theo. (escutcheon) wrote in emillion, @ 2014-01-08 10:43:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, !log, peony min, theodore finch |
We got the fire, and we're burning one hell of a something.
Who: Theodore Finch & Peony Min.
What: A lesson in fire magic, and an assessment of skill.
Where: The Mages Tower.
When: Backdated to last Friday.
Rating: Tame.
Status: Complete!
Mindful of the poor example recently set by Sven with his new student, Peony arrived in the tower lobby a full quarter hour early, settling herself in the reception area and greeting scholars and fellow mages as they arrived and departed. It was no trouble, after all, and the guild’s image could always use maintaining. She had no doubt she would see her student the moment he walked in, and so she did -- he was a large, imposing man with a massive weapon and a wide stride, very unlike the robed figures with their stacks of books who surrounded him. It was good to see for herself that he did indeed seem unharmed after his recent misadventures. She offered him a small, polite smile as she set out to meet him in the center of the tower lobby. She had no doubt he would recall her, and his thunderous expression (the same as the last two times she had seen him) did not faze her in the slightest. “Good day, Sir Finch,” she said, extending her hand. “A pleasure to see you well.” Theo had strode into the reception area with all of his usual force, no longer subdued by his former wounds and loss of memory, and had planted his gaze on the familiar mage easily enough. While he himself had proved punctual, a frown formed at the idea that he had still managed to keep the woman waiting. “Good day,” he returned, shaking Peony’s hand as he spoke and making sure his grip wasn’t too intimidating. Attempting to keep his rough manners in check around well-mannered women had always been something of a habit (though success at these attempts was always another matter). “Waiting long?” He gave a sniff and moved up to his full imposing height, an effort that more easily allowed him to look around and make observations of the mages in their environment. It had been quite some time since he had come to visit here, he recalled, his mind drifting slightly to Darius--his half brother. But this was not a social call, and white magic was not the subject to be discussed. Theo recalled the battle that he and the mage had fought, and her masterful wielding of magic. Certainly he had come to meet with the right person on this particular matter (and there was another, more deeply hidden matter as well--but that he could not speak of). “Not at all,” she assured him. “You are exactly on time.” Her handshake was limp; her strength very clearly lay elsewhere. “I have reserved a casting room for our use,” she said, gesturing for him to follow her towards the waystone. “As we walk, perhaps you can tell me more of your experience with the magical arts, so that I may best assist you?” He was a man of few words, by her estimation -- on the network and also in person. But his few terse responses had given her an incomplete picture of his needs. ‘Unconventional study’ could mean a great many things. “Aye,” he said gruffly, stomping along behind the smaller mage as they moved toward the waystone. Peculiar way to travel about, he had thought once and did so again. Theo would admit that the Mages Tower and its mass of studious denizens were a curious lot, in their own fashion, even if he did not always entirely grasp their methods. The knight cast a glance over his shoulder before speaking. “Self-taught,” he explained. Or didn’t, as the truth might’ve been--for he had not come about fire magic in the same way has he had his basic skills in Cure. But to explain the nature of his strange affinity to this element would be to put himself, the mage, and perhaps a great many others at risk. Recent events discouraged all such thoughts in this direction, and so Theo had to explain what little he could. “Some experience in battle,” he continued, shuffling behind the mage as they prepared to make to the next floor. “Not well-versed in the academics.” “I see,” she said. “We can discuss the theory -- and I can recommend some reading, perhaps -- once I have seen what you have learned on your own.” And hopefully, he would not need to be retaught from nothing; rarely did anyone but scholars (who had little choice if they wished to advance) have the patience for such an endeavor. The casting rooms located in the basement would be their aim -- plain stone, without furnishings save for benches of that same stone protruding from the walls, and heavily warded. Peony led him down the hall to the room she had reserved, a touch of her hand causing the door to swing silently open. “There is little here that can be set aflame,” she said by way of explanation; as a space for training, it was quite austere. The walls were warded against accidents, making this the best place to work with beginners. “You mentioned control as an area of concern?” she asked, once the door had shut behind them. She had read all the interactions publicly available to attempt to better gauge her new student. “Does the spell backfire? Or is it simply difficult to aim it? Or, perhaps, is it the size or duration of the conflagration that you find difficult to manage?” Theo took up a wide amount of space in these stone halls, and he couldn’t help the feeling of being slightly boxed in. The sound of his footsteps echoed in his ears like the pounding of a war drum, thundering off the bare stone walls of the basement as he moved. He tried to concentrate on Peony’s questions. “Aye,” he grunted, waving a hand as if to agree with all of her deductions. “No use to me if I can’t master it.” He stomped around in a circle, making certain for himself that the room was safe to his eyes. When he appeared at last to be satisfied, Theo reached back for his greatsword. Hefting Ragnarok forward, he attempted to show Peony what it was that he could do. He was a straightforward man, after all, and didn’t see reason in mulling over words when action would serve just as well. “Here,” he said, and concentrated his mind on the weapon. Soon enough, flames begun to dance around the blade--his control seemed to come naturally, as one adept to certain spells may be prone to show, but it was obvious his knowledge and ability to control the fire was limited to its summoning. Her brows rose ever-so-slightly -- from her, surprise. it was more like Aura, what he did, perhaps a bit like an Synergist’s Enfire, than the traditional black magic spell. It did not, at least, backfire the way she had feared it might, though it was obvious he had little idea of what could be done with it now that it had been called. “Release it, for now,” she instructed, approaching as if being closer would give her further insight on the curious weave of the spell he used. “How long can you maintain it?” she asked. “And -- if necessary -- can you call it without your sword?” Theo grumbled and did as Peony instructed, and with a wave of his sword the flames had disappeared once again. He strapped the greatsword to his back and stood facing the mage with his arms crossed, looking down at her thoughtfully. He frowned, unable to come up a decent answer. When using his magic in battle, he had often been caught up in a battle-frenzy, his mind hardly on anything more than the enemy in front of him--let alone such seemingly trivial details. But this was why he had come seeking counsel from mages, he knew, as they were learned enough to ask these sorts of questions. “Don’t know,” he said hesitantly. “Haven’t attempted it.” She put out her hands, cupped as though she held some invisible item. With a whisper, the flame came, small and slow, a ball of heat and light between her palms. “We will try,” she said. “Place your hands as if you are holding the blade, if it assists -- but do not draw.” The magic did not need the weapon, and would be far more versatile if not bonded to it. “May I?” she asked coming up beside him, her hands hovering just over his, clearly intending to take them. “Aye.” Theo frowned (mostly in confusion this time), but allowed the mage to do so. Meanwhile, he attempted to do as she had shown and cupped his hands together. The knight was uncertain as to what results might spring forth from an exercise such as this, but he gave all patience Faram had afforded him and went along with Peony’s instruction. He did not know what to expect. She did as she often did with children still new in their power, uncertain how to begin -- taking his hands in hers, she cast through them, so that he could feel the spell taking form between them. It sprang into place perhaps a bit more quickly than she had intended (rather odd, really), but it was the same small ball of contained fire as she had called before. “It feels something like this, if it is correct,” she instructed, letting the fire continue to burn above his hands before finally winking out. “Maintaining it is draining -- less so when it is small. Sometimes, new casters will not realize how draining until they find themselves lightheaded and their weapons too heavy to lift.” A challenge she had seen with the young knights she had tutored for Heron. “Attempt to recreate it, if you can,” she instructed. “If you cannot control it, I will put it out.” While Theo hadn’t been the one to summon forth the fire, he could indeed feel the magic working through her hands. Feeling a strange comfort, and indeed, a familiar pull at his senses as the flame sprung forth, he felt prepared to make an attempt to perform the same feat. Keeping his hands together, Theo put all of his concentration into recreating the ball of flame he had just seen. A flame sparked to life in his hands, but unlike the mage’s effort, it was wild and inconsistent. Unaccustomed to this sort of exercise in relation to fire magic, Theo looked from the flickering ball of fire to Peony. “Not the same,” he said, noting the difference between his effort and hers. While he hadn’t seemed to have too much difficulty in summoning the magic, it proved just as unwieldy as the demonstration before. Whatever talent he possessed obviously needed fine tuning and improvement. “Nor should it be,” she said placidly, though she watched his fire’s flickers attentively. It did not seem in need of curbing yet, for all that it flickered in size and intensity. “It is, however, a very good first effort.” She stepped away from him now, making her own fire reappear. “Try to shrink it,” she said, collapsing her hands closer and closer together as the ball of fire grew smaller and smaller. “Make it more compact.” It would be easier to grow it if he could control it, and control was a matter of delicacy, where elemental magicks were concerned. “Give it firm shape with your mind. Fire, in its elemental form, is not the most obedient of the elements, but it can and should be contained lest it cause accident or injury.” Theo sighed. Accidents and injuries were the very things he wanted to avoid with power such as this, and he took a deep breath and attempted to do as she instructed once again. Proper learning of magic was a complicated matter, he decided, and perhaps he had long forgotten the trials of learning Cure in his early knighthood (or perhaps it was that elemental magic was simply incomparable). He slowly began to collapse his large hands together, watching with a dour expression as the fire flickered and shrank. Theo made a low growl in the back of his throat when he thought the flame might extinguish altogether, but as inconsistent as it was, he had still managed to pull off a lesser semblance of the woman’s previous feat. “Your assessment?” He glanced up to her, curious (and a smidge impatient). “You’ve a natural skill,” she said. She wondered how he might do with other elements -- but now was not the time. She had been engaged to teach Fire, after all. “Your control is rough -- as you have indicated -- but not nonexistent. With time, I think you could learn a great deal of value here, which would assist you on the battlefield.” Considering a moment, she said, “I will take you up to the library, if you’ve a half hour more to spare, and recommend several books which you should take home. If you wish to continue with me, I will arrange for the time.” He was an interesting case, and the occurrences in the snowstorm would not soon be forgotten. “I should, perhaps, give warning: my approach may appear quite… delicate.” A smile ghosted across her lips. “It may be, at times, frustrating. However, if it is control you seek, I can promise you I will teach it in a way you will not learn elsewhere. If you prefer another instructor, however, I will not take offense, and provide a list of recommendations.” Theo nodded his head as she spoke. He slapped his hands together and the fire spell had dissipated at once, but the exercise had done its work and proven a number of new possibilities to both of them. “Aye,” he said, “I’ve got time for it.” As far as who he prefered to teach him these lessons in control, he could only reason between what little he had learned of late. Peony was, by all means, an honorable woman, and a mystifying but knowledgeable trainer. He took a moment to scratch at the back of his neck and recall Divina’s advice to him as well. “Talk more of this as we go,” he suggested at last, holding the door open for the smaller mage and allowing Peony to lead the way to the library. Theo had plenty of time to ask on this Barnard character, he decided, and whether or not it would benefit him to learn from different mages as well. After all, he did have more than enough reason of late to spend what time he could at the Tower. “Next week, then,” she said. “Come at the same time, if it is agreeable to you. Plan on spending an hour.” As she led him from the casting room and back towards the waystone, her aim the library, she reflected that this had worked out to her advantage, too. Although they had been set aside for more immediate worries, she still had questions for Theodore Finch regarding what had happened that day in the snowstorm, especially considering other recent experiences. Perhaps she might find the right time -- and the right words -- to ask them as he worked with her. If his situation was in some way similar to Hippolyta’s, she had no doubt that this would require patience (and if not, only more questions arose -- but that was for later). Fortunately, Peony Min had patience to spare. For today, she was only a guide. “Have you visited our library previously?” she asked as they reached the waystone. “It is a wonderful resource, though many in the city unfortunately do not realize that books may be taken from here for personal study and reflection…” |