Elwin witnessed hundreds of woodblocks laid out upon the boundaries of the theatron in House SUNNA.
Professor Helen stood by the brazier of the Flame Eternal, arms firmly crossed, her posture the paragon of all postures. It looked as if not even a hurricane could convince her to bend. An enormous jar of what looked like narak peppers were at her feet.
The Fradihta quickly arrived at their seats without wasting a beat. They knew that any transgression of rules – including lateness – carried with it the duty to consume a chili pepper from the jar, along with at least fifty push-ups per infraction. Elwin gulped and prayed in his seat that he wouldn’t fail at whatever task was thrown at him.
“ATTEN-TION!” she said, and all the Fradihta stood up at once. Seeing the Artens to her satisfaction, the Master of Fire began her speech.
“This day marks your proper induction to the Art of Fire, which we call Tahamastra. When in class, I expect you to refer to Fire as Taha, and the Art of Fire as Tahamastra, just as FOUNDER SUNNA intended. Do I make myself crystal clear?”
“Yes, ma’am! Clear as crystal!” they enunciated in unison.
“Very well. You may sit.”
They all breathed a sigh of relief.
“The essence of Tahamastra is energy, manifested through dance. It is through the motions of the body that we push and pull the energies of the world. The extreme forces that we gather and press excites the atoms of all that are, and manifests them into red-hot plasma, which we know of as Taha.”
Elwin cautiously nodded.
“However, unlike Mashur and Gurun – water and earth, respectively, that exist as-is without our intervention, Taha requires our will to create. For that end, I need someone to enlighten the class as to how matter changes form with temperature and energy.”
The red-haired boy Elwin remembered from the morning raised his hand.
“Mr. Robert.”
“Thank you ma’am, for allowing me to –”
“Cut such address. We have no time.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Robert announced, standing up like a cadet. “As we add energy, matter melts from solid to liquid. From liquid, it evaporates to gas. When they are energized further, gas turns to plasma.”
“Correct. Sit back down.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Elwin thought it a little strange that Robert followed through all the motions as if he was elsewhere.
“As Mr. Robert has summarized, what we call plasma rests upon the pinnacle of energetic states. To produce Taha, or to even muster a small flame, you need to push sufficient energy in a volume of space to bring it up to more than a thousand degrees. For those whose Maht is Taha, such a feat is instinctually achievable. But for those without, sweat and tears will be demanded.”
Katherine crossed her arms and broke into a wordless grin. She had shown everyone what she could do with fire back in Professor Aionia’s first-ever lesson. Lucian seemed to remember, and he threw an irritated glance at her direction, only to return his gaze to the Master of Fire in a fraction of a second.
“All of you shall learn to set objects alight and muster a sizable flame by the end of next spring. To this end, you shall learn one of the foundational forms in Tahamastra.”
Lucian shot up his arm.
“Yes, Mr. Lucian.”
“Why must we each learn how to produce a flame? Isn’t it possible to prepare food and hone our survival skills as long as we know how to use Taha in some way?”
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“You are also to develop abilities with Taha for combat and defense.”
“But what if we can already perform combat with other Elements, professor?”
“Such as?”
“Mashur.”
“An Element of grace,” remarked Professor Helen, rather tersely. “Yet you shall find that you will be beaten by those who can perform both Tahamastra and Mashurmastra.”
“I disagree, professor, because –”
“Are you so confident in your current abilities as to wager your life on it?”
Of course, what do you take me for! was what Lucian wanted to blurt, but his eyes fixed on the Flame Eternal licking and spitting its many-horned tendrils, along with an aura of absolutely sizzling heat that emanated from the Master of Fire. So Lucian sat back down without a word.
“Stand back up.”
“Ma’am?”
“Stand.”
Lucian stood again.
“You did not give me an answer. Are you so confident in your current abilities as to wager your life on it?” Professor Helen repeated, repeating every syllable in her enunciation.
“No, ma’am. I will accept your instruction in Tahamastra without complaint.”
“You may sit.”
Lucian sat down and grit his teeth in silence at the Master of Fire. From away, Katherine chuckled quietly, and Elwin watched the exchange with mouth agape. Back at Ascension, Lucian held sway over the teachers of his school, and some he even called without honorifics. But here at Aeternitas, the professors were unassailable.
“For your Franen, all of you shall master the Dance of the Sparks, the most accessible and vital form in Tahamastra,” continued Professor Helen, as if nothing had happened. There was not a tiniest whiff of gloat or hint of satisfaction at putting a student in their place, unlike Mr. Sadis. And that’s when Elwin had the revelation that Professor Helen was nothing like his numeracy teacher, despite how fiery and strict she was. Professor Helen was uncompromising because she cared for the well-being of every Arten – and this was the best way to ensure that Lucian’s pride would not lead him astray, to not lead him to demise in what she knew of as war.
Elwin felt a well of respect for the Master of Fire rise from within.
“The chief aim of the Dance of the Sparks,” she continued, “is to impart you to the basic bodily movements required to pull and push energy. It contains 8 sequences of dances, each of which you shall call a dancephrase. You will master how to set objects alight with each dancephrase, and if you exceed expectations, I shall teach you in earnest the Dance of the Apprentice’s Flame while the others continue to hone the Sparks.”
At the conclusion of her sentence, eight differently-sized woodblocks untangled themselves from their brethren and shot across the theatron to Professor Helen in jets of fire. She motioned her hands to arrange the woodblocks in a spacious circle around herself, each several yards apart from one another.
“The blocks are arranged from small to large in a clockwise manner. The goal is to set each of the woodblock alight – one by one with the move you perform. Watch closely.”
She cracked her fingers and lowered herself to a low physical stance before the smallest woodblock, a stance that runners made before they broke into a sprint, except her hands were not upon the ground, but rather extended as if to balance herself.
Taking a breath, she slid to the side with sharp speed, her left arm stretching forward gracefully; the smallest woodblock became wreathed in flame. She then strode forward, her arm seeming to tug on invisible strings, and swept the air with her right elbow; the second woodblock came alight. Taking a short step with her left leg, she crushed the surrounding air with a punch, which set fire to the third woodblock; she took several steps forward, and performing an elegant rotation of her core, swept the force of her turn into the fourth woodblock with her left elbow, smoldering the wood. She then swooped low with her legs out as in a tackle, and kneed upwards as a bow releases its tension; the fifth woodblock burst into flames.
The Fradihta watched captivated as Professor Helen set the sixth woodblock aflame by releasing her bent right arm like a spear, thrusting the energy of its draw; she took a stride sideways and back, pulling her legs and arms inward, and set the seventh woodblock on fire with the momentum of her halt; finally, taking to the air in a great jump, she cleaved down the air with the inertia of her kick, so mighty that it not only ignited the last woodblock twice the size of her torso, but split it apart, sending its fragments flying at the Fradihta some twenty yards away.
“URA!” one of them hollered, careening the woodchips up and away behind them.
It was not an overstatement to say that the jaws of the Fradihta had solidly made friends with the earth.
“This is the first dancephrase, and the most pivotal one in the repertoire of the Sparks. I shall perform it again, and this time, you shall observe its unifying characteristics.”
Elwin watched as Professor Helen started the dancephrase anew with a fresh supply of woodblocks. All her movements were graceful, elegant, and without flaw; the dance itself was forceful, reflexive, and angular, her arms, legs, and torso making a series of what appeared to be triangles in their swift thrusts and sharp retractions, punctuated by staccatos of perfect precision. It was obvious that she had performed it thousands, perhaps even tens of thousands of times before.
Professor Helen performed the dance yet again, this time faster, all the eyes and necks in the theatron turning sharply this way and that as the Master of Fire went through the motions; she performed the dance again, faster, and faster, her individual movements seeming to blur into a singular entity yet distinguishable to the trained eye, until the velocity of her movements and the friction of her swift strikes set alight the air and sky in an emblazon of gigantic sparks, arcing light and flame.
She landed upon solid ground again, her hair of burgundy-vermillion unsinged, without a single streak of soot.
“Stand and descend. Let us begin.”