The Fire and the Storm - Metric Pro Edition: Fiction, Dragons, Elves, Unicorns, Magic (32 page)

Valentia had made it plain that she didn’t want a huge birthday party in the gathering hall like the one the twins had arranged for themselves, but the guests at her party were more than enough to fill the public areas of their house, so the event spilled out into the yard.

As she’d expected, she was given a set of arms and armor that matched what the twins had been given in every way, and since she hadn’t asked anyone to not give her presents, she received many other gifts as well.

The evening ended with her and the twins casting an impromptu fireworks display a third of a kilometer above the settlement, complete with glowing and flashing lights of every color, lightning, ribbons and loops of fire, multi-colored explosions, and multi-colored fireballs that expanded with widely-varying speeds from barely-growing to almost-exploding.  Sometimes it seemed almost random, sometimes it formed beautiful and abstract symmetrical patterns in the sky, and occasionally simple but pretty pictures were formed in the maelstrom.  The thunderous noise of it all seemed to shake the ground at times, drowning out the applause and shouts of amazement from those who watched.

Finally, Alilia had to call out psionicly;
“Enough, my darlings!  It’s very beautiful and impressive, but if you don’t stop soon you’ll expend yourselves to exhaustion.”

She received the mental equivalent of a nod, and the children finished up with an incredible barrage for a finale.

The three of them giggled as they took their bows, but by the time the last of the guests had said their goodbyes and left, they were almost asleep on their feet.  Their parents put them to bed early, and they were asleep before they were finished with goodnight kisses.

“There’s one area in which our children have already far exceeded us.” Alilia softly laughed as she sat down in the kitchen for some tea with Mark and Talia.  “Being showoffs!”

“True.” Talia chuckled.  “They don’t seem to have inherited Mark’s humble traits at all!”

“Ah, they’re just kids.” Mark said with a proud smile.  “I showed off every chance I could get until I was about twelve.  But by then I was bigger than most of the men in Shinosa, and I got the feeling that they started to resent it.  Besides, about then I started my formal apprenticeship as a Ranger, and the whole ‘honor of the corps’ thing got to be pretty important to me, pretty fast.

“I’m glad we’re here now though.  By the time we go back to the wider world, they’ll have had enough years here to do all the showing off they want.  I’m sure there’ll be enough public curiosity about them to ensure they get far more attention than they’ll ever want, even without showing off.

“For now, I’d like to go over everything they did last night with Valentia’s psionics and the twins’ magics and brains.  I’d like to understand it thoroughly, if I can, and I doubt I’m up to it by myself.  Would you ladies care to join me in that?”

“Yes, I wish that also.” Alilia nodded as she closed her eyes, Linked with them, and cast discrete Readings on all three of them to isolate and clarify everything they’d learned from the children on what they’d done.

They stayed up late, examining and discussing it psionicly, and the entire household slept late the next morning.

Some six weeks later at midmorning, Silaran psionicly asked the entire community to meet with him in the gathering hall at noon.  Since none of the unicorns had been seen outside their grassy valley for weeks due to the two mares’ pregnancies, everyone had a good idea as to why he had called them together, and he did not disappoint.

He arrived in the midst of them by Translocation precisely at noon, and immediately cast a four meter wide square Revealing in the air above him while calling out;
“Our son is born!  Last night Equemev brought Falaran into this world, and both are healthy!”

The Revealing was cast to make the scene seem brighter than it had been, since Equemev had delivered in the dark of night without artificial lighting, which gave it a slightly surreal look.  The sequence obviously began shortly after the birth, with the colt curled up in a depression in the grass while Equemev licked him clean.  He was adorably cute, with a white coat, silver mane and tail, and dark blue eyes.  His tiny horn was just a cone thirteen millimetes high and seventeen millimeters wide.

Many of those watching oohed and ahhed and declared how darling he was, and some gave spontaneous applause.

“The Revealing lasts for forty-two minutes, but I must go be with my family.”
Silaran stated, and then he was gone as the Revealing played on.

Within five minutes, Equemev was finished her ministrations, and the tiny new unicorn struggled to his feet as his mother and father nuzzled and supported him from either side.  He stood there wobbling and shaking a little for a minute or so, until he gained his stability.  Six minutes later, he took his first tentative steps, and ten minutes after that he was walking steadily.  He soon progressed to running with joyous energy, then running in circles and zigzags.  He quickly tired, and went to his mother to nurse just before the Revealing ended.

The very next night Equemev’s friend Selmiom gave birth to her daughter Penulan, and the next day at noon her proud father Namada displayed a similar Revealing of his pretty girl, who was light yellow with light purple mane and tail.

As the twins discovered when they checked, the unicorns’ valley was cloaked with heavy psionic Shielding, and no one left it or entered it for the next nine days.  Only then did the unicorns invite a select few humans to meet their new children.  They explained that those with the least psionic strength were invited first, to protect the colts, who were extremely psionicly sensitive and impressionable at this stage.

Mark’s household were the second-last to be invited, over two months later.  The children and the colts delighted in chasing each other all over the valley, with the children flying along a meter or so above the ground so they could all play tag.  Even at this young age, the colts had their race’s supernatural speed, balance and agility, and they held their own.

The dragons were made to wait another three months after that, and were asked to remain more than two hundred meters away from the colts, since unicorns have an instinctive fear of dragons that required some maturity to overcome.  When the colts were eight months old, the unicorns finally ended their seclusion and brought their young with them as they rejoined the regular activities of the community.

During those months the twins and Valentia spent more and more of their combat training and leisure time with Karzog, and the four of them took to sparring with each other in the little valley behind Mark’s house for an hour or two every afternoon.  This was serious sparring indeed, and included full use of armor, weapons, and magic, as well as all of Karzog’s fire and strength.  Not only did they improve in combat proficiency, and quickly, they also gained skill in Restoring the damage they did to the valley, repairing and recharging their armor and weapons, and Healing one another’s many broken bones and serious injuries.  Only lethal attacks were prohibited, most of the combat was fought in the air, and to any observer it was indistinguishable from true warfare.

Of the four of them, Karzog had to push himself the hardest to keep up.  A young dragon’s development is normally much slower than a human or an elf’s, but with their help he did keep up, and by the time Valentia was two he was already casting spells and using psionics.

About half their fights were one on one, but occasionally they would have a ‘wolves and deer’ exercise with three of them chasing one, and they often fought as pairs.  At first the pairings were random, but over time they found it most fun when it was Helemia and Karzog versus Reggie and Valentia, so they did that most often.  The twins balanced each other, and Valentia’s greater magic was balanced by Karzog’s strength and fire.

They still did their evening training with their parents versus Ria’s simulated demons, and Karzog joined them in that with increasing frequency as well.  Often others from the community would join them, sometimes for the sake of extra training, and sometimes just for fun.  Since Karzog and Mark’s children were gradually becoming inseparable, Povon and Kragorram also spent more time with the family.

Whether Reggie’s prophecy was genuine or self-fulfilling, he and Kragorram did indeed become great friends as they built the first Kellarani void-craft together.  Reggie devoted more and more of his learning time to this project, and Helemia broadened her studies to compensate.

Valentia finished her general education before she was three, with a lot of the twins’ help.  Thereafter she limited herself to studying the use of magic exclusively, though it was a broad field.  She spent much of her days learning spells from anyone who had one that she didn’t, usually her parents.  She simplified them to match her own style, and practiced them incessantly.  She made many improvements in casting speed and efficiency as she did so.

There came a day when Valentia was almost four.  After breakfast Mark, Talia, Reggie, and Helemia left to attend to their various pursuits.  Valentia was scheduled to work on magic with Alilia in the study, but instead she went into the living room and laid down on the floor with Stripe, and cuddled with him.

She seemed a bit morose, so Alilia asked her; “Is anything wrong, my love?”

Valentia shrugged a bit and said; “Not really.  It’s all just petty anyway.”

Alilia picked her up and sat on the couch with her, and cuddled her.  “Sometimes we have to talk about what’s troubling us, even if it seems petty.” she advised.

“Well, I love Reggie and Helemia a lot, and they’re always nice to me, and they always help me a lot.  But a lot of times it bothers me that they’re so much… more than me.  If I were anywhere else, I’d probably be the most amazing child that had even been born in the country.  As it is, I’m a distant third.  And falling farther behind all the time.”

“I don’t see that at all, babe of mine.” Alilia chuckled.  “They have more amazing psionics, you have more amazing magic ability.  They’re most of a year older than you, but believe me, in a few years that won’t matter at all.”

“It’s not their psionics that makes them great, Mother, that’s just a small part of it.” the child explained.  “Another part is that deep down inside, Helemia has the soul of a Sylvan and Reggie has the soul of a dragon, and they both share that, plus they share so much of Father and Talia and you from all the Linking they did when they were little.  I’ve been helped a lot by all the Linking I’ve done too, but they got a lot more of it, and they still do.  But most of it is their intelligence.

“Every night I show them what I’ve learned that day, and they both learn it all from me right away, every detail of it.  I’m getting to be more skilled with the spells than they are because I practice them a lot more, but they know how to do everything I do.  Then they show me what they learned that day, but I can only get the basics of it, because it would take me way more than two days to really learn what they learn in a day. 
And
they learn almost everything that you and Father and Talia learn everyday, and that only takes them a few minutes too.

“I’m getting to be a better spell-caster than they are, and they’re getting to be better than me at
everything else.
  And their determination and drive is just amazing.  I only work so hard because
they
do, and I don’t want them to think less of me.  They don’t need anything to push them to work that hard.  I don’t think anyone could stop them from doing it!”

“Ah, my daughter, I know exactly how you feel.  For most of my life I’ve been overshadowed by Yazadril’s intelligence and experienced wisdom, and lately we’ve all been overshadowed by Mark’s magical ability, the nobility of his character, and his new wisdom.  The day we first met the gods, he made me feel like a coward by comparison, so incredible was the bravery he displayed.

“And I’ll admit that there’s been times when it bothered me, being overshadowed like that.  To almost be the very, very best, but forever destined to be second, or third, or whatever.  But most of the time I’m just extremely thankful to have them in my life, to have their help and support, and their love.

“Besides, one never knows how life will turn out.  Yazadril wasn’t the fastest learner when he was young, or very powerful, nor was he very notable in any way until he was almost three thousand years old.  Now he’s universally recognized as the mightiest of elves, and the finest military commander in the world.  With the possible exception of your father.

“Eventually you’ll find your own place in life, and then it won’t matter.  I’m Princess of The People of Life, perhaps the mightiest of elven nations, and when I’m with them it doesn’t matter that there are others who are greater than I am.  I’m the leader of my people by their choice, and if I say that they should do something, they’ll do it, even if everyone else in the world disagreed with me, including Yazadril or your father.  And that’s enough for me.

“And truly, even that doesn’t matter to me very much anymore.  I have you and I have our family, and most days I feel half-drunk on love and happiness!”

“I know Mother.  I know I really have nothing to complain about and a lot to be thankful for, and I know it’s petty of me.  But sometimes it still bothers me.”

“Hm.  Why don’t we take a few hours and have some fun, just you and me?  No learning or combat or competitiveness, we’ll just have fun.  What do you think?”

“That sounds good to me.” Valentia smiled as she sat up, brightening.  “We could go flying, and have a picnic lunch by the ocean.”

“Then we will.” Alilia smiled as she stood with her daughter in her arms, and carried her into the kitchen to pack their lunch.

Eight months later, Valentia was four years and seven months old, a hundred and four centimeters tall, and weighed eighteen kilos, which made her a bit bigger than average for a human girl her age.

The twins were five years and two months old.  Helemia was only eighty-four centimeters tall, and just less than fourteen kilos in weight, which made her smaller than average for an elven child, or extremely small for a human.