Fuel for the Fire [Attn Amaranie]

A place for the Learning Ranks to socialize and mingle.
Post Reply
User avatar
Bridget
"Lord of Chaos"
Posts: 340
Joined: October 2nd, 2014, 4:57 am
PC: Haxia do Catalan a'Coralle

Fuel for the Fire [Attn Amaranie]

Post by Bridget » December 30th, 2017, 11:01 pm

Haxia
Haxia stared up at her ceiling, her head propped on her flat, lumpy pillow, and tried not to cry. It was all so… terribly insurmountable. It had seemed that it should all be easy, once she started to apply herself in truth! But saidar slipped from her like water through a sieve, no matter how diligently she tried to call it to her. Tia Sedai had been replaced by a stream of Accepted, who went from competent to surly to resigned as she failed to make any significant step forward. And now she had been relocated to lessons in which a single Accepted taught a multitude of novices. Haxia had never had anything less than a private tutor, and being one student in the crowd was more than enough to make her bristle. And worse than that, any hope that other girls struggled as much as she did had been summarily extinguished.

Even Amaranie, who Haxia considered to be her equal in most things, was so far ahead of her that Haxia had found herself quite unable to speak to the other girl throughout the entire lesson earlier that morning. She scowled, sitting up to punch ineffectually at her pillow in an attempt to pound it into a more comfortable shape. The whole situation was unbearable. Haxia was certainly unused to being jealous; in her experience it had always been other women envious of her, not the other way around.

She rubbed her stocking feet against the bedspread, trying ineffectually to warm herself. It was not just that she was the worst of her classes- what if it did take her decades to become Aes Sedai? Haxia had heard of women who had taken more than twenty years to gain the shawl. That would be unendurable, and worse than that- what if she could never become Aes Sedai? There were women who were sent from the Tower, who were judged to be too weak to take up that mantle.

Haxia sat up, tucked her cold feet under her. “I will not be sent home.” She whispered to herself, more than a little furious. There would be at least a few minutes before Amaranie returned. The other girl had taken their free hour to go somewhere- the kitchens or library perhaps. Haxia had not been in the mood to listen. That was more than enough time to practice the weave the Accepted had taught them that morning. If the Tower would not give her her own teacher nor the time to practice, she would take matters into her own hands. She would not be sent home in disgrace, decades older.

She stilled, laid her palms on her thighs to steady herself, and thought carefully of a blooming rose. A small bud in the morning light, opening into a blossom. That, at least, had begun to come a little easier- it only took her a handful of tries to feel the warmth of saidar. She just held it, for a long moment, let herself feel both the satisfaction of her success and the bright joy of saidar itself. But she likely didn’t have that long before Amaranie returned, and Haxia knew the other girl wouldn’t approve of breaking Tower rules.

With a deft hand, Haxia worked a white ribbon out of her hair. The weave was a small illusion, enough to change the color of an object. Carefully, she formed delicate threads of Fire and Air. It was easiest with Fire; that was the one place where Haxia surpassed her peers. None of the other novices were half as comfortable with Fire as she was. She made the weave over the ribbon, working painstakingly to entwine the thread of fire with her thin flows of air. It was harder to manage the two flows of Air; they were hard to make thin enough for the weave. Frowning, she turned her attention from her thread of Fire to those flows of Air, braiding them together-

And screamed as the ribbon caught fire, burning her hand. Saidar fled from her as she leapt up from the bed, half tripping over her own feet, to thrust her hand into the pitcher at their washbasin. The water steamed for a moment, and Haxia pulled her hand out, afraid to look. Her hand throbbed as she tucked it against her chest, sobbing quietly. Oh light, it felt like it was still on fire. Haxia sunk down, still cradling her hand, and cried. She could not even change the color of a ribbon. She would never be Aes Sedai.

Alianora
"The Path of Daggers"
Posts: 997
Joined: May 2nd, 2016, 8:32 pm
PC: Liaran Sedai, Blue Ajah
SC: Amaranie Sedai, Indigo Ajah
TC: Kalyan Rihera, Yellow Ajah

Re: Fuel for the Fire [Attn Amaranie]

Post by Alianora » January 1st, 2018, 1:02 am

Amaranie
Amaranie headed down the hallway to her room, clutching two heavy books in her arms , and wished her head would stop pounding. She felt stuffed full of vocabulary after having spent most of her free hour laboring over the Old Tongue. Light, but I hate that class. Why do we even have to learn it? When she'd almost reached her room, she was startled out of her thoughts by the sound of someone screaming, and Amaranie thought she recognized the voice. Haxia? The novice picked up her speed and ran the last few paces to the room they shared, careless of who might see. Yanking the door open, she hurried in, hitting a foot on the doorframe and nearly tripping in her haste. Her empty hand landed on the wall to steady herself, and Amaranie looked up just in time to see her friend plunge a flaming hand into the pitcher.

What happened?

The books in her other arm made a soft clunking sound as Amaranie tossed them carelessly onto her bed before rushing to the other girl's side. She threw her arm around the other girl's shoulders, pulling Haxia closer to her as they both looked down at the hand Haxia had pulled from the water. Amaranie couldn't stop herself from gasping at the sight of the reddened skin, which was rising into blisters even as she watched. It had to hurt terribly given how hard Haxia was crying, and without really thinking about what she was doing, Amaranie reached for saidar. In the moment, with her friend in so much pain, she did not care that it was forbidden to her. She took a deep breath, imagining a small red rose, and allowed it to open, filling her with light.

Instinct alone guided her as she pulled threads of Air, Water, and a smaller amount of Spirit and attempted to braid them together. Amaranie frowned as she concentrated, weaving Air under Water, Spirit over Air, Water under Spirit, until her creation was long enough to wrap around the injured hand, which she did. When she'd worked the last ends in so that the weave formed a circle, Amaranie let it go and released the Power, only then stopping to wonder just what she had done.

The novice stared, blue-grey eyes growing wider, as the blisters sank back into the skin and the redness receded. In just seconds, Amaranie would not have been able to tell that Haxia's hand had been burnt at all, had she not already seen it. She blinked, trying to understand what had just taken place. It looked as though she'd Healed her friend, but she'd never learned how that was done, and wasn't sure how she could possibly have managed it without knowing the weaves. As she puzzled over it, an unwelcome memory stirred from deep within her mind, where Amaranie had desperately attempted to bury it.

Standing beside Haxia, her arm still around the other girl, she couldn't help remembering her younger self, kneeling on her parents' kitchen floor, Keegan's arm around her just as she now clung to Haxia. It struck her then that this was what her brother had done for her on that awful day, that she might not have to know the Healing weave to be capable of using it, as certainly Keegan had not. Amaranie began to cry then, remembering how frightened and apologetic her brother had been, and of course, everything that had happened afterwards. She glanced again at Haxia's hand, trying to assure herself that her friend really was healed, then let go of the other girl and retreated to her bed, shoving her books to the end.

She curled up in a ball, head laying on her pillow, crying so hard she couldn't speak. Her face quickly turned red, and a damp spot formed on the pillow beneath her. All of her concern for Haxia fled as Amaranie finally allowed herself to mourn her brother, behavior her parents had not tolerated in their home. Her whole body shook as she cried, and she made no noise other than the occasional low moan or high-pitched cry. Eventually, she felt herself beginning to calm down. As her tears slowed, though they did not stop, Amaranie found herself capable of whining a single word, "Keegan."

Post Reply
meble kuchenne na wymiar cennik

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 8 guests