Fable - Ask Against The Tide, Against the Fire

[Ravelyn Anne Conleth]

Within the vale was a waterfall of impulsive blue that did roar and crash down below upon the rock. A great wind could be felt that caused the spray of water to be all the more impulsive. A knight pursuant pointed a block of serrated bronzed piece of metal that was their sword up towards the height of the water's crest. The orange of the sun set the waters to sparkle and made Ravelyn's armour resound in bronze hue.

“You see, the water isn't consistent in direction when to comes to the crest, all pitter patter, but the pressure is if you're under it,” Ravelyn shouted over the sound of the water falling down. “Being under it is one thing, but contending with the space it occupies in descent is entirely another! Watch! There's a few ways of doing this, but I'll give you the brute force approach just to show you how much you have to really kick out to completely dominate it, you understand of course,” Ravelyn said and scrunched up her nose and made a wide swing with the cutlass that made a terrifying low thrum as it swung in the direction of the waterfall crest. The blade made a rippling wave of rolling orange flame that absolutely abolished the water from the waterfall in thick smothering actions of spinning. Ravelyn was grinning as she performed this display as the water rolled back and left the waterfall silent for twenty seconds as the fire remained in place at the crest.

“You want to give it a go? Or you want to talk about approaches of handling this particular challenge? Depends if you want to learn what you can do just without thinking. Just, go, you know?”

At that exact moment, as if expertly and deliberately timed, the water began to crash down, drowning them in the sounds of water. Twenty seconds from one swing of her sword. Of silence against the tide.

Helena

 

[Helena]

Helena stood wide eyed as she watched the water crash anew, her jaw relaxed, but never slack. She gave Ravelyn a nod, and drew her own blade. Zenith's long and straight peak glittered in the evening sun, all the more as mist and water gathered along its edge.

She was not Ravelyn Anne Conleth, Pursuant of Flame. But Helena knew exactly what she meant.

She pulled in a breath through her lungs, the sword's point swung down and back to her side, length run behind her in the long tail stance, the runes burned red, then yellow, then white, and she swung her blade up and across with a stance switching step.

A thin line of red hot flame sliced out of the blade, seared through the roar of the waterfall with but a sniket snap of silence that was drowned out as soon as it had come.

A huff of frustration, Helena's brows knit together and she looked dissapointed at where her flame had struck the curtain of water, her fingers regripped around Zenith's handle, the blade still shimmering a hungry as water dipped along its run and hissed as it burned away in little trails of steam.

"My angle was too shallow," she self corrected, but knew that was just part of what she had done wrong. The rest, however, illuded her, as she felt her fingers, tight along their grip, quaver and tremble with the memory whence last they'd let loose such a flame. The scars aback her hand hot against her skin. She clenched her jaw, and set her stance back to long tail with an exhalation.

Ravelyn Anne Conleth

 

[Ravelyn Anne Conleth]

Ravelyn grinned as she saw that the Captain was able to produce flame when compelled by her command without hesitation. The energy was drawn into the blade, harnessed, and released without complaint or lash back. So many students, Ravelyn thought, had to be attended when drawing larger wells of heat to such a task. She was glad not to have to prevent a blowback of heat, the energies were directed correctly away without burning the one who commanded them. She began to speak at length, taking proper moments to allow the lecture to be understood without it being overwhelming.

But it was clear this was very much a subject she enjoyed talking about, especially to one such as the Captain's proficiency so displayed.

“Ah ha, the angle, yes. But you channel the fire well! Excellent build up of energies, very potent, which is good to see you have such a wellspring. But you know, the task is best approached by something other than a fire and forget! If you'll forgive the pun. You draw the flame well into yourself, you spend enough time bringing about intensity to the magic, but once it's released, your task isn't finished if you want to really overwhelm an elemental neutralism. The water, in this case. You will have a tether of intent to the magic commanded, one that can be severed by a desire not to be burned by it. I'm going to show you an advanced technique that will make even an improper angle irrelevant. Well, slightly irrelevant. What I'm going to ask you to do is to try a smaller flame which you feel comfortable drawing up and burning slow and close to you, eject it out, and then reinforce the fire's energy once it has just released. So, in essence, instead of just charging up a powerful blow within the flame and letting it fly unattended and unreinforced, you'll send a weaker initial charge, and then supplement it with extra energy and intent to scourge. This is an advanced technique I hasten to add, but one that can make such feats of fire last when they would normally be extinguished by the environment, or elemental countermagic. Advanced countermagic that works on mismantling the arcane structure instead of countering the elemental nature of the flame is a different thing to counter, but most magic users will see fire and think, oh no I have to smother it, nullify the air, put water to it, instead of the more pure arcane practice of unweaving the arcane pattern at it's core, which is far more difficult and requires a deeper understanding of magic.”

Ravelyn smiled and let this digest for a moment, before lifting her heavy blade up and smiling further as she breathed deep in as was tradition when flames were about to be commmanded. To become a furnace one had to conduct the body as a furnace, as a set of bellows set to the heart of the flame.

“So! Just so I'm not chewing you ear off, a demonstration of what's possible with even an incorrect angle. You're not always going to be able to produce flame with the proper angle, or to be allowed to employ angles that are perfect, or even ideal, in the course of battle and such! Especially if you're redirecting an opponent's wild flame, or heck, wildfire spitting and fire. Dragonflame, now that's a different matter, brutal stuff, but that's another lesson entirely. Now! I'll show off what's possible with the after-touch redirection if you keep a connection to even a lesser flame summoning! Watch!”


Ravelyn pointed the curve of her blade downwards so that it would appear the flame that gathered within the metal would simply enter the lower spray of the waterfall. The blade grew to a low amber, and then instead of the first demonstration being such an intense wave of flame, a thin wave of flame erupted from the blade. It sizzled on contact with the water, and Ravelyn said with only a minor hint of concentration but a fierce gaze, “Maintain contact, amplify the fuel and...”

The wave was compelled to rise up towards the falling water's direct descent, and erupted into fresh life. To the arcanely sensitive one could detect a direct contact line, as if it were a pouring liquid of flammable oil on the sand of reality, flowing continually and then drowning the initial flame in the combustable.

“Redirect and resend!”

The wave of flame trembled as it hungrily consumed the water. Even from the direct angle it chewed through the water in spits and spats and continual burning, the wave of flame going at a lateral angle at first and then rising to a perfect horizonal. Instead of striking at the perfect angle, the angle had been adjusted to contact as much of the water as possible, yet was being overwhelmed in arcane intent. The flame wave rose up to the waterfall crest and trembled, before dissolution consumed it.

Ravelyn sniffed deep and then exhaled, satisfied with her own demonstration.

“It's like throwing a javelin, except you can readjust your hands on the javelin mid flight. Or perhaps an arrow. Yes, try thinking of it as an arrow. Tie a piece of string to it, that's the arcane intent and connection, and once it's fired, know that you can place it in a bow again and redirect and give it more power. It takes some getting used to, but I believe you can do it! Medium flame, then pour more power and angle into it to correct it. But try whatever angle you please first, just focus on pouring more energy through the conduit line after you've released it. Don't just abandon the intent after you fire, stay with it, feel it, and then overwhelm. Give it a few tries, I have faith you can do it!”

Helena

 

[Helena]

Helena listened to the Pursuant's words intently. A javelin whose trajectory you could re-adjust. An arrow which you could add more power to. None of it felt like it clicked in her mind. Abstractions that made little sense to her, so rooted in earth and stone. Arrows and javelins both flew freely. Sailed on the wind.

Her brows scrunched as the wheel of her mind turned, pushed on by the stream of thought.

I have faith you can do it!

The certainty struck Helena, had her flinch back and go wide eyed. She had faith in her. The young knight nodded, her hold on her sword redoubled. What moved the the arrow? The pull of arms and the snap of string. The wind carried it farther, if the archer could take it into account, use it as part of the shot. Same with the spear.

She spread her feet into her stance, long tail. The blade glowed red, then gold behind her.

Pouring.

The word came to her as she focused on her breath. Poured in through her nose, and out through her mouth. A bellows to the furnace of her magicked soul. Remain connected. Her hands ached. The healed scars felt aflame.

Redirect. Resend.

A step forward, her sword swung across and vertically, the blade flashed to fire, shifting from gold to white in that moment that the tempered focus of her magick slashed across. A beam of flame whipped out, like spider's silk, it lashed at the waves of water, ate up their liquid matter, and just as the white flame sliced up, all hiss and steam's roar, the flame expanded, grew fat from sword's tip first, red and swollen, the fire bulged out, turned silk to rope, to thick vine. Up and up it went, further then the time before, if only by inches, half a meter at most, and the raging water spilled overtop of the red flame.

Helena's arms trembled as they held on to her blade, raised high near ox's guard. Her hands ached, her scars lit by the red of the fire that streamed out of her blade. She grit her teeth, shift her feet as she held the channel, drew in sharp breath.

The sword's blade turned orange, then gold as it burned hotter. She shift her arms, pushed the blade up against the force of the crashing falls. The flame burned brighter across the width of the falls. Ate at the ceaseless flow with storm of steam. The line of golden fire shook, clear there as no water spilled over its blazing edge. It inched some, further up. And the fire broke.

Strong stance broken, Helena drew in labored breaths, sweat rolled down her brow, and she looked down at her blade, its runes still gold and hot.

"Redirect, resend," she repeated, and mentally prepared for the next go.

Ravelyn Anne Conleth

 

[Ravelyn Anne Conleth]

Ravelyn produced some delighted laughter at the sight and quickly provided assurance that there was no jest or mockery in it. “Captain, dear Captain, you succeed on your first attempt! Well done! The technique has been demonstrated in one swing of your sword, marvellous, simply marvellous! Take a minute to appreciate your strike! Be kind to yourself, cool off for a moment. The waterfall will wait even as it rushes. Say, you've done more in your first strike than I did in my first hundred sword strokes trying to develop the technique! Simply wonderful!”

Ravelyn was smiling as she said this and hopped closer to Helena. There was a great deal she could say, but she felt the sound of the waterfall soothe.

“You've got a real talent for this. Breathe, let your body recover from such a technique. It can be taxing for sure.” She paused. “But not as taxing as some of your responsibilities,” Ravelyn said daringly, with a strong sense of collegiality behind her words.

“You were just going to jump right in and try again without appreciating your first success weren't you?” Ravelyn said with a admiring smile, hoping that those words might carry more context than simply hurling flame waves around.

Helena

 

[Helena]

The shower of praise was, unexpected. Not because her Masters and mentors were oft cold and critical in their approach, but because she saw no success in her effort. Only a failure that needed correcting. Adjustments. Recalibrations to the network of seals and sigilwork within the white flame of her mind.

How else was she to improve? How else was she to meet all the threats that assailed the order. Her eyes closed. and she bowed her head to the Pursuant of Flame, sword held firm at her side.

"Thank you, Syr, I am only as good as the efforts of those who have taught and continue to teach me," she said from the bow, and stood upright as her eyes opened again. There was a tension in her hands. Muscles and sinew felt worked, but were all too ready for another go. All too ready to purge whatever faults were left in her. Her hands regripped around the hilt of her sword.

Memories of battles past flickered and danced in the fires of her psyche. Moments where the carnage came clear. A gnash of steel claws and teeth as wildfires burned and the earth itself woke to crush those who dared defile its sanctity.

Breathe, let your body recover...

She huffed out a long hot breath through her nose. Filled her lungs full of new, water cooled breath. Felt the mist kiss her skin, and let the rumble and the roar fill her.

You were just going to jump right in...

Helena smirked, as tiny droplets of water splashed against the still cooling blade of her magicked weapon. How they hissed and sizzled across its gleaming edge. "Am I so obvious, Syr?"

 

[Ravelyn Anne Conleth]

"As obvious as ashes," Ravelyn said.

Ravelyn had a few tasks within the order as Pursuant of flame. One such charge was providing lessons such as these. But she also assisted in cremations for funeral services in the Order. She respected people's wishes to return to the earth by burial, but some preferred their ashes be carried to winds. Abalon handled the details and wishes of those fallen.

She considered her own funeral arrangements and smiled. The diamond would be good. She had already arranged it long in advance.

"Captain, the domain of flame is yours to command, as are we all. I remind you of the adage, prevention is better than cure. You are potent with the fire. You fought against the water to deliver a strike. But I ask you, my dearest Captain, to be a mother to yourself in these heated times. You're doing marvellously. And I'm not just talking about the technique."

Ravelyn brushed her hair back.

"I have received a vision from within the most perfect blue flame. It told me that I must impart something to you. Are you familiar with green flame techniques? Or for that matter," she said and placed her hands on her hips, "Are you capable of producing blue flame? Worry not if the answer is no. We can explore it if you like. My hearth of knowledge requires but a word to provide emberic sustenance."

 

[Helena]

"No Syr, I can't say that I am," she confessed. "My flames," she thought on it a moment. "I have managed to reach the white flame," a thing of intensity, and destruction. A thing that left not behind, but took much from her to sate its hunger all the same. As her hands bore testament. Skin discolored and silvery where Flame's appetite had taken her flesh as sation. Her eyes cast low as the roar of the waterfall filled her ears once more.

"But I have yet to wield the blue flame with any semblance of control," a point of ignition blown past. For her heart beat to the Wylds. The Flame, and all it gave, it was a thing she wielded out of necesity. Not a thing she could dance with. Not a thing she felt any measure of grace behind. "I would learn all you would show me, Syr Conleth," the young knight bowed.

Ravelyn Anne Conleth

 

[Ravelyn Anne Conleth]

Ravelyn nodded and wrapped her left hand around her right, from which the palm was raised upwards. An impulse of regular flame, all languid tongues of orange and red that spiralled upwards, as if ignited from a singular pulse of will. The waterfall continued to crash.

“Regular flame, useful for a myriad of reasons. Simple enough to summon, igniting the air with mental fortitude. It doesn't demand much. Just ignite, and most people just release it. Of course it can be redirected and fed willfulness to consume. To be respected. To be nurtured into further forms.”

Ravelyn inhaled and exhaled at the same time, a technique of circular breathing that was normally associated with musicians, and indeed, she had learned from a particular trumpeter who could continually play. And with this technique, although not vital to the craft, was an ease with which the white flame was beckoned from the initial flame. The orange tendrils focused themselves and stood at attention in a single jet of flame, white flame now emerging from the palm, focused and standing taller for Ravelyn's will.

“White flame. Far more focused, far more rigid in direction. It's not a writhing exploring thing, like regular flame. Can overcome greater gouts of regular flame if set adversity to it. Useful against fellow pyromancers attacks, I can tell you that! You pierce the wall of flame with one of these, and well, the whole assault falls apart! The will of fire is subdued by a fiercer form, a fiercer will.” Ravelyn said cheerfully, and stopped herself from giving a light hearted anecdote which she realised might disturb Helena's enthusiasm for studying fire altogether.

She clenched her hand, extinguishing the flame by such a bold gesture around such a high temperature thing. No burns were observed. No wince of pain. Just control.

“Blue flame,” she said with a good sense of mystery about it, as she smiled, “is more subtle. White flame is intense, regular fire expansive. Blue flame? It's a passionate thing. It requires more from the user to set the flame to the right mindset. Instead of just setting tinder to fire and setting oxygen to it like regular flame, or compelling it to become disciplined and feed it's ambition to burn brighter and hotter, like white flame, blue flame requires you make it to continually hunger for more fuel, a fuel one must provide in regular pulses. That must be promised with full bore. It's not a simple matter of adding more fuel to the maw of fire. One must make it chew faster, hungrier, fiercer! You in essence give it a small taste of what's possible, and promise more in quick fire pulse of energy, which encourages the burn to purely consume what is being given from the offset. It's difficult at first. Blue flame can be reached by brute force of injecting more fuel consumption to white flame, but a proper initial pulse of mana fuel into the arcane schema, can set it right from the off, and render it more reliable. Otherwise we'd have to go through all the previous forms of fire to gain access to blue. Which can be, well, less that time expedient when you need to get to blue. Promise the flame more fuel in regular cycles of feeding, instead of just forcing it to consume it all in one burst. Like a musician with timing.”

She ignited a blue flame and narrowed her eyes at it as she employed the technique to create a dancing spiralling blue flame about her guarded palm.

“So. The cycle goes like this. Or at least the cycle I've found works best to getting blue flame to maintain. More complicated timings can yield different results.”

She tapped her feet to a 4/5 timing.

“So, on the fifth beat, add fuel mana. Or known as a beat accent to musicians.Then on the fourth. Third, then second, then first, then return to the fifth, as the flame will remember how you fuel it so well and keep discipline and hunger. So it has a build up, a trickle of fuel mana, without ignition, only ignition on the fifth. So! Feed-feed-feed-feed-ignite and ultra feed, feed-feed-feed-ultrafeed-feed, feed-feed-ultrafeed-feed-feed-feed, and so on. This method requires some practice, but, there you are. One of the key elements!”

 

[Helena]

To hear Pursuant Ravelyn speak of the flames, was to hear the fires themselves whisper their secrets. All crackles and hisses from a thousand tongues, multi-form, and everchanging as they burned on. Life the Flame itself, her wisdom was overwhelming.

All igniting.

But Helena was one made from deep roots. Of the stones of the Spine. Of the woods of the Wyld. A knight who had been graced by the shade of the Eldyr's boughs.

If Ravelyn's words brought wisdom to life, Helena would be need be the kindle and hearth to see the wisdom carried forward.

"I'm not so good with music," she said with a cheeky smile, then set her eyes down to her own hands. Felt the beat of Ravelyn's tapping through the soil of the earth. An uneven thing. An offkilter quickness.

The words. Feed. Ignite. Ultra-feed all blurred to shimmering not within her mind. Yet as she steadied her breath, and loosened her limbs, let her feet spread beneath her. She let her breathing match the rythm. Let her magick flow to follow the jumble of words.

She held her hand out, palm up.

Feed feed feed feed, ignite.

A flicker of blue flame sparked to life. A tongue the size of a candle light. Blue as stars in the night.

Her eyes went wide and she smiled. The flame went out. her face scrunched up and she frowned.

"Delicate thing," she grumbled warmly. And thought again on the measure. The flow. How to train her fire. She let out a breath, took in a new one.

Feed feed feed feed, ignite. Ultrafeed.

The fire whooshed to life. And died just as fast. Singing some of her hairs.

Ravelyn Anne Conleth

 

[Ravelyn Anne Conleth]

Ravelyn clasped her hands in glee at the sight of the one she so instructed take to the practice she had prescribed. Her smile was wide at the sight of the tinge of blue of the magic so summoned giving her a rush of energy in turn. She paid no mind to the singing of the hairs, such was the occupational hazard of anyone who pursued the flames in any small part, let alone those who would seek to unlock further permutations of the blazes that could be commanded.

"Superb! A sudden burst of flame where there was none of such colour before, bravo, bravo! With some practice you'll be summoning the purest blues, of that I have no doubt. Of course, you may find other ways of summoning the blue flame through your own intuition, but my method of feeding the fire, well. It's the most efficient on the frame and fire. Been long in the game of such things, as I am sure you can appreciate, but there's many ways to cook a goose as it were!"

She gave a small hum as a new thought emerged.

“You know, you're really rather good at this discipline to be bringing forth such things so soon. I understand my method isn't the easiest,” she admitted, “but I thought you should know about it should you wish to burn true. I could impart more direct methods if you like? My method requires some...mindfulness that is hard engrained by practice and practice and more practice. Or perhaps instead, a method of summoning fire when all about you thwarts it? The rain should not stop us from bringing forth the heat in battle after all! I remember my days when I feared the rain. Now, it just makes me more often than not the only one capable of bringing fire to the field when the falling rain does appear. The surprise on some geomancer's faces when they think that a downpour can stop a Flame Pursuant, hah! I was once doused completely in water, and then submerged in a sphere of the stuff. Still managed to evaporate the thing entirely and make good my victory. Ah, good days, good bouts,” Ravelyn admitted and crossed her arms and smiled contently at the thought of it.

Helena