Song: "How Am I Going To Tell Him?" from The Dragon Prince Season 2 OST

Father's arms were so strong and warm. Holding him and listening to his deep voice in his chest was like a blanket over my body and soft music in my ears. Tell me you remember, Mother. Tell me you remember the man you married. Because I must write down what he was like, or I shall forget.

❂❂❂

By Divendres - the day before the weekend - Micah was bored. Emeth Ahelia constantly droned on as though he was stupid and didn't get that magic strain existed, and he wanted to nod off at how easy everything was. He sighed, gazing at the pens she'd given him - pens he couldn't click like he had been. Maybe you should give me something to do besides that. At least they're interesting. We always used charcoal to write back home.

He lowered his head onto his desk and spoke. "Emeth Ahelia, I want to move on already." The other students cast annoyed gazes his way, but he ignored them; they rarely talked to him anyway.

"Move on?" Ahelia echoed. "What do you mean?"

"I want to actually learn magic." The other students exchanged confused looks. "I've been sitting in this classroom getting taught things I already know. I mean—who doesn't know where sorcerers' magic comes from or how to make a mandala? Just give me the spells and I can figure it out."

Ahelia rested her chin in a hand. "Everyone else is at the standard pace, Micah." She frowned. "You must also learn how to raise your hand, dear. Otherwise, you will have trouble when you graduate to the higher classes."

The bell rang, and Ahelia shouted over it. "Don't disturb Light Spinner's class on your way out, please!" The sorceress gazed at him with bright eyes as he left, writing a note with a glitter pen on her class roster.

Micah shuffled down the hallway till he halted at a transparent door with text in a foreign language. Beyond the glass, Light Spinner's slender white fingers glided over Ver's, and they traced a spell together. The entire back wall was a window that displayed the crashing waterfalls on the edge of the island.

He clenched his fists and sighed, fogging up the glass. Veritas was three years younger than him, and she was learning just fine how to cast spells. I wish I was there. I'm ready to move on. Light Spinner seemed friendly enough at the ceremony.

Light Spinner's long skirt trailed across the floor as she opened the door. "What?" Her voice was hard.

A blush burned his cheeks—how was she so intimidating? The Guild badge on her dress winked treacherously at him. "Sorry—your class just looked cool. I didn't mean to...to..." Moons, what is the word in Meyan? Setg laic? Cridar a?

Light Spinner grunted, her veil shifting with the puff of air. "Go to your dorm if class is finished. And don't disturb us again," she said coldly, "or there will be consequences." With this, she slammed the door, and Micah clutched his bags. An idea began to brew in his mind. A crazy one.

Regardless of what had just happened, he wanted to learn magic. He wanted to be in Light Spinner's class.

✧✧✧

That night, Light Spinner shut down her classroom and meandered to Master Norwyn's house, her shoulders drooping with weariness. This was the routine each week: to visit her father figure and enjoy his company. He was the only person willing to be close with her, and she was grateful for his grace toward her.

After ten years of bad sleeping habits to study for her Emeth, she was just beginning to fall back into a proper routine. She passed the time by distracting herself, poring over fantastical stories about the She-Ra, and reading book after book about runestone magic. But some days she abruptly stopped, as if in a trance, and remembered the crushing loneliness: the price of her knowledge and power.

Her mind shifted to Micah of Tropicilas, who had spied into her class. That boy is trouble. Ahelia complains about him. The other students talk about how much he disrupts class. He's said to cheat on tests, click pens while she talks.

What a nightmare. Imagine if I had to deal with that.

She walked up to the small cottage, letting herself in. Norwyn rested on the couch near the empty hearth. When she snapped, plasma danced along her fingers. She touched the wood, prompting the hearth to burst into flames with a homey fragrance.

She sank into the couch with Norwyn, and he held out his hand. "How was class today?"

She placed her hand in his tiredly. "The same as usual. Veritas being herself, and Asteria trying to stop her." She shifted her tone, mustering false cheerfulness. "But it went well otherwise."

Play along. Just as before. She leaned her head on his shoulder. The satyr didn't love her as much as he loved his reputation; as she was ignored and treated as dangerous, he refused to defend her openly. But he was still the only person who cared for her in any deep way.

Her thoughts wandered back to Micah. "Someone tried to interrupt class today."

Norwyn's aging face betrayed an amused smile. "Who would dare?"

Oh, shut up. "That Tropicil boy from the coronation. The one Asteria and Veritas brought."

"Sarah's son?"

"Yes; Micah, son of Abraham. He came up to the glass and just...watched."

"Is this a bad thing?"

"I only wish he'd leave," she grumbled. "He's impeding the learning of my students."

"You don't think he wants to learn magic?"

Light Spinner snorted. "Ahelia tells me he won't even let her talk before he blurts out some meaningless jabber in class, and the other students hate him for it. Luckily, he's not mine to keep track of."

Norwyn was quiet for a time. Light Spinner loathed silence between them. Change was a part of her life; it always had been. Now she simply had more power and the responsibility to wield it properly.

She drew in a shuddering breath. Don't think. Just do what you must. Keep the peace. There were good things about being his child. Patient were his actions, as a gentle old man whose wife had died young, and he chose his words more carefully than anyone else she knew. He must be aware of how she ached for love, though she never betrayed those wishes openly. "Things will change soon, child," he said. "Have faith."

Light Spinner wished it could be true, but for now, she had to be content. Her lot in life was to be unloved, and his care was all she would get. So she sighed as she lay near him and watched the fire.

❂❂❂

Did you know...

● Norwyn plays a very small role in She-Ra as Light Spinner's superior, who disagrees with her line of thinking on power. But I figured since I have a whole book to do whatever I want with Light Spinner, I could expand on their relationship. 

● I also drew upon the old show slightly in this regard, since Norwyn having been her teacher and father figure was only in the 1985 cartoon.

Tell me what you think...

● What do you make of Light Spinner and Norwyn's relationship so far? 

● Why do you think Light Spinner is so cold toward Micah?