After walking most of the way out of the woods with Effy, we split up since it's still not a good idea to be seen together, and head back into the city separately. I walk quickly to get home, not long before the last bell. I end up sitting on my bed, sort of trying to meditate, but kind of distracted and wondering when Emily will be back. "I'm not getting anywhere..." I mutter to myself. Maybe I should talk to Jess, have her teach me more about the different gods' marks? It still feels like I'm behind and have too much to learn and not enough time. I walk the halls briefly before realizing I don't even know where to look for her, and end up flopping back on my bed again.

Come on, I think to myself, I got something done today. I made at least a little progress, learning more of what I might be up against. Why do I still feel so anxious?

Because I know even better how unprepared I am. I roll over to face down on the bed, sighing into the hard wood. "Uhh, Aria? You alright?"

I wave Eve off, sitting up on her bed. "Fine, just thinking."

"Anything you need to talk about?"

"Probably, but I don't really want to talk... Sorry..." I apologize.

"It's fine, I'm here if you ever do want to talk," she says quietly.

"Thanks, Eve." I don't know. Is it that I know I can't really talk about this with her, or that I actually don't want to for once?

It's just, before the last battle, every day was focused on frantically learning everything I possibly could that might help me. Now that I've been to war, now that I actually know what I'm really up against, it feels like nothing will help, and I'm not even gaining any ground with the things I am working on.

"Maybe I just need more practice..." I mutter under my breath. Like writing and sewing, maybe the things I'm working on now are really hard and I need to throw my all into practicing as much as possible if I want to get any better? At least that gives me a goal, a target to go for. I hate feeling so helpless and powerless to do anything, like I did back then. If I can stay focused on my goal, that will be much better than feeling like this all the time.

I push up to kneel, close my eyes, and start meditating again, with determination this time. Of all the things I can practice, commanding my mana indirectly is the one I can work on most often since it doesn't require anything or anyone to work with. I get to work, commanding my mana to move, turn, organize itself, go to one part of my body. As before, I never get anything like what I want it to do, and I have no idea if I'm even making progress. But I'm going to keep practicing anyway.

My practice continues until Emily comes in. I can tell by her footsteps, so I don't open my eyes, and return my attention to my practice after a moment. Eventually, she comes over and taps me on the shoulder, so I stop and look up at her. "Dinner," she notes holding the bowl out. I guess John already showed up. I give a small nod and thank her, then get to eating.

I spend the rest of the night meditating, practicing writing and my mana control, teach Emily a little more, and eventually go to bed again. My nights are getting pretty late, aren't they...?

I wake up groggy the next morning, before first bell again. I head downstairs, practicing and teaching Emily a little more writing. There were a whole lot of new words yesterday, and I'll probably start learning even more as we get to the rest of the alphabet. That, and once Claire starts teaching me longer words.

Eventually John shows up, and he carries me off to work again. Firoday, last day of classes this week, I think to myself. I've made it through a lot of the alphabet already. At this pace, we should finish next week. Then it will either be learning a ton of new words, or finally getting started on some of the other subjects that I guess require me to read even more than I thought.

On the way, I keep practicing my mind-speaking with John. I explore some of the ideas based on the few tests that gave some sort of results before, even if they weren't what I was looking for. I keep working on it, but honestly, I'm starting to run out of ideas. There must be some way to make it work... right? It's definitely not that there isn't a way and that's why Reena didn't tell me?

I shake my head at myself. Of course there's a way. Reena said she didn't want to interfere in me learning, she wouldn't sabotage me like that, sending me off to try and learn to do something that isn't possible. It has to be something I just haven't thought of yet.

Still determined, I keep messing with the shape and composition of the link, tweaking, twisting, shifting it all around in any way I can imagine. But I still don't manage it by the time we get to the refinery. As I sit and eat breakfast, I just keep thinking about it.

What am I missing? I've done so many tests, seen so many small differences, but I haven't landed on the right answer yet. There must be something in all of it, something I missed...

Staring hard down into the bowl of vegetables, I pick over the bits and pieces of information I have to work with. Of everything, my best clues are those two size tests. The one where I made the connection as small as possible and it sort of helped. And the other, where I made it really big and was able to hear Eryk's thoughts. Besides those, there were the tests where I changed the size as I was thinking and that had some effect too, though John couldn't really describe it too well.

Different composition of various mana types never did anything useful, so I can rule those out... Neither did the shape of the string, even making it into things like stars and rectangles...

Stars and rectangles...? There's some thought, at the back of my mind, just out of reach. Trying to hold onto it, I grab some stuff from my basket and make lightning mana. Come on intuition...

Shaped string...

I finally stop, blinking a little. Then I look over at Eryk and ask, "Hey, what is string made of?"

He looks up from his work, pausing for a few moments, then answers. "String is made from fibrous plants or animal fur."

My brow furrows as I look down, trying to understand. "How is it done?"

"I can't say I'm that familiar with the process, but I believe it's done by spinning the individual fibers together so they interlock strongly enough to form a single thread."

"So... it's not a string..." I mutter. I turn back to my food, continuing to eat while I think. I pictured it as a string. A piece thread to connect me to the other person. But I already changed it into other shapes. Based on Eryk's description, thread doesn't do that.

I've been thinking of thread this whole time. Things I can do to change thread. I am not working with thread. It's exactly what Reena warned me about. I have to be careful of words and labels. They form solid, certain images in my mind and change how I interact with things. If I choose the wrong word, I'll end up interacting with things the wrong way.

The connection I'm forming for this is not thread. It's... something else. What exactly? Let's see... What does it do? How does it work?

It carries my thoughts and feelings. Like... sound I guess?

Like sound...

I bring my hands up, cupping them over my mouth so there's just a small hole to let my voice out. Then I look to Eryk and John and loudly ask, "Can you hear me?" It comes out muffled and quiet, and they both tilt their heads with similar, worried expressions. They definitely can't make out what I said though. I reverse it, moving my hands to circle my mouth outward instead of inward, like I've seen people do sometimes. "How about now?" They both flinch a little at my unexpectedly loud voice.

"Umm?" Eryk can't seem to come up with any better question beyond that.

"Hey John, can I try one more thing?" I ask.

"Uhh, sure?" At his answer, I get up, leaving my food. I touch his hand, and grab my mana. I don't make it into a string. I take a whole blob of it, forming it into... a sort of... faintly shaped form. A container to hold the sound of my thoughts as they travel. Because sound travels...

I stretch the container, draw it away from where it connects to my barrier, thin it down as I pull it over, through the wall between me and John. It eventually comes to a small point. If it works like sound, it should force down the sound of my thoughts, making them smaller and smaller until they don't hurt to listen to. I connect the small point to John's barrier.

"Did it work?" I think at him.

John jolts. His entire body spasms, head nearly cracking into the wall behind him. The strength goes out of him and I have to catch him when he nearly collapses.

What?!

Eryk launches to his feet, coming around his desk quickly to help me. We shift John to sit on the floor against the wall.

"I... I..." However I try, I can't form any sentence.

"It's fine," Eryk pats my head, but he's still looking John over. "You're still practicing."

"B-but-!"

He cuts me off. "Mistakes happen."

I slide to the floor, trembling. "I... hurt John..." I hurt a person. How could I?

"Don't worry, he's..." But he trails off as he turns to me and sees my face.

I stare down at my hands, watching the tears fall into my palms one after another. I hurt a person. Not an enemy, not an animal, a human being living in this city who I have a duty to protect. One that I care about, who helps me every day.

But I didn't mean to!

But I knew it was a possibility. I knew it could happen. I saw how it hurt them if I spoke too loudly. I must have realized that finding a way to make myself louder would cause something like this.

Except I didn't! I didn't consider the possibility that I would accidentally find a way to be louder first!

Doesn't that just make it worse?

A groan drags me from my downward spiral. My head snaps up to look at John. His eyes squint open. He shifts a little, raises a hand, then closes it over my head.

"That's sure got a kick," he says, starting to ruffle my hair.

"I-"

"Don't worry, I've been through worse." He bats his other hand in the air, totally waving it off. Then he shows a smile, despite the pain in his eyes. "Congratulations, you figured it out."

"But-"

He cuts me off again. "If you still want to apologize, there's one way to do it." Before I can ask how, he taps the side of his head with a finger. He... wants me to do it again? After what I just did to him?

But, I have to apologize. I have to. He already has a hand on my head. Still shaking a little, I swallow hard. I grab my mana and do it again.

I'm not working with sound. I don't make it more quiet by narrowing it down to a point. This is a surface.

A surface... An image from a dream fills my mind. Connecting surfaces... I join the mana to my barrier, a small point this time. With another stretch, I pull the mana over to his side, widening it, allowing much more of his barrier to connect.

A small point of me, connecting to a much larger portion of him. "I'm sorry." I think.

He winces a bit, but it isn't with pain this time. "Come on, you shouldn't feel that guilty," he responds to the feelings that went with my thought, still rubbing my head. "I've had worse hangovers than this." With a small grimace, he pushes himself back to his feet. I pull the connection back quickly, before he removes his hand from my head, to avoid losing the mana. "Come on, cheer up. One little bump along the way is no big deal," John says encouragingly. "Now, it's probably about time, I'll head outside," he jerks his head slightly toward the door as he says so, then heads out.

I keep staring at the door before Eryk speaks up. "Come on Aria, he'll be fine." He speaks quietly. "Claire should be here soon. Go finish your breakfast." With a small push, he directs me back over to the table. I sit, wipe away the tears staining my face, and eat the rest of the food in my bowl.

I close my eyes and think to myself. I have to clear my head. Eryk and John both said he would be fine. It was just an accident. I know better now, it won't happen again. Even if I can't forgive myself for doing it, I have to just leave it for now so I can focus on my lessons. "Haahhh..." I breath out slowly, letting the guilt settle to the back of my mind. I... can't deal with it right now. Claire should be here soon.

I sit for a bit longer, just waiting.

Then Brom grabs my attention. Something is weird in the forest.

"Not me!" Myra denies immediately. With a quick check of her location, she's at the edge of the mountains and forest, still moving south. It's... mostly clear that her travels aren't close enough to the section of forest where Brom is. Probably...

"Do you guys want to check?" I direct the question toward the hobins.

"Sure. Kiara, can you do the hunting today?" Maven asks. She shrugs and agrees, heading his way to relieve him. Soma and Baan go along too. I wonder what it is? Hopefully not another monster or something... Although, supposedly those aren't that unusual if you get deep enough in the forest, right? Maybe it's something aggressive enough that it goes after other monsters or something?

Well, I'll just wait and see. Maybe it is just a reaction to Myra, she's probably a lot more powerful than anything in the forest, so maybe we're underestimating it? Then the lightning mana I generated earlier suddenly kicks in. It's definitely not Myra.

"Alright then," I think to them, "not Myra." That just makes me worry even more that it's going to be another monster or something. At least Emily is at work today, not in the forest. But... what about everyone else? There are lots of people out in the forest every day, people I'm supposed to protect. Like John...

I have to kick away the guilt that bites out immediately, before returning to my previous thoughts. No, that's just not reasonable. I can't possibly protect everyone in this town from everything. I mean, if someone was attacked in front of me, it would be my duty to shield them, but I don't have to run off into the woods just because there's something dangerous that might hurt someone, I would never get a moment's rest if I had that sort of obligation.

Well, even if I don't have to, it still kind of bothers me, knowing there might be something dangerous and not doing anything about it.

Except I don't actually know there's anything dangerous. The last time my attention got called to the forest, it was just because there were some suspicious people standing around. Which I never figured out...

I shake away another intruding thought. Whatever's happening is in the deep forest anyway, I'm sure there's a ton of stuff there that I don't know anything about. No one even goes that far in anyway.

"Just keep me updated if you find anything," I instruct, then return my attention to myself. Just as I turn, there's a knock on the door.

"Eep!" I squeak, totally caught off guard. Eryk raises an eyebrow, motioning for me to move. I shake myself, then get up from my chair and hurry over to the spot where I usually stand to greet Claire.

"Come in," Eryk calls. John lets her in and we go through our usual greetings. Then it's off to the back room for my morning lessons.

They go about as well as usual, but between the guilt from earlier and the worry about something happening in the forest, I keep finding my mind wandering and have to kick myself to get back on task. I still try to do my best and focus, memorizing everything I can. We cover more letters, getting to 'r,' which is used in a whole bunch of new words.

A big one that jumps out though, is 'paper.' Apparently that's the word for those thin things people write on.

But... "Umm, I thought the word for that was 'page,' is there some difference?" I ask.

"Ah, page refers to a piece of paper in a book," Claire explains simply. I've... been using it wrong this whole time... I shake my head a little. That's fine, I know the difference now. 'Page' in a book, 'paper' outside...

We continue on. Pretty much all the new words she teaches me use the letter 'r,' but none of them have a 'q' in them. When I ask, Claire says that 'q' is a pretty rare letter, and most words have it followed by 'u,' a letter I haven't learned yet, so we'll get to those words later. "Hmm..." I mumble as I nod. So that's why...

Before I know it, the fifth bell rings and we stop for lunch.

I sit at the table, still kind of distracted as John brings my lunch. I'm glad to see he looks better now. As I start to eat, Eryk comes over from his desk. I look up, raising a brow, and he starts to explain.

"So, we'll be doing some more work later, I just wanted you to know that I've been working with the magnet you gave me, running all sorts of tests. I made sure to try every metal I could, and copper's still the best for making lightning. I didn't get much of a result from anything else.

"O-oh." I didn't even realize it might work with other metals...

"Unfortunately, no matter what I've tried, I can't get all that much energy out of it. Right now, the best I have is stacking up a whole bunch of copper around around the magnet. Each piece makes a little energy, but I still haven't figured out a good method to get it all to join together. That's what we'll look at later. I'm thinking of heading to a blacksmith to see if maybe we can custom order something that might help. I'm not sure if we'll need more copper, or if some other shape is better, so I just wanted to see if you could come up with something after seeing how it works with more copper and a strong magnet.

"Mm, alright." I nod a little and respond between bites. I guess we'll get to that after my lessons. Once he's done explaining, he starts jotting something down on a sheet of paper. I wonder how much lightning he's been able to make, and how much more he still needs to get the star metals to combine...

But my attention gets grabbed away again by the others in the forest. It took them a while to pinpoint the thing in the forest since it's been moving quickly while everything keeps a lot of distance from it, so they've been searching all around the area it should be.

Turning my thoughts to Maven, he jumps through the trees as it comes into sight.

It's... people? A small line of people, moving quickly through the dense tree cover. Why would they spook the animals? Maven moves in stealthily, taking care to keep to high branches where he won't be spotted, while the other hobins hang further back.

Peering down, he starts picking up more details. Adults, wearing clothing I'm not familiar with. They sort of look like... dresses? No, they don't have skirts or anything. They're just very form fitting, I guess. They all look like men, or at least they're really tall and have short hair like men. Actually, a couple have large breasts, so they're not all men...

None of this is helping. Why are they there and why does it even matter? Since they're moving at a quick pace, Maven has to reposition a few more times as he observes. Then he gets close enough for a better look.

Their faces. Those expressions.

Those are rail units.