The effect of the Wooden Heart

Spirit looked at the sun and turned to Bite. "Any longer and Bright is going to be late." Bite raised an eyebrow. "I know! I know! Too much like my teacher but with me his methods seemed to work. After all I learned much from him."

He Spirit closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He stuck a stick in the earth and started his balance meditation on one hoof. "Bite could you please warn me if somepony comes so I don't fall like the last time! Thanks."He mediated a bit till Bite gave him the signal that Bright had arrived.

He stayed balancing and kept his eyes closed and took a deep breath. "You are a bit late! care to explain?"

He opened his eyes and saw a very surprised Bright before him. He jumped from the stick and raised an eyebrow. "So?"

"Oh right I had to clarify something with Fallen. I am sorry!"

He smiled to her. "No problem, you don't need to apologize. So did you got everything ordered?"

She nodded and pointed at her saddlebags. "Yes, right here!"

Spirit grabbed his own saddlebags and went right in the direction of the forest. "Good. Well then, let's start your lesson!"

They walked slowly in the forest and Spirit started. "So why do you think I ordered these things?"

She look at the ground and thought for a moment. "Hm I don't really know it all seemed quiet random."

They reached a clearing and Spirit stopped. "Well than I show you why. Please lay the stones, the crystals and the knife on the ground!"

She did as he said and Spirit sat down in front of them and pulled a phial out of his bag and showed it Bright. "What is this?"

She looked at the phial and recognized the green glow but she wasn't sure. "The powder you feed Bite with?"

"Is this a question or an answer?" For that he earned a angry glace from Bite. "Yes. Yes. I know too much teacher. Understood!" Bite happily laid down again.

He turned back to Bright."It is a answer!"

"You are right, it is. So to explain it, this powder contains much magical energy but the for the most species it is dangerous because a normal body cannot handle this kind of magic. Now what do you think will happened if I strew it over the stone?"

She looked for a moment at the stone than at the powder. "Nothing?"

He nodded. "Correct!" He opened the phial and strew a bit on the stone, and nothing happened with the powder. "But what do you think will happened if I strew it over the crystal?"

"Hm as far as I know are crystal able to contain magic so could it be that the powder transfer his magic to the crystal?"

"Again you are correct." Like before he strew a bit of the powder on the crystal but this time the powder stopped glowing and the crystal started to glow a bit. "The crystal absorb any magic and now I show you a bit about runes." He pulled a stone with a light rune from his bag and showed to Bright.

"What does this rune? It looks different from the runes I saw in the books!"

"That is because this rune comes from my lands, they have more curved lines than yours. Your runes are made with mathematics methods if I recall correctly but ours are symbols, this one means light by the way. So try to copy the rune on the other crystal and stone with your knife! No need to hurry you have all day!"He laid the stone before her and sat down next to Bite.

He watched as she started to copy the rune one line by one. He helped her a bit by correcting if she was going to do a mistake or don't knew how to continue and as she was finally done Spirit overlooked the runes. Bright waited nervously for his judgment. "And? How good was I?"

"Very good I would say but runes aren't really my field! But they should do their work so what do you think will happened if I strew over them?"

"I think the stone will not react but the crystal will activate the rune!"

"That was a guess wasn't it?" he strew power on the stone with the rune and the rune started to glow. "A rune doesn't care were you draw them but what do you think will happened with the rune on the crystal?"

She thought for a moment before answering. "It start glowing too."

"Yes you are right but..." He strew the powder on the crystal with the rune and it started to glow very weak. "You see the rune still tries to work but the crystal absorb the energy so the rune is very weak!"

He grabbed the crystal without the rune and held it up. "As you see they are good at contain magic but not good for runes. They are some runes how actually work better on crystal but as I told I don't know very much bout runes. My father was much better in this he knew even a few tricks to activate runes without the powder!"

Spirit garbed the crystals and the stones and shoved them aside. "Next step, a bit alchemy!" He reached in his back but Bright interrupted him.

"Wait you aren't going to show me more about runes and we just go on with the next topic?" She seemed very confused by this.

"I will only show you some basics and if we have some time left you can choose on which topic you want to go further!"He turned back to his bags and pulled out a blossom, some leaves, a bowl and a brown, thick stick.

"So to the powder, it is not so easy to make. To keep the explanation short, you need the leaves because the blossom is able to contain magic but it cannot hold it if it gets damaged, the difficult part is to make the mixing ratio correct. Too much leaves and it is just a waste for the leaves but not enough and you could lose a big amount of magic! I have two blossoms and a bunch of leaves first I will show how to do than you will try!"

Bright nodded and looked with big eyes as Spirit started to mash the blossom and adding from time to time a few leaves. As he finished he filled the powder in a phial and showed it to Bright. "Now it is your turn! A last tip it is better more leaves than less!"

She smiled and grabbed a bunch of leaves put them together with the blossom in a bowl and started mashing it. After some minutes she finished it and put in a phial and walked to Spirit who was meditating. "I am done!"

Spirit opened his eyes and looked at the powder closely then nodded. "Very good you seemed to have a hoof for this!" He smiled and added. "It is much better than the first time I tried it! Do you have any questions so far?"

She looked at the leaves and blossoms behind Spirit. "How does this plant work as a whole?"

Spirit looked very happy as he heard this question. "Good question. I must admit, I don't understand this plant completely but what I know is that the roots of the plant can absorb natural magic from the earth, the leaves hold the magic and transfers it to the blossoms. The first blossom contain magic and give it slowly to their surroundings and the other blossom contain the seeds for the plant. The wood also seems to react to magic but I don't really know in which way."

"So this plant absorb, use, contain and spread magic?"

"Correct. So do you have another question?"

"Yes, why should I brought food with me?"

Spirit laugh a bit than reached in his bags. "To eat of course! It is already lunch time so I think we can make a break!"

Bright turned to her bag and pulled out some food for herself and Spirit laid a bowl for Bite down than grabbed his own food. The ate a long time without saying anything till Spirit was reminded of something. "Bright, now I have a question! Fallen is a dark one, right?"

Bright choked on her food and immediately stopped eating. She looked very surprised at him. "No he is not! How did you get this idea? That is just silly!"

Spirit stopped eating and looked at her and shook his head. "You are a bad liar. So am I right or not?"

She hung her head down. "Don't tell him I told you but yes he is an Umbrum!"

Now it was Spirit turn to look surprised and now even Bite started listening. "An Umbrum? I just meant that he is a dark mage!"

Bright seemed to noticed her mistake. "Oh no. That was just stupid! Please don't freak out! How do you even know about Umbrum?"

Spirit stood up and started walking in circles. "Of course I know what an Umbrum is. They are the reason that Timberwolves do exist!" 'How is it possible that I didn't knew it?'

"Fallen is not evil like them! I promise but please don't be angry at him!" Spirit took a deep breath and turned back to her.

"I believe you. My teacher told me he would be important and I trust him so I believe you. Also I won't tell anypony about it, that is yours or Fallens job not mine." He sat down again and looked at Bite. 'I trust my teacher on this.'

She looked at him and raised her eyebrow. "And you're not angry that I or Fallen didn't tell about him being an Umbrum?"

He took a deep breath and looked at Bite. "No I am not. I came here to create a bond between ponies and Timberwolves and I hide him for some time too! Also I believe in the good in everything so maybe even an Umbrum can have something good in the inside."'At least I hope.'

Bright smiled at him with big happy eyes. She was about to say something but Spirit interrupted her. "But enough of this, you came here for a lesson so let's continue!"

He stood up and walked next to Bite. "Let's go on with Timberwolves magic structure! You know the spell to see magic auras?" She nodded. "Good then but we first had to find another animal!" He turned away and they left the clearing behind them. It took them while till Bite smelled something.

"It is a Manticore! Bite lead the way!" Bite started to go faster and the both ponies had to run to keep up. As Bite stopped was Bright completely puffed.

They saw a Manticore who was dirking from small lake. Spirit turned to Bright. "You stay here till I call you this could be dangerous if he think we want to attack him!"

She nodded and duck a bit down to make sure the Manticroe doesn't see her. Spirit nodded to Bite. "You stay here too please, I think this is easier if I do it alone." Bite nodded and Spirit turned to the Manticore he stood up and slowly walked towards the lake.

The Manticore suddenly turned around as he heard Spirit and growled. Spirit just sat down and took a deep breath. The Manticore walked slowly towards Spirit and Spirit started reaching out in his mind as he touched he felt the anger from being interrupted while drinking. Spirit quickly send him positive emotions and tired to talk with him. "No need to be angry I just want to show somepony something about magic you can just ignore us! We won't hurt you!" The Manticore first looked at him surprised than turned around and continued drinking.

He stood up again and turned to the others. "You can come Bright and you too Bite!"

The both came out there hiding place and Bright looked very impressed at him. "How did you do this. It just looks like you talk with him in mind!"

"Well you are not so wrong. But first I calm the animal that it even listened to me, than I can send them some messages. The thing is, it is for me only possible to communicate correctly with Timberwolves, one time I talked with one back at the tribe that was able to answer me in small sentences, my teacher said it had something to do with my special talent. With other creatures it seems to be impossible."

"So you can talk with animals through your mind and they understand?"

"Yes they understand but not listened always. Anyway back to the lesson, activate the spell to see magical auras!"

Bright closed her eyes and opened them shortly after that. "Done!"

"Good now look at the Manticore. What do you see?"

"I see a weak aura nothing special."

"Now look at your own aura."

She looked down to one of her hooves. "It looks a little stronger, like any other unicorn."

Spirit nodded. "Now look at my aura."

She looked at him then blinked with her eyes a bit."Your aura looks very strange like it is stretched away in all directions."

"Yes that is because of my special talent but now look at Bite."

She turned her head a bit to left to Bite who stood right next to Spirit. "Wow his aura is very strong ... and it looks like it is different in the middle."

"Exactly. You see the difference comes because the Timberwolves used the magic they gain from food to strengthen their aura. They add the extra magic to their aura which hold them together the difference is a normal animal aura like from a dog compromised to small point. So, so much about Timberwolf auras, to the next thing." He walked back to his saddlebags but was stopped by Bright.

She looked curios in the air between Spirit and Bite. "Um Spirit what is that between you and Bite?"

"Ah right that is another thing of my special talent I have a bond to Bite which is always active. I can use it to see through his eyes and he through mine, we can sent emotions and at last talk I can talk with him but till now he wasn't able to answer me without just sending feelings."

Bright closed her eyes and opened them shortly. "So your special talent seems to have a big influence on your aura!"

"Well yes but that is normal. The talent of a pony always change the aura in my case it is just a bit more obvious since I use my aura to make the connection to other creatures."

"Ok what comes next?" She followed him as he walked back to the clearing.

"I think for the end I will show you a few things about Timberwolves. For example a Timberwolf has a very sensitive nose." Bite eyes opened very wide as he got what Spirit was about to do. Spirit reached in his bag and pulled out small bottle and opened it.

He held it to Bright. "Here sniff on it."

He sniffed and grimaced. Spirit chuckled and Bright hold her nose closed. "What is that?"

He smiled. "You don't want to know! And anyway..." He held the bottle up and blew. Bite instantly hold his nose with his paw and duck his head and after a few second he fall into pieces.

Bright looked worried at Bite but Spirit laughed. "Oh come on Bite this is just cowardly but ok I close the bottle but before that I got an idea. Bright use the aura vision again!"

Bright closed her eyes and did the spell and looked than at Bites heart. "Wow it looks like a big glowing orb."

Spirit nodded. "Good, now look carefully. Bite go on and rebuild yourself." And as Bite started to rebuild was Bright able to see that his aura started to reach out for the wood and literally building a wolf from the pieces.

As Bite was done Spirit turned to Bright and saw he amazed expression and Spirit pat Bite on the back. "I know it looks really impressive."

"Wait how could you be able to see his aura?"

"Oh I almost forgot to explain. Back at the tribe we used rune glasses or some even painted the rune on their head that have the same effect but needs more energy and the rune is much more difficult."

Bright looked again to the bottle. "Wait! If Timberwolves have such a sensitive nose how does it come that they have such a bad breath?"

"First of only adult Timberwolves breath stinks, Bite here is not that far but it could come every day now. In answer to the question it is the normal smell for them to identify another adult, so it doesn't bother them! The smaller don't have that so it is easier to hide them for enemies. " Spirit turned to the sun for a moment. "Well it seems your lesson is over. I am sorry we didn't even as quiet as far as I wished but you are not my student."

Bright smiled to Bite and petted him on the head. "No problem, it was much fun and I learned much today. Maybe you could show me some more!"

"Yes maybe but first want to do this with more other ponies everything that show them the good side of the forest is a good thing!" Spirit started to collect his things and put them back in his bag.

They both walked back to the cottage and as Bright was about to o stopped Spirit her one last time. "Oh and just that you know, I will let Twilight know what you learned today. She will probably make a test so I would overlook my notes, which you of course didn't forgot!"