The Twelfth Moon || ✔️

64. Passing Days

After the thirteenth day of training, Loic and Reuben decided I needed to join some group training, as well. My mornings constituted training as a human, which seemed to progress quite easily.

During my first session, Loic confirmed that the approach would be very similar to Reuben's portion of my discipline. I soon learned it was - and since my human body was much smaller and more flexible, it was easier to find creative ways to play with shadows. And as a human, Loic also taught me the basics of how to hide inside - how to disappear into a wall, how the cloak myself behind a door.

As a human, I could use more objects to hide behind, under, or sometimes even up. After a few days, Loic instructed me to use the height in the trees. He explained that it was vital that I recognized the forest as more than just a collection of trees and bushes - but that I saw it as an endlessness of hiding spots. Everywhere I looked, I needed to find something to hide. Unless I was standing in an open, barren field, I would never be in a place where I wouldn't be able to conceal myself. And the same would go for my foes: if I could hide behind in a specific bush, so could another wolf. If I could find the shadows in the hallway, so could another wolf.

Wherever I went, someone else could go, too.

So even when I wasn't training, I was. During my duties at camp - which mostly involved the kitchen - I always looked for places to hide. Even when I was just walking around the camp, I caught my eyes trailing down every shadow, finding safety in places where I otherwise would never look.

And in the afternoons, I was accompanied by Reuben, who never truly seemed to warm up to me. His cold and distant stance harshly contrasted with Loic's, who was more playful in his teachings.

But the liberation of being able to shift every day made it easy to forget about Reuben's dislike of me. My wolven form was feeling more and more like a true part of me. Dell had only needed to supervise me for the first three days - after that, I had accustomed enough to my wolven side to be able to stick to the training. Running free, however, was still ill-advised.

My evenings were usually free. I often spent them with Jerr, who I otherwise barely saw as we were both tending to our duties during the day. I didn't really know what he was doing, and he didn't like talking about it, because he had two Alphas who seemed to have sworn him to secrecy.

Thankfully, my days were always eventful enough to fill our evening with chatter, and the rare, quiet moments we had, always made room for other activities to happen.

Tymen and I had gone training a few nights, too. I enjoyed his company, and I felt less pressured to perform in the presence of a friend. The first time he had offered to help me out, I had been hesitant about it. But Tymen soon convinced me that I needed to experience hiding under our Moon's light, too.

It felt different. It was misleading to assume it'd be easier to hide as the world was enveloped in the darkness of the night, so it took me a few tries to adapt to the nightly surroundings. But being under our Moon's wake, utilizing my senses when she danced in the skies - it was even more liberating than it was during the day.

My training sessions with Tymen got more playful every time - and the lack of burden only made it easier for me to grow my skills, which also shone through in my sessions with Loic and Reuben.

So during my first group training, I had been disappointed to find that Tymen wasn't present.

Training in a group was also vastly different than training with Tymen. I had more shadows to play with - but more people to hide from. And more people to find.

The main focus of this training was to hide as a group in combat. We were usually assigned in groups of four to five wolves, one of whom was blessed. The blessed wolf would create shadows for us to hide in, and we had to make sure we found those shadows, instead of letting the shadows find us.