"Humans are weak. They are brash, rebellious and forgetful!" The elderly man with a balding head halfway full of thin greying hair and white pasty skin stretched upon a narrow but yet angular face stated.
With his prominent chin and dark hostile eyes framed upon a wide round forehead, the man glowered even as he pranced around his office quarters in his gold but mostly purple robes in a manner that resembled that of a peacock that was high on heat.
The garment of his robes was heavy and the fabric shiny even without the golden embroidery that marked the mandarin collar, floor length hems and the edge of the kimono sleeves, the purple fabric being so glossy that it reflected the very light that had been refracted a million times over by the glowing crystals that were quite abundant not just in this room but in the whole Sanctuary as well. For that was the nature of the Triban robes, reflecting not just one's fortitude but his glory and his virtue as well.
Purple spoke of royalty. The raiment of kings and the council of elders and where it should have made him seem illustrious, the colour had had a totally different effect despite the heat of the crimson hues imbued within. For the colour made him look like a wraith, what with his gaunt form and his dark eyes that seemed to suck out the life out of every thing. The multitude of the crow's feet clawing upon his eyes and pulling at his thinned lips did not help either. For that together with the deep furrows that now marked his round forehead into a permanent scowl were also a product of his fervent glaring rather than his age that was also apparent.
"But my lord, aren't we also human?" the words tumbled out of his young apprentice's mouth before she could even stop them.
Her mentor stopped pacing and swiveled around, turning those dark eyes to glare at her for the perceived insult that issued out the young girl's mouth.
"Apologies master." The girl quickly rectified but it was already too late. The damaged had been incurred and the man was now out for blood even as he stalked her, gliding around her as though his feet padded on air and not the crystalline floors that were glittering beneath them unaware of the carnage that was about to befall her.
"Don't you ever compare us to that scum Havillah!" The elder roared, his mouth frothing with anger even as his dark eyes continued to shoot icicles at her, raging as he waged a war with his words as if to dissuade himself if not her of the truth he was now speaking. "We are the Great!" the elder orated. "The chosen bloodline, the servants of the Great and Eternal Light and you must never tarnish our names by comparing us or even associating it with that of that filth!" the man seethed.
"Yes...ma... ma master." The young girl could only manage to stutter even as she bowed her head down low under the weight of the elder's terrifying gaze, enshrouding her brown eyes and the tears that had now stained her light caramel skin behind a thick curtain of long black hair.
Silence reigned between them even as the elder continued to regard his apprentice with a dark look in his eyes. The girl, barely eleven trembled. Her body shaking with a fear that rattled the very bones that remained hidden beneath the brown and gold Triban cowl that were so characteristic of her cohort, even as her head continued to remain bowed low, too afraid to raise it or to say anything that would farther serve to agitate idiosyncrasies of the ill tempered elder.
As it was, this was a regular occurrence and once again, her impetuous behaviour and thoughtless speaking had once again landed her in a heap of trouble. Hadn't her mother already warned her so? Against her rash behaviour? Yet she had always managed to say something that served to infuriate the good elder, an Elder of the Great, the Appriser and the Keeper of the sacred tomes of Tiberias.
"Now, where was I?" the elder finally said and Havillah looked up to face him in surprise. The elder, noticing her strange staring smirked even as he shot her a wide smile that was anything but reassuring and being predatory as it was, it chilled the girl's skin all the way to her bones.
"Humans are weak, brash, rebellious–"Havillah gulped, swallowing her fear as she dragged out the words, grateful that she had at least paid attention to some of that.
"Ah, yes." The elder perked up with that same smile curving his lips, cutting the girl short right in the middle of her oration and the girl went silent. To the untrained eye it would seem that the good elder was glad that his mentee had finally gotten his question right, but that was not the case here. For the girl knew very well that this particular smile meant that he was cooking up something, something diabolical in that uncanny mind that was his. "Since you seem to be so quick to forget that which that you are," the elder paused to watch his mentee as she squirmed under his gaze before continuing, "I will help you remember."
The girl whimpered and the elder's smile grew as he was pleased by the effect that he had on her. Slowly, watching her for the terror that was still showing on her face, the master lifted up his hands revealing his skeletal fingers that had been concealed beneath the lengths of his wide kimono sleeves and flicked them with a subtle show of power. The air between them crackled and a Sanctuary scroll appeared remaining suspended in the thin air that stood between them. Havillah gasped and stared at her mentor with wondrous eyes. She had temporarily forgotten her fear in a moment awe, having witnessed a real life summoning. All her life she had heard of summonings, but in her short ten years, she had never actually seen it with her own eyes and thus, in one sweep moment, her mentor ceased to be her tormentor and became the sole recipient of her awe.
"Summoning. It is the art of calling things that are not as if they are. You can use your mouth or your mind and a hand gesture as a conduit of some sort." The elder and her mentor so graciously supplied that she glowed at the thought of the possibility of attempting that same feat. "However, it requires a certain... amount of certitude, which you are yet to master." He smiled as he knowingly bursted her bubble. Her smile dropped and her mentor laughed at the downtrodden expression that had suddenly appeared on her face.
"You know what to do?" he asked his lips still smirking as he brought the same Sanctuary scroll closer to her. The girl stared at the scroll and then back at him. She then shook her head no as he was yet to explain his intentions to her "Of course you do not." he muttered rather darkly the sudden change to his emotions being so fast and too often that even Havillah could not process. "You are as incompetent as they get!" the mentor sneered as he hoped to get another rise from her. When the girl did not respond as he expected, the elder went on and began to elaborate. "This is a scroll." He started with a leer that was meant to mock her. "And you..." he trailed off just as a Sanctuary assistant burst into his chambers shouting out his name.