Every day I went to the cafeteria less and less to eat. I rarely saw anyone besides Ikovos and Jaden. Thoran and Cornelius were almost never around. It had been like this since the last Meoden meeting. Even Sophie left for the towns more than once. I did weapons training with Holdan about an hour each night . . . neither Jaden nor Ikovos liked this very much, so I usually went when they weren't around. Both boys had been so wonderful with helping me throughout. Luckily, concentrating on my studies, combined with intense willpower, had helped me get my mind off of any fanciful imaginations. Every day I felt more comfortable around the boys. It helped that they chose to spend a lot of their time with me, despite the fact that at this point with the magic training it wasn't so much them showing, as me practicing. Ikovos had to leave the lodge every so often for different duties, but Jaden never did due to his grounding. Another piece of his punishment, I discovered, was intensified studies.
