Look Beyond What You See

The two young men begin to circle each other, sizing each other up and examining the training area as they do so. My heart is in my throat. I do not like this situation at all. I’ve positioned myself in a corner in the hopes that they’ll keep their attacks away from me. I wish just as strongly that we’d use this time on targets or something. Did Wesley not tell Giacomo that, while I have improved immensely in various skills since learning of my magical endowment, I am nowhere near ready for any sort of combat? But what would Wesley know of that, unless Dmitri told him?

Giacomo, as challenger, moves first, launching a mighty wave of water in Dmitri’s direction. Dmitri leaps into the air and wings of fire sprout from his shoulders, holding him safely out of the wave’s path as he shapes and throws fireballs. He does this seemingly effortlessly. My breath catches watching him. I knew he had a lot of control with his ability, but I did not realize that he was so powerful. Giacomo, however, narrowly dodges all of the fireballs and responds with well-aimed geysers beneath Dmitri--attempts to knock him out of the air--once the wave subsides. Dmitri seems harder pressed to dodge these; some of the geysers he avoids by only a hair’s breadth. The fireballs are smaller but come faster. Giacomo creates a water shield so that he can focus on other things. Dmitri flies faster and in erratic patterns while creating the largest fireball I’ve ever seen. He must think the water shield obscures Giacomo’s vision or something, which might be accurate; the water of the shield moves rapidly, making Giacomo appear as just a vague, blurry shape behind it.

Water bursts from a large section of the ceiling just as Dmitri releases his immense flaming masterpiece in Giacomo’s direction. His wings become sizzling clouds of steam when the deluge hits them and he plummets to the ground, hitting hard but rolling to his feet outside of the splash zone with a practised air. The fireball slams into the water shield and a roaring sizzle drowns out all other sounds as steam engulfs fully half the room around where the shield once stood. I lose sight of both of them in the thick white steam, but clashing roars of flame, roaring splashes of water, and brilliant flashes emit from the opaque clouds. My pulse throbs in my throat and my heart drums against my chest. Why so nervous?

An eruption of flame explodes through the clouds, burning them to faint memories and throwing Giacomo across the training area. He lands on his feet, skidding backward a metre or two as a tsunami rushes forth from his hands towards the focal point of the explosion. His eyes glitter with determination. The ends of his blond ropes of hair are smouldering. In that moment he is powerful and alluring--until I remember who is at the receiving end of that tsunami, which reaches near to the ceiling. Dmitri cannot fly above this one, and he must be running low on energy. All of these things he’s been doing must take so much of it. But the eruption of flame has not shrunk; instead it seems to grow by degrees and spirals ever-faster, shooting off fiery darts in all directions. They actually pierce through the wave, though much diminished. I duck one, and Giacomo is nearly hit by three; perhaps he was not expecting them.

The wave crashes into the fiery vortex with another deafening, sizzling roar. Almost immediately Dmitri bursts out of the water and the quickly forming cloud of steam, propelled by a tail of flames, ever being extinguished by the water they come through and being regenerated through Dmitri’s power. I am amazed. Another wave from Giacomo, this one more substantial. Dmitri drops abruptly to the ground, flames gone, and lets the wave pass over him, drenching him thoroughly, before leaping up again and resuming a barrage of fireballs and fiery darts on Giacomo. The water-bender is stunned. He underestimated Dmitri’s skill, or perhaps that dogged, bitter determination that gleams in my fiancé’s eyes is the cause for this strength. Giacomo quickly recovers his wits and forms another water shield, which is quickly followed by geysers under and around Dmitri, who leaps and flips out of range while maintaining the barrage of fiery paraphernalia.

This must stop. At this rate, they’ll kill each other. Just because of the element difference, Giacomo has the upper hand, but Dmitri seems to be the more skilled and more determined of the two. I have to stop this, before someone really gets hurt. But what can I do?

“Acionna, help me!” I plead, racking my brains for anything, any skill I might possibly possess that could be effective here.

“Think of Moses, child,” the goddess replies. Moses parted the Red Sea. How does that help me? Part them, somehow. He moved water out of the way...it must have formed walls, on either side of the Israelites. I just need to make one. One wall of water. I might as well be asking for the moon. Here goes nothing. All of my concentration goes into a line between the two combatants in the ground. At first nothing happens, and then just a mere burbling, several springs in a straight line, flowing together. More, Aerys. All or nothing. Put your whole self into it. My brain will explode. The fiery barrage and the geysers intensify moment by moment.

WHOOOOOOOOOOSH!

The wall of water suddenly rises, splitting the room floor to ceiling in a line from where I stand to a point on the wall opposite me. Both men stop cease to fight and stare at me with something not unlike awe.

“What do you think you’re doing? This is how battles are done. Who gave you the right to interfere?” Giacomo demands.

“It was meant as an example for me, was it not?” I reply tightly, most of my focus remaining on the watery wall of separation. “Should you not be pleased with my accomplishment, instead of scolding me?”

“I marvel at your skill, Aerys, but I do wonder that you felt the need to interfere,” Dmitri intervenes more tactfully, somehow reigning in his annoyance with me, which I know is only slightly surpassed by Giacomo’s annoyance with me.

“It seemed to me that things were becoming rather too realistic, as though someone might get hurt, and last I knew that was not the goal for training sessions. Perhaps my eyes deceived me, but it does seem that you both have expended a tremendous amount of energy in this exercise. I greatly admire your skill, both of you, and despair of ever achieving at your level, but I must humbly request that this be the end of your sparring match.”

“Eloquent but firm. A lady of the highest order. I will honour your wishes, although I dislike them,” Giacomo assents. I narrow my eyes at him. Flattery is never a good path to take with me.

“You speak well, Aerys. Perhaps if you used such tact in situations that called for it, my mother would think more highly of you,” Dmitri quips. I think I’ll strangle them both after dinner. For now, I’ll ignore that rather irritating remark. My wall crashes to the ground, drenching both of them, which I at least find highly satisfying.

“Thank you.”

“The pleasure is mine. Now, if you do not mind, your ability to raise such a wall, combined with what I saw of your skill earlier, intrigues me deeply. Before we call this training session to a close, I must request to see a sampling of your skill,” Giacomo entreats me.

“I’m quite certain I cannot put on a show to hold even the most meagre candle to your sparring match, but I will oblige you, for the sake of training.”

Dmitri rolls his eyes at my (slightly dry) self-deprecating speech, which I ignore along with his earlier rudeness. Later he’ll hear from me, but for now I cannot be bothered with that sort of nonsense.

I begin with a number of witches’ lights, which I then subject to a rainstorm and geysers, which they endure obliviously. While the lights continue to bob merrily along the ceiling, I launch balls of water at various targets around the room (including Dmitri, who peevishly dodges them). Then I turn my attention to one of Giacomo’s ropes of hair, which shortly begins to writhe and slither in its new form as a water snake.

“What in the name of--” he exclaims, after a very girly high-pitched scream upon realising what I’ve done.

“Watch your language,” I interrupt calmly, snapping my fingers at the snake, which reverts to its far less interesting original form.

“So you have a talent for sorcery, in addition to water manipulation.”

“I hear that’s fairly normal for magic-endowed humans.”

“You’ve improved even since yesterday,” Dmitri mutters with a hint of surprise.

“Sometimes I practise instead of sleeping.”

“You seem to do a lot of things instead of sleeping.”

“Stop distracting her from training!” Giacomo interjects imperiously.

“You’ve seen the basic run of my skill, where a river or pond is not present,” I retort. Would that I could get away from both of them for a while. “If it’s all the same to you, I believe we could all benefit from a nap. It seems we’re all getting cranky, and I’m sure you’re both more tired than I am, and I am exhausted.”

“Aerys is right. We might train again later today, but for now we should call it quits,” Dmitri agrees.

“As you see fit,” Giacomo sighs with resignation before turning his bright blue eyes to me. “Perhaps next time we’ll begin with weapons.”

“I look forward to it,” I reply as genuinely as I can manage. Anything to be done with this.

“We’ll see you at luncheon,” Dmitri adds curtly before taking my hand and leading the way out of the training area, up the stairs to Wesley’s study.

“Fairly impressive,” Wesley remarks coolly as we enter the electricity-decorated room, startling both of us.

“You were watching?” Dmitri groans. I smirk. I suspect he might have reigned in his (unnecessary) jealousy a bit more had he known that.

“Indeed. Hot tempers down there today. I expect future sessions will be highly entertaining. At least, for me.” Finally--something on which His Excellency and I can agree. I can hardly wait for the next installment of “entertainment.”

***~O~***