"Three gold vilnes?" Dagher, Seif's father, yelled, "Do you have any idea how hard it will be for us to get any of that money back?" His father was an imposing man. Long years of raising and slaughtering cattle had given him a stocky figure with large muscles. He wore his straight black hair cropped just below his ears and pulled back, tied with a leather thong. Now his face was red under it's deep bronze color, his black eyes wide in his rage. Seif sat with his head down at the dining table as his father continued berating him.
"That's more money that you should ever have taken! You are hardly of any use here, to be taking that kind of money! You work a maids job, you should make a maid's pittance!" Seif flinched as he shouted it, thankful his sister was required to work at the castle during midday. His fathers words were like dull rocks that were thrown at Seif's fragile mind. He felt like an already formed pot, and his fathers words were stones causing him to crack and break. He was about to fall apart.
Slowly in his mind, the feeling of the fire clay came to him. Stubborn, hard, almost immovable and unwilling to bend. It was meant to take a beating, and to withstand even the hottest fires. Seif imagined what it would be like to be a fire clay. His fathers shouting seemed to disappear as he imagined what it would be like to be tough, strong, and resilient. As if someone else wore his skin, Seif looked up into his fathers face. His eyes were stern, and his mouth was set. His father stopped shouting and was taken back by the change in his son.
"You have two sows and a cow who are pregnant. I would think that, for someone with so much business sense, you would see that you could sell a few of the piglets and the calf this late in the year for enough to get your precious gold vilnes back and some extra. Now if you're done wasting our time, I have to finish packing." Seif stood, and walked from the table. Dagher's mouth hung open as he walked by, shocked by this sudden outburst in his son. He wasn't sure what to say or do. Never in all their lives had his children spoken out against their parents like this. They had been raised to respect their parents with lashings and lectures, as was traditional.
Seif made his way to his room, his head held high as if he himself were immune to the world around him. When he closed his door, he collapsed onto it, his knees trembling so hard they fell out from underneath him. He slid to the floor and tried to catch his breathe as tears welled up in his eyes. Whatever feeling had taken over him, it was gone now and left the small, trembling boy in it's wake. His lips quivered as he did his best to keep his tears silent. He began to heave as he struggled to breathe, he was crying so hard. As the town's clock chimed the half hour, Seif was finally able to compose himself enough that he could stand. He walked to the dresser and washed his face in the now warm basin water.
As he finished drying his face, he heard a knock at the front door that was assuredly Faïence coming to collect her charge and his things. He heard his fathers unmistakably gruff voice shouting for him. Seif grabbed his trunk by the side handle and dragged it out of his room and to the front door. To his surprise he found Tuma instead of the Dedicate he had been expecting. Tuma smiled, and Dagher scoffed, at the sight of the boy. As Dagher returned to his shop, Tuma came over and helped Seif lift the trunk."I hear you're leaving this afternoon. I was speaking with one of the other Dedicates who will be riding with you," Tuma said. He was silent for a while. He walked into the sitting room where he had been with Seif when the boy discovered his power. Seif entered the room and took a seat near his friend. "I was actually quite sad when I started thinking of your departure. I know your family won't admit to it, but they're awfully sad to see you go as well."
Seif scoffed and rolled his eyes. He relayed the fight he and his father had just a half an hour ago. "It doesn't seem like 'sad' is the right word. More like they're thankful their burden is being shifted to someone else." Seif toyed with a loose string on his shirt as he spoke, refusing to make eye contact with Tuma, lest he start crying again. He never considered saying his goodbye to Tuma would be so difficult.
"Well, they might not show it, but I'm sure they are upset. I know I am. My best almost-apprentice is leaving for Burning Circle!" Tuma sighed and smiled. Just as he opened his mouth to speak, there was another sharp rap on the door. Seif hurried to answer it, and was happy to find Faïence standing there, another Dedicate with her, and a horse and wagon further behind them. When Tuma appeared, Faïence smiled at him.
"I had thought I'd find you here, you sly old man. Help Bonemender with the trunk," She stated more than asked. "I trust you've packed all you'll need?" She addressed Seif with this question. He nodded vigorously, practically trying to force everyone at the door, anxious to begin his journey. Just as he was about to close the door, he stopped at looked to Faïence.
"I almost forgot!" He said, startled, and ran back into his house. In the kitchen he had gathered his back of treats for their long journey and found his mother. She had tears in her eyes, and was drying her eyes with her apron. Seif paused, then rushed in and hugged her as tightly as his arms could. "I'll miss you," Seif said around his own surge of emotion. She hugged him back, tighter then she might have ever held him before, and sniffled.
"I love you, my little mage," She whispered in his ear, and gave him a light spanking on the bottom as she shooed him, and his bag of treats, out of the room. Seif wiped his eyes on his hands as he raced out the door to meet the wagon. He was surprised to find Tuma sitting inside with his trunk, the crocks of clay, and what looked like a potters wheel and other personal belongings. He opened his mouth, too confused for words.
Tuma smiled sweetly, "You are right, Faï, I think he might be daft. Perhaps we should rethink this venture of ours." Seif climbed into the wagon, still clearly unable to comprehend the scene around him. "You dumb boy, I'm coming with you. You didn't honestly think Faïence would be able to teach you, did you? Her magic is hardly able to understand all the complexities of pottery and clay."
"Tuma, you old devil, I demand you take that back this instant! I think if it came down to knowledge, you'd find that clay would be more reasonable with me than you," She said in a voice that mocked anger and exasperation. The man Faïence had called Bonemender did his best to hide a chuckle behind the sleeve of his habit, which was a dazzling white with bright blue trim around the hood, arm openings, and base. He cleared his throat and grabbed the reins of the horse, urging it on.
"I thought Faïence was a clay mage, like me. I just assumed she would teach me," Seif talked mostly to himself as he tried to order his mind around everything that had happened. "So, you're coming with us Tuma? You'll be my teacher?" His face expressing his hope and joy at the possibility of having a familiar face in such a strange and new place. His mind finally catching up, he looked to Faïence, "Then what is your magic?"
Tuma and Faïence shared a look, before he spoke up. "Yes, child. I will come with you to Burning Circle to be your teacher. How Honored Ansez will handle my return is questionable," He winked to Faïence, who smiled widely, "But I will return nonetheless. As for our dear Faï," he started.
"I am a cook mage, especially talented with baked goods and pastries. I could never quite get a passion for cooking meats and stews. Unfortunately, that means I'm about as useful a teacup in a flood when it comes to doing much beyond teaching." Faïence's smile seemed to waver as she spoke, as though she was upset she reminded herself. "I apologize if I misrepresented myself, but Tuma had asked me to test you for magic, since he seems to be terribly, irrevocably out of practice."
"My dear, I'm about as out of practice with identifying a mage as you are at changing the wind. I asked you because you live in that great big temple surrounded by tiny, unpracticed magics. If anyone would know what to look for it would have been you," Tuma chided as he poked Faïence in the shoulder. For a while the small group was quite as the wagon bumped and creaked as it made it's way out of town and down the long road that would lead to Burning Circle temple, and Seif's knew home.
Seif watched longingly as his town shrunk in his view, eventually vanishing behind a large hill. The area around his city had not been the best. The few patches of farmable ground had been claimed for the castle, and what little grazing space could be spared was long owned by Seif's family for cattle. The rest of the space was hot, dry sand. Firmer in some places, and loose and shifting in others, Seif had been used to it. As they passed other travelers, Seif noticed a small caravan of a middle-aged woman and young man passing by. Faïence and Bonemender waved.
Seif noticed the woman's green habit, and asked Tuma about it. "From another temple," He said simply. "Now, be a good boy and pass me that bag of treats I saw you caring. I'm starved!" Tuma said as he patted a round stomach. It reminded Seif of the bellies on some of their pigs. He handed the bag over to the man, who pulled out a piece of dried and peppered meat. "Hm, I'll wager your mother padded this goody bag of yours. Delicious!" He said as he bit into it.
As Seif took the bag back, he looked in and saw several other pieces of dried meat. It was some of the most expensive his family sold. Smiling broadly he offered the pieces to the others in the wagon, each of them gladly accepting it. Seif selected a pastry for himself. It had a crisp brown crust, and was folded over itself in a triangular shape. Inside it had been stuffed with preserved lime and apricot fruits. It was one of his favorite treats of all times. Around bites, he found the chance to speak up, "So if Tuma is a clay mage, and Faïence is a cook mage, what is your magic Bonemender? And how do you all know each other?"
"I'm a healer," Bonemender said matter-of-factly, slowly chewing on his food. "I know Faïence because she and I share a cottage inside of the temple. Tuma I had the pleasure of meeting on this wonderful trip." His voice was dry as he spoke the last two words. It was clear he was not fond of the man, and it seemed he didn't much care for the man's new charge.
"Don't mind him," Faïence spoke up. Her gravelly voice seemed to wash the man away in a rockslide as she began to relay the tale of how she and Tuma had met. "Let me see, it was many, many years ago. Many more for Tuma," she said with dramatic emphasis, "As he is clearly much older and worn than I."
"Oh yes Faïence, you're absolutely spritely," Tuma said dryly, rolling his eyes and plucking a grey hair from her head. "Here, I got this for you. I don't want you to betray your own age." He smiled and winked at Seif who coughed on his pastry at the antics. This was a side of Tuma he had never seen. The man was boy-like in his interactions with Faïence, and she was alike in return. Rubbing the spot on her head where he pulled out her hair, she turned around to glare at Tuma, and continue her story.
"We had both been brought to Burning Circle in the same year. At this time it was under a different Dedicate Superior. He and I were taking a basic protections class. If I recall, it was because neither of us had a proper teacher at the time." She tapped her lips with a slender finger, as if trying to sort out the images of her past in her mind. "Yes, I think that's it exactly. The cook at the time had little to no time for someone without an ability at meats and stews. Useful foods, he called it. And Tuma was too much trouble for any of the potter mages."
"Most of those clay ball fights weren't my fault!" The grown man stated, almost whined. "I had a very energetic magic. It got away from me. A lot. Needless to say, I had been given to the temple until a proper teacher could be found to corral me. Faï and I were in a basic protections class, learning 'practical applications' for our magics when we had been paired together."
"And this genius decides he's bored, and shapes the Dedicate Instructors protective circle into a bowl, and upended it on the poor woman. I couldn't stop laughing," Faïence took back over telling the story, "And so naturally she decided I was a cohort in his evil deed. We've been great friends ever since."
"I wouldn't say great. She didn't talk to me for months after that. I brought her around eventually," Tuma smiled at her.
"You badgered relentlessly." She quipped as she settled into a fit of giggles at the memories. Seif sat in the cart, his arms folded on a few crates. He rested his head on them, day dreaming of what Burning Circle would hold for him and the great many things he could one day make. Soon, day dreaming became real dreaming as his eyes grew heavy and shut out the noontime sun and world around him. Again, he fell asleep with a large smile on his face.