I emerged into the entryway of the house, too tired to even be apprehensive at this point. The march from earlier combined with my generally poor state had led to a case of complete exhaustion that I had never experienced in my life.

From where I was standing, I could only make out a few things in the entryway. There was a staircase leading up to the second floor on the right side of a hallway that led to the back end of the house. On either side of the entryway, I could make out two closed doors that led to other rooms. It was too dark in the house right now to make out anything else.

The large dwarf shut the door behind us and locked the door, barring the two dwarves that had taken me here from coming in. I didn’t turn my head, but I could feel his intimidating presence behind me. I was barely aware of my surroundings enough to put one foot in front of the other at this point, and I think that the large dwarf realized this. Coming up to stand at my side, the large dwarf said something to me in a much kinder tone before putting his hand on my shoulder and starting to lead me into the house.

We didn’t go very far, as he only led me to a door situated underneath the staircase. Looking back at me with a small frown, the large dwarf opened the door.

I shaded my eyes with my chained hands as well as I could from the light that spilled out.

Despite being in an awkwardly situated location, the room inside was fairly large. It looked lived in, with large bookcases and dressers along the wall. I could also see a large workbench situated along the far wall covered in papers, materials I couldn’t place, and tools I didn’t understand the purpose of.

There was also a human man inside. Wheelchair-bound.

If I had the energy, I would have been more shocked at the incongruity of seeing what appeared to be a high-backed wicker wheelchair in a fantasy setting. As it is, I was just numb.

As he turned his wheelchair to face the door, I could make out the man inside. He was elderly, looking to be at least in his seventies with a completely bald head. From the collar around his neck, I could guess that this man might be a slave as well. But there were two things about this man that really stood out. The first thing was the reason that he was in a wheelchair.

He had no legs. I had some experience with amputees, and with a glance, I could tell that both of his were above the knee. He had tied off his loose pants high up enough to tell.

The other was his eyes. While his irises were pure black, he nonetheless had a distinctly colored pupil. A pure, shining silver. The oddly reversed combination seemed almost inhuman.

As I took him in, he did the same to me. Unlike the large dwarf that had strode into the room before me, he didn’t look at me with pity. It was sympathy, instead.

Looking away from me, the man in the wheelchair addressed the dwarf in an inquisitive tone. The large dwarf looked awkward for the first time I had seen, rubbing a hand behind his head as he began to explain something to the man in the wheelchair. As he spoke the large bushy eyebrows of the elderly man shot up in surprise.

Taking a quick glance at me again, the elderly man asked a question of the large dwarf. Nodding his head, the dwarf spoke to the man again.

Turning back to face me properly, the elderly man smiled at me before gesturing at me to come inside. As he did this, I realized that I had just been standing just outside of the doorway, staring exhaustedly at their conversation. Too tired to even consider doing otherwise, I stepped into the room.

As I did so, the dwarf dragged a chair from the corner of the room and placed it directly in front of the wheelchair-bound man. Guessing what they wanted, I sat down in the chair. Slumping into it, I closed my eyes for a second. I was surprised when I felt large, rough hands grab my own.

Jerking my eyes back open, I could see that the large dwarf had laid a hand on one of my manacles. With an intense look on his face, the dwarf spoke a single word. Both the manacles on my wrists and the ones on my ankles fell off onto the floor with a thunk.

My collar didn’t though.

Stepping back, the large dwarf moved behind the wheelchair-bound man and leaned against the workbench on the far wall. I was frozen in surprise for a moment before the voice of the elderly man ripped me out of it. He must have understood that I didn’t understand him, so he was speaking to me in a calm soothing manner. Reaching for me, the man took my hands into his own, longer-fingered ones. Even if they weren’t as rough as the dwarf's, I was surprised by the strength I felt in them.

Finished with whatever he had been saying, the elderly man closed his eyes and began to visibly concentrate. As he did so, I could feel a small wind start to kick up in the room. Taking my eyes off the man for a second, I tried to find the source of it and couldn’t. The window in this room was closed.

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Looking back at the man, I was astonished that he had started to glow in the brief second I had glanced away. A growing aura of shining silver energy had started to radiate out of the man, growing larger every moment. As the glow around the man grew larger, the wind inside the room began to pick up as well, until there was a vortex of loose papers from the workbench flying all around us.

Starting to panic, I tried to yank my hands away from the elderly man, to no avail. No matter how hard I tried, it was like he had the strength of a steel vice grip. In my panic I stood up and knocked the chair that I had been sitting in backward, hoping that the increased force from standing could help.

Throughout all of this, the dwarf just leaned against the workbench and observed calmly.

Furrowing his brow, the elderly man concentrated harder, making the silver glow surrounding him intensify until it was painful to stare at him. After a few more seconds, he must have been satisfied, because he smiled slightly before opening his eyes.

As the man looked directly at me and caught my eyes, I screamed in pain. It was incredibly painful to meet his eyes, as they were shining even brighter than his aura. All I could think is that this must be why they tell people not to look directly at an eclipse, as this is what it must feel like. My eyes felt like they were on fire, but for some reason, I couldn’t look away.

Staring into my eyes, the man sat up as much as he was able to and adopted a stern look on his face. Slowly, the man began to recite something that I couldn’t understand in a solemn manner. As he did so, the silver glow began to move from the man to me. Creeping along his hands, it slid up my own.

With a surge of energy that I didn’t know I was capable of in my exhausted state, I began to yank on our conjoined hands even harder, screaming incoherently all the while. But no matter what I did, I didn’t even budge him.

As the silver energy began to completely cover me, the man began to speak louder. By the time that the energy had completely covered my body, he was practically shouting.

With a single shouted word, the man finished whatever he was doing, and when he did so I could feel the energy surrounding me surge inwards, penetrating my skin.

It felt like a bomb had gone off inside my head.

Stumbling back, I didn’t even realize that the older man had let go of my hands. I was too busy screaming in pain. Clutching my head, I fell to my knees.

Something was happening to me, but I couldn’t tell what. It felt like something was reaching down into the very depths of me, somewhere I couldn’t explain, and electrifying it. At a point, it became too much for me to withstand.

I passed out.

……………………………………...

Sometime later, I jolted awake upright with a coarse scream.

Despite just waking up, my blood was pounding in my ears like a drum. I couldn’t even see properly for a few minutes. Slowly, my blood stopped rushing through my ears and I started to calm down. As it did, I hunched over and put my head into my hands.

“Good afternoon, young man."

Jerking my head back up, I turned my head in the direction of the voice.

Sitting off to the right of the bed I had been laying in, was the old man in a wheelchair from last night. From the look of it, he had been there for some time. He had a blanket over his lap that he had laid a book on.

At the sight of the man, memories of last night rushed through my head. I remembered the silver light burning my retinas and inflicting an ache that I could still feel even now.

I stiffened, eyeing him warily and saying nothing.

The man must have noticed my reaction to him because he softened his expression before raising a hand.

“I assure you; I mean you no harm,” The man softly began. “I regret the intensity of your Awakening, but such a reaction is common in cases of your age.”

“W-what?” I stuttered, speaking for the first time in days. “What are you talking about? What the hell are you talking about?”

Wait.

I could understand him? He could understand me?

What the fuck did this guy do to me?

So, I asked him.

“Who the hell are you, and what did you do to me?!” I shouted at him, trying to climb out of the bed. I tried to at least, because when I tried to move to any degree I nearly passed out.

Despite getting some rest, I still hadn’t eaten or drank anything in days.

I began to topple forward, face forward off of the bed. Before I could, I felt the man catch me.

“Calm, young man.” The man said soothingly as he began to help me sit up. “I will be glad to explain your situation, but I do not believe you have the strength to stand just yet.”

After he had helped me to the edge of the bed, the elderly man gestured to his left. Looking over, I could see that there was a bedside table to my right. On it was a plate with a glass cover over the top of it, with a glass of water accompanying.

“Firstly though, I believe that you need to regain some strength after your ordeal.” He said with a smile. “Please, help yourself.”

Still wary of the man, I nonetheless scooted up the bed to hunch over the plate of food. Taking off the opaque glass cover, I beheld a plate of eggs and toast, still steaming hot.

Suddenly aware of how ravenously hungry I was, I started to shovel the food into my mouth with my bare hands, uncaring of the days of collected filth on them. Only pausing to guzzle the water in between handfuls, I finished the food in record time. Frankly, I was past the point of caring if the food had been tampered with in any way.

When I finished the food, I flopped back onto the surprisingly comfortable bed with a sigh. I luxuriated in the feeling of a full stomach for the first time in days before sitting back up with a groan.

Directing my gaze to the old man, I opened my mouth before closing it when he raised a hand to stop me.

“Perhaps, before we begin, we should introduce ourselves?” The old man said.

I looked at him for a second before shrugging.

“Alright,” I started. “I guess I’ll go first.”

“My name is Nathan Hart.”