“Teleportation requires grounding. You need to feel the earth below and see the sky above.” Eje sits directly in front her childhood dreams coming to life, her expression rapt. Salaya sits to her right, Ariel to her left.

“Is that why you said you couldn't teleport out of the cave?”

“Yes. It's also harder at night when your surroundings are dark. Light is the friend of teleportation.”

“Ugh, hold on. They're back.” Eje follows Salaya's gaze to a group of four watching from a safe distance. They look away a little too quickly.

Octave frowns at the interruption. “Does it bother you that much?”

“It should bother you more. They aren't watching us three.”

“I don't know who spread the rumour.” pouts Salaya. “I hope it wasn't Annya or Broga.”

“It doesn't matter who, Salaya. What matters is that Octave can't have a free moment at the castle.”

“Your concern is touching, but we have somewhat more important things to –”

“I'm going to talk to them.” Eje stands up and marches toward the four onlookers. They turn and hurry away. It's like a childhood game of tag. “Cowards.” Eje stomps back. “Come on. Let's find somewhere secluded before more show up.”

As they move into the forest, Eje doesn't need to check to know they're being followed. “Duck in here.” She pulls them behind a stand of trees, their leaves orange splashed with red and brown. “Wait a bit. A bit more.”

“Wait for what?”

“To confront them, Octave. This is for you.” Octave seems hardly impressed at the favour, but follows Eje, resigned to her fate. As the four grow near, Eje springs from the bush, dragging Octave with her. She snarls at them. “What do you want?”

Octave, her face stamped with a friendly smile, takes a more welcoming approach. “Is there anything I can help you with?”

The leader of the four stammers and looks to his teammates for support, but none is forthcoming. “Er, no. We were just...looking for something. Nevermind.” Eje crosses her arms.

One of them plucks up the courage to ask it. “Is it true you have wings?”

Octave stares his down for several seconds before answering, the smile gone. “Do you see wings?”

“Can you grow them out? And fly?”

Another pause. “People are too heavy to fly, even with wings. We lack the hollow bones and slender bodies of birds.”

“Does she look like she can grow wings and fly off?” demands Eje. The four exchange looks but have no answer to this. “No. So piss off.” She's said this so many times in the past week, she's starting to believe it too. And while she's suppressed the urge to ask, she knows she will. One day.

Deeper in the forest, where the creek trickles over a bed of autumn leaves, Octave gathers them again in a semi-circle. “As I was saying, you need to feel the earth below, not just under your feet, but supporting your body. You need to see the sky, not just over your head, but all around you.” She looks at each of them and Eje busies herself trying to feel the earth supporting her. She isn't sure if she got it. “A strong part of teleportation is envisioning, and there are two images you'll need. The first is where you are. The second is where you want to end up. Your destination isn't so strict with its parameters, but you'll still need a solid foundation under your feet. You can teleport into a building. Teleporting out of a building is considerably more difficult.”

“What if the building has windows looking out at the sky?”

“That might make it easier. A window in the roof would be ideal. These are things you'll need to get a feel for yourselves when you eventually learn this.”

“What do you mean by 'eventually'? How long will this take?”

“I was one of the faster learners. It took me about...” Octave looks up at the sky and starts counting. “thirty-five months before I could teleport short distances. Five years before I could make it a full league without help.” She looks at their crestfallen faces with hints of a smile tugging at her lips. “Are you surprised? How long did it take you to combine colour and fire magic, Salaya? Or you to launch dusk magic attacks from range, Eje? Or you to just project a shield, Ariel? Much of this will come from your ability to control magic, so if you practice as I taught you, that should help. If you can deflect magic,” her sweeping gaze rests on Salaya who smiles faintly with pride, “that demonstrates superior control.”

“What exactly do you mean by control? How much magic we can muster?”

“How much you can do with your magic. It isn't as though you gain more power as you improve. The greatest mages of our era have no more magic flowing through their bodies now than they did as children. It's about how much you can harness from dancing in your head to affecting the outside world. Magic in one sense is nothing more than bridging the gap between conjecture and reality. Imagined potential within becomes realised power without.” Octave pauses to let her words sink in. “Teleportation requires vast amounts of magic. The greatest practitioners with decades of experience can do it once a day without struggle. Twice will wear your body and mind out. Three times is about the limit. Don't look so glum. The upside is, with experience, you'll find covering great distances doesn't take much more out of you than short ones. Here's where we'll start.” With the toe of her boot, Octave clears the leaves off the dirt and in it draws a circle around her. She takes several steps forward and repeats the process.

“Can we all learn this? Or is it like the main branches of magic where people find some easier than others?”

“While I suspect aptitude plays a role, there's no doubt that some highly apt people go their entire lives mastering all sorts of magic, but not teleportation. However, my teachers, and by extension I, say that teleportation is a magic anyone can learn. That most mages go their entire lives without ever clearing the first step is indicative of the paucity of our schools and teachers.” She pauses again as though daring them to argue. They don't. “But there's only one to find out, and it begins now. The first step is proper envisioning. I stand in this circle and look to the other one. I memorise its every feature: the blades of grass around the edge, the colour of the dirt and the speckled rock buried in it. Then I look down at the circle I'm standing in and repeat the process. Don't worry about feeling the earth just yet. That's the next step. I look up to the sky above, to the clouds and their shapes, the position of the sun. It's easier when both spots are under the same sky. Then I close my eyes and do it all over again. Envision. The image in your mind must match the image in your eyes perfectly.”

They draw their own circles and follow Octave's instructions. Standing there, eyes taking in the grubby earth, then closed while she tries to picture it, Eje has never felt more silly. Birds are flying, leaves are dying, and they're standing amongst them, hands feebly at their sides as though playing a childhood game of hidden seeker. Other teams are training, or selecting missions, improving their standing. What would Captain Loswel say? Eje hears a rustling, movement in the trees nearby. Anger erupts over her eyes. Hissing, she snatches up a rock and hurls it with all the malice she can muster. There's no satisfactory yelp of pain to reward her accuracy, but a flurry of footsteps into the distance at least provides a modicum of relief. She's got a second rock ready to go, but they've retreated again. “Better keep moving.” Eje leads them on, not deeper into the forest but south toward the village of Lakeview. “We'll meet up with Trila. She won't gawk or ask silly questions.”

“All week long.” Salaya keeps checking over her shoulder in case they're being followed. “I'm starting to lose sleep over it.”

“Allowing others to control your life seems unhealthy.” observes Octave, following along with the air of someone curious to see where it all leads. It's all well for her to say that. She breezes by the onlookers, ignoring the stares, quelling gossip with a glance. The others are less resilient and far less imposing.

Once they step out of the treeline into the village outskirts, Eje's pace relaxes. She leads them down familiar streets where villagers dawdle in the morning sun or bury their hands in little square gardens. For the first time, she envies these people living in a world where magic extends only to the mundane and the outside world is gossiped about over weekly luncheons. She can almost hear them now: 'A winged woman ye say? Wut an oddity that would be. I'd give me pipe and and boots to meet a winged woman. Would be something worth talkin' about, it would.' She's having so much fun she doesn't hear Salaya at first.

“Eje. Eje! Where are you going?”

“Sorry, what?”

“We found Trila.” Trila stands behind her in the neatest black frock ever sewn. Her hair is smooth and her hands are folded on her stomach.

“I have a message for you, miss.” Even the note in her hand is perfectly folded.

“Where from?”

“From the lodestone, miss. For Team Twenty-Four. I've transcribed it.”

“You listened to our message?”

“Don't worry, Salaya. Trila understand the value of discretion better than any of us.” Eje unfolds the message. “It's from someone named 'Ogostinia'. Isn't that the plant woman you talked to in Salkrit?”

“It is!” Salaya perks up. “What does she say?”

Eje reads aloud. “To Salaya and Ariel of Lakeview. This is Ogostinia. I've made a significant discovery pertaining to the book you showed me. Although I was initially sceptical it would yield worthwhile results, I am beginning to suspect I underestimated its potential. I have ordered a mission from Lakeview with a special request for your team. If you are interested in pursuing this endeavour, I urge you accept. Ogostinia.”

Ariel says nothing but looks up at the sky with a smile. She could be excited about the message, or she could be imaging those firegems hidden under her bed.

Eje wracks her brain. “She told you two that the village book related to terraforming the desolation, didn't she? She sounds strange.”

“Aren't you interested in botanical magic too, Eje?”

“Of course not. Nobody normal is. I like a garden or a grove of trees as they are, without magic.”

“I'd like to see what she has to say.” says Octave.

“Then it's settled?” says Ariel. “I'm looking forward to meeting Ogostinia again.”

“What about teleportation?” asks Eje, searching for an excuse not to go. “We just started it, and we're already giving up.”

“We're not giving up. We can practise envisioning anywhere. Come on, Eje. This is important. Don't you remember the village?”

“I'll never forget the village.”

“All the more reason to come.”

Eje can't argue further. She knows better than to look to the implacable Trila for support. “Let's go check the mission board.”