“I want to show you something before I take you on the tour,” Savannah said, motioning me over to her side of the desk. I got up and stood next to her as she pulled a laminated sheet of paper from her drawer, which was illustrated with a handful of star segments of varying colors and accompanying notes.
“This is the insignia for an Elementalist,” she said, pointing to a black star encapsulating a pentagon. “This is from where our organization’s name was derived. Asteri; Greek origin, meaning ‘star’.”
“It’s been used for centuries to distinguish those of us with special abilities from the rest of the world. However, each branch of Elementalism also has its own special symbol, a piece of the larger star. There’s a great sense of pride among us Elementalists, particularly with respect to which Elemental branch we belong to.” She then pointed to a colorful illustration that looked like this:
“These are the symbols of the elements. The ‘L’ on the far right is for Lightning, or Electromancy,” she explained. “This is what Elementalists get tattooed on our arms once they join the Order. In my case, I’m able to control two Elements. Only about ten percent of us can,” she added with a hint of pride. “My Primary skill – that is, the one I am much more adept at and stronger in – is Terramancy. But I also have some limited talent in Auromancy, making that my Secondary ability. Therefore, in my case, we would combine multiple symbols to make a new shape comprised of the two Elements I wield. That’s where the symbol on my business card comes from, and also this…” Rolling up her sleeve, she exposed a half-dollar-sized tattoo on her left forearm, in the same location where the girl at the front desk had her purple Auromancy symbol. But, in addition to purple, Savannah’s tattoo was also colored green in the pentagon and side points.
“Once you’re initiated in a few weeks, you’ll have one too, except yours will reflect the three Elements you can wield.” I didn’t appreciate the blunt assumption that I would automatically be joining her club, and also couldn’t help but notice the almost-imperceptible note of resentment in her voice when she mentioned my three Elements.
If only you knew, I thought grimly.
“Actually, I’m not exactly sure what that tattoo would look like,” she mused, almost to herself. “It’s so uncommon to display two Elements, let alone three…” She glanced through the symbols, frequently referencing several lines of numbered notes at the bottom of the page.
“There are rules for which points of the star overlay others when combining sigils,” she murmured as she reviewed them. “But because Electromancy is so rare, and considered quite extraordinary,” she added, glancing up at me over the page, “I would say that that sigil ought to take precedence over the other two.” She retrieved a small, square piece of poster board, about three inches on each side, from the same drawer as before. It had a black and white line drawing of a star on a white background. She quickly filled it in with color, using some felt-tipped markers, then showed it to me when she was done:
“Here’s what your tattoo will look like,” she said, not bothering to hide the envy in her voice. The top point and connecting dots were purple, the left point and pentagon were green, and the bottom-left and right points were yellow. It frankly looked a little gaudy to me.
“It’s remarkable, really. You’ll have the most striking tattoo in our Chapter.”
“Wow,” I murmured, trying to demonstrate what I thought to be a suitable amount of awe. She handed the illustration to me and I took it, giving a small nod of thanks.
“I’m jealous,” she said teasingly. “You almost have a full star. The last time I saw that was when I met this mediocre Pyromancer who also happened to show the tiniest amount of hydro-aptitude. Not that the ability to make half-formed ice cubes should actually be considered Hydromantic ‘ability’…”
“Has there ever been someone who could control all five Elements?” I asked, trying to make my voice nonchalant as I tucked the square she had given me in my jacket pocket.
“That’s an excellent question,” she replied, somewhat officiously. “What you refer to is what we call a Pentamancer. Highly revered, extraordinarily powerful and, in this day and age, completely unheard of. Hundreds of years ago, as recently as the 15th century, or so I’ve read, Pentamancers used to be slightly more common – perhaps one in a thousand Elementalists – but there’s no record of any known Pentamancer existing in over 300 years, and there’s even some dispute around that particular individual’s actual Pentamantic ability. If you’re curious, here’s the Pentamancer’s symbol,” she said, pointing to a multi-colored star at the top of the laminated page. Each point was painted a different color, representing the five distinct Elements. The inner pentagon was painted a stark black.
“This sigil is archaic now. If you ever happen to come across an actual Pentamancer, please be sure to call me right away,” she said, chortling at her own joke.
I leaned over the page to get a closer look, tracing the vibrant star with my fingertips. There’s no record of any known Pentamancer existing in over 300 years. In that moment, I couldn’t fully process her words. Frankly, stuck there as I was in her office, I didn’t really want to.
“Anyway,” Savannah said, clapping her hands together brightly, “I think it’s time I give you the grand tour.”
***
As we walked through the circular waiting room and toward the elevator, Savannah was briefly explaining the building’s different floors.
“The top floor – that’s where my office is, of course – has three other office suites for the other heads of this chapter. I manage marketing, recruitment and practical training efforts for the region. Tom Richardson runs the Security and Containment Division…”
I frowned slightly. Containment Division? Containment of what?
We approached the elevators and one of the doors opened as soon as Savannah pressed the down button. We stepped inside. Back in the elevator, the jazz saxophone still wafting through the speakers, Savannah droned on mechanically. I imagined she’d given this speech dozens of times before.
“Dr. Steven Chen oversees the medical and psychiatric centers. And then there’s Jeanette Vasquez, who handles all Chapter finances, including membership dues.” She glanced at me sideways. “Not that we’ll be requesting any membership fees from you until you are firmly on your feet and established,” she smiled reassuringly.
“Fees?” I asked.
“Oh, you know, to keep this place up and running,” she explained, waving an indifferent hand. “It’s really not anything you need to be concerned about. We have a sliding fee scale for those of our members who require assistance. And,” she added, raising her hand to the side of her mouth in a mock-conspiratorial manner, “We waive all fees in their entirety for those members who score particularly high on their Elemental Assessment… and I have a good feeling you’re going to blow everyone’s minds.”
That logic struck me as odd. Why waive the fees for stronger members? What do they care how talented their members are? It also bothered me that Savannah continued to speak as though it was simply a given that I would join this… Community. I guess they’re just not used to people saying no, I thought to myself. Aiden’s words from yesterday suddenly came to mind. He hadn’t explicitly stated that the ‘cult’ he had belonged to was the Asterians, but it didn’t take any sort of great leap in reasoning to gather he had been referring to this same organization.
It turns out they don’t take too kindly to members who attempt to opt out. I shuddered slightly, wondering what I was getting myself into for the sake of getting answers.
I tried to return to the present, as Savannah was still cheerfully reciting the floors as the elevator descended. “Let’s see… Level Four is records, filing, boring administrative stuff like that… Ah, but Levels Two and Three…” She pressed the button to stop the elevator at the second floor. The doors opened with a ding, revealing what looked like a very clean and sparsely-crowded hospital waiting room. We didn’t get off the elevator; Savannah just held the door open so I could take a look. Three ordinary-looking people were seated in chairs, presumably waiting to be seen. One had his arm wrapped heavily in gauze, another woman was pressing an icepack to her head. I couldn’t tell what the third person’s ailment was; he was just reading a magazine. Though, on closer examination, it did appear that the magazine was upside down. I frowned slightly. Just then, two doctors wearing teal scrubs, a short, middle-aged man and a dark-skinned young woman, passed by the elevator. The woman waved at us, revealing two blue triangles tattooed on her left forearm. A hydromancer, I thought, remembering the icon from before.
Savannah smiled and waved back, leaning close to explain to me, “Levels Two and Three are for therapy appointments, wellness checks, health classes, doctor’s visits… We’ve even installed a small, state-of-the-art burn ward on the third floor specifically for some of the more accident-prone Pyromancers in the Community,” she said with a small tsk. Then she added thoughtfully, “You know… I suppose Lightning is actually considered the most dangerous of the five Elements to work with, but we have so few people in the Community who can manipulate it, we hardly ever see electrocution cases.” She winked at me then, playfully adding, “Let’s try to keep it that way!”
I flashed her a tight-lipped smile. Yeah, you’ve really done it this time, Aspen.
The elevator doors closed again and we continued our descent.
“Level one, above the lobby, is where we hold all of our community meetings and group events,” Savannah said, brimming with enthusiasm. She must have thought I would be excited to hear about that. “In addition to the usual weekly gathering for all initiated members every Sunday evening, we also have Tuesday Night Elemental Trivia, Thursday Night Speed Dating, Saturday Night Mixers… I’ve heard those evenings in particular can get real wild!”
Immediately, an image popped in my mind of drunk Elementalists awkwardly flirting with each other using pocket-sized Fireballs and levitating ice cubes.
I stifled a laugh.
I expected the elevator to open at the ground floor with the ornate lobby, but Savannah had pressed another button below the “L”, marked “B”.
“This building has a basement?” I asked.
“Oh… something like that,” she answered coyly.
Several long moments passed as we descended below-ground. After a minute I started to wonder anxiously if there was something wrong, but just then the elevator dinged and the doors slid open.
“I thought I’d save the best for last,” Savannah said with a knowing smile.
We stepped into a stark, harshly-lit corridor, with plain, white tiled floors and steel-paneled walls that reminded me of a medical facility or a laboratory. As we walked briskly down the hall, I couldn’t make out any sounds other than Savannah’s sharply clicking heels. At the end of the corridor was an intimidating steel door with a small ballistic glass security window, its tempered surface obscuring the view on the other side, at least from where I was standing. For a brief, terrifying moment, I couldn’t help but imagine some white-walled test lab on the other side, replete with long needles, electrical probes, and hospital beds with leather restraints. Before the grisly horror movie in my head could unfold much further, Savannah punched in a keycode on the number pad near the handle. A buzzer sounded, and a few moments later she pulled the door open.
Through the doorway was a cavernous chamber. Despite being at least several floors underground, the cavern was brightly illuminated by warm, radiant light, and, once my eyes adjusted, I was completely taken aback when I realized that the floor was almost entirely covered by thick green grass. Additionally, there were scattered trees, various plants, and even a small waterfall flowing down one of the steep back ‘walls,’ which was actually unpolished rock. Thirty feet above us, hanging from the domed ceiling, were long rows of huge, circular lights, alternating in blue and yellow hues. There were also four round skylights in the ceiling, which I assumed had been built into the building’s courtyards, as well as a complex array of mirrors that were positioned around the uppermost parts of the walls, reflecting even more light toward the ground.
Savannah stood uncharacteristically silent behind me while I stepped forward to look at my surroundings in awe. The cavern, I realized, was roughly shaped like a pentagon, and divided into five equal triangles by different types of colored pennant rope, whose points all met in the middle. About a dozen people were scattered among four of the five triangles.
Farthest from me, inside the blue-designated triangle – which, like the other four sections, was about sixty feet across at its widest section – housed the waterfall. That started about halfway up the rough stone wall and culminated into a wide pool of water, which was surrounded by large rocks and manicured grass. Just above the waterfall, embedded in the stone, was a large two-way glass window, about fifteen feet wide and ten feet tall, though I couldn’t make out whether anything was behind it.
To the right of the blue quadrant was the red triangulated section, which had no grass, and instead had hard-packed dirt that appeared heavily scorched in some places. Three large red and white targets, also marred by angry black scorch marks, were painted on the wall behind it. Next to that was the green triangle I was currently standing in, grass-covered like the blue one was, though the green area was also filled with huge rock piles and gaping holes in the ground. Behind me, in the same section, the wall surrounding the steel door I had emerged from had intricate designs etched into it, symmetrical swirls and geometric patterns carved deeply into the rock face.
Just beside the green, to my left, was a purple section, which was closed off from its neighboring quadrants by thick, transparent, twenty-five-foot purple tinted walls that rose nearly to the ceiling. Within the thick plexiglass were several trees, including one uprooted on its side, all mostly naked save for a few stubborn green leaves clinging to their otherwise-bare branches. In the center of the chamber was a tall flag post with a raised purple flag that had some sort of black symbol in the center, though I couldn’t make out the insignia since the flag was only fluttering slightly. The last triangular segment, next to the purple area and to the left of the blue area, was demarcated by yellow posts. Like the Pyromancer’s area, it had no grass; instead it had black rubber mats on the ground and a singular tall, metal rod standing in the center, similar to the lightning rods you see atop some tall buildings.
Seeing my amazed expression, Savannah beamed. “It’s incredible, isn’t it?” She remarked as she came to stand beside me. “This is our training arena. It took five years to complete, with the help of our best Terramancers. I, of course, was one of them,” she added with more than a hint of pride.
Terramancers did all of this? I thought, eyeing the huge chamber incredulously as she continued in an authoritative voice.
“The industrial-sized halide lamps do an effective job of converting electricity into light for photosynthesis when combined with the mirrors and skylights, which are oriented for optimum sunlight. That reduces the amount of artificial lighting needed and helps keep energy consumption low, while also providing necessary illumination for the grass and plants.” She pointed to several large ventilation units installed halfway up the walls. “And those vents pull in and circulate fresh air from the outside throughout the arena.”
I was awestruck; I had never seen anything this remarkable in my life. Savannah glanced over at me, chuckling. She was probably used to stupefied reactions such as mine.
“I know it all must seem extravagant upon first sight, but we wanted to create an adequately large space for training, which would also provide the necessary accessibility to all five Elements. And we felt that it was important to build a space that felt open, non-confining, and lovely enough to want to spend plenty of time in.”
I regarded the dozen Elementalists scattered throughout the arena. In the red section, two Pyromancers, both teenage boys, were lobbing a basketball-sized Fireball through a metal hoop held high by a gray-haired woman in bright green firefighter’s coveralls. A fire extinguisher sat on the ground close beside her. A group of four Terramancers sat in the section next to them, circled around a wide hole in the ground, chatting together amiably. Within the purple walls, a small girl in a blue dress was waving her hands above as a feather flew in gentle figure-eights above her head. No one stood in the rubber matted area, but nearby a small group of thirty-something year-old Hydromancers stood drenched and laughing loudly on the edge of the pool of water in the blue training area.
“Training looks fun, and it often is,” Savannah remarked, “but we do take the drills very seriously. Some of the biggest catastrophes in history were actually due to untrained or uncontrolled Elementalists. The 1871 Chicago Fire, for example, was due to a jilted Pyromancer who came home from work early, only to find his wife in bed with another man. It proved almost impossible to cover up that incident, but the Order did manage.”
My eyes widened in surprise.
She carried on gravely, “And one of the strongest Terramancers in recorded history was an Uzbek man who was experimenting with his abilities in October of 1907. Ignorant of what lay below him, he inadvertently triggered a larger fault line along the border of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. 15,000 people died as a direct result. It remains an extremely regrettable incident for the entire Asterian Community to this day. It’s why we take training and obtaining pre-authorization for any use of outside powers so seriously. The safety of the Community, as well as maintaining our kind’s secrecy, are our utmost priorities.”
I swallowed hard, wondering what other terrible events in history might have been caused by people like us – and concealed by the Asterian Order. I wanted to ask Savannah more about the Order’s “priorities,” but she started speaking again before I could ask.
“Training, by the way, is available to all members of the Community, twenty-four hours a day – though off-hours will need to be requested by appointment – seven days a week, and is totally free of charge. Its funding is made possible by the monthly dues and charitable donations,” she explained, her voice cheerful once again. “While all Elementalists are born with different and varying levels of ability, we dutifully assist all of our members in learning to control and properly utilize their gifts, thereby helping each of us reach our highest potential.”
With a slightly wistful tone, she added, “We unfortunately can’t help, say, a Level-One Elementalist achieve a higher Elemental ranking, since power potential is innate and predetermined at birth; nor can we teach a Terramancer, for example, to wield Water, unless they already have a natural secondary Hydromantic ability, which as I stated earlier, is quite rare.” She eyed me closely as she said that. “As for rankings, we’ll delve further into that a little later…”
“This place – what you do here – it’s… unbelievable,” I admitted.
“This arena is also where you’ll take your assessment on Sunday,” she mentioned casually.
I turned away from the various activities in front of me. “Sunday?” I asked, surprised. “This Sunday? As in, two days from now?”
“It’s an imperative step as part of the initiation process,” Savannah explained patiently. Putting her hand on my shoulder, she squeezed it gently as she spoke. “We would love to have you join our organization, Aspen. I know you want the opportunity to learn more about your powers, as well as the chance to discover who you are. As a member, you’ll have access to our best instructors. We’ll get you identification, authorization to work, a passport; you’ll be welcome at Asterian chapters all over the globe: Istanbul, Paris, Tokyo! If you rank highly enough on your assessment, and continue to prove your dedication over the years, you could even obtain an Officers’ Rank, eventually earning a deciding seat at the Inner Circle’s Table.” Her green eyes flashed with excitement. “I truly hope you’ll say you’ll join?” Her expression was almost pleading.
It’s the only way to get answers, I thought grimly. There’s no other option.
Attempting to match her wide smile with that of my own, I said the only thing I knew I could say in that moment.
“Where do I sign?”