Timestamp: 1st of Summer, 513 A.V.
The glorious first of Summer! As was her wont and her tradition, Alses had stayed up the night before to see the Watchtowers flare, ringing in the changes of the season on pillars of burning, actnic light, silent and wonderful. Fresh, leafy green, the burgeoning life of Spring, gave way to the pulsing red of Summer, bathing her upturned face and the landscape for miles around in a carnelian glow.
As ever, she watched until the pillars of quiet fire dwindled and diminished to the more usual glimmering glow around the great crystals that topped the Watchtowers. Only the spire of light from Kalea's tower – in a place called Mirror Valley, or so she'd heard - was visible from Lhavit, the gem and tower itself being hidden from view by the mountains of the Misty Peaks and the thick forests which colonized the valleys.
Even had the Watchtowers (unthinkably) failed, Alses would have known the very next dawn of the seasonal change. The gods had more profound methods of measuring the steady progression of Spring to Summer, Autumn to Winter, than those available to mere mortals, and so the shifting of her celestial form would doubtless occur with the same clockwork regularity, no matter what happened.
This morning, as Alses contemplated her unselfconsciously-naked form in front of her tiny mirror, was a good one. Summer was one of her favourite seasons, vying with Autumn for the personal beauty she saw in herself.
The pale Spring colour of her hair had quietly given way to the richer, deeper, golden tones of Summer, and all sense of green and purple had been purged from her crown-of-horns, the summer light now dancing between peach and gold and white. All in all, a beautiful sight, a Synaborn Ethaefal in the very flower of perfection. A smile curved her lips at the thought of flowers.
'The season of roses,' she thought happily, thoughts already turning to the rosebuds nodding in every garden – including the Respite's – and to the blooms that would soon silently burst into extravagant life, spilling their sweet perfume into the streets for all to revel in.
However, even given the sharp signal from the Watchtowers, nature herself kept to a more gradual schedule than the civilised races of Mizahar; it would be more than just a handful of days and the red flare to convince the rosebuds to unfurl their delicate petals, alas – and the weather just didn't seem to be cooperating either, at the moment – the day was gray and unsettled, overcast and definitely threatening rain within the next bell or two.
Joy upon joy – especially as today was supposed to be a field trip. Well, not much of a field trip, in truth, just to the Temple of the Sun, but still...
It would probably involve getting soggy, and a bedraggled Alses was never very imposing or inspiring. Rain, the great leveller. And many other things besides, admittedly – it meant she didn't have to water the gardens, for one, a task that, whilst pleasant, was herculean for one person all on their own.
With a sigh, she dragged a brush through the golden strands of her hair, polished her crown-of-horns to a liquid shine and descended from her ivory tower – well, all right, room at the Towers Respite – to head out for the pearly stronghold of House Dusk, and her classroom there.
A
Her corner-tower classroom hadn't changed much – it never did – but the smell, at least, was different. Pleasingly so, at least to her, a potpourri of attar of roses – her favoured scent, although she was down to the dregs of perfume now – and jasmine oil, her preferred backup, or for when she fancied a change. There was no jasmine in the Respite gardens, which made obtaining its oil rather more difficult – or, more precisely, more expensive – than she liked, but Tian had been very accommodating, and she could count on a bottle of jasmine oil at a reasonable price from the Starry Chalice, always providing she gave them sufficient notice.
It was nice to have useful friends.
Speaking of which...she mounted the spiralling curve of marble stairs that led up to Mr. Secretary's office, intent on a nice bit of conversation before her first class began – she still stopped by regularly, for a chat and to add a bit of interest to the dapper fellow's day. It would have been unthinkable – and worse, rude – to have dropped his acquaintanceship after her promotion.
Besides, as she'd learned when only a lowly courier, Mr. Secretary was the lynchpin on which much of the Tower turned – and common sense dictated that you offended such people at your peril.
She raised a hand, more out of habit than anything, to knock, and then hesitated. Perhaps it'd be best to see if he was busy – by which Alses meant 'had anyone else with him' – before barging in. There was always the staffroom to relax in, after all, a hidden chamber down a passageway she'd been completely unaware of and accessible thanks to her new keys. Even if that did carry with it the possibility of meeting madam instructor on equal – or near-equal – terms.
Skyglass swelled in a sorcerous symphony all around her, a mantling flare of purple and blue and a diffuse sensation of white and gold, self-satisfied divinity and impeturbability, but that was easy enough to be rid of, a moment's concentrated thought to filter it from her Sight with a fine skein of djed, a gossamer-web across the bright flare of djed conduits inside her body. Skyglass manifested exclusively in the visual sphere, at least for her, so she could safely ignore all the other conduits that were the mental manifestation of the integration of the physical with the mental.
Like this, freshly-charged with power and mind clear enough for pinpoint control, the door was so much cobwebs and shadows, easily brushed aside.
Alses tasted ink, felt the phantom brush of feathers across her hands – they twitched; one of her little secrets was being ticklish – and felt the banked, slow fires of Mr. Secretary's serene, untroubled aura. To her auristic senses, he was supremely organized, his aura a topiary-work of neat little filing boxes mostly made of rich turquoise light, always in slight motion, though steady and predictable, with the light-forged boxes opening and expanding and swallowing other boxes as emotions, desires, thoughts and concerns shimmered and flickered across his consciousness, and his body's demands continually made themselves known.
It was always slightly hypnotic to watch, and she became aware with a jolt that she'd been standing, like a dolt, in front of his office door for some little while. He was alone, which was good, and so she knocked and entered without further ado.
“Good morning, Mr. Secretary! What a glorious summer's day we've been blessed with.” Flat and monotonous, her voice conveyed the sarcasm effortlessly.
He didn't look up from his marble desk, still busily writing, but his voice was clear and sonorous as ever. “A fine morning to you too, Alses. Looking forward to your classes?”
The glorious first of Summer! As was her wont and her tradition, Alses had stayed up the night before to see the Watchtowers flare, ringing in the changes of the season on pillars of burning, actnic light, silent and wonderful. Fresh, leafy green, the burgeoning life of Spring, gave way to the pulsing red of Summer, bathing her upturned face and the landscape for miles around in a carnelian glow.
As ever, she watched until the pillars of quiet fire dwindled and diminished to the more usual glimmering glow around the great crystals that topped the Watchtowers. Only the spire of light from Kalea's tower – in a place called Mirror Valley, or so she'd heard - was visible from Lhavit, the gem and tower itself being hidden from view by the mountains of the Misty Peaks and the thick forests which colonized the valleys.
Even had the Watchtowers (unthinkably) failed, Alses would have known the very next dawn of the seasonal change. The gods had more profound methods of measuring the steady progression of Spring to Summer, Autumn to Winter, than those available to mere mortals, and so the shifting of her celestial form would doubtless occur with the same clockwork regularity, no matter what happened.
This morning, as Alses contemplated her unselfconsciously-naked form in front of her tiny mirror, was a good one. Summer was one of her favourite seasons, vying with Autumn for the personal beauty she saw in herself.
The pale Spring colour of her hair had quietly given way to the richer, deeper, golden tones of Summer, and all sense of green and purple had been purged from her crown-of-horns, the summer light now dancing between peach and gold and white. All in all, a beautiful sight, a Synaborn Ethaefal in the very flower of perfection. A smile curved her lips at the thought of flowers.
'The season of roses,' she thought happily, thoughts already turning to the rosebuds nodding in every garden – including the Respite's – and to the blooms that would soon silently burst into extravagant life, spilling their sweet perfume into the streets for all to revel in.
However, even given the sharp signal from the Watchtowers, nature herself kept to a more gradual schedule than the civilised races of Mizahar; it would be more than just a handful of days and the red flare to convince the rosebuds to unfurl their delicate petals, alas – and the weather just didn't seem to be cooperating either, at the moment – the day was gray and unsettled, overcast and definitely threatening rain within the next bell or two.
Joy upon joy – especially as today was supposed to be a field trip. Well, not much of a field trip, in truth, just to the Temple of the Sun, but still...
It would probably involve getting soggy, and a bedraggled Alses was never very imposing or inspiring. Rain, the great leveller. And many other things besides, admittedly – it meant she didn't have to water the gardens, for one, a task that, whilst pleasant, was herculean for one person all on their own.
With a sigh, she dragged a brush through the golden strands of her hair, polished her crown-of-horns to a liquid shine and descended from her ivory tower – well, all right, room at the Towers Respite – to head out for the pearly stronghold of House Dusk, and her classroom there.
A
Her corner-tower classroom hadn't changed much – it never did – but the smell, at least, was different. Pleasingly so, at least to her, a potpourri of attar of roses – her favoured scent, although she was down to the dregs of perfume now – and jasmine oil, her preferred backup, or for when she fancied a change. There was no jasmine in the Respite gardens, which made obtaining its oil rather more difficult – or, more precisely, more expensive – than she liked, but Tian had been very accommodating, and she could count on a bottle of jasmine oil at a reasonable price from the Starry Chalice, always providing she gave them sufficient notice.
It was nice to have useful friends.
Speaking of which...she mounted the spiralling curve of marble stairs that led up to Mr. Secretary's office, intent on a nice bit of conversation before her first class began – she still stopped by regularly, for a chat and to add a bit of interest to the dapper fellow's day. It would have been unthinkable – and worse, rude – to have dropped his acquaintanceship after her promotion.
Besides, as she'd learned when only a lowly courier, Mr. Secretary was the lynchpin on which much of the Tower turned – and common sense dictated that you offended such people at your peril.
She raised a hand, more out of habit than anything, to knock, and then hesitated. Perhaps it'd be best to see if he was busy – by which Alses meant 'had anyone else with him' – before barging in. There was always the staffroom to relax in, after all, a hidden chamber down a passageway she'd been completely unaware of and accessible thanks to her new keys. Even if that did carry with it the possibility of meeting madam instructor on equal – or near-equal – terms.
Skyglass swelled in a sorcerous symphony all around her, a mantling flare of purple and blue and a diffuse sensation of white and gold, self-satisfied divinity and impeturbability, but that was easy enough to be rid of, a moment's concentrated thought to filter it from her Sight with a fine skein of djed, a gossamer-web across the bright flare of djed conduits inside her body. Skyglass manifested exclusively in the visual sphere, at least for her, so she could safely ignore all the other conduits that were the mental manifestation of the integration of the physical with the mental.
Like this, freshly-charged with power and mind clear enough for pinpoint control, the door was so much cobwebs and shadows, easily brushed aside.
Alses tasted ink, felt the phantom brush of feathers across her hands – they twitched; one of her little secrets was being ticklish – and felt the banked, slow fires of Mr. Secretary's serene, untroubled aura. To her auristic senses, he was supremely organized, his aura a topiary-work of neat little filing boxes mostly made of rich turquoise light, always in slight motion, though steady and predictable, with the light-forged boxes opening and expanding and swallowing other boxes as emotions, desires, thoughts and concerns shimmered and flickered across his consciousness, and his body's demands continually made themselves known.
It was always slightly hypnotic to watch, and she became aware with a jolt that she'd been standing, like a dolt, in front of his office door for some little while. He was alone, which was good, and so she knocked and entered without further ado.
“Good morning, Mr. Secretary! What a glorious summer's day we've been blessed with.” Flat and monotonous, her voice conveyed the sarcasm effortlessly.
He didn't look up from his marble desk, still busily writing, but his voice was clear and sonorous as ever. “A fine morning to you too, Alses. Looking forward to your classes?”
