The Fire and The Storm - The Nexus of Kellaran #2 novel Chapter 46

Part 8

“Brilliant!” Mark marveled as they passed Dalia and Bezedil’s place. “You know, in many ways, you really are the smart one in our marriage.”

“I’m pleased you think so!” Talia laughed. “I’m the quick one too! Race you there!” she added as she took off running, with him laughing in pursuit.

They soon settled into the new routine, and theirs became a much more closely-scheduled household, as they all arranged and attended appointments to learn, teach, and work with others in the community.

Their evenings were usually reserved for family warfare training, which was the emotional highlight of their day. They worked as a team of six against whatever simulated demons Ria conjured for them that day, and they consistently found it to be an incredibly fun and deeply bonding experience. All the magic, light, and sound of their battles were cast as private Illusions which were sometimes augmented with a bit of Force or Heat, so as to not disturb the neighbors. However, they soon realized that they sometimes looked quite silly running and flying around making inexplicable motions, so Ria devised a nice spell that allowed anyone observing them to see and hear their battles if they chose to, complete with hundreds of demon enemies, barrages of spells, full use of weapons, and listening-only access to their family Command Link.

Soon after that, spectating their family warfare training became a common pastime for the rest of the community.

Valentia often made a pest of herself by trying to share in all of the twins’ activities, and they responded by spending about four hours every day playing with her. Without specifically saying they were doing so, they spent that time deeply Linked with her, trying to hurry her development as much as they could.

Their efforts, combined with the lessons and training that their parents were giving her, soon began to produce results. Valentia’s speech lost most of its childish quality within weeks, and her behavior and abilities improved so rapidly that within a year she seemed as mature as Reggie and Helemia. She still had a fiery temperament, but she was in control of it, and she became as dedicated to self-improvement as her siblings.

PART 9

The day before Valentia’s first birthday she initiated conversation as the family was sitting down for supper.

“Tomorrow’s my birthday, and there’s some presents I want to ask for.

“I think you can trust me not to make silly mistakes anymore. I promise to keep getting lots of exercise, and to not sleep with Levitation.

“I want full control of my magic, and I want The Skills of Visinniria spell done on me. I promise not to hurt anyone, and not to wreck anything.

“But I really want to do what I can do! I want to see how much I can lift, I want to see how big a Fireball I can cast, I want to see how big an explosion I can make! I mean, playing with the Illusions is fun, but I really want to use all my abilities, and I really want to fight! I mean, some really serious sparring at least, both with magic and without! I want to shoot real arrows, and I want to use a real sword, and I want to learn all the forest ranger stuff Father knows!”

“That all seems pretty reasonable.” Mark agreed. “And I think we’re all ready for some real weapons training.”

“There’s a small island at the southern edge of the archipelago that we could use for a weapons range.” Alilia told them. “It’s not much more than a big flat-topped rock at one end of a big sandbar, and there’s only about half a dozen trees on it because it gets blasted by the hurricanes every year. It’s about the only place in Hiliani where there’s not much to destroy, and it’s as far as we can get from here, and from the Sylvan.”