Page 124 of A Simple Truth

Fire was easy: just dip into the power. You found your source and took it, and there it was, right at your fingertips. All you had to do was shape it and wield it.

But a Seer’s gift was so much more complex. There was not apowerto dip into, just never-ending silver strings of Fate that I could see, connecting matter and time.

I closed my eyes, tuning in to the sound of waves crashing into the cliffs nearby. My chest fell into a slow rhythm of exhales and inhales.

Breathe. In and out.

Minute after minute, breath after breath, my mind slipped away from reality, emptying of all thoughts. Though my eyes were still closed, others had opened, letting specks of light into the calm darkness of my being.

My Seer’s sight was still blurred, like I was watching everything through fogged-up glass, but there, amidst the muted colors were the silver strings of Fate.

“I’m here,” I said to Xentar without opening my eyes.

“Good. Now focus and look for a ring.” His voice echoed as if he was far, though I knew he stood only a few feet away.

There were two major pathways for Seers and their approaches: patterns and rhymes.

Patterns were lengthy; breaking down matter slowly between your fingers, layer by layer, until you recognize the repeating pattern and you find what you are looking for. But they were precise.

Rhymes, on the other hand, worked a lot faster, but you had to make sure it made sense and your words accurately portrayed what you were looking for, otherwise you wouldn’t find it.

“A golden ring that has been lost, wanted by most, needs to appear pretty near?” I said out loud, unable to come up with anything better.

“Your poetry is such a gift…” Xentar commented, his voice full of amusement.

“You can laugh all you want, but if I start patterns, we will be here all night,” I shouted back to him, aware that even my voice was muffled in the trance.

“Focus,” Xentar reminded me and I leveled my breaths again.

I let out a long sigh. My rhymes didn’t seem to work, and I scanned the beach for the lost ring once again. Though my body was immovable, I stood up in a daze. My steps felt so much lighter, gravity having less of a pull in here.

I trod cautiously, to avoid touching or pulling on the millions of shimmering threads in-between, lest I got tangled up in them and my mind became forever stuck here.A veryminorinconvenience.

I ironically scoffed remembering the list of warnings Xentar gave me during our first lesson:don't get tangled up, don’t get lost, don’t go crazy with the visions.

Just casual reminders, nothing special.

Although I joked and laughed about it since the first time I managed to slip into the trance, my hands still turned clammy the longer I stayed in the ‘in-between’, searching for that godsdamned ring.

Thering. Focus on the ring, I told myself.

But where the hell was it?

Perhaps my mind could conjure a shovel and just start digging for it.Nobody said I had to find the ring in one particular way, and it was still faster than patterns,I reasoned.

But before I could start digging, the glistening sky turned into a black abyss, and within a single blink I was no longer on the beach. Instead, I was in Xentar’s room, at his desk, pulling on his drawer.

There, a golden ring.

Jerk! I was about to dig through the whole beach looking for it and it wasn’t even here!I murmured.

My Seer eyes closed once more until soothing darkness encompassed my mind. Thoughts slowly coming back while my breaths sped up. A moment later, the bright sun appeared, and the muffled colors were gone as Xentar looked at me curiously.

“So, did you find it?” he inquired with a half smirk.

“Yes.”I gave him a snarky look. “But it’s not on the beach. It’s in your drawer back at the house,” I replied, narrowing my eyes at him. Xentar returned the look, his face flashing with doubt.

“How did you find it? Did you follow a thread?”

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