Thunder #5: The Flicker Rims

Smoke.  Sulfurous fumes.  The air around the Ring of Fire is said nearly unbreathable.  Dragons dwell here, as do the Firecasters of the Fifth Thunder, but they are trained and equipped to handle what it means to live surrounded by eight active volcanoes.

The cadets of the Fifth call them the Sisters.  The gypsy folk of Sarass, however — well they offer them more ominous names.  Because, of course, these are their ancient lands that spew, and for those who believe they spew because they are cursed, and cursed because of the aborted, buried remains of three holy gods, well, ominous is only fitting.  After all, Klotho, Lachesis, and Athropos impact everything; they are the three Fates: they control destiny and everything the earth makes.  Of course they had their hands in the shaping of the Ring of Fire, and from the fetal corpses of what the Sarassii say were eight stillborn children!

Eight births, eight graves: two from Klotho, two from Lachesis, and four from the woeful womb of Athropos, whose gaze alone everyone knows brings death.  Eight births, and each of them buried and placed where the land of Sarass looks like it suffered most, as if a bite was taken right from its core.  Well, the result was said to have been catastrophic.  Tectonic-plates shifted, molten erupted — the mingling, that of hag-flesh with earth — well if it were true, how could the land not revolt?

These are just legends, of course.  The Ring of Fire formed because nature decided it would.  But it is easy to see how people could embrace such a notion.  Eight giant peaks, during high season when the sky is clearest and they can be seen pummeling the horizon; it’s enough to conjure up any number of fantastical explanations, especially if you’re Sarassii where fantastical explanations are par for the course for growing up gypsy.

Rancor, Ruin, Tumult, Travail, Warble, Waster, Fickle, and Fail — eight mountain peaks form the Ring of Fire and such are their names, and somewhere along their long and circuitous and treacherous configuration sits the Flicker Rims, the mountainous home of the Fifth Thunder.  They are the Firecasters, possessors of the Thangor Breath.  It is flame, yes, and from the cast of Blue, as in dragons.  Oh yes, dragons.  The Fifth Thunder’s Wielder is a gift supplied by dragons.  But not of their breath alone.  No.  As with all Wielders, the Thangor Breath is enchanted, and with a power known only by the members of the Wielder Guild, as is the case with the other six Wielders that protect this world.

What is known is that the Thangor Breath is cradled by dragon scales.  But what it does…  Well, what the Thangor Breath does is what makes it special — and lighting catapults ablaze to lay siege on an enemy stronghold is only half of it.  Covered in the flames of the Thangor Breath a Firecaster can rebound any and all magic used against him, or her, whichever is the case — make it their own, absorb it,  quench it even, until what remains has been drained.  And though certainly not the Third Thunder’s Woodwives Balm, the Breath, in right application, can sooth the skin smooth of rashes and even gashes, and it’s definitely a viable option for performing triage on the field and cauterizing wounds, and it’s even been known to rejoin bone, though not really recommended, and only under the strictest of circumstances if a proper orthopedist isn’t nearby.  Trust me; you don’t want just anyone lighting your innards with Thangor Breath, broken bone or not, especially if they’re inexperienced at channeling it and preventing what it wants to do.  Because lest we forget, Thangor Breath is first and foremost a tool to raze.  It likes to scorch.  And for reasons not understood — probably because of its magic, as the nature of magic is unwieldy — the harder the substance, the quicker it moves to reduce it to rubble.

As the Firecasters say:

The Blues breathe Breath,
But the Breath perfects it,

Firemagic,
From sources close-hold,
Dragon licks,
For reasons so bold,

O Might of Breath,
Course through me and drain,
That darker spells,
Be quenched out like rain,

Blue fire you are,
And to you I am bound,
Fire of Fifth,
And of fire I’m crowned.

Inkling #31:
What is the Seven Thunders?  It is the Flicker Rims, and their Wielder the Thangor Breath.  The Fifth of Seven and with five comes fire.  Firecasters, defenders of the lands, and with a single Breath they can repair you or undo you.  But be wary: fire like magic can be…unpredictable.