Sarah and Alexa sat quietly, watching the flames. Sarah's imagination had been correct, the blue light was draining as the flames danced around the wood. Some of the smaller pieces were nearly empty, and as she watched one skinny little piece emptied out entirely. She watched as it blackened, making popping noises as the water inside flashed to steam and escaped. Finally, it collapsed under the weight of the other wood, sending a brief burst of sparks into the sky as it fell.

"So... it's more than just moving stuff around, clearly," said Alexa.

"Yeah," said Sarah. "Let me try something..."

Sarah trailed off, concentrating on the pile of wood. With a groan, she was able to make some of the pieces bend, twisting like they'd grown crooked. They dimmed rapidly as she twisted them, although she was able to make one piece move a round a lot before it lost any power. It was a knot of wood with several small branches sticking out, and if you squinted it looked kind of like a stick figure of a horse or cow or something.

The stick pranced in a circle around them, Alexa laughing delightedly at the sight. Oddly, it moved smoothly, even though one "leg" was actually part of the main branch and was significantly thicker than the others. Sarah could feel it losing power each time that thick leg moved, even though it looked as supple as the more twiglike portions of her little creature. After one particularly energetic jump into the air over a tuft of grass, it finally fell silent, exhausted of the blue energy she'd poured in before. Other than the wood still in the fire, all the blue light had drained away. Almost all.

"Why does your qi stay in the wood longer?" asked Alexa.

Sarah was confused at first, thinking Alexa had asked about the different pieces of wood. But Alexa was actually gesturing at Sarah. Sarah looked down - that was right, in her panic she'd put power into her clothes too, but only her shirt was still blue. Her leggings and sneakers had lost everything, not like they'd taken much before filling, but the light had still drained back out without doing anything. Just to try, her shirt twitched, tightening on her briefly like she'd tugged it into a better fit for a moment. It stayed blue, just like the blanket.

"No idea," said Sarah.

"Cool," said Alexa. "One last thing - I thought you'd figured out how to not pass out? What happened?"

"I can't do what you do," said Sarah. "The light won't go into my body, and I can't hold it without it starting to really, really hurt. It feels like I've dipped myself into boiling water, and it just gets worse. I've got to put it into something pretty fast before that happens. And it's like there's a limit to how much I can stuff in. If I pull too much and don't have something to dump it into, I'll get stuck."

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"Ok, we need to figure that out," said Alexa. "I mean, I'm putting on a brave face, but that was pretty scary, even if I thought it'd be fine. I wonder if I have a limit too?"

With that, she sort of inhaled, and the landscape turned purple again as the green light infusing Alexa’s body got brighter yet again. Alexa arched her back and stretched out, her feet digging furrows in the ground. The two of them glanced at the deep lines Alexa had dug in the hard dirt with her feet. The boulder Alexa had been leaning against had shifted too.

"Wow, that still feels so good," said Alexa. "I don't know if there's a limit, but it's really hard to just sit still. And maybe it's getting harder to not break stuff either. So that's simple enough, I guess. But what about you? I guess you just can't take too much at a time?"

"Hang on, I think I have an idea," said Sarah. She'd been thinking about the tiny fly back in her room. It barely weighed anything, but it had taken several times as much light as her blanket had, and she could tell it could have taken a great deal more.

She got up and walked back to the edge of the clearing. It was dark, but the stars gave more than enough light for her to navigate and find things under the trees. As always, even though the purple fog covered everything, instead of obscuring her vision it highlighted everything instead. Alexa had followed her, stumbling over rocks and kicking through a few roots.

Alexa's crashing noises didn't bother Sarah any, she was focused on what she could see on the ground. She found the pile of broken bits of wood that Alexa had made earlier, and that gave her bearings. Walking in a straight line, she retraced her steps back to where she'd been searching for deadwood earlier. Finally, she found it.

Even hours later, the ants hadn't moved the snake's body very far. Glancing around, she found a stick to pick it up with. A chunk fell off the tail, and Sarah looked at it, considering. It was ok, she'd take things slow. She could come back if she needed to, maybe after getting something better to handle the rotting body.

"What is it?" asked Alexa. "I don't know how you can see anything out here. I should have grabbed a flashlight, I didn't realize you were going into the trees."

"Sorry," said Sarah. "Just follow me, we'll go back to the fire."

The two walked out, Sarah picking her way through the brush while Alexa stumbled behind. Right before they got back to the meadow, Alexa tripped over a rock. She kicked it in frustration, cracking it apart and sending chips flying everywhere.

"Shit!" exclaimed Alexa. "I broke my shoe!"

Sarah glanced down, glad that Alexa couldn't see the involuntary smirk on her face - Alexa's shoe had split apart at the toe where she'd kicked the rock.

"I'm sorry, look, you can see the fire," said Sarah, leading them the rest of the way. She set the dead snake down in the dirt and looked at it. Something she'd learned to recognize made it look like a deep well to her. It echoed to her senses, just waiting to be filled to the brim with light.

Alexa sat down in a huff and glanced down at what Sarah had fetched from the dark woods.

"Eww"