Galdur looks upon his apprentice with great pride. He found Sihiri as a young girl many years ago while on his travels to search for a new apprentice after Idin proved himself capable of being elevated to an Arch-Pyro, the highest mastery possible, and walking his own path alone. He was preparing to rest for the night when he felt intense heat. Investigating, he found the building opposite the inn on fire with a young girl on her knees crying on the road in front of it. With more than a little effort, he intoned the necessary words to cast a spell and summon enough water to douse the fire. He is after all an Arch-Pyro, a master in the arts of fire casting. He is adept enough to learn a few simple spells from the other three Elements but his lack of affinity for them makes for tremendous effort out of such casting. As he was walking towards the young girl, he was buffeted by strong winds and hurled through the closed door of the inn. Before he could pick himself up, the inn was rocked by violent tremors that subsided as soon as they started. Taking a moment to compose himself, he stood up unceremoniously and made his way towards the girl. He walked through the pool of water that has appeared around the girl and planted a strong grip on her shoulder, reassuring her. It was clear that the girl possesses affinity with magic and possibly all four elements at that. A mage that has affinity with two elements was almost unheard of, let alone four. With the blessings of her parents, he stayed in the town to train her to master her latent abilities while she grew up with her family.
Now a young woman, she has developed into a very talented mage. He submitted a petition to the Magi Order's leader, Grand Arch-Mage Andrya, to seek dispensation to affirm Sihiri's unheard of refined mastery of all the elements by assigning her the ranks of Pyromancer, Terramancer, Aquamancer and Terramancer. The arena in the Reyda Festival is where she can prove herself to the Grand Arch-Mage.
She raises a hand and the ground of the arena shakes violently, unbalancing her opponent. She is one of the rare magicians who can cast a spell without first intoning the words. She follows the tremors with a hurricane that picks up her opponent and sends him flying to the sky. As he falls from the sky, she sends a water bolt straight towards his chest with a force enough to knock the wind out of his lungs. As he is struggling to pick himself up, she prepares the coup de grace. She points her index finger at her opponent and fire starts to form around it. Then the fire dies.
Galdur winces. Despite her immense potential and talent, she suffers from the occasional mistakes. Galdur attributes such problems to that time when he first met her, when her uncontrolled magics caused destruction in her town. Even though the destruction was fortunately kept to a minimum and she subsequently aided in the rebuilding efforts, she has never really outgrew the trauma and fear of loss of control the moment caused her. As a result, she is afraid to let loose and such inhibitions are hampering her progress.
Her opponent lies sprawled on the ground. Her finishing move is not necessary after all. She is still on track for her promotion. However, if she is to realise her potential and be the most powerful magician in the history of the Order, there is more work to be done.
