ANCIENT LYCAN COMPREHENSION

I had to part with Robin and Charbear after lunch. They had English Language class, but on Mondays I had private lessons with Lady Amber on Lycan Language. This was because I had alpha blood, and only those of alpha bloodlines (and sometimes beta bloodlines and specialized scholars) were allowed to learn how to read and write in Lycan.

It was a very troublesome language. Officially, there were three types of Lycan. The modern lycan language (which wasn't modern at all). This was what the "common wolves" would learn and the most employed in our classic lycan legends. They had no punctuation, interspersed poetry and prose, and traditionally were accompanied by hand painted illustrations.

Lycan was a strange language in that it was more often written than spoken.

The other two types of Lycan were Ancient Lycan, one more ancient than the other. The new Ancient Lycan was what the wolves in the Mountain used from their early court records and chronicles. It was also used in deep thought poetry and philosophical discourses and as a language for magic.

It was believed that the lycan magic was a particularly effective medium for wolf magic. The more ancient, the more powerful. I wouldn't know, since I had never learned any spells in lycan.

In the Colored Mountains, most wolves, including Alpha wolves, didn't speak any lycan normally. It was used in official letters (especially those between alphas), and peppered in daily speech among nobility like a classy speech accessory.

The even more Ancient Lycan was the language found in the wolf dens of the first wolves. There were a few similar words to the other Ancient Lycan, but it was styled differently and the rest was pretty much unpronounceable, so scholars had used Modern Lycan to sound it.

There was a fourth version of Lycan though. It was called the Forgotten Lycan, and legend had it that it was the language of the goddess, but the wolves could not understand it until they were gifted magical intelligence.

I had always imagined it was like how a wild dog would understand human speech, but Lady Amber assured me it was nothing like that. It was a far more profound interaction.

So anyway, I was the only Alpha Bloodline girl in my year, so I got the "privilege" of private lessons with Lady Amber.

Most of the lessons involved calligraphy, because Ancient Lycan was written with a brush. (Maybe the wolves used their tails to write? Hahahahaha. No, I didn't dare to suggest this to Lady Amber.)

Then we would study some old poems. Sometimes the poems would be in Ancient Lycan, sometimes a mix of Modern and Ancient Lycan.

"You have to understand, Kayla, language was magic to the wolves." Lady Amber had tried to explain, "Every poem was a spell that had to written from the heart."

Oh, was that why traditionally as pups, we were forced to memorize lines by heart? But when I asked, Lady Amber only gave me a strange look, "Maybe…"

"You read English with your mind, but Lycan has to be read with your heart." Lady Amber went on the explain.

I was never good at Lycan in any form. Most of the time, I just memorized its shapes and randomly slapped some kind of translation to it. Of course, it never went well for me. There was one test, where I had to interpret this paragraph. My answer looked something like this: "There is a magic bus that plays music and makes everyone feel glad to see it."

Which, if I had thought about it, would definitely be wrong since I doubt the ancient wolves had buses! But it was during a test, there was a time limit, and there were other questions and I didn't take the time to actually think about what the ancient wolves had in their world.

Anyway, the correct answer was some kind of flower (not "bus"), which daintily unfolds its petals to release a heavenly fragrance (nothing about music), which calms (not "feel glad") the mind and stills the seas (not "everyone").

I liked my answer better, and I mean, I felt my last part was not bad because the word "calm" and "glad" both shared similar parts, and "seas" and "everyone" looked the same because the ancient wolves believed that "everyone" looked like a "sea" of wolves when they were put together.

I passed the test, but barely, and only because there were multiplication choice questions in the first half.

Lady Amber was a very patient teacher, "There is no hurry, most students only truly blossom in their understanding of the lycan language in their senior year."

She wasn't results orientated either, "I would rather you grasp the language in its fullness than achieve full marks in a test."

I bet she would rather I could do both, but I was just a girl, it wasn't like I would received a report from another alpha like I did from Stephan in my last life. Oh! I could read that perfectly.

And I suddenly understood, I was struggling because I hadn't shifted yet. This was a wolf language, naturally learning the ABCs of it or even recognizing the shapes of each word wouldn't make any sense because only a wolf could actually string them together to make actual meaning.

But then again, if I never learned the shapes, my wolf wouldn't be able to read either.

Most of the time, Lady Amber was kind and good natured. My answers, no matter how much they were of the epic fail variety, never upset her. They did cause her some bewilderment and confusion, but she would give up understanding it after a while and move on to the next activity.

Lady Amber believed in language exposure. That was the belief that if she exposed me to the Ancient Lycan language enough, I would just naturally absorb it and become smart at it. So far, I must have a very thick skull because I don't think Lala was much better than Sam at the language - oh, but Lala's calligraphy was really pretty. Her hours of practiced really paid off.

So I was going to pass all my Lycan Language tests this year because 50% of it was on copying a passage or poem in calligraphy. The other 25% were multiple choice questions. The last 25% would test my interpretation and comprehension - which I think I knew, and Lady Amber knew, was going to be a lost cause.

By my graduating year, I was expected to write full essays in calligraphy. This was laughable given my current level, but Lady Amber was not one to give up on her students - even if I regularly misinterpreted basic words like "flower" and could only sound 1 in 5 syllabus in most texts.

But today I had a good plan to deal with this. In fact, I had 2 plans.

PLAN A: We return to the undo point and never have to take my exams.

PLAN B: We stay, but I shift and Boo would read for me.

Therefore, even though I was usually stressing out during lycan lessons because of how stressfully hard Lala found everything in the lesson except the calligraphy (she had to be the only illiterate wolf who could copy calligraphy so neatly), I wasn't stressed out today.

Because I knew that no matter how hopeless I seemed now, I would be able to read and understand lycan properly once I had my first shift and a proper Alpha Wolf to read it with.

"You're looking confident today, Kayla." Lady Amber noted, "Have you been practicing?"

I shook my head, "Not more than usual, but I think I will be able to do it naturally one day."

"Oh?" Lady Amber looked pleased, "Well, its good to have confidence in yourself."

When was I not confident in myself? I was the alpha! Of course I would be confident! Oh wait, I wasn't the alpha, on top of that, I had two older brothers - the first one seemed godlike because he was a full 8 years older than me, the second one was only 3 years older, but he was Fluffy, and Fluffy was a genius scholar type Alpha Wolf who skipped grades like it were hopscotch and was already in University at 17.

I guess growing up like that gave Lala lots of examples on how she wasn't that invincible or wonderful. It was the first time in my life when I had to reflect upon my own sense of confidence. Could it be that I had always been too confident? O.o

I had always been a "dumb pup," but I wasn't stupid enough to be incapable of learning. I was just really, really, unaware. Wow, epiphany.

Today's quote of the day (because Lady Amber liked to give this at the start of her lesson) was, "One does not fail to fly for the lack of trying but the lack of knowledge."

"What do you think this means, Kayla?" Lady Amber asked after helping me figure out how to read the lycan words. I mean, I would have explained it quite differently if it really said, "One does not break wind/sail on the nothing/naught of attempts nor the nothing/naught of knowledge." (I got "knowledge" right!)

"If I fail in anything, its cos I had been a dumb pup and didn't know any better, but if I learn more, I won't be dumb forever and I'd be able to know enough to succeed the next time I try." I surmised my earlier epiphany.

"Oh." Lady Amber blinked. It was borderline at her bewildered expression, and the possibility of me getting the answer very wrong flashed through my mind, and then Lady Amber nodded, "Well yes, I believe you're absolutely right."

And then she laughed, "You've never been a dumb pup though. Kayla, you're one of the brightest and loveliest young ladies I ever had the privilege of knowing."

Which I took as a huge compliment since Lady Amber literally admitted hundreds of new girls into her school every year.

Unfortunately, despite my momentarily breakthrough, today's comprehension passage exercise proved to be torturously mocking. If Lady Amber were any less gracious, she would have taken back saying that I wasn't a dumb pup. Even I hated myself.

After stumbling every five words to the end of the passage, I struggled to answer the questions. The first one was supposed to be easy, "Why did the author say the flowers in Spring were the most beautiful?"

Oh… we were talking about flowers? All along I thought it was about beautiful busses. Of course I didn't say this aloud. Instead I tried to look for the answer in the first paragraph, but all the author wrote was about waking up to the fresh Spring air.

At least I knew the passage wasn't about air fresheners installed in busses anymore. But at that moment, I remembered the smell of spring whenever I sat by the opened window in Dad's office, and the flowers that covered the fields on one of our orienteering trips with the Lycan Study Group, and Hayao's Field of a Thousand Deaths (minus the poisons, they were beautiful).

"Because flowers together are better than flowers alone?" I attempted, "Or flowers in Spring contrasts against no flowers in winter?"

Okay, I was just winging it - something that Kayla never had the confidence to do freely.

"Actually, I think the most beautiful flowers are also in Spring." Maybe I was being too free now, "Although I like how the roses bloom late in the Summer in my Grandmother's rose garden, in Spring, the flowers grow freely, no one needs to prune or fertilize them, and all kinds of flower can grow anywhere they like - in the fields, by the roadsides, up in the trees… and everyone can enjoy them for free."

"Oh." Lady Amber said. I don't think she knew what to make of that.

"Those are good answers, but look again at what the author says in line 7." Lady Amber decided to get back to the lesson plan.

I looked at line 7 and Lady Amber decided to read it for me, just to increase my chances of getting it, "Even before seeing the flowers, their scent is already in the air. Perhaps it is this scent of a thousand flowers, more than the sight of it, that stirs my wolf…"

The author should be careful. If it were Hayao's Field of a Thousand Flowers, the author's wolf would be dead. No, of course I didn't say this aloud. Aloud, I answered very properly, "Because the author liked the smell of spring flowers?"

We discussed the answer a little bit more to adjust my choice of words, and after that, while I was writing down my final answers, Lady Amber mused to herself, "I've always personally loved roses, but you're right, roses aren't free the way the flowers are in Spring."

If Lady Amber was speaking in Ancient Lycan, she was probably not talking so much about flowers, but about herself or something deep like that.

I nodded, because I was concentrating on writing neatly, I forgot to not say everything I thought aloud, "Yeah, but that's why roses are precious and wildflowers are mowed with the grass. Okay, finished!"

I showed Lady Amber my answer.

"You got this character wrong. It's written like this." Lady Amber showed me. And then our lesson went on as if nothing happened.