ethan and rini

Ethan stepped out of the house, and out towards the lake. It'd been a few weeks since he'd 'awoken,' as his friends called it, found out that he'd had some magical power inside him all along or some Hollywood shit like that. Except it was real. Luckily he had a buddy that knew what the hell was going on, and before long he was taken into a nice house by the lake where he could hone his abilities with other young mages.

Before his awakening, he was never one to stop and appreciate much of anything, but even he had to take notice of the gorgeous early summer night. The air carried only the slightest hint of coolness to it, the humidity heavy on his skin and in his lungs. The forest was alive with the songs of crickets and cicadas, and stars shone brightly overhead, unmarred by the lights of town.

It was the perfect time to practice.

The kind of magic he could weave was best done with a reflective surface, as he learned the first time he awakened when his bathroom mirror forced him to slip sideways. Luckily there was a massive one just outside the house. At night, the lake was cool and still, what little waves there were beating softly on the tiny dock. It would do just fine. He rest his palm on the water, taking a deep breath while he waited for the water to still once more. Concentrating, he finally felt the familiar dropping sensation in his stomach as he disappeared from the normal world, opening his eyes to the other side.

In this place, the Milky Way was no longer a faint, hazy line, but a brillant, glowing streak of purple and white cutting the sky in half and ringed by millions of bright points of light, reflected perfectly on the now-glassy lake surface. The trees and mountains surrounding him didn't change much in appearance, but he could feel them intimately, towering ancient souls that stared straight through the stranger, seeing what he would do. There was no need to mind them much now. He took a look back at the house, that hadn't changed much other than the fact that it was covered in fresh spider's webs.

He rose to his feet and stepped out onto the lake, which now was more like a solid plane of glass with a few centimeters of water coating it. His eyes turned downwards, he moved slowly, able to see perfectly under the surface. There were fallen trees covered in algae, the slow, deliberate foraging of bullheads, even the skeletons of vehicles that met their fates along the treacherous mountain roads, several semi trucks and an airplane.

A massive shadow passed by corpse of the plane, a long shadow that weaved its way through the depths. He jumped, and for a moment he seriously considered going back to shore and returning to the normal world. But he was curious. Was it just a trick of the eye, or something spectral? It wouldn't have been the first time he met a spirit. It didn't matter, because whatever it was, it circled around his feet, rising closer and closer until its massive head finally breached without a single ripple.

It looked for all the world like a giant horse, rectangular pupils meeting his eyes as its tall, pointed ears swivelled back and forth atop its long head. But its neck didn't stop, looping down into a serpentine body that rose and fell through the water, weaving through the lake in smooth, continuous movements. Maybe he should have been afraid of it, but he could sense an intelligence in its eyes, as it stared him down through a long, straight mane. It, like him, was curious.

He smiled at it, and was very startled when it hesitated for a moment, then copied his expression, revealing rows of crooked, razor-sharp teeth. It saw his fear and... laughed, in its own way, tossing its head and making a soft whinny in its throat, flicking its long tail. It took him a moment to realize that it was playing with him, but when he did, he laughed a little too, becoming increasingly confident that it wouldn't hurt him. Now, he was sure he wanted to know more.  So he stayed with it -no, her, he would find out- a little longer, watching her movements and engaging in what little communication was possible. He still wasn't sure exactly what she was, but he was already becoming attached to the creature that called herself Rini.

 He didn't immediately recognize that something was going wrong. There was a strange tingle in his hands, a warmth in his chest, but he didn't think much of it. Then it began to grow in intensity until even Rini was beginning to grow nervous. Before long he felt as if his hands were on fire, and was driven to his knees as the massive outpouring of power began to overwhelm him. His hands slammed against the lake and suddenly all the energy came pouring outward, cracks of brilliant white light spreading along the surface like a broken mirror until it finally shattered. The force of the magical outburst forced him from the Umbra, with nowhere to go but under the water. He had enough sense to start swimming and keep his head in the air, but it was difficult with all the turbulence.

Turbulence caused by Rini, who had been dragged along with him and was thrashing in the lake of the mortal world, howling in fear and pain.

Even when he painstakingly swam back towards the house, she still followed him, whimpering and unsure of what to do, and Ethan felt his heart break. It was already clear that the poor thing didn't belong here. He didn't know what had happened, but no matter what, he would eventually set it right.