Neda sat on the edge of the carriage’s seat and tremored with awe at the tall mountains on either side of the road. Having spent her life out on the dusty plains; she had never seen a rock much taller than a man- let alone the reddish behemoths raging up into the clouds around them. Try as she might; she could not avert her eyes from the transformed landscape and the odd patches of something green and white in between the rough peaks. Berral enjoyed her sounds of awe, but his ears still rung from when they had passed through a light drizzle and she had screamed with joy at the momentous phenomenon. But her awe, by far, was greater as she saw the tall, black barrier ahead of them. Like a line carved through the lands; the black, smooth wall separated the mountainous region from the mystery that lay beyond. She blinked, cocked her head, rubbed her eyes and turned away only to verify that the impossibly tall, cloud-touching colossus of darkness was, in fact; real.
Barrel informed “There’s it at. Separates the Empire from ‘e Blight.” Asrael had said as much, but when he had said ‘wall’, she had thought that he referred to a thin strip of canvas- not a physical impossibility. Her mind spun as she attempted to follow it through the humid mists.
She eventually whispered: “W-why... is it there?”
Barrel nonchalantly chuckled and wiped his nose with a sniffle. “Dunno. Maybe Asr-” Before he could finish; Neda had leapt off of the side of the carriage and sprinted around to pull the hatch open. As always; the sulking, brooding, pale Asrael sat there- in the darkness; staring at the wall opposite to him. He turned to signal his disapproval of her rude arrival, but the excitement in her eyes softened any verbal protests. She shouted questions such as ‘how big is it?’, ‘why’s it there?’, ‘what’s it keeping out?’ along with several others his ears were too slow to catch. His fingers drummed on the bench next to him and eventually; he relented with a sigh and a jerk of his neck to welcome her inside. As she had the propensity to do; she leapt in to seat herself directly next to him and although he appreciated the warmth of her supple form, he was no fan of her tendency to seek physical proximity.
He demonstratively got up and sat down opposite to her and crossed his arms to explain; “I take it you mean the wall. Your questions would be better answered by a brick-headed, lowly murologist... fortunately; they are no more. I watched the last of them burn on a pyre some thirty years ago and I have not missed them since.” This confused her. Thus far; it seemed Asrael knew all there was to know about the world and surely such a magnificent construction should be well within his scope of knowledge.
He sighed and continued to inform; “The wall is ancient- older than our recorded history. None know why it was built, nor, more importantly; how. Its size alone warrants the destruction of more mountains than there are in the entire empire. On a clear day; you might be lucky to see a fraction of it, but I assure you; you will never see all of it at once.” The girl was excitable, he had learned as much from their month together, but he had yet to see her tremor with joy at the unknown. For it to be directed at a wall as opposed to the magnificence that was his creations; he felt somewhat offended. He bit back the bile he wished to spew about her continued idiocy and instead calmly continued his lesson- if only to silence the harlot.
“Everything about the wall is unknown. It is a thing of the old world- before the First Emperor. Whatever knowledge survived his reign has now most definitively been lost to the foolish non-magical masses’ idiocy... pondering its making is a useless venture, as it is neither a natural phenomenon nor something we may ever hope to conclude beyond reasonable doubt. All we know is that it is there and that it slows the leakage of magic out into the Blight, where it would otherwise disappear. If it had not been for the wall; the Empire would have been long since deplete of magic.”
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Neda scratched her chin ponderously before questioning; “And that’s a bad thing, right? ‘Cause you said everything needs magic to live.”
His grimace contorted as he nodded- hoping that soon; this infuriating conversation would end. Neda raised an inquisitive finger and continued in her line of unnecessary questions; “So... how’s the other side of the wall?”
He brought his palms to his face and shook his head into his cold, dead skin. Neda could scarcely hear his mutters; “That is obviously where we are going, you halfwit. If you were to just sit down and be quiet; you will find out eventually.” She scoffed a sour hum and crossed her arms. As much as she irked him, he could not deny that he found her inquisitive nature a likeable aspect of her personality... now; if she would only be quiet; he might find her all that more likeable.
He let his scolding hang in the air for a few minutes, during which it was clear- even to him, that the girl’s mind would oftentimes wander to her brother. He could see it on her frown- that looming grimace of strengthening pain. She was transforming; becoming stronger. Where she had once been a mess of chaotic emotions, she was now focused for several minutes on end; capable of learning how to read with a swiftness he had not come to expect from such a simple, underdeveloped mind. The small, fat man’s lessons were reaching through to her, which naturally raised the question... why was she not making any progress with controlling her magic?
He considered his past and journeyed through his memories- back to his earliest memories where the old man had found him at the orphanage. Of all the snot-nosed, disgusting children; the ancient magus had landed on taking him on as an apprentice- a wise choice, seeing as none of the other children were anywhere close to as... developed... as he was. According to Asrael; what some had claimed to be his arrogance had, in fact, been an early manifestation of his genius and his just pride. Was this what his Master had seen in him when he dredged through the filth of Capita’s nurseries and decided- of all the children; to claim Asrael has his own? Several times, the old man had attempted to inspire his protégé to take on an apprentice, but from all the bumbling fools of the Tower, none had stricken him as having any sort of potential- this girl... was somehow even less impressive than either of the foolish, snot-nosed apprentices wasting air around the Tower.
He shuddered at the thought of the old man staring up at him from whatever eternal Hell he had been banished to and see what had become of his magnificent apprentice. He would likely have mistaken whatever was happening in the carriage with some form of mentorship, when in reality; it was simply... Asrael glared at her as he realized he hadn’t an answer for what exactly this was. She gathered enough courage to meet his glare with one of her own. There was an uncomfortable intensity to his stare- one she found herself drawn to breaking from by muttering; “You never told me... where are we going?”
Asrael came back from the distant reaches of his mind to realize how intently he was eyeing her and broke the awkward eye-contact with a shift of his weight on the bench. “We are going to Pilta- a city close to the wall. From what the small, fat one has told me; it still stands. Perhaps there; I will be able to find some answers.”
Neda jerked her lips back and forth ponderously before continuing her line of questions; “Answers to what?”
He hadn’t expected the question any more than he had expected the hundreds of others swirling about his mind. The state of the magics, the whereabouts of Sargerrei- the lay of the lands. If she had the faculties to understand any of it; he would have to explain it to her. No. This was, at best, a temporary arrangement. He owed her no answers- no words. She was there for the study- to show him her magic. He waved her off with a dismissive hand and lay back down on the bench. “That is none of your concern. Study the magics and we will-”
The carriage came to an unexpected halt. At this point; it was almost second nature to Asrael to view the world through the eyes of the dead soldiers atop the carriage at regular intervals. There was no one nearby and it was still high noon above... so why, then, had the small, fat man stopped?