?Nana cocks her head at it and then grins like that vampyr I just killed did.
?I step on the mat and release my aura to build around me. It floods my eyes and I twist that fourth key within to deepen them. A bloodred darker than I’ve let show before. Then I release my hold and my aura shatters the air with how fast and far it flies.
?“Rules,” Nana sneers, but I tisk at her.
?“Nomagicgoes past the matts. Aura is not magic.”
?I approach her where she stands in the middle of the forty by forty foot mat flooring. She’s teeming with so much power from her aura fueled by her irritation at me, but so much careful control.
?Her milky eyes cloud as she glares at me, and then she sniffs and hums. “I am impressed, Mavyllora. So much control over the powers within you that you have been able to withhold a wish for nearly an entire month.”
?The rest of the room had seemed to fall away as soon as I stepped on the mat. But pieces come back where I see my fated looking just as confused as everyone else.
?“It’s not possible to withhold a wish for longer than hour. It would have eaten away at your aura and then your spirit and soul before reducing your body to dust.”
?The stone witch’s eyes begin glowing as she steps past the other trainers and stares at me. The ends of her white hair are dyed the same pink that is in mine and it stuns me a bit that someone who must be at least a couple millenniums old has dyed hair.
?Not that she looks it. If she were human I would peg her around late thirties to early forties. Definitely younger than Nana who looks like she’s easily in her sixties.
?I let that fourth door swing open and the strength of my aura almost becomes tangible. “I’m beginning to think none of you actually know what the wordimpossiblemeans.”
?Nana hisses at the witch and snaps her teeth at me. “Quit being a brat, Mavyllora. Sonya is correct. Why hasn’t the wish killed you and why are you continuing to withhold it?”
?I twist and open that second door making thunder clap directly above us. My aura now reaches further past Nana’s. She scoffs at it.
?“I’m saving it for a rainy day,” I answer honestly. “And ithasbeen eating away at my aura.”
?Varian clutches onto our bond and I can feel three others doing to the same as Nana finally takes a step back in surprise.
?“It’s been a month,” she whispers.
?I roll my shoulders back again as I stretch out my neck. “I know.” And then I unlock and open that third door which makes my aura dominate Nana’s.
?“How?”
?“Aura is the core of magic. A spiritual representation of it. You cannot have powerful magic without a powerful aura. And the first definition for infinite was simply a fractured blood art.”
?Nana shakes her head at me. “You cannot have infinite aura.”
?“No,” I agree, “but a mobius strip is infinite even as it stays in the same place. Perspective, Nana. No end, but stuck in the same loop. I am feeding my wish recycled aura within that loop. In a sense, I’m tricking the wish into believing I do have infinite aura. Though I haven’t fully tested the actual edges of my magic. Not sure you’d want me to either. After all, you did say I have no control.”
?And I finally open that first door.
?Consuming is my aura and scent. The red sheet – not ribbons or threads – lays like a blanket that I know everyone can now see.
?“Are you ready to evaluate my skill?”
?She coils her magic around her as she lunges. Faster than Kolasi. I have no choice but to block with my exposed body, but Nana does not attack with a closed fist or technique that should test my skill. She comes at me with open palms and wraps them around my forearms.
?Pain obliterates like it does every time.
?Singeing my nerves and burning with a heat that wishes to turn my soul into ash. I do not, however, let it last long.
?Nana does nothing else as she waits and watches. Expecting me to fall like I should. Succumbed to the pain.
?“You think this is pain?” I whisper to her. Just like I did to that bone witch on the field. It has the same effect. “You don’t know burning.”
?Then I twist out of her hold and shove her back. Fury rumbles and it presses my aura further. That was a low blow and she did it with an intent to hurt me. To punish me. To put me in what she believes is my place.
