“Take a deep breath in through your nose,” Hanon said. “Close your eyes.”

Mel did as he said, the large doors in front of her disappearing from her vision.

“Good. Now release your breath slowly and, at the same time, try to focus on the sound coming from your center.”

Mel cracked an eye open. “From my center? What does that mean? Like my belly?”

Hanon shifted his stance. “More like a bit above your belly button. Just below your heart.”

“I think I can just hear my stomach growling in there. I don’t hear anything else, Hanon. What am I supposed to hear exactly?”

He let out an exasperated breath, pinching his nose with his thumb and forefinger. “Not your stomach. I guess, think of it as more like your heart, but not exactly your heart. I guess it’s not your heartbeat, at least.”

Melissa gave him a questioning glance.

“What? It’s where it’s located.”

“Okaaaay, but what am I listening for?” Mel asked.

“You know that sound you heard in the wasteland? The one I made for you to find us when you’d wandered away alone during the night?”

“Yes.”

“Well, that’s the sound you're listening for, but it should be quieter, almost silent. It’s your life energy.”

Mel stared at him for a moment, feeling a prickling sensation at the back of her neck. If she could hear this sound coming from her own heart, wasn't that proof of them being the same? She tried to shake the feeling off and closed her eyes again. This time she focused on the spot just below her heart, her ‘center’, and listened.

She heard her own heartbeat drum in her ears and creased her forehead to focus harder, to make her heartbeat quiet for a moment. But it didn’t work. She opened her eyes again, looking at Hanon. He was watching her with an excited smile on his lips and at this moment; he looked almost like a proud older brother. It annoyed Melissa.

“I can’t do it,” she said. “Maybe I’m just not meant to be doing this. I'm not like you. I don’t have powers. Maybe I just can’t hear the sound because there is no sound coming from my…” Mel made bunny ears with her fingers in the air, “‘center’.”

Hanon sighed. “Stop with the air quotes. There is such a thing as a center, okay? Please just, trust me for once. I know you can hear the sound, because you heard it when I amplified the sound of my life energy. And I know your center is giving off the same sort of music, because I can hear it playing.”

Mel’s eyes widened, and she took a step back. She didn’t know he could hear her. It made this whole thing just a tad bit too real for her, and she swallowed hard. Why did this entire thing make her want to crawl out of her own skin?

Hanon took a few steps closer until he was standing just inches from her face. He placed his hand on the top part of her stomach, just underneath her heart. “Listen.”

He graced the side of her ribs, and Mel dragged in a deep breath. She closed her eyes, feeling his hand on her body, and focused on the place where he was touching her. Her blood pumped hard, and the sound threatened to make her deaf toward everything else. But she willed her heart to slow down. She willed herself to extend even a smidge of trust toward Hanon.

There. A sound emerged through the noise of her beating heart, and she smiled involuntarily. Because the sound was familiar to her, it was the sound that had been playing in her mind almost her entire childhood. It was what she’d thought about in chapel when the musicians had been dreadful. It was the sound that had lulled her to sleep on those nights when her parents hadn’t stopped fighting in the kitchen.

Mel’s eyes flew open and connected with Hanon’s. He smiled back at her and for a moment they just stood there grinning at each other like two idiots.

“You see, I knew you could do it. Now let me teach you how to direct this energy to an output.”

“What does that mean?” Mel asked, her voice coming out a little breathless.

“It means, I will teach you how to make your own water magic,” Hanon said, his hand slipping away from her ribs. “But first you have to imagine what is possible.”

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He took a few steps back from her and dragged a hand through his hair. Mel couldn’t help but think about Austin at this moment. There was something eerily familiar with what Hanon was teaching her. To be able to visualize what you could do was how Austin had taught her to use her double imbue. A blunt pain shot through her heart and she realized she missed him. She wished he was the one teaching her this and not Hanon, even though that made no sense since Austin wasn’t like them. He wasn’t… whatever they were.

“You fill your mind with the song of water,” Hanon continued. “It will tell your center where you want it to move and the magic will be created inside of you. It will drain some of your life energy and you have to make sure not to use too much. Not that I think it will be an issue in the beginning. Creating any magic at all was quite difficult for me in the start.” He flashed her a self-deprecating smile and Mel smiled back despite herself.

“So if I tell my energy to essentially become water magic, it just will?” Mel asked.

“Well, yes. That’s essentially how it works,” Hanon said. “But you have to believe it’s possible first, I guess. Otherwise you won’t be able to do it. It’s what took the longest for me to figure out on my own. I knew I wasn’t like other people, but I didn’t necessarily want to be this.” He gestured down at his own body. “Being a part of the void. Accepting its gifts. It took some time for me. Especially when I knew where it would lead me in the end.”

Mel swallowed hard. She still couldn’t accept being a part of the void. But in her mind, that wasn’t what Hanon was, anyway. So, with that logic, perhaps she could do this.

She sucked in a deep breath and tried to feel the energy inside her center, focusing on the sound that emerged from right below her breast. When she thought she could feel the energy like an extra limb, she played the water note in her mind. Her heart suddenly felt like it wanted to crack open and pour out all the blood from her veins.”

Mel took a step back and opened her eyes. The note wasn’t playing in her mind anymore. She wasn’t sure she wanted to go down this route. She had done this once before in the dragon forge and it had emptied almost all of her energy. She’d fainted and only woken up the next morning, with a wind imbue created from her own magic. She shook her head at her own thoughts and Luthel floated into her vision. He was staring at her too now, but then he shook his head.

“This will never work if you don’t believe in it,” Luthel said. His voice was different from Hanon’s, harder and raspier, probably from being more than twice his age.

Mel shook her head back at him. “I’m trying to believe, but the feeling in my heart is just… I don’t know. It doesn’t feel right.”

“It’s scary at first.” Luthel took a step forward, reaching Mel in one single stride. He grabbed both her shoulders in a tight grip, staring down at her. “But you’re blocking your own energy, your own magic, by fear. It’s not the void who’s making you weak like this. It’s you who are standing in your own way.”

He released his grip and Mel felt like her lungs were too tight to breathe. He pushed her forward, toward the large doors, and willed her to look at them. “Do you want to get inside this place? Do you want to help your friends in Aldrion?” He reached down and looked straight into her eyes. “Do you want to kill the void? Because right now it doesn’t look like it. It looks like you’re hiding and hoping that someone else will come and save you from having to make a difficult choice.”

Mel jerked her arm away from him and took a step back, staring daggers at Luthel. “I’m not hiding or running away from my responsibilities. I haven’t done that in a long time.” She threw her arms out to her sides. “Look where I am. Does this look like hiding? I’m in the freaking wastes for the dragons’ sake. I traveled with you to Krazaa when everyone else wanted me to just forget about it and go to Aldrion. I’m here and I’m trying my best.”

Mel’s eyes slipped from Luthel to Hanon. But he didn’t look like he wanted to intervene now. When his father was here, he was back to being stoic and quiet. Mel couldn’t quite figure out why he was like this around Luthel, but then didn’t seem to be when they were alone.

“Good,” Luthel said. “Then both of you, create the magic we need to get inside.”

Mel’s eyes flickered around her, looking for a way out. But that’s when she caught herself. Her eyes immediately shot back to Luthel and his knowing grin. He knew that she’d been thinking about how to get out from having to create magic. She hated that about him even more than what he’d said. Why did he have to see her for who she really was?

Hanon had closed his eyes beside her and his hand calmly slipped into hers, squeezing her hand tight. Mel’s chest was still full of stormy emotions and she’d rather go and smack Luthel in the face right now than to create any sort of magic, but she forced those impulses down. She didn’t want to hide from her responsibilities anymore, and she knew no one else was going to come along and open these doors for them.

She sucked in a breath through clenched teeth and squeezed Hanon’s hand back. Together, they walked up to the doors and placed their free hands on them. Mel closed her eyes and focused on her center and the energy swirling around inside. She played the water note in her mind and her heart wanted to open up. This time, she didn’t shy away from the feeling. Instead, she let it move on its own. Energy streamed inside of her and changed direction into water magic. It flowed out from her heart and down through her hand, filling the door with energy.

Mel’s eyes opened, and her gaze immediately traveled to the eye. A purple glow emerged from the carvings between the two doors and Mel felt hope swell inside her. Her center felt cool and oddly calm now, her stormy feelings from before almost gone.

The eye kept glowing until a cloud of mist puffed out from between the doors and a loud squeaking sound cut through her ears. Mel lost focus and the water energy left her body, but it didn’t matter by now, because the doors were slowly opening. Her knees felt like they wanted to buckle, the magic clearly taking its toll on her body, but she didn’t mind it.

She let out a small squeal and turned to Hanon, who was looking at her. His pupils dilated and his mouth turned up in a happy smile. Mel threw her arms around Hanon and smiled against his shoulder.

“I knew you could do it,” he whispered against her hair.