Practice, it was always all about practice, especially doing something as stupidly, or amazingly, dangerous as she was. Success often gave her a surge of giddy emotion, and failure...well there was pain with failure. There was an art to it of course, a talent she had learned watching the two leggers entertain each other. She had snatched the satchel one had and run with it before exploring it's contents and then trying to recreate them. The many scars and burns inside her mouth, on the pads of her paws, spoke of many failures. Still after all that time she now managed quite the trick, with almost constant success.
Almost, that was why she still practiced in a prime location, close to water, with low hanging tree branches, and a mound of dirt she would dig up. She nosed into her satchel and carefully extracted a thick piece of glass. This was the part Kooza disapproved of, dangerous and frightening, but Kooza was a mere coward! She lifted her head then and smiled as the sun moved in a perfect line through the glass and against a low small branch. It took a while but it started to smoke and then with a soft puff a small flame appeared, quickly she dropped the glass into her satchel and snapped the branch off the tree setting fire to another before setting the one in her mouth into the pile of dirt carefully standing upright. She sat up then and carefully opened her mouth, and started to swallow the flame, or so it would appear to those with no knowledge of how the trick was done.
Kooza watched as La Nouba practiced from her perch on a log in the middle of the river, she didn't like fire. He ears pinned back and perked up in rapid motioned and her tail alternatingly rose to keep her balanced and curled under her in concern. She knew she ought to be practicing as well, maybe trying to get into a tree...but La Nouba had her so worried she might fall out!
Oh how she wished Raive were back, he always made her feel calm, better centered. La Nouba always acted nicer around him as well, less...snarly. They had come to depend on him so much, he was their alpha, their rock, they had followed him easily, and they would follow him to the ends of Telk if need be.
