Molun beamed at him.
“Want to sit here with me and mess with them? Did Brannal say you couldn’t use your element once you were out?”
An even bigger smile crept across Molun’s face.
“He absolutely failed to say that,” he said very happily.
A very ruffled-looking Delana was the next one to appear, and Molun was polite and didn’t douse her with water because she looked annoyed enough as it was.
“Nisal is sneaky,” she said, sounding disgruntled but impressed.
Perian would not disagree with that assessment.
That left Arvus and Nisal out there, and whatever Brannal was doing to track them and help or hinder.
It got very quiet for a while, and then Perian saw motion out of the corner of his eye. Arvus was reaching for him just as Molun—and possibly also Delana given the amount of water—soaked him to the skin.
And then a hand plucked at his sleeve.
Chapter Thirteen
He turned. Nisal was standing there.
“Where didyoucome from?” Perian wanted to know.
They smiled at him as his question was echoed by all of the others, especially the very wet Arvus.
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” they said, sounding very satisfied.
“It’s one of the most effective ways to attack,” Brannal said, making them whirl again as he stepped out of the forest. “Wait for a distraction.”
Perian clapped a hand to his chest. “Yeah, maybe itisbetter that I was just sitting here with a book. You’re all really good at that. Wow.” He looked back at Nisal. “Wheredidyou come from?”
They pointed at the water.
Perian blinked at them, looked out to the water, and then looked back at Nisal.
“Uh, aren’t you kind of dry for that?”
“I wrapped myself in air,” they said.
“You can do that?” Perianasked, surprised.
They nodded. “It’s not easy.”
“No, it’s not,” Molun and Brannal said at the same time, both sounding impressed.
Nisal shrugged. “I waited until I saw Arvus sneaking up and then floated across the water when I knew you wouldn’t be watching, just those few feet, so I would be coming from a direction you weren’t looking for. And here I am.”
“Impressive,” Brannal said, and the others were nodding in agreement.
Nisal smiled, looking very pleased.
They sat down afterwards, and Brannal had them break down what they’d done and what they could have done differently. It had been the most playful type of training Perian had ever seen, but it had still been training, and he liked that Brannal didn’t just leave it at one person being the winner and the rest of them losing and that was the end of it. There was always something to be learned.
“Nisal, would you do it again?” Brannal asked.
“Not with this group,” Nisal answered promptly. “It works for surprise effect, and I judged it was worth trying; there wasn’t much to lose except the possibility of getting wet. But I was actually very open to attack out there had this been any sort of real battle. Had they looked up and seen me, I would have been done for, and I chose to get into an element that isn’t mine. I could maybe have dived under the water and swum to safety, but I couldn’t have counted on it.”
