Searing 27, 116
The initiation ceremony took place on the side of a mountain, of course. It was one of the peaks of the southern range, not more than a half-day’s trek from the last farming village which still answered to Zaichaer’s laws. Not much to look at, either, at least not on the average day- a bunch of big-ass boulders with some strange edges and wobbly protrusions lying around in a big, unusually level circle. There were large, worn stones around the arena, meant to be benches, but not that different from the surrounding terrain at a glance.
For the Trial, however, things were a bit more dramatic. Imogen had no idea whether the arena’s transformation was the result of some kind of enchantment, or if some of the Sunsingers there simply had Kinetics runes, but some of the large boulders would ascend from the earth, forming the outline of a shallow dome over the participants seated “inside”. They didn’t look like much, but they cast distinctive shadows, reflections aided by gleaming silica, which cast the emblem of the triumphant Sun onto the earth.
Imogen Ward had not been invited to the ceremony, but she hadn’t been forbidden either. Over the course of three days, she had not stopped trying to discover what she had done wrong, and she’d finally been forced to accept the answer she had gotten from each of the masters- nothing. Had there been a reason, even a bad one, perhaps she would have stayed back, accepting that another year was the price of perfection.
Since she was given no reason for her failing, however, she was determined to attend. She couldn’t force the masters to grant her a rune, but perhaps she could find… some kind of satisfaction. She had not witnessed a Trial of Initiation herself, not in all of her time in the Sanctuaries, but there was no explicit rule against going to one, even if it weren’t meant for you.
She chose to leave just after the masters, following far enough behind them that they wouldn’t notice her and demand she turn back. If she was going to be rejected, she was damn well going to make them do it on the Trial grounds.
The trek wasn’t terribly difficult. Obviously the Sunsingers wouldn’t conduct the Trial off a main road, but the footpath up the slope was worn enough. Imogen wondered briefly what would happen if someone showed up part way through; she imagined the masters took some steps to avoid that. It might be necessary to slip past a lookout if she wanted to confront Master Gerhard.
She kept going for a few hours as the sun rose into the sky, until she finally spotted the tell-tale signs of boulders shifting in the middle distance. She had brought a few basic supplies- water, a snack for midday- but she had also felt it necessary to bring her fucking sword, and lugging that thing was a very tiring experience. Still, if she showed up to a trial of Reaving unarmed, she’d look like a real asshole.
“Stop!” came a quiet voice, breaking Imogen from the reveries of her own thoughts. “Stand and identify yourself.”
It was Initiate Tilman, the man she had sparred with briefly earlier in the week. He stepped out of the shadow of a monolith- perhaps out of the air itself? It was hardly inconceivable that the watchers would have some manner of invisibility spell.
”It’s me, Tilman. Imogen.”
The man gave her a once-over, expression considered. When he spoke, his voice was neither hostile nor particularly welcoming. “You weren’t summoned here, aspirant.”
”That’s correct.”
“May I ask your intentions?”
”You can ask.”
Tilman regarded her for a moment longer, then shrugged. “I have no orders to keep you out, specifically. But are you certain you’re ready to face the consequences? If you turn back now, I won’t tell the masters about this.”
She wasn’t certain, so she didn’t answer. Instead, Imogen marched straight past Tilman without another word. He did not call out after her.
It took only a few more minutes for the aspirant to reach the trial ground, passing below the temporarily-airborne monoliths and into the proving ground. There, she found the circle… empty.
The stones hung in the air like an earthen constellation, the shadows casting a starburst on the ground, but there were no Sunsinger trainees or masters inside the ring. Had they noticed her coming? What was this supposed to mean?
”What? Where the-”
She didn’t have time to speak another word before a sudden warmth bloomed across the back of her neck, and the world went black.
~
When the light and sounds and colors returned, they brought with them the imposing form of Master Gerhard, standing over her. As ever, his expression was considered, posture perfect. His smile was not quite as laconic as she had come to expect, either.
She wasn’t smiling, but it wasn’t from anger. Something really hurt, and she thought it might be her everything.
“Aspirant Ward. I believe that I told you that you were dismissed, no? Why are you here?”
Although her head was pounding, something about that voice brought her anger back into full clarity. ”Doesn’t make sense.”
“Make sense? I told you, I am not obligated to explain-”
”Not that. I don’t care what’s wrong with you. Doesn’t make sense to do the same thing if you’re just going to keep blocking me. May as well… ugh, press the issue.”
Master Gerhard looked down at the Orkhan aspirant and he sighed, still wearing a patient smile. Gods, she hated that fucking smile. “Not… what you’re meant to conclude, but if you insist-” The man gestured to the ground next to Imogen, where her sword lay.
”What?”
“If you won’t accept my judgment, then the talking is over. It doesn’t really matter if you’re ready, because we’re beginning.”
Master Gerhard cast a hand to his side, and a sudden light filled the arena, blossoming like a flower above his palm and blooming, lengthening into a long staff. After a moment, it resolved into a gilded spear with a handle of ash. The shining weapon, archaic in design though it might be, was imposing enough even before the tip ignited, shedding streamers of sunfire.
Imogen yelped in as dignified a way as she could manage, and then rolled over, grabbing her greatsword. As soon as her hand made contact with the hilt, however, she knew exactly how she had been played.
Immediately, she could feel a magnetic connection between the burning sensation on her chest and the sword. A moment later, it was as though her senses were trying to take leave of her body, rushing down the veins of her arm toward her hilt. At what seemed like the last moment, the aspirant recalled her training and wrestled control of her aura back from the weapon. She pushed herself to her feet, and turned just in time to hastily interpose the weapon with the spear, the polearm running down the length of the blade before being caught on a parrying-hook. Imogen’s nerves burned in her arms as the flames of the spear licked the tender steel blocking their way.
”The- the initiation?”
Master Gerhard didn’t answer, and he didn’t need to. The Trial was not an opportunity for dialogue. Either she would win, or she would die, and it didn’t really matter if she died confused.
As Imogen moved back, she steadied the sword, which throbbed distractingly in her mind, and her soul, and her veins. A golden patina played across the blade, the Orkhan Girl’s aether seeping into it. And if it was seeping into the sword…
She could already feel that her limbs were growing steadily heavier. Enhancement of a weapon necessarily implied the enervation of the wielder; energy had to come from somewhere. The only way to end it was to complete the Trial, and the only way to do that was to win.
Well, then. Time to think logically.
First: Master Gerhard was a master. She might have a Rune (???), but he had decades of experience. He was going to win this fight, given even the least chance, and maybe even if she fought perfectly. So she was going to have to create her own victory here.
Second: He was using a spear, which meant that the greatsword’s advantage at range meant nothing, and she’d be shocked if he couldn’t throw the weapon with perfect accuracy. Keeping her distance, while instinctively appealing, simply wasn’t going to work.
Third: He was evidently familiar with Uncle Lewis’ style, and that meant he knew how she fought, too.
So, he was better than her, had superiority at range, and knew her style. Three nails in her coffin, but also three opportunities, if she could hack it.
”Fine. Fine, let’s go.”
The initiation ceremony took place on the side of a mountain, of course. It was one of the peaks of the southern range, not more than a half-day’s trek from the last farming village which still answered to Zaichaer’s laws. Not much to look at, either, at least not on the average day- a bunch of big-ass boulders with some strange edges and wobbly protrusions lying around in a big, unusually level circle. There were large, worn stones around the arena, meant to be benches, but not that different from the surrounding terrain at a glance.
For the Trial, however, things were a bit more dramatic. Imogen had no idea whether the arena’s transformation was the result of some kind of enchantment, or if some of the Sunsingers there simply had Kinetics runes, but some of the large boulders would ascend from the earth, forming the outline of a shallow dome over the participants seated “inside”. They didn’t look like much, but they cast distinctive shadows, reflections aided by gleaming silica, which cast the emblem of the triumphant Sun onto the earth.
Imogen Ward had not been invited to the ceremony, but she hadn’t been forbidden either. Over the course of three days, she had not stopped trying to discover what she had done wrong, and she’d finally been forced to accept the answer she had gotten from each of the masters- nothing. Had there been a reason, even a bad one, perhaps she would have stayed back, accepting that another year was the price of perfection.
Since she was given no reason for her failing, however, she was determined to attend. She couldn’t force the masters to grant her a rune, but perhaps she could find… some kind of satisfaction. She had not witnessed a Trial of Initiation herself, not in all of her time in the Sanctuaries, but there was no explicit rule against going to one, even if it weren’t meant for you.
She chose to leave just after the masters, following far enough behind them that they wouldn’t notice her and demand she turn back. If she was going to be rejected, she was damn well going to make them do it on the Trial grounds.
The trek wasn’t terribly difficult. Obviously the Sunsingers wouldn’t conduct the Trial off a main road, but the footpath up the slope was worn enough. Imogen wondered briefly what would happen if someone showed up part way through; she imagined the masters took some steps to avoid that. It might be necessary to slip past a lookout if she wanted to confront Master Gerhard.
She kept going for a few hours as the sun rose into the sky, until she finally spotted the tell-tale signs of boulders shifting in the middle distance. She had brought a few basic supplies- water, a snack for midday- but she had also felt it necessary to bring her fucking sword, and lugging that thing was a very tiring experience. Still, if she showed up to a trial of Reaving unarmed, she’d look like a real asshole.
“Stop!” came a quiet voice, breaking Imogen from the reveries of her own thoughts. “Stand and identify yourself.”
It was Initiate Tilman, the man she had sparred with briefly earlier in the week. He stepped out of the shadow of a monolith- perhaps out of the air itself? It was hardly inconceivable that the watchers would have some manner of invisibility spell.
”It’s me, Tilman. Imogen.”
The man gave her a once-over, expression considered. When he spoke, his voice was neither hostile nor particularly welcoming. “You weren’t summoned here, aspirant.”
”That’s correct.”
“May I ask your intentions?”
”You can ask.”
Tilman regarded her for a moment longer, then shrugged. “I have no orders to keep you out, specifically. But are you certain you’re ready to face the consequences? If you turn back now, I won’t tell the masters about this.”
She wasn’t certain, so she didn’t answer. Instead, Imogen marched straight past Tilman without another word. He did not call out after her.
It took only a few more minutes for the aspirant to reach the trial ground, passing below the temporarily-airborne monoliths and into the proving ground. There, she found the circle… empty.
The stones hung in the air like an earthen constellation, the shadows casting a starburst on the ground, but there were no Sunsinger trainees or masters inside the ring. Had they noticed her coming? What was this supposed to mean?
”What? Where the-”
She didn’t have time to speak another word before a sudden warmth bloomed across the back of her neck, and the world went black.
~
When the light and sounds and colors returned, they brought with them the imposing form of Master Gerhard, standing over her. As ever, his expression was considered, posture perfect. His smile was not quite as laconic as she had come to expect, either.
She wasn’t smiling, but it wasn’t from anger. Something really hurt, and she thought it might be her everything.
“Aspirant Ward. I believe that I told you that you were dismissed, no? Why are you here?”
Although her head was pounding, something about that voice brought her anger back into full clarity. ”Doesn’t make sense.”
“Make sense? I told you, I am not obligated to explain-”
”Not that. I don’t care what’s wrong with you. Doesn’t make sense to do the same thing if you’re just going to keep blocking me. May as well… ugh, press the issue.”
Master Gerhard looked down at the Orkhan aspirant and he sighed, still wearing a patient smile. Gods, she hated that fucking smile. “Not… what you’re meant to conclude, but if you insist-” The man gestured to the ground next to Imogen, where her sword lay.
”What?”
“If you won’t accept my judgment, then the talking is over. It doesn’t really matter if you’re ready, because we’re beginning.”
Master Gerhard cast a hand to his side, and a sudden light filled the arena, blossoming like a flower above his palm and blooming, lengthening into a long staff. After a moment, it resolved into a gilded spear with a handle of ash. The shining weapon, archaic in design though it might be, was imposing enough even before the tip ignited, shedding streamers of sunfire.
Imogen yelped in as dignified a way as she could manage, and then rolled over, grabbing her greatsword. As soon as her hand made contact with the hilt, however, she knew exactly how she had been played.
Immediately, she could feel a magnetic connection between the burning sensation on her chest and the sword. A moment later, it was as though her senses were trying to take leave of her body, rushing down the veins of her arm toward her hilt. At what seemed like the last moment, the aspirant recalled her training and wrestled control of her aura back from the weapon. She pushed herself to her feet, and turned just in time to hastily interpose the weapon with the spear, the polearm running down the length of the blade before being caught on a parrying-hook. Imogen’s nerves burned in her arms as the flames of the spear licked the tender steel blocking their way.
”The- the initiation?”
Master Gerhard didn’t answer, and he didn’t need to. The Trial was not an opportunity for dialogue. Either she would win, or she would die, and it didn’t really matter if she died confused.
As Imogen moved back, she steadied the sword, which throbbed distractingly in her mind, and her soul, and her veins. A golden patina played across the blade, the Orkhan Girl’s aether seeping into it. And if it was seeping into the sword…
She could already feel that her limbs were growing steadily heavier. Enhancement of a weapon necessarily implied the enervation of the wielder; energy had to come from somewhere. The only way to end it was to complete the Trial, and the only way to do that was to win.
Well, then. Time to think logically.
First: Master Gerhard was a master. She might have a Rune (???), but he had decades of experience. He was going to win this fight, given even the least chance, and maybe even if she fought perfectly. So she was going to have to create her own victory here.
Second: He was using a spear, which meant that the greatsword’s advantage at range meant nothing, and she’d be shocked if he couldn’t throw the weapon with perfect accuracy. Keeping her distance, while instinctively appealing, simply wasn’t going to work.
Third: He was evidently familiar with Uncle Lewis’ style, and that meant he knew how she fought, too.
So, he was better than her, had superiority at range, and knew her style. Three nails in her coffin, but also three opportunities, if she could hack it.
”Fine. Fine, let’s go.”
