Page 84 of Legacy Elite

"You're welcome."

She glares. There's a small vicious pleasure in that which I do not examine.

"Right," she says. "So what do I do about it?"

Good. That's the thing about her. She'll be furious with you for ninety seconds and then ask the correct question.

"Tell me what it feels like."

"What what feels like?"

"The shift. Not the wolf. The part before the wolf." I fold my arms. "The very first thing you notice."

She thinks about it, and it takes her a moment, and I watch her turn her attention inward.

"Heat," she says. "Under the skin. Like a door opening on a hot room. And—" she puts her hand up behind her own neck "—here. It goes tight. Right at the base of the skull. That's always first. Then the world gets closer."

"Where does the heat start?"

"What?"

"Not where you feel it. Where it begins."

She opens her mouth. Closes it.

Then puts her palm flat against her sternum.

"There," she says, and looks slightly surprised at herself.

"Then that's the exercise," I say. "Forget the wolf. Forget the finish. Find that, and then choose it."

She looks down at her own hand.

"That's actually helpful."

"Yes."

"Don't be smug, it doesn't suit you."

It does, but I let her have it.

I shift for her, because describing a thing you can demonstrate is a waste of both our time.

Wolf, and back, twice — a second each way, no windup, no preparation. There's nothing impressive in it. I've been doing it since I was nine and my father made me do it four hundred times in a courtyard until it stopped being an event.

Jessica watches with an expression I would describe as personally offended.

"Show-off," she says.

"Yes."

"That's not even — you didn't do anything. You just changed. Like a channel."

"The speed isn't the point." I roll my shoulders. "I could take a minute over it if I wanted. Slower isn't worse. The point is that I know exactly where it starts, so I can put my hand on it whenever I want it."

"And you learned that by—"

"Repetition. Four hundred times in a courtyard."