*The Dragon and the Swan (part 2)*

In the middle of the banquet, someone pointed out that a dragon was fast approaching. Everyone fell silent, wondering how a dragon could penetrate the magical defenses of the island.
The Airs were especially on their guard. They were the ones Merkier counted on to create barriers against sudden physical attacks.
Beside Fall of Night, who looked as stunned as everyone else, Winter stood and faced the area where everyone felt the beast was coming from. He brought his outstretched fingers out before his face, started to utter a spell. His eyes gleamed. Everyone prepared for the worst.
Suddenly, Winter fell as silent as everyone else. He brought his hands down slowly and did not turn around at once.
"What is it?" Fall of Night hazarded asking. Winter turned to him with surprise in his eyes, which was rare, and which affected everyone who saw it.
"It's not a dragon. It's -- "
There was a scream from the distance that nothing but a dragon could have uttered.
Out of the darkness, a shape came into view. It was long, dark, powerful. It glided into the banquet area as surely as if it had planned to.
"It's..." Someone else stepped forward. It was the Earth named Dusk, a Changer. "It's rock! It's a big piece of rock!"
"What?" an older boy shouted. "What are you talking about?"
"He's right. Look and see." Everyone turned to the one who spoke. It was Jade. The magic eyes of the boys of Merkier found him glowing with a deep blue aura, and when they looked closer, they realized that the two who were standing beside him, his best friends Descrier and Polar Star, were also surrounded with the faint light.
Jade was smiling. Mirth shone in his wise young face. He shut his eyes, and moved a step back to join his friends. The combined blue aura of the three grew stronger, until it was a huge flame that seemed to consumed them.
The dragon was about to dive straight into the mob, which started to edge into itself warily. The strange rumbling noise it made grew steadily louder, more frightening. But just as it was about to collide with the audience, it rose, curling gracefully upward and speeding, shooting up like a star.
It hovered above the crowd. The watchers noticed that it was circling. As their eyes grew accustomed to its speed and darkness, they were able to discern something special about the intruder: it was made of thousands of fist-sized stones pressed together.
The truth hit them like a tidal wave -- it was an illusion! The creature's shape and motion were defined by telekinesis. The rumbling sound it made was caused by the stones rubbing against each other as the creature moved.
Awe lit up the face of the crowd. The feat must take enormous concentration! At last only four faces seemed devoid of this emotion: those of the three who had surely made the dragon and were controlling everything about it -- and Winter's. Winter simply watched, not even bothering to show if he hated what he saw, like he usually did.
But, unknown to the watchers, the dragon had prepared another surprise. Before their very eyes, the creature burst into multicolored flame. It was so close to the watchers that some shaded their eyes, but none turned away. What was happening? Why was the creature burning up?
The flames subsided quickly. The dragon had not slowed down, or changed its route. The only thing that had changed about it was its form: instead of rock, it was now made of thousands of fist-sized jewels, of all colors. In Merkier, where precious stones could be acquired with just a flick of one's wrist, gems were of practically no commercial value -- yet they dazzled, and oh, how they shone in the eyes of the watchers!
"Change," Master Sunhawk explained to no one in particular, beaming. "Nothing here is illusion." He sounded as proud as he was of his three prodigies.
The dragon did not last in such majesty, however -- it was not meant to shine so for long. Quite suddenly, it flew upward again, until it was a safe distance from everyone and everything else. And then it exploded.
The dust from the dream fluttered downward amid deafening shouts of delight.

"*Yes*...!"
Descrier was the only one left standing in his little troupe. Jade and Polar Star were on their knees on either side of him, catching their breaths, wiping off beads of cold sweat from their foreheads.
The large crowd that the announcement of the afternoon had gathered was applauding gaily. He heard some familiar voices laughing aloud in genuine delight, among which was Fall of Night's. If anyone grumbled in disdain or discontent, Descrier chose never to know it. He basked in glorious praise.
Multicolored dust flew into his eyes and made them water. The dust that fell from the sky glittered like microscopic bits of jewel, which, Stoneshapers like Polar Star knew, the shimmering bits actually _were_. It was all that was left of the mile-long dragon the young Firestarter, Sealord and Stoneshaper had so carefully formed from what was originally clay and saltwater.
At this point, a Weatherworker in the crowd took the incentive to summon a gentle breeze to waft the dust from the audience so they could once more turn their faces up. They saw the dust gather above them, swirl, and finally settle in a wide circle on the rocky ground around the banquet area. Enthusiastic applause followed this otherwise simple feat.
"Lightning! Don't tell me you're part of the show!" someone shouted. The mild-tempered Air for whom this call was meant bowed, to the amusement of the crowd.
"It was wonderful," Fall of Night said aloud. "It was perfectly done, Descrier."
Descrier, though pale and obviously more than a little weak, beamed. "Doing the Change from rock to gemstone was hard, without an Air to help," he admitted. "But Polar Star, Jade and I - we considered it a challenge worth our while."
"It was perfectly done," Fall of Night said again, smiling like an older brother. "Thank you."
Polar Star was already on his feet, and was helping Jade up. The two were slowly but surely being surrounded by younger Earths and Waters, who vowed to absolutely _worship_ their skills after that night. Presently, two Healers in their early twenties, peers of Fall of Night, attended to them.
In the meantime, Fall of Night restored some of Descrier's strength with a simple touch. Pale green light issued from the palms of his hands, steady on the smaller boy's shoulders. While color came back to Descrier's cheeks, he laughed and jested with the other guests.
Descrier loved the evening. He felt as if he had fought hard for something and won. Fall of Night was smiling and laughing. He had liked their performance. Oh, the preparations had been worth it. Spending mana had been worth all of it.
But the glory was not to last.
"I have also prepared..."
This quiet declaration stunned the audience. Fall of Night's hands left Descrier's shoulders, but by then the boy had regained most of his strength.
Winter looked ahead at no one in particular, stood very straight. He was that way when he addressed a crowd, looking like one of the Master Woodshapers' more finely-built dolls. "If Fall of Night would allow it," he pronounced with uncharacteristic care, "I have also prepared a show. Regretfully...unlike the one that we have all just seen." Why bother with humility, in the first place?
Fall of Night broke into another smile. "Well," he answered quietly. "This is indeed a surprise, Winter. A presentation! I am honored."
"And I can hardly wait," the recovered Polar Star said aside to Jade.
Winter stepped up. The crowd parted for him, made a respectful circle around the spot where he finally decided to stand still. Gently he adjusted the cuffs of his air robes, loosening them so he could free his wrists.
"This is all illusion. There is no Change involved," Winter announced as his eyes closed. And promptly he raised his arms to summon the imagery he had planned to rival the combined magic of three comrades.

A dot of electric blue appeared on the horizon.
The dot multiplied, spread like sand across the vast expanse of sky, claiming the heavens as the stage for what would appear next.
"That's already using up a lot of mana," someone whispered in the utter silence, and it carried through a large part of the crowd. "Does he know what he's doing?"
The sand across the universe that everyone in Merkier could see shifted and twisted and whirled, concentrated and made spaces between them that defined shapes. Shapes etched on the starry stage. It looked as if the illusionist were positioning and repositioning all the bluest stars in the midsummer night sky.
Descrier made out...
a picture from a dream.
Even he could not deny the magnificence of the scene. Winter was painting a landscape out of glittering bits of sand of the same color.
The woody landscape centered on a large "pool"; the space that was to represent water warped and rippled as if it _reflected_ the stars behind it.
Suddenly, somewhere nearby, there was music. Or something like music. There were no notes, but everyone who watched the drama knew that his heart was being made to conceive of a singing out of a distant world. It brought to mind the slight tinkling of bells...
As the listeners strained to make sense of the feeling, some of the blue particles from all around the lake gathered at the center, and created a gigantic shape: a swan. A lifelike swan, moving with unearthly grace.
"How," Jade began, breathless. He never quite finished.
"Oh damn," Polar Star sighed, "the mana that swan must take..."
The imaginary swan started to glide across the imaginary pool in time with the imaginary music, its movements growing more fluid by the moment. It danced. The imaginary magic seemed to take strength from the awe of its spectators.
Descrier's mouth hung open. His tired hands hung limply at his sides.
Fall of Night simply looked up, like a mystified child, wide-eyed.
None of them had seen anything like it before.

Tears formed at the edge of Descrier's dark eyes - tears like no one else's in the crowd. Angrily, he wiped them away before they could think of falling.
It was a _swan_ Winter fought Descrier's dragon with. _How could it possibly have won_...?
Darkness fell over the wilderness as Winter's stars died out one by one, with the brightest star at the swan's right eye going out last.
After that, there was thunder.
It was not even a magical one. It was little more than applause, from the banquet area to the farthest dormitory rooms of Merkier.
It would have gone on and on, Descrier thought numbly, on and on, if only something had not happened...
Winter dropped to his hands and knees gracelessly. Then, reluctantly, the thunder stopped.
Fall of Night hastened through the crowd into the small empty circle where Winter lay. But all he did by that was to keep a distance a little less respectful than everyone else did from the weary Warmage.
Jade, who happened to be near the circle, also stepped up, and laid a hand on Winter's shoulder. Not entirely to everyone's surprise, Winter shoved his hand away brusquely.
He stood on his own, without anyone's help. And, with his head bowed, he turned to leave. A pitch-black Teleport shroud swallowed him whole, and in a heartbeat he had completely disappeared.
"What," Polar Star breathed, as he strode to Jade's side, "is that man trying to pull? He needs help. He'll be in bed for days after this without Healing."
Descrier was about to comment, when he happened to turn back to the circle, and see that Fall of Night had also disappeared.

He felt he went mad after that. All the same, no one other than Jade and Polar Star must have noticed how urgently he had pushed through the crowd to return to the school proper. Polar Star tried to block his way, but Descrier brushed him aside with a simple Force spell, too strong to still be friendly. He felt Polar Star's hurt glare burn into his back as he ran on.
"Descrier," he heard Jade shout after him, "don't be brash. Descrier!"
The main building. They had to be somewhere there. There was nowhere for them to hide in the dormitories. But the main building was far larger than the dormitories and its true size was never reliable, anyway. The Libraries and equipment rooms were magically sealed, so those permanent rooms were out of the question...
Where could they be?
What does it matter?
"Descrier," he heard Jade shout after him, "don't be brash. Descrier!"
The main building. They had to be somewhere there. There was nowhere for them to hide in the dormitories. But the main building was far larger than the dormitories and its true size was never reliable, anyway. The Libraries and equipment rooms were magically sealed, so those permanent rooms were out of the question...
Where could they be?
What does it matter?
Descrier wanted this sort of reason to get the better of him, but he was in such a familiar situation: he felt like he was not in control, that he was looking down on his body and not really knowing how it felt -
He would scour the main building until someone stopped him, or else his strength ran out.
_The curse of many young Firestarters_, he remembered one Master or another saying once, as he strode down the empty classrooms, halls, _is that they can barely control the blazes they sometimes set by accident_.
At one time or another, he found them.

At first it was just one of them. The one whose midnight eyes turned downward almost sadly. He was crouched in a corner of the shadows in a random corridor, one that would disappear come the dawn, with his arms about his drawn-up knees...his face hidden from view.
He seemed to fidget so, catching breath, sometimes, just turning his head from side to side, and shivering with cold all over. Descrier knew the symptoms of mana drain. At one point or another, every student in Merkier would experience such pain, the pain that no superficial spell could kill. Some students have died of it.
Winter needed rest. Or Healing. Both, preferably.
A sneer formed, not entirely against Descrier's will. He recognized whatever perverse pleasure he got from seeing an unofficial rival suffer. Why he could stay there all night, hidden like that, he told himself...but he had classes the next morning. And for all it was worth, he wanted to experience a day in Merkier when he did not seethe with the knowledge that Winter was somewhere in the vicinity.
He turned to leave.
Just then he felt a mana rush, and turned back. Someone had just teleported into the scene.
It was exactly whom he feared it would be.
"Winter," Fall of Night called again, just as softly as he did in the wilderness.
Winter hid his face in his arms and edged as far away as he could get. He barely had the strength to tell Fall of Night to leave him alone, as he might have wanted to. It was, Descrier chuckled to himself, not at all reasonable behavior toward someone for whom you had almost killed yourself.
"Winter," Fall of Night said again, as he knelt beside the younger boy. "I only want to thank you."
He tricked the Air with that. Everything about Winter seemed to loosen and surrender. What could be seen of Winter's features softened in grievous defeat.
"It was a grand show. A grand show."
Fall of Night pulled the younger boy against him in a tight embrace. A Healer's embrace. Descrier knew it for what it was. Magic eyes saw the greenish light that enveloped the two.
The supernatural weariness slowly left Winter's face. But during the transition, there was a moment, just a moment, whose passing failed to escape Descrier's attention. For that moment, tears stood in Winter's eyes, as they would in the eyes of a child grown lost in a storm that never quite ended. And then the midnight blue eyes closed completely.
The shadow of a familiar smile of subtle mirth and subtle sadness traced itself upon everything about Fall of Night. And then it was all the grief Descrier could stand for the evening.
He expended a bit more mana to get himself as far away from the illusionary hell as possible.

Late that night, as he was weaving himself into another restful dream, he thought about the following morning. He thought about what people would say. He especially thought about what Jade would say, when what Jade said would seem to matter more to him than almost anything else.
Jade, he thought, would say "It always hurts when you want so much to win, doesn't it?"
And that dragon he had planned so long to make, worked so hard for, already dwindled in comparison with the single-color swan that never Changed, and never truly existed.
The tears he had been holding back all evening finally fell as he dropped off to sleep. By then it was too late to stop them.