The next five months went away like a flash for brian. In his jam packed schedule of eat, sleep, crap, repeat; meditation for magic was added for every night. Slowly and steadily he was getting better at feeling the different elements. That is what he called them. He was able to identify wind, water, fire, earth, light and darkness. Among those he realised he had better affinity with wind, fire and darkness. Those three element were easy for him to manipulate compared to the others. But mostly he used the wind element for practice because fire and darkness were likely to leave behind evidence of his late night studies. Fire elements use was quite easy for him to figure out but not so much for darkness. Usually when brian used the darkness element he manifested a ball of darkness and then tried to change it into various shapes like arrow and spear because it seemed to be most malleable. And when brian seemed to be reaching his limit for his mental strength (which he seemed to be improving after every practice) he slowly dispersed the darkness back into the environment.
He was also slowly able to learn this world's language more and more. He was now able to understand most things that were spoken. He also understood that all the servants referred to brian's father and mother as lord and lady respectively. He learned through various conversations between his parents that his father's name was Henry Steyn and he was a count. His mother's name was Elise and his brother was called Albert. Also brian's full name was William Steyn but his mother and maid Mary called him Will. He had also gotten a general understanding of everyone's personality. His father was always strict and stern in his demeanor only ever showing his gentle side in front of his wife. His mother seemed to be always graceful and full of life. She seemed gentle but strong in her behaviour. His brother seemed like he had two personalities. One in front of their father and another in his absence. In front of his father he always tried to be calm and composed and always behave with perfect etiquette. While in his absence he behaved like a 'kid' he was.
The most interesting person for brian was the maid mary. She always wore a calm and stoic expression in front of everyone. The only one she showed hints of her emotions were to Elise. But the one who really knew what she was like was brian. She would play with brian and giggle around him when it was only two of them. If anyone else in the castle were to see this they would not believe that she was the same 'straight faced demon'. Yeah that is what the other servants called her. She always wore a poker face and was brutal in terms of duties for others as well as herself. She seemed more like the head maid than the head maid. She was brian's mothers personal maid but seemed more like a friend when they were alone. Whenever it was just brian and mary, mary seemed to unload the stuff on her mind to brian while playing with him. At first when brian was unable to understand anything. But as time passed and he started to understand the language he enjoyed her gossip. He also learned that she was married to the head of the castle guards. The day that brian learned this was the day that brian pretended to be heartbroken when he was alone. Yeah, brian was a drama queen as well. So back to mary. She had a daughter named Alice who was two years old and she also mentioned that from next year onwards she was going to train her personally to groom her as brian's personal maid. The day that brian learned this was the day that brian pretended that his broken heart was mended when he was alone. Common, he had to keep himself entertained.
While brian was observing and learning everything, others were observing him as well. Especially mary and his mother. Now to brian's credit, despite of having no preparation or training he was really pulling of this baby gig quite well. Normally Elise should have found out something weird with brian as she was the one spending most time with him. But she seemed to be have too much affection for him to notice anything. She just thought that brian was bright, cute, cute and also cute. Yeah she was a hopeless case as well when it came to brian. Second person who observed brian the most was mary. She believed that brian was a genius and a blessed child of God. Conversations like these were the reason that brian believed that mary was really interesting. His father seemed to be happy hearing comments from Elise and Mary that brian might be a genius. His brother Albert was slowly starting to be less enthused to see brian. Whatever everyone else thought didn't matter because Brian was sure that his future would be full of excitement as William Steyn. And so this day he left behind Brian and fully embraced William.