Aeromancer

Chapter 3 - Enter Faulkner

On Sunday morning Seti and Sydria were driving to the city of Maybell.

Sydria found out about his wind light when they ate last night. Thinking she was invisible to all working eyes, she got caught picking her nose. Seti would have loved to see the color of her face when he told her to stop, all while looking down on his plate. Being able to see when people thought he wasn't looking could do wonders for him.

He hoped his wind light could grow, or expand because it was like permanently living in a world without the sun and only a flashlight on hand. He repeatedly had to propel wind at himself to reduce the level of frustration.

Seti still hadn't confronted Sydria about contacting their father, nor had she mentioned that she did so. While it was the Shepherds that pushed towards Cassie's expulsion, it was Sydria's loud mouth that allowed everything to happen in the first place. She needed to learn that her thoughtless actions had consequences.

At the same time, Seti remained conflicted about feeling bad for Cassie at all. She placed a geas on him without his permission, and the feeling of helplessness gnawed him. But it did ultimately help him, in more ways than one. Regaining the dream memories gave him an idea of why he went blind, and he also believed that the remembrance geas had helped create the wind light.

The thing that struck most odd to Seti was that his father still hadn't said a word about his blindness to him. Perhaps pops would say nothing until Seti got home and informed him in person. That sounded like something he would do. He was grateful that his father wasn't home after he finished moving out of the dorm. Had his father been there, it was likely Seti would experience a berate session about his desire to learn more about his adept abilities.

"We've passed at least three temples already," Sydria tried saying again, "why does it have to be the one halfway across the galaxy?"

"This one is the best," Seti said once more. He had not told her that he picked the Maybell temple specifically because his counselor mentioned it. Temples tended to reject people if they were too low tiered, as he was. If the counselor saw something in him, then maybe the recommended temple would see something too.

"I don't know, I can't see why it would matter," she said.

"When you learn about your abilities and decide to them train, then you'll understand."

Sydria said nothing.

He was at least pleased that she focused on this topic rather than him deciding to train his wind before trying to restore his eyes again.

The three-hour drive was painfully long. There was only so much in the car for him to look at with his wind light. He tried testing his ability further by using the wind light outside the car window. But unfortunately, the real wind outside overpowered his so he never got to see past the interior.

He brought his earphones and plugged them into his cellphone. Sydria had helped him navigate to his music playlist, giving him some semblance of normalcy.

A game he played in secret was pretending to sleep while he gently used his wind light on Sydria. He didn't think she noticed the wind, but just as she was about to habitually pick at her nose, she slowly turned her head and saw his semi-hidden hand. He roared with laughter as she kept hitting him and calling him a wind pervert.

When they finally arrived in Maybell, Sydria slowed the car down, followed by a comment or two about her hating cities. She kept glancing down at her phone to make sure she didn't miss any turns before they arrived.

"It's closed," Sydria said. They were driving as fast as a car could when one didn't press the pedal. Since Seti couldn't see, he wasn't able to know if a car was behind them, forced to match their speed.