Xyra thought, and it happened. The swirling orb of water that she’d created circled her lazily, its path wide enough to leave her wings unwetted.

When first Miss Vora had her do this, it was difficult to not have the water fall like a rock. Or, worse yet, splash into her own face. Miss Vora laughed whenever it happened, but Xyra grew upset at every failure. She would hastily form another orb of water and try again, only to commit the same mistake again, but with more force. On like this she went, from the sun’s rise to its highest point (Miss Vora called it noon) until Miss Vora took her by the hand and suggested a break. She’d said that, while magic did require perseverance, this exercise required a calm, focused mind.

“Don’t be worried, Xyra,” she’d said. “It takes many months to form a basic path.”

So Miss Vora had nearly jumped out of her gown when, later that night, Xyra stood in her bedroom doorway with a watery moon of her own.

Two days had passed since, and Xyra didn’t even need to think about the orb, unless she wanted to change its pace.

Miss Vora stood before her in the garden, walking back and forth in its stone-encircled clearing. Xyra was seated on the bench, her hands rubbing against the things on her legs.

Trousers, Miss Vora called them. Xyra saw them often in the city, but none like those she wore now. They were a delightful blue, but tight like another layer of skin over her scaled legs. Yet they were also soft, and if she pulled, stretchy. Whatever they were called, Xyra liked them, and not just because Miss Vora said she looked nice in them.

“What to do with you, Xyra?” Miss Vora said, a slight bend in her waist. “I can’t very well thrust more advanced magics on you and have you hurting yourself. I’d never live that down. But this spell is meant to take months, and…look at you, you beautiful thing!”

With a bit of concentration, Xyra had managed to loop the orb just a bit farther, until its path took it around the entire bench. It faltered a little with the warming of her cheeks. “Thank you, Miss Vora!”

“Had you attended a formal school, you’d be permanently silenced for using blood magic.” Miss Vora tapped her foot. The sun made the green jewels on her robe shine, and they reminded Xyra of the giant crystal towers in her homeland. “You’ve breezed past the beginnings and into the ranks of a novice within a day.”

“So what I’m doing is bad?”

“Far from it!” Miss Vora smiled. “Now, let’s move on to something else. Let the orb fall.”

Xyra did as she was told, and the orb splashed as it made a wet spot on the stone.

“As contrary as it is to dragons, your affinity lies with water. That may explain your quick mastery of the orb.”

“Affinity, Miss Vora?”

“A natural drawing to something, dear. The vast majority of us have an easier time learning one element over another. Yours happens to be water. Which, by way of coincidence I’m sure, is Princess Farruca’s affinity as well.” She tapped her chin with a slender finger. “Still, it took the princess months to control the orb as well as you, and she’s an incredibly gifted young lady. Affinity doesn’t quite explain it.”

Miss Vora rarely spoke of the human princess. From the first time she’d mentioned her, Xyra had been terribly interested in knowing more. “Oh. Is…is she nice?”

“As much as a royal child can be. She has her moments of imperious demand, but she’s good about her lessons. I love her very much, if I’m to be honest.”

“Can…can I meet her?”

Miss Vora stared at her for a time. When she saw that Xyra was serious, she spoke plainly. “No. Unless she slips away from the tower and into this manor, that will never happen. I can’t take you into the tower. Seeing Wards will strip that illusion from my ring faster than we can blink.”

“Oh.” Xyra’s eyes looked past Miss Vora and at the distant tower, where Princess Farruca lived. Her family’s cave was never so far away from other dragons.

“But,” Miss Vora said, “I’m sure she’d love you. It would take a strange person to not. I think you two could even be friends, and goddess knows the girl needs one.”

“If I didn’t wear the ring?” Xyra focused again on her teacher.

Miss Vora raised a thin brow. “What do you mean, dear?”

“If I wasn’t a human…if she saw me as I am now. As my true self. As a dragon.”

“I suppose...” Miss Vora’s face lost its earlier happiness and replaced it with a small frown. “I suppose not, Xyra.”

“Then…then I don’t want to meet her!” She was just as surprised as Miss Vora at the forcefulness in her voice.”

Miss Vora stepped forward, towards her, with a look of gentleness. “You must understand, Xyra, that the Sacreds are quite clear. For most, there is no greater word in the land. And if nothing else, the royal family is devout.”

Miss Vora had told her of those. Scrolls written by people long, long dead, that carried the will of their goddess. She found it strange how much hate Inera had for her kind. Xyra had never heard of her until she came to this place, known as Adamore.

“What about you, Miss Vora?” Xyra asked. It was clear that Miss Vora didn’t hate her, but she rarely spoke of the Sacreds at all.

“Personally,” she said, taking a seat beside her, “I don’t place too much faith in them. There are ideals that I agree with, of course, such as love and kindness, but it goes off the deep end into unflinching obedience and, worst of all, virginity.” Miss Vora shuddered.

Miss Vora seemed to not like that word. “What’s that, Miss Vora?”

“Hmm? What’s what?”

“V-virginity…”

Miss Vora’s lips pursed. “You…you don’t know what it is?”

Xyra shook her head slowly. Should she have known? Now Miss Vora would think she was stupid. Again.

“W-well…” Miss Vora’s face was flushed red. Never had Xyra seen her so. “Uh, have you ever been…touched before, Xyra? By another dragon?”

“My sister and I, when we were small. But-“

Miss Vora coughed.

“Oh!” Xyra’s eyes widened in realization, and it was her turn to grow warm in the face. “No, Miss Vora! No!”

Miss Vora tugged at a braid absently, then smiled. It was such a strange smile, too, as if that was the answer she wanted. “I thought as much. You do absolutely reek of it, dear.”

Xyra wasn’t sure how to take that, given that Miss Vora didn’t like such a thing. “I’m sorry, Miss Vora…”

“You have nothing to be sorry about. There’s nothing wrong with it. My bone to pick with the Sacreds is their insistence on treating it as an ideal to aspire to, rather than the descriptor it is. You tell these girls all their lives that the Virgin Goddess is something to aspire to, and you inevitably break them when their bodies tell them different. The result is a church full of poor women thinking, as you do, that they must apologize for themselves.”

Xyra smiled, though she understood little of what Miss Vora was so passionate about.

“I suppose I’m boring you,” Miss Vora said with a glance towards her. “How about another spell, and this time, one that leans more into energy than water?”

Xyra nodded, but a doubtful question sprung forward. “Can it hurt people?”

Miss Vora shrugged. “Perhaps. But, to be truthful, most spells can cause harm if the caster has the will to do so. That little water orb? Get comfortable enough with it, and you can drown someone standing up.”

Was that true? A cold tingle crept up the tip of Xyra’s tail and through her back. “Ok, but…don’t teach me how to do that!”

A giggle escaped from her amused teacher. Those shouldn’t have been a surprise by now, but they always served to remind Xyra that Miss Vora wasn’t much older. “You and Farruca are so, so different. Now, touch the Well, as I’ve told you.”

Xyra closed her eyes. Outwards she reached with her spirit, shifting through until she touched it. A familiar feeling of warmth. It enveloped her, washed over insides like a sun-beaten puddle of water. Her eyes opened. “Ok, Miss Vora.”

A light flickered to life in front of her keeper, blasting her face and twin braids with light. Blue. Somehow faint and powerful at once. “This is Nisva’s Companion. It’s an ancient, but simple spell, meant to illuminate things. Perfect for a novice and-mostly-harmless. Here. Take it from me.”

The light was suspended in a strange form above her hand, but Miss Vora needn’t move it in order to push the light towards Xyra.

With a nod, Xyra reached for it. Both their magics mingled for a moment, and Xyra was in awe at the silent calmness that was Miss Vora’s, until the light was firmly in her own.

Miss Vora exhaled sharply. “Goddess, Xyra!”

The light flickered as Xyra’s concentration lapsed. “What? Did I do something wrong?”

“No. It’s just…that’s incredible,” Miss Vora said, seemingly out of breath. “I saw it when you first took the orb of water, but I thought myself mistaken. Your portion of the Well is immense. I can’t see the end of it.”

“Are you alright?” Xyra asked.

“Yes, yes. I’m fine. A bit shocked, is all.”

Relieved, Xyra again focused on the light. Its blue was different from the sky, or the city’s streets. Those were deep, dark blues, with voices to match. This was softer, and more shrill than anything. But she didn’t dislike it. Somehow, familiar.

“It’s supposed to flicker and go out, you know,” Miss Vora said. “I don’t believe that you’d lie to me, but are you sure that you’ve no practice with your magic? If your usage of it’s as sparse as you say it is, then little about you makes sense.”

“I promise, Miss Vora. A few times, that’s it!” She’d used it to heal Magenia’s scrapes and bruises when they were children. It wasn’t much; droplets, here and there. Nothing like the torrent she needed to heal Volsten. To speak of it, she hadn’t revealed the nature of her magic either.

Miss Vora’s face was thoughtful in the blue light. “I see. Our grasp of the Well grows with our experience, and I’ve studied under masters, men that were near-enough archmages. Yet, their portion is a puddle compared to yours!”

Xyra held the orb in silence. Should she let it wink out, to ease Miss Vora’s mind? She didn’t understand why it was so easy. But, no matter what Miss Vora said, she knew something was wrong with her. Otherwise, Miss Vora wouldn’t have been so shocked.

“Regardless,” Miss Vora said, crossing one leg over the other, “I’m thankful for the opportunity. Say, Xyra, would you like to know something interesting about this spell?”

Xyra nodded, relieved to be moving on.

“There are two origin stories for it. In one, it’s believed that Inera gifted the spell to Nisva in her darkest hour, when the saint had nearly given up on her cause. A sign that the goddess still watched her, even while she suffered. Why she offered nothing more substantial than a nightlight, the story doesn’t say.

“The other story-and by the name of the spell, you’ll be able to guess which is more popular-says that, rather than the goddess, it was the fairy queen that gifted the light. And, not to Nisva, but to Artheon, as a sign of friendship. To be honest, there’s debate as to whether or not fairies even existed, and the church treating the subject as heretical stifles any attempt at settling it.”

Xyra knew enough about the goddess that she didn’t like that story much. But what was a fairy? It was a pretty word that meant nothing to her. “Which do you believe, Miss Vora?”

She looked deeply into Nisva’s Companion, and her shoulders went up and down. “As always, it’s probably a bit of both."