Alexei wondered why this had happened to him many times before. He just gave up caring after a while and considered it part of life.

Hosanna and Ana had fallen asleep on Alexei's lap. Hosanna had felt unsafe in her hotel room, you see she claimed that someone had tried to get into her room earlier. So she came to Alexei, since he would never touch her. Pictor would not touch her either but he was not very good at the comforting of a distressed anyone.

In Alexei's personally opinion Hos could take care of anyone or anything that bothered to show up at her door. Of course his opinion did not matter at one in the morning.

He sighed, it was all he could really do at a time like this. He wanted to sleep himself, but it was very uncomfortable like this.

Bah. The morning would not be pleasant.

***

Hosanna screamed.

Alexei fell out of bed.

Anastasia clung to the bed post.

Simultaneously, Ana and Alexei looked towards the end of the bed. Both of them were quite shocked to see two odd creatures sitting there. One was pure black, and resembled a black cat, but it had a mane of flames. That definitely meant it was not a normal cat.

The other creature was red and cat like. It had little demon wings and devil horns to match. Really, there was no way to describe the creepiness of this creature as it was examining Hosanna.

The creatures both conversed with each other, ignoring the others in the room. The red one spoke first. "Do you honestly think she's the one?"

"Yes. For the last time Teivel, yes."

"But Ignatius! She doesn't look like she could be a priestess and control water. I mean she barely looks like she's capable of casting a spell."

The black one, Ignatius, smacked the red creatures upside the head. "How many times do I have to tell you looks can be deceiving!"

The red one, Teivel, whimpered. 

*Excuse me? Big black fangy fire cat?* Ana had gathered enough courage by listening in on their conversation. They seemed to be utterly harmless, and if they were looking for Hosanna how dangerous could they be?

The black cat hissed. "It's Ignatius, and I'm an elemental hunter cat. What do you want fuzzy ball?"

*Okay then. Mister Ignatius, I was curious if you were here to make friends with Hosanna.*

Ignatius seemed taken aback. "We came to ask for the priestess help or at least her wisdom."

Ana raised and eyebrow tuff, *Hos has wisdom?*

"I really should hope so."

*Oh. And what do you need her for?* Ana asked as Hosanna had crawled over to Alexei for "protection." Really that woman was useless under stress.

"Well... we want to ask her some questions about elemental magic and... such." The hunter cat looked to his companion, who shrugged. "May we speak with her alone?"

*So, Hosanna, these guys sound friendly. Why don't you accept their request?* Ana had let go of her bed post and had settled down at the bottom of the bed. She shuffled and waited for a response from the priestess.

"Well... could they let me go back to my room so I can dress decently? Then we could talk at breakfast..."

The hunter cat and whorling nodded and quickly scurried out of the room. Hosanna followed them shortly after, leaving the vampire and his bond to muse over what had just happened.

Alexei, half asleep, looked to his bondmate and asked, "How exactly did they get into the room?"

*I'm not really sure... maybe they used magic?*

The vampire blinked a few times. Speaking of magic was Ana not supposed to have magic to call her very own. "So Ana, don't you have magic yourself?"

The dragon blinked. *I... have to train with a mage to learn my abilities. At least that's what I think I'm supposed to do. I'm sure my mom told me something like that when I was an egg.*

"Really? Well... then we have plenty of options don't we." Alexei stood up and dusted himself off. Should he go to sleep or eat? He shrugged, it was six am and Pictor would never let him sleep past eight, so he would not get that much sleep if he went to bed now.

***

"So, you don't want to train with Hosanna for obvious reasons," Ziven was sitting on the window sill in the main dining hall as she spoke, "And you can't train with me because I don't have the skills to teach anyone. You can't train with Pictor either because he only knows Res magic." 

Anastasia sighed. *And Alexei knows no magic at all. So want can I do?* She looked over to Hosanna's conference,  everything seemed to be going well. It was nice to see that people were still kind to strangers.

Alexei watched Doushi hop down the stairs with Pictor following him. "Maybe Doushi knows someone who can help you. He has been around this world, and I'm sure a few others."

The fuzzy dragon fweed. Her bondmate was probably right! *Doushi! Do you know anyone who's powerful with magic and can teach me?*

The haken blinked with his mismatched eyes. He did know of someone who happened to frequent this town from time to time.  Should he tell the little dragon this? "Well, I do know of someone. A "misfit" of sorts, who happens to teach people about different kinds of magic. She's probably in this town right now." The haken watched the dragon's eye's fill with complete joy.

The male haken sighed, "If I tell Alexei the description will you go out with him and find her?"

She nodded.

"All right Alexei! You have to look for a small griffin whorling, who is black with a red main and tail, orange eyes and wings, who happens to be named Ryuuri. She travels with a canine whorling... who is quite interesting to say the least." Doushi nibbled on some toast before wishing the two well. 

What exactly had they gotten themselves into.

***

Alexei started at his bondmate. She was happily listening to a griffin, who was half her size, preach about magic and how to use it. "Magic is simple once you find your calling! Choose and object to work with and I can start our first lesson."

Ana blinked. Item? What could she use for magical purposes? Oh! She had the cross that Alexei had given her when she was a wyrm. Carefully, she dug around in her fur and managed to wiggle off the necklace.

The griffin blinked, "Are you sure you want to use that as a way to medium to use your magic through?"

*Of course! This means a great deal to me, and I would love to use it.* She glanced back at her bondmate who gave her a reassuring smile. It was time to become an adult... hopefully.

Ryuuri shook her head, "Suit yourself. Now all you need to do is concentrate on the feeling of magic. You know what it is, it's been with you all of your life. There is no possible way you can miss it."

Ana took a deep breathe and proceeded to concentrate. She was disappointed, however, when nothing happened after fifteen minutes. *... Is it supposed to take this long?*

"No one ever gets it on their first time! Try again."

She tried again, and again, and again, and still nothing happened. After the tenth try she flopped on the ground miserably almost in tears. There was no way she could ever get magic at this rate.

Ryuuri looked to Alexei, who mouthed, "Give her a break, and she'll be fine."

The whorling nodded and slipped out of the room to call her friend.

That left the two bondmates together. "Ana, it's all right. It's really difficult to get magic, which is why I've never use it."

*No! I'm never going to get it,* she sniffed miserably. Alexei could probably do magic on the first try, who was he to talk.

"Ana, did I ever tell you I play the violin?"

*No...* What did that have to do with anything?

"When I was younger, I thought playing he violin was going to be easy, and I would get it on the first try, which I seemed to do with everything else. However, I was extremely frustrated when I tried the violin for the first time." He grinned as his bondmate turned around to look him in the face, "If it wasn't for my dad I wouldn't be able to play the violin."

*How so?*

"He told me never to give up on something, even if I failed the first few times. Those failures would lead me to success, and they did. It's the same thing with you learning magic." Alexei closed his eyes, "When we get home I'll show you how well I can play the violin."

*You mean the library that I've never seen?*

He nodded, there were a few more moments of silence before Ryuuri and her friend walked in. He was a dog like creature, with spines in several places. He seemed rather intimidating, even when he spoke.

"So, who wants some tea? I have it set up in the next room." That wasn't that intimidating. "I'm Seiei, if you care to know. It's a pleasure to meet you both." Both Alexei and Ana assumed that he would have tipped his hat if he had been wearing one.

Alexei shrugged, tea sounded good.

***

*Four days, Alexei.*

"Yes, Ana, four days. I fail to see your point."

*I've practiced for four WHOLE days and I haven't gotten any further in my magic. I'm still at square one. I've meditated, exercised, studied books, and about forty other kinds of mediation. I didn't know that many kinds existed until I started trying to learn magic.*

Alexei shrugged, "It takes time to gather magic, Anastasia. Sometimes it takes years for people to get to a beginners level of magic. You just need to give it some time." He knew how frustrating it was, after all the two of them were connected. However, he still had faith in her. "Maybe your magic is different, and just needs a bit more time to reveal itself."

*Easy for you to say, when you have so much magic.*

"I don't have magic, I've been magicless all my life."

*... Yes you do,* Ana said with a confused look on her face. He had always had it, though it was faint when she had first met him, and it had been steadily increasing since that day the city caught fire... how could Alexei miss it?