Intro to Saidar: Fourth Lesson

[Kathleen]

Kathleen walked the hall of the Tower with a basket on her arm. There was a light cloth covering the top so nothing would fall out of it. She arrived early as she always did, and there were a few students waiting around the door. She thought they must have taking her advice to check locations. She opened the door and let them in.

 

When everyone was settled and ready to start Kathleen rose and addressed the class, “Good morning class. I am sorry to say this will be our last lesson on the Introduction to Saidar. It was a pleasure to teach you all. While this is our last class, this is just the beginning of your journey. Let us make this final lesson together a pleasant one."

 

"In our last class you were introduced to Water and Fire; today you will learn about the remaining three Elements of the One Power: Earth, Fire and Spirit. We will look at Earth first. Earth can be used for many things, including finding mineral ores, helping crops and plants to grow and bloom, to detect fault lines deep within the earth. There are other things Earth can be used for, but you will learn more about them when you become Accepted.”

 

Kathleen had circled the class as she spoke and had arrived back at the front of class just on point in her speech. “Today, as your introduction to weaving with Earth, we will be making a rose bud bloom.”

 

Kathleen took up her basket and set it on the large desk. Setting the cloth aside she exposed the full basket of tightly closed rose buds. "We started this course with having you image yourself as a rosebud, opening to the sun. I feel it is only fitting to end it with having you making a bud bloom."

 

Kathleen took a small rose bud out of the basket and addressed the class, “You see the rose bud here, tightly closed, so tightly furled we can see even a hint of colour, but watch carefully girls, concentrate on the weave.”

 

Kathleen pulled out three threads of earth and weaving them together just so she laid it across the rose bud, causing the rose to slowly bloom in front of their eyes. This one was soft pink, but the others could be any number of colour. Part of the fun was in seeing which colour each girl would get.

 

“I shall show you once more before you attempt your own, remember to take care when observing the pattern the threads make.” Kathleen slowly showed them the simple weave again and then walked through the room with the basket of buds, letting the girls choose their own. The students all copied the weave she showed them and as always Kathleen went through the class making her self available to help if needed. When each girl had at least one bloomed flower on her desk the lesson continued.

 

“Next we will learn about Fire. The number one rule when working with the Element of Fire is to never,” for emphasis she repeated the word, “Never, draw heat out of a fire to extinguish it. You will be burned severely if you do. To extinguish a flame use Water to douse, or Air to snuff it out, or Earth to smother it – but never use Fire to draw the heat out.”

 

"Now the simplest thing we can do with Fire is to light a candle, and it’s a handy weave to know too. A single thread of fire is all that is required,” she said as she demonstrated. “Pull out your thread of Fire and wind it around the wick like so." Kathleen's thread of Fire wrapped around the candle wick in her hand and it caught alight. The flame bobbed and danced as it sparked into existence, but soon it stabilized and stood straight.

 

When it had settled down and the flame stood long enough for the students to all see it, Kathleen spoke again, “The same action from a thread of Water will extinguish it.” Kathleen demonstrated this and the blue thread doused the flame with a small hiss.

 

Kathleen reached into the bottom of the basket that held the rose buds and took out the candles she had placed on the bottom. She handed them to the first girl in each row and told her to pass them back. When all the students had their candles she instructed them to try the weave she had just shown them. When they had all lit and extinguished their candles Kathleen had them return them to the front of the row and she put them back in her basket. She turned back to face the class.

 

“The last Element is Spirit. Highly underestimated, Spirit is central to many weaves such as Healing, setting Wards, Shielding another channeller from Saidar and in the Bonding weave, to name just a few. These weaves are too advanced for you to learn today, but learn them you will as your strength and control increases. However I will demonstrate the Ward against eavesdropping for you.” Kathleen pointed out two Novices and beckoned them to the front of the classroom. “All I need for you to do is stand there talk about what you had for breakfast this morning.”

 

The pair of Novices giggled but began speaking of porridge, eggs, hot tea and the like. Kathleen deftly spun out the threads of Spirit required and wove them together in a complex pattern. She laid the weave over the two Novices. It seemed to sparkle in the light shining through the windows and though the Novices could be seen to be talking not a sound was heard. “So you see,” Kathleen continued, “they talk, and they see us, but we cannot hear them and they cannot hear us speaking.”

 

Kathleen allowed the weave to dissipate and the pair of girls could again be heard discussing their breakfasts. The Novices seemed suitably impressed by the weave and exclaimed to each other about it. Kathleen had repeated what she had said to the two who had missed it and told the class that as they had more experience with One Power they would be taught many more weaves. When the two girls were sitting back in their seat Kathleen centered herself at the front of the class.

 

"You all did very well today, and over the last lesson I have spent with you. This concludes your Introduction to Saidar course. We have only touched on the uses of Saidar but you now understand the nature of Saidar and the different Elements contained within it. I want to reiterate to you the importance of never channelling unsupervised. You will have many opportunities to channel in the coming months and years; do not find yourself serving a harsh punishment for breaking the rules.” Kathleen looked over the class once more before she finished, “If you have any questions about what I have taught you in this class, either from this lesson or one of our previous ones, please feel free to approach me after class and I will help you with what I can. I hope you have enjoyed this class, and I will be watching to see how far you go. Class dismissed.”

 

Kathleen cleaned off the large desk she had used for the lessons and put the cloth back on the basket as the students began to leave the classroom.

 

Kathleen Vandiar

Aes Sedai of the Green Ajah

 

OOC: RP out arriving, your reactions to the lessons, and rp out doing each weave with the new elements. General reaction to the goings on in the lesson.

[Cainam]

Sora arived to class early as she always did and noticed this time that many other girls were also there. As she stood there the girls who had been laughing at her and making jokes at her expense began whispering amongst themselves again. They would giggle and whisper then look over their shoulders at her. She did her best to ignore them. After a short while Kathleen Sedai arrived and let them into the classroom. She took her normal seat and set out her things Kathleen Sedai spoke“Good morning class. I am sorry to say this will be our last lesson on the Introduction to Saidar. It was a pleasure to teach you all. While this is our last class, this is just the beginning of your journey. Let us make this final lesson together a pleasant one."

 

Kathleen Sedai explained the first lesson and then demonstrated. She passed out some rosebuds to each girl and Sora picked up her first rosebud. She spun her first threads of earth and the rosebud began to blossom and then wilted. Sora frowned and she picked up the next one and tried again. again this one wilted but she was able to get it to bloom further. She kept trying and as Kathleen Sedai came by her desk she noticed what was happening and leaned down to sora and whispered. She told Sora to keep at it and that earth is a hard element to master. The other girls thought she was being reprimanded and some smiled.

 

The next lesson was with fire and Kathleen Sedai passed out some candles as she explained and demonstrated the lesson. On Soras first try she got the candle to start to spark and then the candle melted an inch onto the desk. She took her time and tried again and after her third try she got it to light and stay lit. She was so happy that she didnt have the troubles with fire that she did with earth.

 

As she explained the lesson sora was very nervous. Sora took the threads of spirit and the Easedropping wave sprang into place on her first try. She was so happy she smiled.She noticed that the girls who had been picking on her were having trouble and this brought some satisfaction to Sora. As sora sat and watched she began to think of the things that Kathleen Sedai had told her and she was ashamed of herself. She walked over to the girls and said "I can help you if you will let me. I see where your having your troubles and I think I can help." The girls were defensive at first but eventually they allowed Sora to help. She felt good about herself.

 

Kathleen Sedai said that was the end of class so sora gathered up all her things and gave kathleen sedai a curtsy.

[Shalon Casbin]

Amore listened patiently to the teacher before being one of the last to stand and come get her supplies. The trick of picturing herself as a flower and opening to saidar had never worked for her, she was always the bank, guiding the gentle currents of a river. She grasped that river now, succumbing to it before proverbial emerging from the Water that was the One power.

 

She was so weak in earth, she saw the threads as black lines, regardless of color she watched how the weave was done. She chose two yellow roses from he basket and took her seat. The first she placed the weave on, and the rose sprung to full bloom, then quickly died. One the second she removed the weave before it sent the rose into a death state.

 

Smiling she turned to the next road block in her path. fire; the one element she was afraid of. Amore wove the fire carefully, igniting the wick. It burned far to fast and hot, wax dripping on her fingers. She copied the teacher's weave of air, and put out her stick of half burnt wax.

 

Spirit was one of the elements she'd heard very little about, her eye drank in the weaving of the teacher, but it took her three tries to replicate it. Even then, he only successfully managed to field the area around her from the noise of the classroom. She sighed, then applied logic to the situation; reversing the weave, suddenly the classroom was quiet and she felt as if she could hear normally.

 

Releasing the power was frustrating as always, but she did as instructed, gathering her things and being one of the last to depart from the room.