"One! Two! Three!"

Ro teleported with Brina into the budding spring trees and they ran together. Brina was in her black wool leggings and a fur-lined mantle with a hood that matched her purple dress, and she'd knitted herself striped arm warmers. Ro was Ro and wearing some leg warmers in addition to her usual one-shouldered dress. The crisp cool air was warming with the sun, but Brotz could still see his breath steaming as he thumped evenly along.

Ro and Brina dashed in opposite directions, and Brina quickly found ways to get off the ground to hide her tracks. Her skill was impressive, and Brotz was pleased to see it. 

"Fourteen, fifteen, sixteen!"

Brotz was 'safety', and as such, he was not playing the game. He was better at sneaking than Ro, but he couldn't run in the forest worth a damn. He was good at moving fast in a straight line, and doing that here would just take down a couple of trees before he finally knocked himself out. He'd taken to making the game harder for all of them by moving around, but he found himself absently following Brina if he wasn't careful.

"Twenty-seven, twenty-eight, twenty-nine!"

Eupa had taught Brina well. He could see flashes of the nimble child as she hopped and skipped and leapt. (Much like Eupa, to Brotz's continued chagrin.) He kept losing sight of his daughter as she gracefully swung into and through the trees. It filled his heart with a warm swell of pride when she did a neat flip to land standing on the limb of a neighboring tree. 

"Thirty-nine! Forty! Forty-one!"

Ro did something loud (she probably knocked a tree over. Or rolled a boulder she shouldn't have.) to Brotz's left and he noticed that he was following Brina. He started moving west to correct for it and didn't notice when he started going south again. 

"Fifty-six, fifty-seven, fifty-eight!"

Brina had found a hiding place, Brotz determined. She was quiet or out of his earshot, and he couldn't see the flashes of chestnut hair or purple or black anymore. 

"Sixty-four, sixty-five, sixty-six!"

Ro got quiet, too. Eupa was getting bored. Brotz could see her spinning agitated circles and looking into the sky as she counted. She was dressed for the cold with a hooded cowl and her cloak, trousers and leg warmers. She was also likely to complain about it anyway, as she had little tolerance for much worse than warm-but-not-hot weather with a nice breeze.

"Are you guys done hiding, 'cos I'm done counting!" she shouted harshly into the woods "Eighty-two, eighty-three, eighty-four--!"

"Why do you pick a hundred if you hate taking the time to count to a hundred?" Brotz laughed. This was a common problem. She didn't always respond this badly to it, but she was consistently annoyed with how long it took.

She interrupted herself with a huff. "'Cos Ro fucking said so. She said it's good for Brina 'cos it's practice counting to a hundred, and she's fucking right, much as I hate it. Plus, gives them a chance. We'll think it's not long enough when Brina's finally good enough for Ro to hunt."

Eupa went to continue the count and her expression went flat as she realized she'd forgotten the number. Brotz watched to see what she was going to do, and she caught him looking. He didn't bother fighting the playful grin. She did fight hers, and Eupa held a surly scowl for a few moments before the skinny fiend stuck her tongue out at him and he laughed. She turned to the forest with a grand motion, swinging an arm wide and striding into the woods. "Alright, I'm coming after you both, hell with the rest of the count! You've had your chance!"

Brotz chuckled and continued pacing evenly through the early spring forest. The air was pleasant, filled his big lungs with the good kind of chill when you're too warm. He liked the feel of the forest under his boots, and he did a few paces of circle around the woods to keep things fair. 

Eupa trying to make noise was about as loud as Ro trying to be quiet. Brotz was amused with this as he watched Eupa trying to stomp and shuffle and scuffle and kick, deliberately stirring up leaves and animals. She talked to herself about what she was doing, what she was looking for, and how Brina was doing in her efforts to be stealthy.

"Alright, I can see what you did here, you did really well up 'til this point."

"Good one, but you should have climbed further up. Too many spots to follow your path. You're doing so much better, though, kid. Next time, don't be afraid to go up before you go over."

"Oh, shit, you've done well. Damn. Well damn! Oh, okay. Holy shit, Brinarini, you're getting as good as me at this!"

"Oh, good job here, kid, you lost me completely," she finally declared, and Brotz beamed proudly for Brina. Eupa was not a hunter but did grow up hunting, she knew what she was doing, and Brina had given her the slip. "You get up? Did you just wait to do that 'til here? Well done, I'm proud of you, kid!"

Eupa was not one to give insincere compliments, and hearing her gush about his child made Brotz want to melt. He was never certain if she was being honest when it came to Brina, he was sure that she was, at least occasionally, lying to make or help Brina feel good, but he could hardly remember to care.

Ro made another noise to Brotz's far left, but Eupa and Brina were both front-right and Brotz was distracted with trying to see them through the trees. He wanted to cheat for them and be where Brina could see him but not Eupa, but he wasn't sure where Brina was. 

Ro made another noise, closer to Brotz. Eupa hesitated, looking between the noises, and she started toward Ro. It was a feint, Brotz already knew, but he couldn't let Brina know that.

Brina did seem to know, and she waited for Eupa to get out of sight before she dropped from her hiding place and began to sprint toward her father.

Brotz saw Eupa hear her. She smiled to herself, then circled around the long way to chase Brina from behind instead of meeting her sideways. Brina was fast for her age, but Eupa was an adult monster, and they'd made it a point to give Brina a good chance and occasional victories.

Brina screamed playfully and giggled when she saw Eupa behind her. Little feet flew as the graceful lope followed, red and purple flashes flickered through the trees. Eupa's vicious grin could be seen from the river. Both their hoods fell back and Brotz listened to their timed, even breathing. "Gonna catch a Brina," Eupa sang as she chased.

Brina knew she had no chance, Eupa was steadily gaining, but Brotz saw her trying, legs working hard as she kept her light feet moving, practically flying over the forest floor. 

Brotz saw Eupa measuring distance, bobbing her head as she tried to figure out exactly how fast she could go to catch Brina right before she made it to safety. "Gonna eat her little legs off!" Eupa added in a harsher sing-song. 

"Don't be creepy!" squealed Brina. She visibly refused to look over her shoulder. Brotz couldn't decide if that was smart or not. He'd never been big on looking back, either, but Brina wasn't as tough as he was.

"Legs are good to eat," Eupa argued conversationally, and she made a deep growling noise as she pounced.

The big redhead flinched for them as Eupa came down at Brina, but she only hit ground and tumbled as the child disappeared. A crashing noise from behind startled Brotz, and he spun to see Brina sliding on the ground, dead leaves crumbling all over her clothes and in her hair. 

The six-year-old scrambled to her hands and knees looking very confused. She had fallen onto her chest and she was covered in leaves, but she didn't look hurt. She sat on the ground on her butt and looked at her hands, then at the trees, then at Brotz. "What happened?" She looked around and got up and spun in a circle to figure out where she was. "What was that?" 

"Magic," spat Eupa. The word sounded worse than anytime she had sworn in her life, and the hate in it struck Brina so hard that she flinched and put her hands to her mouth.

Brotz swung at where Eupa had been standing, but she was gone already. Ro appeared from nowhere and wrapped her arms tightly around Brina, dragging her off her feet and into her arms. "Brina, dearheart, don't cry! Don't mind Eupa, remember, she's an asshole? She's just scared of magic and you startled her is all. You know how she gets when she's scared. She's not angry at you, she's not even angry at your magic or when you do magic, okay? You just scared her is all, you saw her face, I know you did, she's just scared! This is a good thing! We knew this would happen, remember? We wanted it to happen!"

Brotz descended upon them and put his arms over them both, putting Brina between them, and he kissed the top of her head. Brina stopped crying quickly but she still needed cheering, and she stayed on Ro's lap, blinking the tears from her eyes. Brotz put his hand on her arm and back and rested it there until she released some of the tension. "Your magic's just coming in. We've been talking about this, remember? We said we wouldn't know how it would show up first. And this was your first big showing of it."

Brina nodded and took a shuddering breath, but she still didn't pick her head up.

"I'll get Aunt Eupa to say sorry," Ro promised, nudging Brina gently with an arm. "She's an asshole, but she didn't mean to hurt you like that."

Brotz already knew Ro would let it go with Eupa going off about what was actually wrong, which was better about fixing Eupa's behavior, but that wasn't the point and that wasn't what he wanted. "I'll get her to apologize. She doesn't get to make Brina cry like that. Ever."

Ro caught the tone and the anger, and she attempted a glare at him, but he met it with his own. "It was just the sound of her voice, she sounded angry," Ro objected. "She always sounds like that."

Brotz swelled at Ro and she backed down. "Brina gets to be special," he growled, as if it needed repeating. "She's gonna act right or I'm gonna smash her to bits."

For some reason, that helped Brina's recovery, and she picked her head up to wipe the tears away. "Don't smash Aunt Eupa." Ro let her stand, and the adults stood with her, each taking one of Brina's hands in their own. "She's just scared of magic, she said so." The little girl sniffled and wiped her nose on her shoulder and peered up at Ro-Ro. "Am I gonna teleport again?" She would probably know better than the others, seeing as she was a magic-user, even if not the same kind.

"There's no telling, Brinarini," Ro said brightly. She brushed Brina's dress off lightly, mostly making the dead leaves break and stick worse. "I've heard a bunch of things about first breakthroughs. What I understand, your magic will be trying itself out with you for a while before you get to try stuff out with your magic. It'll show you what it likes and what it's good at doing with you, and then you can learn to work with it by copying it when it shows you."

Brina grunted softly, but she looked concerned and confused with the wide mismatched eyes looking around like that and her lips pursed. 

"Don't worry about it, we'll get there," Ro said with a soft laugh.

Brotz waited for Ro to look at him before he lifted a brow at her. She shrugged in response, then looked into the forest for Eupa.

Eupa was a creature of habit. Brotz had known this to an extent, but Brina had pointed it out to him in ways that couldn't be dismissed. One of the ways in which she was predictable was to wait until she was sure Brina was in bed to come home. Her bad moods would have her not wanting to be touched, and sometimes she would be blood-soaked. 

Brotz waited by the door to ambush her. If she knew he wanted to 'talk', she'd sneak into her window and lock everything until the 'talk' became irrelevant or he felt silly trying to bring it up, she could trust him to let go like that.

The 'talks' he had with Eupa usually featured a death. She'd done it a few times, and she listened to him, but she was going to make it hell for him to give a command first. He'd do it for Brina.

Eupa cracked the door and Brotz seized her arm and dragged her through before she could stop him. He felt the cold steel enter his right side, through his liver and into his lung, and he felt the familiar sharp ache of blood flowing into his chest cavity. 

He didn't even bother looking, and instead slammed Eupa to the wall by her arm. She was so good at that! "You need to apologize to Brina." He had maybe another minute or two before that finished him off. He used a hand to keep the blood in to keep the mess down. Hurt more and he died faster, but that'd get him back up sooner.

He dragged her further into the house and closed the door. Eupa let him rather than fight, knowing that would only make him squeeze harder. That didn't mean she was being pleasant about it. Her high-pitched indignance was barely contained. "I didn't do anything! I left before I did! I lost my temper, I didn't mean to say it like that! I didn't even swear, I didn't yell at her, nothing! It was hard! I tried!" 

If Brotz wasn't so sure she was incapable of it, he'd think she felt guilty. She was defending herself in every way and he hadn't said anything. The pain in his chest was getting worse and he groaned as his legs went wobbly. She tried to slip his grip and he tightened it. "You've got to say sorry," he pressed. 

She looked hurt by the idea alone, and she sneered at him. "I didn't--I mean--I always sound like such an asshole when I try to apologize! Just let it go! Let me go, shit, you're hurting me!" She tried again, but he only squeezed until she cried out. "Ow, fuck you, you're gonna break my arm!"

"You killed me, shut your mouth," Brotz groaned through the pain. His vision was going dark now, he didn't have long. 

"You ain't dead, yet, asshole!" Eupa tried to push him away, but he dragged her toward him and wrapped her into a bear hug as he fell. He dropped his weight on her to make sure he had her pinned while he was dead. It took some work to knock her over before he got too weak to do it, and he hoped he hurt her when they landed.

Eupa growled with rage, kicked and wriggled, but she dared not make too much noise and risk disturbing Brina. She could lift him, but the way he had wrapped his arms, they were pressed down and not going anywhere. 

Brotz's lungs inflated again. Eupa tried to escape when he woke up, but he just tightened his grip. "Oh fuck you to pieces." 

The enormous redhead got his big arm locked around her and dragged them both upright, then got another grip on her wrist. "How the fuck did you work that pin out!?" she yelped, but she had apparently decided to ragdoll instead of fight anymore.

He ignored her complaints as he dragged her to the washbasin and soap that he had on the table. He threw her so hard into her chair it nearly took the chair and Eupa both down, and he got started cleaning up the wound in his side. She slouched over the table with her arms folded around her head. Every time he looked down at her, he'd see the piercing yellow glaring back up at him, and he refused to show her anything but his teeth. She'd gotten small again, and Brotz tried to decide if she was going to hide or attack next. It was hard to tell sometimes.

Eventually, Eupa let the tension fall and rolled her head on the table with a loud groan. "Fuck do you want from me? The only thing that can fuck me up is magic, it's the only thing that's ever put you down, it's what's given Ro that edge over everything, why she can take us both even though you're immortal and I'm--"

She stopped and glanced at Brina's door, and he continued wiping the blood off his side. He barely glanced at her, apparently distracted with his task, but Eupa knew he was keeping her in the corner of his eye. He could catch her better that way.

She kept going, but much quieter. "We've seen the shit magic does," she insisted. And it was true. They'd had things go wrong before. They'd turned on each other and been turned against each other in ways that gave all of them nightmares. Eupa was the single leading cause of Brotz's deaths, Brotz had beaten both the twins, Eupa on multiple occasions, Ro had hit both of them with her spear, with her fists, her teeth, all because of magic. All their close calls had been magic. 

But Brina was different. She wasn't a bad person trying to make a spot in the world, she wasn't a hunter with only a sense of cycles for order, she wasn't a gladiator that had to kill or die, that enjoyed the screams of his opponents and the popping of breaking bones. She was a little girl whose favorite things in the world were the color purple, frilly dress sleeves, and her family. She just happened to have the power of a minor god.

"That's Brina," he stated firmly. "Even if she can do twice the shit we've seen with half the work, you know she would never use it on any of us."

Eupa glared at him harder, and it was quiet for so long that he had to make sure she was still there. Her mouth was pressed tight, and she kept preparing to talk but she didn't want to say it.

"Go on," he rumbled threateningly. 

Eupa looked away before she did. "On purpose." Her voice was barely a growl, barely a mumble. "Right now."

Brotz put the washcloth into the basin and thumped at Eupa deliberately. He got as big as he could and pressed his presence on top of her until she got off the table and ducked to her chair, until she stopped refusing to look at him for fear of him. She pulled her legs into her seat, and he waited 'til she armed herself before he stopped. He put a hand on her collar and held it firm, clutched her entire collarbone and part of her neck and shoulder. He pinned her other arm to the back of her chair, and he rocked down to put their faces so close together that he could see the few green and orange flecks in her soulless eyes.

The frequency of Brotz's rumbling bass made Eupa's chair tremble. She'd never heard him call the bowels of Hell into his voice like that. "If you dare say anything like that ever again. Ever. I will make you wish she had. She would never. You don't get to let your fear hurt my child. You don't get to pretend she could ever bring herself to hurt you. I won't let you. I'm done letting you pretend that child doesn't love you."

Eupa stiffened and she glared, and something in her face looked hurt. Her pupils dilated and contracted, and she took a breath to speak and released it. "I don't think she doesn't love me," she finally stammered. Eupa was a bad liar under pressure. Her voice was always unsteady and her lips and tongue were fighting her. 

The murdering scum had settled into what kind of evil she was, and she'd gotten used to the idea that the only love in the world to be had for her was in the form of madness and despair, neglect and fear. Brotz hated her for it, then pitied her, then hated her again. And despite all that, Brina had shown her a love so pure that she couldn't argue with it, founded in nothing but a connection that couldn't be denied. Like warm water on cold skin, it burned. 

It was a suffering too good for her, but he'd take what he could get. "You do not get to make her cry like that," he growled in the same floor-rumbling bass, but he was getting louder, now, and more like himself. He eased off Eupa's chair and watched her pupils go back to round. "You don't get to make that sound at her ever again. You cussed her. That was vile." He picked up the basin and washcloth again and finished cleaning the blood off his side.

"I didn't mean to," Eupa objected indignantly, sitting herself upright. "It just startled me. Made my fur stick up and everything!"

"No excuse," he growled, pointing at her vehemently and splashing her lightly with drops of bloody water. "Tell the baby you're sorry or I'm gonna rip off your sword arm and beat you with it." 

Eupa's face twisted, and she glanced at Brina's door again. Brotz waited for her to give up before he eased back. She slouched back onto the table. "Brinarini, come here, I know you were listening."

Brotz took the basin and a lit candle to his room. Brina took the few extra seconds to pretend that she wasn't listening, and she crept across the den. The cloud of hair had been brushed and braided for the night, and her purple long-sleeved nightdress hung to her ankles. It did have lace on the collar and wrists, and Eupa could see a few stray threads from where she'd cut that back off. Stubborn shit kept it as long as she could, even after Eupa told her she wouldn't like it, it wasn't good for sleeping. 

Brina stood on the boarhide rug in front of Daddy's chair, sucking and chewing nervously on her first knuckle and keeping her chin tucked down. Her honey-brown skin and braids shone orange in the warm firelight.

Eupa held her hand out palm up and curled her fingers. "Come here, Brinarini." Brina obediently moved forward, steps shrinking as she approached the surly werekin. She was sure she was in trouble. Eupa continued gesturing 'come here' with the hand until Brina was close enough for Eupa to pull into a tight, loving hug. 

Brina relaxed and hugged her in return, putting her nose into Eupa's neck to take in the meaty metally scent, and her fingers followed along Eupa's shoulderblade pleasantly. 

Eventually, Eupa sat back and let Brina stand in front of her, both the werekin's hands were on the child's shoulders and she deliberately looked Brina in the face before she spoke again. "I'm not mad at you, and I don't hate you, and I know I sounded really really hateful and angry, but it's not you, and it's not your fault." She brushed Brina's hair back with her short fingers. "I'm sorry I sounded like that. Ro-Ro was right, I was just scared. I get real mean when I'm scared." 

Brina opened her mouth to speak, and Eupa covered it quickly with her soft fingers. "Don't say sorry. You did nothing wrong. Nothing. Even if you did it on purpose, and I know you didn't, you didn't do anything wrong. You did the right thing, if you have to call it anything, because it was growing." Eupa sat up straight, almost like a normal person. "You're supposed to grow, you're supposed to learn, this was supposed to happen, okay? You're magic! You're Brinarini and you're magic! Remember?"

Eupa almost faked the enthusiasm, but Brina could hear the uncertainty, and she waited to see if Aunt Eupa was going to admit it or not.

Eupa slouched and hugged Brina again, resting her black-furred forehead on Brina's shoulder for a moment before she nuzzled their cheeks together more sincerely. "Seriously, you're a magic person, you're supposed to get the magic, no matter how much I don't like magic." She kept her tones practical and her words short. "I don't get to decide who gets the magic, and so Brinarini gets the magic and Eupa gets to get over it." 

Brina's crooked smile reminded Eupa of Ro, and she sat back in her chair, suddenly overwhelmed with how tired she was. She released a heavy sigh. "I love you, kid, I do. You're exhausting sometimes. I'm exhausting, too." She rubbed her face with her hand and slid it over the top of her head and down her skinny neck. "Ugh. Love." She kissed Brina's forehead, then nipped her nose with her blunt front teeth. "'Cos I love my magic, strong, fast, tough, good Brinarini."  

Brina giggled and nipped Aunt Eupa's nose in return and they smiled at each other. Brina pushed a little more to get herself into Aunt Eupa's lap, and Eupa pulled them so close together that neither could tell which heartbeat she was feeling. Brina rested her chin on Eupa's shoulder and her hand on the opposite shoulder. Eupa noticed, not for the first time, that Brina was getting bigger than she realized.

Eupa squeezed Brina lightly and ended the hug. "So we're gonna get good at this magic shit, right? You're gonna be the strongest mage ever, right? Gonna blow shit up? Be a demigod like me and Ro-Ro and Daddy?" 

Brina giggled. "I don't know if I'm gonna blow stuff up, there's lots of kinds of magic. We don't know what mine is, yet."

"Yeah? They teach you that at school? They teach that kind of thing at school?" She sounded surprised. "Huh. Not entirely useless." She grinned mischievously and nudged Brina off her lap. 

Brina huffed and crossed her arms and Eupa chuckled. "I'm kidding. Sort of. You've got school tomorrow, don't you?"

Brina shook her head. 

"Good, then we're going squirreling in the morning. Go to bed."

The teleport was just the beginning. With every passing month since, Brina's magic got more intrusive and less controlled. There were times where just moving her arm too much would set off a wave of magical force. All of them were anxious for Brina after she set herself on fire the second time. It didn't hurt because it was a hot-cold day (which was why the fire happened), but it wasn't going to go well at school if this kind of thing kept up.

As it manifested, Brina felt it more and she could occasionally catch onto the build-ups before they happened. She'd found a grove of trees to fling the gathered magic away from herself. She learned a lot about the kind of magic she could do like that. Ro-Ro tried to help, but sometimes even being near Brina was dangerous with that much magic floating within. 

She had fire and ice and lightning, but there were other things they couldn't identify, like this black jelly-like substance that spread over a whole tree like a fungus and sucked the life from it. One was sound, as Brina discovered when she deafened the entire house by shouting. Another of her powers made a clinging liquid that dissolved things. Aunt Eupa and Ro-Ro called it acid, the way the stuff would chew through like embers and destroy everything it touched. One petrified the tree she hit, turned it into a giant rock. All the leaves fell off immediately and rained on her head, it was really neat. 

Temper tantrums became hell for everyone. Brina would often feel bad for them afterwards, but that did not stop her initial flares and flails. She rarely casted more than twice, but one of the fits resulted in an entire bubble of force bursting from her and throwing all the furniture into the walls. She even broke her door and one of the windows. Fires weren't uncommon, and she froze the cauldron water, and lightning only happened once but it was terrifying. Daddy got a scar from it and they had to rebuild the entire front wall. 

Happiness led to interesting effects as well. She frequently created light motes that would blink or change color and dance around her, or her voice would throw itself while she giggled when she and Peck were playing. 

A few months passed before Brina started seeing the forces. It started as glimpses over the day, usually different ones every time it happened, bright colors and lights that would cover or shine or crawl on their vectors. She could see light, that was uncomfortable. Aunt Eupa was a good thing to look at on those days, her black fur would consume it, it was like a void in the whiteness. Daddy said that was appropriate, but wouldn't explain what he meant. Motion was dizzying at first, but Brina got to where she liked it. The ripples people created around them were hard to follow, but Brina loved to watch birds fly like that. The acidic one was rare to see, and only in certain foods. The one that petrified the tree showed up on Daddy's ale in his jugs on the shelves, and in Ro-Ro's cider.

The first time Brina saw sound was so bad they had to take the day off school.

Ro heard Brina weeping from her hovel. Eupa was at work and Brotz was still sleeping, so Ro flitted off to find out what was wrong.

Peck was pacing outside Brina's door, which was closed, and Ro climbed in through a window and sat on the weeping child's bed. Brina had her eyes shut and was covering her face with her hands. When she felt Ro there, she lunged over to cling to the hunter. "Ro-Ro!" 

"What's wrong, Brina?" Ro stroked her hair gently, not used to this kind of response. She normally clung to one of the other two. 

"I don't know, my eyes are seeing something weird and I don't know what it is, but it's everywhere and it's so much!"

"Another kind of magic?" Ro asked. She picked Brina up to carry her into Eupa's room. It was darker than her fur, sounds were muted by at least two layers of insulation, and strange as it was, Brina seemed to find Eupa's blood scent soothing.

Ro deposited Brina on the bed, wrapped her in Eupa's big down blanket, and closed the door. "You're in your Aunt Eupa's room, now. It's very dark."

Brina opened her eyes, and Ro watched the now-blinded child looking around. A few things seemed to catch her eye, but Ro watched her and waited to see what she said.

"It's--" Brina started, but she stopped and clapped her hands over her mouth. She looked around the room as if following a bug in flight. "Voice," Brina said through her cupped hands. She lifted one finger from them and said, "Voice," again, and she giggled. Ro wasn't sure what she was seeing, exactly, but she seemed to like it.

"Are you seeing sound?" Ro asked, but then Brina squeaked and ducked under the cover. 

"You're really loud!" Brina called. The sound was muffled by the blanket. "And bright! It's all blue-green and moving everywhere!"

Ro had never considered what color her voice would be. It was a strange idea in general, but blue-green would certainly not have been her guess.

Eventually, Brina sat up and put her mouth to the blanket to muffle the sound, and she held a note as she moved the blanket. Ro waited patiently while she played with her magic and resisted the smile until she remembered that Brina couldn't see her face. 

Brina looked back up to Ro and said, "Mmm," and smiled slightly, but then she said, "Again?"

Ro, rather than speak, began to purr. Hers was unsteady, she couldn't purr on the inhale, but Brina didn't seem to care much. She watched the sounds come off Ro, and she covered her own mouth with the blanket before she said, "It's brown and crinkly and coming off your chest." 

"Thank you?" Ro said without thinking about it, but she said it soft enough that Brina didn't seem to mind as much as she did before. "Do you like it?" she asked, careful to stay quiet.

Brina nodded. 

"You think your own is too much?"

Brina shook her head and covered her mouth before she said, "It's too close."

Ro took a moment to realize that it would be, being right below her eyes. Ha. "What color is it?" she asked. 

"Kinda pinky-purple with kinda orange?" Brina said, barely speaking above a whisper and apparently watching the ripples flutter up. 

Ro whistled a short note and Brina sat up sharply and giggled, then covered her mouth and dove back under the covers. 

The door flew open. "The hells are you doing in my room," barked Eupa, but Brina squealed as if she was hurt and Eupa stepped back and drew her knife. "The fuck!"

Ro snickered and looked to see Eupa's clothes were bloodspattered, but Brina was still hiding. "We're using your room for the darkness until Brina's eyes adjust to the attunement. We'll be out, I won't let her touch anything."

Eupa made a soft noise and practically vanished, going to the bath house without bothering to ask anything else.

"What color is Eupa's voice?" asked Ro curiously.

"Green-yellow," Brina answered. "It moved like sharp lines when she's angry. That kinda stabbed a little, it hurt."

"You can feel the sounds on your skin?" 

"Kinda? It feels like. Feathers. Soft. Mostly. 'Cept firepops, those are sharp."

Ro smiled at her and nudged their heads together, and she sat on Eupa's floor. She hummed and purred in turns until Brina was ready to join the world again. She had to get a blindfold and she covered her mouth all day, but it was easily one of the most interesting powers she attuned to and she quickly grew to love it.

Brina started school the summer she turned five, broke through the spring before she turned seven, and she left school the spring before she turned eight. She was successfully reading and understanding words in both her languages, she could convert basic fractions to percentages, and try as Mierta might, Brina was successfully making friends and had made a very good impression on the kobolds and all but one of Ferrin's family members. 

She tried to keep her magic calm at school, kept herself calm, and she was good and did her lessons, but it just kept happening. Just little things, over and over. She'd drum her fingers and the sound made the rest of the room tremble. She tapped her foot and coated the whole floor with ice. She teleported two feet to the left every time she hiccuped. She produced bubbles when she tried to speak. She couldn't make it stop. 

Mierta was no help at all. After the fight, they moved Mierta to a different classroom, but they still shared play-yard time and try as Brina might, she couldn't avoid Mierta forever. The lace-clad imp made it a personal goal to shout with her strikingly green voice any time she noticed a sounds day. She tried to provoke Brina regularly into her usual temperborne flails or swings or stomps. She even succeeded twice. The magic didn't hurt anyone, luckily, but Brina felt horrible about it.

The dwarf boy and one of the humans in Brina's class were on Mierta's side of the girls' feud, and they took their turns following Mierta's commands to make Brina's life and day difficult. Mostly just stealing her inkwells and pens, taking her chair away when she went to sit down, little dumb things like that. They didn't get away with much of it--her friends were often quick to tell the teacher or get revenge themselves. Ferrin's smallest brother ate paper and more than a couple of times stole some assignments to eat.

But then one day, the human boy stole Brina's bracelet. She had just adjusted it, but she didn't tie it well enough, so it untied and fell off. While she was gathering the beads back up, the boy snatched the string and beads from her hand. He knocked most of the loose beads back into the grass.

"Don't do that!" Brina cried. She wasn't sure if she should chase him to get it back and pick up the dropping beads or stay and guard what she still had…

"Don't do that!" the boy mocked, dancing backwards. "Why don't you get your little faerie hunter aunt to save you? Your dead uncle?"

Brina knew that Ro-Ro could hear her from the forest now, but she wasn't sure Ro-Ro was in the forest, and she didn't want to look even stupider than she felt already.

The boy took a bead off the string and threw it at Brina. "Come on! Call them!" he demanded, throwing another few beads at her. Brina caught those, and the boy began to back away. She stood up. She was going to fight him, she had to fight him, the bracelet was--

If she hadn't seen the spear, Brina would have thought she did it. The only reason she looked at all was because she recognized the squawk-like screaming of Uncle Peck's raven when it called, "HELP!" Brina looked just in time to catch a glimpse of the spear dissolving into a swarm of wasps that dove at the boy. She looked to see where it must have come from but couldn't see anything. She dismissed the boy and hurriedly returned to the beads. There were five of each color, she needed to find all of them or else the magic wasn't right….

"Brina, did you cast a spell at Halgin?" asked Headmistress Lyre's voice from overhead.

Brina flinched and spun quickly to look up at the imposing figure of the headmistress. She didn't know what to say, she couldn't say Ro-Ro did it, could she? "I didn't! I don't know how to do it on purpose! I didn't feel it! I don't do bugs, I do other stuff!" she cried. None of it felt very convincing, true or not, but she tried.

The headmistress frowned and peered into Brina's cupped hand. "I see. And what is that?"

"My bracelet," she said softly. "Daddy showed you, remember?" 

"Then all the beads have been touched at once?" the headmistress asked. She nodded toward Halgin, who was still being chased by a real wasp that had joined the magical swarm.

Brina shook her head quickly. "I haven't found them all, and he didn't have them all."

Headmistress Lyre gave another simple nod and straightened. "Gather them all and hand them to me." She held out a hand palm up. Brina gave all the beads she had gathered to Headmistress Lyre obediently, and she collected the rest. 

"Is your hair normally purple?" asked Headmistress Lyre as Brina handed over the remaining few. "Is that something your magic did without your permission as well?" 

Brina flushed horribly and hung her head. "I sneezed during maths lesson," she admitted softly. "I haven't figured out how to fix it."

"It's fixing itself," Alga assured her. "The hair at the scalp is brown. The sneeze in question was also the one that marked your desk with those little burned spots?"

Brina wished she could bury herself in the ground for the way she felt now. "Yeah," she whispered. "I think it was my spit." 

Lyre hummed a long low note thoughtfully. "I need to speak with your father."

That hurt already. "Is it the magic? Am I in trouble?" 

Headmistress Lyre handed the bracelet back to Brina. "You are not in trouble. Even if you had done anything wrong, it is not your fault."

For some reason, that made it worse. "Do I have to stop coming to school?"

Headmistress Lyre gestured toward the building with an open palm and Brina walked ahead of her. "Only until you have better control of your powers," Alga reassured her, following closely. "You're very strong. We noticed that before your power ever showed itself, we knew this could happen. You won't be the first student that needed time off for these very reasons."

Brina nodded, feeling really bad, and she began to cry. The headmistress pressed Brina's shoulders gently with her palms and guided her through the painted clay hallways to the central office.

Brotz had felt his bracelet warming and cooling at random for several minutes, and he started walking to the school well before he felt all of them getting hot. He hoped Eupa was asleep and wasn't touching hers, and he was sure Ro was already at Tinian and waiting.

He wasn't halfway to the road when Ro appeared next to him. "This might be my fault." Brotz groaned aloud. "She was being attacked, I swear."

"Did you hurt anyone?" he demanded. If Brina was being 'attacked', it had been handled, clearly, but he was too busy worrying that Brina hadn't been rescued properly if she was being 'attacked' and he was going to have to clean up a mess Ro made. Those were bad. 

She was too good at keeping her face blank. "I did not hurt anyone. I scared the boy. I didn't even sting him with any of the bugs. Except one. Or two."

Brotz stopped walking to wheel on Ro, who did not duck away at all. Either she knew he wasn't going to hit her or she didn't care. "Ro, you can't mess with Brina like that! You can't use magic on kids! There's so many things wrong you did!" he cried. "You're spying, you're in town and lurking--"

"I didn't use magic on anyone!" Ro argued. "They're wasps, for fuck's sake, and the little shit stole Brina's bracelet and started taking it apart! Peck called me!"

"You sound like your sister making excuses," he growled, shoving her. She let him and pushed back. He didn't move, not even a little, not even with her strength shoving at his bulk.

"I didn't hurt him!" she repeated indignantly. "Oh, and her hair's purple. I didn't do that one."

She redirected like that on purpose. Brotz couldn't fight about it. He and the twins had discussed Brina leaving school off and on since she'd gotten a good command of reading, but the benefits had been acceptable. None of them liked the Mierta saga, but once Brina made friends and got backup, the mini-war against Mierta and her toadies got interesting. The twins said it was vital that she go through these silly hardships, and it wasn't their job to stop them, it was their job to give Brina a safe place to return between them. 

Since the breakthrough, they discussed removing her nearly once a week. If the magic was going to make it difficult for Brina's education to continue, they needed to sit out until she could control it better. This was likely to be another one of those discussions.

It was a long walk, but the school knew that, and he was surprised to see that Brina was still crying when he got there. No other students, however, so whatever Ro did wasn't being discussed. He hoped.

"Is it that bad?" he asked, moving to back Brina. She stood in her chair with her arms extended to him, and he scooped her up to cradle her. She curled against his chest like an infant.

"It's been off and on," Alga said kindly. "Sit, please. If you remember, we discussed her powers coming in when you enrolled."

Brotz did sit as requested, placing Brina on his lap. The headmistress met his amber eyes with her red ones and the sternness in her expression made Brotz worry he was in trouble too.

Eventually, she relaxed and sat tall. "I don't have to tell you that she's very strong, as predicted when she started. I don't think it's a surprise that it has come time now for Brina to find a different school that will better aid her in learning to control it, something directed at natural mages like herself; or perhaps some private tutoring until she has learned to control the outbursts, at which point she may return."

"It was an accident," Brina objected in a high, weak voice, sniffling pitifully from Brotz's chest. "It was just a sneeze."

"The result of the sneeze in question is there," said Alga, pointing at a desk next to the wall. Brotz got a look at it and looked back to Alga with his eyes wide. He didn't want to say anything because he didn't want to hurt Brina's feelings any more, but the desk had been reduced to a holey plank of wood on a stand and looked as though someone had gotten bored for several hours with a drill on hand. Brina wasn't looking at his face, fortunately, because it was wearing his shock.

"The damage to the desk was very slow," Alga said patiently, arranging items on her desk, moving around soundstones until she found one with a white mark. Brotz remembered it vaguely from the couple of years before when they made the contract. "The desk was only pock-marked when it happened, but over the course of the day, the damage has continued. I am sure the spell has worn off, but it lasted several hours. This is indicative of quite a bit of power in just a single sneeze, or perhaps as she said, in her saliva."

Brina sobbed softly. Headmistress Lyre had put on her Important Person voice and was speaking in a firm alto that resonated in Brotz's chest.

"In addition to the spell inflicted upon the desk, the sneeze also turned her hair purple, as you can see. This is also a signal of more to come. Her magic was potent enough to transform herself at the same time as produce an hours long acidic meltdown of a protected item. I expect great things to come from a trained and developed Brina, who is as kind a girl as I've ever had the pleasure to meet." Brotz patted Brina's back, and she finally turned to look at Headmistress Lyre. The bald woman finished arranging her desk and steepled her fingers. "In summation, as much as it has been nothing but a pleasure to have Brina, child of Brotz the Living Legend, we believe it is time to part ways for now." She interlaced her steepled fingers and leaned over her desk to level them with a hard stare. Brotz knew that look, but he was trying to be nice to Brina. He didn't want her last day at school to be the day she got kicked out unless that was best for everyone and he didn't think it was.

"We have 'til the end of the month, right?" It was only another few days. "Won't force it if none of you want to, but I know Brina will want to give a farewell."

Brina grunted softly and he felt her take a breath to speak twice, but she didn't say anything and settled her chin on his shoulder.

Brotz looked again at the swiss cheese-looking desk, the divots and dents and holes the size of coins surrounding one uneven circle in the center. She said it was a sneeze and slow work, they must have started small and shallow. And Alga had said it was protected. He furrowed his brow questioningly at Alga and pointed at the desk, then at Brina's back as he mouthed, "She did that?!"

Lyre nodded slowly and sincerely, then lifted her brows and gestured from him to the door with a round motion of her extended finger.