By the time Aloia released him, after so much talk that his felt too full and a little disoriented, Sentio, Chario, and Kenjista had gone off to their afternoon classes, which had not ended, but Akija was waiting out in the hall for him. She even flashed him a grin as he stepped out of the office. Still feeling off-balance, Cacopheny just stuffed his hands in his pockets--

What a brilliant invention, pockets.

If you didn't know what to do with your hands, just stuff 'em in there! Haha!

Too bad more of your clothes don't have pockets, mutt.

--and started for the door out and the snowy, bonding complex lawn. Akija cast a narrow glance at Aloia's door, which shut behind him, before trotting back up to his side and falling into step beside him. He didn't walk too quickly, for her; he'd finally realized that his strides were simply much longer than hers, and she had been forced to trot along just to keep up. Since he was finally getting used to being in places without the safety of a roof, he didn't feel the need to hurry home quite so quickly, so he didn't mind slowing down to accommodate her. It was one of those things that friends were supposed to do, right?

"Sooo... what'd she want?"

Well, damn, what to say?

The truth?

It's not the truth!

Says who?

I told you, we're not a mage.

Says who?

"Zhe vants. To teatch me majzic," he grumbled. "I told her I am not a majze. Zhe doesn't belief me."

Akija blinked, ears lightly skewing. "Well sure yer a mage. Or ya could be. You do magic. Not often, sure, but'cha have it in ya."

"Not you, too!" he growled unhappily. "Ssat's not-- it's not-- it's tifferent!"

Akija blinked again and put her hands up for a moment. "Okay, okay. She can't make ya learn anythin' you don't want ta, anyway." She shrugged dismissively, putting her hands back down.

Then he felt bad, and hunched his shoulders a bit, looking at the ground. "I'm ssssorry. For snapping. It jzust makes me nerfous. Majzic. Zhadows-- ssey are not majzic... ssey to not seem like majzic. But you and Aroia sssay ssey are."

Thankfully, she wasn't angry with him--

Spoil sport.

--and she proved it by tucking her hand into the crook of his arm and hanging there lightly as they walked. "Shadows alone aren't magic," she explained, "Yer shadows aren't magic, either. But ya do have shadow-magic in ya. I kin feel it, smell it. Ya leave it in places yer around a lot, like home, and it's always in ya. See, watch. I kin get it out o'ya."

Then she held out her free hand and... breathed in with her shadow rather than her body. That was the best way he'd found to explain to himself how she pulled magic into herself. Only this time, it wasn't from the surrounding area that she was drawing from. He gave a little start and stopped walking entirely at the sensation of something... leaving him. Not much of something, but still: something. And he hadn't the faintest idea what it was.

Then there was something hovering over Akija's palm, forming out of nothing at all: a little, inky blob of... shadow. Let me go let me go! it wailed in a tiny, tinny voice. Put me back, oh, it's not fair! Let me go! Cacopheny bent over to stare at it more closely. "Ssat came frrrrrrom me?" he asked incredulously, though he couldn't exactly deny that he'd felt something....

Akija grinned. "Yup. And it kin go right back inta ya, too."

As quickly said as done: the wailing little shadow got thinner and thinner, and quieter and quieter, and then disappeared entirely with a sigh of sound and the words: Yay, thank you! At the same time, though, there was the distinct impression that something had come back. No voice, thankfully; there were enough of those, already.

How'd she do that?

I don't get it!

Fascinating! I wonder if she can do it again-- see if it's the same two times in a row.

Genner, only you would want to get leeched from more than once!

Leeched?

She's a daemon, that's what she did: leech.

Oh.

"And that's the magic Aloia had t'be talking 'bout," Akija said. "It's there fer ya t'use if ya want t'learn."

Still a little confused, and even a little awed that Akija could control a shadow-- magic or not!-- he asked, "How?"

"Well... that's what Aloia would teach ya. You'd prolly have it easier than I did-- I hadta learn t'find the magic outside me and draw it in b'fore I could learn t'use it, and you'd just hafta learn how t'tap the magic that's already inside ya." She tapped his chest with a finger for light emphasis. "Fer you, it'd be like... oh... learnin' t'sing, or t'dance. Ya already have everything ya need inside ya-- ya just gotta learn t'make it do what ya want."

"I really do not ssink I could dance or ssssing very vell," he countered with a little smirk: he was clumsy and had no endurance, and his voice was a painful-sounding rasp. "Sssso maype vat you say issss apt. I can tell ven you usssse majzic. I to not know vat it issss like ven I usse it...." The smirk faded, and he sighed a little, pushing messy hair back from his face. "I ton't know...."

Akija watched him thoughtfully for a moment. "You know, I think someone in there does," she offered, slang fading in the face of serious consideration. "Cuz you have used it before. Like... way back when, with Fuego. And even way before that, when you jumped from the hallway in the bonding complex to your room and took me with you-- remember that? So... maybe if you ask them, and figure out who, they'll help you?"

"Smart girl," Tiger chuckled, taking Cacopheny completely by surprise for a moment, and "translating" for Akija's benefit, though she knew most of those words by now. "Actually, some of us do, and he's just conveniently forgotten."

Then he quite promptly receded again, leaving Cacopheny to scowl at nothing in particular. "I hate ven he doesssat," he grumbled. "And I tid not conveniently vorget."

Akija smiled, not without sympathy, and gave his arm a little squeeze, which he responded to be putting his hand on hers, freeing one, at last, from its concealing pocket. "Well, no matter. Now ya know some of them know, and if ya decide ya do want t'learn, you kin try askin' them fer help."

Cacopheny started walking again, glad that she, at least, was used to the random shifting of shadows.... "Do you... sssink I should?" he asked a little nervously.

"Not if ya don't want to," she answered honestly. "Though... I think ya'd be really good at it if ya did. I mean, you've jumped rooms-- houses, even, at that-- and made giant shields and lifted a full-grown Ruban... and if that's what ya can do without lessons or practice... who knows what ya could do if ya knew how you were doin' it."

"But vat if-- vat if-- I got vorse, if I knew more," he suggested, an argument Aloia had been unable to counter, though also one he had yet to articulate very well. "Zhadows are dangerous, viss me... knowing more about ssem... might be more dangerous."

"Then ya tell Aloia thanks, but no thanks. Yer allowed to. I'm not gonna tell ya what to or not t'do here-- you should think about it and figure out fer yerself wha'cha wanna do." She looked up with a grin and gave his arm another squeeze. "I'll still be yer backup no matter what ya decide."

He couldn't not return the smile, even though he was still tense about the whole thing. But, thinking about her infamous stubbornness and fiery temper behind whatever choice he made was very heartening, and he thought he felt... a little better, at least. She'd been able to at least make him consider that he might have magic, rather than just hallucinations, which was better than Aloia had managed. "Ssank you," he told her, stroking her fingers on his arm lightly and gratefully. "I appr-- apprisssate. Apprissssiate ssat."

"Anytime, buddy," she beamed, and his own smile even deigned to linger, to match.