CHAPTER TEN: PLAYING IN THE DARK.

      The silence only got on Rayna's nerves, but that was interrupted by the echo made by Deucalion —he had hit one of the containers with his stick—. Scott and Rayna followed the noise while the man stared at them with a smile.

      "Any of you know what is the name of what I'm doing?"

      Scott looked at Rayna, who looked at him with her face scrunched up before he replied. "Eco-localization."

      "You've done your homework."

      "Yes, I've looked some things up." Scott nodded.

      "And now you think that you can learn everything that it took years for me to dominate in a day?" Deucalion asked before looking at Rayna, his lips went up in a smile. "It's good to see you alive, goddess."

      Rayna smiled at him back. "Thanks for caring, but we came here looking for advice."

      "Yes, something that can help you fight against the Anuk-ite without looking at it."

      "Fighting blindly is one thing. You haven't even learned how to walk. A specialist in Orientation and Mobility has to practice without using his eyes and with a stick for at least twenty hours before being certified."

      "You're talking about humans," Rayna replied. "He's the true alpha and I'm a goddess, we can handle it."

      Deucalion's smile appeared again when he heard the girl talk with such confidence. "I see you haven't changed at all, goddess. But I can't teach you how to walk and fight in less than twenty-four hours."

      "Look, we know that the probabilities are bad, but Gerard has an army. There's a creature that can scare people enough to convert them into murderers."

      "That creature is capable of killing you by only looking at you. You have seen it, haven't you?"

      "We have seen people's bodies turned into marble, that's all," Rayna stated.

      "Then, why aren't you running for your life? I thought you had already learned to recognize the dangers of death from afar, goddess."

      "I'm sick of running, Deucalion," Rayna admitted with a sigh.

      "Because we don't run away," Scott replied firmly.

      "Now you look like an alpha." Deucalion nodded. "Let's start."

♦

      "Unfortunately," Deucalion spoke, now in front of the couple. "There's a crucial difference when teaching you to fight blindly."

      "We're not really blind," Scott said.

      Rayna sighed. "Remind me why I care about that."

      "Unless you pass the next days going everywhere with your eyes covered, the only thing that the Anuk-ite needs to do is to make you open your eyes," Deucalion explained.

      Rayna nodded. "The first thing we do when we feel that we're in danger is open our eyes."

      "Especially if you're afraid," Deucalion added. "To have more light on the situation and send more information to the brain. So you can handle better any threat that it's in front of you."

      "What's next?" Scott asked.

      "In schools for the blind, it is called 'Shadow-dream training'. We'll use normal bandages and we'll start with eco-localization."

      "Sound," Scott nodded.

      "Then I'll teach you how to use thermo-conception," Deucalion added.

      "Heath," Rayna murmured.

      "Balanceception."

      "Balance." The girl nodded, feeling like she was going under a competition against Scott. The boy looked at her and he raised a brow, a little smile playing to appear on his lips while he thought of letting her win.

      "And proprioception."

      Rayna frowned and, after Scott stared at her, noticing that she didn't know the answer, he replied. "Pressure." He smiled at the girl.

      Deucalion sighed while looking at the couple staring at each other. "Your babies are going to be so worthy." He said, gaining the attention again. "Let's start."