EDIT: ... Ack... I just realized I had used a different method to represent mind-speech... Ah, oh well, I'm too lazy to change it...
Do you think I could now?
I suppose. Is there anyone around?
Sidra listened for a moment. Birds. Trees. I don't think it works on trees.
You could always try.
Do you want me to get myself into trouble?
I think it would be good for you.
Sidra mentally frowned. Now she wasn't so sure she could trust Jereth's judgment.
He whickered, which was his form of physical laughter. Oh, come on. You know you want to. Besides, I want you to. It makes you happy.
But the last time-
I think the trees will forgive you.
It's not the trees I'm worried about.
I like listening to you.
That's not the point.
You worry too much.
She draped herself over his neck, burying her fingers in his soft mane. The action stretched out the muscles in her back, which felt good.
Too good. Sidra began humming before she could even think about what she was doing. She hastily sat back up, which made Jereth sigh.
Apparently she was privy to a magical talent called Bardic Gift, which was something she wasn't sure she quite understood. She did know it meant things happened to people who heard her voice and the effects were far stronger when she sang than when she simply spoke. Unfortunately, it had come to both Jereth and Sidra's attention during a music lesson with the last Shin'a'in clan. She'd rarely heard music before and had never sang herself but when she'd tried it-
The truth was she loved it. That was probably why it had had such a strong effect on the audience. Jereth explained that usually the Gift only manipulated the emotions of the listeners- not actually thrown them into trances. Later on, the clan shaman had concluded that her voice had actually put some of the effected into healing trances and a few who'd been chronically ill for some time were actually healed.
Sidra didn't care. She'd been spooked. The thought that just the power of her voice could do so many things- it frightened her. The worst was that neither the shaman, who knew next to nothing about the Bardic Gift, nor Jereth, a Companion, had ever seen anything like the Gift she'd displayed. Jereth had muttered something about a bard named Stefen but by then she'd been too rattled to ask him to elaborate. All in all it meant that no one was really qualified to teach her to control her power and she couldn't wait in one place with someone to muddle through with her.
You only tried it once. How can you know how to control the power if you've only done it once? Do you even remember what it felt like?
I don't even know any songs.
Like I care. It doesn't matter. What matters is what you learn from the experience.
Sometimes you talk as if you're younger than me- then you say things like that and you sound like you're a hundred, she grumbled, lying down again.
I try.
Sidra didn't answer. Instead, she just smiled. Then a thought hit her. What if the power affects you?
It won't.
But-
We're connected, bonded. I'm supposed to be an anchor of sorts- which means I can resist whatever you throw at me, especially now when you don't know what you're doing.
You're not just saying that to make me feel better, are you?
He didn't answer, which meant he was trying to be mysterious. She hated when he did that.
Her fingers twined through his long hair again. His easy gait beneath her was hypnotic. She felt her breathing fall into the meditation rhythm that An'desha had taught her- it felt like years and not weeks ago. A tune began to creep its way in, and though she realized instantly that it was the same one she'd been taught by the clan, it took her longer to notice that something was different.
"I don't feel it," she said out loud, the first thing she'd spoken in days.
Neither do I.
"Maybe it only happens when I'm not trying to do it."
Jereth snorted. It doesn't usually work that way. Even with no one around but me, I still should have felt some sort of power connected to the humming. I didn't feel a thing.
"What does that mean?"
I don't know. It's strange, but your power seems to run on instinct- you view the world with it. Maybe your Gift only activated because of the sick clan members.
I felt so ill when they were around. A part of me wanted to wrap my arms around them and let them cry- they were so scared and sad. A relative silence fell- of course it wasn't total since there was wildlife everywhere. But Jereth fell deep in thought, and Sidra let him, preferring to reflect for a bit.
It had happened before- with An'desha, the ill ones, a few stray children here and there. They were in pain and it was all she could do to stop herself from going to them. Something in her wanted to soothe and console- it felt like it was ingrained in her. Wasn't she something like a healer? Did she have the right to help them?
-Hooded fledgling, why hood a fledgling?-
She half sat up, startled. "What was that?"
Hm? Jereth asked lazily.
Didn't you hear?
-Frightened? Hood frightened birds, yes? Fledgling frightened?-
There it is again!
What is it? Jereth stopped, standing still and erect. I don't hear anything.
-No, Houh, we do not hood our fledglings because they are frightened. Show me again, please?-
I think there's something nearby.