Solo Into the Lion's Den

[Alses]

Timestamp: 50th Day of Spring, 513 A.V.

The room was bare and relatively spartan, with just the bare essentials for teaching – a semicircle of desks, a lectern, some blackboards and over it all a vast banner of the Dusk Tower's crest, the metal threads of the tapestry gleaming in the skyglass glow.

Six nervous young Lhavitians were sat behind the desks, casting glances at one another and talking in a desultory, stilted fashion when Alses walked in the door, her new robes swirling impressively about her form as she did so. She'd gone for purple, this time, in an attempt to fit in a little more with the Dusk Tower's general colour scheme, and it had to be admitted that the rich colour suited her just as well as her favoured crimson. She'd clung for grim death to the gold, however, and the glyphic sigils had been embroidered to her exacting directions in that warmly-scintillating thread. The robes looked very fine, Alses thought, resisting the temptation to run her fingers down the shimmering silken folds, enjoying the whispering caress of the fine fabric against her skin.

'Don't catch them in the door, don't catch them in the door, don't catch them in the door,' ran like a rogue mantra through her brain as she stepped through and into the classroom proper, ready to face the scrutiny of people who, just a few days ago, she'd have considered her peers. Now, they were her students, and that was an idea that took some wrapping her head around.

“Good morning, everyone,” she trilled, eyes skipping in self-defence over the six worryingly keen individuals staring at her, in the case of two of them their gazes disconcertingly magnified and focused by eyeglasses.

“My name is Alses, and we'll be going over some of the basics of auristics together.” her smile ran into the collective brick wall of their stares, and she cleared her throat. “Well, how about we start by finding out what you all know about the discipline? Anyone?”

There was a moment of pause, and then the words began to fly thick and fast, bewildering and confusing her with their speed.

“I've heard that you read souls when you use auristics. Is that true?”

“Well, that's not quite right-” Alses replied helplessly, but the Junior Inquisition was in full flow, steamrollering effortlessly over her words.

“Can you see what we're thinking?”

“No, not-”

“Have you got eyes in the back of your head, miss?”

"Well-"

“Miss, what does 'wavered sea-foam of desire' actually mean?” That one had a textbook - 'When had he had the chance to get one of those? Alses wondered, slightly wildly.

“Can you explain three-dimensional djed harmonics, please? I did some reading and I'm not sure I fully grasp the concept...”

“I've heard that powerful aurists can overwhelm the auras of other objects; how does that work? Does it have anything to do with Tellurian's Expansive Theory of Soul Dynamics? And what about changing your own aura? Doesn't that contradict the principles of Conflation? And-”

In her room at the Towers Respite, Alses shot bolt upright, bedclothes falling away from her sweat-soaked form and eyes darting wildly into the corners of the room before blessed reality asserted itself and her conscious brain took charge.

“Oh, thank Syna for that,” Alses breathed into the terror-scented air, one hand pressed to her hammering heart. “A dream. Just a dream, just a dream...Just a dream, Alses. They won't know Tellurian from a teacup. They really won't. Besides, Tellurian's theory has nothing to do with aura swamping. What was I thinking of?”

Hands still shaking, Alses pushed away the tangled, rumpled, sweat-stained bedclothes, opened the windows as wide as they'd go and breathed deeply of the cool night air, scented with the earliest spring flowers from her garden below. The city of crystal light and fantasy blazed in the dark, a mass of towering topaz spires and jewel-like domes, an earthbound star glorying in Zintila's tapestry of stars overhead and in the silvery moonlight which stole colour from everything – but not the starry city, no, its rainbowed raiment shining in defiance of the moon-thief, even the plants glowing with otherworldly bioluminescence.

It was some mineral in the soil that did that, turning even the plants into seas of moving light, but such mundane concerns were very far from Alses' mind as she hung half-out of her window and drank in the sight of the never-sleeping city. Even this late, there was a red glow and a plume of spark-shot smoke rising from the smithies abutting the Azure Market, Touch of Fire chief among them; the forges had no conception of time, after all, and demanded feeding no matter the bell. Lulls never lasted long in the city; her unusual system of rest and work bells saw to that, and her citizens were industrious to boot, turning out almost all the city needed to survive and indeed the luxuries it exported by the ingenuity of hand and brain and a healthy dollop of hard work.

Regardless, the sight was still a beautiful one – the starkly empty Unforgiving unrolling on all sides, full of dramatically silver-lit peaks and shattered cliffs and scree-slope sides, plunging away into dark forests and hungry ravines...and then, rising majestically on five great peaks in the middle of it all, Lhavit, the Diamond of Kalea, living up to its name, a beacon to be seen far and wide.

The muted chimes of the city bells echoed softly through the shining streets, reverberating from the mountains which ringed Lhavit, a gently-resonant announcement of the fourth bell of the morning that centred and calmed Alses, turning her mind from vague tumbling thoughts, still scattered from her dreams, to something a little more coherent.

'Too early to head over to the Dusk Tower, I expect,' Alses thought, still shackled in her mortal chain until there was a lightening in the eastern sky and the first lemon-yellow ray of sunshine lanced over Kalea, heralding the new day.

'But it's also far too late for me to even bother trying to sleep again,' she realised, with a mildly irritated sigh. By the time she'd quieted her thoughts and got comfortable again, it would hardly be worth the half-bell or so of sleep she'd manage to get, rising unfulfilled and tetchy and decidedly not prepared for her first day of teaching.

“Syna above, why did I have to remind myself of that?” Alses groaned, padding around her room for towels and all the other paraphernalia of bath-time. That was one of the signal benefits of the Respite, its baths were always hot and ready, thanks to the hot springs welling up from Kalea's volcanic heart, and a good long soak in supportive, mineral-rich water would be just the thing to let her mind go blank and relax her before the stressful business of the day – this day in particular. And if she used enough bath oil, the slightly sulphurous smell would be quite, quite unnoticeable.

Thus buoyed, a pale Konti slipped out into the currently-sleeping halls of the Respite, heading for the half-subterranean chamber that was the home of its communal bathing pools and the sweet relief immersion in hot water promised.

[Alses]

The golden tide of the dawn had crested over Lhavit in a silent wave and brought Alses celestial confidence and a certain amount of mental chaos, as it always did. Floating lazily in the boiling pools of the Respite's bath, a radiant Synaborn collected her scattered thoughts, trying out Lu's advice in re: meditation.

The water helped, soothingly warm against her rainbowed skin, as she focused on the elusive mental acrobatics of meditation. Well, perhaps acrobatics was the wrong word, imagining the sunlit flood of her brain as a calm, still lake, sparkling in serene tranquillity in a green and verdant valley, its forested sides rich and bosky-

With a sigh, Alses turned over in a wave of water. That was always the trouble, getting too involved in the imagery, the metaphor and simile that hid the difficult bits of achieving quietude and serenity, of finding calm in the maelstrom of Mizahar. Mind you, the peaceful, colonnaded, steam-wreathed baths of the Respite were doing sterling duty of calming her down and, crucially, keeping her calm as she floated in the hot, mineral-rich liquid.

Even thinking about meeting students for the first time as a teacher, later in the day, produced no more than a vague, half-detached and hugely nebulous 'Hmm...bit daunting...' which was easily rocked away by the lapping wavelets, preserving the peace and tranquillity of an early-morning soak, some of the calming essence of which even managed to penetrate Alses' dynamo of a mind, lulling some of the cacophony to silence and part-damming the flood of cogitation which habitually stormed over her conscious mind, never empty, never silent, never resting.

But, like all good things, it couldn't last forever – Syna climbed ever higher in the sky, a niggling sensation in the back of Alses' mind, usually a welcome reassurance and now the herald and harbinger of her new assignment, which would require abandoning the baths, drying and dressing in her new robes (still unusual, although it had to be said they were very comfortable indeed) and sallying forth to take up a responsible position with the Dusk Tower.

Once again, her thoughts turned to escape, to fleeing from duty and responsibility, but the greater part of her snapped back at the dissenting voices in her head. 'Remember what we've always said about the cowards and the Fallen who ran and hid and fulminated against our Beloved? What we should do to distinguish ourself from them and prove our worth? We should raise up great works in praise of Her and bolster Her radiance by our actions and the fire of our belief. Great works come with great responsibility; if we cannot even shoulder this burden we cannot call ourself a Daughter of Syna, unworthy of Her regard and Her love.'

The resolve from that, all the more stinging since it was her own words and beliefs being thrown back into her teeth, saw her stand up in the steaming pool, water sheeting down her perfect form and tumbling in shining droplets from the intricate crown-of-horns that adorned her head.

A few more choice excerpts from things she'd said to Cook and Mr. Secretary and a few others got her through the drying process, and as another means of distraction she let herself get completely absorbed in achieving total dryness, buffing every square inch of shining skin to a liquid shine, perfectly dry and gleaming in the skyglass light. The horns, as ever, were the tricky part, with their convoluted spiralling curvature, and she became distantly engrossed in chasing every last drop of moisture round the divine material until she was perfectly, radiantly dry and her towel sopping wet.

Her robes were neatly hung over the carved privacy screen that protected her modesty (such as it was) and she slipped into them with a nervous shrug. The fine material glided smoothly over her skin and brought a faint, involuntary smile to her lips as the folds of rich tyrian silk settled about her legs and her fingers did up the intricate hidden buttons which kept the garment closed and hanging properly.

After a brief detour back to her room to pick up a few papers and her trusty notebook, there really was no putting it off any further; Syna continued her inexolerable climb into the powder-blue sky and the bell of her trial – sorry, class – was drawing ever closer.

No getting away from it.


A


The Dusk Tower was as unchanging as ever, a spear of pearly light soaring up into the heavens, a familiar and comforting thing to Alses. As she mounted the sweeping marble stairs that climbed in lazy spirals up to Mr. Secretary's office, she felt a stab of fear, a rising spiky thrill of nerves – how would he treat her now? She wasn't a courier anymore – how would that affect their relationship? They'd spoken since Chiona had sprung the Great Surprise on her, of course, but this would be the first time, officially speaking, that she was an instructor at the Tower.

The gold embroidery on her robes caught the light pouring in through Mr. Secretary's windows as she stood, rocking on the threshold, knocking softly on the dark wood of his open door. Dapper and fresh as ever, he looked up the instant her knock sounded through his room, a smile appearing on his face and his monocle blazing with reflected light as the muscles bunched.

“Ah, and if it isn't the instructor prodigal, come in glory to set the educational establishment on its head! Good morning, Alses. Are you well? Come in, sit down, do. You've got some time before you have to be on the fourth floor, after all. May as well have you on my chairs rather than wearing a hole in the skyglass of the corridor.”

She collapsed gratefully into one of his overstuffed chairs, thankful for this little bastion of normality, a tenuous link to the processes and procedures of the past. “We're a bag of nerves, Mr. Secretary. I know we agreed our lesson plan with Chiona, but still – me giving a lesson! Me! Five days ago we were still just an apprentice and courier, now we're one of its staff? It all seems a little...unreal. Or a set-up of some kind, I suppose.”

There was the little click of a quill being set into an inkpot, and then the gentle rustle of fabric.

“So why did you say yes, then, Alses? Zintila knows we can't force you to do anything – the Towers tried force once before, when dealing with people, and that led to the Day of Discord and all its fallout.”

Alses blinked. “It...wasn't presented to us as an option,” she said with a sigh. “It seemed to be a precondition of our remaining here. Besides, we do need the money, and we don't like to let people down. The textbooks here, too, are a disgrace – how is anyone supposed to learn anything useful from them? I don't have to tell you, of course.” This was true. Mr. Secretary had, down the seasons, been on the receiving end of a large number of Alses' more vocal complaints about the poet-mage Dusks of ages past and their idiosyncratic way of noting down their discoveries and procedures.

“In any case, the die is cast and we're here fretting. Any last bits of sage advice you can give me? Anything at all?”

In truth, if Alses admitted it to herself, she was looking for some magic philtre or panacea, some great and simple secret of lore that would catapult her to the ranks of the great and experienced instructors of Mizahar.

Alas, such was not to be: it seemed that, as with so much else, hard work and perseverance – and rather a lot of trial and error – were the ways in which greatness was forged.

“Far be it for a clerk to presume...” Mr. Secretary began, with a twinkle in his eye, only to be pinned to his seat by a double-barrelled glare. “Aurists have an advantage, I always thought,” he said, after an appropriate volte-face. “You can have eyes in the back of your head.” He raised a hand as Alses opened her mouth. “I know it doesn't quite work that way, but it's close enough. You can keep an eye on what they're feeling, no? And you don't have to be looking at them to do it now, do you?”

Alses shook her head – she hadn't had to do that for quite a while now. “Fair point, Mr. Secretary.”

“Exactly! Always be one step ahead of them. But subtly.”

That, of course, was the tricky bit.

[Alses]

“It's time, Alses,” Mr. Secretary intoned, in the leaden notes of doom. “If you want to get a bit of a look at your classroom before the students turn up, that is.”

She swallowed, and rose in a waterfall of silky robes, absently patting herself down as she gathered her courage, her wits and her hopes. “Time to face the music,” she said with a weak smile, accepting a sheaf of papers from Mr. Secretary – her plan for the lesson, approved by Chiona Dusk, and a few other things, just in case.

It was only a short walk and a few flights of stairs to the fourth floor and the classrooms there – large rooms decorated in a characteristically-Lhavitian minimalist style and flooded with light from their many windows. Alses' room was one of the corner chambers of the Tower, its outer wall following the gentle curve of the subsidiary turrets which soared up alongside the majestic main spire. This meant that the room, shaped like a quarter-segment of a circle, naturally funnelled to a single focal point, the site of the elaborately-carved lectern from which an instructor could pontificate.

Behind the lectern, a diagonal wall truncated the segment, providing ample space for blackboards to illustrate a teacher's points and, above those, a banner with the crest of House Dusk in silvery thread moved lazily in the rising air. Just in case anyone happened to forget in whose house they were learning.

There were six students in Alses' first class, she'd been told, and so the lectern was faced with a semicircle of six desks, sloped and with ink-wells for an optimal writing environment. All in all, very regimented, very formal.

Standing at ease at the lectern, trying to quieten the roaring in her ears and ease the soaring flights of butterflies in her stomach, Alses browbeat her brain into calmness, using the relentless throb of her heartbeat to push out all the panicky thoughts, the red rhythm of existence singing her into life from one second to another, her own personal marker for 'then' and 'now'.

Calmed and centred by the dark pulse that thrummed out from her chest, richly cargoed with whatever it was her body actually needed to keep functioning second to second, only the barest mental command was needed to command her reserves to rise and twine themselves about her soul, to sluice up through her body in a rising tide of white-gold fire, some great tree expanding and flourishing in an instant, extending vines and twigs and branches into every facet of her being, nourishing the pale conduits of her senses into raging torrents down which her djed roared at full spate, gathering in shimmering layers beneath her skin and seeping, gently, ever so gently, from a million million places, out into Mizahar itself, every wavering, ephemeral tendril drinking in the flood of information there for those with the skill to see it.

Fortunately, it was easy to get a general grasp of the room – skyglass was uniform, consistent, unchanging and with its divine origin, vastly self-contented and contained: the source of its immunity to djed. Quite aside from it being the favoured building material of the city of light and magic, the skyglass was ideal for novice aurists – it was a barely-noticeable aura when one was still grasping at the rudiments of the skill, so there would be less to clutter and overwhelm the unaccustomed senses. That was the main reason for the plainness of the lecture room – Lhavit might have favoured a minimalist style, but these chambers were bare even by that standard; the fewer distractions, the better.

Alses stood in the middle of a malestrom of colour and sound and touch, a thousand impressions down the years cascading onto her – but she was no novice, no; well-used to the auristic bombardment of the ancient edifice of the Dusk Tower she could filter and sort the memories burned into its furniture and floating in its rarefied air with nary a flicker of thought. Auras flamed and died in her sight as, with deft flicks and twists of her mental fingers, she directed the djed flows through herself more precisely, with greater finesse, cajoling and coaxing them to flow more finely, to spread more evenly or to focus hard in one particular area, to assemble into complex meshworks that filtered and sieved yet more conduits until the auristic world she beheld was arranged to her satisfaction.

Instead of unfurling green woodiness and the memory of long-ago forests, the desks were now dark and silent. So too the lectern, infused with rhetoric and oratory from other instructors, and the blackboards, reeking of chalk and knowledge, now blanked as though they were tabula rasas, blank slates. The Dusk Tower cleaning staff knew enough to use a salt-water purge in their cleaning here – she could tell that by the half-eroded, faded nature of many of the auras – but achieving total reversion was beyond the reach of all but the most expensive cleaning philtres, and whilst the Dusk Tower was wealthy it was anything but extravagant – Alses' experiences with the Exchequer had shown her that. Perhaps that was the reason for their wealth.

Thus attuned to her teaching space, Alses turned to her blackboards and drew the chalk down the waiting surface with an ear-rending squeal. That had been one of Chiona Dusk's pearls of wisdom, to note down the goals and aims of the lesson for her to check every so often, to keep things on track. It also helped the students, apparently, in terms of organization.

So.

'Today's Aims' she wrote carefully, in a clear, steady hand. That was a good start, a decisive start.

'One. What Are Auras, and How Do We Sense Them?'

'Two. Uses of Auras.'

'Three. Risks and How To Deal With Them.'

'Four. Simple Experiments.'

It all looked so simple, Alses noted, written down, nailed down like that, as though the complex and delicate and above all subjective art could be easily described in objective, empirical terms. It couldn't; that was the major stumbling block in its teaching, and why Dusk textbooks so easily resorted to poetry and flights of fancy. Beautiful to read, enchanting in their imagery, and about as useful as a toffee hammer – at least, to Alses' cast of mind. Some people, doubtless, would find them enthralling, fascinating and transparently easy to interpret, able to draw forth meaning from the pretty quatrains and stanzas without even consciously trying. Alses was not one of these, having to fight to wring every drop of meaning from the obscured truth behind the veiling words, hence her arguments in the library.

As she finished the last letter and straightened up to survey her handiwork, there came the chiming toccata of boots on the staircase just outside the room. Swallowing a lump that had suddenly materialised in her throat, she straightened to a regal bearing that befitted a glorious Ethaefal, Chosen of Syna, her intricate crown-of-horns putting the shimmer of precious-metal threads and even the glow of the skyglass to shame.

“Come in,” she called when the toccata had died away to a vague sort of shuffling outside the door. “It's not locked.”

This would be her first proper glimpse of her students, and hopefully their auras as they filed in and took their seats would tell her much about their personalities, their feelings, hopes, dreams and fears, so she could better tailor her teaching style to their own individual needs.

Hopefully.

[Alses]

They filed in, nervous and expectant in equal measure, dressed rather soberly, by Alses' estimation. Dark colours predominated – but then again, this was the Dusk Tower; they favoured the darker shades, and surely these students were aware of that, and had dressed accordingly, hoping to make a good impression.

Alses hadn't bothered with that when she'd first started; she'd had her head more-or-less permanently in the clouds, totally oblivious to the nuances and social pressures which informed other people's clothing decisions. Then, too, it had probably helped that she'd not spent any real time in a lecture environment; she'd joined the Dusk Tower only shortly before the Djed Storm in Spring 512 ripped through the ranks. Suddenly, the Tower had had a surfeit of instructors and a dearth of pupils, as novices deserted the Tower – and magic as a whole – in droves, having been served a harsh reminder of its dangers. Ever since then, as one of the few remaining (and, crucially, sane) apprentices, Alses had been taught more-or-less exclusively one-to-one, so she'd had no frame of reference from her contemporaries.

Things were returning to normal for the Dusk Tower, however; these were the first of the new intake, apparently, about to go through the more traditional methods of teaching – lectures, practicals and tutorials in small groups for the less-experienced, and then one-to-one apprenticeships of the sort Alses was used to when – and if – they became more skilled.

The midmorning sun caught on her crown-of-horns and wove an intricate tiara of reflected light between the shimmering curves, and still more light spilt onto her fire-opal skin as she smiled at the array of nervous faces gazing up at her, unsure and unsteady and filled with wonder – no small part of it being directed at the living jewel that blazed at the lectern.

Fortunately for all involved, a cloud passed in front of Syna's radiant orb and Alses' glow dimmed to a more bearable glimmer. “Good morning,” she began – that was safe enough, at least. “As you've doubtless guessed, we're one of your instructors. My name is Alses.”

She paused, but no response was forthcoming. “Won't you introduce yourselves?” she asked, slightly plaintively – although she managed to hide her wince. That was one of the things Chiona had warned her against: being too friendly, too soon. Establishing authority was essential, apparently, before you could become a real person to the students, even when they were in a small group such as this one.

Her students looked at one another in silence. Alses let it stretch for a chime or so and then lost patience, pointing randomly at one of them. “For Syna's sake, you first.”

The indicated, a painfully young-looking boy – but then they all looked terribly young – swallowed convulsively, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down like a ping-pong ball.

“Uh...Malien T'kari, m'lady.”

Alses nodded. “Pleasure. One point, for all of you – in this room, we are Alses. I have too many titles as it is; I expect you to remember my name, as we shall do our best to remember yours – although we're dreadful at names, as you'll doubtless find out. Now...” her finger stabbed out again, and Malien collapsed gratefully back into his seat, radiating relief like a sun now that the limelight was off him. At least ostensibly; how was he to know that she could so easily read him?

And so it went, an unreeling of names: Malien, of course, then Alma, Erin, Robert, Shano and finally Tael. Too late, Alses realised that perhaps she should have asked them a little about themselves, something to share to break the ice.

Too late for that now, though, they were all looking at her again, expectant and hungry. “There. Was that so hard?” an outward grin, an inward quail – strike two in the informality stakes. “Now, before we go on with the lesson, a few rules. First, don't talk when we're speaking. If you have a question, raise your hand and I'll answer you when I finish.” 'Yes, thought Alses, placing a mental tick beside the box marked 'Setting boundaries'. "Second, don't lie to me. I will know and you will not like the consequences. We can be very inventive, when I've a mind. Third, if you don't understand anything we've said, or need something clarified, for Syna's sake put up your hand and ask me! Better you do that than sit there all confused and looking stupid. Fourth, if we tell you to stop using magic, stop. No argument or point of pride is worth the price of overgiving, and we're quite good at spotting when it starts to take hold of you.” She clapped her hands briskly – three of her students jumped – and continued: “Now. Any questions?”

Silence again, but then a hesitant hand rose, from the redhead Alses tentatively identified as Erin. Or possibly Tael – her notoriously bad memory for names was already coming into play. She graciously nodded her assent.

“Er...why do you speak like that, my l-uh, Alses?” she asked quietly, correcting herself at Alses' cautioning finger.

“Speak like what?” Alses asked, although she had a fairly good idea of what was meant. It seemed to put the poor student even more on the spot – she turned a shade of red to almost match her shock of hair. She took pity on the poor girl quickly enough, however. “Swapping between 'I' and 'we'?”

A nod – no, not just one, several, from her semicircle of watchers. So everyone had noticed, and was presumably curious.

“I'm an Ethaefal,” she began, in reply. “Part of being one is remembering other lives from before this one, although they often don't hold much coherency, or consistency. I experience rather more of these past memories than most, so unless I concentrate hard on using the right pronoun, they tend to muddle up a bit. Pay it no mind; you'll get used to it fairly quickly, that I can promise. Anything else?”

The blankness of the stares directed back at her indicated that there was not, so she pressed on.

“Now, we'll be trying to cover all the areas I've written up there-” Alses waved one hand at the blackboard, and instantly there was a switching of attention and a flurry of activity as notebooks were opened and quills inked. “-but don't fret too much if we don't cover everything today. We have some leeway in our plans, just in case.”

That had been another pearl of wisdom from Lady Dusk – 'You will get drawn into tangents,' she'd said with a trilling laugh 'And tangents to tangents, if you're anything like me. You'll also find it hard to make everyone get hold of an idea on occasion, especially the more complex stuff, so some things will take you much longer than you anticipate. Everyone's different, so you should leave some time to be flexible in all your lessons, so it doesn't matter if you overrun on an area once in a while.'

She had to raise her voice to be heard over the scritch-scritch-scritch of quill over paper and the occasional glassy rattle of an ink-pot in its well. “So. Auras. What exactly are they?”

[Alses]

No ideas were forthcoming from her audience, so she turned to the blackboard and began to draw, noting with some small satisfaction the banked fires of curiosity behind her.

It was a very simple diagram, a series of concentric circles in white chalk. Those, at least, were perfectly circular, the result of a great deal of practice in her Glyphic endeavours. “This is a representation of what we currently think a soul looks like,” she announced, gesturing grandly to the unprepossessing drawing, being of the opinion that a little bit of theatre helped make even the dullest instruction a little more memorable.

“The first two layers aren't very interesting to us as mages, but it's still worth knowing at least a little about them. Now, this deepest part is what they call the soulcore, the very heart and what makes you distinct from, say, the chairs you're all sat on right now. The next layer up is where your personality resides – without that we'd all be mindless clones of one another. Now, the third and fourth layers are the most interesting – for us, anyway. Third is what's known as the astral body – it's what allows your mind to move your physical form. The Projection that the Shinya guards use is based around altering and manipulating that layer, I'm told. We're most interested in the fourth layer, though, the energy radiated by every soul – this is the aura that we try and read with our powers.”

She paused for a little while, casting her gaze over the row of busy, writing heads, sizing each of them up as surely as they were doing the same to her – in between writing furiously, of course.

“So, is everyone clear? An aura is the djed signature radiated by any soul, which contains information we can read with practice and skill. Any questions? Yes?”

That last was to Tael (possibly) who raised her hand with an obviously-puzzled expression on her face. “Instructor, what about plants and rocks? They don't have souls, do they?”

Alses paused, stumped for a second, but rallied magnificently (even if she did say so herself), and decided to allow the 'Instructor' title to slide. “Not in the conventional sense, no,” she replied, picking her words with care. “But they do still have a certain essential something to the djed that forms them, something which marks them as distinct and separate from everything else, which is close enough to a soul for our purposes.”

Tael (maybe) settled back into her chair and, satisfied at having negotiated her first real question, Alses continued. “So. What can we use auras for? Any ideas? Anyone?”

“Uh...to sense things we otherwise couldn't?” Alses nodded.

“Very good, Robert. Care to elaborate on that?”

He squirmed slightly under her gaze. “We can use auras as a stand-in for our senses?” he hazarded; at her encouraging nod he continued, rather reedy voice firming up a little. “So I could try and taste a...a...a grape, say, from the other side of the room.”

“Exactly right! Anything more? Someone else, please.” She let the silence stretch for a bit, and then pointed at random. That was another trick of Chiona Dusk's, selecting someone for metaphorical sacrifice if an answer wasn't forthcoming.

“Uh...can we find magical items?”

“Excellent, yes, with a bit of practice that's very easy to do. Anything more?”

There were a sea of blank, despairing faces looking back at her – but this she'd expected. Why would they know all of the manifold uses of auras straight off the bat? That was what they were here to learn, after all.

Alses turned back to her blackboard, writing in a clear, legible hand and keeping a weather eye on her students thanks to her superior auristics. Always useful, three-hundred-and-sixty degrees of impressions, if not a little difficult to control at times.

Uses of Auristics

1.) Proxy For The Senses:- Using auras to extend the reach of the physical senses, eg. tasting grapes from across the room, sensing if someone has a fever and so forth.

2.) Detection of Magic:- The auras of magic and magical items are quite distinct, and easy for a trained aurist to pinpoint. Useful for a wide range of things, eg. divining the location and purpose of magic at work and magical items at range.

3.) Detection of Emotions:- The nuances and changes in an aura tell the aurist a great deal about the physical and mental state of a person, which has many uses, such as: discovering whether someone is tired, afraid, happy, sad, confident and so forth.

4.) Sensory Extension:- Auras are not impeded by physical barriers, so they can be used to provide forewarning in some instances. Used for, eg, seeing the locations of people, via auras, through a wall or door. Finding hidden items.

5.) Revelations of the Past:- Advanced aurists can interpret fading impressions from the past in an aura to discover more about it. Useful for historians and helpful to the Shinya in criminal investigations.

6.) Revelations of the Future:- Advanced aurists can also interpret the minute changes in an aura just before an action is taken, allowing some degree of response and forewarning. Useful in combat situations.

“These are the six principal fields of endeavour in auristics,” Alses said grandly, in accordance with her theory on theatre. “Almost everything you can achieve with the discipline fits into one of these categories. Now, it's important to remember that these don't develop sequentially, one after another – everything develops together, and if we gave you enough time, and always providing you had enough djed, you could perceive everything about an object – past, present and a little way into the future.”

Now there were sideways glances between her students, and the first inklings of whispering. Alses surfed her voice over them, hoping that more information would shut them up. “That's not to say everything develops at the same rate, though.”

'I could really do with a pointer or something,' she thought ruefully, gesturing towards the first sentence she'd written. “It's generally agreed that using auras as proxies for the senses is the simplest application – you can do it as soon as you can sense an aura-” At this point, Alses noticed a hand upraised.

“Yes?”

“What does 'proxy' mean, Instructor?” the poor girl – Erin? - was bright red, but Alses was sharp enough to see that several others were looking relieved someone had asked.

“Proxy. Using something on behalf of, or as a substitute for, something else,” she recited equably, with a smile and slow enough that they could note it down. “In this cause, magic for the physical senses. Good question, thank you.”

[Alses]

“Now, risks and dangers of auristics. Magic is a wonderful and useful tool up to a point and then you die, as one of my old masters used to say. Auristics is thought of as one of the safer, more scholarly disciplines to practice and indeed it is – but only if you're careful. People – including other mages – just consider it the soft option because its dangers are mostly up here-” she tapped her temple “-rather than grossly physical.”

Alses paused for a few moments, just to let the implications sink in. “The Dusk Tower has plenty of lurid books in the library telling you all about it – and if you severely overgive in any class here and survive, you'll be set them as reading until you know them by heart, take it from us – but we'll cover the basic problems. Whenever you use magic, for Syna's sake pay attention to what's happening to you! Warning signs are just that – warnings of catastrophe on the way if you don't change or stop yourself.”

Alses cast a glance over her students as she spoke – there was comprehension there, but none of the slight fear she thought would be appropriate. It was probably something that would have to develop through actual experiences, mild overgiving showing them the shadows of worse things to come. Of course, overgiving was very serious in any form and really should be managed properly...hmm. Maybe she'd speak to Chiona about how to manage it in a controlled setting. If such a thing could even be done.

“Now, we can divide the results of overgiving into two categories: physical consequences, and mental consequences. Physical problems can include gross physical mutation, setting your hair permanently on fire, turning your lungs to stone and so on – but they're not as important to us, as aurists, as the mental problems. Sweet Whispers, that little voice in your head that tells you to use more, push harder, ignore the warnings, is only the start of it,” she intoned forebodingly, recalling her own experiences and warnings down the years.

“So. What might you expect from going too far with auristics – far too far? Well, firstly, you can lose control of your magic, your reserves. They can activate completely at random, and drain you to death and you've got as much control over it as you do over the progression of the sun. And you've no control over what you might see, either. You might end up knowing the life story of the baker three streets down but not your own name...and there are worse things to see,” she added darkly. “Some aurists have gone mad from whatever it is their runaway powers have shown them.”

“Other problems...well, you can find yourself thinking you're a god, which never ends well, losing various parts of your identity, and perhaps worst of all, in a way, you also lose the ability to tell truth from fiction, which lays the darkest parts of your own imagination open to abuse by your own runaway powers.”

Good. They were looking scared now.

“However.” Good word, implied hope. “There are warning signs, tells, indications, mild forms of overgiving that aren't permanent and won't destroy you – if you heed their warnings and stop using your power, of course. For auristics, those are as follows, and learn them well: they could save your life one day.”

Oh, now they were definitely paying attention, their shivering auras now crackling with absolute concentration overlaying the fear. Good. Good. She was getting better at reading them, too. Excellent.

“First, we have tiredness. Non-specific and not very useful on its own, we know, but it's always the very first sign you're approaching the end of what you can achieve safely, magically-speaking. Next, we have dilated eyes. Again, not very useful if you're on your own – though you can always use a mirror – but if any one of you, during partner work, notice someone's pupils are wide and black, give them a good hard slap and call for your instructor at once, understand? Headaches, another fun non-specific one. Useful, because they disrupt your concentration, though. Excellent warning sign you've done too much, too quickly.” Alses paused once more, to let them catch up and work the kinks out of their writing hands, brushes dancing across the paper in an elegant ballet.

“Incoherency, that's another critical sign – if you can't speak properly, you're about to tip over into something much more serious and much harder to reverse. The last of the common signs is quite a wide one, really – loss or change of your senses. You might find yourself suddenly struck deaf, or blind, or your sense of taste might get stuck on...on red meat or star fruit. You might start seeing everything through a veil of blue, or constantly hear someone whispering something into the back of your brain. That's your final warning, really, before you fall over the edge and into the realms of serious overgiving, which we've already discussed. Everything up to and including the sense alteration isn't permanent and can be reversed, with time and care. After that...you're in the hands of the healers and the gods, may they have mercy on what's left of your soul.”

She let the pause stretch, this time, until their auras were shimmering and humming with the emotions she'd aimed to elicit. Good. Good.

“Now that we've gone over some of the ways you can destroy yourself – or wish you had, at any rate – it's my happy task to see that you're well-trained enough and skilled enough not to let that happen. Splashing in the lower end of the spectrum of overgiving is not encouraged, but unfortunately almost inevitable. If you're careful though, the high-level damage can be avoided completely, and that is something everyone in this Tower will be trying to get you to understand, along the way of turning you from novices into skilled and principled aurists.”

Alses gave them a beaming smile, a panacea to the fear of the last half-bell or so. “That said, then, let's consider some practical applications we can easily do here in the Dusk Tower, even with novices such as yourselves.”

So saying, she moved liquidly across the floor towards a covered table, hitherto ignored and dismissed as unimportant. On the table, when she dramatically uncloaked it, was a wonderful spread of food straight from the Dusk Tower's kitchens. Piles of fruits, jams and jellies, chutneys and preserves, nuts, little bowls of spices and much else lay in colourful profusion, covering almost completely the wood of the supporting table. Heavenly smells wafted from the miniature banquet even as Alses' students craned to get a closer look.

“So. Anyone care to have a go?” she asked.

A hand, again. “Um...have a go at what, Instructor?”

“It's Alses, as we're sure I told you. We mean you to use your auristic talents to extend, encompass, surround a piece of food on that table and taste it, touch it, feel its pressure on your skin, the smell of it, every scrap of information about it that can be known through using its aura as a proxy for your physical senses.”

Silence, again. Perhaps they'd need more leading – Chiona did say that new students often needed to be dragged around until they found their feet and got a little more confident in themselves.

Well, that she could provide. “All right,” she said with a sigh, when it was evident no-one was going to be the first to take the plunge, moving to the table and selecting things at random, placing them down on her student's desk in a similar random fashion and then gesturing for the students to stand up and surround her in the centre of the room.

“We put something on each of your desks. That's your focus, that's the food we want to know about from you. Everything about it that you can tell.”

There was a little secret in each of them – the grapes, for instance, they'd been dipped in a sugar glaze that made them tooth-achingly sweet and crunchy to the senses, whilst some of the meats had been liberally rubbed with lemon juice or marinaded in brine. She'd know – even if their auras didn't tell her – the instant any of them tried to cheat their way out of it when she pressed them for impressions.

“Everybody ready – yes, what is it?”

“Isn't this all a little...frivolous, Inst-Alses?”

“Yes,” Alses replied, after an appropriate amount of consideration. “Yes, it absolutely is. Because frivolous things are all you can do at your level of skill – and by practicing your frivolities diligently and building up your familiarity with the discipline through these silly, unnecessary, safe uses, you'll learn how to control your power, how to direct it to a single goal. Technique and finesse, technique and finesse. Power at a point is the goal – and that's all anyone needs to do great things. Besides, these little uses can give you a great deal of pleasure, if you approach them in the right mindset. We'll be taking some little trips out into Lhavit to illustrate that, but the world seen through an aurist's eyes is a beautiful thing. Appreciate it.”

[Alses]

“All settled?” Alses asked, voice quiet and mellifluous. “Get into a comfortable position, something you'll not mind holding for at least a bell. This can be tiring and draining at first, and the fewer distractions the better.”

There was some shuffling on the skyglass as people settled, and a quick reading of their auras, skimming her Sight across the surface, skittering lightly from one to the next, expending an elegant minimum of power, told her when they were as settled as was likely.

“And now...we focus. First on yourselves, and just that. Look for the heartbeat in your chests, the fundamental rhythm of life itself, steady and uninterrupted. Feel the thrum of it through your body, focus on the sound of it until it pushes out your thoughts. Just the pulse of your heartbeat, marking out the time.”

Alses didn't need the aid of meditation to help her focus this time – indeed, she didn't even need to focus at all, at least for such simple applications as tasting food from a distance. She was so habituated to the djed and the particular methods of changing and channelling her reserves to grant auristic power that her ordinary, passive Sight delivered that sort of information to her waiting brain without her having to really think about it at all – or, crucially, to expend anything more than the tiny, involuntary trickle of djed which produced an aurist's Sight-in-ordinary.

That left her time to explore her students' responses, to watch the shivering melange of quivering-yellow fear, the sparkling webwork of intrigue and the flat drone of nascent boredom slowly get beaten out and away by the meditative thrum of the heart, clearing the mind under its insistent, incessant beat.

It also meant she could get to know them properly, auristically speaking. Perhaps pairing her knowledge of what they looked like through an aurist's lens with the names would help her be slightly less rubbish at keeping them all straight. With that in mind, therefore, Alses went systematically down the deep-breathing line of students, focusing herself on each one in turn.

This was, after all, a very low-risk activity – which was why novices were allowed to try their hand at it – and so there was very little likelihood of anything going spectacularly wrong whilst she was...otherwise occupied, so to speak.

'So,' she thought, determined, fixing her gaze on the back of her first student.

Male, that was the most basic of all the impressions, though others quickly piled themselves one atop another. Supremely comfortable with the surroundings, with the skyglass – Lhavitian-born and bred, then; the confidence without awe could imply nothing else – though unnerved by the sheer bulk of the Tower – and was that some small, nascent fear of her?

She looked closer, teasing apart the tight burgundy threads that wove themselves into the deeper parts of his psyche, wrapped close at the roots of his aura – ah. Ah. Well. That was...flattering, but deeply odd, too.

Alses knew, without a shadow of a doubt, her face was a brilliant ruby colour. Those sort of thoughts – even if they were so deep he wasn't exactly aware of them (probably) were still...embarrassing. Chiona's comment about her dress came to the forefront of her mind and she silently blessed her for her foresight – and command to get some robes. They were very impressive and luxurious, that was true, but crucially they covered a lot, and hid the excesses of her voluptuous figure quite well.

Elsewise, some of the older members of her class might have had rather more than mostly-subconscious naughty thoughts.

Swiftly, she switched her focus to the next – one of the girls, this time, and calmed right down – evidently, Alses' advice was working or, more probably, if she was honest with herself, the girl had had some meditation training already.

And so it went, Alses learning the tricks and twists and turns of everyone's aura as they calmed and settled out, swirls and endless motion curling back into itself and slowing, slowing, slowing to gentle regularity.

“All right,” she murmured into the waiting silence. “Try it. Extend your auristics in front of you, and read what's been placed on your desks. Then write it down when you're done.”

Confusion flowered, bloomed, burst into being all along the line, brows furrowing, calmed auras rising to thrash and shiver with new emotions.

"How, Instructor?” came the question, cargoed with no small amount of apprehension – they were worried, much as she had been when she first started, that any small mistake or lack of understanding was grounds to be kicked out of the Tower. The reality, of course, was rather different and considerably more lenient, but they didn't know that yet. Or rather, didn't believe it yet.

Still, that was an odd question. “You've been initiated, haven't you?” It was a purely rhetorical question, since Alses knew for a fact that this was the case, for all of them. “Apply what you learned there.” This didn't seem to go over well; she cast about quickly for a more constructive approach and silently blessed her greater powers. It meant she could see – to an extent – how things wee progressing and allowed her to be responsive to all the little cues and thoughts and feelings others might miss.

“All right. Look inside yourselves, in your mind, find the bright blaze of your soul, like you were shown the first time you used auristics. It should stand out a league. Around it, your expendable djed reserves – you were shown how to create those by your initiator, we understand.”

Chiona had said that the initiation of new aurists was something that was generally reserved for the masters on the Tower books – which mostly meant members of House Dusk – since it was a delicate and complex matter, requiring empathy, depth of sight and experience. Every soul was different, every person different, and teaching them how to expand and bud off parts of their soul was a vastly difficult undertaking for most. Alses was quite prepared to believe that this was so, but added the rider in the privacy of her own head that it meant House Dusk got a good long look at most everybody who came for tuition. Not that that was a bad thing, of course.

“They should be visible as lakes or clouds of brightness,” she added; those were the most common interpretations. “They may be quite small, right now, your reserves, but they're very responsive to your thoughts – imagine a rope or a column of djed, rising to your call out from them, and it should happen. Get a feel for it, play a bit with it, understand what you're holding in your mental hands is a piece of yourself. An expendable piece, since it's from those reserves, but a piece of you nonetheless.”

She gave them time, ample time, to find themselves and to have a bit of a play around, in the conceptual playground of their mental impressions. It was important for them to be habituated and completely comfortable with themselves, their impressions on the world and how they could use parts of themselves to change the world to their liking – the basis of most personal magic. It also meant she could see who might be struggling a little and offer some extra advice – perhaps their impressions weren't the norm, or they were simply nervous and having difficulty with calming themselves sufficiently.

Alma was one such, but just as Alses padded over to offer some help – or perhaps a private session – her thoughts seemed to race to comprehension and her aura positively snapped into a new appearance, a lightning-quick, determined shift. Unusual – Alma, perhaps, would bear more watching.

[Alses]

Everything seemed to be going rather well, all things considered – the class was quiet and seemed to be getting on with their tasks, no-one had tried to swing from the chandelier or throw paper around the place, and no-one had overgiven or disobeyed her either.

Really, she couldn't have asked for a better first lesson; pupils quiet and obedient to a fault, absolutely focused on learning, a perfect microcosm of order in a generally-chaotic world. “Now, cast your djed out, let it fracture and craze, and then weave all those tendrils about you, open them to the world and drink its glory in.” A pause, for consideration, remembering unfortunate consequences again. “But carefully. Your focus, your synchrony, use it as a guide. Find the most interesting currents of ambient djed coursing through the world and weave your personal magic into them, filament between filament, until you're so connected it's hard to tell where you end and the world begins.”

As unskilled as they were, it would serve to do little more than brighten the glow of passive Sight and perhaps give them a little insight into the food they were supposed to be examining. A few chimes, to let them all habituate to the new, enhanced feelings. “Now, follow those ambient currents back in your mind, look for the ones pouring out from the food, the djed which defines it as what it is, rather than a part of the desk or the air. Start your weave slowly, carefully – too fast and you'll lose your concentration. Speed comes with familiarity and skill, all things in time.” Her voice was low and soothing, a rippling cadence that insinuated itself into the consciousness of her listeners rather than demanding attention.

That was something she'd taken from lessons with madam instructor, since whatever her other faults, the cold martinet who'd taught her before Chiona did at least have the right sort of voice for teaching.

“Don't worry if you can't manage it the first few tries – it's expected. Learn from what went wrong, and keep trying. Within the bounds of your strength, of course.”

Time stretched out, endlessly unspooling – Alses began to worry – but then, blessedly, comprehension began to blossom and flower a rippling battery of emotion blooming in the aurist's colour-drenched world, eyes widening to the Sight beyond sight, to some of its manifold applications, hands reaching, glacial in their speed, for brushes and ink-pots, smug smiles curving through auras on crescents of golden delight, sparkling and scintillating in contrast with the smoke-shot miasmas of their still-struggling classmates – was that a sinuous, silvery flicker of deceit there, of intrigue and corruption?

Faded and superficial – a small lie, a shallow deception, not really worthy of the terms, even, but there nonetheless, and it set her on her guard. That one would bear watching. Alses allowed herself a moment of smugness, though, both for having caught it in the first place and for having devised the secrets of the food that would let her leisurely tear strips off the lying student, at her own convenience.

Well, perhaps that was a bit strong; she'd decide what needed to be done later. Perhaps check with Chiona Dusk about a few things – including that niggling notion of controlled overgiving. Worth looking into – but there was no time to dwell on that, now: the city bells were swinging into action, pealing and pealing their grand symphony of the current time, and the end of their first lesson together.

“Stop trying,” Alses said loudly, her voice no longer the soothing cadences of an instructor, instead purposefully jarring, to aid in the disruption of their concentration. Not that that was particularly necessary; the cacophony of Lhavit's hundred hundred bells was enough to destroy the focus of all but the most determined and serene of practitioners. “Thank you for your attention,” she added, feeling something extra was owed but not quite sure what. “Leave your notes on the food on your desks; I'll take a look at them a little later on.”

There was already movement towards the doors – that needed nipping in the bud. Fortunately, even in her robes, she was quick and graceful. “Did we say you could leave?” she asked, allowing a note of irritation to seep into her silken tones. “We realise you-” this was to one of the girls; her face flamed red as Alses continued “-are eager to see a certain lady-” and her tones left no doubt about the type of liaison which would probably ensue “-and you-” she turned her gaze on the boys – it was only fair, after all “-want to dance with the Taiyang-” that was deduction, from the tendrils of white-and-gold devotion winding through his aura and a true-blue flicker of timely concern, and an activity that, at least, was excusable and explicable, but she'd be damned if she'd show that openly “-but you are in our lesson until we say you can leave, understand?”

Chagrin, a bit of rage, that overwhelming bonfire of embarrassment and a few other emotions, swirling into the collective auras of her students, told her that she'd put her point home. Not before time, too – she was beginning to insure Chiona's dire warnings.

“For our next lesson,” she continued, voice only slightly gentled, “Write a brief essay on your impressions of auristics so far, what you've been told and what you've inferred.” A quick, wintry smile – she was still annoyed at them for thinking the bells decided the lessons, rather than the teacher. “Look on it as a test of your intelligence.” Her eyes raked over the group one last time, and she nodded to the door. “Now you may go.”

There was a brief stampede at the door and then it swung gently shut, far too gently to have simply been left to swing on its own – so someone surely had at least a rudimentary grasp of manners – and Alses was left, all alone, in the small lecture room.


A


Free from the prying gazes of novices, she sagged thankfully against the lectern and collapsed into one of the chairs with a long sigh of expelled air.

“Syna above, we're glad that's over,” she breathed, the adrenaline that had fuelled her thus far slowly draining away from her extremities, allowing the bone-deep tiredness to seep in in its wake. It had gone well, she thought – or at least, not catastrophically wrong, which, for her first ever teaching foray, was surely to be counted as an unqualified success?

She would count it so, anyway, Alses resolved, resting her crown-of-horns gently against the carved sides of the lectern.

She didn't, unfortunately, have long in this restful state. Even though her eyes were closed and the hinges of the door well-oiled and silent, the scent of jasmine wove itself inexolerably through the still air of the lecture room and tantalised, teased and tickled at Alses' sharp nose.

She half-rose, operating on autopilot through the surprise, but was waved back down impatiently by one purple-gloved hand. “Chiona!” Alses exclaimed, shocked and yet knowing, really, that she shouldn't have been. “We should have expected you'd be watching my first attempt.”

The lady nodded brightly, moving in a whispering waterfall of fine fabric to perch elegantly on the edge of one of the desks. “Yes, you should have.” Tawny eyes swept up and down Alses' form, drinking in the change of dress and, doubtless, much else besides.

Alses could have tried to read Chiona's intentions, and perhaps seen if any magic was at work, but after a lesson of near-constant use, her eyelids felt uncomfortably like they'd been lightly skinned and her eyeballs were hot and itchily irritating in the eyesockets – a sure sign she'd been overexerting herself. Best to be cautious, then – she had other lessons, later in the day, and she'd need her reserves then as well.

“You chose a good tailor,” Chiona noted, still appraising. “And the colour's a nice touch.” A wide, white smile split her features. “It's the little things, I've always felt.”

Alses nodded, quite tiredly. This teaching lark rather took it out of one. “Thank you for your advice.”

A brief little chuckle. “On buying robes, or on teaching?” came the mischievous question – Alses opened one eye to fix a baleful glare on the laughing Lady Dusk and then thought the better of it. An acquaintanceship of five days wasn't really enough to presume she knew all of her tutor's moods, after all.

“Both,” she replied, briefly, instead, voice liquidly neutral. “Is it always this exhausting?” Alses asked plaintively. “We don't know how you can stand it!”

A shrug, the sense of velvet and cold gold slipping on her shoulder, stray bleedover from Chiona, doubtless. “Most of the tiredness is probably from your own nerves and the backlash of relief now you've negotiated the first lesson. At a guess, anyway.” A slight mischievous glitter in the eyes – had Alses been a little more au courant with current events she'd have braced herself for one of Lady Dusk's sly little jabs. As it was, however...

“Technique and finesse, Alses, technique and finesse. It doesn't just apply to auristics, you know – useful life lesson, my father calls it.” Chiona never seemed able to stray very far from mild mischief, having picked up very quickly how to gently needle her apprentice without being abrasive – and sure enough, when Alses groaned quietly, deep in her throat, and opened both her eyes to stare at her teacher, Chiona's eyes were glittering with mirth and mischief in about equal measure.

“So,” the heiress presumptive continued, with a brisk clap of her hands that was muted more or less completely by the muffling silk of her gloves, “How do you think it went?”

[Alses]

Alses winced; the question she'd been expecting and dreading. “Well...” she began, ordering her thoughts. “I wasn't prepared for how different they all were,” she admitted. Chiona simply nodded, bidding her continue. “And we could rather do with a pointer or something, to save us jumping up and down to point at the blackboard.” Was that a covered smile from her ladyship? Probably, knowing her. “I'm still useless at names; we know what they all feel like, auristically speaking, but their names still elude me.”

“I noticed you didn't refer to them by name very much,” Chiona added. “Work on that, please. Nothing makes one feel like a mindless drone so much as not being given the courtesy of a name. Anything else?”

With a sinking heart, Alses continued. “I might have gone too fast for some of them,” she allowed, and then rallied somewhat. “But we really have no frame of reference.” An arched eyebrow, and crossed arms, turning the tables back on her own instructor with a faint smile, certain she'd pick up on it.

That was part of the game they were starting to play, and once Alses had become a little used to the idea, she started to respond to Lady Dusk's little manoeuvres and ploys with counters of her own. It seemed to be working so far. “How would you assess us?”

Chiona, with a knowing look in her eye, seesawed her hand back and forth for a few moments, a favourite gesture of hers and one that Alses had only recently realised meant balance or indecision, something equally weighted one way or another. “'Tis difficult to judge another's style,” she commented, “Since everyone does things slightly differently, but you didn't come off too badly, in my estimation anyway. I'd have stepped in if things were getting truly out of hand, though I never like doing that. It undermines authority, see – and that's your biggest weapon in the lecture room. Not so much when you're teaching one-to-one, but in a classroom, it's the best thing to have on your side.”

She nodded towards the Dusk Tower banner behind the lectern. “That's partly why that's there.” Alses craned her neck to look.

“The banner,” Chiona qualified quietly. “It's at just the right height to tower behind you when you lecture at the podium,” she explained, “And it implies that behind you is all the power and might and wisdom of the Dusk Tower, that you have our support – which you do. It's good to remind the students – especially the older ones – just who holds the reins in the lecture room, and that it isn't them. In any case, you held them fairly well – especially the exodus. A little informal at the beginning, yes, but I rather suspect that's a combination of nerves and your own personality.” A faint smile.

“You fell into the trap of almost every novice teacher, though – assuming too much! Just because you know something, and consider it quite basic, doesn't mean your students will. As you found out – you should be thankful for that outspoken pupil.”

Alses flinched, despite her best efforts not to react, and Chiona gentled somewhat, perhaps seeing it. “That said, you answered well and promptly enough, and you didn't laugh. They'll feel it's easier to ask you things if you keep that up – and questions are very important.” A nod to the small spread of goodies from the Tower kitchens.

“I rather liked your introduction of the practical element,” she added. “Though I do have to wonder how much practical value your exercise had, since these are all common Lhavitian foods – they can just write down how they tasted with any old faked drivel about their auristic vision, no?”

Alses covered a smile and, instead of answering, padded over to the bunch of grapes and plucked one, holding it out to Chiona who took it readily, albeit with a slightly quizzical look, and popped it in her mouth.

Reaction was swift in coming – a cough and an unusual facial expression Alses was prepared to bet good kina few had ever seen before. “Zintila above, those are tooth-rottingly sweet!”

“They're glazed in concentrated sugar,” Alses replied, with just a soupçon of smugness. “Every bit of food has a secret – the meat might be basted in sugar or marinaded in brine, the rice might be tumbled with powerful spices, that sort of thing. We hope we'll be able to spot who's actually managed to use their powers and who's just looking to slack off. I think at least one of them's taken the latter route; we'll find out who it is soon enough.”

“What were you thinking of doing with your miscreant?”

Alses bit her lip – she hadn't thought that far ahead. “I'm...not sure,” she admitted, with a faint smile. “Perhaps make them eat the dish; I told the cooks to go overboard on the seasonings so they'd be obvious to anyone who could truly sense them, but by the time I see them again I expect they'll all have spoiled.”

Chiona nodded. “Discretion might be the better part of valour,” was her agreement. “I can't imagine you boxing someone's ears, either.” A mild grin. “Well, either way I look forward to hearing what your fertile mind comes up with, in due course. You've a few bells before the next lesson, and I'd hazard a guess you're rather tired, no? Can I tempt you to some tea and cake?”

Alses blinked – this was a welcome, although surprising, development. “At Mhakula's?” she clarified; Chiona looked intrigued and thoughtful for a moment, as though she'd intended staying the Tower – which confused Alses for a moment, before she remembered the Family would surely have their own cooks and dining room – and then smiled broadly, the sun coming out from behind a cloud.

“Well, why not?” she agreed readily. “Father's always saying it's good for me to get some exposure to the rest of Lhavit.”

END

[Elysium]

Alses

XP:
Teaching +5
Auristics +3
Organization +2
Observation +4

Lore:
Teaching: Organizing the Lesson Plan
Class 1 - Malien, Alma, Erin, Robert, Shano and Tael
Teaching: Uses of Auristics
Teaching: The Almighty Tangent
Teaching: Caution Against Overgiving
Teaching: Establishing Authority
The Inestimable Chiona Dusk

Notes: I was reading along as you wrote this! I'm impressed at your level of detail (though I'm unsurprised) I'm very interested to read Alses' next foray into the world of instruction. If you have any lore you'd like to add, let me know!

and so, the journey continues...