I woke early in the dream like world. There was a faded crimson outline on the top of the mountain outside my east window. I sat up, and played with the end of my new tail to give myself time to fully wake up. I watched as the crimson line grew, and slowly transformed into gold. I slid my bare feet out of the warm covers to the cool wood. Getting up for the morning, I ran my fingers through my smooth thick hair, out on my freshly tailored dress, and slipped on my boots.

"Good morning, Mary." I said walking in through the kitchen door.

"Morning." She replied in a cheery mood. "Hope you like eggs." She slid me a plate, with two eggs in it, to the place I was now seated.

"Thank you." I cut my fork into one.

"You enjoying yourself here in Almera?"

"Uh-huh. The scenery is gorgeous."

"Yes, it is quite a beautiful place. What scenery are you use to?"

"Red mountains mainly. It's pretty, but nothing like this."

"Hmm, where you from?"

"Utah." I replied without thinking. How was I to expect her to know where that was? It's not even on the same world!

"Utah? Never heard of it, and know quite a bit of places with I how many different people run in and out of here."

"It's not very well known. Very small place." I said, not sure if I should tell her of the fact that I was from a different planet.

I finished my food after a little more small talk, and remembered Theo wanted me to meet him this morning. "Well, thank you for breakfast." I said at the door of the kitchen.

"You're welcome!" She called back to me.

I walked into the hall, traveling back into my memory to remember the way to the training room I was in the previous day.

I opened the large door to the training room revealing Theo. He held two knives in his left hand, and one in the right. He stood in the center of the room, and had his concentrate face fixed on a large bullseye dangling on the wall at the far end of the room. Carefully clutching the knives blade, he chucked it at the wall. The blade pierced the center with a smack.

"Morning." He said not taking his eyes off the bullseye, and raising the next knife, ready to throw.

"Morning." I replied walking into the room. Another swift bang sounded off. "What's the plan for today?"

"Combat." His eyes still never glancing away. The third bang echoed in the room. His eyes finally broke, and ment mine.

"What kind of combat?"

"We'll start with hand to hand, and once you've mastered that, move to weapons."

"Wait, so you're going to teach me how to use those?" I pointed towards the wall dressed in menacing looking weapons.

"Yes..." He replied, failing to see what my problem was.

"And you're sure it's safe." I said, eyeing a particularly sharp axe.

"Safe?" He scoffed. "I don't expect anything we're going to be doing to be safe." I felt a sudden churning in my stomach, and I wore a slightly horrified expression while looking into the path I chose for my future.

Theo saw my uneasiness, and looked a little regretful for what he had said.

"Let's get to work." He said, trying to move me out of the state I was in.

I walked face to face with him, focusing my mind. "Do you have any experience fighting?"

"Nope."

"Do you know how to punch?"

"I can punch. I don't know if there's a proper way to do it."

"Okay, show me what you got."

"You want me to punch you?" He replied with a small nod. "Okay..." I gave him an uneasy swing to the chest. He raised one eyebrow.

"Really?" I gave him an awkward shrug. "Come on Skyler, just punch me." He repositioned himself, ready for the impact. I gave another swing, but this time with confidence and power, nailing him in the shoulder. The punched nicked him off balance for a second, but he regained it. A roughly concealed pain bled on his face, and his lion ears bent in pain.

"Are you okay?!"

"Yeah-yeah I'm fine." He had a failed attempt in hiding his pain." Th-that was good. " He began to rub his now bruised shoulder. He let out a breath. "I really underestimated your strength."

"I'm so sorry." I apologized earnestly.

He regained his original position. "At least now we know you can punch." He gave me a small smile, still rubbing his shoulder. I went a light pink under his smirked gaze. There was a moment of silence framing that picture. I felt myself fall into a trans while exploring his misty eyes. I moved from his eyes to his strong, sharp, handsome facial features, tracing them with my eyes.

"Um...Skyler?" He pulled me out of my trance. "Shall we move on, or would you like to keep staring at my face?" His mouth quirked up into a sly smirk.

"I wasn't staring, I was just...thinking." I lied

"And what were you thinking about?" He said with a hint of amusement.

"Why does it matter to you what I think about?" I put my chin up to hold my own authority.

"Just curious." He shrugged, but went back into a faded version of his smirk.

I narrowed my eyes at him, but washed it away and refocused.

"Okay," he clasped his hands together. "Now that we have established your strength, and how you have proven that you know how to use it, we can go into the actual fighting piece of the training."

For the next hour and a half, or so, we went over defensive and offensive moves. He taught me strategic ways to use my arms and legs, showed me some blocks and counter blocks, and the most effective places to hit on the body.

Afterwards, we began to test out what I had learned.

"Okay Sky, come at me."

I took in a deep concentrated breath before attacking. I pulled up my fist too form a heavy blow at his chest. But I was to slow. Before I made contact, he had managed to dodge out of the way and catch my fist. From there, he moved up my arm and, getting control of my body, he flipped me over. It happened so fast I could barely keep up with what was going on.

Landing smack down on my back, I was grateful for the small but helpful padding spread across the floor, yet I still managed to get the breath knocked out of me.

Theo offered me his hand, and I gladly took it.

"You got to be faster than that." He said. "And always keep a focused mind to think of what your next move is. For example, what you could have done, after I caught your hand, was pull me closer, and kneed me in the stomach." I have him a nod of understanding, and we began again.

We continued this for a few more hours, and with every fight, I managed to end up on the floor, with no breath, and in pain. A couple times, I hit my head hard enough for the world to spin, and nearly faded into darkness.

At around one, we took a break for lunch, then began again until dinner. This was the routine for the next two weeks. This exhausting routine of train, train, train, and endless failure in our scrimmages. And at the end of each day, I retired to my room, stiff as a board, to snooze away on my heaven kissed bed.

During those weeks, we drilled through a couple of first aid lessons where he taught me wrap bandages, clean wounds, and (as sickening as it was) stitch up wounds.

Although this was a nice break from the fighting, it rarely happened, and I still went back to failing each day.

With this repetitive failure streak I was on, my relationship with Theo was tested. I'm not sure he could go an hour without making a snide comment. It was simply his nature. And my failure was full for his teasing fire. He quickly became one of the most irritating frustrating people I know.

Then finally, at the end of the second week, I won.

"Okay, again." A sly smile was on his face as he gave me a hand up from the floor, once again. I wasn't eager to protest, gladly willing to punch him again. Although, wanting to skip the part where he kicks my butt afterwards. "And try not to lose so quickly this time." He flashed me a devious smile while we positioning. All this did was burn my rage ever more brightly.

I narrowed my eyes and clenched my teeth tightly.

I went for the attack, and in a swift move, went straight for the throat. I wasn't at all feeling mercifully this fight. The move was too fast, he couldn't block it. He also wasn't expecting a move like, but only tossed me a brief look of curious pleasure. He seemed to like the idea of me starting off with such a viscous move.

He then made his move.

He swung into a high kick that I barely managed to dodge it. Right after, he swung his fist at me, but I was ready for him. I grabbed his arm before he could make contact, and used it as a handle bar for me to spin myself around, and cover distance between us. This set me up perfectly to perform a back kick.

He stumbled back a bit, but still managed to keep himself steady in the end.

I flipped myself around slightly panting. His brow was creased, and he looked frustrated with himself that he had not yet successfully delivered a blow.

I closed the distance between us, and we engaged into a heated fist fight.

We began swinging at each other, but barely being to slow for the other person, and yet so fast that it would look like a blur of fists. My arms were bruised from the number of times I had sacrificed them by putting them in the path Theo was taking in order to punch my face.

We sprawled around the room swift punched and kicks. Neither of us making a successful blow.

Theo finally stopped the fiery fist fight after I caught his fist. He used it to his advantage by grabbing my arm, pulling me in, and kneeing me in the stomach. The memory of him teaching me that move flashed in my mind as I stumbled back, hunched over in pain.

When I looked back up, his fist was flying through the air, inches from my face. I bent over backwards to keep from the wrath of his fist. I watched as his white knuckles fist sail above my face. I flew into a back hand spring, while nailing my foot into his clenched jaw.

When I resurfaced up right, I saw my blow had knocked him off his feet. And, not only that, left a tiny stream of blood trailing down from his bottom lip.

He looked up at me from his propped elbow position with a deep brow and darkened eyes. He tore into me like this, until breaking into his usual smirk.

"Well, well, well. It appears you finally beat me." He said, while brushing the blood off his chin, and holding his injured jaw A sweet sensation built up with in me. It felt good to finally win. I couldn't help but join him in smiling at my victory.

I gave Theo a hand up, feeling good not being the one on the floor this time. He looked at the pleasure swelling in my face, and said, "Don't get use to winning. After today there's no more going easy on you."

"Easy?" I said with raised eyebrows. "You weren't going easy on me." I said as if reassuring myself it was a joke, still wanting to hold onto my victory. "You're just mad you lost, trying to make up excuses for yourself."

He looked at the ground and laughed as if he had caught some joke I had not. He finally looked back at me with a smirked gaze.

"Prove it." He said, his voice slick as butter. An orange path of smudged blood almost disappeared blending into his tanned skin. Then he strode out of the room yelling back, "See ya tomorrow." The door banged closed behind him.

I couldn't help but let out a stale laugh at his childish reply.

The next day, we did not continue our usual hand to hand combat. In the morning, Theo was a little late, but when he came in I could see why. He came into the room carrying two piles of armor. Not full sets, it looked like, just the essentials. He placed them down before disappearing into the hall, coming back a second later heaving a large, worn out, wood dummy stand.

"What are those for?" I said walking towards the things he had just brought in.

"Well, the armor is for protection, and -"

"Protection from what exactly?" He nudged his head in direction to the menacing wall of weapons. "I thought we were still doing hand to hand stuff, after all, I only ever beat you because you were going "easy" on me." He let out a huff of a laugh.

"True, but there's no time to get into anything more advanced then you already know, well not right now."

"Why are we in such of a hurry?"

"Derkon's stronger than ever, and the last chance we have lays with our parents." I suddenly realized the importance of this mission. It would potentially save all those under Derkon's threat. "Also, we have to track down the others."

"Others?"

"There were four children, as you should remember, and it's up to us to find the other two, and persuade them to help us." I have him a nod of my understanding, and he plucked the heavy armor into my arms. "Put these on, and we'll begin."

The armor fit me awkwardly, but I was perfectly fine with it, just glad I would have some protection in this stage of training. Theo put on the other set of armor that covered the chest, head, and bits of the arms and legs.

He went over to the wall, and pulled off two plain blunt swords, which did not at all look as magnificent as the other weapons that clothed the wall. He tossed me one of the blades, and came to stand a couple yards in front of me.

He put his left foot forward and held his blade at the ready. He signaled for me to replicate. I did so, but Theo still managed to find fault with my stance.

Theo let out a sigh.

He slipped his dull blade through his belt to allow him to use both of his hands. I held my positioning while he disappeared behind me.

"Here, let me show you." I heard his smooth voice just behind my ears. He slipped his hands on top of mine. I noticed his strong yet gentle grip, and felt a slight tingle at his touch. "You need to hold it up more and closer in." He guided my hands to the correct positioning, and tweaked my elbows. I felt the hilt of his blade nudge the small of my back, making me realize just how close he was to me.

Once I had it, he slid his hands away, and I slid out the breath I was unknowingly holding back.

"Okay, now memorize that stance." He appeared back in front of me. He walked from me, and grabbed the splintered wood dummy stand, pulling it to where I was.

He ran me through the basics of using a sword, getting me use to the blades movements.

When I began practicing on the dummy, I could feel the strength of the sword with every hit. I could feet the vibrations of the blade as it banged against the wood. Even though the blade was blunted, I would often hit at certain angles, further splintering the wood.

I was getting sword fighting much easier than anything with the hand to hand combat. I easily moved the blade as if it were a part of me rather than a weapon. It strangely seemed like I could feel the metal of the weapon. It felt so right.

Theo examined me and my movements with intensity. You would think I would have gotten use to it by now, but I couldn't help but feel a little squeamish under his intimidating gaze. But this time it was worse.

"Stop." He said softly while I was in mid swing. "That's enough practicing the movements of the blade. Now, let's fight." He took the blade out of his leather belt, rolling his shoulders back, and lifting the blade in positioning. I let out a hefty sigh, knowing that I was going to return to my losing streak, and once again be use to the sight of Theo, standing with an out stretched hand, above me. I made my positioning as well.

He took the first lounge, closing the distance between us quickly. He swung the blade at my armored side. I quickly slid my sword in between his blade and my armor before the two could collide. As they clashed together, a sharp ring echoed through the room. He drew his blade away, and came in for a second attack, and I again was able to block it.

Our blades were still clashed together from his second attack, when I saw a hint of a smirk play at the corner of his mouth. He swiftly slid his blade down, and under mine. He flicked his sword up with enough strength to send mine flying. The hilt of my blade slipped from my hand. As my fingers skimmed the very end of the hilt, I tried to impossibly grab it with my finger tips. Then suddenly, as if the blade ignored the strong force that Theo applied to it, fell back down into my hand, defying the laws of force.

Theo paused as he looked at the blade, that was somehow still in my right grip, with a bewildered expression. But I kept my focus. Without hesitation, swung my blade at him. He barely refocused on time to skip his blade in to stop my attack.

We are both strong, pushing our blades against the other, when Theo released, and spun out of the way, allowing me to stumble forward. He swung his blade hard against my armored back with enough force to create a dark bruise. I fell forward on my knees with tired breaths.

"What was that!?" I heard Theo's voice behind me.

I flipped my body around to face him.

"What was what."

"How did you do that with your sword?" I suddenly realized he was referring to when the sword magically fell into my hand.

"I don't know." I said with complete honesty. I had no idea what happened. "The sword just fell into my hand."

"It just fell?" He wore a raised eyebrow. "No, seriously, what did you do?"

I put my hands up in surrender.

"Hey, I'm just as lost as you. I only know what I saw." I lowered my eyes as I picked myself up off the ground, and when I lifted them, I met his scrunched eyebrow gaze. I almost froze under it. My eyes ment his, and it was hard for me to draw them back away, even though that was all I wanted to do under his uncomfortable gaze. He examined me as if I were a curious animal that just displayed something unheard of, and he watched me as if searching for an answer to what I had just done. I didn't know what to do or say, so I replied to him with an expectant gaze, that he appeared to see through.

The silence was killing me. All though it stood for only a moment, possibly even mere seconds, his look was so intimidating, it was as if time froze.

For how often he used these intimidating looks, it seemed that they were, in a way, natural to him. It was simply his nature.

"Let's get back to practicing." He finally broke the silence, and released me from his invisible grip. He turned to put a little more distance between us, and appeared to let the impossibility I had preformed wander to the back of his mind to remain an unsolved puzzle for the mean time.

We continued practicing sword fighting for the next couple days, then moved on to archery, and ended with daggers and knife throwings. Nothing like what happened with the sword falling into my hand happened again after that first day, and everything was fine until we were interrupted one day.

I was more of a natural with the weapons then I was with the hand to hand combat. We were able to pass off the basic fighting of them much fast. Training began to feel easier. Even though I received just as much bruise (and even more, if possible) and went to bed just as sore, the practices seemed more relaxed.

"Those were some pretty good moves back there. I'm glad I'm finally teaching you something." Theo said to me.

We had just finished some sword training, and we're now cooling down with a game of what I liked to call extreme darts.

"Why do you always have to do that?" I asked.

"Do what?" He frowned.

"Twist your complements." His frown reversed into a small smile.

"What do you mean?" He needlessly asked. I knew he understood perfectly well what I ment, but I played his game anyways.

"I mean, with every compliment you give, you always tag along something negative to counteract it." He held his smile, and carelessly nailed a knife in the bullseye of the target.

"Well, I don't want to be too nice. I'll ruin my reputation." I couldn't help but laugh at his response. His smile widened as I let loose the small laugh, although his eyes never moved from the target. "You have a cute laugh." He said with his eyes still glued to the board.

"Thank you." I said, not knowing how else to respond. My cheeks flushed slightly.

For a moment when I looked down, I thought I saw him still a glance at me, but when I looked back up he was still focused on the board.

"Wh —" I was about to ask something, but stopped at the sound of the door creaking open. We both turned to look at the little taylor, Jacob, popping his head in the room. Once his eyes laid on us, his whole body emerged.

"Oh, there you two are." He said at the door. " the lady Mariah would like to see you." Without another word, he popped back through the door frame.

Once the door had clicked shut behind him, I asked, "Lady Mariah?"

"Yes, she's the one who runs Almera." He said walking to the door.

"Oh." Was my only response. That made sense as to why I hardly saw her. In fact, I hadn't seen her since when I talked to her on the bridge. That was when I first came here, I have been here for a month since. She must keep really busy.

My mind played with the puzzle of what she would want to see us for. I couldn't think of anything in particular, I only thing I could think of was it had something with the fact that we were both Arikan.

I couldn't tell what Theo was thinking. The entire walk he was silent, and had a blank expression, although I could see from a flicker on his eyes that there was more going on.

We pushed open a door to reveal Mariah speaking to a man that looked to be some where in his fifty's, and had black hair with thick gray at his sides. He had a small beard with a connecting mustache. He had small wrinkles on his brow, and at the corners of his eyes. He wore a large black jacket that hung to his knees.

The man held out a small metal gadget, showing it to Mariah. As we walked in he slid it into his pocket, and kept his hand with it for security.

They turned to us after the gadget was safely tucked away. The man looked at us in slight wonder examining every part of us, while Mariah looked at us with a sweet smile.

"Wow...real Arikan!" The man said in a whisper. His voice deep yet soft.

"I guess we will have to discuss this again later, Victor. If you mind, I need to speak to these two privately." Her voice was smooth and soft, yet held authority.

With one more look at us, he turned back to Mariah.

"Well, aren't you going to, at least, introduce me first?"

"There will be time for introductions later, but right now, I need to speak to them." She gestured towards the door. He let out a sigh and replied, "Very well." He slipped past us, and out of the room giving us a half smile, with his hand still tucked away in his pocket.

Once the door was tightly shut, then a smile creased Mariah's lips.

"We found another one." She said.

A/N: Please remember to vote, and thanks for reading.