Adamagika: The Spirit Within - 25. Ch 25: I Am Ho-o

CHAPTER 25: I Am Ho-o

“You nyuuww that Ryuun guy is konda cool,” Jacob said in between mouthfuls of potato wedges. We had one day off before we needed to get back to training and Jacob and I were spending most of our day going around the city. We decided to have some dinner at a place that was known to have really good potato wedges before heading back to our room.

I watched in fascinating as each potato wedge disappeared into his mouth. It almost seemed like he just swallowed, not even bothering to chew.

“You yunk ee ii,” he paused probably realizing he was not making any sense. He took a few seconds to swallow before continuing. “You think it’s kinda funny that Brian’s apprentice is called Ryan?” Another potato wedge got devoured. Jacob met with Ryan a few times in the last week. As it turned out, Brian’s apprentice was basically the equivalent of a squad leader for all apprentices even if they weren’t really a squad on their own.

“No, not really,” I said. “I don’t think names factor in the selection of apprentices.”

“Yaww, wuuldn ii be,” he paused again to swallow. “Wouldn’t it be cool if all recruits and apprentices had the same names?” he asked as he picked up another potato wedge to meet its fate. “Like if Rick had an apprentice called Nick. Or Clarisse and Charise. Oh! Bruce and Duce!” he said as he laughed. It got muffled though as he stuffed another potato wedge or two into the darkness.

“Maybe,” I said with a smile. Jacob’s been on an emotional high ever since he got into the Aerophalanx. Sure, an apprentice wasn’t quite the same as a recruit but I think just being there was such a wonderful thing for him already. “What would my apprentice’s name be then?”

Jacob scrunched up his forehead in thought. I tried doing the same thing and found it difficult to find a name that rhymed with Adam.

“Arrr…Aiden… no not quite,” Jacob said. “Anna, well that’s a girl’s name and you won’t end up with a girl.”

“Why not?” I smirked.

“Well, Ryan tells us that apprentices are like lifelong partners to most recruits. I just can’t imagine you spending the rest of your life with a girl, even if only as an apprentice.” He positioned his hand over the potato wedges, ready to strike. “The Pledge of an Apprentice involves being a faithful companion to his Aerophalanx. There’s even this whole ritual of trust thing. Of course, they didn’t ask me to do it because I’m more interested in becoming a recruit than an apprentice. I think Ryan pretty much knows that I would either become a recruit or would leave altogether. I can’t really imagine myself as an apprentice my whole life anyway.” He then looked over at me. “Not that I wouldn’t mind being your lifelong partner,” he grinned.

“Well, I can’t imagine you would be that bad!” I grinned back.

“Excuse me, mister!” he said with mock indignation. “I happen know a few things about pleasing a man in bed.”

“What?” My eyes widened a bit.

“Oh, I’ve never done it,” he added hurriedly. “I have a friend who was married to one of our village chiefs. He was the third husband or something. Anyway, he told me a few things.” His eyebrows undulated suggestively.

“Whatever,” I said with a blush. Somehow I thought we just broached a very sexual subject. I had, in fact, been thinking about it almost non-stop since my last talk with the voice. I didn’t have a name for her yet so I just called her the voice. I’ve been trying to find ways to bring up the topic of sex, err, well, at least more sexual things to Jacob. Somehow though, the moment of clarity that came with the vision (if that was what it was) seemed to just fade away with the passing of time. Uncertainty crept back in and I was afraid to broach the topic. I had no doubt that I’d do it with Jacob in a heartbeat. I was just afraid to be the one to bring it up in case he wouldn’t reciprocate. I never imagined though that we’d discuss it or at least hint at it so easily in such a public place.

“Saddam!” Jacob yelled which caused several heads in the store to turn in our direction.

“What?” I asked confused at his sudden outburst.

“Saddam rhymes with Adam,” he said with a triumphant grin.

I shook my head. “I think Jacob sounds fine,” I said as I leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. I could almost feel electricity spark in between my lips and his cheek as they made contact.

He looked surprised at first before his trademark sated puppy dog look masked his face, a look he only got when I kissed him, when I held his hand, or when he finished stuffing himself with every bit of food within reach.

The little jolt of energy surprised me. I already noticed that each time Jacob’s skin touched mine, it was as if energy passed between us but it has never been that strong. It felt like the energy within me could not be contained anymore and just had to reach out to Jacob. Tentatively, I tried touching Jacob’s hand as he reached for another potato wedge. When our hands made contact, I could feel the energy again moving between us, even more pronounced than earlier. What I noticed then was it had a pleasurable quality to it, almost as if it made my whole arm tingle just from the contact.

Jacob pulled back his hand in surprise. He looked over at me with a confused look before smiling. “Whatever that was, do it again.”

“What?” I laughed. “So you felt it too? That flow of magic between us?”

“Yeah,” Jacob looked intently at me. “It was… nice.”

“And it wasn’t you? It’s not one of those things your friend taught you?”

Jacob shook his head. “Nothing he taught me involved magic.” Jacob held his breath and tentatively moved his hand towards me across the table. I did the same thing and our fingers slowly inched towards each other. When their tips finally met, Jacob and I released our held breaths.

“Woah,” was all I could say.

“What is that?” he asked as he closed his eyes. Several of our fingers were now intertwined and I could feel the tingling feeling rise up in my arm and spread across my chest. It was like my senses were going into an overload and Jacob’s mere touch was pushing them even further. My entire arm felt so good.

“I don’t know.” I realized that my own breathing was suddenly more constricted. I looked at Jacob and he had a somewhat pleased look on his face as though he was trying to get lost in the feeling of the moment. He looked so beautiful, just sitting there looking so content. It was as if nothing else mattered. I could see his skin prickling with goosebumps and every hair rise to the feeling. I wondered to myself if the hair on the rest of his body was also rising and I was tempted to remove his shirt to find out.

When I started feeling myself harden, I knew that it wouldn’t be too long before I actually did take off a few articles of clothing (and not necessarily mine).

Reluctantly, I pulled my hand away and Jacob whimpered as we lost contact. The feeling disappeared as soon as our fingers were no longer touching. Jacob reached over with his hand and I pulled back. He looked hurt.

“You don’t like it?” he asked softly.

“I do,” I groaned as I tried to ask myself why exactly I pulled away. And then I remembered. “It felt so good that if we held on any longer, I think might have started stripping you here.”

Jacob leaned over and I thought he was going to kiss me. Instead though, he raised his head to my side and placed his lips next to my ears. Oh my god… was the phrase that kept repeating itself over and over in my head. I think he made sure that with every word he said they would brush against my soft ear. I could feel the energy course in and out as contact was made and lost. I immediately hardened. “Why don’t we go back to our room?” he whispered.

I didn’t need to be asked twice. Without another word, we stood up and left the restaurant.

The potato wedges were left forgotten.

I think we ran. That was the only plausible explanation because the next thing I knew, we were in our room, panting and sweating. Jacob took my face in his hands. The touch from his fingers made my head soar in pleasure and I felt like collapsing there where we stood. When he kissed me, I felt like the world faded into the background and only one emotion existed – pleasure. Okay, maybe two emotions – pleasure and love.

I ripped his shirt of, as in literally ripped it. For the briefest moment, I wondered what housekeeping would have to say about that. But the thought was short-lived as Jacob moaned in my hands. I let my hands trail over his thin, muscular frame and I could feel so much pleasure from just touching him. I wondered how he felt at that exact moment.

Jacob took my hands in his and pulled them away from him. He was breathing heavily. “Oh god… oh god… I… oh god…”

I laughed but my laughter was cut short when Jacob grabbed me down there. Even fully clothed, the energy flowed seamlessly through the fabric. I could feel my hardened member course with energy and one leg gave way in the pleasure and I fell onto Jacob’s chest. He moaned loudly as his own legs gave way and we fell as heap onto the floor.

“Maybe we should get into bed,” I managed in between ragged breaths. I was almost afraid to touch Jacob in case my legs went into a permanent catatonic state.

“I think that’s a good idea,” he said, also out of breath. It took us five minutes just to pick ourselves off the floor and move to the side of our bed. Weakly, I lifted my shirt off.

“I can’t wait anymore,” Jacob said as he made an elaborate movement in the air with his hand. Before I even knew what was happening, all my clothes including my underwear were ripped away from my body rather painfully.

“Hey, that hurt,” I said as Jacob repeated the gesture and all his clothes were torn off his perfect body. He winced probably feeling the same pain I did moments earlier. Before I could make any comment, he reached over and held my stiffness in his hand. “Let me make it feel better.”

This time, instead of one leg, both legs gave way. I suppose we were lucky that we moved to the bed because I collapsed backwards and felt limply to the bed. One thing about me though was not limp.

Jacob didn’t join me in bed. Instead he knelt down and did the most shocking thing I have ever seen. He lowered his head to my member.

“That is not a potato wedge,” I yelled in panic before I was devoured his warm mouth. I jerked involuntarily as waves of pleasure coursed down my legs and up my chest. It was short-lived though as Jacob quickly released me and fell to the floor laughing hysterically.

“Of all the things you could say, you had to say that,” he managed in between his laughing fit.

After I recovered from the unbelievable sensations the few seconds in his mouth caused, I chuckled to myself. “What? You looked like you were going to eat me.”

“Haven’t you heard of this before,” he asked as he made two fingers walk up my thighs. My legs bucked at the pleasure of it.

“I have,” I writhed beneath his two fingers. Jacob was watching me lovingly. “It’s just that I didn’t expect it. I didn’t know what to expect.” I couldn’t say anything else as his fingers finally reached the point between my legs. He grasped me completely in his hands and I felt myself getting lost in the feeling.

“Now, you do,” Jacob said softly as he once again took me in his mouth. This time I held back any comment that crossed my mind because it felt like my whole body was exploding. Every bit of me was in pleasure and it felt like Jacob’s mouth was roaming all over my body all at the same time.

I felt like I could die at that very moment and it would be okay.

“Jacob… come here,” I managed to say.

Jacob raised himself to me. He moaned as more parts of his body came into contact with mine until he finally collapsed on my chest. My member was leaking onto his tight stomach. “Oh god…” he croaked. “It feels so good.”

Despite my euphoric and pleased state, I willed my arms to pull him up. With a little help from him, we managed to become face to face and his member was aligned perfectly against mine. “Make love to me Jacob,” I said. “Make me yours.”

Jacob moaned as he kissed me. He looked down at me with so much love in his eyes. Tears started pouring down from them. “No,” he whispered, “you’re already mine and I’m already yours. I want it the same for the both of us the first time.”

I creased my brow in confusion, which was a horribly difficult thing to do when you felt like you had no control over your muscles. I didn’t have much experience with sex. Okay, I didn’t have any experience with sex but there were certainly books about it. I mean, I have never really bothered reading them in depth. Just browsed them once. Or twice. One thing I did pick up was that somebody had to be inside someone else.

“Trust me, Adam,” he said. “Do you trust me?”

“With my life,” I whispered.

Jacob looked intently at me and our eyes gazed into each other. What I saw though was not what I expected. A flurry of negative emotions seemed to rise out of him – worry, fear… pain.

Before I could ask about it, he closed his eyes and pulled his head back. He then thrust his hips forward and his hardness pressed against mine. I screamed in pleasure as the energy coursed even faster between us. He repeated the motion and all thoughts from my mind vanished to be replaced by a pure wave of pleasure.

“Oh god…” I whimpered as he thrust himself against me a third time.

“Huuuh…” Jacob moaned, while still kissing me.

“Jacob…” I kissed him back.

“Oh god, Adam…”

“I’m gonna come…” I whispered hurriedly.

“Huh… Aah… me too…”

“I love you, Jacob…”

“I love you, Adam…” With his words, I knew that I could no longer hold it back.

I buckled and my body stiffened as I prepared for the ultimate release that I knew as coming. I closed my eyes tightly as I moaned one last time against Jacob’s mouth as I finally let our kiss break. My body went into sensory overload and I felt like I was going to burst from every single pore on my body.

I waited for the inevitable pleasure to course though my body. Waited. And waited. And waited even longer.

Nothing.

“Well that was disappointing,” I heard Jacob say. I opened my eyes and realized he was no longer on top of me. He was beside me but not on our bed. He was standing up. We were both standing up. We weren’t standing on our bed either. It looked like we weren’t even anywhere near our bed.

Instead, we found ourselves in a large room. Large may have even been an understatement. It looked like an enormously, endless white room that stretched without limit in all directions. The floor, ceiling, and walls (if there were even any) seemed to glow with white luminescence. Upon realizing that, I shielded my eyes at the glow that seemed to suddenly assault my eyes. It was like my eyes became blinded only when I realized that everything was bright.

I also realized that I was not feeling anything. Moments earlier, I was in the throes of passion having my very first orgasm from a sexual experience with another person. And without even realizing it, all the emotions just suddenly drained out of me. I didn’t realize it until I actually thought about it. I suppose it was the same reason the light was not hurting my eyes until I thought about it.

“Where are we?” Jacob asked. He was stark naked next to me. And then, he wasn’t. It was like thinking about it made clothes stretch from the ground. It was less that a second but the light seemed to bend from the ground and stretch up like a white fabric snaking their way around Jacob’s limbs. He didn’t even seem to feel it until he looked down at his chest in surprise. He was wearing something that looked like a white toga. It was glowing too like the rest of the room though perhaps not as bright to the eyes. I looked down at myself and realized I was wearing the same thing.

“I dunno, Jacob,” I said. I released an annoyed breath. “But, I must agree. That was disappointing.”

He laughed and his voice seemed to echo in the hollow room. The emptiness of the surroundings made me nervous.

It was then that the ground seemed to grow. The white light that made up our floor suddenly sprouted grass and other kinds of bushes. They grew quickly around us and encompassed the entirety of what should have been the floor. The new plant life gave a new perspective to the room. Instead of endless white, we could now see endless vegetation stretching in every direction. At least the plants didn’t glow so they weren’t hard on the eyes.

“Okay, this is started to get weird,” Jacob said as he looked around us. I certainly agreed.

“Did we do something wrong?” I asked.

“You did nothing wrong, my dear,” came a familiar female voice. She sounded much closer this time as though she was not merely an echo in my head but rather like someone speaking next to me.

Jacob and I looked around for the source of that voice. It was Jacob who found her first.

“Adam, look,” he pointed towards a shimmering cloud that hovered a few inches from the grass.

The odd formation floated towards us and became clearer with each passing moment. Slowly a solid form materialized within the mist making out the unmistakable figure of a woman in white bathed in light. As her face became more solid, I felt shivers run through my skin. The air formed into eyes, a nose, lips, and ears. Dark brown hair cascaded from her unknown yet familiar face. Without anyone having to tell me, I knew immediately who she was. I was sure I had seen that face before. Without knowing it, I missed that face.

“Adam,” Jacob whispered, “that’s your…”

“Mom,” I finished.

She smiled at me. She looked directly at me with brown eyes exactly like mine. “Hello, Adam, Jacob. I’m glad we’ve finally had a chance to meet like this.”

“Are you the voice inside my head?” Jacob inquired.

She smiled at him. “Not only yours but Adam’s as well.”

“What?” Jacob asked in surprise. “You mean we’ve been hearing the same voice? You? Both of us?” Jacob looked over at me but I hardly paid him any attention. Somehow my mind had blocked out everything else and settled to one very simple thought.

“Mom,” I whispered. Nothing else mattered at that moment. I always imagined how our reunion would be like. I sometimes dreamt of it since Jacob told me about his vision. I wondered if it would ever happen, if we would even ever meet again. Now, here she was. Although, I had never seen her face before, I knew it somehow. Seeing her face sparked something in me, like an old suppressed memory of how she looked like. She was here standing before me. Yet… something felt out of place.

She turned her smile to me. “Your instincts do not betray you, Adam. I am not your mother. I look like her. I have taken her form as it is a form familiar and comfortable to you both, especially you Adam, even if you never knew it.”

“You’re not my mom? You look like her,” I frowned as I realized that I had never seen my real mom. Sure, I probably saw her as a tiny baby but it would have been impossible for me to remember her face at that age, at least not with the kind of certainty I was feeling that very moment.

“Your mom was a brilliant mage,” she said. “She wanted to make sure that when the time came to collect you, you would recognize her. Parts of her memories are suppressed within your mind but they are there. They have always been there. And no,” she added quickly, “I cannot read your thoughts unless you willingly open them to me. I know of these memories though because they were imbued in you as an infant. You could not hide anything from me then.”

Thoughts of her being able to read my mind didn’t seem important to me at the time. I assumed that the ability to read my mind was a given for her, as the voice inside my head. It seemed logical to be part of her nature (not that hearing voices was logical at all). However, knowing that I could block her out if I wanted to did provide some comfort.

“Collect me?” I asked. Why would she use the word collect? It didn’t sound like something a loving mother would do.

“Your mother was involved with some very dangerous people, very dangerous mages. She was part of a cunning and ruthless society founded on misguided beliefs. She believed in them, until you came along.”

“Me?” I asked.

“Yes, Adam, you. The society she was part of took powerful mages for their experiments; adults, children, men, women, no one was spared. Their existence is hidden from the greater world. Anyone who poses a threat to the secret is quickly disposed of. Even now, only a handful who isn’t part of the society knows they exist. Your mother was a willing participant, perhaps even one of the most capable mages in their ranks. She was fine with following her duties until she received a vision of the future, a vision of what would happen if the society were to take hold of a powerful mage with a powerful spirit, perhaps the most powerful one of them all.”

“You?” Jacob asked, his voice laced with disbelief.

“Do I not seem threatening to you, Jacob?” she asked. Her tone was calm and innocent enough.

“That’s not what I meant,” he added quickly. “I mean, it’s just that you seem so nice.”

At this, she chuckled. “Just because I am powerful doesn’t mean I can’t be nice.” She looked at me and a shadow seemed to pass through her eyes. “Now I am giving you the opportunity to share in that power.”

The wind picked up around us and the grass swayed in unison. I felt a chill pass through me. “Who are you?” I asked.

She smiled and the wind died down. “I am a spirit almost as old as time. I am the source of your magic. Through me you are able to perform Great Magic. If you help me now, you will perform great things in your world. What you have now is simply a taste of what I can do. I have been called many names, many of which were unjustly given. But the name I prefer to call myself is Ho-o.”

“Hoe?” Jacob asked.

“Ho-o,” she replied.

“Howoah?” Jacob asked again.

“Call me Beth,” she said.

“Huh?”

“There, he finally gets it,” she laughed. Jacob couldn’t resist grinning when he understood.

I looked at Ho-o, I mean just looked at her. She had a somewhat kind personality about her that I imagined my own mother would have. Yet, the way she described my mother made it sound like I was the spawn of an evil mage that had no regard for morals or justice. I wanted to know more. I needed to know more.

“What happened to my mom?”

The smile she had subsided. “Your mom couldn’t take it when it was her own son that would be used by the society. It was fine if some stranger was ripped from their families. But, when the vision showed her own son was next, she ran for it. She took you away, as far away as possible from their prying eyes, away even from their most powerful seers. She bound your magic which wasn’t entirely difficult since I helped her do it. Of course, she had no idea I existed, or that something inside you was watching and capable of thought and action. What happened to her after she left is anybody’s guess.”

“You mean when I was a baby, you were already there watching everything I did, everything I went through?”

“Do you think it was mere chance that a society that seeks out vulnerable but powerful mages would miss a find like yourself? Coincidence? Karma? No. We, the spirits of the other world work behind the scenes to make sure things happen according to plan. We make sure that our charges are safe and that our foothold in your world is secure.”

“Foothold?” Jacob asked. “You sound like you’re planning an invasion.”

“Far from it,” she said. “Long ago, spirits were free, able to roam the different worlds without the need of a physical host. But we were cursed and bound to the physical realms. We were forced to use hosts that would limit our true power by the extent of their physical capabilities. If anything, you and your world invaded ours. Because of our condition, I am bound to your body in the same way you are.”

“Wait,” Jacob interrupted. “Bound to his body?”

“I am the spirit that gives magic to both your bodies. I do not have the time now to explain the source of all magic to you but I am certain that Adam will after this.” I didn’t understand what she meant until I remembered that I only knew of spirits through the Seer. And according the Seer, it was a secret told to no one else but me. “Most spirits do not talk to their hosts, only a few ever do. My power though cannot be contained in one host, so I sought another compatible host that could take in my spirit. Before you were even born, I could sense you coming into the world, Jacob. With your births so close, I knew you were perfect.”

“So you knew,” Jacob said angrily. I didn’t understand the sudden change in his emotions but I knew it was real because tears quickly built up in his eyes. “You knew what would happen to my family and you did nothing about it.”

“I didn’t know what would happen to them, Jacob. My gift of foresight is not as honed as you assume it to be. I can sense danger or change approaching. You have manifested that gift which is why you can sometimes sense terrible things about to happen. It is because of me that you managed to escape that night.”

“You could have done something,” Jacob shouted. “You turned me into an orphan.”

“Would you give up what you have now for what you had then?” she asked calmly.

Jacob stared at her. Although his cheeks were wet from tears, he was not sobbing.

“Tell me Jacob,” she said when he didn’t reply. “Answer honestly. Would you give up what you have now with Adam to be with your family again?”

Jacob looked down almost with shame. He took a deep breath then looked into my eyes. “No, I wouldn’t give up what I have now for anything.”

She nodded, “I could have taken over your body. I could have forced my magic to act through you. But at such a young age, it would have likely disfigured you if not worse. If I unleashed my magic against them, I could have killed you and likely Adam too.”

“Me?” I asked with surprise. Jacob also looked taken a back.

“Yes,” she said solemnly. “It is the price that must be paid for having two hosts. As long as my essence dwells within both of you, the existence of one depends on the other. If one of you were to die, my spirit and my power will pour into the other host. No matter how strong you think your bodies are, you will be unable to host my spirit alone. You will burn from within until there is nothing left but dust.”

“So if I died, Jacob will die?”

She nodded. “And if Jacob dies, you will die.”

“As long as your spirit dwells in us both,” I repeated her words earlier. “Does that mean you can choose to leave?”

“Is that what you want me to do, Adam? To leave and never look back? To take away all magic from you and Jacob?”

I wanted to say yes, if it meant you risking both our lives, I’d let go of magic any day. However, Jacob answered for me first.

“No,” he said quickly as he looked at me. “I know what you’re thinking, Adam, because I’m thinking the exact same thing you are. I’d give up a life of magic if it meant that you would be eternally safe with me. But think about it, giving up magic won’t make us safe. If anything, it will make us more vulnerable to those that want to hurt us.”

I thought about it and he did make sense. I looked over at Ho-o who was watching me carefully as though trying to read my thoughts. I looked into her eyes trying to use my talent to sense her thoughts. But I sensed nothing and realized with a pang that it likely wouldn’t work on her. After all, I probably only had that talent because of her. Something was unsettling in all this. Perhaps my experience with the Seer was making me cautious. It felt like I was being manipulated somehow.

Once again, the wind picked up and the place seemed colder. I got the impression that no matter how much I thought about it or resisted it, the final decision wasn’t mine. “So what do you want from us? From me?”

Ho-o smiled and raised both her hands towards us as though gesturing for a hug. “Share in my power. Take my hands and let my power flow through you. Let my power take hold in the physical realm for you to use. Clear the final barrier between you so that my power can flow freely.”

I stared at her outstretched hands and then Jacob. He seemed uncertain but also decided. It seemed to me like he wanted this and would only reject it if I did. “Is this what you really want?”

“I’ll only do it if you want to,” he said. It didn’t really answer my question although it supported my suspicions.

I looked back at Ho-o who was looking expectantly at us. “What do you get out of this?” I asked.

“A presence in your world,” she said without hesitation.

I looked at Jacob and he merely nodded at me. I couldn’t understand it but it felt like two forces were conflicting within me. Part of me was saying to take this opportunity to gain more magic. It would help me save Arantiva from its enemies and even keep Jacob safe. Yet, another part of me was warning me of something terrible happening, as though accepting this came at a price, a price even greater than death. I wondered if the thoughts were like the memories my mom imbued in me, that perhaps there was a warning there too. Then again, if my mom had imbued that then wouldn’t Ho-o know about it?

“Adam,” Jacob said as he squeezed my hand.

The look of need and love from Jacob dampened the doubts in my mind. They were not gone but they receded into the background like a dull hum. “Okay, I’ll do it.”

Jacob smiled and reached out to Ho-o with his other hand.

“You’re doing the right thing,” Ho-o said.

“I hope so,” I said as I took her other hand in my free hand. As soon as all our hands were clasped, she started glowing a white light. Jacob started glowing in a swirling blue aura. I looked down at my hands and realized I was also emanating a light except it looked more like a fiery red.

Within seconds, the white light poured out from Ho-o hands and stretched across our bodies such that Jacob and I were glowing in the same aura she had on top of the blue and red auras we already had. The wind had picked up violently and the grass and leaves were being thrown about in a swirling vortex with us at the very center. My hands became very warm, hot even and it felt like my whole body was going to burst into flames within moments. It was odd though because instead of being painful, it felt pleasurable.

“It is done,” she said in a voice that seemed to echo around us. Everything went out of focus and slowly the white enveloped everything I saw. With time, it turned darker, greyer. While the world around me changed, so did the feelings and sensations. It suddenly felt hot and humid. A tingling sensation was crawling all over my body. The feelings seemed to fade around me until one, definite feeling overcame everything else.

“Oh god,” I managed to whisper as the world came back through a myriad of colors. I was staring at Jacob, still prone and naked on top of me. We had somehow returned to our bed. Perhaps, we never even left it. From feeling nothing, I felt everything. The orgasm I anticipated earlier had suddenly swirled back into existence magnified ten folds. Every single nerve was focused on that one spot between my legs and I knew I was about to explode. And we did explode, in a very literal sense.

I probably shot thick streams out of my member but if I did, I had no idea where they went. As pleasurable as the sensation spreading all over my body was, I was far too distracted by what happened next.

Something sparked on every bit of my skin that touched Jacob. In the blink of an eye, this force, this huge wave of heated wind felt like it was exploding out of my skin. It spread outwards across the room destroying every bit of surface it touched. Jacob was hurled clean off me and disappeared under a torrent of debris. Our dresser was sheared in half, the top completely blown into bits of wood shavings. The mirror and tables were completely blown apart. Our windows exploded outwards to the ground below. The force was so strong that where our wall once was now stood a gaping hole out into the darkness of the world. The door to our room was blown off its hinges and flew across the hall causing a large crack on another student’s door. Only my bed seemed untouched in the explosion, although bits of wood and rock covered it. Jacob’s unused bed was nowhere to be found. Bits of his mattress were flying everywhere.

After three short breathes, I came to my senses. “Jacob!” I yelled as I scrambled off my bed.

He was lying in the middle of the floor in a fetal position, the door of our devastated dresser obscuring his face from view. I lifted off the damaged wood and heard Jacob cough as though he only remembered to breathe then. He blinked a few times at me probably to get the dust out of his eyes.

“What the hell was that?” he asked with a shocked and bewildered expression.

Despite the absurdity of the situation and the gravity of the trouble we’d probably get into for what we did to our room, only one answer seemed appropriate at the moment. “Sex.”

Jacob stared incredulously at my serious face before breaking down in laughter. I couldn’t help myself as a grin slowly spread across my face.

Our laughter ended though when I heard a swooshing sound accompanied by metal being sliced across metal. Wind assaulted my face as two gryphons came into view from the gaping hole that was our window. The riders on them were brandishing maces with glowing crystals, both of which were pointed resolutely at us. They weren’t wearing the maroon robes that everyone in my squad did. Instead, they were completely clad in black, including their gryphons. They almost seemed to blend into the night.

Their serious expressions didn’t last after they got peered through the hole at us. Their faces settled to something closer to confusion and amusement.

“What is going on here?” a man asked, not from the window where the riders were hovering, but rather from where our door was, or should have been anyway.

I looked back to the other hole in our room that led to the hallway. Standing there was a rather portly looking man I recognized as Magister Va’aelua, Jacob’s teacher. He was wearing what looked remarkably like oversized children’s pajamas. Behind him was a gaggle of students, some with large eyes and others with knowing grins. It was then that I realized that Jacob and I were still both naked with one lying prone on the floor while the other hovered over him.

We certainly had a lot of explaining to do.