A Court of Heritance and Destiny

Chapter 6 Amaya

Time, it always takes time.

Time to grow, time to learn. Time in training and time to heal, both mind and body. Amaya had gone through that a year early, and after that first night with Orion she half expected to go back to that situation. But she felt nothing, after one day it was as if nothing had happened. Then it was the next large twist in her life. Tamlin was dead. Lord Escar was now High Lord Escar. When her father told her that she stood there and waited for the same wave of emotions as before. But she felt nothing.

She had left her room, shaken but determined, and she met Ikarad for training the next day, continuing on like nothing had happened. Day after day she moved on, training, lessons, dinner, sleep, over and over again. She had said her goodbye to Tamlin that day in Hewn, and while she had grieved for a moment, it had passed. He was gone, hopefully in a better place now then before. It all passed. Little over a week later she stood in the rings again, working on her powers with her father.

It had been over a year since she started her training with Orion, and the control she now had was a testament to how far she had come. Multiple strands of her sand out at the same time, she had mastered destroying, creating and moving things. Sometimes even at the same time.

She took a deep breath, doing her best to keep all of that going as her father tried to enter her mind with the Daemati powers. Pushing her to her limits.

She tried to not look bothered as she started to snake one of the sand tendrils back around to strike at her father. But it was a slow moving attack, if she lost her concentration, even for a blink of an eye, it was over. Amaya relaxed her face, trying to look as unbothered as her father, until she couldn't.

She held back a scream as he broke down her walls, ending her concentration and control over her powers in one swift move. Amaya sat down on the ground, doing her best to catch her breath again.

"Good work." Her father said, looking completely unfazed by the session. "It was a good plan, a bit on the slower side, but it could have worked."

"Yea..." Amaya ran a hand through her hair, "Maybe if I had one less thing to keep track of." Her father nodded along, but his eyes focused on something far away.

"We will continue to work on it." He said after a moment. "And hope you never need to use it."

"Do you think I need to?" She asked back, pushing herself up from the ground. "That I will need to use everything I have to defend myself?" Her father went quiet again, looking out over Velaris that spread out under the House of Winds. Amaya followed where he looked, seeing the mountains, river houses and the sea beyond that.

A flock of seagulls flew low over the bay area, and if she closed her eyes and listened, she heard the faint sounds from music being played in the streets.

"I have seen war, fought in them using everything I have more than once." He started and Amaya turned towards him again. "I do hope that you will never see that type of conflict in your life, that your time here will be freed from war and battles. But my greatest loss, the biggest failure that I have ever done, was to not be ready for everything with my mind." Her father dropped his head down. "It cost me fifty years, and far too much pain, fear and loss." Amaya nodded.

She was no warrior, sure she had only had a few months of training, compared to Ikarad... No amount of time could fix that. All that she had was her own powers, and mastering them to perfection, if not even more, was the most important skill she could use. If a day did come where she needed to stand with her court against a threat. Other worldly, or close to home.

"I am ready to try again." She said, unsure if she truly was or not.

"No, we are done for today." Her father said in response, "Etera is on her way back." Amaya just nodded, biting on her lip as she tried to think about what would happen now. The Shifter had been gone for over a month.