Raising Beautiful 03

A.N. Thank you for returning! If you are just joining me and want to start from the beginning of the story, please at least make it to chapter two before you make any final decisions. In a few chapters I will see about learning how to resubmit that first chapter and fix a few of its issues.

~~~

SILVANUS:

"Howdy," came a sleepy mumble from above him. Silvanus was sitting on the floor, back leaning against the wooden frame that kept the cots off the floor. When he looked up Zorah was peeking over the edge at him.

"We need to teach you to meditate," Silvanus informed her. "That is most likely your problem. Corian and I both assumed the other did it,"

"What? Why?" Zorah seemed quite out of it. "Where is Corian?" Zorah glanced around the small room.

"She left a while ago to practice enchanting things. Meditation, let me explain. Actually, first tell me what you understand about these two worlds and how you get back and forth,"

"Humn, well, when I go to sleep my consciousness wakes up in my second body. I think its more dimensional than space because otherwise I would be sleeping for as long as I am wake here and vice versa. Even if time traveled at different rates I would pay for it somewhere. And I was just at home before waking up here, So I just lived an entire day on Earth and its only been a few hours here. However yesterday, I went through whole day here in the six hours of sleep that I got,"

"You seem to understand the concept pretty well," Silvanus mentioned, thought a moment then continued, "I will clarify a few things. When you bounce back and forth from one world to the next, your consciousness, or soul, doesn't get any down time. I am not going to lie, I might only be twenty something years old, six I think. Regardless, I have lived over 50 years, my ages in the different worlds are not the same because I've taken more naps in this world or that one and stayed awake for days strait in yet another. They start to get out of alignment pretty quick,"

"What about paradox? If people visit lots of worlds and one person moves more quickly from one to another than cant they just tell each other the future and change it?" Zorah cut in.

"Ahh, that is a whole debate in and of itself. There are different, how to put it? Regulations? On each world. But we can discuss that when you understand more. Right now, don't worry about it and know that here it rarely happens. So back to what I was saying, dreams are vital to us humans and they allow our brain to process what has happened, what we learned etc. Mediation is a substitute to dreaming. It is rare that you will ever actually dream anymore. When you sleep your body is resting but not your mind,"

"My mind and body didn't really rest before. Before this trip I never slept all night long. My parents were thinking of taking me in for a sleep study,"

"Your body sleeps now I am sure"

"Yes, I am. Why is that?"

"Your mind was too stressed to catalog your day through dreams and kept disrupting the process. Now its forced to be somewhere else so your body is doing its job properly without your minds interference,"

"Thinking about it it has been a lot harder to concentrate in my classes on Earth, and I have been extra grouchy. Wait, your telling me my mind has ADD? I thought it was just the distraction of being here, but now I am thinking its the lack of rest,"

"ADD?"

"Attention deficit disorder"

"I suppose so," Silvanus said slowly, not sure what she was really talking about, "Let's do something to fix everything," Silvanus said, standing up and climbing onto the cots with her. "Find a comfortable position that you wont be likely to fall asleep in,"

Zorah crossed her legs and sat against one of the walls. Silvanus did the same. She laid her arms on her knees, palms up like the traditional meditation stance. Silvanus tucked his arms behind him in the small space between his hips and the wall, leaned his head back and closed his eyes. "Won't your arms fall asleep like that?" Zorah asked, looking at him through one eye.

"Never has," Silvanus cleared his throat. "Now take deep breaths and focus on nothing but the sound of your breath. Well, and today my voice. Practice breathing a few times," They did so and when he heard her tempo level out he said, as gently as he could so he did not break her rhythm, "slowly open your eyes and find something to look at. Many people study their hands, at home I like to watch the dust floating in the last few sun rays that float through my window," Zorah's eyes slowly opened and she slip them upward until they met his and locked in place. Her breathing never faltered.

"Your main goal is to stop your thoughts, bring silence to your mind, focus solely on this object before you. When you feel the last of your thoughts drifting away and your mind fuzzing, let it. You can either let your eyes close or keep them open without seeing. Breathing with your stomach and centering all of your energy there should be your next priority. That's it, breathe,"

Silvanus saw the glazed look come over Zorah and her eyelids flutter shut. When they did he suddenly missed looking into her eyes, they were a hazel green with one brown streak. "Breathe in, focusing yourself into a small compact ball, breathe out, feeling your awareness grow and push against your own skin. In, compact, out, skin. In, compact, out and to this room. In, compact, out, room," Silvanus started feeling a tingle graze over him with every breath she took. It was like laying on the shore with waves gently washing over him. He prompted her to expand herself as large as the world and as small as sand. Then he moved her up to her heart, listening to its beating chambers, feeling herself becoming balanced like the tempo. Then they moved up to her mind, prompting her to sort her needs, desires, emotions and memories. Then he slowly drew her out of it having her expand back to fit within herself and open her eyes. When those unique eyes cleared, the gentle buzzing on Silvanus' skin stopped.

"Your a natural," Corian said quietly. Silvanus jumped slightly and saw his sister in the doorway, content smile on her face, a little jar in her hands. Her toes were pressed against the bottom of the door frame, and her back was against the other side. Almost as if she were sitting in the air. "I am just glad I did not disturb your lesson. Zorah, you should do that at every time you switch worlds. Either right before or right after. It is good to work it into the world with the less busy schedule,"

"Thank you," Zorah said, slightly hoarse, "I am already feeling a lot better. I am not sure if I can do it without help yet though,"

"As you practice every day your brain will know what you want and take over. It is like riding a horse, your legs and butt gets very sore the first few times, but if you keep at it it becomes so natural that the even after years you can hop back on and ride like you were on the day before," Silvanus remarked.

Zorah's stomach let out a giant rumble, "Food?"

"Food!" Corian and Silvanus said together. As his sister came fully into the room to put away the jar she had. Silvanus caught the unmistakable scent of sex as she whisked by. Nostrils flaring, he tried to catch her eyes but she was being overly obvious about not looking right at him.

Deciding it was none of his concern, after all he had warned her yesterday about her egg, he just set about ignoring her and the smell. Besides with how long this journey was going to be he was going to have to learn to live without breathing. Rarely anyone was still marginally tolerable by the end of a trip with such poor living conditions and lack of sanitary facilities. After all there was a disgusting pot just outside their door.

~~

ZORAH:

They kept the cots together and slept in a row that night; Silvanus at the edge, Corian in the middle, and Zorah against the damp wall.

There was an odd scratching rustle against the boat wall. It jolted Zorah awake. She listened intently for the strange sound again and was rewarded just before giving up. "Wake up!" She whispered in a panic, pausing when she though she heard two voices say it.

Corian and Silvanus were instantly awake. They both looked around in confusion, not knowing why they were suddenly sitting up. In the dim light Zorah got their attention and pointed at the wall just as the scratching noise came again, further up.

"Someone is scaling the boat!" Silvanus whispered, he lunged out of bed, drawing on his boots and grabbing his staff. "Get your stuff, lets check it out and see if we need to wake anyone else. Corian, I need you to scout it out and let me know,"

She vanished and their door opened. Within minutes Corian's voice came from beside them. Zorah and Silvanus had silently left their room and climbed up to the last bit of shadow leading to the main deck.

"Its not a huge group, I only spotted one Mage. Most of the men have concealment spells on them. I should be able to counter that, here Zorah, I have to wait to the last minute to enchant your staff, it is too high of a level spell for me to safely do without alerting the other Mage. Do you want me to inform the Captain?"

"Yes, sneak in there and let him know. Any other hands would be appreciated, They are just after the cargo, but they will still try and kill you if they attack you. Zorah, your barely trained, if you don't want to do this that is fine-"

"Are you kidding, this is the most exciting thing I have ever done. If I don't go out there soon I might lose my gumption, though, so let's hurry. Besides, when Corian enchants my staff, I will be fine, I hold my own quite well against you after all," Zorah cut in in a rushed hushed voice.

"I don't want to worry you, but even though I am good, I do go a little easy on you, and I have no idea their skill levels. Your best bet is to dump them overboard, It is quite difficult for a beginner to knock someone out and you wont have time for the required effort with multiple attackers," Silvanus held up an arm as one of the men came near. When it sounded like he stopped moving just outside where they were. Silvanus drew in close to Zorah's ear, his breath making her shiver, "Wait Corian 'ignal. Run to. Enchant 'aff," Silvanus said in a voice so deadly quiet Zorah was almost sure she heard it in her mind not her ear. She was also a little proud that she knew he purposefully dropped the S'es because they are the loudest whisper sound.

A lamp was lit, orange glow spilling over the main deck. Before Zorah had time to realize that a shout accompanied it and a crack of a bell sounded, Silvanus had darted, lightning fast out from around her. The silhouette of him in the doorway, accompanied by the crack of wood against skull terrified Zorah for a moment. When her breath returned, accompanied by the slump of the victims body, she scurried after him, peering through the bright light for Corian.

Zorah heard her chanting before she saw her, She was right outside the captains door, arms raised, wind billowing around her. Zorah took off at a sprint for her, cursing when her knee almost gave out at the sudden turn and slip of her shoe. Her knees never were the greatest. But she grit her teeth and made the mad dash.

Just before she got there, a body imposed itself before her. "NO!" She screamed, her voice scattering across the deck, reverberating off everything round her, sounding odd. Seeing the man before her pause, she took advantage of the moist ground and ropes near her. Stepping on the ropes for traction, she threw herself under his upraised arm and slid to Corian's feet like a baseball player sliding home.

Corian was hesitating, probably with the same confusion as the man at Zorah's outburst, resumed motion. The sounds on the deck caught up to Zorah as she stood, holding out her staff for Corian, Somehow holding a note throughout, potentially with her outstretched hand, Corian quickly ran through the incantation and resumed her previous spell. Once Zorah felt the rush of air, she turned and rapped the oncoming man on the head. Unfortunately, this only stunned him and he still tackled the two of them.

A yell came from across the ship and suddenly more people were coming at them. Corian hiked Zorah up from the main deck to the quarter deck.

"Run!" Corian shouts, but Zorah figures they are coming for Corian to stop the Mage, so she drops her staff, turns and catches Corian's hands. With the strength that women have only in extreme circumstances like giving birth for 48 hours or when their children are trapped under a car, Zorah lifted Corian out form the mans grasp and onto the deck with her as if the railing were no obstacle, however, her shoulders did scream a decent protest. Corian grabbed the staff and handed it back to Zorah. They ran to the stern of the skip and Zorah placed herself between Corian and the oncoming men.

Signaling that Corian should continue, Zorah shifted into her ready stance. Immediately she swung at the nearest attacker and was shocked at his feeble effort to dodge the attack, but did not succeed. Either she caught him off guard, or Silvanus was better. She did not have time to ponder the fact that he should not be off guard in a battle so she swung again to get him to side step to the left. Twisting her staff under his leg Zorah used he knee as leverage turned him end over end into the sea below. Being at the highest part of the ship, that had to hurt.

The second one was getting too close to Corian for Zorah's comfort and she lunged at him like a football player, sending him spewing over the raining. It was that same railing that Zorah was clinging to for dear life, staff tucked oddly to free her hands. She had charged too hard. Zorah started to panic as she felt a large hand yank on her pants, but the familiar pat of Silvanus' hand on her shoulder when she was stable again told her who it was. She had not thought twice about it previously, but he did that every time he brought her back to standing. When she turned, drawing her staff once again to the ready, she whispered, "Let's take them out," and sprung into action again with Silvanus by her side and Corian helping from behind.

Silvanus took the lead, and gripped Zorah's staff, pulling both of her hands to one end with his. As he did so, he led her in the motions to jab the next guy in the gut, catching his belt and use his own momentum to swing it in such a way that they 'scooped' the man up and flung him over the edge to follow his companion. The two smirked when there was a yell, deep splashing sound, and a nasty gurgle. "Fight well little girl," Silvanus said as they separated slightly to better fight the growing mob.

"I thought you said there was not many!" Silvanus hollered at his sister a few splashes later.

"There wasn't!" She cried in between chants.

Silvanus got two more over the edge and Zorah got one, when the enemy started to catch on. There was a large, brutish man, who came between Zorah and Silvanus next. Silvanus was preoccupied, which left this man to Zorah; she was not pleased. getting a few good hits in, but also got one dizzying one in return, Zorah needed a new angle. Looking around between exchanged blows, she saw an opening, yelled, "SILV!" As she thrust one end of her staff at him. Not paying much attention, Silvanus grabbed it as his usual reflex whenever she had tried that during training. Zorah shifted her grip and started to shove it towards the large man, After a quarter glance of confusion, Silvanus shifted his grip and joined in her effort. They succeeded in tripping him, the edge of the quarter deck was behind him so he couldn't back up, and when he tried to step over and grab at them he took a nasty fall. Due to his placement, his chin cam down on the edge of the wood that supported the mast. A sickening crunch sounded, his neck, and jaw quite broken. "Nice," Silvanus shouted as he refocused his efforts on getting his fifth man over the edge with growing difficulty. Out of the corner of her eye it did seem that he was causing a lot more pain with each of his hits than she could hope to do. In fact at one point Zorah swore she saw him grab a mans arm and he started flailing like he was burned.

In her distraction, Zorah knew she got in a predicament, the tree of them were being separated. There was now room for two men to approach Zorah at once. After temporarily removing one man from the fight, Zorah ducked under the arm of another and came to face one excessively large man, who more closely resembled an ogre. Choking down panic, Zorah fought on.

She ended up practically under then Ogre-man and her staff was tucked in close. Hanging on by her teeth to her welling panic, Zorah boosted the staff upward. There was a sickening pop, that sounded nothing like the crunch of broken bones from before, and as that filtered into Zorah's foggy mind a dark salty liquid ran down her face. The familiar smell of iron sent her skin crawling. She stifled a scream as she clamped her mouth shut, nostrils flaring dangerously as she tried to breathe.

The Ogre-man's weight started to shift and slid down towards her. But her staff was stuck, pressing her officially into full panic mode, Zorah started flailing her staff around trying to get it free. The two of them tumbled to the ground. The new crushing weight on her leg, and sharp pain in her back caused a shrill scream to escape her lips.

The weight moved and Zorah tried to scramble away, her staff lost. Clutching around for something to defend herself Zorah found another staff, it was very top heavy and had a strange handle. When the next man advanced on her she shifted her grip and screamed again, fire shooting through her hand. Eyes wide she searched for Silvanus. She was screaming again and she was heaved up and tossed somewhere, A tight pressure spreading across her arm. Suddenly there was a face laying practically in her lap, its body missing, there was a loud noise that was piercing the area and Zorah wished it would stop. Her breath was gone and darkness was overtaking most of her vision. She barley saw the glint of metal before it sliced her shoulder.

Zorah did not want to be awake, she did not want to hurt, but there was only a slight gurgling sound when she tried to say this. She could barley do much more than focus on her raspy breath. A face floated in front of her, and then everything was dark.

~~

ALAM:

Waking with a start, he felt himself being pulled into a vision. Preferring to sleep he started to fight it, but saw the image of Zorah sitting alert in her bed he decided against it and let it happen.

By the time Alam fully sunk into the vision the three of them were frantically getting shoes on and Corian winked out of sight. Zorah and Silvanus were edging towards the deck. Alam was growing nervous as they readied their staffs. When they emerged onto the deck, Alam got the full picture and took in a sharp breath.

Alam saw the first man fall, Zorah run for Corian, stumbling on the way. He tried to warn her when one of the men spotted her, but of course she could not hear him. Zorah yelled something and the entire boat stood still. Both Mages were halted in their enchantments, Silvanus and all the other men drew still.

That was why he woke! Why he was pulled into the vision, Zorah was using her power!

Everyone resumed motion when Zorah slammed into Corian who enchanted her staff. When they were tackled and Corian's spell interrupted, the other Mage thought Corian was responsible and pointed at them yelling something. A smaller boat down below sent off a flare. The men on-board converged on the two of them. There were many people coming up from the cabin below, and the Captain and their guard were trying their best to dislodge the ropes from the railings. But they were adhered mostly by magical means and Corian was busy on the quarter deck with Zorah. Silvanus, fighting through the growing mob to get to them as well.