Born in Fire

I wouldn't be surprised if Tanau was a diplomat earlier in her life. She certainly seems to have a knack as smoothing out the tensions, though part of that might be her familiarity with the personalities involved. And yes, you probably were that naive once upon a time Tanau.

I get the distinct impression that Master Siveth is cut from the same cloth as Sensi Ito and the rest of the BMA instructors. While it might be considered cruel, Thulia definitely learned from the trip to Ultima Thule. In addition, it showed her that some of her foibles, such as her interest in basic weapons, are not time frittered away.

I'm also getting the impression that Thulia could be the Henry Ford of the plane of fire, if she so chose. The jump from 'being able to fab whatever at a moment's notice' to 'being able to fab 100 whatevers at a moment's notice' isn't that big of a leap, provided you have the essence to drive those 100 fabers. I'd like to think she'd at least think through the consequences of a smart circle revolution before going to scale, but caution isn't always a word in her vocabulary. At least she has earth's industrial revolution as a poster for what could go wrong.

Minor typo - 'make me my servant', me should be her. Also, 'wouldn't be possible to annul', wouldn't should probably be would.

Thulia's Home, Plane of Fire

Bruce contacting Tanau about Thulia going to tell her parents what she has been up to, plus her plans for her studies, this could be painful to watch. Talk some sense into people, I like the way Bruce and Tanau think.

*eyes turn red with rage* Parents should not treat their children like this, Thulia deserves better.

But this was her family, she didn't want to just run away from them even if they did act like idiots towards her some of the time. She wanted them to understand, to accept her back. The conflict between the two outcomes made her feel like something was tearing her apart.

Seriously wish I could take a giant clue-by-four to Thulia's parents.

Earlier, Thulia's Parents Home, Plane of Fire

Humiz and Mirdaz, trying to get Tanau to leave and not interfere with their family discussion with Thulia.

Tanau just smiled brightly. "Well, then, I'm family, so I'll be happy to help." She gave him a sweet grandmotherly smile that had teeth barely concealed inside it. "Or don't you want an old woman to know what you intend to discuss with Thulia?"

Hehehe, I love how she takes them down so handily. Browbeat Thulia, that would have resulted in Thulia storming out and never talking to her parents again at this point.

"You're going to tell Thulia off, yell at her, tell her what a fool she's been and demand she comes back home and does as she's told, aren't you."

He opened his mouth and then closed it without speaking. Yes, she remembered that look from when he was young, he'd been even more stubborn back then than Thulia was. That was exactly what he'd intended to do.

"It won't work. If you lecture her like that, you'll just drive her away from you. Unlike you, I know what Thulia has been doing - and, in general, I approve. Do you really want your daughter to run away? Because I assure you, she's shown she is capable of looking after herself, push her too hard, and running away is exactly what she will do."

"But she's our daughter! She's young, she needs to do as she's told."

*facepalms* Mirdaz is being a stubborn, overprotective idiot and not listening to what his mother is saying. Only Tanau seems to have noticed Thulia isn't a little girl who needs to come running to her parents for every little thing. Humiz wants what is best for Thulia, yet they never asked Thulia what that is.

Left out the trip to Hell, good idea, right now her parents would use that as an excuse to lock her up at home and throw away the key for her 'own safety'. Told them everything else, even the part about helping out Rob from the way Thulia's parents are reacting. Prideful, pretty sure Thula gets that from you, Mirdaz.

Her calling is to push forward the boundaries, to find and develop new ideas. She can no more stop following that calling than she could cut her own arm off.

Sounds like a gadgeteer/devisor alright. And Tanau has gotten through to Thulia's parents, yay!

Innocent, grandmotherly smile= Red alert, Tanau has been up to something to Thulia. Learning not to act foolishly is part of growing up, you just know Tanau coached him on what to say. No going to Earth until after Samhain, huh, as punishments go that is pretty light.

Thulia, you won with a light punishment, you aren't the age where you are recognized as an adult in your society yet, it takes time to get others to see you as an adult. Stop treating you like a child, when they stop doing so you might wish you hadn't been in such a hurry to grow up. Tanau is one of those people who grew up, but still remembers what it was like being a teenager from how she deals with Thulia.

Academy of Training, Plane of Fire

Master Siveth knows what Thulia has been up to, now I'm as worried about his smile and what it means as Thulia. Is he in trouble, does he know something she doesn't, what?

"I have had some conversations with your parents" - oh damn, she thought - "and after consulting some of the faculty, we have decided that we will - under the proper supervision of course - arrange for you to travel and explore some of the different regions of the Planes. Such knowledge and experience will be of use to you after you leave here, I am sure."

She almost forgot herself enough to perk up, that did sound interesting. Then he smiled broadly and told her exactly where she would be visiting and what she'd be doing there.

I have a very bad feeling about all this. And yes, his smiling is just the right amount of creepy to leave you guessing as to why he is smiling like that.

The next day, Thulia's Home, Plane of Fire

Ultima Thule for survival training, oh crud. Bruce, you just had to make her more upset. A frozen wasteland, they picked the one place they knew would make her miserable.

How to cope without her magic, needs furs to keep warm, eep. Ration packs and she is getting more irritated by the moment, smart move ducking out now, Bruce.

Thulia's Workroom, some weeks later

Back from Ultima Thule and trying to work out a way to contact Morgana without breaking her father's punishment, tough one. Woken by a summoning attempt, and it is Morgana, her father didn't say anything about being contacted by someone on Earth.

An ingenious way for Morgana to summon Thulia, and I wondered what Morgana did when she went outside the wards to summon Thulia. I love loopholes in grounding punishments, her parents can't get angry at Thulia. So that is how Thulia knew where to mail the bowl for Morgana. These two are so cute together.

Lingering on the memories of her kiss with Morgana, so cute. And keeping it from Bruce, for now, Thulia needs more female friends to share stuff with.

Thulia's Workroom, Plane of Fire, 3rd October (Earth Standard Date)

Figuring out a way to get past Whateley Academy's wards without setting off a lot of alarms, very steep task you have set for yourself, Thulia. That is how the bowl was designed, dang, she would have everyone in the magic department, and workshop wanting to see her stuff at this rate.

*watches intensely as Thulia crafts* Her way of doing this, almost seems like a combination of magical tools like a devisor would design, and some of what an Artificer would do when crafting an artifact, at least from my perspective. Those two bowls they use to communicate with each other just became a lot more impressive to me.

Bruce snickered slightly. "Just think of all the gossip you two will have to catch up on."

She turned and gave the grinning imp a mildly-murderous look. "It's not so the two of us can gossip! It's for serious talk about...uh...things!"

Bruce, give Thulia a break, she is in love and missing her girl.

Precision brushwork with an alchemical mixture of molten metal, badass. FedHex, nice one.

Friday 7th October (Earth standard date), Thulia's Home, Plane of Fire

Bruce, teasing an irritated and tired teenage girl about gossiping is as safe as juggling nitroglycerin. And the call went through, yay.

"Yeah, it's pretty useful, I used it a lot when I was getting ready to visit." She decided maybe now wasn't the time to describe some of the sites she'd visited, perhaps later when they were together.

Maybe not all the sites you visited.

Thulia tells about what the staff and her parents plotted, the trip to Ultima Thule. Legends of such a place here on Earth. And we get to learn what happened to her there alongside Morgana, nice.

Arrokoth the imp as Thulia's guide, this isn't a good start. Good grief, this place sounds like the worst of an arctic tundra without any of the good points. It sounds like being in a desert with no signs of life at all, no plants, not even hills to break up the monotony. No wonder it made her sense of time blur. Warm up a rock and keep it warm, yikes.

"Good. Lesson 1, depending on where you are, the availability of a type of essence will vary, and when the world is not attuned - or like this one, opposed to - fire essence, even with a link to the Heart of Fire it can be hard to get. Your options are either to learn how to use other types of essence more effectively or use the fire essence more efficiently. Now, next lesson. This place might look lifeless, but there are some nasty beasts roaming around, and the heat will attract them. So you need to put a ward around us unless you want to wake up half-eaten!"

Oh great, it is just like Earth's arctic tundras. Looks like it is barren of life, but life is about and waiting for the chance to eat you.

Woken by howling in the distance, never a dull moment out here.

She had no idea what they were, but they looked vaguely like a greyish-white ferret. Except they were about fifteen feet long, and she got a distinct feeling they weren't wandering over to welcome them.

Okay, I have no idea what those things are. Closest I got when trying to research them was the Snow Wasset of Canadian mythology.

Thulia wants to find out about guns on Earth, if she introduces them to the Plane of Fire I don't want to imagine the havoc it might play on the power balance there. Nice takedown of the creature by Thulia, Arrokoth having a halberd is great, rarely see such an excellent weapon used. A crazy who enjoys killing things with a halberd, when you don't use ranged weapons one with a good reach is best. Plus in the right hands, those things are brutal.

Hehe, I would have been grinning too. Glad they got to chat and have a schedule to work with now.

Sunday 16th October (Earth Standard Date), Thulia's Home, Plane of Fire

A call on the quantum bowl at an irregular time, this is about the psychofágos issue if I recall the timeline of that. Yup, having to fill in Thulia on all that happened from their perspective. With what happens next it was smart of Thulia to get them to allow a portal to be opened to her workshop and Morgana to be brought there.

Smart circles linked to a computer, now I know some of the more technical minded of the mystic track students would love to have one of those. Mistress Grimes, not sure if Thulia knows what that means on Earth. Taught no Artificers still walked the Earth, when were the history books on Earth last updated in the Plane of Fire? Thulia, what is wrong with Morgana right now isn't your fault, no need to cringe at the trust Morgana is giving you.

Thulia this angry, yet keeping it contained, if some creep put something lethal inside the person I love I'm not sure I could keep as composed. And she already knows what it is, how bad it is. Soul eater, okay, I'm with Thulia on this. How did Morgana survive long enough for it to be discovered? And the thing is a ticking timebomb in the literal sense too, Abraxus was an idiot. Consulting Tanau about it, so that is how she got so much information to help Morgana in such a short amount of time.

Whoa, Tanau needs to stay away from Earth or there will be a lot of broken hearts [and other issues].

"Yes, it's possible. It's not easy by any means, and it will need all her strength and willpower, as well as all the help you can give her, but it can be done."

"Whatever it takes, grandmother."

It is a wonder Thulia got out of saving Morgana's life without more damage in one form or another. Cruel to be kind, Tanau loves Thulia even if her granddaughter might hate her for what she might have had to do if things didn't work out.

Grimes knowing what a psychofágos is, just what kind of books do they have on demons in the Whateley Academy Universe? Gotten powerful enough to draw essence out of Morgana's well and cause damage to her in the process, good lord, this demon is worse than I remember. Burnouts until it kills Morgana, sickening to use this demon on anyone.

Arguing over solutions while a student is dying, concern over the size of the blast when it happens, there is no time to waste! Bwahahaha, using their belief that Thulia is a pure demon against them for the contract and to get a payment that benefits her and Morgana, I would have known.

"Screw the rules. If they get in my way, I'll ignore them. There are always loopholes, and if necessary I'll create some. Trust me."

Proof that Thulia is a teenager once more no matter what she says.

Besides, she wasn't quite breaking the rules she'd agreed to; being summoned wasn't the same as visiting Earth, or at least that was the argument she was anticipating using.

Are we sure there isn't a book on rules-lawyering out there in the dimensions that some teens just stumble upon?

Sunday 16th October, afternoon (Earth reckoning), Thulia's workroom.

Glad Thulia planned for every potential problem even if the precautions aren't needed. Another source of power to give Morgana so she can finish off the parasite, and Tanau has options to bind them that doesn't involve a demon mark, thank you for that. Leman bond.

"Yes. But while it would involve a commitment between the two of you, it can be revoked, and it's mutual, so you wouldn't be controlling her. If you want to do that, I can get you a copy of the ritual and the chain you'll need."[//quote] Interesting, though I wonder why Thulia went straight to marriage before.