It started in the middle of the night. Zaniyah had fainted from exhaustion. Her first day of training had taken its toll. She was oblivious to the man who had been watching her and Iath for some time. He and Iath exchanged a simple nod before he vanished into the night. Traveling far to the north in a matter of hours, he came to the fort that housed the elemental mages.
A flick of his fingers and part of the building collapsed. Of course, he ensured that no one inside was hurt. He would never dare to injure one of his precious mages. However, he was eager to chase one of them out. The moment the stones began to shift, he knew he had found his target.
Before he could react, Chickadee was swallowed up in an orb and dragged down into the earth. Somewhere deeper than he had ever been before. The orb broke open in the middle of a massive cavern. It had been decorated with glowing crystals and housed several buildings. The architecture was old, but they didn’t seem to be designed for cavern life. If Chickadee had to guess, he would say that this town was buried centuries ago in some sort of freak accident.
“Hi there!” A young teen with antlers waved at him. He was sitting on a stalagmite. “Did you get kidnapped too?”
“... Yes?” Chickadee looked him over carefully.
His appearance matched the description of the boy that had been kidnapped with Sybil last winter. She seemed convinced that this was Mart in human form. Now that he saw him in person, Chickadee no longer felt as though she was wrong. The antlers were certainly similar and his hair was the same color as the serpent's scales.
No doubt Tyrtain was also present. Chickadee turned his head at the sound of approaching footsteps and nodded at the approaching man. He was wearing a robe that didn’t quite fit around his waist or shoulders. It must have been stolen from somewhere. He bowed politely towards Chickadee and held a grin on his face.
“My name is Drake Crayton... I have a favor to ask of you.”
“Your name is Tyrtain.” Chickadee pointed to Felix. “That's Mart.” He held out his hand and made a grabby motion. “Boon please.”
“... Yes. I had expected you would be in the know.” The ground rumbled slightly, and a claw as large as Drake came out from the ground next to him. “This is a claw from my original body. It is made from an alloy that is not available anywhere else in the world and it is a better conduit than any blood iron. I am certain this will please you.”
It did. It pleased Chickadee a great deal. He walked up and knocked a knuckle against the metal. “Does it work against tainted beasts?”
“My body was constructed from divine magic. It will work against any tainted beast or would-be,” replied Drake.
Chickadee gave a nod as he struggled to hide his excitement. His mind was buzzing with all the fanciness he could make. He could create a new collar for Alton, or heavily modify Veximarl's spear... Not to mention that this could be the final piece he needed to complete Entomb. The thought of that alone sent vibrations of excitement down his spine. He glanced over to Felix, eager to learn what that god had to offer.
Felix smiled a grin full of childhood innocence. “I'm here to make sure you don't starve or die of dehydration while you're a prisoner!”
Well, he couldn’t exactly deny that that wasn’t important. “What do you want?” Chickadee took a breath to calm himself. He needed to make sure to negotiate this in a way that would be beneficial to himself.
A smirk appeared on Drake's lips. “I am in need of representation. Since the war between the old and new gods, the siblings have sought to find a new way to settle disputes between the divine. Either we fight amongst ourselves and do not involve mortals, or we select a single individual from our acolytes to be our champion. Iath is training his paladin of choice at this very moment. I am asking you to represent me.”
Chickadee's first response would be to say no. He shook his head and attempted to gather his thoughts. There had to be some reason why he was picked.
Zaniyah had left for training a few days ago. She was Iath’s chosen champion. As for the elementalists at Braytons, Trenchall would’ve been the wisest choice. Even with Entomb, Chickadee had trouble overpowering his coins. Tyrtain must have chosen him because he was hoping to use Chickadee’s inside knowledge. He knew better than anyone how to disable Zaniyah.
On the other hand, Trenchall knew how to kill her.
For her sake, Chickadee didn’t have a choice. “... I'll do it.”
Drake was pleased with his response. “Feel free to spend the rest of your night as you wish. We'll begin training in six hours.”
Though he should have spent his time sleeping, Chickadee began work on the claw. No matter how much he heated it, it remained cool to the touch. He also noticed that it was hollow. This was something that had peeled off the original claw, similar to how a cat’s claw worked. As interesting as that was, it meant that there was less material to work with.
Chickadee had been fooled.
… And he was not happy about it.
He did nothing but frown at Drake when the golem bodied man came to fetch him. They sat around a fire where Felix had been roasting vegetables and Drake watched the two of them eat. Despite looking human, his body was of stone and mud. He lacked the need to abide by the necessities that burdened living forms.
Drake began his lecture as soon as the meal was finished. “Cast off everything that has blood iron and leave it in that hovel there.” He pointed to the hut behind Chickadee.
There was a lot. He had been sleeping with the majority of it on. When the shelter collapsed on them, he had also grabbed his cane. It took a moment to pry every off and sort it neatly on a table.
“Are you done?” Drake started to walk away before Chickadee could answer the question. “Combat is a strength of yours. Your only weakness is that you fear your magic, thus you have no control over it. First, we must reach the root of your fear and cleanse you of it. Only then can I begin your real lessons.”
He instructed Chickadee to sand in the center of a clearing. His hand stretched out and a series of rings appeared around the mage. First a ripple in the stone, followed by a ring of fire, then a moat of water, and finally a spiral of wind that caused a dull roar to echo throughout the cavern.
Drake raised his voice so that he wouldn’t be drowned out by the wind. “Your powers should not have increased by much. You were already at the limit of your potential. Focus on channeling these four forces at once. Listen for their harmony and concentrate on why you are holding yourself back.”
He walked away and Chickadee sat down. He already knew why he had started to bind his magic in the first place. After all, he had done nothing but bring hardship to his family since he was born. Until his mother crafted his first bindings, all sorts of spells would randomly go off around him.
Talwyn was already struggling within the core. She had made a business deal with the outlander, Adrian Toval, and secured herself more blood iron to work with. Not to mention she had chosen to be with another outlander, Dodo Tuma, as a mate. Despite not marrying him in order to abide by core laws, they still lived happily together with their offspring. This made a lot of people in the core, along with her parents, not very happy with her.
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She had done her best to keep a low profile and provide for her family, but Chickadee was only growing stronger. By the time he was ten, the accidents were becoming more frequent. There was a concern that an outburst would lead to a cave-in, and a cave-in in the core could cause hundreds of lives to be lost.
By that point, Talwyn was a well known blacksmith. Their financial burdens were non-existent. She had started to shy away from common goods in order to work more on weaponry and armor, and Caitlin was concentrating on both school and her apprenticeship. Chickadee had been helping his mother out in the forge, but Millie had never been interested. Fairy was too young to do much of anything.
They spend their funds on the construction of a large house. One that was at the base of the mountain. Away from both the core and Carapace. Dodo made it seem exciting. Every child would have their own room. No need to share one room with everyone. If they wanted to, they could attend a school in the outerland.
Caitlin wanted to finish her years at Dogfall. Starsons had a different curriculum, and Chickadee didn't want to be separated from Sybil and Zaniyah. Millie wanted to attend a core school like her siblings, which made Talwyn happy. Fairy would be starting at Starsons that fall.
Despite it being for the best, the move wasn't easy for any of them. Caitlin could handle the bullies and they were afraid of Chickadee, but Millie took after their father in a lot of ways. She wasn't as strong in magic and causing fights only made everyone’s lives worse. Those in the core were looking for any reason to expel them. They all had to be on their best behavior.
That meant that they had to have the best grades, keep a low profile, and needed to head home as soon as school was over. Chickadee had joined the squire program so he could have more time with his friends. He wasn’t given as much freedom of movement as they were, but he thought he was happy. Yet deep down, somewhere inside of him, he knew it would've been better if he had taken after his father.
Though rare, magic had been known to restrict body growth. At least, that's what a doctor in the outerland had told him. His mother had encouraged him to have a physical done because he had been a teenager for years now and hadn’t grown an inch. He was told that he would always be tiny. Small, and easily mistaken for a child. Though, being covered in scarves most of the time didn’t help.
Everything would've been easier if he took after his dad. Big, strong, covered in muscles. Used an axe instead of magic... But no. Nearly all of his children, aside from Caitlin, where short, frail things.
“Fai’y will be fine outzide the co’e,” his father explained to his mother one night. “Zhe zhould not have to g’ow up goin’ through what the othe’z ah doin’.”
“My upbringing was everything. Heritage is important. Better for their future.” Talwyn didn't want her children ending up like most of the snobby outlanders she had met.
They didn't know that Chickadee had come home early from school that day in order to work in the forge. Six years had passed since they had moved into the ranch house. They broke off their partnership with Adrian Toval peacefully. Talwyn never sought to be rich beyond her dreams. She opened a shop and it was enough to support her family and give them a proper inheritance.
Although they were worried at first when Caitlin had moved out, Miss Zoe and herself were able to thrive in the store. They sold common wares that Caitlin made and Talwyn was able to focus on projects that drew out her creativity. Though her family was safe, Talwyn was beginning to worry that their morals would soon be corrupted by the outerland.
That was a day that Chickadee would never forget. He didn’t know it at the time, but coming home early that day had been his first mistake. His letter had been flooded with messages, but he had been too distraught to notice.
Millie was having problems again, which was one of the major reasons why Dodo Tuma supported Fairy’s schooling at Starsons. Hayden was Millie’s only friend at Dogfall. Chickadee had his scary magic, but he also had his equally scary friends. No one wanted to mess with the Sybil, whose dad kept the core's golems running, and then there was Zaniyah the Barbarian.
In contrast, Millie was fun and perky while Hayden was quiet and completely normal.
That is to say, there wasn't anything wrong with Hayden. She simply had the same presence as a puppy would. Even when she stood up to others for them picking on Millie, the two looked like a pair of kittens whose fur had fluffed up from being startled. As frustrating as they found it, they did their best to deal.
Without Chickadee to take her home as he usually would, Millie had had an especially bad day. She had run off into the caves below Carapace, and Hayden had gone off after her. After she had had a good cry, Millie came back out. Hayden hadn’t returned. Now Millie was in a panic trying to figure out if she was in danger or worse.
Quickly making his way to the core, he met up with Sybil and Zaniyah. They were trying to convince the core guard to let them help with the search. Meanwhile, the guard was trying to get rid of Caitlin and Millie. One was about to beat the tar out of them, while the other wouldn't stop crying.
“We don't need outlanders to help us in the core,” one of the guards argued.
“They're just as much members of the core as you or I!” Sybil snapped back. “Look! That's our friend, Chickadee! He’s one of the core’s best earth mages! The stones will tell him exactly where Hayden went... It would only take a few minutes. Please.”
Another guard backed up the first one. “And he told you; we don't let outlanders meddle with our affairs. I don't have a problem with you, Twist. Your eyes will work just fine down there, but Mayor Rhoades doesn't want us to have outlanders help us in these emergencies. He says it makes the core look weak. The only reason why those Cully kids are even allowed in here is because their mom helped out a lot of people, but the mayor is going to revoke that right if we make heroes out of people who abandoned their home.”
Sybil couldn't understand the stupidity behind that logic. Either way, she knew that they weren't going to budge on the issue. She went over to Millie and grasped onto her hands tightly. Her words were spoken quickly and firmly.
“Zani's going to take you home and hang out with you all and I’ll message her first if anything happens. I know these caverns just as well as you, Millie, and dad is already starting up the search and rescue golems. I'm going to find Hayden and I promise you that she's going to be okay... I'll message you as soon as we know where she is.”
Chickadee's second mistake was to leave the core with Zaniyah and his sisters. He should have stormed past the guards or entered the core through one of the outer caves. Instead, he glared at them and left. Two years had passed since that day and Chickadee still hadn’t forgiven himself.
Hayden had gone out looking Millie and had quickly got cut off by a group of predators. She was a proud member of the squire program. Keeping herself safe until rescue came wasn’t an issue. A rescue group soon found her, and they chose to return to the core via golem.
They went against safety protocols by summoning a golem to an area that hadn’t been tested for their use. Golems navigate their world upside down. It pulled the rocks of the ceiling loose and became trapped under a cascade of boulders.
Of the two that died in the accident, one was a classmate of theirs. Hayden’s legs were crushed beyond any cleric's ability to heal them. Several others sustained lifelong injuries. The entire incident was written as a malfunction of the golem’s navigation systems and ruled as an accident.
Hayden attempted to be cheerful about it. The accident was only a year after Lydia’s death. She didn’t want to make a fuss when the core and outerland already had second thoughts about the use of golems. Stallis and Talwyn even made her new legs, but they were never good enough to let her dance the webs again.
Luckily, the tainted beast blood iron allowed for modifications to be done to Hayden’s legs. They would now operate outside of mist regions. She had even applied to Braytons… Chickadee doubted that her legs were good enough to let her pass the entrance exams, but at least she’d be able to have one last adventure with Millie.
Even though Hayden was living her best life, Chickadee felt differently. If he had taken Millie home that day, Hayden wouldn’t have been out in the caverns. If he had ignored the guards and gone to find Hayden himself, she wouldn’t have been in that golem. Everything had been his fault.
After visiting Hayden in the hospital, he was flooded with rage. He wanted to murder people. The bullies who forced Millie to cry, the guards who refused his help, even Mayor Rhoades and his stupid regulations. His rage at that moment summoned an earthquake that shook the city and got him banished from the core.
And it absolutely was his fault. His magic, especially his outbursts, were what had caused his family to move out. Without Barsen’s knife, he would’ve never entered Braytons. Even Lady Till acknowledged that he was too dangerous to keep around. When Sybil had been kidnapped, Alton and Veximarl had chosen not to involve him in the rescue because his powers were so unpredictable.
His friends loved him. He knew that Sybil and Zaniyah loved him dearly, yet they babied him constantly because they pitied him. Because they knew how much he struggled to simply be himself. And, he would never tell them this, but he absolutely hated it when they did that.
Only one fact was a certainty.
Everyone would’ve been happier if he hadn’t been born with magic.