Elua sat cross-legged in a secluded clearing deep in the forest. The light of dawn helped tint the sky in hues that complented the Skydancer’s twilight plumage. It also stressed the duskier colors of the bird as it perched on a low branch nearby.
Dull mint eyes locked with the avian’s very white irises. It had been patiently waiting and showed no sign of taking off unless allowed, showing the creature had clearly been trained already.
"Alright, little one. Let’s see what you can do."
The heiress murmured in monotone. There was rarely much point in being false with a beast that a cultivator would be working with. They tended to pay a lot more attention than a human to the small changes.
She extended her spiritual sense in a cloud toward the Skydancer. The bird’s spirit flickered at her probing. The mortal size of it was small, but surprisingly complex for sothing that wasn’t humanoid.
The Skydancer tilted its head curiously at her when she pressed a little intent at it. Almost hesitantly, its spirit responded with its own version of ’understanding’. The brunette breathed out with a bit of contentnt.
’Working with birds is great. So many of them can feel and manipulate their inner spiritual energy. Now I know I can retrain him.’
"Good. Now, let’s try sothing more... intricate."
She conjured a simple illusion that it could see. A shimring thread curved and connected from her outstretched arm to just in front of the bird. Its white eyes were transfixed to the thing that ca out of nowhere.
"Follow it."
Elua commanded aloud while pushing the sa intent through the cloud of energy ’linking’ them. The Skydancer hesitated but took flight when she added ’safety’. It traced the illusory path near perfectly and landed its small grip on her skin.
"Clever thing, aren’t you?"
The small flier was t with an awkward attempt at the brunette girl smiling... without the delusion of her facade. The muscles *should* have been well used to the movent - but her ancient ntality of conserving physical energy by remaining expressionless still fought back with her.
’If I really wanted to change into my ideal kind of person, I should have been practicing seriously. Instead, I took a shortcut to seem normal to my parents. Which was fine. I don’t regret that.’
Solutions becoming obsolete was not new to her. Neither was realizing that she had set sothing serious aside that she should not have. Having more than enough ti to focus on this in the past but disregarding it was the only thing she felt bad about.
"Well, we can both learn to act a little more ideally together, can’t we?"
Over the next hours, the illusionist put the bird through increasingly complex exercises to find its limits and get it used to her expectations. She wove so illusory mazes for the companion to navigate, while feeding it minimal hints. She blinded it to her movents and hid ’objects’ in the forest nearby for it to find.
Each ti, she always reinforced the tasks with spiritual commands to build a repertoire of thods she could use to direct its focus. The sun climbed higher as the cultivator felt that the bird’s responses were becoming quicker and more intuitive. Its tiny spirit seed to finally be harmonizing well with her own.
"Now, let’s try sothing new again."
She showed it a tiny, intricately carved wooden bead that she had been throwing her essence at all those hours. The inside of it now was more complicated than anything she’d ever sold, if not nearly so much as her dress or Qat’s blade.
She pulled it apart into two pieces and with great care she attached it to the Skydancer like a breeder’s leg band. Which of course, for the black market linked exiled elder... was not present. Whether it was stolen or not didn’t matter much to whom it had been given to.
As far as she was concerned, it was already hers.
The little crafter had made sure to use the lightest type of wooden material in the area she could find - and cut as much away as she could from the insides to decrease even more weight for the light bird. Still, it had been a lengthy and ti consuming project that surely had *little* to do with being embarrassed to go back ho.
’If I was just making the sigils, it would have been done in a few minutes...’
"This will let see where you’ve been. So that when you report back, I can tell where the feelings you send were happening. I’ll make the next one do much more... but for now, let’s practice our directions and make sure this doesn’t bother you."
She explained herself to the bird even if it didn’t understand human language... yet. Elua sent a series of commands through the tiny fragnt of her spirit which she embedded in the bead. Unlike with Qat, there was no chance of lding it with the avian. There was worrying that soone you loved would be affected and then there was *knowing* that a lower creature’s self would be essentially erased if she tried.
’Making true puppets of creatures is a fine way to be lynched~ Because mortals and cultivators alike think that they are next in line when you grow in power.’
Up, down, left, right. The Whispering Skydancer reacted with impressive accuracy and speed to the slight commands. Swooping and diving as directed as she built up her trust in it and vice versa. When it landed on her shoulder to take a rest, she fed it a species of tiny shelled insect that it seed to fancy.
"I won’t intentionally give you wrong directions, but keep your head about you, okay? I make mistakes all the ti."
As they made their way through the forest and back to the estate, the reincarnator’s thoughts turned to Qat and how she reacted. Then it turned toward the looming conflict behind the competition.
’We’ll have to be careful, of course. But with this new asset...’
The bird trilled softly - as if sensing her sches involved it. The heiress chuckled and stroked him with the side of her finger. The soft feathers rubbed back against her.
"Don’t worry, little one. We might just be getting started, but you’ll have a lot of fun, food, and safety to make up for any danger I put you in."
The colors of her little partner, like a hunk of dusk-bound twilight, sunk into her dress as she modified its appearance. An ancient style from mory, more flowing and epheral, began to swing ’naturally’ in the breeze.
"After all, I quite like birds and spent a while with a civilization that revered them - and there is all the reason I need to dislike cats."
Cultivators made and used tools of all sort, yes - but a pet she let into her plans was always sothing more. A companion for the trials to co... and the closest thing to family besides her disciples and romantic interests to ever exist in her past life.
---
The teen nervously approached the nursery with silent steps cloaked in illusions. Her spirit was bound tightly to her form and all her concentration hid her presence from the beloved she knew was in there.
’Using it on myself doesn’t count as using it on her. What a split hair. How low will I still fall if given the chance?’
The sound of laughter filtered through the closed door... low chuckling mingled with delighted infantile squeals. Warmth blood in her heart and threatened to give away her ’invisibility’. Before it was too late, she quietly twisted the handle and pushed at the door.
Elua paused at the exposed threshold to take in the lovely sight. Qat sat cross-legged on the floor with her usual stoicism softened at the corner of her eyes. She dangled a toy just out of Onya’s reach while standing. Determination was apparent on her chubby little face.
For a few seconds, the Goltbred simply watched and committed the visual to mory. It would be a great comparison in the future! A small child, straining forward with little fingers grasping up at the ’adult’ spending ti with her.
Mint eyes closed then opened with more light in them. She stepped inside with the usual ’sweet’ expressions of her facade - instead of practicing as she should. Even if these two knew what she was ’really’ like, it did not an she had to give herself another reason to be ashad of her recent behavior!
"Well, isn’t this an absolutely adorable scene?"
The blonde teenager’s head snapped up as the voice coincided with feeling their fragnts resonate. A red crept up the back of her neck and the tips of her ears at being caught in such an unguarded mont.
"El, you’re finally back-"
"Ah. Just a mont, darling."
The girl raised a finger and interrupted her ’fortress’ smoothly. She strode to the high locked window and opened it. There was only a slight pause to shoo away the mory of doing sothing very similar hours ago...
’I’m not jumping out of it undressed this ti!’
"There we go. Much better with a little natural air let inside."
A blur of twilight-hued feathers swooped through the open window as she turned away from it. The cultivator’s arm stretched out toward the pair on the floor as the Whispering Skydancer circled the room once - before it landed gracefully on Elua’s waiting limb.
"Now, what were you saying?"
The heiress tilted her head at her family. Her first sibling and her *best* spouse. Everything about the brunette spoke of ’innocence’. Qatrand’s usual forbearance was tested as her pigeon-blue eyes flicked between the tad creature and the seemingly ’untaable’ one.
"I was about to welco you ho, but now I have to be more interested in what just flew in through your window."
She had a feeling the answer was going to *sound* simple but be more complicated than she was prepared for. Her wife made everything more complex than it needed to be, sotis.
’Why does she have to keep wearing that stunning silver dress? Will it continue until I finally ask her about it?’
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