The Near Infinite Names of Autumn Aubrey (Psychological Fantasy Progression)

Learning Implementation under Precept Seram had been frustrating at times, but her perfectly pleasant patience had guided me through whichever assignment I had been given.

Conflict and Resolution with Precept Zetta had just made sense.

What she taught and the way she taught it had felt like it was all just for me. Overcoming the nicknames, the praise when I did something right, dueling the other new moons and my teacher's workings both, I could have stayed in her class forever.

In my short time at Lun, Restoration had quickly become my least favorite of the three.

The first and easiest reason to understand was because I was truly awful at it.

Every single seed, sprout, bud, bulb, petal, stem, flower, plant or other living thing that I had been given had died violently at my hand. No matter how little of myself I gave it, no matter how long I spent thinking about what I wanted to do and how to do it, as soon as my aura leaked through my channel, that life would end.

Precept Cherith had insisted that my azure blight was nothing to be troubled over, that time with my special little responsibility would teach me how to stop killing, and that the medery in Hymneth would be happy to have so many overgrown flowers in its halls, but that did not make me feel any better.

The second reason, which was not my fault in the slightest, was that I did not want to be there.

Sam had caused that.

Everyday since he had taken me into the inner halls and showed me the way out, I had been waiting for him to take me away again.

Before class, to and from the dining hall, on the way to my hall, after class, and any other time that I was not in The Well or with Anna, I was looking around every corner for my big blue cat.

All the things he had spoken of, all the things that he had said that he had tried to tell me about, I was far more interested in what lay within Lun than I was turning another seed into dust. I had grown so desperate for him to come for me again that I had taken up silently shouting for him in my mind with the small hope that I would break through what kept him from speaking to me.

But it had been days since I watched him stare down a phantom bear, and there had been no sign of him except the brief time he spent watching over me when I returned to Katarina in The Well.

I had managed to learn how to copy the first two steps of her dance perfectly, but I had not gotten a word out of my familiar beyond what he was compelled to say to me.

The third and final reason that I had begun to dread my restoration class was Spring Tana.

But of course it was, I really should not have been surprised.

Effortlessly sprouting seeds and healing full trees had not been enough for her.

No matter what assignment I was failing at, no matter what Mallory and Plia were doing, every class inevitably turned into all of us being made to watch whatever stupid thing that Tana was doing.

It would not have bothered me so much if she had not been so good at everything she had been asked to do.

I hated it.

What I hated even more, was watching my teacher, Vanda, and the others cheer for her like she had done something impressive.

She had brought a seed into a tree bearing bright red apples, grown a vine so long that it had coiled against the walls like Zizicoltain's skeleton did the hall of conquest, and returned a charred log into soft green wood, but that did not amaze me like it did everyone else.

If I had not been cursed with having so much aura and I was weak like her, I could have done everything she had done with my eyes closed.

Halfway through my second week of the class I no longer wished to be in, I found myself standing in a circle around the honey haired underwitch.

"Take your time, Tana. Finesse is what is required with this patient." Precept Cherith reminded her

Mallory rolled her eyes. "It's a pumpkin, not a person. Hurry up, Plia is going to starve to death."

"It is true. I feel myself growing faint already." The little underwitch muttered, her thin hair covering her face as she cast her eyes down to the floor.

Vanda gave both of them a stern glance before looking back at Tana's patient.

It was indeed a pumpkin, the largest one I had ever seen with my own eyes or anyone else's as a matter of fact.

The top of the big orange thing was even with my brow, and made Plia look even smaller than she actually was just by being next to her. Rot had taken one side of it, black, soft, and sour smelling. Tana knelt before it in a pool of her watery blue.

"It has been severed from its vine? Even if I remove the blight, how will it become whole again?" She asked up at our teacher

Precept Cherith smiled and nodded her head once. "A very good question. Vanda?"

Her and her comforting presence had only been in the classroom for a handful of minutes, and I had to force myself to not think that she had only come to see Tana.

The former new moon agreed with Cherith. "Right. The way it grew has been lost, but the memory of how to grow still lives within it. But, you must be sure that the blight is removed completely, or you risk causing it to grow instead."

For a moment, I caught myself not hating Tana.

The curious focus in her eyes, the slight nod as she understood what she was being told, the determined set of her jaw as she turned back to her patient and began her work, she was literally anyone else in all of chaos, I would have wanted her to succeed.

But then I remembered the day she had healed the grievous wound of the split tree that had been brought into the classroom.

Lost in the sorrow of her afterglow and weak from the loss her working had taken from her, I had let my heart soften towards her just enough for it to hurt when I learned that she had told Alexei of my plans.

I would not make that mistake again.

Her watery blue trickled up the seams of the pumpkin and closed in a ring around the rotten hole that ailed it.

"Have you ever had pumpkin pie," Plia whispered to me, her arms wrapping around what must have been her very hollow stomach. "Or soup. I have even seen them roasted with stew inside, so they are the bowl and the meal."

Tana's eyes cut over to us when she heard the little underwitch's ravenous ramblings, but only reacted with a smile.

"Do not worry, Sister. This will not take much longer." She said as her face relaxed and the pumpkin began to separate.

Precept Cherith kept her smile through the deep sigh that seeped out of her. "That is truly the best part, when one of your student's confidence grows as a consequence of their competence. You will grow to love that more than most things, my apprentice."

More than ever before, I hoped she failed, just so she would have to see Precept Cherith be disappointed with her.

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She didn't because of course she didn't, but that did not keep me from hoping.

Like a blade, the ring of her aura cut through the sickened flesh of her patient. All the soft orange came free from the rest of it with a dull pop before being carried back down into the pool underneath it all.

Without a moment passing, the ring spread out to cover the gaping hole that had been left.

Like water that had been poured on the ground, Tana's aura soaked into pumpkin as a new sound filled my ears.

Like the slow creaks of old wood being moved for the first time in far too long, a long groan peeled out of the hollow as it began to close.

The new growth did not come evenly, and when it was done, there was a faint ring of blue where the rot had been before, but the patient no longer had a wound.

Tana's shoulders slumped as her pool turned to dust, and she fell forward against the once again whole pumpkin.

By the sounds of celebration that broke out after her working, anyone that heard it from a distance would have thought that she had just performed some impossible feat.

I seemed to be the only one in the classroom that remembered she had only healed a plant.

Everyone clapped, cheered, patted her on the back, and congratulated her for her success.

From the far wall, Auden raised his head from where it had lay atop his paws and let out a long howl.

Precept Cherith knelt down beside the honey haired underwitch and traced the faint blue line with one of her fingers. "You forced too much of yourself onto it in the very beginning. Remember what I told you about your breath. It is a sigh, not a shout. Very well done."

Mallory elbowed me in my side and pointed me towards my teacher with her eyes.

I looked and then looked back at Mallory.

She traced some unknown shape in the air with her fingers and raised her eyebrows several times as she grinned at me.

I looked back down at Precept Cherith and discovered what shape Mallory had traced in the places that my teacher's robes had tightened when she had knelt down.

Warmth filled my face and I covered it with both my hands to hide my embarrassment.

Mallory laughed beside me, and no matter how hard I tried, I could not help but laugh with her.

When I finally convinced myself that it was safe to take my hands away, everyone else had already started moving towards the wall of waxy leaves that led to the classroom door.

All it took was one look at all of them for the embarrassed heat in my cheeks to burn into anger in my hands.

All the praise they were giving her, all the smiles and laughs, only made me hate her more.

Mallory, still caught in the humor of her inappropriate observation of our teacher's full figure, was the only thing close enough for me to grab.

Before I knew what I was doing, I took her by her hand and snatched her towards the door.

"What did I do?" Mallory yelped as I rushed us through the door and turned towards my little hall.

She could fix pumpkins and play with plants all she wanted, I had something she would never have.

I did not know what that was, exactly, but I knew that I had it.

"Where are we going? Do I get to hold Anna's hand again?" Mallory asked, not resisting my pulling any longer.

Alexei stood where he always did, but considering that he had not spoken to me since his temper tantrum in the hall of conquest, I didn't so much as look at him.

"Daddy problems? Let me tell you," Mallory asked as she stumbled past him behind me. "If anyone knows about that, it's me."

I threw the door to my little hall open like I was trying to rip it off its hinges.

"He is not my father!" I growled and pulled her in after me.

She started laughing again. "I know, but it makes you so mad when I say it."

Covering the snowy painting of the medery with the door that only I could open, I led her into the room with the black box.

The thing in the box had grown so used to my presence, that it started saying it's almost word as soon as it heard me come in. "Gup. Gup, gup. Gup."

Mallory stopped dead and threw her back against the wall. "Temperance's veil, what is that?"

"Shhh. You'll scare it," I whispered and made her walk to the box with me. "It's a secret, okay? You can't tell anyone what is in here or that I brought you."

Mallory took a deep breath and nodded, her face growing deadly serious as she watched me slip my hand into the darkness at the top of the box. "Deal."

"I'm too strong," I began as the thing came swimming up into my hand. It gave a little wiggle as I wrapped my fingers around it gently. "This is supposed to help me learn how to control my aura better."

"So that's what you have been doing in here. What is it?" Mallory asked, her hands held tightly behind her back.

I let go of all my anger and gave the thing whatever it would take from me. Feeling what it needed was still far beyond my understanding, but I had gotten good at letting it have as much as it wanted.

"I don't know, but I have to take care of it." I said once the thing swam out of my hand.

The sounds of swift movement and unseen splashing echoed up from the box before it called out to us again. "Gup. Gup."

I brought my wet hand and held it out to her.

"No. That is not necessary. I will just watch." Mallory said, beginning to back away from the box in fear.

I caught her before she could get away.

"It won't hurt you! Trust me!" I said and brought her hand to the surface of the darkness.

I had never seen her look quite so nervous before. Behind her usual flirting and confidence, there was a very cute and innocent looking girl.

Slowly, I lowered both our hands beneath the black.

Before any of our fingers touched the water, the thing came rushing up to meet us.

"Gup." It said.

"Ahhh!" Mallory screamed.

She tried to snatch her hand away, but my hold on her was firm. Down into the water, I laced our fingers together like Precept Cherith had done.

"It won't hurt you, and I already fed it. Take a breath." I said gently, finding great enjoyment in watching the fear leave her face.

She gasped when the thing wriggled in between our hands.

"It's so," She shivered. "Slimy."

I stared down into the darkness, grateful that Mallory had not followed after Tana like everyone else.

"You can't tell anyone. I wasn't supposed to tell you, but I wanted you to know." I said softly as we took our hands out and dried it on my cloak.

Mallory rolled her eyes and took me by my shoulders. "Now you have to trust me. Precept Zetta told me how she lost her arm, and I promised that I wouldn't say a word. Have I told you what happened?"

"No." I muttered, very much wishing that she had.

"Exactly. I won't tell anyone that you dragged me into a closet to touch your slimy thing. I promise," She said as she shook me playfully. "Now, let us go eat before Plia devours everything in the dining hall like Excess."

"Excess?" I asked as we left the thing and I shut the door behind me.

"I forget that everyone here forgets there are things outside of Zenithcidel. The dragon? The one that will devour us all if we do not resist its temptations?"

Nothing she said sounded close to familiar to me.

Considering how many things I knew about that I was not supposed to, that was impressive.

"Where are you from?" I asked with a little laugh as we stepped back into the main hall.

She did not answer.

Instead, she pointed towards the singing stairs and waited for me to look.

Standing at the end of the hall was a bouquet of moons

One of them, with hair as dark as mine and a mousy looking face, had something in common with Mallory.

She was utterly incapable of whispering.

"That's her!" She said loud enough that her voice carried down the hall with ease.

Mallory skipped forward and waved at them. "That's right! If you want her autograph, I happened to be her sister!"

Faster than I could take a breath, all of the moons turned and practically ran up the singing stairs at the sound of Mallory's voice.

I felt my brows furrow in confusion, but that gave me no help with understanding what had just happened.

"I'm confused." I admitted as Mallory turned back around to face me.

"I forget that you get to live alone with that dark haired beauty of yours. You are famous now, didn't you know?" She said it was something that was impossible for me not to know.

I shook my head in disagreement. "No. I didn't know. Why is that exactly?"

She lowered her voice like she was telling a secret. "Because you are Underwitch Ire, the new moon that defeated Lun's strongest moon with one punch. It's all anyone can talk about."