“Point taken, but look.” Lith took Kamila’s hands, using his breathing technique to check on the baby and a mind link to share with his wife his senses and expertise.
Elysia was now over 8 centimeters (3,2″) long. Her organs, limbs, and bones were present and developing how they were supposed to. Her life force and mana flow were weak but steady, just like her heartbeat.
Kamila clenched Lith’s hands, shapeshifting her skin into scales as he did the same. Dragons could share their feelings through physical contact and Kamila had become reliant on that method to get reassured beyond what mere words could achieve.
She could feel Lith’s love, calm, and confidence that everything was going well. Also, there was more to that. Elysia reacted to her mother’s change and shapeshifted as well. Her face turned into a black slate and a small tail came out of her spine.
The baby was now covered in black scales smaller than a fish’s and had pointed bony protuberances where her horns and wings would be. Kamila found Elysia to be no less beautiful in that form than as a human and was reassured feeling that Lith thought the same.
On top of that, the mix of scales and breathing technique allowed the baby to share her feelings as well. Elysia was serene, welcoming the sudden psychic presence of her parents with joy.
Even though she had no concept of love, she still felt it and returned it in spades. Kamila’s heartbeat made Elisya feel safe while Lith’s inner fire spread warmth through her small being. Also, she was happy to get the opportunity to complain.
Almost an entire hour had passed since her last meal and she was hungry.
“Thank you. I feel much better now.” Kamila hugged him, but her grumbling stomach ruined the tenderness of the moment.
She bolted into the kitchen, using her claws to slice the bread, Origin Flames to instantly boil the water, and magic to prepare herself a meal. Kamila had just achieved the deep yellow core yet her magical prowess bordered on the bright green.
It reassured Lith that she would be safe when they were apart yet worried him for the future.
‘What Kami is experiencing is no different from what happened to Duke.’ He thought. ‘The power and the skills that the pregnancy is bestowing upon her won’t last forever.
‘Sure, they are nothing compared to the White Griffon, but Duke experienced it for a few minutes whereas Kami has them for months. If she gets too used to these abilities, once she loses them it will be traumatic.
‘It’s one of the reasons I don’t want her to exert herself. Without Elysia, her strength and vigor will go back to being those of a normal woman.’
***
During the following days, Lith and Solus would go back to Lutia right after finishing the Void Magic lessons and go straight to the tower after checking that everything was alright with their family.
Elina’s pregnancy was at the same stage as Kamila’s and much to Elina’s relief, the morning sickness was gone and her baby was as fit as a fiddle as well. She was glowing, something that Raaz reminded her of several times a day.
The renewed peace along with the serene work in the fields and the idea of becoming a father again made wonders for his mood. The trauma from Orpal’s torture was still there, becoming more visible after sunset when the darkness brought him bad memories.
Yet he was fighting his inner demons one day at a time and practice made him better at keeping them in a corner of his mind.
Senton was working hard on himself and in the smithy yet he suffered every morning that Leria left for her magic pre-school in the Desert.
As for Tista, she spent her time either among humans in her Red Demon form or among beasts in her human form, in the hope to make up her mind. Despite her best efforts, she was still at square one while the divide between her life forces kept growing.
Shapeshifting was getting slower and more painful as time passed, the human side rejecting the foreign limbs like the tail and wings. The worst part about her condition was that no one could help her.
It wasn’t an illness to be fixed but a life-changing decision whose consequences she would have to bear.
“Damn if this is hard.” Lith grumbled when his tier one Creation Magic spell, Placeholder 25, proved to be a dud as well.
After one failure too many, he didn’t bother giving them a name anymore, using only a number to keep track of the theory he was currently putting into practice.
During their prolonged fusion, the Eyes of Menadion had recovered most of their powers and the same had happened to the Library.
So, when Baba Yaga had used Creation Magic in front of them, the Eyes’ scan had brought much more data than usual and the Library had written it down for them to not overload their brains.
After they had gone back to their respective bodies and the Eyes had reverted to their weakened state, the parchment was still there, allowing them to study its contents. Lith and Solus had combined that knowledge with what they had learned over time from Salaark to grasp the basics of Creation Magic.
The Davross dagger that Lith had created with a wave of his hand had lasted for but a few seconds before crumbling. The cracked mana crystals would have caused a big explosion if not for being just copies conjured by the Workshop.
“Yeah, this sucks.” Solus panted like a bellows as the product of her Fuck my Life mark 6 spell faded as well. “It’s a frigging tier one spell, yet it takes so much mana that I can perform it twice before needing to rest. And we are inside the tower!”
“What did you expect?” Lith shrugged. “Creation Magic works the same way as Silverwing’s spells. It requires combining elemental and Spirit Magic with arrays but also for a single mage to cast the spell and spend the necessary mana.
“It’s no wonder that only two people on Mogar can use Creation Magic.”
“Three.” Solus wheezed. “Three people if you count Balkor. Five if you add us. Yet even I find that a stretch.”
She conjured a chair to sit down and a glass of water that she gulped avidly.
“Balkor is ahead of us but I don’t consider him a Creation Magic user either.” Lith shook his head. “The purpose of Creation Magic is to endlessly recycle precious ingredients so that nothing goes to waste.
“What we do, instead, destroys everything and lasts for a time too short to be of any use in battle. It’s a last-ditch move at best and an expensive one at that.”
‘Agreed.’ Solus replied via the mind link. ‘We can’t even use anything less than Davross without the materials crumbling even before we are done weaving a tier one spell.’
‘Why the mind link? Didn’t we agree to talk more to put boundaries between our minds?’ Lith asked.
‘I’m too tired to talk. Cut me some slack.’
