"Change back, change back!" Audrey shouted.

"You're gonna break something, doofus!" Deynan yelled.

I froze. Don't break anything. Don't. Break. Anything.

"Take a breath and imagine a cold wave washing over you," Sierra instructed.

I closed my eyes and took a breath. It didn't feel so much like a WAVE per say, but more like wind. I shivered, and suddenly, I was a scrawny boy once more. I stretched my arms out, wincing. "I'm sore."

"Drink water, it helps with muscle pain," Sierra said with a smile.

"Yeesh, the scroll tells me to drink water, now you're telling me to drink water, I get it, I get it," I muttered. But I was grinning.

Isaac silently passed me a water bottle. I attempted to unscrew it.

"Your turn," Audrey said, kicking Deynan. He rubbed his shoulder, scowling. "Would you quit that?"

"She wasn't even kicking hard," Sophie said, her eyes dancing.

Deynan rolled his eyes and stood up. "I'm gonna look so much cooler as a centaur than you two."

"Hey!" I said half-heartedly, still pulling on the cap to my water bottle.

"He has a point," Isaac muttered. I hung my head in half-mock, half-legitimate shame.

Deynan bent his head. I shifted uncomfortably. At least I wasn't the one transforming this time.

The light began to swirl. It never seemed to take him as much time as me or Isaac.

To be perfectly honest, he did look pretty good as a centaur. But he did accidentally kicked the broken bench.

"I win for damage report," I called, finally getting my water bottle open.

Deynan transformed back into human. "Hand me one of those water bottles, will you? I'm beat." Isaac took one from the cooler and handed it to me. I tried to toss it to Deynan, but it fell short and landed at his feet. He cocked an eyebrow, leaned over, and picked it up. He sat down, wiping his brow. I noticed with envy that he opened the water bottle on the first try.

I rubbed my arms and stretched my back. I felt like I had just run a mile, and I'm not a particularly fit person.

"Alright, who wants to go first next?" Audrey said after a moment. "It's the last one, right?"

I fought the urge to groan. "Um..."

"Audrey..." Isaac began.

She glared at us, her eyes narrow, her lips pressed thin. "Do you want to save these people or not?"

"We do!" I said hurriedly.

"But we can't," Deynan said flatly.

"And why not?" she demanded. I bit my lip nervously. Audrey was great, but she was scary.

"Because we're tired, Audrey," Isaac said gently. I sat back a little and let the master so his work. "I don't think we're supposed to transform this many times so fast."

"You've only done two today," she said, frowning.

"Yeah, and it's not even lunch yet," Deynan replied.

"We don't want to push ourselves because we want to be in top shape for investigating this problem," Isaac said.

"No, you're just tired," she grumbled.

"Yes," he said evenly, "which is the body's signal to the brain to slow down."

She crossed her arms and sat back. "That's so dumb. Sierra turned into five forms in two minutes."

Sierra looked alarmed. She obviously didn't want to be brought into the argument. "I was also on adrenaline. I nearly passed out. And you remembered how tired we were the next day. Plus, I'm sure goddess helped, seeing as it healed my injuries."

"Hey Audrey," Sophie said quietly, looking up from her book, "I looked it up, and I think it's true. They need some time to recharge. It takes a physical toll on your body concentrated like that."

Audrey considered this for a moment, eyebrows knit.

Finally, Deynan broke the silence. "Well, we can sit here and debate all day, but I'm still not doing it, so..." He shrugged.

She slumped in defeat. "Whatever."

And awkward tension filled the air.

"Hey, Deynan!" Sierra said suddenly, almost overly happy. He raised an eyebrow. She continued. "Didn't you mention lunch? We should have lunch!"

He perked up. "Food?"

Isaac and I cheered. Sierra laughed, but I could see the relief in her eyes. So she hated awkwardness just as much as I did.

But she DID something about it.

Sandwiches were passed around. A small part of me wondered just how much preparation had gone into this journey. Knowing Mrs. Simone, a lot. She seemed like the type to over-prepare.

"Hey Audrey," Deynan said, biting into his sandwich, "can I have my ball back?"

She frowned. "What?"

"My bouncy ball that you took." He swallowed. "Can I have it back?"

"Oh. That. I forgot about it."

"...can I have it?"

"No."

He pouted.

"So," Audrey said, matter-of-factly, "since it appears you three are burned out, what do you propose we do for the time being?"

"I was wondering if you guys could tell us about your journey," Isaac said.

I took a moment to reflect on that. He had said it conversationally, but with an undertone of caution, as if he thought they might not want to share. At the same time though, it was soothing, as if he was apologizing in advance for any discomfort he might cause them.

I marveled.

"Oh," Sierra said. She looked to Audrey and Sophie. "Sure."

Sophie shrugged, and Audrey gave her a go-ahead gesture. Sierra took a breath and began.

"So, you know the whole backstory with Giselle, right? Well, when she attacked the school, we were fairies, and we were outside the dome. It was terrifying. Mrs. Simone told us to go to the Pulchralux sorcerer's guild up north to be safe. We didn't. We went to Giselle's instead. But...it wasn't easy."

"What do you mean?" Isaac asked softly.

"She sent these...things after us," Sierra said quietly. "Tormentors."

Sophie looked down at her sandwich, and Audrey shuffled the dirt on the deck a bit with her foot.

Sierra continued, her voice weirdly steady. "They attack your emotions. They tried to stop us from transforming. No, more than that. They wanted to break us completely."

There was silence. The sail rustled a bit from the wind.

"It nearly worked a lot of times," Sierra continued. "But we turned out ok in the end. That's when we met Magnolia, when we were defending her from a Tormentor."

"Don't forget Genevieve," Audrey said, chuckling.

"Oh yeah," Sierra said, laughing. "She was this crazy diviner we met, who turned out to be pretty legit, but at the time, we thought she was nuts." She laughed, the memory gleaming in her eyes.

"Nope, she's still nuts," Audrey said, shaking her head.

"And we met the Princesses," Sophie said happily. "Seraphina and Primrose."

"They named us," Audrey said with slight disgust, "I think I was Aidrey."

Sierra laughed harder. "Sierrella."

"Sophiana," Sophie said, grinning.

"And then..." Sierra's laughter fell away. "Well...she sent the last Tormentor after us. It was supposed to counteract the fairy form, joy." A dark funk seemed to fall over the girls.

"Indifference," Audrey said with a hollow resonance.

"Well, for me it was guilt," Sierra continued. "She had Tess."

Sierra bit her lip and looked downwards. Sophie placed a hand on her shoulder. I wanted to ask why it was so bad that she had Tess. I wanted to ask why guilt countermanded joy for Sierra instead of indifference. I wanted to ask if she was ok.

But I didn't.

Sierra took a breath and looked up again. "But, basically, we broke out of jail with the help of some friends and I went to confront Giselle. They dealt with the giant snake," she said, gesturing to her friends.

"Giant snake?" Isaac said hesitantly.

"Yeah," Sierra replied with a dismissive wave of her hand. "So anyways, I went to Giselle, and she attacked me with hatred. She was the embodiment of hatred. When she did, I saw...her life, kind of. I don't know how well this has been explained to you, but she was in a sorcerer's guild with Juan. Mrs. Simone and her guild worked for the Elder Council. They were told that Juan was being held captive there by evil people, so they were sent to kidnap him. Well, Giselle wasn't all too happy about that. She's powerful. She can enchant herself, along with other living things. She believed him to be dead. And thus her quest to destroy Myths and Legends was born.

"Well when I saw that, I felt bad for her. She had loved someone, and she didn't deserve to be like that. So...what happened next...um..."

"Sierra turned into goddess form," Audrey continued, "which isn't really a goddess but that's what it's called. It's the form of love and it's super hard. And she defeated Giselle über quick and we went home and everyone was happy."

"That's a way of putting it," Sierra said, laughing slightly.

"But that doesn't make sense," I blurted. All eyes turned to me. A small part of me wanted to shrink back and pretend I never said anything, but I pressed on. "Why did Giselle think Juan was dead? She's crazy, sure, but she's not stupid. Just because someone's kidnapped doesn't mean they're dead. And who told the Elder Council that Giselle's guild was evil? Her guild wasn't evil. I thought the Council wasn't corrupted until later, when Giselle joined. They should've seen it as a good guild."

The girls shared a worried look, but it seemed like it was something they had talked about before. Isaac frowned. Deynan's face remained blank.

"As to the first one, we've thought about that," Sierra replied. "We thought that there was someone out there. Someone worse. Hatred isn't the opposite of love. Love defeats it easily. It looks like we were right. This guy sounds worse."

"And he WAS controlling Giselle, I'd imagine he can talk in her head too," Isaac mentioned.

"That guy from my dream?" I asked.

Sophie nodded. "Mustache man and the other guy."

"As for the second one..." Sierra hesitated. "I never thought about that."

"Do you think it's the same guy?" Deynan asked, leaning further back on the bench. "He lied to one person, he could lie to another."

"Could be," Audrey said, shrugging.

"If it is the same guy," Sierra said worriedly, "it was like he set this up. But why?"

We contemplated this in silence.

"Well one thing's for sure," I said after a moment.

"What?" Sierra asked, her eyebrows drawing together.

"The Elder Council seriously lacks security if it's been infiltrated by two bad guys," I said solemnly.

There was silence.

Then Sierra burst into laughter. Sophie began to giggle uncontrollably, and Isaac bent forward, his laugh richer than I expected. Audrey snorted, and even Deynan shook silently. I smiled faintly. I hadn't intended to be funny.

Then Sierra caught with that look. The isn't-this-fun? look.

And then I laughed too.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was that evening that we were finally rested enough.

"Alright, Ravi goes first," Deynan said. I looked at him in surprise. "Why?"

"It's your turn," he replied, crossing his arms and leaning back.

"Fine," I mumbled. I reached under the bench to get the scroll. I wrote, "Ok scroll, last transformation. The one about power."

"Wow, whatever happened to process of elimination and finding it out yourself? Too stupid, I suppose. Well it's kindness and forgiveness. Have fun and try not to break anything."

I stared at the paper. "That's mildly alarming."

Deynan clapped me on the back. I winced. He grinned. "What are you waiting for? This is like, the ultimate power one! We're dying to know!"

I stood up and closed my eyes.

Kindness. Being kind to people. Helping old people cross the street. Giving kids lollipops. Give to the poor. No, wait, that's charity. Kindness. Forgiveness.

I bit my lip. Maybe if I forgave someone, it would work.

Who am I mad at right now? Um...

I shuffled through my brain. Nothing.

I took a breath. It was powerful. I knew that.

Kindness. Forgiveness. Freeing yourself and others from a burden. Spreading love.

Love...

Kindness was giving. Kindness was supporting. Weaving the world a little bit closer to each other bit by bit. The glue that strengthens this world.

Forgiveness was liberation. Forgiveness was beautiful. Forgiveness was what repaired this broken, broken world.

Kindness is different from niceness. Forgiveness is different than letting go.

And I remembered.

I was power. I did not have power, or create power: I WAS the power itself. Every movement was almost too easy for its own good. I flexed my back, just to feel it. But the source...the source was right at the center of my soul. It was warm, strong, and even more powerful than me. That source could move mountains. That source could bend rivers.

That source could change the world.

I could feel that magic gathering around me and urging me forwards. It filled me, and I followed.

I ran to the edge of the boat and jumped off.

Suddenly, I grew, and the wind below me was buffeted by huge, bat-like wings. I swerved upwards and shot towards the dimming evening sky.

I opened my mouth and fire spewed out. A shriek issued from my long, scaly throat.

I was a dragon.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Author's Note:
Hey guys this is kind of random but I was looking at my stats the other day and it occurred to me just how lucky I am that all you wonderful people are reading and enjoying my writing (at least I hope you're enjoying it XD) and I just wanted to say thank you. Thank you SO MUCH for helping me take these tiny baby steps a little closer to my dream. I love you all :-)

~Paint_splatt