The Hammer Unfalls

1.7 Tea Time

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Glim pranced and teased his father about his victory, and generally made himself insufferable all evening. A poor sport to be sure, but he couldn’t help it. Elation soared inside him at the realization he’d made. He might be tiny, but he could still cause his father to fall. The captain of the guard. Thwarted by an eight-and-seven-twelfths year old.

His father didn’t seem to mind. He seemed to understand that it was about gaining a skill, and that had been the entire purpose of the stepping drill.

That night he tucked Glim in and kissed his forehead. “I’m proud of you.”

Glim wriggled into his bedroll with a satisfied smile and fell right to sleep. He dreamed of everbrown trees swaying in the wind and toppling down with what should be ground-shattering crashes. Instead, they fell like stems of wheat.

In the morning, Glim whistled to himself as he dressed and walked to breakfast. Not idly, as it might seem to others. No, he whistled his new battle cry.

Balance this. Balance that.

You outweigh me cause you’re fat.

Balance down. Balance up.

All these steps make me throw up.

On the way to his lesson, Glim thought about new ways to surprise his father the next time they did the stepping drill. He rang the doorbell to the tower. Master Willow met him, looking down, evaluating him with a critical eye.

“What’s got you so ebullient this morning?”

“I knocked father off his balance.”

“How droll. But it’s fortunate you’re in such a good mood. We have a special lesson today, Glim,” he said, in a tone that made Glim wary.

The mage led him upstairs to a new chamber, where he saw a table with a bunch of instruments laid out. Bags, balls, and a handful of darts. A dummy stood at the center of the room, covered in gray cloth and filled with straw, much like the one he used in training with his sword with his father. But more like a person, with a definite head and arms.

Master Willow handed Glim a handful of darts.

“I’d like you to throw these darts at this target,” he said. “Can you?”

“Of course!” Glim knew darts. The one sharp weapon he’d been allowed to use freely by the guards. Glim considered himself a dart expert. He took the darts and threw one into the dummy.

“Very good,” the mage said. “Try it a few more times. Really get some practice.”

He threw several darts, and each of them hit the dummy. It presented a large target, and wasn’t difficult to hit with the darts. No challenge at all. There had to be a catch.

“Go collect them,” Master Willow said, in a casual tone that made Glim wary. “Try again.”

Glim pulled the darts out of the dummy and walked back to where he started. This time, right before he threw, Master Willow rang a bell loudly behind his head. He threw the dart, and it missed the target.

“What was that bell for?” Glim whined.

“I’m testing your focus,” Master Willow said. “If a mere bell startles you this much, what is a spell going to do to you? Try it again.”

Glim prepared to throw another dart, and his tutor rang the bell again. He expected it this time, and threw a little straighter at the target.

“Very good. Now I am going to stand over here. I’d like you to throw another dart.”

He prepared to throw. Master Willow lifted his hand, in which he held a small orb. As Glim threw his dart, a brilliant light shone forth, blinding Glim.

He threw the dart, and it hit Master Willow’s robe. The mage looked down in irritation. “The target, Glim. Not me,” he said, plucking the dart out of his robe.

“Sorry, Master Willow.”

“Try again.”

He kept throwing darts at the dummy, and Master Willow made all sorts of clangs, loud sounds, and flashes of light to distract him every time he tried to throw a dart. Finally, he learned to anticipate the distractions, and hit the target each time.

“I must say, I’m impressed with your concentration,” his tutor said. “Let’s see what you do with this.”

Master Willow went over to the tower wall. He wheeled a sleek brass pillar towards Glim, with handles on either side. A series of wavy lines perforated its surface.

“This device taps into aeolia. It is a crude substitute for an Æolist, I’m afraid. It won’t give you quite the same experience. But we’ll have to make do.”

Master Willow turned a dial on the back of the pillar. A stiff wind whistled throughout the chamber and started flapping the fabric of Glim’s tunic. Suddenly the sparseness of the chamber made sense. He could hardly hear the mage’s words over the swirling wind generated by the device. Surely another creation of the Elderkin.

“Throw the darts, Glim.”

He aimed and prepared to throw. Master Willow tossed a handful of sawdust into the path of the wind, which pelted his face with little stings.

“Throw the darts, Glim,” he said, tossing more sawdust into his face.

Glim could hardly see the target, as the sawdust kicked up and blinded him.

“You must learn to contend with the wind. An Æolist can do this to you without even thinking. You need to be able to overcome minor winds such as this. Now concentrate, and throw!”

“I can’t, Master Willow! It hurts.”

“Of course it hurts, you clod! It’s not supposed to be easy. You’d already be dead right now if this were real. Throw the darts.”

Glim blinked through his tears, lined up to throw the dart, and hit the dummy.

Master Willow turned off the device.

“Very good work, Glim. Have a seat on this bench over here.” He handed him a cool rag, dampened with perfumed water. “Clean up a bit. Let me explain a few things.”

Glim pressed the cool cloth to his face and wiped away the tiny chips of wood as he spoke.

“The darts were to symbolize plying algidon. You cannot cast ice yet. This is a representation of intent, focus, and flinging. Skills you will come to learn later. The sounds, the lights, and the wind were meant to distract you, in much the same way another plyer might.”

He looked Glim over with a critical eye. “You actually did well. But it’s not enough. You must learn to dissociate from distraction. To cleave it away from your focus, until only your intent remains. Sounds, sights, pain… all distractions. They are beneath you.”

“But how do I do that, Master Willow?”

“We need to increase your tolerance for distress. Tolerating distress is an entire discipline in and of itself. Let’s start with some simple exercises. First is quite simple: you simply identify whatever is happening. Tell yourself things like, ‘I am hearing a loud bell.’ Or ‘There is a light shining at me.’ Simply naming the distraction, acknowledging it, helps your mind to process it.”

He paused. Glim assumed he was waiting for a response, and nodded.

“The next trick is to name your fear. ‘I might get sawdust in my eye’ or ‘this noise might give me a headache later.’ By naming your fear, analyzing it, you’ll see it’s not so bad. You need to soothe your own catastrophizing.”

“What if it is that bad?”

“That’s a different situation. Nothing I’ve done here today is a threat to you. Nor will the next test be, as dire as it may seem.”

Glim felt an icy fear trickle through him.

“For now, let us return to the darts. This time, I want you to name the distraction. If that does not work, name your fear. Try to shift your focus beyond the distraction itself. Only allow thoughts into your mind that help you meet your goal. Are you ready?”

Glim scooped the darts in his hand, but he felt rattled. What had Master Willow meant by ‘as dire as it may seem’? What would he do next?”

“Throw the darts, Glim.”

Identify the distraction, he thought. I am worried about what Master Willow is planning. He threw a dart, mostly on target.

I am afraid he might hurt me.

Master Willow had been an intolerable know-it-all, but he’d never actually harmed Glim.

A whistling wind wound its way through the chamber.

“Keep throwing,” Master Willow said, flashing a light at his eye, and making loud clangs. Showers of sawdust stung his cheeks as Glim squinted into the wind.

Wind.

He thought of the tiny handhold in the mountain rift when he’d fallen towards the sky. How he didn’t think he could possibly grasp it. Focus, the wind had whispered. You can make it. The tiny nub of stone had become Glim’s whole world. Just as this dummy would become it now.

Glim whipped the remaining darts into the center of the dummy’s chest.

“Excellent work, Glim! You are ready for today’s final lesson in tolerating distress. Let’s go back downstairs.”

Master Willow invited him to the sitting room, with the comfortable furniture he’d sat in when his father had last visited the tower. Glim sat in the chair, nerves jangling.

“Now, let’s get you some tea,” his tutor said.

Before Glim knew it, the mage returned with a teapot and some clay goblets. He handed one over.

“There is one more source of distraction you must learn to ignore, and it is going to come from within yourself. Algists ply ice by draining the surroundings of heat. We become vessels for it. The more ice we cast, the greater the heat’s intensity within us. You must learn to tolerate this heat. Just like the tea I’m about to pour into your cup, the heat you generate when plying algidon is unlikely to harm you. But it is certainly painful. And if not properly managed, that pain will ruin your own attempts to ply.”

He started to pour the tea into Glim’s cup. “Tell me: what is your fear?”

Glim felt the panic rising in his voice. “It’s going to hurt, Master Willow!”

“Yes, it most certainly will. But what do you fear? The pain? Or lasting harm?”

“I… I don’t know.”

“Have you ever been sunburned, walking in the snow on a bright day?”

“Y…yes.”

“This lasts far less time and won’t harm you. Your mind thinks it will. You must overcome your fears. Remove the pain from your mind. It is temporary. Like a sunburn that will pass in moments. Do not let your mind terrorize you. Overcome it.”

He poured the tea. Heat seeped through the clay immediately, searing Glim’s hands.

“Hold tight. Don’t let go.”

His palms crawled with painful, stabbing sensations and he cried out. Master Willow clamped his hands over his, keeping the goblet against his palms.

“You have to hold it. You must become accustomed to the heat. The pain is a distraction you must overcome.”

After a few intense moments, his pain turned into a dull throbbing. He felt able to hold the cup.

Master Willow leaned back. “We’ll do this every day from now on until you grow accustomed to the heat.”