Hikari

The gathered clan parted silently, like a wave before a boat, as The Raver entered the hatchery. Clash looked up with a worried expression before his eyes narrowed. He still wasn't comfortable around The Raver, and The Raver knew it. The mad diviner always knew.

The Raver grinned maniacally, obviously undisturbed by the tension in the room. He quirked an eyebrow, asking Clash what was wrong without using words. Clash pointed silently at his newest son.

"Is that all?" laughed The Raver, his mirth incongruent in the somber room, "I knew that from the moment his egg was laid. And you're only just now finding out."

"He'll be all right then?", ANNA, the hatchling's mother, asked worriedly.

The Raver stepped up to the hatchling, tipped his tiny head back with a claw, and gazed into the hatchling's eyes. They shone with an eerie, starry light. The Raver smiled gently as he gazed into it. "Of course he won't be all right. He's a prodigy, like I am, only not. We're never all right."

"He'll be a warrior then, and a good one, as you are. But will we have to send him away, as you were?" Clash asked.

"No."

The Raver's emphatic answer dropped like a solid stone. Clash looked puzzled. The Raver's answers were never simple, and The Raver's tone indicated that it wasn't.

As ANNA opened her mouth to speak again, The Raver pre-empted. "He'll have the company of my pet, Wisdom. Wisdom must stay with him. And he'll begin the training as soon as his wings are dry. Blind-fighting first, I should think."

The Raver spun and departed, the clan parting again like a silent wave before him.

And the new parents looked again at their new son, who saw only the stars in his eyes.

. . .

It was, at long last, time for my initiation and my naming.

Deep in the Hewn City, the ShadeReaver's dojo was comfortably cool even on the hottest days. I always felt at home in the huge, underground grotto. I spat on the floor, the tiny droplet plinking as if it had fallen from the cavern roof, and listened to the echoes. The ShadeReavers slowly filtered in, silently as always, but their bulks muffled the echoes differently than the walls. A spiral settled next to me, silently. rEVOLution, most likely. There weren't many spiral ShadeReavers. Most spirals lacked sufficient focus.

I felt The Raver's pearl approaching. The cracked orb sang in the aether, and radiated wild magic like a beacon. My pet, Wisdom, reminded me to keep my eyes shut and my own pearl tucked tight under my wing. I felt it radiating, and it would likely be glowing if I uncovered it. The dojo was supposed to be pitch dark at the start of an initiation. Wisdom assured me that it was, which was a relief. It would be embarrassing to violate the way of darkness at my own initiation.

And that was why my initiation was so late in coming. Standard ShadeReaver training was to learn magic after learning discipline, but my natural affinity made that impossible. So many times I had been chided for lighting up without even realizing it, violating the ways of darkness and silence! We trained to fight The Shade, and, as was our way, to use our enemy's strength as our weapon. It had been a long road. I was the eldest unnamed student, and had been for a while.

The Raver approached, and through Wisdom's eyes, I learned that he had unveiled his own cracked pearl, radiating it's pastel aurora-lights.

I opened my starlit eyes in response, seeing none of it.

"I knew you were ready," The Raver whispered.

And the cavern surged. In unison, the ShadeReavers roared, and the aether spun with their magic. Wisdom told me it was stunning, blinding, the cavern suddenly blazing in Reaver-lights. And the cacophony that erupted from the silence! I was lost in it.

At last I was allowed. Expected, even, and welcome.

My magic blazed.