Intrinsic

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"So...how did it feel?" Elara asked as she stepped up beside Thane, still basking in the afterglow of harmony. 

"Like nothing I have ever felt before," Thane replied, his voice barely audible before he glanced at Elara, "W-what was it?" 

A rare smile crossed the Fae queen's dark lips, "Intrinsic Magic, the most raw and primal utilization of mana." 

"Intrinsic..." Thane echoed with a mutter before nodding in agreement, "Natural and essential, the magic woven into the fabric of reality itself...I could hear it all around me." 

Elara nodded, "Mana is the source of all; it's only natural that everything seeks to be touched by it and infused with its essence." 

A slight frown marred Thane's elation, "Some notes I could barely hear, but others were early deafening? Why the disparity?" 

"Others?" Elara asked with interest. 

"Stone, fire, and metal," Thane answered, "I could hear them the clearest...it was almost as if they were speaking to me." 

"While the harmony is the greatest sum of all creations, we each hear it differently. The notes that stand out clearest to you are called Attunements. You should take pride in having so many." Elara complimented another rarity for her. 

Thane smiled before a question spawned in his mind, "The Harmony....does it ever talk to those that can hear it?" 

Elara blinked, and her lips twitched into a slight frown, "Not that I know of; why do you ask?" 

"I heard a voice...it told me to answer the Harmony..." Thane trailed off as he recalled the deep, growling voice and remembered a crucial detail, "The voice came from within...I could feel it in the back of my mind...as if it had always been there." 

"What else did it say," Elara asked inquisitively. 

Thane shook his head, "Not much. It was tiring quickly, But when the voice stopped talking, it sang out in tune with the harmony." 

"Can you remember the note?" 

"I can try," Thane replied, doubting the feats of magic he could perform with his reserves so depleted. But the moment Thane reached the depths of his mind, trying to recall the bassy pitch, it flooded forth with a fervor. 

With all the subtlety of a volcano exploding, the note swept through Thane, making his blood boil, his skin crack like the sun-baked earth, and turning his lungs into a pair of burning bellows. 

Suddenly, Thane longed for the sweltering heat forge as the fire raged to life inside of him, and his heart beat like a war drum. Stumbling, Thane gripped the edge of the anvil and hunched over as he gasped, watching embers light up his breath, and the skin on his forearms gain a diamond-like pattern. 

Suddenly, Elara was crouching beside Thane putting a supportive hand on the small of his back, "Breathe, Thane, breathe. The first time is always the worst." 

"What's happening to me," Thane asked through a choked gasp as the fire continued to burn away inside of him.

"You've awakened the beast within your soul," Elara explained, and Thane grasped onto her words like a lifeline, "Do not fight the change; it is a part of you, and you are a part of it." 

Even if he had wanted to, Thane could not respond as the inferno inside of him had reached such levels that Thane's jaw was clamped shut from the pain. With the inferno reaching its apex, Thane's body could no longer withstand the heat, and his skin started to crack and flake off. But instead of exposing the underlying layers of tender pink flesh, tiny specks of silver shone through like stars. 

Thane started to swell, and he tripled in size in a matter of moments. The sudden change caused his skin to flake off in great sheets, revealing that the silver specks were countless triangular metallic scales overlapping to form a natural coat of armor. 

Elara took a step back as she thrust out her hands, conducting her magic as the forge around them shifted, quickly expanding in size in order to fit Thane's new stature. 

The change went unnoticed by Thane, who was wholly enraptured by the transformation besetting his body, unable to process the fundamental changes afflicting him. Collapsing to the floor, Thane felt his bones crack and shift, forming new joints, while his spine elongated and protruded from his skin, forming a ridge of spines down the length of Thane's. His jaw that had been clenched shut like a vice, cracked as his mouth elongated into a snout, and his old teeth clattered to the floor, replaced by gleaming three-inch longs fangs that overlapped, forming a perfect seal that would trap anything unfortunate enough to stray with range. 

By this point, Thane had adapted to the fire burning inside his body; the pain had burned away his old nerves, refining them into ones that not only tolerated the heat but sought it out like a soothing balm. 

Thane let out a sigh as he felt his body settle into place, finally finishing its rapid transformation. But as he opened his eyes and raised his head, awareness swept over his new form, leaving Thane struggling to understand the flood of new sensations washing through his mind. 

The first change Thane noticed was his vision. Every color and detail seemed to jump out at him with such crystal-clear clarity that it was almost overwhelming. It was the same for all of Thane's other senses. He could taste and smell the forge to such a startling degree that Thane could detect the metallic composition of the anvil and every tool in the forge. 

But another smell painted the air, one that Thane could not give word or meaning to as his long serpentine tongue flicked out to taste it. But after looking around at his transfigured surroundings, Thane realized it was, 'Mana...I'm tasting and smelling mana.' 

"Overwhelming, isn't it?" 

Thane glanced down and over at Elara, who stared up at him in return. From the distance between them, Thane judged that he stood at least fifteen feet tall. 

"Yes," Thane replied in a familiar, deep, rumbling voice, the same one that had spoken in his head, "More than just the sharpened senses, I have new memories as well. They are similar to my existing ones but from a new perspective. They date all the way back to the night I completed my Animagus ritual...but this form is different from the one I remember." 

Pushing himself up, Thane slowly stood on all four limbs, each densely covered in scales, with powerful muscles rippling underneath to support his immense weight. 

Looking down, Thane stared at the five metallic claws on each of his forelimbs. Dragging them gently across the stone floor earth left deep furrows without resistance. A deep growl of satisfaction reverberated through Thane's body as a deep primal part of his subconscious took pride in his deadly capabilities. 

Continuing his physical introspection, Thane started at his head, feeling the weight of two horns curved up into the air just above his browline. Thane also flexed his jaw, feeling the powerful muscle capable of delivering a crushing bite with countless teeth. He trailed down his back, tracing the curved spikes that followed his spine down to his tail, which was relatively thick and studded with even more spikes like a bludgeon. 

Believing Thane had finished his inspection, he turned to address Elara when he rolled his shoulders and felt a new series of muscles flex. 

Thane paused momentarily, suddenly aware of a drastic change in his physiology. Thane searched for the muscles again and found them attached to his shoulder joints. A powerful tingling sensation passed through the joint as his nerve endings awakened. 

Thane flexed the newly discovered parts of himself, and a sense of exhilaration rushed through Thane as his wings unfurled around him, resembling a five-pointed star. But they were more than simple wings. The thin-scaled membrane extended from a pair of two fully functional arms far larger than his forelimbs and equipped with two massive clawed hands. 

"Yes, I'd say this form is far more...distinct compared to your previous one," Elara commented. 

"But why the change?" Thane asked. 

"I believe that your awakening ritual somehow interacted with the Animagus residing in your soul." Elara answered, "To be transparent, Thalion, Solara, and I debated whether to stop your attempts to perform the animagus ritual. Usually, Fae children unlock their animal forms when they come of age." 

"So what is this the Fae version of puberty?" Thane asked jokingly, only for Elara to smile somewhat cruelly, quickly souring Thane's humor.