Page 252 of Elemental Becoming

“Feel that?” he asks. “That shift? Control your breath, and you control your body.”

I nod, eyes still closed.

“Again,” he says. “This time, hold your breath like you would hold your magics. Not with force. With intent.”

I inhale again, controlled this time, more aware of what’s happening inside me. The breath becomes more than just air—it’senergy, potential, held in place because I choose to hold it there.

Valen’s voice stays quiet but firm. “This is the first step of the Second Breath. Learning to hold power without acting on it. To stabilize it. To shape it before you ever release it.”

I exhale, steady and full. And I begin to understand.

We’ve barely finished the exercise when Valen rises and fixes me with a look that says I’m nowhere near done.

“On your feet.”

I stand, slower than usual, still feeling the weight of the breathwork in my limbs.

He doesn’t wait. He crouches, scoops up a small, smooth stone, and presses it into my palm.

Then, quietly: “Ignite.”

I do. A small flame blooms above my hand, no larger than a candle flame. It flickers once, then steadies, dancing just above my skin.

“Good,” he says. “Now keep it like that.”

I nod.

“And move.”

I blink at him. “Move where?”

He doesn’t answer. Instead, he steps back, folds his arms, and waits.

So I start to walk.

The first few steps are simple enough. I keep my palm upturned, careful, my gaze fixed on the flame hovering justabove my skin.

It holds, but barely.

Normally, when I summon fire, I release it in the same breath. Fast. Furious. Like a feral scream that’s been waiting to be let loose. That’s what fire has always been to me: expression, instinct, fury.

But this is different.

Holding it here, quietly, without letting it lash out or consume, requires far more discipline than I expected. I can feel every shift in my balance, every breath threatening to disturb it. My body wants to move faster. My magics want to act. But I don’t let it.

And gods, that takes everything in me.

“Don’t watch the flame,” Valen says, reading me with infuriating ease. “Watch yourself. Your breath. Your body. The flame is only a mirror.”

I grit my teeth and take another step, this one less cautious.

The flame shivers.

He circles me.

“You need to carry it without letting it sputter out. That’s stillness in motion. Not frozen. Not rigid. Controlled.”

He gestures for me to keep going.