Wish upon a reason
Fire
Karst
"Wrong! Wrong again! Useless girl! Why can't you get it right? Some sister I have!" Angrily, Menardi smacked Karst on the behind with the flat of her blade. A twelve year old Karst lowered her eyes and took the criticisms her sister was now throwing at her silently.
"I'm sorry Menardi. I will practice until my body moves no more." She replied formally after Menardi had finished.
"No. Wrong. You will practice forever, until life ceases its course through you, Karst. For if you are to be an adept, your mind will be your power when your body cannot." Menardi stated and then sighed. "I will see if there are any more talented adepts for training. Do not come to me until you have refined Serpent Fume." She walked away, shaking her mane of short red – yellow hair. ((A/N: I assumed that that's the colour of her hair, and I'm going to assume that her hair was short in the past, for a better portrayal of time passage. So, what I'm trying to say is, the whole thing is intentional.))
Karst sighed and threw her own sword down in the snow. "I'm no prodigy. Somebody must've made a mistake. I can't possibly be Menardi's sister."
She stood up again and examined the print made by her sword, it now being in her hand. 'My sword is a part of me and my body.' "Serpent fume!"
A roar of fire burst from Karst's hand onto the knee – deep snow, and the print flared a molten red before engulfing in steam. As it cleared, Karst hung her head in disappointment as she realized only the centre had melted clear through – a film of ice coated the other parts still.
Karst cursed and though the sound was swallowed whole by the suffocating snow, she smiled. This time, she drew a circle with the point of her sword and stepped in before raising a hand.
"Flare Wall!" she watched as a blazing veil of fire surrounded her, and then screamed "Serpent Fume!" The tongue of flame licked the sky before diving down and streaming through the extra hot ring of fire.
When it landed, she smiled as the clean snow evaporated. 'Success!' she thought as a vast area was melted to the stone.
'If I can just strengthen the flames … shape them, make them burn hotter, more intensely…' Closing her eyes, Karst thrust out both hands and felt the scream tear from her throat. "Dragon Fume!"
She only knew that she'd succeeded because her short hair blew back from the force and the intense heat surrounding her was almost unbearable. When finally she dared crack an eye open, all she saw was steam.
Opening her eyes, Karst leapt up with a jubilant cry, before abruptly falling silent. 'A warrior does not show any extreme emotion but rage.' she schooled herself, though it was all she could do not to dance in happiness.
"Now. Again. Again, again, again. More, more, more. Focus!" Karst let those words become her rhythm as she set out to start the attack all over.
Far away, unknown to Karst, Menardi descended her vantage point and smiled. "She learns fast. She will become strong, our Karst."
Garet
"Aw sis, come on!"
"Move it back! Move it away, now! Where did you even find this thing?" Kay snapped angrily at her cowering brother. "My poor flowers!"
"But I'm all drained, sis!" Garet complained, wondering how the result of his efforts could come not in the form of a reward but rather in his sister's scolding.
"Fine, then you come with me!" Grabbing him by the wrist, Kay tugged her fourteen – year old brother down sets of stairs in Vale before finally reaching the centre and its psynergy stone, ranting the whole time. "In!" She commanded, and gave him a hard shove that sent him stumbling headlong into the small pond the stone was enshrined in.
"Sis!!!" Garet whined as he poked his head out, hair ever spiky even when dampened by the water sagging down his clothing. He climbed out with a pout on his face and held his hand to the psynergy stone.
He was enjoying the rush of his psynergy returning when his sister's voice cut through shrilly. "Aren't you done yet?"
Garet sighed and jumped back, before following her back up all the stairs, reviewing his situation morosely.
All he had been doing was practicing his psynergy. How was he to know that his sister had planted those particular flowers – they didn't look any different than the normal grass to him!
"Move it back! Now!" Kay commanded Garet, and stood with her hands on her hips, one he secretly called "bossy stance."
"Yes sis…" he muttered, and held his hand out, frowning as he concentrated. "Move!!" He directed the stone pillar in front of him, and waited for the pillar to shift off of his sister's flower bed. Kay tapped her foot impatiently when nothing happened.
Finding no reason to scold him again, she instead decided to look on disapprovingly as her younger brother shouted again and again at the rock, finally punching it in annoyance. As Garet hopped up and down and shook his hand in pain, hissing and cursing, Kay sighed and walked toward their house.
When she opened the door, Kay didn't eve look back, knowing her brother would likely never move the stone. Settling down with a book in her favourite window – side seat, Kay found herself engrossed in the story. When she reached a part about the heroine's younger brother, Kay looked up and out the window. Garet was still there, sweating as he panted hoarsely, "Move!"
Kay shook her head and turned back to the vivid world lying in her hands. Reading the next words in the book, Kay smiled. "He'll never get it, my silly brother." 'Yes indeed…'
Garet growled and leaned against the rock. "Why can't I get it now?" he wondered aloud. "Maybe I should stop… No. No. I said I wouldn't give up. I promised myself after that… I will protect the village next time, rather than get… knocked out. I will protect the village. "He turned and concentrated again. "Move!"
And later, as Kay read about how the heroine's brother became strong and idolized, Kay laughed to herself and wondered how she could have ever thought her life was like that book.