Chapter 23: CIRI'S TRAINING INTENSIFIES
The training yard looked different with Yennefer in charge.
Where Vesemir had been patient and methodical, where I had offered stability and support, Yennefer brought something else entirely: expectation. She looked at Ciri and saw potential that needed to be forced into bloom, not coaxed gently toward the light.
"Again," Yennefer commanded, not for the first time that morning. "Focus on the destination, not the journey."
Ciri's hands trembled with exhaustion. She'd been attempting controlled teleportation for two hours, with mixed results. Three successful jumps, seven failures, two explosive releases of energy that had cracked the courtyard stones.
"I can't—"
"You can. You're choosing not to." Yennefer's voice carried no cruelty, just certainty. "Your power isn't your enemy, Ciri. It's a muscle you haven't learned to use. Stop fighting it and start directing it."
I stood at the edge of the training area, Nullification field ready to catch any overflow. My role had shifted since Yennefer's arrival—less teacher, more safety net. I'd expected to resent the change, but instead I found it... comfortable. This was how the division of labor should work. She pushed; I caught.
[SP: 185/215]
[NULLIFICATION: STANDBY MODE — LOW DRAIN]
Ciri gathered herself for another attempt. I could feel her through the Link—frustration, determination, the bone-deep exhaustion of someone who'd been running on adrenaline for days and was finally hitting the wall.
"Close your eyes," I said, breaking the silence. Yennefer shot me a look, but didn't interrupt. "Remember the first time we practiced? Not moving the object—moving the space around it."
Ciri's eyes closed. Her breathing steadied.
"The courtyard isn't between here and there," I continued. "There's no distance. Just two points that are already the same place, waiting for you to realize it."
The air shifted. Reality bent.
Ciri vanished.
She reappeared twenty feet away—exactly where she'd been aiming—stumbling but upright, gasping but conscious.
"I did it." Wonder crept into her voice. "I actually—"
"Don't celebrate yet," Yennefer cut in, but there was something that might have been approval beneath the severity. "That was one successful jump. We need consistent results before we can call it progress."
"Give her a moment." I moved toward Ciri, offering my arm for support. "She's been at this for hours."
"And she'll be at it for hours more. The entity waiting below these stones isn't going to pause because she's tired."
She's not wrong. But burning out before the fight helps no one.
Ciri's grip on my arm tightened. Through the Link, I felt her exhaustion mixed with something else—gratitude, maybe, for the intervention.
"Five minutes," Yennefer conceded. "Then we continue."
The breakthrough came on the third day.
Ciri had been working on carrying objects with her teleportation—starting with pebbles, moving to books, eventually attempting a training dummy. The theory was sound: if she could move herself through space, she should be able to extend that effect to anything she was touching.
The practice was considerably harder.
"It's like..." She struggled to explain during a rest break. "Like trying to carry something while running through water. The resistance increases with mass."
"Then stop thinking about mass," Yennefer said. "You're not physically moving the object. You're convincing reality that it belongs in the new location. Reality doesn't care about weight."
"Easy for you to say."
"Nothing about magic is easy. It simply becomes familiar."
I sat beside Ciri on the training yard's low wall, close enough that the Link hummed between us. Her frustration was palpable—days of effort with minimal results, the pressure of knowing Eskel was suffering while she learned basic control.
"What if," I said slowly, "instead of trying to carry something else, you tried to carry someone who was already connected to you?"
Both women looked at me.
"The Link," I explained. "It creates a connection between us. What if that connection could serve as... an anchor? A way to define what's 'you' for purposes of the teleportation?"
Yennefer's expression sharpened with interest. "That's actually not a terrible idea."
"Thanks for the enthusiasm."
"I mean it. Most magical connections are external—spells imposed on reality. But if your bond is intrinsic, part of her identity's definition..." She turned to Ciri. "Worth trying."
Ciri looked between us, uncertainty and hope warring in her expression. "You want me to try teleporting while holding onto Cole?"
"Not holding. Connected." Yennefer gestured for us to stand together. "Physical contact might help at first, but the real anchor is the Link itself. If your power recognizes him as an extension of yourself..."
We took position in the center of the training yard. Ciri gripped my hand—her fingers cold, trembling slightly with exhaustion and nervousness.
"Focus on me," I said. "Not on moving me. On the connection. What does it feel like?"
"Warm." Her eyes closed. "Steady. Like... a heartbeat that isn't mine, but matches mine."
"Good. Now picture where you want to be. Don't imagine traveling there. Imagine already being there—both of us, together."
The air shifted. The world bent.
We reappeared on the opposite side of the courtyard, thirty feet from where we'd started.
For a moment, neither of us moved. Then Ciri's grip on my hand tightened, and a laugh escaped her—pure, triumphant, exhausted but real.
"I did it. I actually—we actually—"
I stumbled, my legs suddenly uncertain beneath me. The teleportation had cost her; the experience of being teleported had cost me something too. Disorientation, a sense of having been in two places at once, my consciousness briefly scattered across dimensions.
[STATUS: SPATIAL DISPLACEMENT EXPERIENCED]
[EFFECT: MINOR DISORIENTATION — FADING]
"That was..." I managed, steadying myself. "Different."
Yennefer approached, her expression calculating. "The connection didn't just anchor you. It extended her control. She wasn't moving two separate things—she was moving a single unit that happened to include both of you."
"Is that good?"
"It's remarkable." For the first time, genuine approval crept into her voice. "Ciri, you've just demonstrated an ability that most mages spend decades trying to master. Cooperative teleportation is extraordinarily difficult—and you did it on your first attempt."
Ciri's exhaustion seemed to fade slightly at the praise. "It felt different. Easier. Like Cole was helping carry the weight."
"That may be exactly what's happening." Yennefer's attention shifted to me, and I recognized the expression from our first meeting—assessment, reevaluation. "Your Nullification doesn't just suppress magic. It creates a... null space. An area where reality is more malleable because the usual rules aren't being enforced."
"Is that good or bad?"
"Potentially both." She considered for a moment. "We should talk more. Tonight, after dinner. I have questions about your abilities that might be relevant to the exorcism."
The evening conversation lasted three hours.
We sat in the library—Yennefer, Vesemir, and myself—surrounded by texts that ranged from recent scholarship to documents so old they predated the common tongue. Yennefer had questions about Nullification, about my awakening, about the sensations I experienced when using abilities I didn't fully understand.
I answered honestly where I could, deflected where I had to, and learned more about magical theory in one conversation than I'd absorbed in weeks of observation.
"Your abilities aren't strictly anti-magic," Yennefer concluded. "You don't destroy magical effects—you create zones where magic has difficulty existing. The distinction matters."
"How so?"
"A destructive nullifier would be useless against Voleth Meir. She's not held together by spells that can be broken. She's a spiritual entity, woven into the fabric of existence itself." Yennefer leaned forward, something like excitement in her eyes. "But if you can create zones of reduced magical coherence... you might be able to weaken her hold on Eskel without destroying Eskel himself."
"That's the plan for the exorcism?"
"Part of it." She exchanged a glance with Vesemir. "We've been researching banishment rituals since I arrived. There's a ceremony—ancient, pre-Conjunction—that might work. But it requires weakening the entity's grip before the banishment can take hold."
"And that's where I come in."
"If you're willing."
I thought about Eskel, bound and screaming in the storage room below. About the voice that wasn't his, promising horrors. About the friend I'd gained and the monster that was wearing him.
"I'm willing."
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