Two days later, we had our first day of training.
The sun was just beginning to shine down the tunnels, setting Ventosus aglow as Ani and I met Cove in the small training room they’d reserved. It was a little bigger than my living room, large enough for basic exercise and, Cove claimed, for basic magic training.
Cove was already waiting for Ani and me when we arrived, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed and his eyes closed, a white cat sitting on the stone at his feet. The cat perked up when we entered, trotting to meet Ani halfway. They sniffed each other, and I briefly wondered if this would really be okay. Ani was quite the bully.
“Ani, play nice,” I warned him.
He gave an acknowledging flick of his tail, then brushed up against Cove’s familiar. Cove’s familiar froze, ears leaning back against their head, before hesitantly booping Ani back. I let out a sigh I didn’t know I’d been holding and pushed past them to greet Cove, who hadn’t noticed us yet.
I stopped a few feet in front of him, frowning when he still didn’t notice. “Good morning,” I said, startling him.
His head jolted up, eyes focusing on my face. A tired smile crossed his own. “Good morning, Hayden.” Cove shoved himself off the wall, brushing the back of his plain t-shirt off. “This is….” he looked around wildly before seeing Ani and his familiar sprinting across the room, playing. “Already introduced themselves, I see. That’s my familiar, Ranch.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Ranch? Like the dressing?”
He laughed nervously, his eyes darting around. They lingered on my coat briefly before he motioned towards the door. “There’s a coat rack behind the door.”
The ‘smooth’ change of topic made me think I was right.
We began physical training after I deposited my coat, focusing on self-defense techniques per request. Cove built on what Azure had already taught me, discussing and explaining magic theory as we practiced.
My muscles burned painfully when we finished, my mind swirling with the possibilities opening up before my eyes. That evening, I fell into one of the deepest, most exhausted sleeps I’d ever had.
The next couple of months were interesting, to say the least. As promised, my first paycheck came in that Friday, significantly higher than my previous job. During the training, we mainly focused on casting spacetime magic, with some basic information trickling in here and there. To my eternal despise, I also quickly learned that physical endurance was linked to magical endurance and recovery. Cove was a far harsher trainer than Azure had ever been, pushing me to my limits and then dragging me past them until I either quit or collapsed, panting with exhaustion, into a chair. Cove himself remained unphased, able to keep up with the training without so much as breaking a sweat.
Ugly feelings twisted in my chest, and I did my best to squash the jealousy. Despite being a little younger than me, Cove really seemed to have it all: he was well-educated, extraordinarily fit, powerful, and had connections with everyone in the city. If he had flaws, I couldn’t find them.
Cove was apparently not only good at magic but fighting too. He’d won the mage tournament each time he’d participated, an impressive feat, given he’d first participated at thirteen. As such, his physical training extended into self-defense lessons which were wrought with thought problems on ‘how to escape.’ Teleportation was the most obvious answer and one of the first magics I learned. I was only powerful enough for one, or maybe two teleportations if I pushed myself, though the number was significantly higher with the rest between. We hadn’t yet had the opportunity to find any maximum number per day, but Cove insisted that finding any ‘max’ number would only limit me as I continued to grow in power. Meanwhile, Cove was relentless in his demonstrations, and the gap in power grew ever more evident.
According to all accounts, my training was going well. Cove and Jacob showered me with praise, but impatience burned itself into their skin, digging deep bags beneath their eyes. Their impatience was reflected in the number of training sessions, which increased from one or two per day to every waking second Cove and I shared outside of our other duties.
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Cove became more withdrawn, dropping the small talk to focus only on what he needed to teach.
Meanwhile, I physically felt better than ever. My sore muscles were a welcome and constant companion, and Cove’s busy schedule left me plenty of time to myself. I used the time to read one of the plethora of books in the library or to set off and explore the city.
We were summoned to Jacob’s office on one bitterly cold November evening. Cove and I dragged over our usual chairs from the table, sitting at the files waiting for us across from Jacob.
Once we were seated, Ranch and Ani playing at our feet, Jacob began, “All the data I’ve collected for your next mission is in that file.”
I pulled the manilla folder closer, flipping it open to give a brief scan as Jacob continued to explain. “I discovered these fragments right around the time you showed up, Hayen. As this will be your first mission, we wanted to ensure we had all the information possible about the world. A few of our younger members recognized some of the details Cove parsed out from his dreams, placing the fragments in a world from the series, Phoenyx.”
The first page of the folder contained the book titles, a brief summary explaining that Phoenyx was a sci-fi series set in space, and a brief rundown of the plot and the main trio of characters.
“Specifically, they placed the fragments on the planet ‘Cretaceous.’”
The name of the planet sent needles up my spine, and I flipped to the next page in the file, containing a detailed description of the planet and its life forms. The writer clearly had a sick sense of humor.
I flipped the folder back shut. “I don’t need spacetime magic to see where this is going. No way.” Next to me, Cove frowned as he flipped through the pages, his eyes scanning each typed line.
Jacob’s lips tugged downward, and he leaned over the desk to look me in the eye. “If you flip to the next page, you’ll see that the fragments were tracked down to a hotel prior to its destruction in Ignition. In the series, the hotel remains safe until the main characters arrive. So long as you arrive and complete the mission before they do, you should have no problems. You shouldn’t have to interact with any of the local wildlife.”
I shook my head. “Heirs wasn’t identical to the novel–with the fragments there, we can’t be sure the timeline will be accurate.”
Cove lifted his head from the pages of his file and said pointedly, “This is safer than running from arrows. Or swords.”
I looked at him, betrayed.
He shrugged, unaffected. “I taught you to teleport out of the way.” He stabbed his finger at an artist’s rendition of the wildlife. “You’ll hear this coming from miles away. Besides, I doubt we’d run into them.”
The words struck my weak spot. While increased under Cove’s tutelage, physical feats and endurance were still not my forte. His faith was reassuring, however. Cove had more experience with the worlds and had spent months training me.
Jacob clapped his hands together, drawing our attention back to him. “That settles it, then. You leave in two weeks.”
Two weeks later, Cove and I stood in a training room, waiting for the final send-off. Ani was by my feet, leaping up to swat the strands hanging down from my backpack full of essentials, having learned a lesson from Heirs. Next to me, Cove carried only Ranch in his arms, having forgone any form of packing at all..
“You didn’t need to pack anything, Hayden.” He turned, showing off his devoid-of-backpack back.
“I refuse to ever go without soap or have my clothes cleaned that way ever again.”
Cove rolled his eyes. “While I credit you that shared bathing facilities were breeding grounds for bacteria, the way they washed their clothes did clean them.”
“Maybe. But it’s disgusting.” I thought of the horrible stink of the towns and shuddered. While wearing the clothes, I’d had to ignore the practices, but no longer.
“You know they were cleaned that way well into the 19th century, right?”
“We used to leech people.” I felt obliged to point out. “That doesn’t mean it was right.”
“Yes, but Phoenyx is set in the future. They’ll probably feel the same way about what you have in your backpack that you feel about old washing practices.”
I refused to be swayed. “Then I can bring it back with me.”
He shook his head, exasperated. “You do you.”
Jacob eyed the backpack slightly bewilderedly but shrugged it off at our expressions.
“Are you two ready?”
No. “Yes,” I answered, Cove echoing me.
“Watch out for Ava’s interference.”
“We will,” Cove replied.
Jacob gave a sharp nod. “Very well. Cove, Hayden, I’ll see you later.”
Cove stepped closer to me, resting a hand on my arm. Sparks danced across my arm, and I felt Cove’s ocean of magic open up to mine. I concentrated, opening up my magic to him in return, feeling him tug on the flames buried beneath my skin.
Invisible pathways opened up before us, tiny webs connecting a starry sky. Cove yanked on my magic, pulling us down a path as reality dropped away around us, fading until it was only us and the pathways.
A flicker of flame burst in front of me.