"I'm getting tired of it being so dark," I complained to Tennielle as she shoveled cereal into her mouth.

She swallowed.  "I thought you liked the dark."

"I love the dark!  But sometimes being able to see is refreshing."

"You can see," she replied, gesturing around the hall.  It was dimly lit, but the lack of fog was a nice change.

"But you can't even see where the sun is!" I insisted.  "Don't tell me you don't want an open sky for a change."

"I guess I do.  Still, it's not so bad in the mist!"

"The other problem is the valley."

Tennielle raised an eyebrow.  "You're a little grumpy today," she remarked.  "The only parts of Mist Valley you don't like are the mist and the valley."

"No, it really is cool!  It's just... I love being up high.  I love looking out and seeing the world stretch out, I love being able to turn my head and see a thousand different stories."

"That was a bit dramatic.  Good word choice though - 'A thousand different stories.'  You're definitely a writer!"

I smiled.  "You get my point.  I'm just getting a little sick of the same view of fog and more fog."

At that moment, Kiyenta came over.  "Do you guys know what we're doing today?"

"Jared hinted that we were doing something cool," I told her.

Tennielle turned her gaze toward me.  "When was this?"

"Oh... last night.  Just when I was sneaking around in the dark."

Tennielle's eyebrow, which had been hovering near the limit of where I thought eyebrows could go, pushed up even higher.  "You've been sneaking around at night?  No wonder you've been so idiotic lightly.  It's just lack of sleep."

I reached across the table and punched her.  She yelped, and I said, "Just last night."

"Why was this?"

"I just heard a creaky noise and went to investigate, then got sidetracked and ended up - ah - observing a conversation."

"Observing."  Her eyebrows lowered to stare at me scrutinizingly.  "That's a rather light way of putting it."

"I suppose I just have a way with words," I said with a wave of my hand.

When we were done with breakfast, we headed outside.  No one was gathering yet, so I assumed we had some free time before we began the daily activities.

Akdani ran up to the three of us, then turned to Kiyenta.  "I'm Akdani."  He held out his hand to shake.

Kiyenta took it and smiled.  "Kiyenta.  Are you friends with Tennielle?"

"And Fia," he told her.  "So what are you guys doing?"

"I don't know," I responded.  "Just waiting for the activity to begin, I guess."

"Well, do you want to play a game?"

"What game?" a voice said behind me.  I spun around with my fists already raised.

"Hi Riko!" Kiyenta said before I had a chance to speak.  "Akdani was just asking us to play a game.  Do you want to join?"

I looked at Akdani.  He met my eyes and gave a tiny shrug.  I smiled slightly before turning back to Riko.  "It would be lovely if you'd join us," I said with thick sarcasm.

He just smiled.  "Thank you ladies for inviting me!  I'd be honored."

Tennielle looked almost red with anger.  She glanced at Akdani, then to Kiyenta.  "You know him?"

She nodded.  "We have the same English class."

Riko turned to Akdani.  "So, what's the game?"

His face paled.  "Um... I just wanted to play freeze tag."

"Great idea!" I said before anyone else could respond.  "I'll be it first."

He looked at me gratefully.  "Alright... go!"  He spun and dashed away, and I followed a second later.  The group scattered and shot in different directions, but I saw Tennielle going in a similar direction as Akdani.  I smiled, then turned to chase Kiyenta as she ran into the trees giggling.

I hope you guys are enjoying Phoenix's Gaze so far!  Hopefully, this will be one of four books, but I don't know if I'm going to get that far without losing interest.  Still, I'm planning to finish this one at least.

I'm planning to use an online program to make pictures of how I see the characters.  I'll try to put those in the next few chapters.