A small shock, then a wide smile spread on her face.
"Eh, don't worry Suma that's my specialty"
Satisfied after having told her my name, I smile and then ask to continue the lesson, I was able to pull off this one phrase but my overall grip on fae is still shaky.
***
It took longer than I'd like to admit for me to start feeling less terrible at speaking, and by "longer", I mean the whole day, it was only my fault though, Elly is good at what she's doing, experience I guess.
Well, at least I can probably talk to someone now if the need arises.
Even if I was pretty bad at learning today was still fun, during the breaks we took because I was getting incredibly bored Elly taught me the rules of tag and then we played, I was still not able to walk so we played flying tag and of course she's way better than me.
We started with Elly being "it", I tried to fly as randomly as possible but it didn't work at all, she caught me instantly, I tried to get her for a bit after that but failed as she dodged at the last second each time.
I was "it" until the end of this break, once the next one came around Elly decided to be "it" again, I tried to change my way of fleeing to just going as fast as possible in one direction.
And of course it failed, seriously what did I expect?
I remember the speed she showed each time she carried me and I still tried to beat her by going fast, too late to complain about it I guess.
Anyway, I ended being "it" until the end of this break too.
I thought third time was the charm, and it really looked like it was once I dodged her once, I used my magic perception to see where she was behind me and then dodged down when she tried to touch me, positive: I dodged Elly once, negative: she took it a bit more seriously and there was no second time.
Hey, at least I feel I'm getting better at chasing her, she's more proactive now than she was at the first or second break.
***
Well, that's how my second day in existence went, learning fae and losing at tag against Elly, the sun was beginning to set when we started going back, other caretakers and their charge flew alongside as we all went back to the dormitories.
We once again eat with others and I'm becoming more and more eager to meet all my sisters so I decide to ask Elly when will I meet them
"Tomorrow" she said.
"Tomorrow we caretakers will mostly leave you to your own devices, of course we'll be with you in case you want or need anything but you will be free to do anything you."
"Oh, that means no lesson tomorrow?"
"Yes, not tomorrow, nor any days for some time, there'll be lessons later but for now, it's important for all sisters of a generation to get to know each other and play together."
"Why is it important? I mean, I totally want to become friends with everyone but I don't understand the why."
"To make it short, it's because you share a link due to being born of what is essentially the same mana and this link must be cultivated, at least that's what the ancients say."
I nodded, I don't really care about this link or whatever but hey, no lessons and time to play with everyone.
***
We finish eating and then Elly brings me to bed, I wasn't feeling tired yet but the comfyness of the bed quickly brings me to sleep.
When I wake up, Elly is already besides me like yesterday, I greet her and we go eat breafast.
It was still morning and not yet noon unlike yesterday and many more were seated at the tables, despite that, we had no problems finding a spot to sit at.
Once we finished eating, Elly looked at me and said:
"Go meet and play with your sisters, I'll be around here if you need anything."
"Thanks!" I said before flying off.
It seems all caretakers coordinated in some way because all my siblings flew up as I did exactly at the same time, some even bonking into each other.
I looked around, all my sisters seemed to have grown hair of all kinds of color, I hesitated a bit before going towards one with jet black hair, unfortunately she did not see me and went towards another fairy with sunshine gold hair, ironically she was ignored too as this one went towards another, still we followed our objects of interest and ended up making a group of four.
We just looked at one another for a bit before I spoke with a cheerful tone:
"Hello, my name is Suma, pleased to meet you! What are your names?"
"Yo! I'm Lea!" The sunshine gold one answered, her wings looked like rays of light and were the same color as her hair, she had a fiery face, one odd thing I saw though was that both her eyes were not the same color, one was golden while the other was silver, weird but it doesn't matter I guess.
The second one to introduce herself was my initial target.
"Greetings sisters, Eliza is the name Alka gave me." She was way calmer than Lea's boisterous answer, she looked at each of us as if she was judging us with those black eyes and her serious face, her raven like wings gave her a grim air.
The last one to speak was the one Lea went after
"H-Hi, my name is Shana." She looked a bit hesitant while speaking, as if afraid, her wings were like mine and looked similar to a butterfly's, the difference between us was color, whereas I'm of shades of purple, Shana is of blue: Ice colored eyes and wings with cerulean hair.
"Sooo..." I started
"What do you want to do?"
"Play of course!" said Lea almost immediatly.
"But what do we play though?" continued Eliza
"How about hide and seek?" timidly proposed Shana
"What's that?"
Shana explained to me and the others the rules, being the only one among us whose caretaker did not play tag with
"Okay that seems fun, but who's gonna be the seeker then ?" I asked
"I would prefer to hide" declared Eliza
"I wanna search!" volunteered Lea
"Maybe we should go a bit further to play, there isn't much places to hide around the dorms." remarked Shana.
We all agreed on that and went towards the trees near us.
Once there Lea started counting to thirty while we went to hide.
I saw Eliza hide in a shadow and fold her wings on herself, blending into the dark.
Shana went somewhere but I couldn't see as I found a deep bush to dive in.
Soon I heard Lea scream that "ready or not she was coming".
Before the game started we agreed on three rules:
1)The seeker isn't allowed to use her magical perception
2)The hiders are not allowed to move once they chose a hiding place
3)Found hiders will help the seeker to find the others
We also agreed not to go too far but that's common sense.
I waited with bated breath while looking around via magic, hey, the seeker isn't allowed to but we are, and for the moment I saw nothing.
I soon heard a "Found yaaa!!" coming from where Eliza was, I guess her wings weren't big enough to cover her entirely, at least I'm not the first one found.
But this did not last long, I soon see the both of them check every bush.
Eventually they find me, Lea grabs me and screams a "Gotcha!" in my ears, I'm still happy that they looked through at least half the bushes around before getting me.
Now we only need to find Shana, I point the others in the direction I saw her go off to, we look through all the bushes and shadows but don't find her, it's only when we see a broken branch still green inside that we understand, she's hiding in the trees!
We refocus our efforts on scanning the top of the trees and find her hidden in a excessively leafy tree.
She's proclaimed winner of the hide and seek and we decide to play tag next.
It starts with Lea touching the arm of Shana and saying "you're it" before flying away.
Me and Eliza both fly in different directions and Shana decides to come after me after complaining that Lea was unfair.
We weave through the air for a bit before I get tagged, I'm more agile than her but she has way more speed than I do, resulting in her catching up.
I set my sights on Lea and charge straight at her, she looks like she wants to dodge at the last moment possible, she tries to but she was too confident and I still manage to get her, she gets me back though and we exchange for a bit before she changes target and choose Eliza who got closer in order to watch.
Eliza dodges by going up and then simply dropping down, they then fly all around before she gets tired and is finally catched.
The game of tag goes on until each of us is exhausted and can't move anymore, we all lie on the grass next to one another.
"HAHAHA! today was fun, way funnier than yesterday, how about playing together again tomorrow?" exclaimed Lea
"Sure, why not, it was amusing after all." answered the ever monotone Eliza
"M-Me too I liked playing with you all" stuttered Shana
"Then it's decided, tomorrow, and the tomorrow after that, and even the one after, let's all play together again!"
And we laughed, laughed and laughed, I somehow feel this is what it means to be a fairy