Garin learnt the induction in under a month. Even so, Fedrahn informed him to continue training, and even to try out variations described in the scrolls. That might have been the reason she first appeared in his dreams.

Garin had never seen any person like her, and not only because she was probably the first woman he had ever seen. Her skin was the earth, and her freckles authentic pearls and mineral rocks. Her hair was grass, yet even still, Garin couldn't help but admire her majesty.

Her clothes of many leaves of many colours somehow didn't look savage, but gracious. And her eyes looked like they could see everything, had seen everything.

'Another one, huh?' the voice seemed to come from everywhere, and then from her mouth. 'Let me see then.'

And she seemed to lean in to stare at him, though when Garin tried to look down he couldn't see his own body. He hadn't been able to feel it either, so he wasn't too surprised. What surprised him, however, was the woman's undignified gasp. And then in all her majesty, she started to cry.

'You are beautiful, my child, and yet...still. Even were I to warn you, you cannot escape your unintended nature. They corrupted your blood, and it seems not even their blood was able to fix it. It shouldn't be you, my child. I would give everything for you to live the few years you have in peace.

'And yet in every variation I've seen, the events that scribe sets into motion cannot be undone. So I will not intervene, unless absolutely necessary. At least I think this might be the last cycle. There is that.'

With a few words of power, Garin felt his perspective move, the gigantic being getting ever further and her figure blurry. Still though, one thing was certain, she was weeping still. And when he woke the next day, an unexpected downpour greeted him.

He'd only slept for two hours as he always did, so the development surprised him a lot. What surprised him more was that the rain lasted days, and no matter where the ascetics tried to drive their island to, it seemed to still be raining. It was like the rain was pouring the world over, or following their island specifically.

Garin had only a passing impression of the dream. He could remember the sight of the woman, but he no longer associated it with majesty. He could vaguely recall her words being ominous, but she looked threatening so he thought it was a nightmare more than anything.

He didn't waste the days he was on lock down though. It was a stroke of luck, when he found a scroll that described a few of the commonest techniques of the lost earth dance. It was written in the instructions that those who mastered it did so instinctively.

Those they taught never reached their same heights. The dance was a talent, unlike most others. You either had it or you didn't.

The scroll wasn't an instruction manual, to that end. It just contained anecdotes of how the masters trained, the kind of techniques they unleashed.

Whoever wrote the scroll clearly had no idea what they were talking about, saying things like, 'the man's hands streamed like waves, his body hardened like a rock, he flowed into the earth.'

Garin liked the descriptions anyway. They spoke of mental exercises to understand the properties of the material you wanted to emulate. At the end there were instructions for the only surviving branch of the earth dance, the sword dance.

There was no sword sphere. Swords were made of steel, steel came from the earth and so many other things. In their day, true masters of the earth dance were godlike. He had learnt how to wield a sword from Fedrahn, but just like a normal fencer.

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It wouldn't hurt to try and replicate a little earth dance, though he supposed he'd have to spend a lot more time in the woods then. All the better to soak in nature's essence.

'There was this earth dancer who could ride the waves of the sea, moving with them like he were a boat. And his best friend could swing from tree to tree like a monkey and move around like a snake when he fought duels.'

"You've been reading that scroll for the last few days, haven't you?" Fedrahn asked with a frown, "do you wish to learn the earth dance?"

Garin snorted. "Yeah, I would like for my body to be as sturdy as a rock so I never feel pain."

"You and everyone else, kid," Fedrahn also snorted. "I'm happy to see those tall tales haven't rotted your brain yet. You've since learnt the dance induction technique, haven't you?"

"Yes," Garin replied with a nod.

"So now I think its time for the next phase of our plan."

"What plan?" Garin asked in confusion.

"The plan to get you to learn the light dance, obviously. I know a little over two months isn't enough to master such complex movements, but—what?"

"Did you just say you were planning to have me learn the dance?" Garin asked in a small voice he didn't recognise.

His sight turned blurry when Fedrahn affirmed, but then he grounded himself. He couldn't let wishful thinking get the better of him. If an arch master made a declaration, going against it was the height of folly. Besides, he couldn't refute any of the reasons he'd been given as to why he couldn't dance. It just made sense.

He was weak, looked sickly although he'd hardly ever gotten sick, was shorter and smaller than all his peers. And all evidence suggested his sight was going to fail him soon. So what if initially he'd been maturing faster than everyone.

There were stories that during their first months on the island, Garin had learned how to walk in a few months, and to talk too. He was much bigger than most of his peers, so much so that the masters thought they'd put him with the wrong age group. He'd slowed up at two years though, and since three he'd grown barely two inches.

"The arch master will never allow it," Garin said.

"Don't worry about that for a moment. What we need to worry about, is showing off your knowledge of the induction technique. Your peers will be starting their training soon, won't they?"

"Next month," Garin replied with a nod.

"Then we have a limited time line. We need a good plan. But in which you don't expose too many of your… peculiarities."

"What do you mean?" Garin asked.

"You do know that healing from a broken bone in a few days is monstrous, right? And then there is your unproportional strength. Not to mention you don't sleep as much as a normal person."

Garin took a step back at the last, looking around like a trapped animal. Fedrahn frowned at him.

"What's wrong? You're only scared of that one secret? Seriously?"

"Its the curfew," Garin replied. "When I was staying with the others, it was the arch master's most sacred rule. We all have to sleep at least eight hours a night. I would never want him to know I went against his word."

Fedrahn snorted. "Is that it? Well you are going to train in the light dance even though he instructed you not to. You have already broken that rule anyway. You just have to make sure he and the other masters don't know about your peculiarities. That means as we come up with a plan of action, we also need to come up with ground rules about how much you can show them. Only the strategic amount to make them think you have promise, but to not look too closely."

Garin didn't like it. Sure, he really wanted to learn the light dance, but lying to the arch master. Now that was something he could never countenance. He would do it though. He would do anything to learn how to dance.

And the friar himself always said, whenever he visited their lodgings, that he wished for all his children to surpass him some day. He wished for all of them to become masters and arch masters of the dance.

The next day, when Garin went to pick Fedrahn's mid day meal, the scribe walked with him for the first time. Garin noticed how even as he made small talk with him, his eyes kept darting around, watching everyone like a hawk.

This was the kind of thing Garin had been learning from him for a while, but seeing a master do it was really something. Fedrahn was acting too friendly by the time they reached the kitchens.

He tried to act friendly with the cooks, and although they were suspicious at first fell for his charm. He was like a completely different person.

That day Fedrahn carried his own food, and Garin was served twice as much as the other apprentices.

"Garin, my boy, why don't you go eat with your peers today? I'm sure my company gets boring from time to time," Fedrahn said.

Garin looked his way, ready to politely decline, but then he noticed a kind of glint in the man's eyes. In truth, Garin was starting to feel uneasy in Fedrahn's presence.

He'd told him to lie, to peek into forbidden areas and the like. And he changed his expression way too easily. Grown ups weren't supposed to be like that. But then again, he'd promised Garin he would learn how to dance. He nodded and turned, only noticing the other apprentice's ire too late.

"Wait. I forgot to give you your daily spending money," Fedrahn declared.

Garin wanted to shout that he didn't know what he was talking about, but an intense pressure had settled on the back of his neck.