic up to Damien’s palm.

He traced a line through the air. A perfect replica of Damien’s arm, made up of thousands of tiny black and purple specks, followed after it a second later. Henry moved around for a few seconds, letting Damien observe the artificial shadow tracing his actions.

“I’ll do it a few more times so you can try to get more of a feel for it before giving it a shot yourself,” Henry said before doing just that.

He then returned Damien’s body to him and let the boy take his own shot at the spell. Damien ran into difficulty almost immediately. Despite Henry’s words, shifting the way he looked at the Ether proved significantly more difficult than he had expected.

It took a severe headache and over three hours of constantly trying to coax his mental Energy into identifying the Dark Ether before he finally managed to spot a flicker of a Dark rune on one of the strands of Ether.

“That’s it?” Damien exclaimed, wincing as his loud voice jabbed into his head like rusty spikes. “It’s so simple! Why does it work like that?”

Henry snorted. “I’m not philosophical. Don’t ask me.”

Damien paused, a thought pushing past the pain bouncing around his head. “Wait, are there Gods? You would probably know about that, right? With the whole Cycle thing–”

“Don’t ask that question,” Henry said flatly. “I’m not answering it. You don’t want the answer to it. Also, you’re talking out loud again.”

Damien opened his mouth to respond, then grimaced. He scurried off to the shower, letting the healing water sooth his head for a few minutes before he tried forming coherent thought again.

He considered asking Henry why the topic was so taboo, but decided against it. Henry had been honest with him for some time now. If there was something that bad about pressing that particular question, he trusted his companion enough to leave it be. Instead, Damien returned his attention to learning how to cast Wake.

Now that he could actually see the Dark Ether, it was trivial to draw it into his Core. Instead of trying to form it within himself, he copied what Henry had done the first time and brought it out over his hand so he could see what he was doing.

Mixing the two types of Ether proved significantly more difficult than Damien had expected. It was like trying to pinch two skinned grapes between his fingers. The energy slipped and warped in every manner except the one that Damien wanted it to.

“Is it actively working against me?” Damien asked in exasperation.

“You’re giving it too much leeway,” Henry said. “Control it with your mental energy. Don’t just push in one direction. Completely enclose it and squeeze the Ether into a mold.”

Damien grunted in a mixture of annoyance and understanding. Individually, he had no trouble forming both runes. The problem arose when he tried to mix them, which resulted in everything either falling apart or warping beyond usability. It took him several dozen more attempts and a little over two hours before he managed to get the Ether to begin to show semblances of following his requests.

By the time he did, his heading was pounding with such a horrible headache that he immediately headed straight back to the shower. Once the pain receded enough for him to think straight, Damien flopped into his bed and fell asleep.

Henry woke him several hours later with a mental poke. He groaned, not opening his eyes. His bed felt warmer and comfier than usual, and he could still feel the aftereffects of the mental exertion rattling around his head.

Eh? What is it?

“I’m pretty sure you’ve got people headed for your door,” Henry replied. “I can’t tell more than that. They aren’t drawing much Ether, so I’m pretty sure it’s Nolan and the others. I thought you might want to be awake before they arrived.”

Damien reluctantly opened his eyes and quickly discovered the reason that his bed was more attractive than normal. Sylph shifted, looking up at him.

“Henry heard them coming?” she asked, unentangling herself from him.

“Yup,” Damien said with a reluctant sigh. Now he wanted to leave even less, but it wouldn’t be fair to back out now. “Did your training go well?”

“As well as I could expect,” Sylph said. “I read through Delph’s book a little, but I’m going to focus on a full manifestation before I start working with that.”

“Probably a good idea,” Damien said. “Henry is still working on mine.”

“Has anyone ever told you how unfair it is that Henry actually does half the work?” Sylph asked. “My companion tries to help, but it cant just create the full manifestation on its own.”

“I’ll have you know I do much more than half,” Henry said indignantly, his voice emerging from a tiny mouth at the edge of Damien’s shadow. Damien squished it.

They climbed out of bed and Damien brushed his hands through his hair, trying to smooth it out a little.

No more than a second later, someone rapped on their door. Sylph pushed it open.

“I hope I’m not here to early,” Nolan said. Reena peeked over his shoulder, but Nolan pushed her back down. “We can come back later if needed.”

“No, now is fine,” Damien said, hiding a yawn. “Sorry, I’ve been training a bit. Is everyone else here yet?”

“Kind of,” Nolan said. “They’re trying to convince Mark to come. He wants to train instead.”

“Oh, this aught to be fun,” Damien said with a chuckle. “Let’s go, then. I want to see.”