Chapter 5: The Jivae
Finally, out of the dense swampland that coasted to my right, I saw her.
A beautiful mottled brown Jivae doe. She had big, big eyes. And something in her gaze rendered me speechless. She had responded to a call entirely consisting of squeeeeee r, squeeeeee r, squeeee, r. She came up to me from the fog, and she bent down so she could sneeze on my open palm.
"Ew!" I said, but Mr. Brown laughed.
"She's accepted you, all right. Tell her to 'conreaw'."
I did, the word rolling off my tongue in a strange purring sound. At once, the Jivae shrunk to the size of a small, inch-long rat. She leapt into my pocket as Mr. Brown told me I couldn't name her.
What a silly rule. I had. And her name was Song.
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"OK, so, you need to learn to fight, first of all. Take out your swords." Mr. Brown was directing a whole class of young Dqyus. Our thick, brown padded uniforms held tight to our frames as we withdrew our swords.
I tugged out my sword and waited for the next instruction.
"Now, jab it forward and let the energy from your brain impulse to your fingers and into the metal. You should see a blast of fire."
I tried and a tiny flame burst from the tip. The airy area was now alive with a few other fires as the others tried and a few succeeded. We contuined to emit tiny flames for next half hour until-
"You have mastered the first area of Blaze Swording. Next lesson we will build on this. Now, call your Jivae. We will try mind-reading." As we called and stroked our Jivaes, Mr. Brown explained, "The mind-reading relationship between Jivae and Warrior is not really one of mind-reading, but one of trust and devotion. There is only one true mind-reading relationship, which is a form of magic, which we will go over later."
Someone groaned from the crowd, and Mr. Brown focused on that person, whoever it was. Then she came to the front of the class, and he said,
"That is mind-reading, but I extended it to controlling. Ms. Gretchen, you may go back to your spot."
"You got it this time, June!" sniggered a younger boy with contempt as June returned to her spot a few Dqyus behind me. I grinned and waved at her as means of polite welcome, but she shrugged it off with a forced smile.
"Now, look at your Jivaes."
I stared hard at Song. She stared back.
"You are merging into one soul. Tell your Jivae to let out a cawing sound, which will bring you out of the merging."
I glared hard at her. I felt a strange feeling that felt as if I was leaking into Song, but then I told her to caw. She did, and I came out of the strange feeling. Like emerging from water...
Later that night, with Song snuggled in the pocket of my nighttime apparel, I had a dream.
Brown looking out of the dark, a fort. Warriors gaurding it. But footsteps were approaching quickly, and I wanted to alert them, to say someone was there, that something was about to happen...
And then June woke me. She had heard my screams and came to help. She shook me and slapped my face until I woke and she had forced me to tell about it.
"Fort Briar. Attacked by Crystal Soilders."
"We have to tell Mr. Brown." said June quietly, "Fort Briar is at the heart of our Emerald Warrior operation."
"So?"
"It means that they've invaded," said June.
