Vistus

The news of a dragon in the forest caused an uproar, of course, but the fact that said dragon was in Greenglade itself sent the villagers into a frenzy.

Most of them had never seen a dragon in person, Jinny mused. Of course they would be like this. At least there was no talk of hurting Shady. It was as Lae predicted; everyone loved him.

So it was annoying that, by extension, she got some of the attention as well. She instinctively hid behind Shady's foreleg, not daring to meet anyone's eyes. The questions kept coming: "where did you find him?", "how old is he?" and other such queries she answered as simply as she could. Then there was her personal favourite: "How come he befriended you?" That one she couldn't really answer, partly because she wasn't entirely sure herself, and partly because any answer she could provide would be unsatisfactory.

Dragons were reclusive creatures; though they existed with people peacefully, they mostly kept to themselves. If there was any contact between them, it was short and respectful. If you travelled, it wasn't that hard to cross paths with a dragon; actually becoming a friend of one was another matter entirely.

So it made sense that the Greengladers were jealous. Not only could Jinny use three magical elements, but she was friends with a dragon, too. Of course they hated her.

She couldn't blame them. She felt the same. She had been less than useless when faced with the walking corpse. She hadn't even tried to help Laerya or Akorri. They probably hated her for that too. Here she was, supposedly the magical expert, and when faced with danger she was so scared she couldn't even flee. Not to mention the thought of using her magic, knowing she could mess up and make things even worse, was terrifying. What if she had accidentally shot Laerya with a Light blast, or blinded Akorri?

Jinny watched as Laerya answered the questions about the Cragwing, and wished she could talk to her people so easily. But all she could do was press against Shady and reply briefly when someone spoke to her. She was already trying hard to stop herself from shaking when faced with so many people.

It was an incredible relief when the crowds finally cleared away, leaving the group alone in the middle of the village. Jinny slowly relaxed her muscles.

She did it too soon. A blue Feln, dressed in a rather pretty purple dress, seemed to emerge from the shadows to approach them. She had not seen her in the crowds earlier (when she had managed to look, anyway).

"Such a magnificent specimen," she murmured.

"Ah!" Lae spoke. "Lorelei, right? Nice to see you again."

Jinny raised her eyebrows. That name sounded familiar for some reason. Maybe Akorri or Laerya had mentioned her before? She glanced at them, noticing Akorri's ear twitch with unease.

"Indeed," the blue Feln replied. "Now, how did you come across such a lovely dragon?"

Shady stared at her calmly, giving a look Jinny couldn't quite read. What did he think about all this attention, anyway? He gave no sign of anxiety. In fact, he gave no sign of anything at all.

"Jinny found him wounded in the forest and helped him out," Lae replied. "Hunters were trying to get him."

"Is that so?" Lorelei replied. She looked at Jinny, who shrank back on reflex. "Ah. It's you, isn't it?"

"S-sorry?" Jinny gave no outward sign of the alarm she felt. What was her? What did she do now?

"The one with three elements," Lorelei replied, a little impatiently. "You supposedly have a lot of magical potential."

Jinny just stopped herself from flinching. Why did even this stranger know who she was?

"But you don't do anything with it."

Her heart dropped and she immediately shifted her gaze down at the grass. She didn't need another reminder of how useless she was, especially not from this person she had just met.

"Why is that?" Jinny felt Lorelei's eyes boring into her, judging her.

She didn't want to answer. What would she say? That she was too scared to use her magic in case she hurt someone, or messed up and let everyone down? The villagers had all these expectations for her, but she could not meet one of them. The thought of messing up and disappointing people who expected her to actually amount to something was too much for her to bear. And they would judge her for botching up a spell, too. It was all too easy for magic to go wrong. They would scorn her for her inability to do anything properly, and mock her for being useless. She couldn't cope with that.

So, Jinny couldn't answer at all. She wanted to melt into the ground, knowing this stranger was expecting a reply, but her mouth was too dry to respond. She felt choked. Sorry, she thought.

"Jinny?" At Laerya's prompt, she wanted to cry. They wanted an answer, but she was too ashamed to give one.

I'm being ridiculous, she thought. Stupid, can't even answer a simple question! I need to calm down...

Shady nudged her hand and Jinny pat his snout, seeking comfort from it. She took a deep breath and finally replied, not daring to look up. "S-sorry. I'm... just overwhelmed by it, I guess." Now her face burned and she wanted to die, or at least pass out. That was the dumbest answer she could have possibly given.

"Right." Lorelei's voice was like ice. "Do you even try?"

"Wh-what?"

"People would kill for your gift," Lorelei went on, "and you do nothing with it. That is shameful."

"Lorelei..." Laerya warned.

Jinny was having trouble fighting back tears. She knew Lorelei was right. She pressed against Shady, barely aware of how cold she felt despite the pleasant warmth of the sun. She tried to look at each individual blade of grass to distract herself, but everything was blurring into a green mess.

"I expected better from a Greenglader," Lorelei scoffed. Then she walked off without another word.

The square was empty now, but Jinny wasn’t aware of that. She did not even notice the silence, for there was none in her head. Lorelei's words echoed repeatedly, digging into her, and she was barely aware of the conversation that had just started up around her.

"That was uncalled for," Akorri muttered, his tail flicking irritably.

"Where does she get off, criticising people like that?" Lae added. She kicked the grass. "And I kinda liked her, too. Bah."

Akorri raised his eyebrow. "Really?"

"Well, I said 'kinda'. She was pretty encouraging when she found out I was trying to learn magic."

'Do you even try?'

"Jinny, you okay?"

She's right, I don't try. I can't even do that. 

"Jinny, don't listen to her. Don't let a stranger's opinion get to you."

"Yeah, what does she know? That Light magic you used on the bandits was awesome, whether you think so or not."

I can't use magic well, why do they think I can? I mess up everything, just like my friends said. They were right, I'm...

"Jinny, you're shaking." Lae's voice was muffled. "Come on, let's get you back to our hotel room..."

-

Akorri had only seen Jinny overwhelmed once before, and that had been enough. He did not enjoy the sight of the shaking mess on Lae's bed, but not because it was disconcerting. He didn't like Jinny being upset.

All the same, he had not expected Lorelei's words to have that much of an effect on her. Speaking of, he still wasn't sure what she and Yuli were doing in the village, but that matter was nowhere near as important as Jinny's feelings right now.

Lae had draped a red blanket over her to try and stop the shaking, but it had little effect. She leaned against Shady's neck (it was a wonder he could get into the room), her visible eye clouded over.

While waiting for Jinny to return to the present, Lae had tried to get into contact with Fericeus. Akorri thought he wouldn't respond again, but the wolf appeared shortly after he was summoned, his white form present in the crystal ball. He sat alone in his study, the hyperactive Kiyake currently elsewhere.

"Greetings," said the wolf. "How are you all doing?"

"Pretty good," said Lae. Then she updated Fericeus on their current situation, mentioning the status of the Cragwing and the meeting of Shady. She left out Lorelei and Jinny's predicament, probably out of respect for the white Feln. Akorri nodded in approval, pleasantly surprised by the rabbit's thoughtfulness.

"With that distraction I can imagine you haven't been able to practise magic much, hmm?" Fericeus seemed slightly amused.

"Ha, ha... No..." Lae admitted sheepishly.

"Cannot be helped, I suppose. Never mind that," Fericeus continued, "at least you have one way of getting rid of the undead beasts. I've been trying to research them myself, but it's been slow going. There is very little information to go on."

Akorri bit his lip. He hoped that Cragwing had been the only dead thing lurking in the forest.

"I'll continue doing what I can, should you run into anymore of those creatures," said Fericeus. "In lighter news, I have been unable to detect that strange presence near the house for quite a few days. I think it's gone somewhere else now."

Akorri wondered what Fericeus meant, but from Laerya's relieved sigh she seemed to know. "That's great!" she said.

"Not to mention, the earthquakes in the Fields have stopped." The wolf sighed. "Now that the area is safe, I and a few other Peacekeepers are going to inspect it..."

Akorri's ears twitched uneasily, looking at the wooden bedside table as he listened. He still found it unsettling that something had happened in the Fields, but hopefully they would not find anything now that the earthquakes had stopped... And his involvement would be kept secret.

There may have been conversation after that; Akorri wasn't too sure. His mind was elsewhere, in several places at once and unable to focus on any one thing. Until his eyes settled on Jinny, that is. All thoughts of the Fields and the earthquakes disappeared as he watched her remove her blanket and rub her eyes.

In that time Laerya had ended her talk with Fericeus and hopped onto Akorri's bed, making it bounce. "Jinny, hey!"

Jinny lowered her ears. "Hello."

"How are you feeling?"

"Fine."

Akorri twisted his mouth as he looked at Jinny, noting how she didn't meet anyone's eyes. She was still upset, but at least she was fully conscious.

"Um..."

Akorri's ears twitched with interest.

"Th-thank you."

Lae raised her eyebrows. "What for?"

"Not leaving me in the square. And I'm sorry."

"What for?" repeated Lae.

"Not doing anything against the Cragwing. Being a 'terrible excuse for a Greenglader'." Jinny's voice cracked. "Not even trying..."

"Hey, we didn't say those things and we don't agree with them," Akorri said, feeling a twinge of anger at Lorelei. That witch had every right to insult him, but not Jinny.

"So stop thinking about it," Laerya added, placing a tentative hand on Jinny's shoulder. "Okay?"

"But she's right," she mumbled. "I... I can use three elements, but I don't. It's too..."

Akorri sighed. He wasn't entirely sure he knew how Jinny felt... Or maybe he did. If his suspicions about her were right, he knew exactly how she felt.

"It's too what?" Lae pressed gently. "You can tell us. We won't judge, you know. We're your friends."

Jinny paused, as if trying to process what she had just heard. She slowly reached over for Shady, who nudged her with his snout. Then she replied, "It's too s-scary."

So Akorri was right.

"Scary?" Laerya prompted.

Then Jinny told them: exactly how much of a burden she felt had been placed on her shoulders, being the only Greenglader who could use more than one magical element but not being the right type of person to do anything with it. "I never thought I was anything special, and when I was much younger nobody really mentioned it e-either. It wasn't until I started having lessons that word spread."

Akorri listened intently as Jinny spoke. Outside the sun gave way to cloud, the world greying through the window.

"My friends and I took a few lessons together. They were Air users as well. At first we progressed at the same pace... Then when I took lessons for my other elements, I fell b-behind. Practising them at the same time was hard. I would be trying to make a light, but I would accidentally shoot a gust of wind instead. It got confusing very quickly.

"My parents, so proud of me before because of my potential, started to chide me. I wasn't advancing fast enough. I wasn't the magical prodigy they thought I was." Jinny's voice grew bitter. "While my friends moved on to making wings, I was still trying to control breezes. It didn't matter that I was shaping Dark shards or flashing Light at the same time. They teased me for being slow.

"After a while, other people took notice of my lack of skill. They started to judge me, and somehow also hoped I could teach them how to use another element at the same time! I couldn't, of course. One, because I was an inexperienced child, and two because you're either born with the element or not. But that didn't s-stop them from pestering me, or my parents from goading me into it. When they started expecting me to help them... I was too nervous to d-do anything. I couldn't even teach them without freezing u-up..."

Akorri began to wonder what the real aim of the Greengladers had been when asking Jinny to help them. If they'd known she couldn't teach them to use a different element, why did they ask her? To watch her flounder, probably. It was spite motivated by jealousy. And her parents, too. They didn't seem to take her daughter's feelings into consideration. What kind of parents were those?

Jinny pressed against Shady's neck, taking a while to continue. "Then my friends started to actually make fun of me every time I would mess up a spell, so I got too scared to even do that in case they would mock me. Eventually they just stopped... talking to me outside of lessons. So I lost my friends... And then people judging me because I just completely blanked out every time I tried to use magic! And there were times I accidentally hurt people when I did manage to do something. They started hating me. Oh, there's Jinny again, the big disappointment, freezing up as usual." Her voice was spewing venom now. "Jinny, who can't do anything right. A waste of space."

"You're not a waste of space," Laerya said firmly. "Don't think that for a second."

Jinny stared at her, looking completely lost. "What use is a mage who's too scared to even use her magic?"

"You don't need to do something to have a right to exist," Laerya replied quietly, rubbing Jinny's shoulder. "You just need to be."

Akorri swallowed, self-pity worming its way into the sympathy he felt for Jinny. Just like her, he was also scared of many things, more things than she was, he bet.  Scared of what people thought of him. Scared of fighting. Scared of danger. Scared of his own cowardice and what it made him do. Scared of the bitter cynic he'd become, the kleptomania, the inability to trust even the people in this room. It took all of his energy to tear himself away from these thoughts and focus on Jinny. He would help her, because she was his friend...

... But to do it he had to lay bare these very thoughts he'd tried to suppress. He couldn't do it. Not yet.

"It's okay," he said lamely instead. It was the only other thing he could think of.

Jinny huddled into herself. "Sorry for... well, all of that. It just sounded like a rant of self-pity."

"Even if it was, it's good to vent," Laerya soothed. "It's not healthy to keep all that stuff bottled up in there."

"I-I... I guess not. I do feel a little better." Jinny's voice grew shaky. "Um... Thank you for listening."

Akorri and Laerya sighed simultaneously. He guessed that was probably cathartic for Jinny, who didn't have anyone else apart from Shady to talk to. He was glad she got it out of her system.

"No problem," said Lae, patting her shoulder. "That's what friends are for."