Chapter 12: Mentor

There were swirls of grey mist shimmering in the darkness, causing Mya's panic to fade away as she realized it wasn't the light of the moon.

However her memory of what Sarah said about Illyan doing something, she tried to lift her guard 'Don't…If you blocked the connection, it would cause a backlash.'

She stopped herself at the sound of his voice speaking into her mind. She watched the mist spread covering every inch of the darkness, a spark of lightning popped out from nowhere and ran along the mist drops.

Mesmerized by the golden sparks against the silver mist, Mya involuntarily released more sparks of lightning within her, soon there were dozens of sparks bouncing along the mists.

At first, they bounced around wildly, but as the mists swirled, the sparks were gradually guided into a smooth whirlpool of golden light.

As the sparks settled, a few strands of the mist flew deeper toward a part of her mind she didn't know about, there was a burst of pain, and he freed her mind.

Mya let out a gasp as her eyes fluttered open, Illyan had walked out of the garden as soon as her eyes opened.

"Wait! Wait…What happened?" she rushed after him.

"I'm not sure yet, I need to check something." His jaw was tensed, and he seemed like a cornered animal ready to strike out.

Sensing his horrible mood she decided to let him be, she wasn't sure what had gone wrong, but she definitely didn't want to get attacked.

He left her and hurried away, leaving Mya worried and pensive.

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As soon as he got away from her, he teleported into a soundproof room, and started to smash everything in there. Closing his eyes he tried to calm his mind, he had seen the object of his nightmares, the leftover traces of her magic in Mya's mind.

In his disgust, he had destroyed every bit of it, nearly killing the innocent girl. However, that wasn't what had forced him to leave, he had seen more.

In the depths of her soul, he had sensed a mix of multiple things, a darkness beyond measure and a purity beyond compare.

He had sensed a power far beyond the world they lived in, he wasn't sure what kind of plans had been made with Mya's life, but he couldn't risk getting involved.

'So, are you going to turn away? Leave her to fend for herself like you had to?' He stopped himself, freezing up.

*Let her figure it out herself. You answer to someone else after all* Illyan shook his head, clenching his fist.

A familiar voice began to speak to his mind, to bring up his past.

*You were an abomination, but she isn't, you have nobody, but she does. Why should you help her? *

* She is a pawn just as you are, it will be far better for her to return to me. *

Illyan knew, he knew that helping someone like her would get him in a lot of trouble. But he didn't want to listen, not to Madeleine.

The voice in his head was the reason why he had lost most of his humanity, it was a voice that was determined to darken the hearts of anyone strong enough to bear the burden.

Realizing that it couldn't make him abandon her, it changed its tactics. *She is a fool, you've seen her past, she would never survive…Unless you let her go there, but as your pawn. *

Illyan's brows furrowed, he wasn't sure what it was getting at, 'What do you mean?' The voice went silent, letting him figure it out.

'I'll train her then; she'll have to go there anyway…someday' he had mixed feelings. He knew how much he went through to get to the upper realm, and it had nearly destroyed him.

He shook his head, leaving the thoughts of the consequences aside, he would train Maaike and let everything run its course.

He fixed his dishevelled appearance, teleporting back to the training lobby, Mya was already there with Alyssa.

As soon as he appeared, her head snapped up, she watched him warily but there was still concern in her gaze. Pushing down the feeling of dread swelling within him, he walked over to her.

"Ahem…I'll train you." Mya's brows went up in surprise and the confusion was evident in her expression.

He suppressed a chuckle at how obviously her feelings were displayed, even the talkative Alyssa was capable of masking her true emotions, yet here was an innocent daughter of an alpha.

"I said I'll train you. No, it has nothing to do with the witch, I'll take care of her, and you'll focus on learning to control your powers."

She blinked slowly, bewildered at the sudden decision, "Your power is stronger than anything, and there's much you don't know about it."

"What do you mean?" she was sceptical, his disposition had changed so quickly.

"Don't worry your little head with such things…" he muttered as his eyes flashed a bright red.

"You read my mind." She accused.

"Not really…I'm empathic, I read your emotions. It takes a lot of energy to read minds." Alyssa snorted at that, and he shot her a look.

Mya looked between the two of them, trying to figure out if he was lying or not. Unable to tell, she pushed it to the back of her mind, missing the slight curl of Illyan's lips at her thought.

"Fine…I'll let you train me."

"No. I chose to train you, I'll be your mentor." He left after making this declaration, giving Mya no chance of refutation.

Alyssa turned to her pouting, "I didn't even get to have him as my mentor. And I thought I was his favourite."

Mya shook her head at her, "I thought you said he wasn't a good guy?"

"I also said he's a good teacher. Anyway, you have to be careful, most of the students are going to give you a hard time."

"Why? I wasn't the one who asked him to train me though?"

"No, but there's a lot of competition between them to get him to take one of them under his wing, I got a lot of hate because he lets me get away with a lot of stuff." A smug smile flashed across her face.

"Like skipping practice." She pulled Mya behind her as they ran out of the building.

"He'll start training you tomorrow so we gotta rest up!" She yelled as they headed out of the maze of paths and home.