Chapter 63: Like Nothing She’d Ever Felt Before

They took their journey in a hard westerly direction – away from the black streams and the Deep Scar Mountains from which they flowed. Their little band made its way through a sparsely populated region of the Lowlands, with few distractions for mind and soul, and Miro noticed that it was only towards the end of the day, when the mountains were tucked safely away beneath the eastern horizon, when some of the tension left Hima.

They camped that night at the entrance of a cave – the kind that seemed to be in great abundance in the rocky landscape of the Lowlands – but not before checking for any current tenants, such as bears, or worse.

Again Hima picked a more distant spot form their camp to set up their training session – a trend Miro thought could be explained not only by her newfound conspiratorial nature that excluded Nydra and Peteri, but also because now that Miro could actually hit a target, their practices involved a higher chance of flying debris.

“You feeling good?” he asked, finding that she purposefully took up a position that had her back turned to the east.

“I admit – so soon for a whole day’s ride was probably not the best idea.”

“We could’ve stopped after lunch.”

“You’re kidding, right? Have you seen the look of relief on Nydra’s face now that we’re riding again? I couldn’t bear to do that to her.” Miro figured it had more to do with the line of the Mountains being still visible in the distance at the time, but wasn’t going to press it. “Now let’s hurry up and get some rest,” Hima continued. “I’m sure Peteri will relish the opportunity to wake you up in the dead of night.”

“Hey, can you do something for me first?” The thing about riding with a silent partner is that one’s brain has far too much room to roam free and find itself in odd places. “Can you bring up a stationary target for me about where that rock is?”

“Sure …” Hima said, sounding anything but. “What do you have in mind?” she asked, but brought up the requested target before hearing his answer.

“Just something I’ve been dying to try these last couple of hours.” Miro stretched his arms in front of him, palms together, fingers pointing towards the target. Wisely, Hima took a few steps away from him.

Since no one was willing to teach him how to be a magus, or rather, the one person with any first-hand experience being deceased, Miro was left to ponder on his own the potential extent of such powers. A thought had struck him earlier, and though he had been obsessing over it for many miles, he found that bringing the thought to life was more difficult than he had expected. At first, he stood immobile for some time, arms still outstretched, feeling more and more ridiculous with each passing second. The feeling he was struggling with was akin to patting your head and rubbing your stomach at the same time – two tasks that were simple enough but that fought for dominance when attempted together. He could sense Hima standing there, looking on with a mix of curiosity and impatience, which certainly didn’t help matters.

Stubbornly, he persisted, until it was as if his mind had built a wall between the two tasks, allowing him to concentrate on each one individually. Fire came to his right hand while lightning moved down to his left, the two powers combining where his hands touched until both spells could no longer be contained. The resulting force nearly knocked Miro over as an electrified fireball shot out of both his hands and in the direction of the target. It missed, grazing its side, and for a terrified moment Miro thought he broke himself and somehow caused the return of his debuff. Relief came when no threatening message appeared and he realized this was no more sinister than just being off his mark.

“Huh,” Hima said beside him, and coming out of her mouth it sounded like the equivalent of an ecstatic exclamation.

“I can’t believe that worked,” Miro said as he examined his hands, which seemed to go through the process no worse for wear than when he used his powers one at a time.

“Me neither,” Hima said and approached the dinged target, running her fingers along the melted scar Miro’s electrified fireball left. “Can you do it again?”

“I think so?”

“Then go, at me.”

“Excuse me, what?”

Hima planted both boots firmly into the ground and squared her shoulders in his direction. “I said to fire it at me.”

Just a couple of weeks ago, Miro would have probably relished the opportunity, and now he was wondering if the ordeal with the black stream left Hima thinking straight.

“Is that such a good idea?” he asked, “You know, because of –”

“If any of the words about to come out of your mouth include any variation of ‘state’ or ‘weakened’ then you will quickly regret finding out how misplaced your concerns are.”

“Okay, okay,” Miro said, putting up his hands before bringing them again in front of him, his fingers now squarely pointed at Hima’s chest, as the icewinder stood beside the still standing ice target.

Part of Miro knew that at his level 8, he probably posed as much danger to Hima as the roasted rat had posed him. Still, there was something fundamentally wrong about aiming at her and intending to use a power he himself had only just discovered.

Noticing that he was standing there without anything happening for even longer than when he first tried it, Hima said in a softer tone, “Miro, can you trust me?”

“Been doing nothing but,” he said, arms still outstretched.

“Good, so trust me now.”

With a deep breath, Miro felt the wall being put up in his mind, his powers responding to his bidding, and another merged lightning bolt and fireball, even more powerful than the previous one, came shooting out of his hands. Diregarding her assurances, Miro was intentionally aiming slightly to Hima’s right, but despite his best efforts, because he had poor control over this power, the projectile hurtled square at her head.

As casually as waving away a too-friendly butterfly, Hima flicked her wrist and summoned a hefty ice shield – at least in inch thick, and tall enough to protect her from her head down to her toes. He shouldn’t have been surprised, yet he was, that the shield absorbed his spell so easily that Hima didn’t even flinch, even though he himself was again almost knocked down by the power of the casting. The shield also didn’t seem to have taken on any damage, dissipating the impact throughout its surface, which reminded him of the way the walls in the rocky labyrinth near Akaseeya’s temple reacted to his powers. Hima reabsorbed the entire shield into her hand and then gave it a long look.

“Interesting,” Hima said, her voice distant. “Nothing like I’ve ever felt before.”

“I’m assuming that’s a good thing otherwise I’m sure you’d have more choice words to follow up with.”

“Oh come now, Miro,” Hima said, lowering her hand and meeting his gaze, “Not everything coming out of my mouth is criticism.”

“Really? Could have fooled me.”

There was something quite disarming about Hima’s expression just then, and that is that it looked to Miro that she was actually smiling. In her case, it just meant that she was not actively frowning, but Miro found that to be good enough. It was as if his electrified fireball, as it made its way from him to her, had dissolved most of the tension that had remained between them.

“Alright then,” Hima said, throwing up both hands and summoning a saucer-sized shield to each one, “I think this is something we should both be practicing.”