CHAPTER 1 - -

Mini-series first chapter: https://sofurry.com/s/Rnoz2Yxm

Previous chapter: https://sofurry.com/s/mW3K5kQm

For a split-second, magic continued to swirl around Jarzyl in a colourful sphere that thrummed around her, but then the magical energies dissipated. The dragon fledgling was left sitting on the floor, disorientated and confused. “What!” She was no longer in her bedroom—now she was in the kitchen. Jarzyl carefully pushed up to her feet. She checked her wings and her paws, but there was no longer any sign of all those magical sparks which had been swirling around earlier.

Jarzyl drummed her paws against the ground, and fluttered her wings to dissipate some nervous energy. Instinctively she strolled up to the larder cupboard and opened it up to peer at the various foodstuffs inside, but without grabbing any snack she flung the cupboard shut and scampered out of the kitchen.

She sprinted down the corridor in such a rush that she almost tripped up on her own legs. Bouncing off the wall, she rushed back into her bedroom to find Atlas sitting in the same spot as before. Her friend glanced at her. “Oh, there you are.”

Thrilled, Jarzyl jumped up and down on the spot. “Ahhhh! Amazing! That was magic! I displaced!”

Atlas nodded. “It seems you did.” He sounded calm, as he most always did, which was not at all how Jarzyl felt.

“Wooo!” She dashed at Atlas and crashed into his side, pulling him into a hug that knocked them both to the ground. “Magic! Displacement affinity, I’m a displacer!”

Lying on his back, with Jarzyl sitting on top of him, Atlas shrugged his wings. “Perhaps.”

“Undoubtedly!” Jarzyl excitedly drummed her front paws against Atlas’s chest. “You’re still a fledgling. But not me—fledgling no more! Jarzyl Mintaka, a displacer of Clan Mintaka, of the City of Wings!”

Atlas used his paw to grab hers, but he only had one, so he couldn’t grab both her forepaws. “You’re still a fledgling too. Your affinity hasn’t stabilized until you’ve had it for at least three days and you have demonstrable basic control of it, otherwise it’s just a magical surge. That’s what they said at school.”

“I know that!” Jarzyl flicked her neck frill. “But it’s only a formality to wait three days. I think I count as having magic.”

“It is not a formality—it is a basic medical fact. This could be a magical surge, with your final affinity ending up entirely different.”

“Nah! I’ve got a good feeling about this. I can feel it in my scales and my bones, I’m a displacer!”

“You shouldn’t be so certain about that.” Atlas threw a sceptical look at her as she continued lying on top of him. “You displaced once, and just prior to that you had a blast of frost breath, then before it was fire breath. Quite evidently your magical affinity is not stabilized.”

Jarzyl grabbed Atlas by the horns, and gently wobbled his head about. “Hey, you know, my Aunt Mira is a displacer, and so was one of my grandsires or something. So that flavour of magic runs recent in my family. I think it makes perfect sense for me to be a displacer.”

“Showing a type of magic for three days without a change, and having basic control—that’s the definition. No, you’ll probably show some entirely different affinity next. Maybe acid-spitting, or healing affinity or something else.”

“You’ll be the one needing healing affinity, cause I’m going to bite you for being so pessimistic!” Opening her jaws wide, Jarzyl got her mouth against Atlas’s throat and bit lightly on his scales. “Rrrrr!” After a moment she relented from her nibbling assault. “Ok fine. I’ll prove it. I shall displace again right now. Just you watch.”

“Very well.” Atlas wiped the side of his neck, which Jarzyl had left wet from her saliva, then he bumped his snout against hers. “Do it.”

Taking a deep breath, Jarzyl unfurled her wings and spread them open to the same half position they had been earlier. Then she moved her paws, straightening them out even as she kept lying on top of Atlas. A faint smattering of magical sparks rolled down her limbs and swirled around her paws before dissipating back into her body—an unimpressive display. “Wait, there’s an exact posture to it. Give me a moment.”

Jarzyl made small, varying movements of her legs, wings, and body, trying to recreate the exact circumstances which had led to her displacement just a moment ago. Of course, now the difference was that instead of crouched over the bedroom floor, she was crouching on Atlas, using him like a warm, scaley cushion.

“It’s kind of distracting when you squirm about on top of me,” he noted. His tail tip shifted, coiling around hers, and his paw brushed against her side, making Jarzyl shiver. “Jarz.”

Jarzyl grabbed his paw, but then she forgot to let go, and then somehow her muzzle found his and they were kissing again. “Atlas,” Jarzyl sighed softly. She dropped her weight down against him and hugged him tight, enjoying the comfortable feeling of his scales sliding and pressing against her body.

Atlas kissed her back, but then he pulled back his head, and shifted his wings to nudge hers. “Different angle.”

Jarzyl grinned at him. “Oh?” She shifted her position lower, grinding her body against his, so that instead of just their chests and torsos touching, her underbelly bumped against Atlas’s. “This angle?”

Atlas visibly flinched and drew in a sharp breath. “Huh. It is so distracting to be near you, you know that? Let alone when we hug, or when we kiss. It’s very tempting to do something that we just said we shouldn’t be doing.” Shaking his head, he blinked and his eyes focused. “What I was saying, was that your wings were at a different angle when you displaced before. Move them higher up, like you’re about to make an upstroke.”

Jarzyl shifted her wings, and then once more magical sparks began to appear around her wingtips and her paws. “Thanks. Look, magic! Right, I got this! I’m going to displace myself… No, I’m going to displace us both!”

Atlas looked sceptical. “That is ambitious when you haven’t even proven you can displace yourself a second time.”

“Where should we go? Let’s go grab a snack! Hold on tight. To the kitchen!” Jarzyl fixed an image in her mind, imagining the kitchen again. Power bubbled up within her, like taking a deep breath in preparation to shout, and then the world spun in a bubble of magical distortion.

---

Colourful, crackling energy swirled all around her, making it too bright to keep her eyes open. The magic sang with a deep strumming resonance that lasted for a few seconds, then it dissipated away and Jarzyl excitedly looked around.

She was not in the kitchen, where she’d been aiming to go—instead she was still in her bedroom, but now sitting on top of her bed. And rather than displacing Atlas with her, she’d left him behind. “Oh.”

Still lying on the floor, Atlas turned his head to give her an amused look. “To the kitchen, you were saying?”

“It still worked! I did displace. Maybe I didn’t go where I wanted to, but I clearly triggered a displacement again. Except I wasn’t able to bring you with me. Hmmm…” Jarzyl grinned, then she winked at her friend. “See, if I’d displaced you onto my bed, at least that would have been flirtatious.”

Atlas laughed. “Inappropriate. We’re not supposed to be doing that.”

“True. And when we do eventually do that, it wouldn’t have to be on my bed. We could do it on the floor, or while we’re standing—ooh, or even while flying. I’ve heard that’s a thing.”

“Jarz!” Atlas chuckled.

“I’m just saying.” Jarzyl flicked her neck frill up and down. “So many adventurous things happening! Especially getting my magic. I can’t wait to tell everyone in school next week—imagine the look on Caden’s face when I tell her I can displace anywhere I want to!”

“Except that you can’t displace anywhere you want. You couldn’t even make it to the kitchen.” From where he was sprawled out on the bedroom floor, Atlas stretched out his wing and bumped his wingtip against Jarzyl’s paw as it dangled off the bed. “You displaced… one single body length. You can jump further than that. There’s hardly any use in being able to displace if you can’t control where you are going.”

“I’ll get control of it eventually! But the important thing is that I’m definitely a displacer!” Jarzyl insisted.

“Maybe. Or maybe it’s a magical surge.”

“Shh.” Jarzyl coiled her weight back on her hindlegs, then she sprung off her bed and leapt across the room. With her wings locked in a half-open position, she got barely enough uplift to extend her jump, gliding over Atlas and landing lightly right on the floor cushion at her desk. “Exciting. So exciting.”

Atlas casually reached out and batted the tip of her tail. “Your room is so much bigger than mine, you can even glide.”

Jarzyl nodded. “Indeed. Whereas your room at the sheltered home is so tiny. Whenever I come visit you, there’s nowhere to sit other than right on top of you. Not that I mind.” At her desk, Jarzyl searched through a messy pile of schoolwork until she found what she was looking for—a thick folded pamphlet, slightly crumpled. “Check this out. My father passed these to me the other day.”

Atlas rolled to his feet and came over. “Atus-Du Mintaka College of the Arcane: Student Prospectus Viewbook. Seriously?”

Jarzyl unfolded the pamphlet. “Now that I have my magic, I can start planning for learning how to use it. You were just saying I’m not good with using my affinity—but this is where I’m going to learn how to use it!” She flipped to a different page of the pamphlet. “Mintaka College has training for almost every affinity. Including… uh… Yeah! Here it is. Displacement.”

Atlas read off the page. “Move without boundaries. Learn with boundaries. Start your journey today. Wow! Sounds fancy—and expensive. If I was a displacer, I’d probably just end up going to the public vocational school. That’s where the majority of people learn how to use their magic anyway—through Education Division, not through some fancy clan training college.”

Jarzyl gestured with the pamphlet. “But why shouldn’t I learn from the very best?”

“Do you just want to study there because it’s a Mintaka-related facility?”

“No! This is one of the top schools in the city. Although when I think about that… I don’t know if I’m good enough to make it in. The admissions are highly competitive.”

“I’m sure you have preferential admission because it’s a college belonging to your clan?” Atlas asked.

“A little bit. But not much. There’s no guaranteed of admission just because I’m a Mintaka fledgling. The Mintaka College works almost the other way around—the clan uses it to recruit highly talented fledglings from other clans.” Jarzyl flipped through the pamphlet to a different page. “See here? Scholarships for non-Mintaka dragons. The best of the best from other clans learn at Mintaka College. Then to pay for the scholarship they can be bonded for a few years to a Mintaka workplace. But that’s fine! It’s great to work at Mintaka, and you’ll also get good discounted rates for buying accommodation in a Mintaka neighbourhood, by which time you’ll already be well on the way to qualifying for full clan membership.”

Atlas nodded. “I notice that in referring to this hypothetical fledgling student, you switched from they to instead you.”

“I’m just saying.” Jarzyl flicked her neck frill. “You’re the one who would most benefit from joining Mintaka College, more so than me. I’d learn how to use my magic, which is obviously great, but you’d get all the benefits of association with the best clan in the city.”

“I am well aware. There are plenty of colleges where I could learn to use my magic, both from education division and other private clan facilities. Every apex clan has a college, not just Mintaka. Taslin has two colleges spread all around the city. Dirak clan has three.”

“Think about it. Just think about it.” Jarzyl continued to leaf through the viewbook, and she showed another page to Atlas. “See, this could be you. You said you wanted air affinity, right? They teach how to use air affinity! The sky is your classroom—go where the winds take you at Mintaka College.”

Atlas took the pamphlet viewbook from her. “I probably won’t get air affinity. I’m not that lucky.”

“But they teach all the affinities. You could learn anything.” Jarzyl pointed to another page as Atlas kept browsing. “Firebreathing! Focus your flame. Forge the future.”

“Focus your flame,” Atlas muttered dismissively. “Apex clans have a particularly vapid, pretentious way of communicating.” But he kept reading the pamphlet. “I’m keeping my options under consideration. Seriously speaking, if I could get into an apex clan college, I would take that chance.”

“We could go together. That would be fun! Unless I’m not smart enough or strong enough with my magic to get in, which might just happen. I suppose it would be alright to just go to a public vocational school from Education Division.” Jarzyl hopped on the spot then broke out into a quick dance, bouncing between two legs then the other two, and flicking her wings open and close. “Displacement magic. I’m a displacer! This is so cool! I’m going to be like my Aunt Mira and displace all over the place. Whenever she wants to go out with her family for a meal, she just displaces them all together—it’s so convenient.” As she waved her wings around, sparks of glowing magical energy began accumulating along the leading and trailing edges. “Again! Look, look! I’m going to displace again. Behold!”

Atlas put down the brochure and watched as Jarzyl tried to shift all her limbs into the correction position again. The magic ebbed and flowed, circulating around her limbs and dancing back and forth across her body, but she couldn’t get it quite right. “I suspect there’s a technique to that, instead of randomly flailing your wings and legs.”

“I’m trying to figure out the technique! But it doesn’t work? This is the exact same position I was using before, but it’s not working now. Odd!” Jarzyl extended her wings fully open, then she shifted them through every pattern she could think of, but the strength of the magical sparks didn’t seem to correspond reasonably to her movements. More and more sparks were swirling around now, until she could hear a faint crackling coming from the stream of magic, sounding like static electricity as it whirled around her. “Ah, that’s it. Almost there. I think the trick is that I have to listen to the magic.” Jarzyl made smaller movements now, as she honed in on the precise posture. The crackling sound grew louder and louder, and the sparks of magic formed long streams of colourful energy all around her body. “It’s getting louder.”

Atlas tilted his head. “Oh? That’s curious.”

“Ok, now!” Keeping her wings and limbs in position, Jarzyl nodded at her friend. “Come over, quick, quick, quick. I’ll displace you with me this time. This is going to be great!”

Atlas strolled over with his limping gait, relatively fast for a three-legged dragon. “I can hear your magic buzzing. Is it supposed to be this loud?”

“Loud means it’s working,” Jarzyl insisted. “Now you have to hug me! Hold on tight.” As Atlas stood right beside her, she stretched out her wing and hovered it over his back. This time she focused not on any particular destination, but instead on what her magic felt like as it rippled and shimmered around them both in colour swirls. “Move without boundaries,” she quoted from the viewbook. With a bright flash and a deep thump sound, she displaced away.

---

And then she was in the kitchen. The swirling sparks of magic dissipated away from her body, first bouncing off the walls before fading away into nothingness.

Jarzyl slowly pulled in her wings. For a moment she was still, then she broke out into a gleeful cackle. “Hehehe. Yes! Perrrrfect—oh.”

Except that Atlas wasn’t with her, she had displaced alone.

“Hmm. Well that’s still my third time displacing. Not bad.” Jarzyl glanced around the kitchen, then she went to open the frostbox and retrieved a slice of sweet melon—a nice snack, to reward her success and celebrate her newfound magic.

Holding the melon slice in her mouth, Jarzyl skipped out of the kitchen with a prancing, cheery step. As she passed by the living room, she nodded at the incubator box placed at the side of the room, and raised her wing in salute to her two future siblings incubating quietly inside. “Hey, eggs. I have my magic now. You two are the second and third to know. Heheh. Mhm. Our parents are going to be so excited.”

Atlas was still waiting in her bedroom as Jarzyl returned. He was standing up and looking over her bookshelf, but turned to look at her. “What’s that in your mouth? Is that a melon?”

With a supreme look of smugness, Jarzyl strolled over to her friend and gave him a pat on the head. “I displaced to the kitchen and got myself a snack! See? That’s control.” She ate some of the melon slice, then offered it to Atlas.

Her friend took a bite. “You said you were going to displace me with you.”

“Maybe my magic isn’t good enough to do that yet. But clearly I can displace myself,” Jarzyl said.

“Alright. So you planned to go to the kitchen?”

“Eh, no. I wasn’t focusing on any destination.” Jarzyl spread her wings and gestured. “I just wanted to go elsewhere, and then I did. I was listening to the magic and letting it get louder. Crackle, crackle, thump!”

Atlas looked thoughtful. “Yes, about that part.” He pulled out one specific large book from Jarzyl’s bookshelf—an encyclopaedia. “My recollection is that displacement magic is supposed to be quieter the more efficient you are with displacing.”

“But that’s alright. I’m new to this. You can’t expect me to be efficient when I haven’t had any practice or training yet.” Jarzyl ate another bite from her sweet melon. Matching its name, the fruit was sweet, and it was pleasantly chilled from being in the kitchen frostbox. “I’m sure I’ll get better over time.”

“I still think you’re just having a magical surge.” Atlas placed the encyclopaedia down on the ground and flipped through the pages. It was a children’s encyclopaedia with simplified wording and descriptions, but it was still a large book that explained a wide variety of subjects. Jarzyl had read it back when she was but a hatchling. “When you displaced away right next to me, there was… so much distortion and magic all around us both. For a moment it almost looked like there were two of you. Or that you had a second shadow. I—”

Jarzyl finished eating the melon slice. She put the rind into her mouth, then with careful aim, she flicked her head and spat it out. “Puah!” The melon rind soared across the room, and with a solid thump, it landed precisely in the small trash bin placed next to her desk.

Atlas paused for a long moment, then he gave her the most spectacularly judgemental expression—with one eye ridge slightly raised, and his mouth fixed in a half scowl. “Jarzyl, Min-ta-ka!” he said slowly, “Did you just spit that melon piece all across the room? That is not appropriate. I am simultaneously impressed and disgusted.”

Jarzyl winked at her friend. “You’ve had your tongue in my mouth. Why are you disgusted?”

Atlas thumped his tail against the ground, but he was visibly holding back a laugh. “Unhygienic! Shame!”

“It’s my bedroom, I do what I want,” Jarzyl retorted. “What was that you were saying before you got distracted?”

Atlas tapped his paw against the encyclopaedia. “I was saying, your affinity probably isn’t stabilized and you’re just having a magical surge. When you displaced, it was all bright, noisy, and colourful—which aren’t the hallmarks of stable magic.”

“Oh, such cynicism. Maybe that’s why I haven’t been able to displace you along with me—you’re too heavy and filled with doubt!” Jarzyl chuckled, but then she shrugged lightly. “Maybe it is a surge. But I’ve displaced three times now, so there’s clearly a trend here.”

“We’ll see. If you’re still showing displacement magic by the end of this weekend, I’ll be more convinced you aren’t just having a surge of magic.” Atlas closed the encyclopaedia and returned it to its place on her bookshelf. Then he went over to the side of the room and began pulling his flight harness on. “I should go. I need to be back at the shelter before dinner—there are chores to do.”

“Oh. Alright.” Jarzyl nodded, though her neck frill drooped a little. “Thanks for coming. And for… for seeing me back home after I dropped out of the training hunt.”

Atlas smiled at her. “You’re welcome.” He headed over to the balcony and stepped through the open doorway. The late afternoon sun barely seemed to brighten his pitch-black scales, but Atlas squinted in the sunlight. Reaching into his flight harness, he pulled out his dark goggles and slipped them over his head with a practiced movement.

Jarzyl scampered over and joined him. Her house was at a city sector boundary, so past the balcony there was nothing but empty air and thin clouds, stretching all the way down towards the distant ground as the city flew on through the sky. Rolling hills were cast in golden sunshine far below them, and the sky was a beautiful blue with scattered smears of white, but Jarzyl’s attention was all focused on the three-legged young dragon who stood on the balcony beside her.

Sitting back on her hindlegs, she tapped the worn-out leather strap of Atlas’s dark goggles. “Your goggles barely fit any more. These are sized for a younger fledgling.”

Atlas nodded, his eyes hidden behind the reflective black lenses which protected his nocturnal eyes. “I’ll have to buy a new pair sooner or later. I have a friend at the shelter who helped me extend the strap, but it’s getting harder to fit these on. My horns are in the way.”

“I like your horns.” Jarzyl grabbed one of Atlas’s horns and wobbled his head gently. “Bring me along when you go to get a new pair of goggles. I’ll help you pick one out! Something that makes you look stylish…”

“If you want,” Atlas agreed. “Yes. Right. Then goodbye.” He stood at the edge of the balcony ledge and glancing around, checking that no dragons were flying around the nearby airspace, then he unfurled his wings in a smooth movement. The afternoon breeze tugged at his flight surfaces, as if the wind itself was eager to pull him into flight, and away from her.

“I’ll miss you,” Jarzyl sighed softly. “I miss you already!”

Atlas laughed lightly. “You’ll see me again.” He looking  around again, then he pulled his wings to half closed, turned back towards her, and gave her a quick friendly lick on the cheek. “I can come by tomorrow before lunch? Check in on how your magic is doing.”

“Sounds good. I’ll keep working on the magic.” Jarzyl waved her paws about. “If I’m good enough, maybe I can displace all the way over to your place! Then I’ll displace us off for lunch somewhere!” For a moment she too hesitated—they were out in the open, even though there wasn’t anyone currently flying around in this area of the Mintaka neighbourhood. But then took a bold step over towards Atlas and kissed him properly. Not a quick peck or something that might have been mistaken for an affectionate gesture between friends, but a good, hard, proper kiss with his muzzle against hers. “Mhm, you’re mine.”

Atlas was grinning. She was too. “The more you do that, the more you make me wish I didn’t have to go,” he said. “And you’ll just end up missing me more.”

“Oh, get out of here,” Jarzyl muttered, and then she put her paws on his shoulder and shoved him backwards off the balcony ledge.

Atlas did a rolling flip through the air and then threw his wings open, dropping smoothly into forward flight, heading away from her home and soaring into the vast gap between city sectors. Whereas the crippled fledgling was awkward and slow on the ground, he cut through the air with a natural grace. Jarzyl saw him glance back over his shoulder at her, and then he rocked his wings from side to side, turning quickly left and then right in a wave.

Jarzyl opened her wing and waved back. She watched for a good minute until her friend flew out of view, obscured by the distant buildings on the adjacent city sector. Then she headed back inside her room to test her newfound magic further.

TO BE CONTINUED