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Chapter 21: The Shaping

Five weeks past and in that time everyone acquired their own daily routine. In the morning everyone would meet in the dining hall for breakfast, Owen was sometimes late from oversleeping from the extended training sessions from Fate. They then went to the training yard to practice combat, all except Steve who would go to the University with Hector and Navon for morning classes and wouldn't return until late afternoon. The same was for Evan who would forge with Sven, but this was not all work, Sven taught Evan how to fight with a wide arrangement of weapons, including hand to hand. Evan was getting tougher and stronger each day and, as Fate said, wasn't hurt by anything but magic, although he was still careful in the forge. Halfway through training Ace and Owen would fly off to practice the Light Step and other light techniques, Owen was able to Light step short distances after the third week. Jas would be summoned by Violet around the same time and would work on Jas's telepathy and psycho kinesis until early afternoon. Chad would slip away after training and wouldn't return until after dark. Terry would find Kim and secretly teach her the art of the assassin, they too would not return until after dark. Terry and Kim would not train every day though, Kim would hang around Evan at the forge during her time off. Ty hung around Axel when he wasn't trying to find out more about his father or training, they would spend hours on end disusing how they would take down Gale and whether or not they should tell anyone else about their secret. Ace would run his "errands" and was seen scarcely around the castle, except in the early morning and late afternoon. Ace didn't sentence Count Alexander Linnaeus to death, Ace said that he would be useful latter but not in his current obese state and instead made him do vigorous exercise until he dropped from exhaustion. Alexander would have chosen death if it was up to him. Owen would try and convince Spyro and Cynder, who still avoided each other, to get back together, but not while they were both around though. Owen seemed to be making slow progress with Spyro, Cynder on the other hand had not changed her mind. At night Owen would train with the Keeper of Fate who would sometime answer some of Owen's questions about his existence, Owen's sword and fighting form was improving and Brad and Ace were impressed, Owen finally found a teacher as fast as him. Jas on the other hand was frequently plagued with dreams of a giant snake casing her through a cave, she would wake up in a cold sweat and would not fall back asleep. On one occasion, to Owen's surprise, Jas sought him out to ask if she could sleep in his room with him. To Owen's displeasure Boe was badgering him about the event for days. Owen and Chad were admitted into the Order of the Dragon and had the order mark under their right collarbone, they had small crowns painted above the mark to show that they were Royalty. The paint was magic and was permanent unless removed through arcane ways. Aside from breakfast, they would all eat at separate times. This is how it went for five weeks, until one morning at breakfast.

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"Good morning everyone." Ace looked around and noticed a missing face, "Where's Owen?"

"Here I am." Owen yawned entering the dinning room.

"Rough night?" Ace asked.

Owen chuckled softly, "You have no idea." Owen took a piece of bread and began chewing it lazily.

"I just wanted to let everyone know," Ace began, "that there will be a Ball hosted at the castle tomorrow."

"You mean like a dance?" Evan asked.

"There will be dancing." Ace said, "Feel free to attend if you like."

Owen took another slice of bread, "Then I will exercise my right not to attend."

"Not so fast Prince Owen." Ace said. Whenever Ace addressed Owen or Chad as "prince" they knew the next thing had to do with royal standards, "As royalty you and Chad," Ace shot a glance towards Chad, "have to attend the Ball."

Jas spoke up, "Do you think it is a good idea to have a Ball when the economy is in poverty?"

"You may have noticed, or not, that I have been stimulating the economy." Ace replied, "Remember the errands I was running?"

"I remember." Chad said, "Some nights you came back smelling of alcohol." Everyone got a good laugh out of that, even Ace.

"I cannot attend the Ball." Steve sounded like he was hiding something.

"Can I at least know why?" Ace asked crossing his arms.

Steve hesitated, "I…I have my Shaping tomorrow."

"What the hell is Shaping?" Evan asked, "You going to make something."

"I can't go into detail, but it is the next step in becoming a full mage." Steve sounded a little scared.

"I understand." Was all Ace said.

Steve looked up but still had a scared look on his face, "Thank you."

"I have canceled training for today, all training." Ace shot a look at Kim, he knew what she was doing, "So take this as a rare opportunity to rest and ready yourself for the Ball, should you attend." Ace turned to the door, "Now if you excuse me, I have to teach Chad and Owen how to behave at a Royal event. Chad, Owen, lets go." Ace exited the dinning room with Owen and Chad following behind.

"So what? Are we suppose to get a date?" Evan asked.

Jas laughed, "It is not like prom, you don't have to get one if you don't want to."

"But we can if we want to? Right?"

"I don't see why not." Jas replied, "Why, got someone in mind?"

Evan scratched his chin, "I might."

Ty slapped his hands on the table and got up, "If you excuse me, I have somewhere to be."

"Where do you have to go?" Kim asked.

"I need to go find out who will be coming tomorrow, maybe some of the nobles know something about our father." Ty answered.

"I have somewhere to be too." Steve said gathering his books in his bag, "I have class regardless of events." Steve exited the dinning room with great haste followed by Ty.

Evan shook his head, "Steve works to much, speaking of which, I have to make sure Sven knows about this." Even then exited the dinning room.

"I…I have to go too." Spyro said quietly and walked out.

"You two are starting to get on my nerves." Jas said to Cynder when Spyro was gone.

Cynder looked up then back down, "I'm sorry."

"I'm not the one you should be apologizing to." Jas replied forcefully, "I don't know what is going on but its getting ridiculous."

"I will tell you the same thing I told Owen." Cynder was on the brink of tears, "I don't love him anymore."

Jas moved closer to Cynder, "Cynder, I don't need my telepathy to know your lying."

Cynder burst into tears, "Jas I…I don't know what to do. I love him b…but something is telling me that I shouldn't."

"That something doesn't know what its talking about." Jas snifed. Jas put a hand on one of Cynder's wings, "Look, I'm not good at talking to people, but that doesn't mean that I don't know what's right for someone. What is right for Spyro is you, and you for him." Jas walked out of the dinning room and closed the door, when she did she heard weeping from the other side. Jas bit her lip and started to wonder whether she did the right thing.

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Steve entered Hector's study in the castle, he tried to enter the University but the stone door denied him, it didn't even ask a riddle. "Headmaster?" Steve asked knocking on the door, "Headmaster Hector."

"Come in boy." Was heard from the other side of the door. The door swung open soundlessly and Steve entered, "What do you want?"

"The door to the University wouldn't let me in." Steve was a little tense.

"I told the door to wait for both you and me." Hector was reading his spell book, "You see Steven, you will be going though your Shaping today."Steve's eyes widened, "But I thought it was tomorrow, what if I'm not ready?"

Hector began to laugh, "You are more than ready, you have advanced quite fast for one your age." Hector got up and tucked his spell book under his arm, "Come, we will leave for the University, Navon is in charge of preparations and they should be done." Steve followed Hector down the castle halls, Hector was using his staff for walking, "Have you decided what kind of mage you want to be?"

"A good mage." Steve said humorously.

Hector laughed, "You know what I mean."

Steve paused, "Could you tell me what they are again?"

"Certainly." Hector gathered his thoughts, "Grey mages are scribes and keepers of knowledge, they keep records of all major events and discoveries of the age. Yellow mages concentrate on healing and the improvement on the health of all, they are both skilled in magical and natural healing along with making potions and salves. Green mages are concerned with the wellbeing of nature and all who live in it, in other words, they are guardians of nature. Red mages are what we call battle mages, they are more active in wars and skirmishes and specialize in aggressive and offensive magic, they sometimes have a temper to match. Blue mages, like myself, make sure that the forces in this world are balanced, we are also fight for justice and like the Red mages are skilled in offensive magic but excel in defensive magic." Hector paused, "Does that refresh you memory?"

"Yea thanks." Steve thought for thought for awhile, "I think that I will be a blue mage."

"Sometimes we always don't get what we want." Hector replied.

"I'll remember that." Steve said suspiciously. They walked and finally made it to the door to the University, surprisingly it didn't ask a riddle but nodded to Steve. They entered though the portal to the University, there was the usual amount of people going where they needed to go. Steve followed close behind Hector, people actually stopped and moved aside for them. Eventually it felt like Steve was going through a procession, perhaps he was. Hector lead Steve to the ritual chamber that he was told not to enter without the guidance and permission of a full mage. Hector opened the door and motioned for Steve to go inside.

As Steve passed Hector he whispered to Steve, "Once you enter only speak in Vetus Lingua."

Inside the chamber there was a symbol drawn on the floor that had many circles and lines drawn within a larger circle that took up the whole room, nine mages were at the edge of the room equidistant from each other, two from each mage type including Hector. Hector instructed Steve to stand in the center of the room in Vetus Lingua, Latin.

Hector walked over to the far end of the room and picked up a plain white rod about four feet long and an inch thick. He handed the rod to Steve and whispered once again in Vetus Lingua, "Answer when asked, act on instinct, and do what your told. Remember, only speak in Vetus Lingua." Hector walked behind the alter and placed his spell book on it opening the book to the proper page. Hector cleared his throat, "Ready yourself apprentice, the Shaping has begun."

The mages in the circle spoke in unison, all speaking Latin, "To tear the flesh and break the bone."

Hector spoke next, "To be born anew in your image." They were only spoke in Vetus Lingua.

"An image that is long hidden."

"Now it will be brought out." Hector put force in his words, the rod Steve was holding was glowing.

"Brought out into the light." The mages unison was perfect.

"A light that it has never seen."

"But a light that it has always know."

Steve started to lose sense of feeling and hearing, his body grew numb and his vision blur. The voices started to slur and become unintelligible. Steve blacked out.

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Evan entered the forge, he knew Sven was in there because he herd the banging of a hammer to metal. Sven looked up, "You can take the day off."

"I figured that you would say that." Evan walked over to Sven, "Ace said to rest for today, no training." Evan chuckled, "I guess he knew about our little spars."

"Well there won't be any sparing for today." Sven hammered on the piece of steel, "I just have to finish this breastplate and then I'm done, I'm not suppose to be working today either." Sven stopped hammering and looked up at Evan, "So if he asks, you didn't see me in the forge."

Evan made his way to the door, "Fine, I'll tell him I meet you in the hall."

"As long as it isn't the forge." Sven said hammering the metal taking his time, a good blacksmith takes his time on his work.

Evan walked around and made his way to the tallest tower of the castle, it wasn't in the center of the castle, but at the edge of it making the drop even more sheer. The room was small and was bland if it wasn't for a single window and birds nest. To no surprise Evan found Kim sitting on the windowsill. "I'm not bothering you am I?" Evan asked.

Kim had a small brown bird in her hand, she was petting it, "No, I was just watching the birds." She opened her hand and put it out of the window and the bird took off. Dusting off her hands she asked, "So why have you sought me out."

"I was just wondering if you were going to the Ball." Evan asked sheepishly.

Kim rocked on the windowsill, "I might, why do you ask."

"I was wondering if you wanted to go to the Ball," Evan swallowed hard, "with me."

Kim was speechless, she rocked back, the windowsill cracked and sent her toppling out of the window.

Evan's heart stopped, he rushed to the window and without thinking jumped out after her, her put his arms and legs together to become more streamline to catch up to Kim. Evan reached out his hand and grabbed her and pulled her close to him twisting his body so that his would be closer to the ground. He wrapped his arms around her and a terrifying thought came to Evan, We're going to die, Evan hugged Kim close and he felt his shoulder hit the stone bricks bellow. Evan got the air knocked out of him and he gasped for air, to his surprise he didn't feel any pain at all. Evan got air in his lungs and gave a sigh of relief, he felt Kim move on top of him and he realized that he was still tightly hugging her. He let go and she sat up on top of him.

"I can't believe you jump out after me." Kim was still shocked from the fall, "We should be dead for that matter."

Evan smiled knowing that she was alive, "It was a good thing these bricks were here to break our fall."

"Why would you do that? Why did you jump out after me?" Kim asked.

Evan thought for a moment then said, "You didn't tell me if you would go to the Ball with me."

Kim smiled at him, "Of course I will go with you, I can't really say no after what just happened." Kim noticed how she was sitting on Evan and moved off of him and helped him up.

Evan looked at the damage that was done and realized the crater to be bigger that he thought, A good thing no one was standing here, he thought to himself. "Come on, lets get out of here before we get in trouble."

"Yea." Kim said then asked, "How did we live anyway?"

"Its complicated." Evan replied.

"I've got time." Kim responded.

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Owen was bored, but at least Ace was finishing up, "And finally, respect yourself and be well mannered."

"Are we done now?" Owen asked, he would much rather be training.

"Yes, that should cover what you two need to know." Ace was addressing both Chad and Owen.

Chad stood up, "Good, now what exactly are we going to wear?"

"Chad don't!" Owen shouted.

"Well you can go the seamstress in the castle, she always has something nice for a formal event." Ace was enjoying this, Owen knew it.

"You just had to open your mouth, didn't you?" Owen gave a foul look towards Chad.

Chad shrugged, "Sorry, it just slipped out."

"You should go to her now." Ace walked to the door, "I have to make final preparations."

When the door closed Chad faced Owen, "Are you sure you have everything under control?"

"What do you mean?" Owen asked suspiciously.

"Well for one, every day I feel the darkness in you growing." Chad pointed to Owens chest, "And that mark gets darker and darker."

Owen swatted Chad's hand away, "How are you able to see it? Fate said that only I could."

"So this is something of a higher importance than I once thought." Chad was shaking his head.

Owen sighed and told Chad the events that took place five weeks ago, "He said that when the mark turns black that I will fight the darkness for control."

Chad was staring at Owen but didn't look surprised, "That time looks like it will happen soon." The mark on Owen's chest looked like a dark bruise, "Will you be ready?"

Owen paused for a minute, "Fate said that a flip of a coin could tell you as much as he knew." Chad just sat there and had the look of knowing in his eyes, What does he know? Did I tell him what to expect in the future?, Owen shook his head, "Come on, don't we have to see a seamstress?"

As Owen got up and turned for the door Chad grabbed his arm, "When you face the darkness, if you lose your body, don't lose your mind."

Owen turned to face Chad, "If you know something say it." Chad looked away, Owen saw a pang of regret in his eyes.

Chad stayed silent for a long time, "I'll tell you what you told me, I cannot tell you of anything that will happen in your future for fear that the fragile existence of time may shatter." Chad pushed his was past Owen and whispered in his ear, "Some things are meant to happen for a reason, no matter how bad they are." Chad walked past Owen and out of the door. Leaving Owen to ponder on what he said.

When did I tell him that? Owen thought to himself before following Chad.

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Steve was surrounded by a black void but he could still see he hands and the rest of himself as if it were bright. Steve heard a clanking sound and the floor began to glow forming the image of the circle with all the lines and shapes in it that was in the ritual chamber, he stood in the center of it. A tall thin man around Steve's age came into view at the edge of the circle, he was holding a staff, using it as a walking stick. Every time the staff hit the floor it made the clanking sound, it was at that time that Steve realized that he wasn't holding the white rod Hector gave him.

Steve studied the teen, he was tall, taller than Steve at least. He had white hair that gave his young face the appearance of wisdom and had dark blue eyes that showed kindness. He wore a dark blue robe that was split all the way down the front, lighter blue runes decorated the trim on the edge of the divide down to the floor. The robe had long sleeves that was bigger at the wrist and got smaller the closer they got to the shoulder, they seemed to rest easily on his forearms, the robe also had a split in the back that went from the waist down. At the edges of the robe, except the center split, was trimmed with the color of the runes. Under the robe he wore equally dark blue pants, the pant legs were baggy, that lead down to dark blue knee high boots with the lighter blue shoelaces. He wore a plane plain blue tunic with lighter blue trim, Steve noticed that he had a strap with a buckle across his chest that lead down to a brown bag that rested on his left hip. Despite his frail appearance, he actually was quite muscular.

The teen stopped a pace away from Steve, he studied Steve and smiled, "Greetings." his voice sounded laid back but rebellious, young but wise, but it sounded similar to Steve's. "I take it you are here because the mages are putting you though the Shaping." He spoke in Vetus Lingua. "Well say something."

Steve spoke in Latin as he was told, "May I ask who you are?"

"My name is Lan of the Blue mages, Lan is also your name." Lan said, "I am what you were meant to be, and what you will become. I am you and you are me, but we are both separate people."

"What do you mean?" Steve asked.

"They don't call it the Shaping for nothing, your appearance will change into the one you see before you." Lan held out his arms as if displaying himself, "Most mages don't make it though the Shaping because they don't want to give up there image."

Steve swallowed hard, "What will happen to me?"

Lan chuckles, "You will still be you, but you may become something like me. I am open minded and try to see the brighter side of life." Lan got real serious, "But I also know when duty calls and when I am needed. You will take your true name and cast aside your birth name, for you have been reborn." Lan slammed the staff between them, "Not grab your staff and awaken your true self."

Steve was hesitant and studied the staff, it was a little shorter than Lan and was made out of a blue metal. At the top of the staff was a circle about six inches across, an inch of blue steel surrounded a large light blue gem. The gem was a disk that caught the light and refracted it with its many edges. Runes adorned the circle of steel on both sided. Steve grabbed the staff and felt two minds become one, he woke to a white flash.

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Jas found Cynder in her room, "Cynder, I just wanted to apologize for this morning. I had no right to speak like that."

"Its alright Jas, I have thought about it and maybe you were right." Cynder sounded not as depressed, "I will talk to Spyro tomorrow."

"So your going to the Ball?" Jas asked.

Cynder nodded, "I think it will brighten up my spirits."

"I'm glad you think so." Jas smiled, "And your probably right."

"Me too." Cynder said, "I just hope that he will forgive me."

Jas put a hand on her shoulder, "Of course he will. Now come on, we'll find something nice for you to wear." Despite Cynder's protest Jas finally convinced Cynder to come with her, "Its to bad that Steve couldn't come to the Ball with his mage training and all. He liked going to parties."

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Steve was laying face down on the ground. He pushed himself up and noticed that he was back in the ritual chamber, he heard mumbling and whispering from the mages in the room.

Hector spoke up noticing that Steve was getting up, "Tell us, what is this one called?" He spoke in Vetus Lingua.

Steve stood up and noticed that he was holding Lan's staff, he used the crystal in the staff as a mirror and saw Lan's face on every side of the crystal, this was his face. Steve looked at himself and he was wearing Lan's cloths, he then looked up at Hector who nodded to Steve. Steve was no longer his name, in Vetus Lingua he said with a smile, "I am Lan of the Blue mages."

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I had to speed things up, although I planed on doing so anyways. So Steve is now Lan but may be referred to as Steve for the next few chapters. Next chapter out soon.