Tiffany had been thinking about what Slarr had said about not being able to control the book, but being able to nudge it in a certain direction if she tried. As she lay down, she was wondering again about her friend, Azalea. Was she real? Did she escape the creatures that had interrupted their training session? Tiffany had originally intended to try and find out, but even before she fell asleep the book was pulling her thoughts in the direction that IT wanted to go.

Now that she was standing here in this clearing, her thoughts were a little muddled. Part of her realized that she was in the dream again, but when you were dreaming, it seemed as though the dream WAS reality. Her mind was trying to accept this dream state as the real world, which made it difficult to hold on to her memories of just a few moments ago. The real world was quickly fading from her mind.

"Shooting blind... yes, that seems a useful skill to practice. But... before the real world fades away completely... I know you aren't Slarr. You're... you're the one who has really been teaching me. I... I just wanted to know about Azalea. Is... is she real? Or just another part of your illusion? Did she get away from those things?"

Even as she asked the question, the meaning of her words began to fade from her mind as the dream world began to solidify more and more around her, becoming the only reality she was aware of.

She waited for an answer, but if it didn't come quickly she would forget that she had even asked the question.

Whether the imitation Slarr answered her or not, eventually, she would put on the blindfold and ask...

"Ok... so, how do we start?"

“Not Slarr? But I am. At least as far as your conscious memories of him are,” the book answered her. It was confused about her concern for Azalea. This had not been real after all.

“Azalea is real. I drew her from your memories. You've seen her once or twice. But everything about her, other than her name and appearance have been fabricated,” the book as Slarr leaned in closer raising a brow.
“Now that would be up to you.”

She didn't get much more of an answer before this reality began to cement itself. Slarr grinned at her as she submerged herself in this reality.

“First is the easy stuff. I want you to combine your techniques with speed and power firing to the areas you hear noise from. I'm going to keep it simple to start with but as we proceed it will grow more challenging. From those spots I am going to hurl pieces of myself at you. Essentially semi-solid smoke so you'll know when you have failed. Of course as thinks get trickier the stakes scale up ...”

Tiffany heard the book's reply, but the response, and even the question itself, quickly faded from her mind as the dream reality fully solidified around her. She was dreaming now, in the clearing with Slarr...

Tiffany looked at the blindfold for a moment. She thought about asking for a chance to warm up first since she hadn't had a lot of practice combining speed and power yet. She finally decided not to. The whole point of these exercises was to learn as much as she could as quickly as she could. The more difficult the exercise was, the faster she would learn, right? At least she hoped so...

"What exactly do you mean by "the stakes scale up"? Every time you say something like that, it kind of worries me..."

“You'll find out. And it should worry you.” Slarr grinned unseen by the blindfold now. His hands rested on her arms twirling her around as if she were about to smash a pinata. Her facing had been disorientated and for some time she had been left in the silence of that clearing.

With no insects or other life save for the students and occasional guest all she heard was white noise. Every sound seemed amplified with her vision taken from her it was easier to concentrate. When a breeze rolled in she could hear the creaking of tree branches as they swayed and the rustle of the grasses.

The scent of burnt toast let her know that he was still there. It was coming from all around her. She could hear him circling about her, tiny clawed feet flattening that grass. Then his attack began from behind her and to the left as he shaped a piece of smoky residue that he plucked from his torso compounding it like a snowball before hurling it at her.

Arms, head and legs still solid if she could see him his torso was just a mass of smoke dancing there between the limbs. Hit or miss that shadow ball would flow back to the central mass of his body before he launched another attack. At first he went slow allowing her to get use to the attacks but that wasn't to last. He scaled things up forming his wings to carry him around her without making so much noise. His attacks were quicker now and came at various elevations. This time as she was struck those shadow balls became solid hands clawing and taring away portions of that robe. His attacks came quick, too quick to keep up with.

Some were disrupted but there were always more until little of that robe remained.

“Shall we continue? It only gets harder from here out.”

Tiffany could feel the shadowy claws tearing at her robes and could feel the warm jungle air against her skin, but the air was warm and with the blindfold on she wasn't really aware of just how tattered her apparel had become. Especially since she had been so focused on keeping up with Slarr's relentless attacks. At first it had been fairly easy. Shooting blind, she didn't always hit the target, but at least she had gotten off a shot for every one Slarr had taken. Now, though, if she managed to take one shot at every two he was throwing, she was lucky. For the last minute or so before pausing to ask if she wanted to continue, Slarr was throwing closer to three shots to every one of hers. Tiffany was getting angry. She needed to be faster! If Slarr was this fast, then there was a good chance that some other monster would be too.

"Yes. You're starting to outpace me, but I'm not ready to quit just yet. I need to be either quicker or smarter. Let's keep going a little longer."

When Slarr started again, instead of just shooting at the targets, Tiffany willed Cinder to ignite, giving her a length of continuous flame burning in one hand. It didn't make her shooting any faster or more accurate, but when she heard the whoosh of those smoke claws coming she managed to block a few of them by swinging the burning wand in that direction. It made the game a bit more even again. Slarr was still firing off at a faster rate, but she managed to block one shot and shoot down another out of every 3 or 4 shots he took at her.

The pace was beginning to wear on her though. Constantly spinning around to face the sound of an oncoming target was making her dizzy. And the effort of keeping the wand lit while casting firebolts at such an extreme speed was using up a lot more energy than she was used to. She felt as though she was doing ok, but she was tiring quickly...

“Hm ...” he had considered the wand erupting in flame. Not that he couldn't deal with it. He never said that she couldn't do it either, just like the candles she was at least thinking within the confines of the task she was given rather than being restrained in doing things the hard way.

That was good. A bit of thinking helped and while it wouldn't do much for her time on the island it could do well for her time off of it. She saved herself from harder lessons but the book had desires of it's own as it taught her slowly stripping away the robe leaving it a tattered mess.

Next came the uniform beneath though his progression slowed as he went to work on her. That wand enhancing her ability to defend herself until it did not. Able to control flame that wand winked out and while she could reignite it the time without it, as brief as it was, opened her up to his attacks that followed.

A steady stream of those shadow balls connected during into clawed hands briefly as they pulled away from her taking a piece of her uniform with them as they sailed back off her.

When her uniform had been as tattered as those robes the attacks stopped she was once again cast in silence. There was no instructions, was he doing something? Was he still even there? Was this a test of sorts? No he wasn't gone there was still that odor of burnt toast indicating that he was in smoke or partial smoke form though he made no noise. The scent grew stronger, closer though there was no idea what he was doing until she felt something tickling her legs, then arms though whatever it was hadn't been solid.

Then she heard his voice so near it was practically in her ear. “And how would you deal with something that lacks form? That can't be incinerated?”

Tiffany was surprised when the flame wreathing her wand went out. She was very tired, but she felt as though she had been using enough energy to keep it lit. Her exclamation of surprise was cut short however by a louder cry as a that swarm of phantom claws shredded her uniform to tatters.

"Wha- AAHHH!"

When those tendrils of smoke tickled across her legs and arms, she jumped and uttered another cry of surprise, not entirely happy about the sudden change in the conditions of this exercise.

"OHH! Wha-what do you mean? I... I thought we were supposed to be working on hard to see targets..."

The blonde student had a pouty look on her face, but she didn't take the blindfold off, wondering if this was part of the lesson.

"I... I don't really know... we've been working mostly with fire, but I guess... I guess I could try the telekinesis thing..."

Tiffany tried to hold the remnants of her uniform together with her free hand as she spoke, suddenly very aware of how little of it was left and how very close to her Slarr was...

“Just because that is what we are working on doesn't mean that the unexpected holds itself back.” He made it clear that numerous scenarios had been likely to crop up. A grin lingered on his face, about the only portion of himself that remained solid in the swirl of smoke that surrounded her. Outside of one clawed arm his body was a thick cloud circling her.

Occasionally claws skimmed against her shoulder or arm. He paused reflecting on her answer. In that short time he had pondered how effective that telekinesis could be against his incorporeal state. Gases and such could be kept at bay from a strong wind and while he had a will of his own and could move against such breezes it did slow him down.

He concluded that it could buy her some time but ultimately like everything else on this island it was bound to fail. Still it could be somewhat successive later on if she became practiced at it.

“A little diversity helps. If you can do only one thing your options become limited. Take your flames for example, they are totally useless against me. In these cases there would be nothing you could do. Splitting time between the two will slow you down but it's better to be a little skilled in two areas than a master of one.

“You may remove the blindfold. Now we work on both.” He waited until it was removed, his hand reaching into some of the smoky mass producing another smoke bomb. “Now run, we will see what you can do with that telekinesis and flame in concert.”

He allowed her to get some distance before hurling that smoke at her. With only one arm he was slower drawing the smoke from that insubstantial mass as he hurled it at her retreating heels.

Since Slarr told her to run, Tiffany ran, although she wasn't really sure what the point in running was... she already knew Slarr was faster than she was. How was she supposed to fight and run at the same time? Did he mean for her to try and escape?

To make matters worse, she found it extremely difficult to make good speed without losing the torn fragments of her uniform. Her blouse was shredded, one bra strap had been cut through, and the waist of her skirt hadn't been cut in half, but it was cut enough to have widened up, which made it want to fall off as she moved. She had to hold it up with one hand as she tried to run.

She was so distracted by all this, that she didn't even hear the oncoming rush of that first smoke bomb. It struck her right calf, sprouted claws, and tore a long strip of cloth from her knee-high sock, which sent her sprawling face first into the leafy underbrush.

"Unnhhfff!"

A little angry at what she considered to be somewhat unfair conditions in this part of the lesson, Tiffany crawled to her feet and spun around looking for Slarr, her torn skirt all but forgotten. She couldn't hold onto it and run, or fight, at the same time.

"The hell with it. If it falls off, it falls off," she thought.

She knew Slarr had to be close, considering there was very little chance of her outrunning him. Knowing how good he was at hiding, she kept her ears and her nose on alert for signs of him as well.

"You want telekinesis AND flame? Ok... you asked for it..."

Tiffany waited for a target...

Life wasn't fair. The sight of her running was alluring though he watched as she attempted to keep it together until she approached the edge of that clearing taking the opportunity to strip away even more clothing, this time from a stocking causing her to fall out of sight briefly..

At that stage he vanished shrouding himself in invisibility as she collected herself. Then he slowly drifted toward her still in that mostly smoky form. He knew that unless he became solid that odor would remain but he didn't care about that. Had he become solid he would have lacked the ability to launch those smoke attacks though he could use his flames.

“Temper, temper,” he chuckled from somewhere behind her now in the jungle having had to have circled around her interposing trees between them as he drifted closer to her ready to act in order to quell her flames while keeping behind solid objects to thwart her telekinesis for the moment at least

The smell of burnt toast first alerted Tiffany that Slarr was close again, although she couldn't hear or see him yet. While she had waited for his next move, a plan had formed in her mind. When he spoke to her, it startled her to learn he had somehow gotten behind her again, but she had readied herself for his appearance and she reacted quickly.

She spun around and her left hand swept upwards in a gesture almost like a wave. As she did so, every leaf littering the ground within 30 feet of her seemed to be pulled upwards as if by a sudden gust of swirling wind. This swarm of leaves swirled and fluttered until it formed a wall between her and Slarr. At almost the same time, she pointed Cinder at the wall of leaves and a burst of flame erupted from the end of the wand, setting the leaves alight and effectively forming a wall of fire floating in the air between them. But that was only the first part of the plan.

Her left hand thrust outward as though signalling stop, and she "pushed" the wall of burning leaves forward with a blast of telekinetic force. That was her REAL attack. Tiffany knew that fire wouldn't hurt Slarr. The wall of burning leaves was just a diversion and an obstacle to hide behind. She hoped that Slarr wouldn't see it coming. The blast wasn't strong enough to cause any permanent damage, but if she caught him offguard, she thought she might be able to knock him down or scatter him about if he was in smoke form. She didn't want to hurt him, but she did very much want to impress him if she could.

The last part of her plan was a page right out of Slarr's own book of tricks. As soon as she pushed that burning wall forward, she ducked behind the trees, hoping to circle around behind him this time... if she could...

Startled, or so he thought, she reacted quickly whirling about in the direction she had thought that he was in. She wasn't far off the mark but enough that he had felt comfortable moving out from behind the tree he was at as he moved toward the next.

What are you doing? She was waving at him or were she had thought him to be and even though he had thought he would see nothing he cast a quick look in that direction to ensure that they were truly alone. When he looked back he squinted at the sudden brightness seeing the wall of dancing burning leaves.

He actually stopped for a second registering what he was seeing before the leaves were cast out all over as she projected them forth in an telekinetic attack. For the most part burning leaves past through the smoky residue of his body only smacking off the arm and face he had materialized.

The fire did no damage but the leaves smacked against him like little hail stones with the force behind them, hardly noticeable but a little irritating at the same time. More so his insubstantial form was broken up here and there. After the wave of air past by those smoky sections drifted back together as he reformed himself giving her time to circle around him.

Instead or remaining in that form he became solid again figuring it was better to stand up against wind. He was still invisible but if she looked closely she would be able to see soot from the leaves that had connected with his right arm and head. The fire doing no damage to him Slarr hadn't even brushed the leaves off of him. There were areas that were still on fire but Slarr didn't pay it any attention.

Slarr wasn't the smartest individual. He wasn't dumb but would never be mistaken as a mastermind. Had he the foresight to consider that his advantage was lost he might have done something about it. He was a little distracted, his attention first going into finding her then realizing that there were several fires around them he concentrated and with a lazy wave of his hand snuffed them out only then realizing that he was on fire too and killing those flames as well with but a thought. He might not have felt fire in the same way that she had.

“Where have you gotten off to?” His lemon yellow eyes carefully scanned the terrain searching for her. “It's a good thing Birch wasn't around. I won't tell him if you won't though he's bond to find out eventually but by then neither of us will be around.”

"Well, I am certainly not going to tell him." Tiffany stated matter of factly, a huge grin on her face as she stepped out from behind the trees behind the still invisisble imp.

She hadn't known where he was or whether she had succeeded in circling around behind him or not until he had spoken. Only then did she notice the soot that showed his outline. She had considered "pushing" him again from behind while he was unaware, but she thought that might only serve to anger him and possibly bring some form of retribution. As it stood, she was exceedingly pleased with herself and was fairly confident that Slarr would be impressed with his student. (Although... the mention of Birch sent a shiver of uneasiness rippling down her spine and made her eyes dart back and forth for signs of that fearsome monstrosity for a moment or two.)

"So... how was that? Not bad, huh?"

Tiffany's grin became a dazzling smile. It was obvious how proud she was of her little maneuver.

He searched for her with his eyes then turned around to face her as she spoke. Believing that he was still invisible he shifted while he spoke forever changing his position and hoping over problem areas of vegetation gliding over small regions not to give himself away so quickly. He would say something then move again as he circled her. If he had some sort of magic that allowed him to throw his voice that would have been great. Alas, he didn't.

“Using the terrain does have it's advantages. Against an insubstantial creature that little trick has some promise,” He could see her grin, obviously she had been pleased with herself seeing how this had been on the fly and all that.

“Certain insubstantial creatures will be unaffected by it, however. I still have mass in my altered state and can be affected by wind. Others will not be so hindered.” He critiqued the attack then came a little closer to where she was.

“That said it has promise, not to end matters but aid in escape. Plenty of vegetation around.”

He stopped studying the terrain and planning out her movements in advance. Then he regarded her for a moment. Those tattered clothes being more of a hindrance. “But I did tell you to run, didn't I?”

He sprang directly at her unaware that she could make out where he was. The book, in the form of Slarr, was still hungry.

As she watched him continuously change position before he spoke, Tiffany realized that he wasn't aware that she could see him... sort of. In any case, she had purposely not hit him from behind before for fear he might retaliate out of anger, but the thought HAD occurred to her that he might still react in exactly that fashion in response to the success of the rather slick move she had pulled off. She was hoping for a bit of praise from her teacher (which he sort of gave her by saying that her "little trick has some promise", but she was ready in case he responded more aggressively.

Being able to see him (sort of) gave her something to aim for now. As Slarr sprung at her, she "pushed" him again. This time the blast of energy was smaller, stronger and more concentrated since she didn't have to cover such a large area of effect. The air rippled between them in that wavy, heat-mirage sort of way as Tiffany's second blast streaked towards her target...