Peak of Autumn, Week 4, Day 4

Exile, that’s the name of the game. I released a breath I had been holding. It was afternoon and so much —too much, had happened in a day. But maybe that was the nature of my presence now. Too much. Too soon. I had wanted to take a small step into this world on my own terms and traversing through an empty hedge maze had seemed perfect. But I overstayed my welcome in the garden, narrowly avoiding a group but still being caught by Theodore. It felt like a plunge in the ocean instead of a dip in the shallow end. And I was tired of being taken off guard. Now that leaving was an option, I can admit I wanted it desperately. Wherever the Countess sent me, I wanted to go —as long as there were no other Dawns around me to dredge up the old Eunora’s insecurities.

Even if that meant the Borderlands. The Borderlands.

I felt the anxiety of Eunora well up within me. This body had never left the estate, let alone traversed Maeve. She had been a child. She knew such places were dangerous, that they were where men and women made names for themselves through the monsters they hunted. This world was not peaceful, or kind —but neither was elsewhere.

And maybe that’s a blessing, that this world is similar in such a way. Maybe it’s a comfort. Am I looking for comfort?

The bright light of both suns filled my room and I frowned. That wouldn’t do. Not if I truly wanted to be comforted. It was an act of will, then, when I rose from where I was laid out and roughly closed the curtains. One set, two, and the final third set clanking as I dragged the fabric across the bar. The room was not fully dark, not in the way night is dark, but it was overlaid with gray and it was taking time for my eyes to adjust.

Before that could happen, I felt a whisper leave me.

“[Shadow Manipulation]”

The ice cold feeling of mana spiked through my body and shot out of me, suffusing the air like an aura and then swiftly dispersing.

At first, I thought nothing had happened. The shadows had remained still, they had remained but an overlay.

It was as I let out a small breath that they came alive.

The shadows remained flat, and they did not grow, but wisps of darkness radiated off the base shadows now. And they were significantly darker the closer they were to me. I stared at the shadows connecting to the bottom of my feet and felt my will pour out of me. The darkness swelled and shifted, detaching from the objects the shadows were meant to mirror –leaving shades of grey where they had been. All the will in me focused on bringing the darkness to me, around me, surrounding me. It was unrefined, and despite the clarity of my mind, the blob of shadows that grew around me was amorphous. I reached a single hand out, grasping the solid darkness –only for my hand to pass through the incorporeal body.

I nearly hissed at the disappointment before another whisper left my body.

“[Shadow Conjuration]”

The ice cold feeling of mana burst out of every pore on my body. It followed my will. The nature of the darkness surrounding me changed. The blob of incorporeal shadows pulsed once, twice, and then I could feel the darkness caressing my skin, shifting my dress like the wind, brushing the hair from my face. It was warmth, it was safety.

The darkness was a comfort I had thought I wanted.

My stomach roiled with grief once again. It was from elsewhere, memories of my life flooding me in a harsh tidal wave that I hadn’t felt for weeks.

Heels clack down tiled halls, friends laughing as we walk, drinks in our hand as we move to a patio to overlook the Dome from one of our rooftops. Names I cannot remember but faces that are crisp in my mind, dark hair and smile lines on one woman as she grabs me by the arm and drags me forward. Bangles clink as another, with short auburn hair and dark skin, catches my drink from spilling and takes the glass from my hand. A third woman, with blonde hair to match my own and a flowing white dress releases a laugh. She nearly trips and I pulse my Will, magic flows like a river out of me and a bar of darkness appears to steady the blonde. I can hear her soft voice thanking me, as she pulses her own WIll, summoning a yellow flame to dry the three drops that landed on her before they settled. Casual, soft, simple magic. But magic all our own.

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I gasp as I come back to the present. Grief is overtaken by rage. I cannot fathom a world alone. I cannot stand it, even now, even after months have passed. I was stripped of my life, taken from my world, for a game I don’t know how to play. A game I don’t know how to win. A game I wished so thoroughly I could opt not to play. My mind spiraled with fury. The blood in my veins boiling at the very thought of the Gods. Of being given the same magic I had always possessed. It was a trick. A trap. Something meant to drag me further into this life. A constant meant to give me comfort, I was sure. Because it had almost worked. It was so ingrained in me that I nearly forgot. I nearly let my memories slide off, let them disappear into the ether.

In response to the anger in my veins, the fluid darkness rolled against my body violently. It separated into misshapen tendrils that wrapped around me, constricting me. Functioning as a weighted blanket I did not want, cutting me off from the light slinking in through the fabric of the curtains.

Or maybe I did want it.

This was my will. It had to be what I craved.

A creature comfort I needed so desperately my mind willed it without my conscious decision.

I hated that it was working. The solid black darkness in my immediate surroundings made me feel as if I could be anywhere. I could be in a field, with miles to go before civilization. I could be in elsewhere, standing at the center of a bedroom I could only access in my memories. I could be free from this world in the dark.

My breathing, shallow and choppy, slowly began to normalize and I released the fists I was clenching so tightly it was surprising that I didn’t break skin. I wanted to scream, but instead I pushed the palm of my hand against my mouth and sobbed. I let the grief flow. I let the rage focus on the sense of loss it accompanied. I let the tears well and fall. I let it out.

And then, as time passed, I began taking deep breaths. I felt a numbness overtake me.

I had a notification.

[Congratulations! Mental Fortitude is now level 5! New features unlocked.]

Wiping my eyes, I snorted, dark amusement filling me.

“All you do, you stupid Skill, is feed off my pain, huh?”

It made me wonder if [Mental Fortitude] actually did anything, despite it’s claim. Or, perhaps, it simply was the difference of a razor’s edge. That would explain the difference in leveling the Skill when comparing to the others –[Mental Fortitude] may require extreme distress to grow, while it shaves a sliver of torment off. Then again, three months ago, I went unshowered for weeks at a time and only ate the bare minimum –whereas now, I was at least out of bed and cleaned up more often than not. So, maybe it was working.

Or maybe that’s just the way grief works –it wrecks you until you find the strength to stand. The waves becoming more tolerable when they try to knock you back down, every attempt getting easier to resist.

The thought didn’t stop the tears that were flowing freely once again from my eyes, but something broken inside of me understood that maybe this emptiness could give way. In time. And it helped me breathe easier.

As the last hiccups left me and the crying stopped in earnest, I felt the ache of my heart settle down. Not in a way that made it better but in a way that made me find my Will. In the dark, the shadows writhed and tightened around me as if to embrace me once more. And then they unfurled from around my body, opening me back up to see the dim room around me —still gray but without defined shadows.

I felt present in a way I hadn’t before. I felt grounded. A part of me knew it was the comfort of the shadows, the familiarity seeping into my soul once again.

I took a breath, deep and slow. I let the air fill my lungs to capacity. I held the oxygen within me for one, two, three. Gently, I released. And as my breath left me, I focused on a single crude tendril of darkness.

Smaller. Finer. Smoother.

“Denser,” I whispered the final command.

Collapsing in on itself, the crude lumps of the shadow tendril flattened as I pictured a cleaner shape. I felt the cold shock of mana leaving me again, and a sweat built as I focused my mind’s eye on the shape I desired. But the shadow had obeyed. It continued shrinking and smoothing its harsh lines, creating a vine like shape.

For a time.

Seconds later, it was with a snap and a shock of ice flooding my veins that I was forced to release my Skills. The shadows flooded away from me, racing to settle back into their natural state.

I was out of mana. That was the only answer, as an ache began to settle into the back of my mind. Every shift of the walls sent a new bolt of pain through the back of my head, and my instinct warned me I shouldn't try another Skill. An instinct that felt more like a plea to not be ignored than anything innocuous.

So, with shaking hands, I went back to the windows and gently pulled the curtains back open. What had felt like an eternity of sobbing —and then moments of comfort— turned out to be long enough for one of the suns to settle over the horizon. The light of day had begun to give way to the dark of night on the far end of the sky.

I was once again reminded I had no power. Not yet. I was still trapped as a child, but that could change with time. But there was another reminder that I was weak, and it came in the form of two notifications flooding my vision.

[Congratulations! Shadow Manipulation is now Level 2! Class experience applied!]

[Congratulations! Shadow Conjuration is now Level 2! Class experience applied!]