“Ouch, hey!” screeched the cross-legged human as he sat, once again being bopped on the head by the wooden stick. “Can you stop that?”

“If, by my staff, you wish not to suffer any other violation, you should work on your concentration.”

“What? Could you please stop with the fucking rhymes, I—” Once more, wood cracked wood, only that Thiemo referred to one as his head. “Ouch, hey!” He reached for the stick, which the zebra had wrapped a hoof around, only got a rap on the knuckles.

“Nice try, but further attempts I must deny. It is just past sunrise, so keep going with your exercise.” Thiemo stared at Zarni for a few seconds before he took a deep breath and closed his eyes again. The sun hadn’t even been up for two hours, but the temperatures in the savannah of Zebraica were already unpleasant. Luckily he was sitting with his master underneath of one of the biggest trees around. The exercise she had given him was for him to concentrate and to make a connection with the old plant, to communicate with it. He had no clue how to do that exactly, but he knew that he had to gather energy to form a bridge between them.

The energy was the omnipresent magic of Albion. They were sure to never become best friends. It hurt to guide it through his body, a lot. Zarni had said that it would become easier after the initiation, only that he was not worthy of it yet. A test of his abilities lay ahead of him. If he was lucky, he would be ready for it in a few months, to get into contact with two of the four elements, to submit to them, and ask them a favour. And use it in front of the eyes of the chieftain. It may have sounded simple, but all he had managed to achieve in the last three months was raise up dust, and he still didn’t know if it happened because of his breath or not.
Now he had sat for the second week underneath this tree already, while Zarni stood next to him and smoked at the pipe she wore on a necklace around her neck. The smoke burned his throat while his stomach protested. Maybe it hadn’t been so smart to eat freshly roasted griffon.

“Would you stop that!” Thiemo opened the eyes and hissed at the zebra. Again the stick made contact with his head, and all the stupid old zebra did was stand in front of him and grin. In front of him? How did she hit the back of his head then?

The world around him was just darkness, though that was only because of his closed eyes. What was Zarni expecting him to see? Dreams? He could hear a lot instead: his own heartbeat, the soft wind of the savannah, every time the zebra took a puff from the pipe, and of course the quiet rustling of the leaves above him.

“Search, feel the energy. Be one with the harmony.” Thiemo took a deep breath to drown his frustration. For many hours, Zarni had interrupted his thoughts with her empty phrases. He began to wonder why he was doing all this. He wanted to learn magic, not be beaten with a stick every ten minutes.

Frustrated, Thiemo took another deep breath and concentrated on his senses. Something had to be there. After all, every creature on Albion was supposed to have a bit of magic in it, so why not him? Could be because he wasn’t from Albion, but that the zebra next to him didn’t know. To her, he was Simba, a stray human that she had found in the savannah a few months ago. He had gotten lost again, what else. Zarni and her tribe had taken him in afterwards. It wasn’t like they had any ulterior motives involving the various probes they had done with him. Not at all. They needed them for various alchemistic mixtures.

Aside from that, they were also successfully practicing shamanism. He had read a bit about them having magic, but when one of the elder zebras had conjured a cloud above his head to give a shower to him and some foals, he had been quite flabbergasted. Everything he knew about magic up to that day had suddenly been declared null and void. Afterwards, he had directly marched towards Zarni’s hut to confront her about it. She had explained to him that that had not been magic, but that they asked nature spirits for their help. The spirits surrounds them continuously, so if one learned how to communicate with them, one could ask them for little favours.

He had learned that every element got different gemstones assigned. They were bathed in the element on an altar to prepare them to be brought as a tribute for the spirits. Rubies had to be put in the fire for a few days, which wasn’t allowed to go out during that time. Sapphires had to put on a high rock where the wind would blow around them. If one of them fell down, they were unworthy. Lapis lazuli were bathed in the water, which was not quite easy with where they were located. Outside of the rain season, when some remaining clouds from the oceans would float over the savannah, it was hard to get fresh water. That was why they were preparing as many lapis lazuli as possible to ask for water later. Ambers and mountain crystals were buried in the earth, where they had to stay for the longest time of them all.

After he had been introduced to the rites, he had to stand in front of the eldest shaman in the village. There he had to sit around a fire in a hut, while the eldest pulverized some herb and threw it in. A green smoke had engulfed them, which had burned his lungs more than normal smoke. They had stared at each other for several hours before the very old zebra had nodded and she got him out of the hut. From that moment forth, he had been her student, and she had been his teacher.

From there on, she had only spoken in rhymes with him. They were supposed to guarantee an inner balance and also make him think about what he was saying. Yes, she expected him to do the same, but Thiemo had categorically rejected that. “Memories are fine, but don’t let them hold you in a bind.” It was hard enough as it was for Thiemo to understand their language, but these rhymes sometimes made it impossible.

“Zarni, I swear, one more rhyme and I’ll beat you with that stick until your head hurts like mine.” The human gnashed his teeth peevishly. The sigh of the zebra came loud and clear, just like the next puff from the pipe.

“Your emotions won’t help you,” she spoke the first normal sentence in weeks. “You have to learn to control them, just like the energy around you.”

“And how should I do that? I can’t even feel the energy, not to mention control it.” Thiemo rose from the ground, dusted off his coat, and adjusted the new straw hat on his head, a gift that he had gotten from the zebras to make him withstand the the heat better.

Apparently his words made his master thoughtful. She stroked with a hoof through her long, straggly, and stripped mane, letting her earring rustle a bit. In the large, golden rings were a sapphire and a lapis lazuli each, hanging at a short chain. Around her neck she wore a talisman that was built similarly. Her long golden chain also golden and elegantly held a ruby and a mountain crystal. Since the stones turned to ashes once they were used up, they could be swapped at any time. Thiemo would get his own necklace once he mastered control the energy.

“Maybe you are right, Simba. We should try something else. But I have to warn you.” She trotted about from the tree a bit and began to draw signs in the ground with her stick. “If this doesn’t work, you may always be rejected by the elements. It is an old ritual, a very old one.” Nodding, Thiemo watched her finish the signs and drill small holes in four different points on the ground. “Sit down in the middle,” she ordered him. As he took his place, she went over to the first hole and freed the ruby from her necklace. “I give the cleansing fire,” she spoke and put the ruby into the hole. Thiemo waited for something to happen, but that wasn’t the case. Meanwhile, Zarni reached the second hole and placed the mountain crystal in it. “I give the earth, our mother.” Again nothing happened while she headed for the next hole. This time, she took the lapis lazuli out of her right earring. “I give the water that gives us life.”

“And this works? I don’t see anything happening.” Zarni glared at him, clearly telling him to shut up.

“And I give the air that we breathe,” she finished the ritual. “Get ready.” Confused, he wanted to ask what she meant, but in that moment, the worst pain he had ever felt shot through his body. Thiemo winced on the ground, rolled around, and reached for something, anything to ease the pain. The pain was everywhere. “The energy of the elements runs through your body. Be one with it, accept it, and let it guide you.”

That had to be a bad joke.

Author's Notes:

So, thats act 13. Just a little reminder, the next chapter will hit FimFiction in two weeks.

Thanks to Gron for translating this chapter.
Special thanks to JBL for proofreading and editing.

And give their story a try too:
Contact