Closed Flames and Glyphs [Tsaba]

[Annalisa Marin]

65th of Summer, 513 AV

Breath in. Breath out.

The salty smell of Matthews Bay assaulted Anna's nostrils once more, making achieving concentration rather difficult as always. It always took many chimes for her to gain some semblance of clarity in her own mind, though perhaps that was only natural for one so conflicted as her. The wizard was a creature of duel nature after all. On the one hand there was the chaotic and cruel mage, a creature that enjoyed tormenting and dominating her lessers. On the other, there was the calculating and calm Chaon, the creature willing to wear false smiles and lies to advance the agenda of its master.

Both were the same parts of one whole, however their existence clashed with each other so naturally the friction caused between them could occasionally effect her judgment for the worse. As such, these meditation sessions had become even more of a necessity. Clarity granted her some measure of control over the clash of emotions, and let her think clearly.

The wizard sat upon her cloak, the rest of her unneeded possessions, her backpack and boots, laying far off to the side against a small hilly rise that marked the edge of the beach. The wizards hair was allowed to fall freely about her head, her expression was almost peaceful. It was in rare moments like this where one could see the wizard as she had been before the Sway of Magic and the Truth of Rhysol had taken root.

Anna breathed in through her nose once again and out her mouth, cycling her breathing in an attempt to once again melt away all outside distractions. As she meditated uneasily her thoughts briefly drifted to Tsaba, her Nuit protégé, and whether or not the undead would find this place easily enough. The wizard regretted that she had only left a message with Lisaelis for Tsaba as to where she would be, however her own efforts to find the Nuit had proved unsuccessful. The trip here only took a few bells anyway, it was far enough from the city proper where practicing magic was possible without concern for harming the city itself. It was the perfect place for her testing grounds.

The wizard cleared her heads of the doubts and distractions once more, allowing cool clarity to overtake her mind once more. She would need a clear head for the lessons she had planned today, a very clear head, followed by focus and pathway runes to draw on her body. Tsaba would find the place, Anna had faith in that. She might be a little odd, but she was not stupid, the directions she had left with Lisaelis would be enough.

[Tsaba]

Tsaba headed away from the city, nervously swinging her sling at her side. Most of her tools were bundled in her pack or scrollcase, but the sling and bullets were out and accessible. She don't know why she even bothered; she wasn't good enough with the weapon to actually hit anything. Even if a predator sat nicely and patiently ten feet away from her and let her hurl a bullet from a stationary position, she had a 50% chance of missing outright. If something actually came at her... But holding the weapon made her feel better, anyway. Occasionally she stopped to hurl a couple of stones, to 'get her hand in', which did nothing whatsoever for her confidence in her abilities. It was, however, necessary, as she needed to get used to the shorter reach of her new arm in order to even reach her normal pathetic levels of accuracy. She used any vaguely round stone she happened to find; no sense in wasting bullets. It was a good thing she'd checked in with Lisaelis after her shift copying out the old books. Otherwise, she could've sat waiting for her teacher in an empty classroom for hours, which probably would have angered Dr Marin somewhat. Tsaba didn't have a great sense of time but the living tended to lose patience quickly, in her experience. Of course, Dr Marin was probably already mad at her. Why else would she make her travel out of the city? It was dangerous even under normal circumstances, and Tsaba was on new legs and not yet back at full strength. But the journey was probably safe enough. Dr Marin wouldn't send her out to die or anything. Tsaba checked once again that she had plenty of ammunition. Her destination wasn't that far out of the city; not full-day-trek far. But it was further than she'd ever gone for sling practice. And she wasn't a natural navigator, so while the directions were perfectly clear, she nearly got lost twice. Eventually, though, she found Dr Marin, the woman seated on her cloak, breathing deeply and carefully. Her eyes were closed. Tsaba didn't have to look at her aura to know that her heartbeat would be calm and steady, her mind focused. She'd seen wizards do what Dr Marin was doing before. Tsaba moved close enough to be clearly visible when Dr Marin opened her eyes, but not close enough to distract the woman with sounds indicating her presence, and knelt, waiting patiently for her attention.

[Annalisa Marin]

Anna knew what she wanted to accomplish today, that much was obvious, she wanted to demonstrate to Tsaba that Glyphing possessed boundaries but they were only on a technical level. The wizard had been musing as to how she could possibly make the Nuit understand, unless she achieved that understanding then her glyphing would always be limited. Tsaba's own style was developing slowly but surely, with each glyph she witnessed the Nuit use the more she saw less her own style and more the undead woman's. Theory was what the University preferred to teach, which the wizard hated for a multitude of reasons. Magic and understanding it could only be carried so far on theory, one had to experiment with it, be willing to test its boundaries to the fullest. Practically using magic like she was about to was frowned upon by the University in most cases, but she was not in the city at the moment so Rhysol take them all.

The wizard's mind was calm as her controlled breaths helped her clearly visualize the design she had in mind. Honestly, Anna had never actually attempted this kind of style for glyphing. Oh, sure, she had drawn runes in the dirt every now and again but nothing to the scale she was currently intending. It would be a difficult project to be sure, hopefully Tsaba could bear with her in this instance and understand.

The wizard took a few more cycles of controlled breathing before opening her eyes, her eyebrows immediately shooting up in extreme surprise as she took in a sight nearby. A young girl kneeled upon the sand nearby, waiting patiently for something. Two braids fell down her back and dark circles were easily spotted around her eyes.

What the petch was a child doing so far from the city on her own? Was she stupid, lost, or both? She certainly did not look scared, however that might have been the aforementioned stupidity. Needless to say, seeing a child out alone stirred a rather primal part of her, the part of her that was at heart still possessed of decency. Another part of Anna felt like yelling and cursing at the girl for such stupidity, it was one thing for a wizard like herself to be alone a few bells from the city. It was another thing entirely for a lone child to do so. Tsaba would just have to wait for her to take the child back to the city. Oh, how she loathed her remaining humanity.

The tall wizard slowly stood to her full six foot height and carefully strode over to the child. She hoped the girl did not find her height too intimidating, it was known to happen unfortunately. The draw backs of having intimidating qualities was that they were difficult to use towards diplomatic or comforting ends.

"Child, what are you doing all the way out here? Are you not aware that dangerous things lurk in the lands outside of Zeltiva." The wizard asked, looking down at the girl.

"You are lucky you stumbled upon me, we should get you back to the city. You look tired and your parents are no doubt besides themselves with worry. Are you hurt? Do you need me to carry you?" Anna said, the slightest hints of worry creeping into her tone as knelt down to the girls level and tenderly placed a hand on her shoulder.

Gods, why could she not be the same vainglory spitfire with children as she was older individuals? She knew how to do that, this territory of kindness and worry seemed much too much like her dead past self. This would require extensive meditation later for reflection, this out of character reaction was worrisome. For now she needed to figure out how to make sure Tsaba knew she was back at the city and that she should wait up for a while if possible.

[Tsaba]

Tsaba rose at Dr Marin's approach, but the woman's words confused her. Perhaps she'd misunderstood her instructions? Was Dr Marin upset at being interrupted? Had she arrived too early? "My apologies, Dr Marin," she said, "should I have brought protection? I know it isn't exactly safe outside the city, but we are not that far from civilisation." Her own wariness had vanished as soon as she had spied the professor, knowing that she was more than capable of defending the both of them, but her worry at Tsaba's presence had her reassessing that judgement. They were safe, weren't they? "I admit I am not at full strength yet... it takes a little bit of time to adjust to a new body, especially when there is a height difference. But I met no trouble on the way here, and I see no reason to expect any now." The closest thing to 'trouble' that Tsaba had experienced outside of Zeltiva had been that time she'd accidentally hit somebody with a sling bullet, and even that had turned out to be more productive than dangerous. But the look on Dr Marin's face was one that Tsaba had never seen before. There was the normal part-distracted, part-troubled look, but also... concern. That was what really worried Tsaba. Dr Marin had never shown any sign of fear, care or concern in any of their previous lessons. She cast a glance over the beach and ocean, then out across the land behind them, fingering the little pouch of stones at her belt... then the smaller pouch of lead bullets. "Why, do you see something?"

[Annalisa Marin]

Anna was more than a little taken aback by the girl's apparent familiarity for her, as well as her speech pattern. It was far more mature than any child her age should have, and the words 'changing bodies' especially stood out to the wizard. A barrage of questions were ready, however her mind started to put some of the vague pieces together. Calling her Dr. Marin, changing bodies, height difference, the same static gaze she had grown accustomed to... it seemed impossible but really there was only one really logical conclusion.

The wizard rocked back on her heels slightly, her eyes wide in shock. This was unexpected to say the least.

"Wait... Tsaba, is that you? Gods above, I thought you were some lost child and you certainly look the part. That would explain why had a bit of trouble spotting you today." The wizard said aloud.

Anna quickly removed her hand from Tsaba and stood up once more, looking down at her student with a slight blush. To completely embarrass her was a rare thing indeed and the Nuit hadn't even meant to do it by all appearances. Though, could anyone really blame her? Tsaba looked like a small and frail child, not the sickly woman she had seen not days ago. Switch bodies was supposedly a talent the Nuit possessed, however Anna had never imagined the change could be so drastic. It was like she was looking at an entirely different person.

The wizard quickly attempted to recompose herself, a difficult feat even for her. She had thought herself prepared for the lesson today, though this little change was certainly throwing her for a loop. The child, woman, Anna reminded herself, looked pitiful in an endearing sort of way. The wizard found her irresistibly adorable, a girlish part of her that had slowly wormed its way back into her very being.

Anna shook the thoughts from her head. This whole thing was sending her previously well adjusted thoughts and emotions for a loop, not a healthy thing for one in her own fragile mental state. The lesson, she needed to focus on the lesson. Tsaba was still Tsaba, just in a smaller form. Anna decided to liken it to changing clothes, albeit very fleshy and dead clothing.

"Ahem. Well, um, I suppose we should get underway then. I apologize if I made you uncomfortable." Anna said, turning from the Nuit.

Me apologize? This little change for her is causing an imbalance for me, if anything she should be apologizing to me.

It was not her fault, her rational mind reasoned, she was just doing what came naturally. I should have expected something like thing to happen at some point, I just need to take this in stride.

No doubt. Stupid undead, making confusing me and jumbling up my emotions.

Now she was arguing mentally with herself, if the earlier signs had not pointed to insanity then Anna was certain she had a problem now. It could be addressed later but it was still rather annoying. She cast a look over her shoulder, glancing down a the undead child.

"Follow me." The woman said, striding towards a large expanse of beach.

The goals had not changed, just the process in achieving them was thrown a bit for a loop until her emotions and thoughts were completely in check. Or at least to the degree that she was certain she wouldn't either go on a rampage of destruction against all nearby, or break down into a vapid headed idiot and start cooing over the undead child. Overgiving carried such unpleasant baggage, personality issues had been bound to happen with the amount of magic she tampered with. Her recent stint had just pushed her further along the path.

[Tsaba]

Tsaba looked blankly at Dr Marin for a few seconds, then comprehension dawned. "Oh, my apologies. Yes. I... I forget I'm not in Sahova, sometimes." She shrugged apologetically. It wouldn't be long before her eyes properly darkened and her frame thinned, making her status as a nuit unambiguous to anybody familiar with her kind. But the adjustment period was always awkward. Perhaps choosing a child's body had made a mistake; it would be difficult to go about her day-to-day activities if she was constantly stopped by well-meaning adults trying to watch her or take her home. And her teacher seemed bothered by something. Perhaps she was indeed on edge due to their vulnerable location. But she had chosen it. Why would she take Tsaba out to teach her somewhere she didn't feel safe? At least, without bringing some kind of protection? Tsaba didn't bother asking. She may not know the professor well, but she knew that she kept herself to herself; she never spoke about her own feelings or past, and only related her judgements and experiences that were relevant to the lesson. So unless whatever was unsettling her had something to do with glyphing or magic in general, Tsaba probably wouldn't get an explanation. That didn't bother her. She'd lived with Craun for nearly five years before she'd figured out he was dead, after all, and he hadn't technically told her until it was time to flee town. She followed her teacher towards the beach, glad that she'd remembered to bring her waterproof scrollcase. Not that she expected to get any writing done on the beach, with the sand and wind and water. So they must be down there for something else, something that couldn't simply be copied onto paper. Something that required space... and distance... and was probably whatever was putting Dr Marin out. Well, this could only be interesting.

[Annalisa Marin]

Reigning in the imbalance was difficult but Anna managed, shifting her attention to the lesson she had for Tsaba. Teaching would hopefully provide a much needed outlet for her attention, maybe even assist with the changes going on in her mind. The wizard took a deep breath and surveyed the beach with an appraising eye. Times like this made her wish that she possessed control over the element of water, wet sand would be much more easy to mold than dry sand. Her teeth ground into each other as she realized that she possessed nothing to transport water over in the conventional sense.

The wizard thought for a moment, her eye darting to her equipment to assess what could prove a good substitute for a bucket. Her pack was out of the question, too many valuable things that needed transport. Her eyes fell upon her boots, not exactly the most ideal or effective carriers for water, but they would suffice. Perhaps it might even add to the lesson, when lacking conventional supplies seek unconventional methods. Though, her waterskin seemed a valid option as well. The choice was to walk around in squeaking boots for a while, or sully her waterskin with sea water.

The wizard thought about it for a moment before moving for the boots, casting another glance to Tsaba.

"If you have something capable of carrying water from the bay use it and pour it out onto an area on the beach. We will be making glyphs out of the sand." Anna instructed.

"I trust you have already tried your hand at making glyphs from unconventional materials, however this will fill a dual goal of making you more comfortable with the idea that glyphs can take nearly any shape and giving you a display of what happens when a scroll sigil is activated and spent." She said at length, gripping both of her boots and striding down to the gently lapping wave of the bay.

Anna already had an idea of the element she wanted to use, settling on the pure destructive force of lava. The Nuit was unaware of her ulterior motives here, which was just how the wizard liked it. Tsaba possessed great potential in the ways of magic, potential that Anna couldn't resist tainting and twisting towards her own ends. The undead already respected her, but the wizard needed more than that. She needed the undead to need her, to look to her to advice first and foremost. If all went well, Rhysol might have a potential agent of chaos slumbering within Tsaba.

The goal was lofty, but the wizard had faith in her own abilities. A few words of praise here, some teaching of taboo things the University normally prohibited there, all the while Rhysol's corrupting gift would be flowing into the undead to slowly corrupt her. If nothing else, this would prove to be an interesting exercise of her abilities as an agent of Rhysol.

[Tsaba]

Tsaba habitually carried fresh water as it did have many uses, but she didn't tend to carry empty water-carrying devices. Well, not for that specific purpose. She did have one such device, although she'd kept it mostly for the social advantages it gave her in certain situations -- specifically, the ability to sip beer or tea, or even swallow small amounts of food, in social situations. She hadn't expected it to have other uses, but opportunity was opportunity. Currently, Tsaba's stomach was empty and dry; it hadn't been used since she'd flushed it clean and tied off the bottom when she'd removed the intestines. So it was as good a pouch as any. It would be very difficult to clean later, but really, how often was she going to need to store important things in her own body? The human stomach is deceptively large. Tsaba took deep gulps, working faster than a human would since any spillage into her lungs was more an inconvenience than a serious problem. In fact, she hadn't attempted to make glyphs out of unconventional materials. It hadn't even occurred to her to try to fashion them from anything but ink, although she'd considered experimenting with charcoal. Which was stupid, because she knew you could glyph with anything; even if the texts she'd been studying hadn't specifically outlines that, she'd viewed pictures of glyphs in tile work, she'd seen them in tapestries, she'd watched her foster faster draw them in chalk. She'd herd stories of them sketched in blood and ichor. But she herself had, as always, defaulted to ink. Whenever she had the chance, she worked in ink. She was going to have to become more flexible if she wanted to survive. Tsaba's stomach started to feel stretched, so she stopped swallowing and marched a little way up the beach, where she dug a small hollow with her foot. She crouched by the side of it, curving her body so that her stomach began to hurt, and didn't resist the gag reflex, spitting up a stream of seawater onto the sand. Her stomach and throat had been as clean as any waterskin, but newly treated, so there was the slight taint of preservatives in the seawater -- although not, thankfully, Tsaba's own ichor. Rupturing a dead stomach with seawater that she was volunatirly swallowing probably wasn't possible, as gag reflexes should kick in first, but it wasn't something she'd tried before, and she couldn't be certain that the sluggishness of her reflexes wouldn't be a problem. She spat out the last of the seawater without any dramatic fuss (although she had to remind herself not to reflexively breathe out of nervous habit and trigger a completely unnecessary coughing fit) and stirred the water into the sand with the end of one boot. "I haven't worked with sand before," Tsaba admitted, conveniently not clarifying with the fact that she hadn't experimented with non-ink materials at all. She was sure she would inevitably disappoint Dr Marin at some point, and had probably done so already, but there was no need to add extra reasons. "It seems that it would be a difficult material, given its tendency to move about and be easily disturbed."

[Annalisa Marin]

As Anna witnessed Tsaba's rather creative means of acquiring the necessary water her eyes widened a fraction, forcing the woman to remind herself once more that the child was not bound by the constraints of the living. It was effective for all intents and purposes, much more so than Anna's own method. The wizard filled both of her boots with as much water from the bay as it could contain and carefully held both so as to avoid losing the liquid. Control over the element of water would have really been helpful here, then she could have simply transmuted her res directly to usable water. All things came in time, soon all of the elements would bend for her, all she needed was a bit of patience and dedication.

The wizard watched the Nuit regurgitate the water with mild interest, the fact that she had managed to do that without being reduced to a coughing fit was impressive. Undeath seemed to have some benefits, though having to change one's body seemed like a hassle Anna could do without. Besides, the wizard had no idea how Rhysol would react to such a change in one of his servants. Staying mortal seemed to work well for him so the wizard was in no hurry to attempt to find immortality.

Anna poured out the water on the area near where Tsaba had released hers, wetting the sand further and increasing the area to work with. It looked very much sufficient for her purposes. The wizard was going to have to glyph out her design first, Tsaba was improving but she was still a novice in the art of glyphing. Allowing her to add to any part of the sigil might cause problems. Besides, demonstrating what was expected first was always a good teaching method.

Surveying the wet sand for what she had to work with Anna nodded and picked up a nearby piece of driftwood. A sigil this large would likely be able to hold a fair amount of lava if she did this right. It would be one of the largest examples of glyphing she had ever attempted, certainly another test for her own abilities.

"Excellent, now step back and observe Tsaba. I will be utilizing focus, barrier, and trigger to entrap a fair bit of reimancy. I will then release it to display exactly what occurs when a sigil is activated and spent. Ask questions if you have them, but I want you to focus on observing the important components." The tall woman said.

Without much more though Anna moved to center of the wet sand and started on a focus. It was much like when she had been a little girl, creating structures from the sand and carving shapes onto the beach. Only this time errors were not something she could afford. After having placed glyphs on her own flesh for so long this couldn't be much more difficult.

The driftwood slowly carved its way through the wet sand, forming lines and the outlines of a full shape. The inverted triangles she held so dear were rather easy to get out onto the beach, being rather simple shapes to draw on most any surface. Idly Anna tucked an idea for a possible reimancy form utilizing earth and two dimensional shapes, might be worth investigating at a later date.

Wood scraped against sand as the focus started to look more like something worthy of being called a glyph, rather than just lines in the sand. The process was taking her longer than normal but such was natural when creating a larger focus. Needing to ensure that everything was perfect and double checking her work did not speed things up.

[Tsaba]

Tsaba would have liked to have examined her teacher's aura, or indeed the sand's aura, as she worked. What would it look like, weaving the earth into a magical design, tracing the very language of the gods into sand? She'd never noticed a glyph to have any particular aura, but then, she'd never looked all that hard for one, especially in such a large glyph, while it was being drawn. But although Dr Marin was rather faster at drawing glyphs than Tsaba herself, she knew the process to take quite a bit of time. And presumably, drawing them in the sand would take even longer. She didn't want to use Auristics for that length of time so soon after a body transfer; it was dangerous, it would cost her focus, and to overgive in such circumstances would be frankly embarrassing. So instead, she watched Dr Marin work, and she focused on the significant differences between etching in ink and sand. She paid careful attention to how she gouged the lines with the stick, to her sizing and spacing, wishing she'd thought to retrieve an example of Dr Marin's focus before they'd begun. She had one in her pack rolled up with her own notes as always, but she didn't want to leave the process for the amount of time that it would take to retrieve it. Already, she was seeing that her own glyphs would be difficult to do in sand. Tsaba's focus had a core of broad, intersecting lines, which was elaborated upon by further 'skeletal' lines before peripheral strokes were added. In sand, each stroke risked obscuring some of the previous stroke. If she simply scored the glyph into the sand, she'd end up with a mess... unless the glyph was very large. Dr Marin was drawing quite large, but Tsaba wasn't sure she would have the reach to achieve that, at least not in her little-girl body. Not by drawing the 'skeleton' first, which would bar her from walking over the glyphing space to add more. As she watched, she mentally revised her stroke order in the back of her mind, occasionally breaking one stroke into two or reversing the stroke's direction, making it possible to draw in the sand. Dr Marin, too, was being exceptionally careful with her work. Tsaba noticed that she paused to check things often. Had she done that when working on paper? Tsaba didn't recall her doing so, but it was rather less obvious when one was working with ink on a small scale, so maybe she had. Tsaba watched the lines resolve themselves into a full focus, written in Dr Marin's familiar hand. When it was complete, she kept attention on Dr Marin, but began to gather her thoughts. She wasn't certain where the lesson was going next, but she wanted to be ready to pull djed into her sight at any time. There might be something very interesting to observe.