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A Machine's Cage: The Young Mage
Chapter 5, School days

Chapter 5, School days

The warm sensation of a fuzzy cocoon enveloped her as her awareness came back to her. Emilie's head pounded, her body felt weak. As her eyes opened to the dim sight of bed room, cloaked in the dim light of a warming morning sky she wondered, how long had slept?

She stat up in her bed, unsure what was real and what was still a dream. If it was morning, then she had to have slept for 14 or so hours. Her stomach rumbled, implying she missed last night's dinner. Which made sense since she had collapsed. There were a few vague memories of coming too at home, of changing into her night dress, but that was it.

"Emilie, are you up?" Her father stood up inside the door to her room. It looked like he'd been there for most of the evening.

"Dad? What are you doing there?"

"I just wanted to make sure you're alright. You collapsed last night and slept though dinner."

Rubbing her eyes, she tried to push away the pain in her head and the tiredness that she still felt.

"I'm hungry…" was all she could think to say.

Exhausted but awake, Emile sat in the kitchen waiting for what ever food her parents would make her. It didn’t matter what it was, even pickled beets would be good right now, just something to numb the pain in her stomach.

Porridge of cracked wheat, at least it wasn't beets.

A knock at the front door took her father away from the kitchen table. While she continued to try and focus on anything but the pain in her head.

The family had planned to keep the shop closed for the first part of the day, to watch over their daughter, make sure she was ok and to clean up a bit. They were expecting a few knocks from people who didn’t know they were closed. What they were not expecting was the person knocking.

"Fortus! How can I help you? Do you want to come in."

The rugged man projected an air of confidence and strength, but around the edges you could some mild discomfort, as if he didn’t belong there. "No, I only have a few minutes. It's about your daughter…”

A slight flash of guilt filled his pause before he continued again, “The whole town knows what she did yesterday, both helping take down a dragon, and putting out the worst of the fires. My men won't stop talking about it. They… I want to thank her for what she did.”

“Oh! Of course, I’m sure she’d love that. Emil-” Venesar was stopped as Fortus raised his hand.

“No, that’s not what I mean. My son has told me how much your daughter wants to go to school, I know the final decision was made by Ard, but I did have input into it... If you could stop by the Keep about an hour afternoon there should be a break in some of the activity. There should be an opportunity to have the mayor’s ear."

"Of course! We'll be there. We don't know how to thank you."

Fortus held up a hand again to stop him, "…You don't have to." With that he walked off.

Basilara came around the corner, equally supprised at the voice she heard. "Was that Fortus at the door?"

"Yeah. He wants us to stop by the keep a bit after noon. He wants to thank Emilie for yesterday and thinks we can get her enrolled into school."

All the pain in Emilie's head suddenly lifted, and she perked up. Even from the kitchen she could hear the conversation. It was exactly what she wanted. Suddenly, she couldn't stop smiling.

Even as the day ticked by her smile wouldn't falter. When the hour came, it took all of Emilie's effort not to run ahead of her parents as they made their way to destiny.

Everything in the keep was hectic. A consequence of it being the day after the attack. Logistics was the word of the day, as people ran around gathering supplies, drawing up plans and letters for more supplies, identifying things that could be salvaged for supplies. Then you had the school that was slowly moving its own supplies in for the coming weeks. Tattered loosely bound pages, the school’s library sat strewn about. A rather large Black Wolf in what Reese had once said ‘looked like a suit’, whatever that was wandered around the space cleaning up and organizing the books.

Everyone seemed to think this was normal, so Emilie didn’t question it. Of course, she had seen Fense around the town a few times. He was part of a race called Anthros, a humanoid race that strongly resembled one of several animal species. She had met only two others in her short life, both traders who worked with her parents. It still seemed a bit odd, and amusing.

Ard stood around a table in the center of the open space, along with some very well-dressed people. “Always a pleasure Ard Haellyd. We’ll have the caravan here by the end of the month with the wood and stone.” Several merchants and what appeared to be a noble walked away from it all with slight smiles and nods of approval. Whatever they had talked about must have ended on a good note, at least for them and their purses.

Looking from the table and multitude of letters there, Ard gazed around the room, and finally at the young child walking up to him. If he had a watch, he would probably have checked it and made some excuse about the time. He didn't though, so of course he couldn’t.

“Ard, you know, it occurs to me that most of the town is supportive of Emilie.” A soldier spoke on her behalf to the mayor who did his best to seem preoccupied. Emilie remembered that soldier, he was the one that asked her to use her water magic after the dragons had been felled. Probably the first person besides Reese who was interested in her abilities, at least the first to say so.

“I’m kind of busy right now… Ethaa.” The mayor wasn’t focused on the soldier in front of him, nor the girl’s plight. In fact, he didn’t really care one way or the other. It was never his desire to keep her out of school in the first place, it was the town's folk.

“Edthan, sir.”

“Hmmm.” Again, dismissing the soldier while he worked on planning things out. Ard, had a difficult task, there weren’t enough in the town coffers to pay for everything. Which should have been expected, so what should he prioritize? Also, could he get more resources from maybe the local lord? Taxes were possible, but the town would probably riot if he raised them.

Their Duchess Artara was busy with some remote bandit raids and cleaning up from them, currently. Even a large town like Wollseeth would not be on her radar. Maybe he could change that. He suddenly whished he was under the Vallhorn’s banner, that lord’s family had more resources than all the gods. Fortus supposedly knew the Vallhorns, maybe it was possible to get some resources through him, even though they hated each other?

“Ard, she helped saved the town, that’s not an exaggeration.” Fortus broke the mayor’s prolonged silence, and his train of thought.

Ard sighed and looked at the child once more. “The town owes you a great debt. I won’t deny that. But, you know the damage you caused years prior?”

Emilie nodded, her smile dropping threating to be replaced by tears, this didn’t seem like the direction she wanted this conversation to go.

Ard took a second reading of the room, which was only a small sampling of the town, barely 40 in all, including the soldiers that had to be there. Still, more than 5% were here pausing from all the work that needed to be done and just to vouch for the child. No one present seemed opposed in any way. It was reasonable for him to conclude, no one would fault him for giving the girl a chance. Particularly with a few minor conditions.

He smiled at Emilie with the appearance of man trying and selling her a used car that didn’t exist. “I can tell our choice to keep you from school has shown you the dangers your magic can pose? So long as you can promise not to cause any more damage. I think having you attend school is a reasonable concession I can make.” In his mind a perfect arrangement, taking ownership of her future success while still giving him a scapegoat should it fail, namely her.

A few of the people present clapped, while Emilie and her parents could only smile and thanked Ard.

With a nod from Ard, Fense opened his own notebook and made a quick note. Adding one new student to his roster.

With that out of the way, Fense had his own problem to deal with, “Fortus, do you have a chalk board around here?”

The day was little more than a blur after that. She was still exhausted from yesterday, yet chores had to be done. For some reason she couldn't stop her hands from shanking, and may have broke a plate and jar.

Thankfully, the house hadn’t suffered much. But there was still a large amount of debris and cleaning that was needed. Part of the exterior would need more whitewash; her father would likely handle that.

It was disappointed she didn’t see Reese, but she knew he was still healing too. Maybe if she had been stronger she could have stopped him from being hurt in the first place? Maybe no one had to die. It was another thought to add to her own notebook.

When the day finally ended, Emilie felt so excited she thought she’d never sleep. But as soon as her head hit the pillow the exhaustion took over and shut her eyes for her.

Dreams.

Like all dreams, they weren't understood by the waking mind, and it scared her. As she opened her though, something happened. She couldn't move, couldn't even be sure her eyes did open. Her heart pounded, sprinting in her chest. Her body was covered in sweat despite the cool air. She had to get up, but that thing was on her chest, that demonic thing made of smoke and Ash. Scream, she had to scream, she couldn't scream.

The twisted monstrosity opened its mouth and inside, was fire. It lunged for her, engulfing her body and mind, as she finally woke up to that scream she needed.

“Ahhhh!” She was breathing heavily, her whole body shaking. “Ha, ha, huh, emmmm.” Her head feel on top of her knees as she began to cry.

“Emile are you ok?” her mother awoken by the scream came to comfort her child. “it's just a bad dream… shus, shus.”

Her headache was back. Thankfully, her mother stayed with her. There were several hours before dawn, but somehow, the two of them found another moment of rest.

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Once morning fully came around, she was better. The dark dream, faded away in the morning light.

The next day and the inside of the keep was still hectic, though perhaps a bit less than yesterday. Despite the large number of children present, most were well behaved, and didn't interfere with the adults who were busy planning things.

The large center table seemed the best place for her to sit, and in front of her, was her new notebook, the first few pages already filled. Her parents wanted her to use a quill with them, saying would probably be better with ink. But Reese always used charcoal pencils. So she insisted that’s what she would use.

The smile Emilie had felt like it had taken over her entire face. This was everything she wanted, well at least up till now.

"I never knew someone could be so happy about school?" A blue haired elf girl mocked Emilie, slightly.

The attitude from the older girl didn’t make any sense to Emilie. "I mean, how can't you be excited? Learning new things, finding out the puzzles of the world and solving them. It's fun. Isn't it?"

"Don't tease her too much, Venginn. besides you're just as much a book worm as I am." A strange looking boy seemed to stand up for her, at least a bit. The boy was by all accounts unique. His hair a miss-mash of browns, blacks and white, his ears slightly pointed like a 1/4 elf or less, but his skin was the oddest thing. Patches of tan and pure white, a condition she would later learn was called vitiligo. "Sorry about that, you're Emilie, right? I'm Samil."

The boy held out his hand much like Reese had months prior.

Venginn just sighed and started ignoring the two of them. "Don't pay too much attention to her, she'd just Envious of your skills. Every knows what you did a few days ago. I am kind of envious as well."

"Really? The only one who's ever said that to me is Reese, up till now everyone's been scared of me." A glint of hope lit up in her eyes, until now most people were afraid or scared of her. Perhaps, this magical place truly had people that could understand her?

"I mean, my parents told me about you. They said you started some fires and almost killed your family." With those words the glint quickly died out replaced by a slightly bitter smile.

Perhaps sensing she was taking it the wrong way Samil began stuttering and backing up a bit, "But I saw you put the fires out, and heard you took out a dragon. You're scary, but cool too!"

Her smile waned a bit more, she never really expected others to understand her. Hopped perhaps, but never really expected. Still, they weren't running from her, and they she was cool. Maybe, scary but cool was good? Plus, they were talking to her, which was a massive improvement! Maybe with time there truly would be hope!

She did have one friend, no reason to think she couldn't make more, with time. She pushed those negative thoughts far away from her. Today was the first day, the first day of school, and she was going to be happy! Forcing her smile back, she nodded at Samil in agreement and thanks.

Seeing Reese walk in she couldn’t help but squeal a bit. No matter how mundane it may have seemed to everyone else, this was where she wanted to be, and she would remain excited.

The wolf, Fense began the class right after the last bell sounded. “Beginning our lesson, lets pick up where we left off last time. Multiplication tables…”

The class groaned, but she couldn't understand why. Math was fun.

"Yes, yes. Get the groans out now.

Multiplication tables. She already knew these things! Her first impression seemed to be a good one, as quickly took charge of her small group and helped tutor the other students.

Samil and Venginn seemed to take charge of the students around them, as did Reese whose table finished first followed by her own.

It was the first day, and she already felt ahead of everyone else. Well, everyone but Reese, but she’d catch up to him.

At the end of the day, she watched Reese make some notes in that weird script he used. Already he was a good 30 pages or so into it. It seemed like a good chance to ask a question that had been bothering her.

"Why did you choose your notebook? There were several in the store, so why that one?"

"Oh… I don’t know honestly. It seemed like a good one. Good binding, nice paper. I mean… I'll be honest, I don't really know notebooks very well."

Emilie laughed, it wasn't what she expected to hear, but it was enough. For at least one topic, it felt like they were equal. Neither knew what made a good notebook.

Just over half a week later, and Emilie would have something else to celebrate. Something fairly minor though, her Birthday. It was the 29th of Sootemer, and was a Vobeesdeg a perfectly middle of the day kind of day for a perfectly middle-some kind of celebration.

Her morning meal was fairly normal, breakfast fruit and bread, her father would probably make something she really liked tonight, maybe even sweet potato pie. Some last-minute notes on her homework to flush it out. A quick face wash and then off to the old keep for classes. It seemed like the school wouldn’t be ready for at least a few more weeks, which suited her just fine. It was large, and despite the military nature, strangely inviting, like a tiny castle with a friendly court.

The main focus of the day’s lectures, was history and geography. Umileis The more north-eastern ocean between Domconti and Absiter. There were a lot of smaller island and trade routes between the two continents, it fairly dry stuff. But Uginshim was kind of cool. A large island full of ports and cities. Adventure!

The island was just to the south east of the Kingdoms and boasted a large number of Anthros, like Fense, but with more diversity. One of the coolest cities was Yooshus, blue waters in Anthro, it was the largest port city, Fense passed around the original textbook which was still in it's leather bindings. The pictures and drawings were, beautifully. Large hills and mountains, tropical trees, she could almost feel the waves and the wind.

The city was often used for smuggling, and piracy. Anything was legal there, except for slavery, all across Uginshim slavery was illegal, the island was a safe harbor for run away slaves, often from Fresall.

Regardless, she had plenty of information for her homework tonight. Which was interrupted by Reese.

"Hey! It's your birthday! Happy birthday Emilie!", she did not expect this level of excitement from Reese. He was practically ready to hug her, and sing. It wasn't a big deal, just a birthday, everyone had one.

"Thanks." She tried not to blush at the attention, but it was hard not to be a little embarrassed.

"Why are you always so excited when people have birthdays?" Venginn chided Reese. "Emilie you should have seen him on the second day of school when he found out it was Hemmsal's birthday. Talking about cake and presents? For a birthday? Who does that. I don't even think noble’s do that. Poor Hemmsal, I don't know what Reese even said to him."

He shook his head, "I just think birthdays are important. They're when you were born, when the world first came to know you. I think that's worth celebrating." Reese shrugged after seeing Emilie's embarrassment and the push back a bit from everyone around him. He wasn't going to win this fight and it was clear to him he was making people uncomfortable. Instead he went back to his homework.

"Birthdays are fucking stupid. Who cares." An older blond-haired boy half growled in response at the chipper and silly conversation around him. His brown eyes growing dark as he glared at Emilie, like his soul was trying to suck in hers.

"Gezal, watch your language. The rest of you focus on your homework so I can go home." Fense chastised the older boy who seemed to be sulking off the side of the classroom.

Emilie couldn't be sure, but it looked like he was in some kind of pain or distress. In some ways It seemed familiar to her. The boy slammed the book he was working in and marched out of the room. It seemed unlikely he was done with his homework.

Emilie looked concerned as if she did something incorrect. "I think I did something wrong?"

"No, it wasn't you. Gezal has been a di-"

"Eh hem?" Fense, listening to the conversation cut Venginn off before she could finish.

"I mean, he's been…" Venginn tripped over her words trying to find an alternative for the expletive she wanted. "… thorny? Since his dad came back from fighting the dragons. He was burned really bad."

Despite the all the back and forth, it was a nice distraction and a nice gesture on Reese's part to think about her. For a few moments she forgot her hands were shaking.

As they left the keep, it seemed like they wouldn't stop.

"Emilie, are you ok?"

Her legs pulsed, and body rocked in shock. She wasn't expecting Reese behind her, but, why was she so jumpy? "Reese, sorry, I just… I don't know what's wrong with me."

"You've been having nightmares?"

How did he know that?

"It's… I read about it in one of my books. A scholar called it Post Traumatic Stress Disorder."

She had never heard that term before, how could she, when it didn't yet exist in the world.

"Well what do you do about."

Breathe.

That's what Reese taught her. It was absurd, only something he would think of, she doubted he founded it in a book. Yet, her hands weren't shaking as badly. When they were done.

"It can happen after an extreme event, anything that drops a lot of stress on you can cause it to manifest. Breathing helps when you get those panic attacks. Beyond that, writing down what you feel, not running from it but facing it and overcoming it, can help."

"So, just write it down…" There was a certain appeal to that idea.

"I mean, it's a good place to start. Write down what happened, what you did and what was outside your power to change. Identify things that trigger your attacks and try to understand why. Strength doesn't just happen; you need to work at it. Also, remember to breathe. That… that's probably the best thing you can do, and it's easy." Reese took in a large breath, his eyes opened and peered into hers, as if looking at something deeper. "Just. Breathe."

As she sat at the kitchen table, the roast beast smelled… She was wanted to say delicious, but no. It smelled like that day. The meat, looked like her neighbors. The trembling in her hands, grew, threatening to take her. "Just breathe." Reese's voice echoed in her head.

"1… 2… 3…" She closed her eyes and whispered to herself. "4… 5… 6…" Each number preceded a deep intake of air, that she would hold before letting go. The thoughts attacking her, she would let those go to. "7… 8…"

"Emilie!" Her father brought her back. The concern in voice was evident, but his face screamed it.

Her hands weren't shaking, at least not as bad. A smile crossed her lips, "I'm fine dad, just… Breathing."

Roast Beast was one of her favorite dishes, and she could smell that sweet smell of a pipe and it's sweet roots. Her parents put a lot of effort into this, they cared.

Dreams again.

Not as bad, but still, that thing was sitting on her chest. "Just breathe".

When it finally let go, she didn't scream. Though she was shaking. She would be fine, just needed more time.

Several days later, she felt good. It had been 2 days since the last nightmare, and that one wasn't that bad. Of course, Reese and her were not the only ones suffering. That older boy Gezal, every day he seemed a bit worse, snappier and more aggressive. Would the breathing techniques help him like it helped her? She wouldn't get the chance to find out.

Outside the keep, Gezal broke down in front of Reese, as he laid bare everything happening to him.

“I don’t understand. What does being a knight even mean, why is it so important to that fool? He hasn’t done anything since he got back. Just sits in the kitchen and drinks or goes to the inn and drinks. Mom, he… yelled at her last night. I think if he could have, he would have hit her. And me."

Emilie's parents never hit her. Even when she really screwed up, the most they would do is yell. It was hard to imagine what she would do if they did. But she did know it would hurt, and not just physically.

"He keeps going on and on about being a knight, about honor and how useless he is now…" Gezal stopped drawing the threw the stick across the yard. "I don’t get it. He’s alive, he has us. Isn’t that enough?”

She sat behind Reese and watched him. All he was doing was listening, not giving advice, not making suggestions, or trying to fix things. It was weird seeing him that quite, and somber. What was he doing?

“Last night. I think he tried to kill himself.”

With that there was silence. What would Reese say or do. What should she say or do? It was too confusing.

“Fucken fight me damn you cowards!” The shout of deeply drunken man carried across the yard. Kight Told limped forward, arms and neck bleeding like he had just been attacked by someone or something.

It was scary. Like he wanted to die. Eventually Fortus arrived and somehow managed to talk the suicidal knight down.

Those two, Fortus and Reese, it was like they had the ability to win a battle with just words and silence.

It should have felt good to watch them, but for some reason it felt like she was missing something. It felt, like that shadow of his was growing again.

The next day, Gezal was in class again. He seemed different. There was still a dark cloud over him but he didn't seem like everything was setting him off. After school, she was going to try and do what Reese did.

Looking back at him, he had enough pages to keep him busy for the rest of the afternoon. It was a good time to try and make new friends, and maybe be useful herself.

She stopped the older boy just outside the keep. "Are you ok, Gezal?"

"Why wouldn't I be?" He legitimately seemed fine, but maybe, something in his eyes seemed sad.

"I mean your father-"

"Went nuts? Yeah, I was there."

"That's not what I was going to say." Emilie sighed, this was hard. How did Reese get him to talk. "I just. The past few days you've been really down. I thought maybe I could help."

Gezal laughed, "Like Reese did?"

Emilie didn't say anything, was it that obvious?

"It's ok, I see you always trying to mimic him. He's an interesting kid. Smarter than most adults, but really annoying sometimes."

A laugh escaped from her. Gezal and her didn't seem to have much in common, like there wasn't much to build a friendship off of. But maybe there was one thing. That strange boy who entered both of their lives.

"I could use someone to talk to. Want to wander around for a while?"