Training like Trainers (Training)

[Ren Caverly]

Ren met this super amazing nice lady recently. She knew she sounded like a complete child, but she didn’t care. No one could hear Ren’s thoughts and that made them delightfully private. She rolled around in her bed a few times. It was daylight outside, and she didn’t want to end up in the bright lights. They’d probably burn her pale skin anyway. Kade told her that if she just stayed in the sun a little at a time she would get a tan, then her skin wouldn’t burn. Well he told her a lot of things, but it just wasn’t Ren. She was going to be shy and pale and alone until the day she died. Except for the nice lady, she hadn’t left Ren alone. Well, other Lamia Scale members were also there for Ren, but that wasn’t the point.

The point was that Ren was having a nice day, and she wasn’t going to ruin it by getting out of bed. Maybe that was unrealistic. She needed to get up…. In five minutes. Ren pulled the blankets up over her head with her shadow’s and moved her legs back and forth. The sheets needed washed. They’d be softer if she did laundry today. Fine, she thought with a sigh, finally slipping out of bed.

[Ren Caverly]

Her bare feet hit the floor and the immediate could made her want socks. Warm socks. Ren didn’t like the cold. She also didn’t like being weak, but she did like Kotone. Maybe she should… no, that was unthinkable. Ren didn’t do that. She was going to be weak and broken and weird and alone. Ren bit her lip, wiggling her toes slightly as she thought about Kotone. They weren’t friends, but Kotone had been so nice. She’d hung out with Ren even though the young woman was strange and… well, awkward. She’d helped her, and then they’d gone finishing. Maybe she’d never see Kotone again, maybe she would… Ren never knew. She always expected the worst and planned for even worse than that. Still, if she did see Kotone again, wouldn’t it be nice to make her proud? Ren wasn’t stupid, she wasn’t going to use a nice person as an excuse to be lazy and pathetic. No, she should… train. She gulped, she couldn’t remember a time she’d actually trained. She had survived and had to fend for herself, that was the only reason she ever got stronger in life, but not by training. What would training be like? Didn’t she need a partner for that? For… fighting? She gulped again, still rooted to the spot.

[Ren Caverly]

No silly… Ren told herself slowly, trying to decide how to go about this strange concept of training, it isn’t… fighting. That’s just what most people do with it. Its magic… magic is beautiful. Well, not my magic, but other people’s magic. My magic… she held out her hand, the flittering darkness extending past her fingers . First an inch, then two, then a whole extra foot of living shadow. It was almost her friend, if she could see it having a life of its own. Maybe it did, it moved like it did. The way she wanted, following her whims, but never quite that precise. Watching over her, protecting her, healing her, picking her up when no one else remained. Her parents had always said it wasn’t pretty. It was ugly, it was dark. Ren went stinging in her eyes and she couldn’t help but turn her eyes to the ground. Suddenly making eye contact with a shadow was too difficult. Ren was weak willed, but she couldn’t possibly lose an argument with herself, could she? She supposed that made no sense. My magic is mine. And it’ll be whatever I need it to be, she told herself, the darkness wiping away the small flicks of wetness on her face. Maybe if she said it over and over again she’d believe it, maybe not. It was good enough for now.

[Ren Caverly]

So there she was, contemplating things but not actually moving. Maybe she didn’t really need to move. Her magic wasn’t exactly close combat. Other than her gauntlet. She could see it now. It was one of her strongest spells, and one she liked using the least. It meant something was close to her. She could knock it back with that spell, reflective and defensive, almost like someone fighting for her. In fact, someone was fighting for her, usually the opponent. Well, not opponent like that were in some sanctioned fighting match. They were enemies, usually bandits, always scary. All of her magic showed its own life, its own fluctuation, but that was moved the least on its own. It attached to her arm and it clung on, more like someone hugging her arm than a child being pulled along. Maybe my magic is more mature than I am… that’s… sad… and probably true. She didn’t find it weird to be thinking about her magic like it was a person, she did a lot of strange things, they were just her. It wasn’t as if she was going to share these thoughts with anyone else though. That would be… bad. Ren judged herself just fine, she didn’t need other people doing it too… even if they did.

[Ren Caverly]

C’mon Ren, focus, focus, you can’t be standing around all day. Your magic will be fine. You’ll make it fine… she thought to herself. An argument so flimsy it would fall to pieces just as soon as someone questioned her. Ren was fragile, but she was trying. Now…. When did I used to train my magic… practice it anyway… when I danced. Oh, I miss dancing. I’m such an awful dancer…. Can’t forget that…. Never allowed to forget that, she thought with a small sigh. Her parents had made a point of telling her that she was too clumsy for the classes. It was such a clear disappointment to them. Well they left her, so she didn’t owe them anything. She moved a hand back behind her, the darkness grabbing her pillow and pulling it apart from her pillow case. She turned to look at the bed. Yes, she thought, this would be good exercise. Moving fluidly with her shadows, that was good, yes? Of course it was good.

Ren took a deep breath, closing her eyes and imagining the room. She knew it pretty well. The curtains were still drawn making it almost pitch black, despite the slight mist of light filtering through.

[Ren Caverly]

Ren’s hands parted, one hand to place the pillow on the floor, the other to throw the case to the far side of the room. Next her sheets. She pulled off the blankets, raising both hands. She heard the gentle smoothness of her blankets moving against each other. She knew her magic was working, even if she couldn’t see it. That was good. She didn’t need to see it, she needed to trust it. She was always trusting in her magic; she might as well get better at the skill. The blankets were off, tossed aside with a flick of her hand. Next came the mattress. She didn’t need to lift it to get the last blanket, but she wanted to. She wanted to do something powerful. She was too weak to lift the mattress on her own, but she was going to do it now, because her magic was going to help. The flickering shadows moved back to Ren’s body, covering her arms completely, then reaching out. Her arms were unseen in the massive black swirls, but as she found the edge of her mattress she paused to gather herself, as if she could see the whole thing from behind her eyelids.

[Ren Caverly]

The slight struggle with the mattress worried Ren. Maybe she wasn’t strong enough? Maybe her magic was too weak? Maybe it was ugly and wrong and…. She could feel the tears welling up again and she shook her head, shutting her eyes even tighter lest she break concentration. No, no one got to tell her what was wrong. No one who left her alone in Era with no one else in the world got to say anything. She tears were sliding past her lips and down to her chin. Dripping off slowly, silently, lost in the noise inside Ren’s head. The struggles within Ren were painful. She had the potential to tear herself apart and be in constant turmoil. It was a horrible place in her head, in her insecurities. No one could tell her that her problems were fake, or that her insecurities were unfounded. Still she pushed them down, because she couldn’t cope. Right now they were front and center, staring her right in the face and if she opened her eyes she was giving in. No, her magic was good. Fire magic, that pretty magic that her parents liked so much, it would have burned and ruined her bed and all the bedding, her magic wasn’t bad, it was just unique. People just didn’t understand it, and cast it aside, tried to get rid of it, hide from the shadows.

[Ren Caverly]

Ren managed to lift the mattress up slowly, until it was in the air. She could feel it. She held one hand out, keeping it up in the air, and used the other hand to pull the cover off. She then eased the mattress back down and finally opened her eyes. Despite the tears, despite the anxiety, she let out a small squeak of pleasure when her room looked exactly as she had imagined. She was nearly dancing as she moved along to grab all the blankets. Actually, she was dancing a bit. Swaying from foot to foot. She still felt like the biggest klutz to ever live, but she wasn’t thinking about that. Had she fixated, her movements would be rigid and awkward. She could never excel in a place where every tap of her toe was a penalty, where every angle in her body must be precise. She had to be herself, in her quirky and confused body movements. She didn’t understand that there was any sense of grace in any movements she made. She had been punished for being different, not allowed to flourish. She managed enough that she could still pull together some skill from her painful childhood, but it was nothing like her potential. Her personal issues stunted her magic, and her dancing, and she was nowhere near recovering from that.

[Ren Caverly]

Still, the dancing was there. Floating from one graceful foot to the next. She didn’t touch the blankets at first. She lifted them up with her shadows. The darkness swooped down and grabbed them up like raven wings, and then, in a second, the shadows were in layers, a woven pattern, creating a sort of dark basket for her linens. She was so pleased with this she made a shadow strap and attached it to the basket before throwing it over her shoulder. The shadows themselves were elevating the linens, but Ren felt happy to pretend she was carrying them. Wasn’t she… on some level? It was her magic after all. She didn’t feel that good. She felt good enough to be happy, but not good enough to own up to the power she might possess. Nope, it was her magic, it was her ally, it was not her. Most days she wouldn’t even think she was capable, let alone worthy, of being on a competent team. She would never imagine she could actually do something on her own. This was progress, but steps could only be made one at a time. It was lucky that she found something in life to motivate her, something to think of and say yes, I can have something good in my life and not ruin it… yet. Even if that something was an emotionally stinted teenage dragon slayer.

[Ren Caverly]

Ren pranced out of her bedroom for the first time since long before she’d joined Lamia Scale. She snuck, she sulked, she trudged, she did not prance. She thought, maybe, back one day a long time ago, she might have. On her way to her first dance practice maybe. Before she learned how bad she was. Before all the criticism. When she was just a shy little girl with dreams of being good at what she loved…. Back then, maybe she pranced. That light, that fire, they were gone from Ren. At least, perhaps, she could turn her shadows into her own sort of light, albeit they were the absence of light. The absence of light did not mean the absence of life, not when Ren was involved. Right now she pranced, and she didn’t think about people. They were probably going to question her basket. It was clearly magical. The woven parts kept shifting, and as she walked it seemed things dimmed. No doubt if someone saw her, they would question it. Maybe they would call her foolish for using her magic that way. Maybe not, she didn’t know, she didn’t ask, she just walked, to the laundry room. To her pleasure, no one was around. She was in a good mood, but having that come crashing down due to reality would have been quite a buzz kill for the eighteen year old.

[Ren Caverly]

She opened the washing machine with a flick of her wrist, the shadows shooting out and pulling the door open. She then let her shadow encased limbs put all the linens in the machine. Simple work, and her basket oozed away. Down her back, like smoke from dry ice, and then down into an inky mist at her feet. She had some time to kill once she turned the machine on. She also had to power it by her magic, which wasn’t ideal. She wanted to dance, and play, and train. She wanted to train. It felt like she was bonding with her magic, and right now she wanted that. She pushed a hand one way, closing the door, a hand the other way, toward the window. The window soon had a thick fluctuating shadow curtain hanging over it. Soon it felt like night. The moon could have been outside and it not felt more like dark time. Ren’s shoulders relaxed and she exhaled. Now… how could she make this darker? It needed to feel eerie for it to feel calm. It needed to be what most people found creepy, for it to be soothing. If people thought Ren’s magic was so dark and tainted, she was going to have the best dark magic she could. Even if she really thought it was kind of a cuddly magic. Then again, Ren was biased.

[Ren Caverly]

Ren closed her eyes again, lifting her arms up slightly away from her body. She could hear the chug of the machine, she could feel the magic over the window in her self-made eclipse. She kept one hand over, facing the window, its darkness tied to her own shadow. She then held up her left hand in front of her. She could feel the tug of the magic. She could hear it swirling around in front of her. The spell itself was silent, no one else would have heard a thing. Ren could hear it because it was part of her. It was like hearing a voice in her head, or a small humming, maybe whistling. Whatever it was, she felt calmed. She opened her eyes. A ball of what appeared to be condensed magic sat in her palm. She bit her lip, smiling at it, before tossing it to the ground.

The room filled with cackling shadows. They twisted, jerked back and forth, and flooded everything. Ren almost felt like she was breathing in darkness. As she saw it hit the ground she saw it explode. The shadows were like vipers escaping their prison. It was so beautiful to her. She giggled slightly, able to peer through the darkness. It felt thick, intimidating, alive, and impenetrable, but it was hers. She saw through it without trouble, but she was sure others would be unable.

[Ren Caverly]

Ren took a deep breath, feeling the darkness slowly fading. She felt more and more at ease. The machine was still running and she felt shadows flickering in her hands. She moved to the machine and touched it. It stopped, churning, creaking like it was gasping for air. Ren gasped. She knew her magic was meant for people. Meant for life. The machine wasn’t alive, so it was gasping for air with her draining magic. Draining magic. Wasn’t that… bad? She sort of felt like it must be bad. It was what everyone disliked. The dark, bad magic. Ren sighed, it was hers, to be used how she chose. She controlled her magic, not other people. She had to keep telling herself that.

She let the shadow’s fade out, except for her eclipse and the washing machine. Ren needed a small break. She sat there, waiting for the washing machine to finish its load, and then loaded the dryer. She leaned against the wall, clapped her hands together and saw a line of shadows form in front of her as they parted. The line spread as far as the falls allowed. Ren let go and it stood there. Self-sustained from her power. As if she had power. She tried to get back to the positivity again. She was tired.

[Ren Caverly]

It had been a long day. Ren dropped all the spells as the dryer slowed to a halt. Good. She was very happy. Ren cradled her hands together. The small dark space allowed her to stretch it out and make her fluctuating basket. She was fond of the basket, it was just so useful. I’ve done so well! I really did! I bet if I keep practicing I can learn those and turn them into really good spells. It will be great. Kotone will be proud of me… she thought, then paused. Anyone being proud of Ren seemed completely insane. And for some reason, it seemed so possible. She was busy being pleased when the door opened. She sputtered and turned red. Shadow magic, in front of people. She grabbed all her things with her hands, stuffing them into the basket. The basket expanded as things were put into it. Living magic.

The person looked surprised, but Ren just swept past them. Into her room, into her darkness. She hastily made her bed. She locked the door, she pulled the curtains just a bit tighter closed. People. People were her worst enemy, his biggest fear. She wanted to be with them, but they scared her. She was learning though. For now, she slid back into bed, under the comfortable blankets. She moved her legs around and sighed. It was perfect now.

Word Count: 3135/3000
Complete

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