Ranvir watched the snow drift, oddly entranced by the idle patterns. He ran with the pack of his teammates, ahead of him Es tried closing the gap to Sansir and Grevor. Ranvir had learned better at this point.

Grevor was just as tall as him and a faster runner. Sansir was even taller and a faster runner as well. Esmund was a fast runner, but short. Though, Ranvir could tell the competitive side of his friend chafing at the fact that he couldn’t keep up.

Ranvir was just as happy running in the middle of the pack. Again he saw the pattern of a snowflake. He tracked it as far as he could, until he passed. It was oddly entrancing to watch them fall. It just felt right. The way they were moved by the wind, the rate at which the snow fell, even the construction of the snowflake felt right.

His foot slid and he very nearly tumbled before catching himself. Getting distracted while running was usually a good thing, allowing him to zone and keep pace through the field. Getting distracted in the worn down snow, however, was a recipe to slipping on hidden ice.

As he righted himself, and shook the day dream away, his gaze almost involuntarily traveled to the two tethered watching them. A tall broad shouldered man, both his full beard and hair was speckled with enough gray that Ranvir could see it across multiple fields.

The other was a woman. Her dark hair was bound up in a cloth that seemed to attach to the same veil that covered all but her eyes from the world. Her clothes were an odd dichotomy between diaphanous cloth and thick woolen outfits, giving her an oddly bulky appearance. Even the man fell victim to this weird style of cloth, though it was more noticeable on the woman’s outfit.

Ranvir couldn’t get much of a read on her. He knew she was a light tethered, though her approximate strength was hard to read. She simply stood too far in the man’s shadow. The man was an ice tethered, clearly, his power was so well defined, Ranvir thought he could’ve figured it out, without even approaching him with his tether-sense. The man emanated power with a solidity unmatched by any master Ranvir had ever seen.

If he were to guess the man was either a twin master, or possibly, a triplet master, ridiculous as that seemed. Why Ankiria would’ve sent a triplet master all the way to Elusria, he couldn’t figure out.

Ahead, Ranvir registered the others coming to a stop in front of Teacher Vigo. “Students.” The Master greeted them, as they finished rolling in. “I figured after last trimester’s horrible start, you all managed to keep up your training during the break, so I didn’t need to take it easy on you.” He grinned evilly, putting the lie to his words. “Therefore I’ve prepared this nice little exercise for you.”

He gestured broadly to the fields in front of him. Row upon row of tall pyramids made of snowballs stacked upon each other before them. “Your goal is to transport these snowballs to the field over there, where you’re going to rebuild the pyramid.”

Oh that’s not actually too bad. Ranvir thought. The size of the snowballs made it easy for him to grab multiple at a time.

“One ball at a time.” The Teacher turned to look at the pyramids he’d had made, a proud grin on his face. “You may begin.”

Ranvir took in a deep breath. Most of the students around him were breathing heavily, but only a few students were desperate for air, the rest breathed with tell tale practiced motion hauling in air, like construction workers hauled rope. Already, some students were regaining their equilibrium, breathing more evenly.

“How many are there?” Ranvir heard Es ask, as the warp tethered stopped in front one of the mounts.

“Like thirty.” Grevor replied, squinting at the field they were headed towards.

“I think he meant snowballs.” Sansir said, rolling his eyes. He grabbed one and started running. “There’s one way to find out.”

Es groaned, but grabbed his top ball. “One.”

Ranvir followed suit, again setting his own pace, though it was harder as he’d gotten a pyramid next to Grevor. Avoiding the sensation of falling behind was quite difficult, especially as the balls started piling up. The only thing that kept him from trying to keep up with Grev was the experiences of past physical classes.

The rhythm of the training quickly fell into a humdrum pattern and he zoned out nearly entirely, slowly working snowballs from one field to the other. Even as he ran, he traced back the connection in his mind to his tether-space. He didn’t want to commit to additional exercise just yet, so he just kept his awareness there exploring the space as he ran.

It wasn’t until he saw Grev fall into a walk that Ranvir checked back in with the world around him. He saw that Sansir had fallen into a loping run that utilized his long legs very well. It wasn’t terribly fast, but looked easy to maintain.

“I really didn’t think there’d be this many.” Grev complained as Ranvir passed him, though the light tethered had rebuilt much more of his pyramid than Ranvir had.

“There’s like five hundred, or something like that.” Ranvir said, gesturing to the pyramid on his way back.

Grev didn’t reply, his simply look of disbelief transfered his thoughts excellently. Ranvir shrugged, “Sansir obviously realized it.”

He and Sansir had set a solid maintainable pace, not rushing towards the finish line.

“But it’s only like sixty feet.” Grev said, gesturing to the track he’d run in the snow.

“That’s around seven miles.” Sansir added, as he ran by. “This is probably the longest we’ve run yet at the academy.”

Ranvir tuned them back out as he fell into the pace once more. It wasn’t until he returned to his pyramid and found it empty that he stopped looking around. He became aware of the frigid burn of air in his lungs, the sweat on his brow, and the heat under his new winter uniform. Looking around, he found only Sansir had stopped running, though he too was sweaty and breathing deeply.

“That’s the first two done!” Master Vigo yelled, his stony appearance seemingly untouched by the cold. “How long until the rest of you finish?”

Second? Ranvir thought. Looking around, he found only he and Sansir had finished, though their pyramids looked like absolute shit. Well, his looked like shit. Sansir’s looked like an actual pyramid, each ball encased in a frame of ice making it look elegant and nice.

“Well done.” Sansir said, walking over to Ranvir. “That’s a good pace.”

“Thanks.” Ranvir replied, still a little out of breath. “It’s weird, I would’ve expected others to keep up.”

Sansir shook his head. “Grev and Es had little idea of how much they had to run, so they outpaced themselves handily. Es was probably always going to do that, though, even if he knew how far it was. As for solid cadence and pace, you’re a natural.”

“Thanks, but.” Ranvir said, nodding to his friend, though he still found it hard to believe. “I always run in the middle of the pack.”

“Yes.” Master Vigo said, walking over. “But they run at a pace they know they can keep up until the warm up’s finished. You can keep that pace for miles on end.” He quirked an eyebrow. “It happens sometimes with tethered. We find tethered like Esmund, who has a surprisingly developed sprint, or they develop it within a few months of starting to work out. On the flip side, we have people like you who develop a strong endurance and a decent pace.”

“Really?” Ranvir asked, looking at his teacher in surprise. “What about someone like Sansir and Grevor.”

“It’s not a guarantee.” Vigo warned. “Though, if they have a well maintained condition before arriving, we’ve rarely, if ever, seen any massive swings, like with Esmund and you.”

Ranvir pursed his lips, thinking the Master’s words over. “Interesting, thank you for telling me.”

Master Vigo paused, looking at Ranvir. “We’re not going to have more teachers complaining about you because of this, are we?”

“Probably not.” Ranvir replied, barely listening. He considered the implications of Vigo’s words, even as said Teacher walked away shaking his head.

“What are you thinking?” Sansir asked.

“I’m not ready to say, yet.” Ranvir gave him a mysterious smile.

Later, Ranvir sat with the rest of the academy’s students, across the fields in front of the Masters’ Tower. Usually, he had little problem starting his meditation, but the cold was somewhat inhibiting his ability to concentrate, though he noticed that didn’t seem like as much of an issue to the older students. The sheer force of ten-thousand students all gathered in meditation, did little to help him. He just felt more aware of his surroundings, not less. He took in another deep breath, closing his eyes again.

Power exploded.

Overwhelming and enveloping.

Energy crushed Ranvir’s tether to an immediate and painful halt, pain spiking through his tether-space. All around him, first-years cried out in pain, even as he barely bit back his own against the strain.

Opening his eyes, he examined his surroundings. All around him students fell onto the snow, crawling into fetal positions, their eyes glazing as pressure rippling over them. Beyond them, he was vaguely aware of second-years staggering about or down on all fours. It wasn’t until he saw the fourth- and fifth-years that he saw students mostly unaffected. Though whether it was distance or strength, Ranvir couldn’t tell.

Master Svenar stopped next to Ranvir, seeing he was aware. Through his tears, Ranvir thought he saw the Mantle’s discomfort, but couldn’t tell for sure.

The pressure vanished.

Gasping, Ranvir collapsed face first into the snow. Feeling the cooling chill of ice on his face. Raggedly, he gasped for air feeling his thoughts start to drift apart, fleeing the power he’d just felt.

A flash of red and orange burned through him, awakening his emotions and thoughts. Ranvir hissed in a breath as the snow felt painfully cold on his head. Ribbons of white relief rippled with tremors of violet fear through him, interlacing with the remains of red and orange.