Instructor Leor was pacing, deep in thought, when Tessawyn tapped him on the shoulder, as gently as she could manage.
“Yeah, Tess?” Leor said, not needing to look up to know who it was. You got a feel for other people as Angels, if you spent enough time around them - even when not in conscious use, their exceedingly powerful magic left a slight aftertaste in the world.
“What are you doing?”
“Pacing,” he said, and Tessawyn groaned.
“No, I mean with this competition stuff.”
Finally, Leor stopped, and looked up at her, confused. “I thought I laid out my case for it pretty well earlier.”
“I mean, I like a good contest of skill as much as - well, okay, much more than the next Angel, but are you getting the data you need out of it? Some of these matches have been huge imbalances, some have been over in seconds, and while I saw you start to introduce an element of critical analysis towards the beginning, you dropped that pretty quick.”
“Tess?” Leor said.
“Yes?” she answered, looking back at him.
“Don’t worry about it. I know what I’m doing. Think of it like our patrols back in the day. I’m the brains, and you’re the brawn,” he said, smiling. From anyone else, that would have been an insult, but Tess knew him, and he knew her, and she was proud to be not quite as smart as he was - and he had to accept that she was significantly stronger than he was - physically, magically, and mentally, although her mental fortitude had slipped a bit upon finding out that she’d be working alongside Julian for the next four years. The same thing had happened to Leor, so they were still on evenly uneven footing.
She sighed. “Okay.”
Tessawyn looked back at the newly-conjured student bleachers, completely suffused with gossip, discussion of the matches that had already happened, consolation for the losers and celebration of the winners. It was certainly getting them talking about each other, and understanding each other was pretty key to functioning well with your Pair. Hers had never quite been able to catch up to her, and sometimes she wondered just how much attempting to keep up with her had influenced Nathaniel’s heroic death. Maybe - No, it wasn’t a good subject to think about. If she delved into loss and tragedy, she’d never stop dwelling on it. She had to get her mind off of it.
“So, what do you think of Julian’s Wards? That was… impressive,” she said.
Leor shrugged. “It makes sense that he’d end up mentoring the strongest kids in the class.” He leaned in closer to Tessawyn, and taking his cue, she leaned down so he could whisper into her ear. “She is kind of like her, isn’t she?”
Tessawyn had to agree, even if she didn’t want to. “Elza’s more open and fighty, but that inner fire is the same,” she added.
“Not great,” Leor said.
“Nope,” Tess concurred. “But,” she continued, another thought dancing on the edge of her mind, “Could you maybe mess with the formula a little?”
“What do you mean?” he asked.
Tessawyn blushed, a bit ashamed of herself, but not enough to not suggest it. “Could we have some demonstration matches between the Guardians? Maybe, I dunno, between now and the second set of matches, or-“ What she really wanted was a chance to get back into competition. She hadn’t realized just how much she’d missed that side of their school days until she had been thrown back into it.
Leor, annoyingly, laughed at her. “No chance. There wouldn’t be a point. You’d all use techniques I couldn’t even start to teach them about yet, and they’d get nothing out of it besides fuel for “my Guardian could totally beat up your Guardian!” arguments.”
“Fair, but…” Her tone had grown almost whiny, and she hated that it did.
Leor smiled. “Okay, okay, we can spar later. After class. We’ll hash out the details then, but you’re going to work with a handicap, otherwise you’d win every time.”
“I-“ she said, beginning to protest, but thought better of it. “Okay, yeah, I would. But yeah, let’s!” she said, and headed back to the Guardian bleachers, hoping that she’d get there before Leor could reconsider. It would probably be for his own good, but still, she needed this.