[Xander – 13 years]

"Xander," the onigiri says. "We're home, time to wake up."

"Are you filled with chocolate?" I eye it suspiciously.

"Umeboshi, just like last time."

"Ew," I say. "You need to go elsewhere. And skipping the line is rude, especially for foods that don't taste good."

Umeboshi-filled onigiri skipped the line when it's not even a delicious food. He even jumped the line for the strawberry cheesecake with pecans and caramel!

"Xander, you're dreaming," the onigiri says. "We've made it home from the zoo, you fell asleep on the way. You've got your party now, remember?"

Oh. I guess I am dreaming. That makes more sense than me leaving the zoo with Sig, Dad, and Mom, then suddenly appearing in a vast emptiness where I can eat all of the delicious treats I want.

I wake myself up and find Dad looking at me from outside of the car, my door open.

"Hi, Dad."

"Everyone's here," Dad tells me. "You want to take them to the rec area?"

"Yeah," I unbuckle. "Thanks for waking me."

I exit the car and look at the other boys, who are all apparently waiting outside in the cold rather for me than going inside. That's really weird, especially since I'm sure not everyone arrived at the same time. Not everyone here came from the same place, after all. My group left the zoo later than the others', too.

There's Sig, Connor, Isaac, and Sam, of course. Austin, Nathan, and Nash are here as well. Nash's parents gave approval for him to come and even to stay the night (after talking with Austin's parents), which is great.

Nash has brown hair and eyes and is a little pale, and I don't know his build since he's bundled up against the cold. Everyone's acting like it's really cold right now even though it's only in the lower forties due to the cold front.

In addition to those seven, Russell has come just as he said he might. I'm still not sure about inviting him, but I don't want to uninvite him now that he's here and he isn't misbehaving. If he does, I might.

Macy was invited as well since Ethan is here and she is kind of a friend, just like Ethan. But her mom was apparently concerned about her being the only girl among a bunch of boys. That doesn't make any sense to me but Dad said not to worry about trying to figure out the reason. It's a legitimate reason, he said, but that I don't need to worry about it.

Apparently, there being a smaller ratio of boys to girls would've made it fine, but I really don't understand why.

In addition to those nine, Carter, Tate, Knox, Bo, and Cooper are here. That brings the group up to fourteen of us total, but there are even more than that here. Luke, Parker, Tyler, and Seph all came just as they said they might.

So there are eighteen of us total boys here. I didn't really want that number since it's an even number, but at least it's two of nine. Berry was invited to the party as well, but he declined the invitation this time for some reason.

Oh, wait. There are nineteen of us. I forgot to include myself when counting. That's fine, though, as there are plenty of things to go around for all of us.

"Let's go inside," I tell everyone. "I don't know why you're all standing around in the cold."

I lead everybody inside, Dad and Mom following behind us.

"Good luck at the dinner," I tell Dad. "Don't let them be mean to you, okay?"

"I won't," he chuckles. "Have fun with your party."

"I'll try."

"Dinner?" Sig asks.

"Yeah," I nod and start walking. "This party's also at the rec center."

"The rec center?" Luke asks. "Is that what the new building is?"

"It's not that new," I say. "But yeah. Dad let me get it built, and Grandpa Adrian paid for part of the area which converted it from a fitness center to a rec center. Grandpa Adrian did that as part of his present to me for my birthday."

"Ah," he says. "I bet it's cool."

"What dinner?" Sig asks.

"Dad's going to a benefit dinner tonight," I explain. "So he'll be out late. I can't go because I've got a party I'm hosting and their times overlap."

Fortunately, I don't think Dad has realized that I asked about the party partially so that he wouldn't ask me about going to the dinner. I do not want to put on a suit and be around rich people for hours just listening to boring business stuff. They'd all probably be judging me, too.

Even if it's for charity. I don't need to go to some fancy dinner to help out people who need it. Nobody does. They can just… do the donations directly. Dad tried explaining that the real reason people do it is to feel good about themselves and look better to others, which doesn't make any sense to me.

He shouldn't do that sort of thing. I'm definitely not going to. Donating money to help out causes just to look good to others is stupid. The only reason someone should do something like that is because they actually want to help someone else out.

Like me giving extra produce to the boys' home Wednesday night. Nick wasn't there to help bring things in, so he probably wasn't given permission to stay up late again for that. It definitely cut down on their food budget for Thursday's shopping trip.

I made sure not to tell them that the produce I gave them was magic, since no one there would notice. None of what I donated to them has a magical effect on those who eat it so it doesn't doesn't matter and they'd probably be hesitant to accept if they knew it was more expensive food.

"By the way," I change the topic as we walk. "Dad did not give permission for everyone to use the food machines in the rec room outside of the soda fountain. You can pull food off of or out of them, but not operate them. He said that everyone behaved with them for my birthday sleepover, but there are additional people here. The only people he gave permission to operate them are Sig, Carter, Luke, and me. Okay? So don't try and operate them if you're not one of the four of us. I don't know why he said four rather than three, but I hope y'all will listen and obey that. Okay?"

They all agree to abide by that rule, which is good. I would tell them they have to leave if they didn't.

"Whoa!" Luke says when we enter the gymnasium. "You've got a gym in here?"

"Yeah," I answer. "It's where I do my fitness sessions on school mornings."

Though how could he tell it's a gymnasium? The floor is completely covered in mats right now, the bleachers are hidden by padded barrier blocks, and the hoops are raised.

Oh. He probably saw the hoops and realized from those.

A lot more than just the barrier blocks protecting the bleachers and the mats covering the floor have been set up in here. There's a five-foot gap between the walls/bleachers and a sort of half-wall of more padded blocks. That gap is left open as a walkway so people can get to the pool area, storage, and rec center more easily.

The area within the larger section created by the half-wall has a lot of padded blocks set up at varying height levels, but I did that to create passages throughout. The walls within are tall and there's more than one level to the area within. It's not really two levels, but it's not more or less than that for the passages. The heights of each area can vary, so some areas have to be crawled through while the level above it could possibly even need someone to jump over a raised section of its floor due to the area underneath.

Almost like a maze, but not quite. The passages can be a little bit narrow due to size constraints, but I think the others will like the overall result.

Since both the lower and upper section of the maze-like area is mostly covered, that means it would also be nearly black for the others throughout most of it. Only the areas without a ceiling would have light coming in from outside.

I think I'm the only one who'd actually be able to see alright within the maze as a result of that.

To balance that out, the lights in here are dimmer, making it a lot darker in the gym in general. Strips and orbs of glow lights were fixed all throughout the room and the maze to allow people to see by, to some degree. Some are even hung up on the ceiling and the basketball hoops.

"What's this?" Sig asks.

"Some of the guards and I set this up yesterday," I tell him. "There are also pits with foam blocks, some trampolines, and a ball pit. Y'all can play tag in it."

"Laser tag?" Connor asks, a lot of hopefulness in his mind, quickly followed by disappointment. "Oh, wait. We don't have the stuff for that."

"I do," I tell him. "The gear for it's in the storage room. If you want to do that, you can. I've also got something similar with an AR game. The console's set up for that at the other end of the room, and there are magitech glasses for playing there. If you brought your own, you can use those, too, you'll just need to sync them to the console so that it'll let you play. Sig and Carter, you both have permissions to approve syncs."

That way, I don't need to.

"There are foam block pits, trampolines, and even a ball pit in this?" Nash asks. "It doesn't look big enough for that."

"Space doesn't always match what it seems, with Xander," Isaac tells him.

"What does that mean?" I ask.

"You have a lot of spatial expansion stuff."

"Oh," I say. "No, that wasn't used for this. I wanted to try it with just the space restrictions I have, which is why there are varying heights for the passages and why the bleachers are all the way in. That added an extra forty feet of space on the sides and gave more room for passages. I could do up to ten or so alongside each other, which means there was plenty of room for the pits in addition to a sort of maze."

"Oh," he says. "That's pretty neat!"

"Also," I say. "The room is set up for recording, so if anyone plays in here and wants footage of something they did, they can ask me and I can get it for you. I think. If it'll let me…"

"It is?" Carter looks around. "How'd you manage that? I don't see any cameras… or is it only in the playing area?"

"There are streamer orbs set up in a few spots," I tell him. "These ones… are not permitted to be released to the public, so don't ask for one. I realized when we were doing the obstacle course the other week that there was no reason the orbs had to 'look' outwards with their sensors. That was just me being dumb when designing them. So I redesigned them to just observe everything in their range."

"Uh… what's the difference?" Sam asks.

"You can't observe an object in its entirety just by looking at one side," I tell him. "The orbs don't look outward anymore, they're… Grandpa Adrian said it would be 'omniscient within their range', meaning they see everything in it – from all sides. That's actually what I realized was missing from the orbs during Sig's recording.

"See," I continue. "If the orb has to follow behind someone, then it won't get their fronts. But what if they do something really amazing while it's behind them? Or they turn really fast and it doesn't keep up? And other stuff. So I designed a new version and presented it to Grandpa Adrian as the newest version to put up for sale… but he said there are privacy concerns with that so they can't be used. I didn't think about the fact that it would enable them to see through walls, clothes, etc… and yeah, that's a very serious concern. There are people who would use that for evil and inappropriate things.

"But," I say. "He said it's not an issue for me to have them, as long as I follow some rules."

I pull a binder out of one of my bracelets and flip open to the new section in the rules regarding the streamer orbs.

"See?" I show them. "This page is new and has the rules. It's front and back. Oh, and don't worry about it potentially recording you naked or anything like that. I modified the program so that it won't allow anyone to see that when looking. I have zero intention of ever doing that and they're designed so that only I can actually use them, but it's better to be safe with that than to not."

Designing them that way is very important, both for adults and for children. That was something I put in all on my own because of how important it is.

"Oh, also, the orbs are invisible," I add. "But I have a special permit which lets me do that. Grandpa Adrian arranged for it yesterday, when I was telling him about setting up for this. I don't know why, but there are some rules for that as well. It's fine to use that for here, though, which means you don't have to worry about the orbs being in any pictures or recordings you want."

"That… actually is pretty cool," Sam says.

I shrug.

"As for the pool," I say. "Dad says there has to be at least four people in there for anyone to be in the pool, and at least one of them has to be fourteen."

"Anything else we should know?" Sig asks. "Or is it time for the party?"

"I wanted to do a bonfire outside," I say. "But it might be too cold for that since the snow's coming. So no bonfire. Um. All rules are posted clearly by the entrances to each room of the rec center. Dad and I put a lot of effort into making the posters, so please follow the rules. If you don't, you'll get kicked out. And finally, I'm gonna make dinner because I'm hungry."

"What's for dinner?" Austin asks.

"Pizza," I answer. "I already have the dough for it and the garlic bread proofing, and Mom and I made the sauce for the pizzas during my second period yesterday. It was a cooking class that Mom did instead of a regular class with Mr. Wilson."

"Want some help?" Carter asks. "Fixing enough pizzas and garlic bread for all of us can't be easy for one person."

It's not too much of an issue if I use magic, but I guess it would make things easier for me to have others helping out.

"Yes, please," I say.

"I'll help, too!" Sig says.

"Mind if I do?" Austin asks.

"No," I answer. "Okay, so the four of us will make dinner, that should be more than enough. The rest of you can go hang out and stuff. Oh! Let's put all of our things in the sleeping area. And then I'm gonna change."

"Gonna be a wolfkin again?" Carter asks.

"Yeah, I'm gonna do that, too."

"Cool!"

"Wolfkin?" Nash and Russel ask, though I can tell that Ethan, Seph, Tyler, Luke, and Parker are confused and curious, too.

All of the boys who haven't seen my wolfkin form. Everyone else was at my birthday party and sleepover, so they saw it that night. How do I explain this to them?

"Xander can shapeshift," Sig explains. "He likes sleeping as a wolfkin, which is just a human with the ears and tail of a wolf, no human ears, and golden irises."

"Also fangs," I say. "My canines become sharper. Not longer, but Grandpa Adrian said they still count as fangs. And my senses get a little bit stronger. Well, the senses which are apparently a normal person's senses. I'm still not sure the full difference between mine and a human's."

"A human's?" Russel asks.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

"Yeah," I nod. "Grandpa Adrian's only one-quarter human, even though he was born human. He got modified by magical beasts so that he's one-quarter sun dragon, one-quarter phoenix, and one-quarter unicorn. Those would be really weak in my blood right now since it'd be one-thirty-second, except he married a plant and my grandpa from them married the sun dragon queen of Earth and my dad married a daughter of the unicorn queen of Earth and the phoenix king of Earth. So even though my body is mostly human, I'm actually only very slightly human. And I have the senses of all four of those magical creatures' best."

Russel and some of the others now seem really confused, but nothing I said is banned for me to say. Grandpa Adrian has told me it's fine. Part of it is because most people wouldn't believe me, and part of it is because those who do would become nervous about messing with me.

Especially if they believe the bit about me being part-dragon and about Grandpa Adrian being part-dragon. Mythological though most believe dragons to be, most stories and games make them out to be creatures one should never cross. I'm not sure why that would make people believe that about real dragons, but Grandpa Adrian said they would.

"It's better not to think too hard on this," Tate says. "But we've received independent confirmation by our region's guardian spirit that Xander is… rather unique."

"You talked with Fern?" I ask.

"Well, our parents," Tate tells me. "When the three families brought people in for the first rite-of-passage hunt this season, they made him an offering and spoke to him. That's pretty normal, and he does sometimes respond."

"The topic of you came up," Carter says. "And apparently, he was very impressed with your technique for completing it. Said he was surprised when your grandpa revealed he really hadn't taught it to you."

"And if you're wondering," Knox says. "Everyone who's done the rite-of-passage so far has passed."

Though they probably don't know that it's all just an illusion.

"That's good."

"When you told me to tell the rest of us to bring extra clothes," Carter says. "It made me want to ask you something. How did you get your stuff modified for your wolfkin form? I kind of liked being in it that one time."

"You shapeshifted him?" Isaac asks.

"Yeah," I nod. "Grandpa Adrian said it's okay if I shapeshift people. He also said that it's okay for me to teach people how to do the spell, too. And Carter? He gave me some directions on how to get them tailored for my size back then, but now I use a tailoring spell he taught me.

"This way," I continue. "I don't have to shift back to change my underwear and pants or shorts or swim trunks into another. It modifies them to have the hole in the right spot, and creates a sort of 'flap' of overlapping fabric. There's a very thin layer which sticks only to itself. It won't come undone on its own, you have to deliberately undo it. And that lets you pull them down without having to work your tail through it, or pull them on without having to spend extra effort getting your tail in. That's… not very comfortable. Knowing the spell also allows me to return the clothes to human ones as I shift back, so that there's no hole there as well."

"Oh, neat," Carter says. "Wait! So does that mean you wanted us to bring extra clothes so we could do it?"

"Yeah," I nod. "In case y'all wanted to. But come on, let's go to the sleeping areas so we can put our stuff away."

We head to the sleeping areas, where different beds made of blankets have been set out. They're very comfy despite that, and there are pillows for everyone to use as well as blankets to sleep under.

"The transformation spell," I tell Carter. "Takes around 100 mana to cast, and the tailoring spell costs only a few points. At least, they should when you cast them, based on the skill level I saw when you used magic around me."

"It'll probably take awhile for us to learn it," Carter says. "Is there a book or something we can use to reference, once we get home? And since you mentioned additional clothes, does that mean you'll transform me again?"

I pull out a pair of marbles.

"These are spell formula marbles," I say. "They contain the spell formula for the transformation spell and tailoring spell within them. It's a lot easier to learn how to do a spell when you can see them displayed like this."

Pride wells up in me a little even though I know being proud of myself is bad. I can't help it right now.

"Grandpa Adrian said that he's lived for millions of years and never thought of doing something like this to each others."

The marbles don't just show the lines needed for the mana flow, it goes into more detail on how much mana needs to be in each part, which isn't something most spell formula images and illusions do. As long as someone knows how to read the marbles, they'll have a much easier time learning the spell than just looking at a normal spell formula display.

"He's lived for how long?" Carter asks.

"Millions of years," I answer. "He's actually an alien. Humans are on many worlds. So are other species, like wolfkin. He actually took me to his homeworld. Luke, too. Not at the same time, it was different visits."

"Wait," Luke says. "That wasn't some random patch of scenic wilderness? You're telling me that was an entirely different world?"

"He still won't tell me why he teleported us there instead of just opening a portal," I tell him. "I'm fairly certain portals would be cheaper. Anyway, if you have at least 300 mana on the standard scale, it's okay for you to learn the shapeshifting spell. And those who don't have at least that much in this group have less than a sixth of that, so… uh… does anyone want a pair of the orbs? They're free. It's just glass I drew a spell formula in the middle of and then enchanted for durability and stuff, and that was easy. Oh, and I've created guides on how to read the orbs… though they're a bit more in detail than needed for them."

I may or may not have written up small booklets describing how to interpret each color and line type in the flows that I know of. There are several hundred variations. This is one of the reasons why the spell marbles are more efficient – because it's as in-detail as when I assisted Greyson with the mega-computer's flaw causing it to heat up and Luke's generator with the similar one.

All seven of the other boys with enough mana to do this want to give it a try, so I give each of them a pair of the marbles and accompanying booklet. They all split off to where they're going to stick their bags, and some of them immediately begin studying the marbles.

The seven with enough mana are Carter, Tate, Knox, Bo, Cooper, Tyler, and Luke. Most of them have around the same level of mana as each other, though I think everyone except the latter two have been doing a lot of magic practice. Their mana capacities seem to be growing at roughly the maximum they can manage without an extreme training program like the Magic Special Forces recruits go through if they're too weak to actually make the unit.

Carter, Knox, and Luke are the ones who quickly started studying their spell marbles. They must be really interested in shapeshifting.

"What about the rest of us?" Sam asks. "Are you gonna transform us, since we don't have enough mana to?"

"Only Sig, if he wants me to," I say. "The rest of you? No. But that's because I also have to undo the transformation, too. I don't want to bother with that and Dad was very clear on that I need to set a boundary on this. If I do it here, I might get asked to do it again. And again. And again. And by people I don't know or like. The only reason I'm making one exception is so that there are nine of us, if Sig agrees. Eight is a bad number and I don't want that. Look, they're all looking at the marbles. Unless they're bad with the magics, they'll probably definitely be able to cast the spells within half an hour or so."

"You really think so?" Austin seems skeptical for some reason, and I can feel that all of the others still over here feel the same way.

I pull another marble out of my storage and hand it to him. This is one which doesn't need a guidebook to interpret correctly. It's an extremely basic spell which can use any basic type of mana to work.

"Try casting that."

"What spell is this?" He asks.

"Just try."

"Knowing what you're casting is part of how you get the spell to work," Isaac says. "That's a basic lesson we've all been taught. And… Xander? You do know that not everyone has started being able to cast spells, right? Most of us are weaker because we never tried learning until the classes… or this summer, with private lessons."

"Yeah," I say. "But Austin said on Wednesday that he shaped his mana for the first time on Tuesday. Try shaping that spell, Austin."

Austin frowns, but does as I instruct, holding the marble with his left hand while attempting to shape the spell over his right. It takes him less than a minute to realize it's an internal spell, and only two minutes after that to finish.

"This is… whoa."

"What?" Several of the boys asks.

"Is it a durability-increasing spell?" Austin asks as he cancels it.

"Yeah," I nod. "Apparently, being able to see a spell formula in its full three-dimensional form makes it easier than looking at pictures of it from different angles, knowing the breakdown of the different layers, and so on. And with my ability to perceive mana and magic directly, I can correct flaws. That's an improved version of the spell to enhance one's durability.

"Depending on the simplicity of the spell," I say. "Someone can learn a new spell within minutes if they can shape their mana, have enough mana to cast the spell, and can shape their mana well enough. Durability-enhancement is an extremely easy spell which requires no particular skill in shaping mana, just the skill to do it. You'll just end up spending a little bit more mana to make it work since you're close rather than exact."

The more work magic has to do to just make something happen outside of a spell formula, the more mana it costs. At least, when it comes to casting spells like this.

"That's why I feel certain they'll all be able to learn the transformation spell within half an hour," I say. "It's not a simple spell, but it's not insanely complex. It's a middle-of-the-sphere spell."

"A what?" Russell asks.

"A middle-of-the-sphere spell," I repeat. "A spell that someone can do if they're able to practice for more than three minutes straight in the middle of one of the training spheres. And all of them should be able to do that. It looks like Luke is already making progress, too. He's already forming the spell… sort of. He's messing it up, but he'll probably get it soon."

Which is surprising, but I guess he does more than talk and fight demons. He must train his magic as well, just not enough to see big gains to his mana capacity.

"This really did make it easy to learn," Austin looks at the marble, then hands it back to me. "Dang, that was easy. But I guess it's because it was already so simple?"

"Yeah," I send the marble back into storage. "More complex spells would definitely require a lot more knowledge of spells, practice with them, and mana-shaping ability."

"Hey, Xander?" Sam asks.

"Yes, Sam?"

"With you being able to shapeshift and all… can't you just shapeshift your brain to a normal one?" He asks, then immediately feels an immense amount of panic that makes me wish I'd suppressed my empathy. "I don't mean that in a bad way. I just… doesn't being Autistic have a negative effect on things? Like socially? And all of the rules and stuff you follow that gives you stress if they're broken and all that? A normal brain would make life easier, wouldn't you?"

"Yeah," I answer. "But I can't do that."

"But you already shapeshift," he says.

"Not in that way," I say. "What I'm doing is changing my body to another species. That's affecting a fundamental aspect of it, and the shapeshifting spell is only temporary. Technically, but let's not get into that."

The spell will actually cancel on its own eventually if not canceled directly by the caster. How long it lasts on its own is determined by the skill of the mage who cast the spell. It should last anywhere from a few days to about a week.

Permanently changing one's body like what Grandpa Adrian did so that his human matches Earth's human is a lot different than temporarily. That's also not the only factor involved.

"What you're asking is changing the wiring of my brain," I say. "Rather than my species. That's a lot different."

"How?"

"I don't have to understand genetics to change a species," I say. "Since I'm changing a fundamental aspect of it via magic. But to alter the wiring of my brain so that it's a normal person's brain? That requires finesse and practice and risk. A lot of risk for things to go wrong. And my understanding of what a normal brain is might not be correct, so even if I were to try and shapeshift my brain into a normal one, it could come out very, very wrong."

Perception also affects spells cast, to a degree depending on the amount of information given by the spell formula. It's easier to perceive a change that's visible than one which isn't, and it's easier to just add in "wolfkin" than to rewire a brain to be the same species but a different wiring.

"Oh," he says.

"What about your great-grandfather?" Nash asks. "Could he do it? He's literally the guy who taught humanity magic thousands of years ago."

"He said 'no'."

"You asked?" Sig asks.

"Yeah."

Why wouldn't I? I want a normal brain because it would definitely be easier for me.

"Why'd he say 'no'?" Sig asks.

"He's never done it before and is concerned he'd mess it up and then have to revert my body back using the World Memory."

In other words, he knows how to turn an Autistic brain into a normal brain in theory, but he doesn't know for sure if what he knows would actually work. Then add in the fact that my brain isn't even a fully human one, and that complicates matters even more.

Bending reality is simpler when the magic is simpler. Making sure mega bakes rise properly is stupidly easy when bending reality. Dog fur not sticking to me? Also stupidly easy. Shapeshifting into a wolfkin through the bending of reality? Cost nearly a tenth of the mana I had at a the time, and that was easier than changing just one part of me because everything changed to match what I'd be like if I were a wolfkin.

But I'm not normal. Even as a wolfkin, my brain is still not fully wolfkin. I still have all of my senses and process them the same way, even if some of them become heightened in that state. I'm also still Autistic. It's just changing me to be what I'd be if I were wolfkin rather than human.

Changing the brain without changing the rest is not the same thing as just changing everything all at once.

We can bend reality to our will all we want, but if our will is wrong? Things can go very badly wrong.

"That sounds serious," Russell says.

"It's very serious," I say. "Anyway, I'm gonna get changed now. Sig, do you want to be a wolfkin?"

"Can I be a snow leopardkin?" He asks. "Or do you only know how to do a wolfkin transformation?"

"I can do others," I tell him. "When I went to chase down the cloud elemental in the Autumn Realm, I shifted it so that I'd be what I'd be if I were a winged person and that gave me wings. I haven't figured out how to do vastly different things yet, though."

I'm sure that one day, I'll manage to figure out how to transform into a dragon. That's just not something I can manage right now, though. Giving myself wings which use magic for flight rather than muscles in my torso was easy, too.

Probably because I have two ancestors with wings which work the same way.

"Any other questions?" I ask. "I want to get started on dinner."

"I do," Parker says quietly. "Can I talk to you in private?"

"I can put up a filter around us so that others can't hear what we're saying."

"You know how to do it?"

"I've seen it done before."

Not directly as a spell, but as an enchantment. That was enough for me to figure out how to cast it, though, and counts the same according to Grandpa Adrian. Greyson told me that Landon did it when he went over to talk with Henry and I kind of want to know how mine compares to his, but I don't want to just ask Landon if he can cast it so I can see.

Plus, I haven't been to the sanctuary mansion since the one day I went during the summer so I haven't really seen him since then.

"Oh," he says. "Okay."

Most of the others start to go to pick our their bed spots, but Nash stays behind, looking confused.

"Uh… you're all going to just accept that?" He asks. "That he saw it before so he can do it? This is magic we're talking about…"

"Yeah," Russell says. "Xander can directly perceive it, so if he sees a spell done, he can know how to cast it."

Nash feels awkward now, for some reason. I just wait until the others have stepped away, then cast the privacy filter.

"What?" I ask Parker.

"Sorry about how I acted… back in July," he looks down. "It was wrong of me."

He feels really guilty, but also unsure. I wish I could understand other people better because that makes no sense.

"Okay."

Now he feels really awkward and even more unsure.

"And, um… how did you know I was in the hospital?"

Just as he asks that, Luke arrives beside us in wolfkin form, sparks dancing along his body. A bright and cheerful smile is on his face and I can feel how buzzy with excitement he feels right now, though it fades a little the moment he hears what Parker said.

"Hospital?" Luke asks. "Wait, you were in the hospital?"

"I should've done a barrier instead of a filter," I say. "Sorry, Parker. I didn't expect anyone to come over."

Parker snorts, then gives Luke an uneasy look.

"Um… yeah."

"He was sick," I say. "So he went to the hospital. And Parker, I knew because I went to your place to apologize after a week or so for snapping at you, even though I don't remember doing it. I guess I was just overstimulated, that happens sometimes and my brain doesn't process things correctly so I forget. But I went to apologize, and your parents told me you'd gotten sick and were in the hospital."

"That doesn't make any sense," Luke says. "If he was in the hospital for a couple of months, he wouldn't have put on muscle."

"Making sure you have a six-pack is important for staying healthy," I say. "They probably had him working out while he was recovering."

"That's not-argh!" Luke exclaims, feeling exasperated for some reason while Parker feels amused. "Never mind!"

It's quiet between the three of us for a few moments.

"Wait," Luke looks at Parker. "So you knew that he knew, but not how? How did you know that he did?"

"He sent me a get-well package every week."

"I don't like you," I say. "But that doesn't mean I want to see you get sick and die. There were some weird restrictions on what I could send, though. I looked up what to do for get-well packages and it mentioned stuff like lotion, but his parents said it couldn't have anything with a pump. And lip balms had to be the squeeze kind, not the twist kind. He wasn't allowed the puzzle orbs, for some reason, but I could send him puzzle books."

Which makes no sense. What makes a puzzle orb different from a puzzle book? They're both types of puzzles.

"Yeah, that is weird," Luke seems confused, then looks at Parker. "Well, good thing you're out! Being sick is never fun! And look! I'm a wolfkin now!"

His excitement is back and his tail is swishing.

"Parker," I say. "Was that all? Or was there something else you wanted to ask me about in private?"

"That was all," he says. "Um. Thanks for the care packages. Come on, Luke. Let's let Xander get changed."

"Feel my tail!" Luke exclaims as they walk away. "It's so soft!"

Once they're out of range, I look at Sig, who's approaching me again.

"So…" he says. "Are you gonna shift first, or shift me?"

"I can do you now," I tell him. "But do you mind if I put up an opaque barrier around us? I wanna change right after and don't want some of the others to see."

Some of them were invited, but they've never seen me changing clothes before and I really don't feel comfortable being exposed like this. It already pushes it with my friends who aren't my close friends or Carter.

"Sure," he says, and I immediately put up a barrier. Panic fills his mind enough to make me start to panic a little. What happened? Are we under attack? "Xander! Lights! Lights! It's too dark!"

I conjure an orb of light and Sig's panic recedes, though he's breathing heavily.

"You're scared of the dark?"

"No," he says. "Not really, but having it suddenly turn completely dark was terrifying. Never knew about that fear… what happened to all of the light?"

"It's an opaque barrier," I say. "That means that light doesn't pass through it. Wait. You can't see in darkness?"

"Uh… no," he snorts. "That's a 'you' thing, I think. You've got extra senses which lets you see, remember?"

"Oh," I say. "Um. Right. Go ahead and change into whatever outfit you want to wear for the party, and I'll do the transformation and tailoring on you then. And if you want to stay in it for swimming, I can do your trunks as well."

"Alright!"

Sig gets changed while I look away, then he hands me a pair of swim trunks. I use my tailoring spell on them so that they're made for snow leopardkin. Then, I use that on his current shorts and underwear while simultaneously shapeshifting him into a snow leopardkin.

His hair turns from black to snow white with black rosettes, and his snow leopardkin's tail is long, thick, and fluffy, with the same color pattern as his hair and three black rings toward the tip.

Huh. I guess because snow leopards have specific patterns to their fur, a snow leopardkin's hair matches that rather than what it was when they were human. A wolfkin's hair seems to match his human hair color.

"This is so cool!" Sig tries catching his tail. "And it even feels like I've always been this way!"

"Grandpa said it's important the transformation makes you feel like that's your norm," I say. "So that you don't have to acclimate to it but your temporary self feels natural to you."

"It's so cool!" His tail flicks up to his mouth and he grabs it with his teeth. "Mph!"

I don't want to pretend to understand that so I just move so that I can change without him seeing and once I do, Sig lets his tail out of his mouth.

"Before you take down the barrier," he says. "Is there anything you want to do?"

Anything I want to do? Yeah. He seems hopeful about something, but I don't want to ask him what that is.

I give him a hug. That seems to disappoint him a little, but I think I'm also feeling something from him which I think means he expected this and is accepting it. It's strange.

But he hugs me back and feels happy anyway, so I'm happy and my tail flicks a little. His tail has curled around us, which is both weird and comfortable.

I look up at Sig and he looks down at me. He definitely seems happy so maybe I was wrong about him feeling disappointed. I can't feel it anymore, so I probably didn't in the first place.

"Okay," I let go of him. "Now I'm gonna go make dinner."

"Okay!" He laughs as the barrier disappears. "Let's go make pizza!"

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