The parties had huddled up together around the walls of the room, staring with distrustful gazes as though they were competing with one another. He felt it was an odd experience; they all joined together, a lot of them knew one another and yet by forming parties they seemed to have pushed everyone else out in favour of their new cliques.

“I kind of get why they don’t want to talk to us; Keira blew everyone off, you kept your section waiting because you’re stubborn, and I’m just the weirdo with the necklace—but they seem to be avoiding each other as well.”

“Maybe city schools are more hostile than in the outer ring, maybe they all hate each other,” suggested William.

“They’re probably just nervous, I’m sure they’re all having as many issues with their spirits as we are. Once we actually start working together they’ll loosen up,” said Keira.

It wasn’t much longer before Faye arrived with a group of four others trailing behind her. They all had very gloomy faces and he recognised one from the argument at the desk. When they got in, Faye told them to line up beside her and instructed everyone else to gather around.

“Right,” she said once they were closer. “These four idiots got into a fight with another party of equal idiots because the other party of idiots wanted their spot in this section.”

The shame that flooded the four faces was immeasurable and everyone seemed very tense.

“While these four idiots…” she wasn’t going to let that go. “Didn’t actually instigate the argument, they certainly didn't help. I want to make it very clear to all of you right now. Do not let being in my section inflate your ego. That sort of thinking is the fastest way to getting yourselves killed.”

Everyone nodded and the tension worsened as Faye waved off the four to join the rest of the group. He was fairly convinced she didn’t care about the argument but decided to use this opportunity to teach them an important point. Ego needed to be left behind or they’d find themselves in a dangerous situation they weren't ready for.

“Also, I could see as soon as I walked in that you’ve all separated into your little groups and seem to be avoiding one another," Faye continued. "What you’re not taking into account is that often the guild sends multiple parties out on missions together. Avoiding each other in this way is only going to make you less effective in the field.”

She paused and looked around the room, he wasn’t sure if she was planning something in particular or just trying to judge each of the new recruits.

“For the most part, you will be working within your specific parties but for today only, I’m going to put you all into new groups. You'll gain some experience working with different people and getting to know each other.”

There were some grumbles amongst the recruits; he hadn’t expected that either as everything and everyone had been pushing them towards forming parties immediately. She hushed them and then continued to explain that in their new groups, they’d be focusing on learning more about their spirits and sharing each other's experiences. She told them that today was going to be about discovering the connection they had developed and that they would encourage and help one another in their new groups to better understand that.

She separated them, picking each group herself and as there were twenty people in total, she decided on five groups of four. Finlay was with one of the boys who Keira turned away, though he didn't remember much about him and two girls he had seen but not spoken to. They went to different spots around the room and sat facing one another on the floor. Everyone seemed uncomfortable and he wasn’t sure if they were nervous or if there was some other reason.

“I guess we can start by introducing ourselves—my name's Finlay.”

There was hesitation amongst the other three but then one of the girls spoke. “I’m Brianna, I already know Travis.”

“Yeah, we went to school together, I’m Travis, obviously,” the boy continued.

“Anneca,” the last girl said without further explanation. She had been in the group that Faye brought in after the altercation and he suspected was still feeling nervous.

Then they were silent again. He looked around the room to see if the other groups were being as awkward with one another and to his surprise, they all seemed to be. He was starting to think the city schools were a lot more different than the outer ring as even the two who knew one another weren't engaging.

“So how is everyone finding their contracts, I know some people have struggled with feeling new emotions and urges from their spirit?”

He thought talking about difficulty might help them open up, that they might have been putting up barriers to not show they’ve been struggling. He decided to rely on Keira’s experience more than his own as he, so far, had no problems with his spirit.

“My spirit’s been quieter than I was expecting it to be,” Travis was the first to answer.

“Were you expecting it to talk to you?” Brianna replied.

“No, of course not, but I thought I’d feel its thoughts more, or anything really. I feel the same as I did before.”

“Maybe it’s not felt the need to respond to anything yet. Depending on the core of the contract, it might be waiting until it's needed,” Finlay offered.

Brianna looked as though she was going to make another quip but then decided to be more serious. “I’ve been having a hard time relaxing, sitting still.”

She had been fidgeting and bumping her leg around since they sat down but he had assumed that was her normal behaviour.

“I wanted to be fast, to be able to run and move quicker than anyone else. But now I feel like I can’t sit still, it was driving me crazy last night trying to sleep.”

“That’s rough,” said Travis.

“Faye told us that it can take a while to adjust but not to worry too much, at least not right now. She said you’ll get used to each other and those sorts of feelings will calm, it'll get easier if that's of any help.”

They both looked at him as though he had said the most outrageous thing in the world. But it was Anneca who asked the question he was surprised hadn’t been asked yet. “How do you know her?”

“I don’t really, she just helped me out recently, and she gave us some advice. Nothing major.”

“No, it’s more than that... I was there when you went to the clerk, she told them that you were to be in her section.”

He hadn’t considered someone would have overheard that but in hindsight, he should have. The other two looked even more shocked and started to stare at Finlay, searching for some reason he was important.

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“You're reading too much into it, it was just an impulse. Faye seems to do things on her own whims as do a lot of people in the guild from what I've seen. There's nothing particularly special about me.”

Her eyes narrowed as she looked at him but he couldn’t think of a better answer. They clearly didn’t believe him as none of them spoke up after that. Instead, they sat in silence and he wasn’t sure if he should try and break it again given he was the reason behind it this time.

He didn’t have to as Faye decided to break it instead. She sat down beside him, appearing so silently he hadn’t noticed until she was already there. Everyone immediately sat upright and gave her their full attention which only made her laugh. He was right, she wasn’t going to be that serious about everything.

“Why are you all so quiet?”

Travis looked at the two girls and after deciding they weren’t going to respond, he replied. “We talked about our experiences with the spirits, but we didn’t really have much more to add after that.”

“So then, what did you say your experience was?”

“That mine had been very quiet, I hadn’t really felt any thought or intention, I just feel the same as I did before.”

“You sure you managed to form a contract?”

He looked horrified and she laughed. She was definitely not taking things as seriously as everyone thought.

“I’m joking, did anyone offer advice?”

“I guess,” he looked at Finlay before turning back to Faye.

The glance had been enough and she turned to him. “Well Finn,” she had apparently decided to use that name after hearing Keira say it. The others noticed it as well. “What did you tell him?”

He sighed. “I just suggested there might not have been anything to trigger a response yet.”

“Well that sounds reasonable, but did you try asking the spirit?”

Travis looked confused. “What do you mean?”

“Not all spirits are going to communicate as easily or the same as others. They’re not that different from people, and if you want to know what someone is thinking, the easiest way is to ask them.”

“How do I ask it?”

“Well you could do it the same way as you would someone else, but that’s probably not necessary. How about thinking a thought, asking it something in your mind, focus on that for a while and see if you get a response.”

He nodded and then looked down at his hands going into his own headspace and taking her advice very seriously. Faye turned her attention to Brianna and asked the same question. When she explained her problem and was then asked what the others had said, she also looked at Finlay.

“Seems you’re just full of advice.”

“I was mostly just parroting what you told us earlier.”

“Then it’s good advice—time will help but that’s also what today is all about. Try and focus on telling your spirit that you don’t need to be going fast all the time, that you’ll tell it when you need it.”

“So I should think those thoughts, the same way you told Travis?”

“Yes, focus on that idea, you are trying to understand each other and if you try to convey those feelings to it, well that’s going to help both of you do that quicker.”

She smiled and crossed her legs to try and force herself to stop tapping and then closed her eyes, focusing on communicating with the spirit as Faye had suggested.

“Now then, what about you?” She had turned to Anneca.

He realised Anneca hadn’t said anything about her spirit and when Faye asked, she turned away. It seemed she was uncomfortable for more reasons than just feeling guilty about the altercation at the desk.

“I wanted to be able to hide if needed, my core thought was that I would be able to escape, or sneak past things. I wanted to be able to be quiet, silent, and disappear. But now I feel like I want to run away and hide from everyone all the time. I used to love talking to people, I’ve always been a super social person and now I want to escape them.”

“Ah, that’s difficult and you obviously have a strong connection with your spirit for it to have such a pronounced effect on your feelings so quickly. But you have managed to talk to people, you’ve managed to overcome those feelings.”

“It’s just been really uncomfortable and I never used to feel that way.”

“I’m going to give you similar advice as I did the others. You need to communicate when you are actually in danger. You’re completely safe here, you have no reason to feel those things. You need to make the spirit understand the difference between real danger so you can better use those feelings to pronounce that power when it's needed.”

“How can I do that? I’ve tried to tell it that I don’t want to feel this way all the time.”

“Did you tell it when you do?”

“Well no, I guess not.”

“Have you ever been in real danger, been near demons?”

“No, but there was a robbery once in a store I was in.”

“Then use that and any other example you can think of, you have to make it clear when you actually need to use those abilities and when you don’t want them. The spirit needs to learn when it’s appropriate because it has no concept of the workings of our world and the social aspects of it.”

“Okay, that makes sense, thank you, I'll try.”

Anneca looked away again and as with the other two, became intense and focused on herself. Faye spun around on the spot so she was facing Finlay directly. “Your turn.”

“Um—honestly, I’ve not really had any problems.”

“I had a feeling you’d say that.”

“It came to me last night, it helped when Keira was having difficulty, and otherwise it’s been comfortable. I know it’s there but it hasn’t spoken to me or influenced me in any way that I can tell.”

“How did it help with Keira?”

“I’m not entirely sure, but when I couldn’t help her it sort of did it for me. I don’t really know what it did but it helped calm her.”

“You did ask for it to help you protect others.”

“That’s kind of the conclusion I came to, it acted the way I wanted but I don’t really know how or what it did specifically.”

“So you feel fine, and you think you could call upon the spirit at any time, you could call upon its power right now if you wanted?”

“I guess, I didn’t really think about it last night but I don’t see any reason why I couldn’t do it again.”

“Let me see it.”

He was a little puzzled and unsure why she wanted to see him draw out his spirit. It wasn’t as if the others hadn’t been able to as they’d all communicated with their spirits during the contract formation and it seemed that if anything, the spirits were too active for them now. But he had no reason to argue with her either so he pressed his hand to the amulet and in the back of his mind asked it to show itself.

It was the only thing he could think of as he had nothing specific for it to do but it responded without question and the amulet started to glow in that same pale blue light he was becoming familiar with. It radiated out gradually encasing his hand before covering his entire body in the gentle aura.

Faye was smiling at him but the other three had stopped their inner focus and now also watched him with faces that were filled with shock. After a moment he looked down at the amulet in his hand and thanked it from the back of his mind. He felt the warm pulse of its response and then it diminished the aura as it had the night before until it was completely gone again.

“An excellent display of control.”

“Thanks, I guess, but I didn’t really do anything.”

The other three in his group were looking quite uncomfortable now but Faye just laughed again.

“You don’t get it do you,” she said. “You don’t even realise what you did.”

“I just asked it to show itself, nothing else.”

“Finn,” she leaned forward and spoke in a serious, quiet manner. “You manifested a spiritual body around your own. That's something we teach, of course, it's how we protect ourselves against the miasma and demonic attacks but to do it now means you're incredibly in tune with your spirit. It requires a close connection and strong communication.”

“But I’ve seen others do it when forming contracts and last night with Keira.”

“What others did and what you saw were fluctuations of power; Anam gone wild while the contract is being formed or in Keira's case, a spirit gone wild. What you created was controlled and stable, it's very different."

He didn’t feel as though he had done anything special. All he had done was ask the spirit to come forward and it had done the rest. He looked at Faye with the same confused expression and once again she laughed and then stood up.

“I knew having you in my section would be interesting. I think I’ve given your group enough time; keep focusing on what I’ve told you all and if you’re unsure how to talk with your spirit, you’ve got the perfect person to ask right there.”

She walked away leaving him with the three gawping candidates. He looked around the room trying to avoid them but soon noticed that the other groups had also noticed what he did and were staring.

He turned to Keira who was smiling and shaking her head and all he could do was mouth the words. "Help."