Tendrils of Flame

[Aidana Hawkins]

(Invite Only Please!) OOC: You know who you are...

Aidana Hawkins stood outside the giant doors of the Dueling Hall. It didn't surprise her that they were locked closed at this time. There were a few hours until sunrise, but she couldn't wait until the next day. She had become restless since her trip to the Library that night. A, quite literally, fire had been awoken inside her, and how it forever burned. She had gone up to Gryffindor Tower without a hitch, but once she was in bed, all Aidana could think about was her new power. She couldn't be held back, and she knew that she had to see what she could do.

Aidana stood here now, before the doors. they were securly locked, keeping away any midnight duelists. That wouldn't stop her though. From her pocket, she quickly took out a hawk feather, and her wand. Carefully she inserted the hawk feather into the keyhole. This trick had worked on all the magically locked doors at home, so it should work now. She jiggled the feather so that it caught on a metal hook inside the lock. Now she would just have to do the spell...

" Alohamora" she whispered, flicking her wand. Aidana heard the happy click of a lock opening, and took the feather out. It was now ruined, so she dropped it on the floor and didn't think of it again. She pushed open the immense doors, and stepped inside. It was pitch black in the gigantic room, and the only light coming in was the moonlight streaming in through the windows.

Let's see if I really have control over these powers... Aidana walked to a torch hanging on the wall. She stowed her wand away, anyone could to an Incendio spell using a wand. She lifted her right hand up, until it was level to the torch.

" Inflarmare" whispered, slightly opening her hand. A few sparks emitted from her fingers, but burned out pretty quickly. Hm, she needed to concentrate more. She closed her eyes and thought of the red orb that she had created.

" Inflarmare!" she said louder. A small fire sprang up in the torch and was burning quite well. Aidana opened her eyes and smiled, pleased with herself. She walked over to the other torches, and did the same thing. A few minutes later, the Hall was illuminated in the flickering light of a fire. She walked into the middle of the Hall, and looked around. So far so good, now she only needed to learn how to fight.

[Sylph]

A tall somewhat tired looking violet haired girl entered the duelling hall for the second time that day. She had just been sent here from the owlery following her first real training session on the path to becoming an elemental mage. It had been draining, but rewarding, and Sylph, according to her tutor, Professor Windwaltz, had shown quite a talent for it. He had also told her that someone was waiting for her here in the duelling hall to practice with her further, but she had been expecting someother teacher rather than the girl she saw here now.

"Alright, Aidana?" she said in her characteristically low and somewhat wry tones, her green eyes flashing almost as electrically as Talon's hair now did. "Did you do that?" she added, gesturing at the glowing torches. "Nice job. Looks like we might be ready in time, after all."

She smiled a rather exhausted smile and took a few more steps into the hall.

"Professor Windwaltz told me to come here, said someone was expecting me. Told me that the two of us should have a practice session. You up for it?" A lazy grin stretched across her face as she said this, a little more energy injected into her features. She wanted to see Aidana's new found skills first hand, but another part of her wanted to show off slightly with her own.

"What d'ya say?"

OOC: ugh, really crappy post, sorry, i've now got a cold and my head's all fuzzy. Not the best timing, eh?

[Aidana Hawkins]

OOC: I'm not feeling so well either actually. Go make yourself some tea! It helped me. Eh, this is a bad post .

Aidana turned to see one of her best friends walk in the door. But she seemed definately exhausted. Just as tired Aidana had felt after her trial in face. She didn't want to sparr with Sylph if she hadn't gotten her energy back. But they didn't have much time until the battle, and they would need as much practice as they could get. Aidana smiled at the girl.

" Thanks," she said gesturing to the torches. "Our first real training session, eh? I'm surprised that Windwaltz didn't come down himself, expecting us to either burn down the school or blow it to pieces. You know, our powers are very compatible. If I make fire, you can use your winds to mold it, make it bigger. We have real potential here."

[Sylph]

Our powers are compatible. Of course, what Professor Windwaltz had said about secondary elements - last night he must have done something with Aidana to make his seondary element lightning. That would certainly explain his somewhat shocking appearence, at least. Alright, so now they had fire, wind and lightning. All fairly similar and yet completely different effects. A wry grin settled on Sylph's features.

"I'll give it a try if you will," she laughed, considerably cheered by the thought that the pair of them might manage to beat Danawi to it by burning the school down themselves. "But there's more to wind than just making it blow, you know. Look what I learned." Sylph rolled up her sleeves and pulled out her wand, holding it aloft whilst facing south. Dredging up the image of Notos once more, she called him forth, shouting his name with all the force she could muster.

"Notos!" With her cry a great dry heated gale erupted from the south end of the hall, swishing towards them with great force. Sylph maintained it, and, still holding her wand high, called out again.

"Mucro flammeus!" At her incantation a massive spinning blade appeared, made as if from the warm wind itself, but glowing white hot. This time Sylph directed it, using her wand to steer it whilst forcing her will upon it. She sent it slicing through one of the rafters of the hall, letting it effortlessly cut through the wood before letting it - and the blustering gale - go. She shot a wobbly smile at her friend, proud of her achievement.

"What d'ya think?"

[Aidana Hawkins]

Aidana laughed at the prospect of winning the war by technicality. If there wasn't a castle, then Danawi wouldn't try to take over would he? Hm, it might work in some vague fashion, and if Danawi and his followers had enough of the students and decided to leave. She watched Sylph, as she took her wand and summoned a wind. Aidana didn't know what to expect, so she was almost blown away by the gale Sylph had created. She threw up her arm to protect her face, as her skirt whipped around her legs.

She heard her friend yell another incantation, and looked upwards. She saw a white hot blade appear overhead. It spun and cut cleanly through a rafter. Aidana smiled, proud of Sylph and how far she had gotten in training. As suddenly as the wind had started, it stopped and Aidana brushed her hair out of her face.

" Nice nice! Now, if you could only gear that towards a certain Dark Lord, we would be assured a victory,"she said smiling. She reached into her own robes and took out her ebony wand. She hadn't used it on the torches, but this was far more advanced magic. If she could do this right, then she had learned something. She whipped around and pointed the wand at her friend.

"Ignus Catena!" she yelled, and a jet of fire issued from her wand. It hurtled towards Sylph,and wrapped uncomfertable close around her. The fire created chains around the girl, and restriced her movement. Aidana didn't know how close Sylph was getting to being burnt, so she quickly let it go.

"Restinguo!" she countered, her wand still pointing at her friend. Quickly the chain of fire melted away, as if it had been magically put out. She lowered her wand, breathing heavily. elemental magic took a lot out of you.

" So, what do you think?"

[Sylph]

OOC: sorry this took so long - a crane fly flew in the room while I was writing this... see 'pathetic fears' in the muggle world.

IC: Sylph smiled somewhat ruefully at Aidana's comment. She thought it unlikely that Danawi could be defeated so easily. Ok, so Sylph had a hidden talent up her sleeve, but Danawi was supposed to be much more powerful than her. Still, when the time came, Sylph would certainly give it her best shot. She'd have to learn more advanced spells than that one though. Thinking vaguely about what else she'd read in the book that Talon had given her, she allowed Aidana to demonstrate this time.

Sooner than she could say 'antidisestablishmentarianism', Aidana had wrapped Sylph head to foot is firey chains. At first, Sylph felt nothing, but by the time Aidana had removed them Sylph had an uncomfortable tingling sensation, and as she looked down at where the bindings had been touching her skin, there were faint brownish marks, like a burn half-way to healing.

"Ouch," she grinned, though the pain was mild at most. "That'll come in handy in the battle for subdueing people. Just bear in mind not to use it near the fire demon Isaac, huh? You never know what he could do with it." Rubbing her burns absent mindedly, Sylph picked up the beaten black book that contained all the information on the winds, flicking through the pages.

"Any idea what else we could use?" she asked without looking up. "Anything that Danawi could be hurt by?"

[Aidana Hawkins]

Aidana winced as she saw the light burn marks on Sylph's arms. She hadn't meant to do that at all. Well, at least it had taught her something, she would have to get greater control of her powers. The spell she had done had been a bit advanced for her yes, but she had done it without burning the whole school down! She might be able to use it in battle where she wouldn't have to worry about hurting others with the flame.

"Sorry about that," she said smiling apologetically. "I could use it to subdue people in battle, but I'm not sure how long I could hold a spell like that.I'm still getting used to these new powers." She flinched when Sylph mentioned Isaac. He was powerful indeed, just coming up and almost destroying half the Astronomy Tower.

" Hm, Isaac would use that to his advantage wouldn't he? It would make him stronger, he would probably find a way to make him stronger. We need to find a weakness in him, something we can do to beat him. If he falls, then I doubt there is someone like him to take the place of Danawi's right hand," she said thinking. Danawi was the Evil Lord yes, but it was Isaac who did most of the damage. Aidana looked over at Sylph, who was flipping through her book.

" How about something that restricts air? A spell that makes the winds stop blowing?"

[Sylph]

Sylph still didn't look up from thumbing through the pages of her book, flicking idly waiting for something to jump out at her.

"A simple smothering charm would do that," she said emotionlessly, her eyes never leaving the page in front of her. "Of course, you have to be close to do that, and it doesn't cover a very large area. You couldn't stop the winds from blowing, but it would smother out flames." She paused, finally raising her gaze to Aidana's once more.

"Isaac's a fire demon," she stated, a slight frown on her features. "That means he is likely to detest water, right? All you gotta do is dump him in the middle of the ocean and you're fine." She smiled weakly. "Ok, maybe not, but water would help, as would ice, even. But you'd need a lot of it. How did Professor Windwaltz fight him? The two of them had a bit of a scuffle, didn't they? After the whole lava thing." Sylph jiggled her fingers at this last bit, trying to simultaneously emphasise and explain the 'lava thing'. She had heard about Isaac and his attempt to burn down the school, albeit a half-hearted attempt - but didn't know how he had been stopped. An explanation would be useful, unless of course, he had just given up.

Well even that's fine, Sylph thought wryly to herself. If that's the case, we just need to bore him to tears...

[Aidana Hawkins]

Aidana laughed as she saw the mental picture of the demon Isaac drowning in the middle of a Lake. It wasn't the best idea that they had, but it was the only one. She felt that the key into defeating Danawi was defeating Issac. He should be their main target, it was Issac who was holding the web of followers together. But drowning him in the Lake wouldn't be their best bet, and he might be expecting something reckless like that.

"Yes, he and the professor did fight in the Tower. Just be glad you weren't there," she said, smiling wryly. Aidana still had the large bump at the back of her head to show for being there.

" The professor fought him with wind, but it didn't get much farther than that. Maybe if Issac fought a skilled water mage? Then he wouldn't be able to use the other peron's power to his advantage. But speaking of the lava, what happened to all that anyway?"

[Sylph]

Sylph smiled faintly and shrugged. The mysteries of MH were a little beyond her, but she gave the most likely explanation she could think of.

"The teachers must have got rid of it," she reasoned. "That or the faeries felt it ruined their view and transformed it into grass and trees again." Sylph shrugged again. How she wished she could just get on with it. This whole waiting lark had her irked. She was fed up with being on edge all the time, spending ages planning and plotting and researching... all she wanted to do now was fight.

"Do we have a water mage at this school?" she asked blandly, feeling that it might not help even if they did. Suddenly she gave a short laugh and shook her head slightly.

"We could get the giant squid on our side," she giggled, rather uncharacteristically. "He could just grab Isaac and hold him down in the lake for the whole battle... wouldn't even need to drown him, just keep him out of our way." Sylph's shoulders shook silently at the mental image of such a thing, but it soon faded, her expression turning more serious.

"Has anyone contacted the valkeries yet?"