My heart gave a strange lurch. Dance? With my reality-bending, exploding Voice? It sounded terrifying. It sounded exhilarating. And for the first time since my awakening, it sounded like something I might actually be able to do. The Academy's rigid rules had felt like trying to stuff a supernova into a thimble. Lyra's approach, however, felt… different. Like she actually understood the chaotic beast inside me.
Violet, still looking a little shell-shocked from my latest accidental explosion, just sighed.
"Lyra, with all due respect, 'dancing' with a power that can shatter ancient focusing stones might not be the most prudent approach."
Lyra, however, simply smiled, a knowing, almost mischievous glint in her Emerald eyes. She was taller than Violet, with a lean, almost ethereal grace, and her earthy robes seemed to blend seamlessly with the glowing forest. Her presence radiated a profound calm, but beneath it, I sensed a sharp, incisive mind.
"Prudence, my dear Violet, is for those whose power follows the rules. Cassandra's Voice, as we've clearly established, does not. We cannot force a river to flow uphill. We must teach it to carve its own path." She turned to me, her emerald eyes twinkling. "Ready to dance, Cassandra?"
I shrugged, a nervous flutter in my stomach. "As ready as I'll ever be. Just try not to make me trip over my own feet. Or accidentally turn myself into a permanent disco ball."
Lyra chuckled, a soft, melodic sound. "No disco balls, I promise. For now, we begin with awareness. Forget the words. Forget the commands. Forget the runes. Just… feel."
She led me to a small, secluded clearing where the moss glowed with an even softer light, and the ancient trees seemed to lean in, as if listening. The air here vibrated with the purest essence, a gentle, pervasive hum that felt like a lullaby.
"Close your eyes, Cassandra," Lyra instructed, her voice calm, soothing. "Feel the essence around you. Not as something to be controlled, but as a part of you. As the very air you breathe, the ground beneath your feet, the light that surrounds us."
I closed my eyes, taking a deep breath. The hum of the Heartwood filled my senses, a soft vibration in my chest, a tingling in my fingertips. I tried to just feel, to let go of the frantic need to control, to command. It was harder than it sounded. My mind kept trying to categorize, to analyze, to do something.
"Now," Lyra continued, her voice a gentle current in the vastness of my awareness, "recall an emotion. Not rage. Not frustration. Something simpler. Something pure. Like… joy. Or wonder. Or peace."
Joy? Peace? After the last twenty-four hours, those felt like alien concepts. But wonder… I thought of the glowing trees, the shimmering bridge, the sheer, breathtaking impossibility of Elara. A faint warmth spread through my chest, a fragile sense of awe.
"Good," Lyra murmured, as if she could feel the subtle shift in my internal landscape. "Now, with that feeling, open your eyes. And simply… wish for a small light. Not a command. A wish. A gentle invitation."
I opened my eyes. The Heartwood was bathed in a soft, diffused glow. I focused on a single point in the air before me, holding that fragile sense of wonder. I didn't speak. I didn't even think a word. I just wished. I invited the essence, with the pure, unburdened desire for a tiny spark of light.
And then, it happened.