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“Extremely sensitive,” Kallan interjected.
Kieran continued like Kallan hadn’t interrupted. “They can feel Energy and manipulate it. They could draw it to them and use it however they wanted. Everything has Energy. That’s one of the most important things to remember. Everything has Energy you can use.” His face was serious as he stressed that point and Claire nodded to show she understood.
“One can use Energy to sense disturbances in one’s environment. This could be sensing which plants are sick and where to find water. You can use it to sense creatures around you and determine if they are friend or foe.”
“How do you do that?” Claire interjected. “Tell their intentions? You mentioned that last night.”
Kieran thought for a moment. “It’s advanced work for sure. It’s about reading the sensitivities in the Energy. It’s like…” He paused and thought some more. “You have to break down the Energy of a person. It’s not enough to feel their Energy, you have to break it down to the smallest unit and then… you just feel it. You can feel when the Energy is bad or tainted or when it’s good.”
Claire nodded slowly. “I think I’ve felt it before.” She quickly told the twins about feeling the dark magic and Kieran nodded.
“It does feel like that. You are already advanced if you are feeling the differences. It shouldn’t take you too long to pick it up.”
A thought struck Claire. “Is that what you did with that Council guard? Sucked the Energy out of him?”
Kieran and Kallan exchanged a look and Claire bit back a sound of frustration. The twins had their own secret language of sorts it seemed, filled with silent looks.
“Sort of,” Kieran said. “I did use Energy but there’s another specific ability associated with our family line. Have you heard of metal manipulation?”
Claire bit her lip. “Like Metallicum?”
Kieran raised his eyebrows. “You know about Metallicum?”
Claire tilted her head, biting her lip. Was the sliver of metal in Malcolm’s hoard not supposed to be there? She decided to be honest. “Yes. Malcolm has a sliver of it. There aren’t a lot of books on it. The Academy pulled everything on the Fae and Elves when the war started.”
Claire was getting really tired of watching Kieran and Kallan exchange looks and not share their thoughts aloud. “What is it?”
“That was one of the questions after the barrier went up, what happened to those books. There were fears that if the books were available then someone could figure out how to break Winona and Erick’s barrier.”
Claire bit her lip. She hadn’t thought about that. She thought of the books she left in the Postulationem room. Hopefully, the Academy would continue to keep them safe.
“Metallicum is… a separate but related topic,” Kieran said. “But metal affinities are unique to the Fae and specifically unique to our family line. When properly taught, a Fae can manipulate metal in all forms. It’s what made your father such a great craftsman.”
Claire nodded, that made sense. “So how does that relate to what you did to the Council guard?”
“Metal is in a lot more places than people think. There’s even traces of it in blood.”
“In blood?” Claire was shocked.
“Yes,” Kieran nodded. “Just small traces but a metal affinity user can sense them.”
“So you what, pulled it out of them?” Her stomach rolled the contents of her breakfast over in her stomach.
“Kind of, yes. Metal, while it doesn’t hold much of its own natural Energy, is a great conductor of Energy. I essentially used the metal in his blood to conduct his Energy out of his body. Quickly.”
“Holy Realm!” The words burst from Claire’s mouth before she could stop them. Sucking all of the Energy out of something or someone could kill them. What Kieran was talking about… Would she be able to do that? Would she be able to stomach that? What if she did it accidentally if her magic spun out of control again?
“We aren’t starting there,” Kallan said, shooting Kieran a look. “We are just going to focus today on feeling metal and learning how to conduct with it.”
“What about the Metallicum?” Claire came back to her earlier question. “I thought that sucked Energy.”
Kieran shook his head. “Not exactly. It can suck Energy but it can also be used as a powerful conduit as well. But you have to really learn how to use it as it’s a dangerous metal to work with untrained. It’s very rare too and hard to come by. It’s closely guarded here.”
Hmm, Claire thought over Kieran’s words. If Metallicum could both suck in Energy and be a powerful conduit, maybe it was one of the ingredients on the Council’s list. Maybe her Triad and friends would find something to corroborate that.
Speaking of her Triad, she felt Malcolm check in with her down their bonds, a soft questioning feeling like he didn’t want to distract her if she was focusing. She sent down warm feelings of safety and comfort back. She was fine. Just learning a lot.
“Okay,” Claire said, taking a breath and rubbing her hands together. “Teach me how to use this metal affinity.”
