The Hammer Unfalls

Just as he had yesterday, Master Willow invited Glim into his sitting room. Unlike yesterday, he did not have a smile pasted onto his face. But he wasn’t frowning either, which was something at least.

To Glim’s surprise, he’d made a different tea than usual. Not the simple tea that he used to sear Glim’s palms. The fancy tea from yesterday’s visit with Father. One much richer, and more floral than Glim was used to drinking. The mage handed him a cup. The scents expanded in his nose, sending his senses through pathways he’d never tread before.

He hadn’t just made tea. There were tiny plates filled with cookies, berries, and sweets. A fortune’s worth of treats, which came rare in Wohn-Grab.

The mage motioned for Glim to take one. A chewy confection with a hint of honey. He sighed appreciatively at this unexpected turn of events. Perhaps plying had its rewards after all.

“Plying essentiæ can be frustrating work,” Master Willow said. “Trying to perfect one little thing can drive you mad. And sometimes things go unexpectedly. Other times, you don’t realize you have dipped your toe across the line and used up your essentiæ. Just like stepping too far over the side of cliff. Once your balance has been tipped, you will fall. There’s no stopping it.”

Memories of sliding down the rift rushed into Glim’s mind. The maw of the sky opening up to swallow him. He’d had that feeling then, of knowing the fall was inevitable. Only luck and instinct had saved him.

“There’s no way to stop it. But you can lessen the odds of it happening in the first place. It all begins with the mind. How calm, balanced, and whole it is. You must always accumulate positive experiences. Every chance you get, find something new to taste, or touch. Really savor it. Watch a beautiful sunset. Lay on your back and watch the clouds. Rebuild your peace of mind. Always add layers to it.”

Master Willow frowned, but it didn’t seem as though he were frowning at Glim. Just to be on the safe side, he straightened up and paid attention.

“People pay me respect to my face, but I know their minds. They think me vain for wearing fine clothes. They find my collections of art or delicacies pretentious. They wonder why my beard is so neat, and my skin so smooth with scented oils. They find it all a bit too eccentric for their liking.”

His tutor paused and ran his fingertips over his silken tunic.

“When you’re in a tight spot, where your focus is absolutely critical, the soothing sensation of silk against skin might be the thing that saves you. It does double duty: prevents distraction, and increases your comfort. Whereas scratchy wool or an ill-fitting tunic might irritate you. Perhaps enough to take one last tiptoe over the line.”

He handed Glim a plate. “Try one of these.”

As he munched on the lightly sweetened wafer, his tutor continued. “Would you go on a march with a splinter in your sock? You’d be miserable by the end. Or would you stop, take the splinter out, and walk in comfort? A mage is always looking for splinters to smooth away. Tiny improvements in comfort. Soft clothes. Scented soaps. Fresh flowers. Whatever improves our mood, seduces our senses, and lets tension or distraction melt away. It doesn’t have to be costly. You simply have to pay attention, and be mindful of each choice. What will taste better? Keep you healthy and hale? What will put you at ease and uplift your spirits? Do those things, always. They build you up, so that you are harder to tear down. It’s not vanity, but security. It takes mental discipline.”

Master Willow took the plate from him.

“Show me that you understand. Why have I made you tea and cookies today? It wasn’t for my own amusement, I assure you.”

Glim thought furiously. What was the message? He couldn’t repeat the man’s words back. That hadn’t worked last time.

“It is easier to get sad when I am tired. It is easier to be grumpy when I’m hungry. So I should treat myself nicer so I don’t get tired or hungry or grumpy.”

Master Willow smiled. “Well put. But that’s only part of it. What about the tea? You seemed to enjoy it yesterday. So I made you some today. Why?”

“Because the scent made me happy. And maybe when I think about it later it will be a happy memory.”

“That’s just it. You should seek such experiences wherever you can.”

“Yes, Master Willow.”

Master Willow’s eyes flashed with a hint of the cruelty he’d come to expect.

“There’s more to it. Another reason why it is critical to accumulate these positive experiences. You’ve tried the restoration ritual recently, I take it?”

Glim shivered at the memory of his body shutting down from cold. The way his mind had frantically cast about for things to make the glow stronger. Bunny fur had not cut it. But standing up to the ghost of his mother had.

“I imagine that was frightening,” Master Willow said, without a hint of apology. “No one likes that part. It would be nice if words did the trick. But most of us only learn about the cold by being at the wrong end of it. I recall it well. Knowing I was going to die unless I summoned that warmth inside myself. Something about mortal peril tends to make the lessons mean more. Now tell me: how easy was it to fight back the cold and restore yourself?”

Glim felt his chin trembling, and knew he was about to cry.

Don’t. Don’t let that dung lure get the better of you.

“It was okay at first. But then I thought bad stuff” —you, you clod. I thought of you —”and the cold came right back. It was hard to shake it back off.”

“I’m sure it was. It was your first time. It gets easier.”

Master Willow stood and started pacing the room, in a way Glim had come to understand meant he needed to pay particularly close attention.

“But there’s a problem. The good memories get used up. They don’t fill us with as much warmth if we use them over and over. Eventually, the taste of fresh berries or the perfume of a quality tea will no longer stir your mind. You need to cultivate meaningful memories. Experiences, passions, or obsessions so powerful they light you up inside. The more honest you are, the more powerful it will be.”

At last, the man’s words had started making sense. Although Glim wasn’t quite sure how to come up with a list of positive experiences.

“I’ll need you to come up with a list of positive experiences,” Master Willow said. “But fear not. Generations of us have faced this same problem. Here is a scroll with a few suggestions on it.”

He handed Glim a scroll the width of his calf and unrolled it partway. There, in tiny scribbles, was a list of ‘Suggested Accumulations.’ Glim groaned. There must be thousands upon thousands of them.

His tutor chuckled. “Indeed. Quite daunting. You don’t need to read the whole scroll. Just enough to get you started on a list of your own. That is quite personal to each mage. I cannot write it for you. It must come from within. So here is a scroll for you.”

He handed Glim a scroll the width of his pinky finger. Which, by human standards, was quite a petite pinky indeed.

“Think it over. Write down the experiences and sensations that will enhance your cheer. Then do at least one of them every single day for the rest of your life.”

“So, you’re telling me my training is now about finding the best experiences I can possibly seek out?”

“Just so. It’s important to get right. This week I expect you to do nothing else. All of plying depends on this, and I can’t help you with it. You have the scroll. Use it.”

The idea of crossing the Avaunt Mountains alone had just lost its appeal.

————— ~~~ *** ~~~ —————

Walking from the tower into the light of midday stunned him him. Blinking, Glim waited a moment for his eyes to adjust to the full sun at its apex in the sky. He looked around at the crumbling buildings, the half-standing towers, and wondered what thrilling experiences he should seek among them.

A slight breeze ruffled his hair. Perhaps the goat shed holds a secret stash of silk for you to sew into clothes? the wind snickered.

“Not helping,” Glim said.

Maybe some fine scented mud from the cabbage patch? Oh, wait, I’ve got it! Hear me out. Pine branch pantaloons. She laughed. The sound always seemed more hollow than a human’s laugh. Insubstantial.

With mounting trepidation at his chances to find joy among these crude huts and fallen stones, Glim walked back to his home. The alcove he and father had claimed did not offer much in the way of creature comforts. A bedroll barely comfortable enough to refresh his at night. A cooking fire with a single pot. His pile of rumpled clothes, and father’s neatly folded stack of uniforms, each the same as the other.

However, their tower did have one important thing that Glim needed now more than he ever had before: his study.

Every plyer has one, he’d been assured. It’s another reason they’d claimed this particular tower. It had an intact second floor.

Glim trudged up the curved stairway along the tower wall and walked into the room he pretended to use often. It featured lots of windows to let in light. A ring of sconces on the wall with wicks and reservoirs of oil, so he could write observations at night if need be. A rickety wooden table and chair. A modest stack of mostly untouched parchments, and a cupful of sharpened charcoals wrapped in waxed parchment to protect from smudges.

Glim knew the basics of reading and writing. He needed to, because Master Willow often sighed in exasperation and shoved a book into his hands. As if the act of holding the words would cram the knowledge into his brain.

So when he set the Suggested Accumulations scroll on the table and weighted it down with a handful of rocks —clean ones! Don’t anger him — Glim had a fighting chance to understand the words. He scanned the list for something usable. Most of the words made no sense to his at all. Finally he read a promising candidate, within his means.

Laughing.

Glim paused right there. One word. Easy to understand. And completely within his abilities. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.

He checked the stairs to make sure father wasn’t there. He peeked out of the windows. No one was nearby.

Glim cleared his throat.

“Ha!” he said. “Ha, HA, ha HA!”

Nothing happened.

I don’t see how this is going to help, the wind said.

Glim giggled maniacally. He chortled, and even guffawed. No matter what he tried, he didn’t feel particularly rewarded for the effort.

“Let’s try another one,” he said.

Listening to other people.

A vision of Master Willow pacing the room and pontificating about essentiæ popped into his mind. Glim shuddered.

Spending an evening with good friends.

Good friends? Glim didn’t even have bad friends.

Meeting new people.

Having a meal with a friend.

Glim thought of the dining hall, and Gyda’s words: “Oh, hello, Eyeball. Fresh out of blood? There are rats in the cellar. Try there.”

“I’m starting to think,” Glim said, “That whoever wrote this list has not met people.”

Discouraged, Glim started back at the beginning. Not that he was expecting to have better luck on a second reading, but because he was too lazy to unfurl the massive scroll. One of the entries caught his eye.

Taking care of my plants.

Taking care of plants? How would that help? The only person he knew of who did such work was the gardener, Daryna. Come to think of it, the woman did seem cheerful, for the most part, if a bit odd. She’d appeared in Wohn-Grab a year or so after he’d been born. Glim had never really gotten to know her.

Perhaps the time had come to do just that. Then Glim could check off two of the Suggested Accumulations at once.