Cole

She is standing out in the rain without a coat, eyes closed, twirling, getting as cold and wet as she can possibly get.

There are a million thoughts that run through my head, but rising above them all was that she was going to catch a cold.

Bella, my stepmom, sat on the couch, green eyes fixed directly on me.

They have a hard edge, but no harder than normal. She is silently asking what I am doing.

"Coy's gonna catch a cold out there."

My dad turns from the stove. "I wouldnt worry about that, son."

Bella opens the window.

I walk over.

Coy looks ecstatic and full of grief at the same time.

She is shouting at the sky, dancing jerkily and then fluidly around the yard, never slipping.

"I have stood here before inside the pouring rain,

With the world turning circles running round my brain

I guess I'm always hoping that you'll end this reign,

But it's my destiny to be the Queen of Pain,

Queen of Pain, I'll always be

Queen of Pain,

I'll always be

Queen of Pain.."

I look over at Bella as Coy momentarily stops singing, If you can call screaming your grief and rage to the sky singing.

She has a deep look in her eyes.

She glances up at me, and her eyes soften.

"Come sit down, Cole."

I hesitate, then sit by her.

Plenty of times I had thought of how beautiful she was, but she was my stepmom, and years older than me. There was just something about her that no one could resist.

She smiles at me, tight and small amid her black lipstick.

"She just needs to shout at whoever's up there sometimes."

I nod. I feel the same way sometimes, but I don't have the nerve to go stand in the middle of a storm and scream at the clouds.

Bella readjusts her cloak. It slides over my arm, smooth and warm.

Coy steps inside.

She looks triumphant, and hollow.

My dad hands her a cup of tea. She grins at him, and walks to where Bella and I are sitting.

She sits down, getting the couch wet, but Bella merely reaches over and moves a soaked strand of hair off of Coy's face.

Coy closes her eyes, and leans her head on Bella's shoulder.

Bella strokes her hair slowly, closing her own eyes in turn.

I watch as Bella's hand moves pale and thin along Coy's dark gold hair, wet from rain.

The smell of cooking lobster meets my nose, and boiling water warms my ears.

I hear my dad cooking in the kitchen.

Oh yes, sometimes I understand Coy quite well.

We're very similar, her and I.

This is my family.

It's not normal, and times like these are few.

But who would really want a normal family?

I close my eyes, breathing in a slight tang of wet dog, Bella's dark flowery scent, and the lobster cooking.

This is my family, and I love them.

The Tennins

Beings that populate the cosmos. They have the powers of the universe; aether, light, dark, water, air, fire and earth. They have existed forever and continue to exist forever. In SHADE, all humankind is descended from a colony of Tennins, although, after thousands of years, their powers are either very diluted or nonexistent.

Notable Tennins:

Katarael: the soul of a water tennin. She doesn't have a body, but piggy-backs with Katt. Without some kind of physical anchor she will eventually fade away. She is intuitive and warns Katt by sending her impressions- when something bad is happening or about to happen.

She is harbored inside the charm that Katt carries around with her, but is able to leave the charm if needs be. She is a peaceful and benevolent spirit, and has been with Katt's family for generations. Katarael does not like fighting, and tries to protect Katt, and steer her away from danger or confrontation as much as possible.

Katt can control the element of water because of Katarael's presence. Although Katt is independent of Katarael, and visa versa, they are also so closely knit that Katt will sometimes be referred to as Katarael. People subconsciously recognize Katarael's presence in Katt and, without realizing they're doing so, will sometimes refer to Katt as Katarael. (* See: Katarael; Nature of)

It is unknown as to why Katarael does not have a body of her own. Either she was never born, or was killed, or lost her body under strange circumstances.

Katarael lay on her back, holding the crystal up to the starlight. She gazed at the stars in the dark sky through the rocks' translucence. 

She had to come to terms with the fact that this might be the very last time she ever saw the stars. Letting out a resigned laugh, she wrapped the rock in her fist and held it to her chest as water trickled down her cheeks and she evaporated into nothing. 

Katarael's death

Katt has very little awareness of Katarael. She doesn't understand what Katarael is or how she exists. She knows that without her charm she has no control over water, and she has a vague suspicion that her charm has some kind of sentient energy. She also knows that when she received the charm from her grandmother, her name was changed to Katarael, and she has been called that ever since.

Katarael and Katt are so similar that it is a possibility that they may be the same person. Katarael could be Katt from a parallel dimension, with more accrued power than Katt has, thus making Katarael a ghost of Katt's own potential.

Katt's powers change and morph as she gets older. At one point, Katt's charm bursts in an attempt to spontaneously warp an entire boat full of people to a different dimension. When Katt awakens, she is separated from her friends, fatally dehydrated, and her powers are seemingly gone forever. But as Katt ages, her powers start to manifest in different ways such as when it starts coming out in her synesthesia.

She could tell everything about you by just watching you breathe. She can read the moisture in your eyes, or on the palms of your hands. She could tell everything about you at just a glance, by the vapor you expel, that floats around you, that sits on your skin with a rainbowy quality, like oil on top of a puddle. Human beings are very wet creatures, and can you can learn a lot from the colors of water. 



Envariel: The soul of a fire Tennin (Shiner).  Envariel resides inside Coy. Envariel and Coy are like minded in personality, which is why Envariel chose Coy to piggy-back with. Envariel and Katarael know each other and can recognize the other, which would explain why Katt and Coy were drawn to one another and became friends.