299 A.D. Age of the Drunken Monk, Somewhere on the border of the Middle Kingdom

“Ash, you stupid little dumbass!”

The boy was sitting in the hallway of a house so small that it looked more like an oversized shed. The woman called out for him again, but he didn’t hear her, being too busy watching the sky and feeling the wind caress his hair gathered in a tight tail tied with a leather strap. Stroking the air with his fingers, he observed the clouds, as if trying to reach them. He felt as if they were talking to him, but he knew that that was nonsense as clouds couldn’t talk.

“Ash, you spawn of demonic lust, I’ll tear you apart!”

Gwel, on the other hand, could talk. Too much and too often. Sometimes he wished that she’d shut up for a little while. No, not wished. He would’ve preferred it if she’d shut up forever. Perhaps one of the kitchen knives ran across her throat would make her quiet down?

Ash got up and went into the room that smelled of herbs and old age. Gwel was sitting in her chair and staring at the cauldron hanging over the fireplace. Over the years, she had grown so old and ill that she could no longer move or see on her own, so Ash had to drag everything over to her or her to wherever she needed to go. As there was only one bed in the small “house,” he preferred to sleep outside.

“You little cretin,” she hissed, “I should’ve left you in your whore mother’s womb who thought it wise to lay with the beasts.”

“Yes, mistress.” Ash nodded although he didn’t understand what she was trying to convey with her insults. Then again, he didn’t understand what anger was. He didn’t understand concepts like “contentment,” “envy,” “sadness,” “joy,” “hate,” “desire,” or any other “emotion” many others seemed to be experiencing. Gwel had said that that was because he looked at the world through the eyes of the Fae and not those of a human. But Ash didn’t understand this for he seemed to himself very much human. However, he’d often feel like his soul was split in half. And until the two halves found harmony, he’d walk this earth as an animated doll, devoid of emotion.

Long story short, the old woman was senile and spewing gibberish.

“Throw the grass into the cauldron,” Gwel grunted.

“Yes, mistress.”

The boy went over to the table, stood on tiptoe, and tore a bunch of grass from one of the bundles. Separating the blades, he threw them into the seething brew the color of sick.

“Your mother should’ve taken this potion.” The old woman smelled worse than the concoction that was being brewed, but Ash endured. “One sip... One sip and I wouldn’t be having to deal with you now...”

“Yes, mistress.”

“What?” Gwell coughed. Ash immediately brought her a pitcher of water. She always had one nearby in case her throat started feeling itchy. “Thank you, you little bastard.”

A wrinkled, warm hand ruffled his hair. If Ash had known the difference between “good” and “bad,” he would’ve considered Gwel good but foul-mouthed. She often threatened to whip, strangle, starve, drown, or burn him, but she never acted upon those words. And during the long, hard winters when food was scarce, she always made sure that he had enough to eat.

“What did you see in the woods today, boy?”

Every day she’d ask him what did he see or hear in the woods as if she thought that the trees would come to life and share their stories to him, or that one of the animals would suddenly speak a language he could understand.

“Trees, grass, flowers, animals and clouds...”

“And?”

Ash pondered and then it dawned on him.

“I saw a squirrel.”

Gwel blinked a couple of times and burst into raspy laughter that resembled the croaking of a dying crow. The laughing continued until she started coughing again.

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“A squirrel he says,” she grunted, taking a sip of water. “Eyes of a Fae, but blind as a bat.”

“Yes, mistress.”

“How can I teach you to talk if you can’t listen?” the old woman continued. “It’s been so long and you still can’t talk.”

“I can,” Ash said, stirring the concoction with a long wooden spoon.

Tomorrow at dawn, a girl from the village should come for a vial of the potion. Gwel told him that it got rid of bloating in women, but Ash wasn’t stupid, he knew that the potion killed the fetus inside the womb.

“You can growl and hiss like a beast, but you can’t talk.”

“Yes, mistress.”

If there was one thing that Ash had learned it was that there was no point in trying to argue with Gwel. She was very old and for every argument Ash had, she had a dozen more.

“By the Queen, if you say ‘yes, mistress’ one more time, I’ll drown you in the cesspool!”

“Yes, m―” Ash swallowed when his eyes met her half-blind glare.

“Atta boy,” she said, stroking her staff. “And why are you having such a difficult time learning words? You have enough terna for several people, so you’re right.”

“Terna?” Ash asked. “And I know words! I’m talking to you, aren’t I?”

“I’ve told you about Ternites and terna and why our world is nameless, didn’t I?”

“Is it really nameless?”

Gwel swore so hard that the potion’s stench got even viler.

“By the Queen, I’ve been waiting for you to listen, but you seem to not know what you’re listening to.”

Ash would’ve been offended if he could, but all he did was wait for Gwel to continue her speech. Which she did after more cursing and another sip of water.

“No one knows where the power came from, but a couple of eons ago, people became equal to nonhumans. Not all, of course, but only those who could wield it. They called it terna. Since then, the Ternites, those who could wield this power, were taught how to use this gift. No ordinary warrior is stronger than a Ternit Warrior, no alchemist wiser than a Ternit Alchemist, and no mage more skilled than a Ternit Mage. So, it was for many thousands of years until the Ternites exiled the ordinary people... And there was no more division.”

Gwel coughed again and Ash, not waiting for her to tell him to bring him water, ran outside to the barrel in which they collected rainwater. Expecting a long conversation, he filled the pitched to the brim, brought it back inside, and filled Gwel’s cup. She eagerly drank the cold water and, wiping her lips with a wrinkled hand, continued her story.

“In general, the Ternites replaced the Ernites ― ordinary people. The maximum that an Earnite can hope to achieve is to be given chainmail and die in a war as a soldier, or cannon fodder, as they’re more frequently called. The rest of the ‘jobs’ were taken over by the Ternites. Assassins, witches, magicians, paladins, necromancers, sorcerers, wizards, hermits, heretics, hunters, and so on and so forth... Like locust, they swarmed the Thirteen Kingdoms.”

Despite listening carefully, Ash had little idea what she was on about.

“At one point, there were so many Ternites that the cities became so small for their giant egos. And then the Kings, even those of ordinary men, decided that Ternites should serve only for the benefit of the mankind. So, thank you, I guess, you little maggot, for not yet doing them a disservice. Anyway... The Ternites now roam the world, carrying out various tasks. Those who refuse this sacred task are considered heretics and hunted like wild beasts. Such is life.”

“But what does that have to do with words?” Ash asked, stirring the brew.

“It has to do all with everything!” the old woman barked and coughed again. “With you, Ash, the terna is water and you’re a fish, it’s all around you.”

Ash shrugged. “I don’t feel it.”

“Because you can’t feel it! You don’t know how... But more about that later... Let me teach you about words. All, even the poorest people, have their language. Take a stone, for example, there are a thousand words with which to describe and call it, but they’re all false. You have one name, Ash. It’s not the best, but not the worst one either,” she said. Ash wanted to tell her that it was her that had given him that name, but he kept silent. “And just like you, this stone as its own name.”

“What is it?”

Gwel’s lips moved but he heard nothing.

“You don’t hear,” she said, “and you won’t be able to hear until you learn how to listen. Just like you and the stone, everything in this world has its name. Its true name, let’s say. Those names make up the language spoken by the Gods who created our world. And knowledge

of this language, knowledge of the name, gives power. That’s why no one knows the name of our world, for the Gods are afraid of the power that it holds. This is the language you must learn how to speak if you want to understand the essence of magic.”

“Why does it have to be magic?” Ash asked.

“Look at yourself... You’re small and scrawny, you ain’t worth for anything else other than carrying a staff and an entire library in your head.”

The boy shrugged again. He didn’t care.

“Hold on,” she said, genuinely angry, “you haven’t seen me do magic?”

“You do magic?”

Gwel froze, then laughed, and then spent some time praising and cursing her Queen that had played such a cruel trick on her.

“Looks like the timing is right,” Gwel said suddenly. “Observe, little maggot.”

The old woman ran her fingers over her staff and whispered something. A moment later, the kitchen came alive. Knives jumped out of their boxes and began cutting herbs. The spoon with which he had been steering the potion leaped out of his hand and continued stirring on its own. The tablecloth suddenly rose into the air and move to the window to shake off crumbs off itself. The fire in the hearth danced vigorously and the chair in which Gwel was sitting swayed a little bit slower.

“Ah, I still got it,” Gwel whispered contentedly and closed her eyes.

“Are these words?”

“The best kind... Now, go outside. I want you to learn at least one word by tonight.”