When Ushanti first told her about the boy who had washed up wanting to train, she thought it was a joke. A deliberate ploy in order to get closer to the princess. A twisted seduction game.
Mainlanders were good at such things. Shay lost count of the number of girls that had been left to mother their children born to them through visitors from the mainlands who visited from time to time.
So, she took over the training under the guise of letting Ushanti focus more on her own Aether control. She had deliberately visited the boy early that first day with the goal of scaring him off.
Instead, the boy stood his ground and when Shay made the regime harsher than usual to make him quit... the boy went on.
His constitution was strange, every bruise and injury to his body were healed immediately thanks to his Awakened ability and that gave her more reason to be harsher, after all if Liam trained his muscles and they were instantly healed by his ability then they would just revert to their original state with no sign of improvement.
So the boy's training regime included depleting his Natural well of Aether before they could begin the actual training.
Not only would he be severely hurting but he would be training while fatigued and experiencing the symptoms of Aether exhaustion. On top of that the training regime that she came up with was tough.
She doubted if such a frail boy would withstand all that.
And yet he did.
Not only that, he thrived in it.
Improving by the day and that... that was admirable. And so although she had not planned to, she sat here on the deck with her legs crossed and her arms placed on Liam's back, directing her Aether into him. Teaching him about Aether circulation and the principle behind core formation and what it implied.
It wasn't something that should have been taught to an outsider and yet she felt obligated to do so.
After the first Aether grain was formed and the Aether dispersed into his veins, she said:
"Now I'm going to demonstrate it one more tim-" that was when something else lurked. Something laying dormant, deep within him awakened. It lashed out, hungry as though a beast starved for days. It came like a primal tide.
While Aether was steady and filled with warmth, this one was aggressive and filled with the intense urge to burn and consume everything in its path. It swept through the vacuum above the navel and headed directly for the newly formed Aether grain.
Then to Shay's astonishment, it swallowed up the grain in what seemed like a blink of the eye. Then it paused.
Shay observed it curiously. Now that she looked closely, the energy was akin to the colour of blood which was a direct contrast the pale blue glow that was associated with Aether.
What is it that dwells within you boy?
The wild entity suddenly turned its attention to the foreign stream of Aether, Shay's conscious immediately flared. Her instincts kicking it. She immediately stopped circulation and began retracting her Aether. The red energy was already moving, it entered the veins and latched onto the end of the stream.
If Shay had her eyes open, they would have been as wide as saucers.
The moment the wild energy made contact, it rolled over the stream, swallowing it faster than she could retreat. She immediately gave up and cut off her connection to the Aether.
Usually, leaving foreign Aether within someone else's body, especially someone who had not yet formed an Aether core was dangerous. It was because such a person already had a maximum capacity and it you exceeded that, there was a possibility the body would become bloated and if it was too much for them... well what happened to an over inflated balloon?
But I have no choice, Shay thought, I just have to trust that whatever this is can managed to devour it all. Or else...it'll devour me.
Shay was merely relying on her instinct to make such a deduction and she wasn't even sure how accurate she was. She didn't want to test it out either.
She quickly detached her hands from Liam's back. She jumped back creating a space of three paces between them. Her face was pale and her hair wet with perspiration.
At the same time Liam groaned, he slumped to the ground on his side and shivered as though in pain.
...
Shay sat in silence. The crew members weren't as loud as they usually were, mostly because it was still the early hours of the morning. Still her attention was far from the proceedings of the table and it definitely wasn't on the food in her plate.
"Something on you mind?" Grey asked beside her.
"Nothing in particular" Shay said.
"I think I've known you long enough to notice when you lie"
Shay opened her mouth then closed it and then sighed. "There is just something that I don't understand and at the same time... it scares me"
Grey raised an eyebrow. "Didn't know you warrior maidens even knew fear"
"We're human too you know"
Grey laughed. "Yes, I know... but if there is something that you fear then isn't it only natural to try and overcome it. Hell, you could even observe and understand. That way you get to know it. What we fear most is the unknown after all"
Shay gazed at him.
"What?" Grey asked when he saw that.
"Nothing. Its just that you can be exceptionally wise sometimes"
"It comes with age" Grey's lips curled.