The season had shifted toward the colder half of the year, when the crops’ growing thirst brought ache to my legs and I carried water from the southern river to satiate them. This time of the year, the corn grew above my height and its leaves sliced with every venture to take an ear, causing an itchy and uncomfortable sensation. All was worth it, as corn was the lifeblood, a repurpose of the earth’s energy into a form the village could consume and draw strength from. All came from the field, and all returned to the field.
I had been staying at the RASA just over this time when I caught a glimpse of myself in a mirror when returning to the dining hall one afternoon and lingered to look. My body had begun to resemble myself again, or what I remembered from the reflection of water.
I was no longer some starved woods-creature, plagued with unruly hair, fragile skin, and dirt, but back to the strength I possessed before this journey started. My forearms reformed their stringy bulk, and my veins returned to a normal and healthy size after being dehydrated for long enough. My skin, a natural dark tan, lost its dried texture and became supple and soft. The red tinge of sunburn faded. I also felt physically stronger. Having proper, regular meals did wonders for me.
Bathed and clothed upon my arrival here, once again I felt like a person, and now my visage resembled one as well. I stood there in the marble hallway, just examining my reflection.
I still sometimes felt isolated. My endless walking while trapped in the “veil” Corbal pulled me from often returned to me in dreams, especially those where I’m sprinting but make no progress toward any escape from whatever demon would chase me. The burning nightmares still plagued me, as I assumed they always would.
Farm work had trained me to keep busy, so even now I spent my days running errands and gathering supplies for Corbal and other staff. Each day I noticed fewer stares, and some students even made conversation. It was still weirdly isolating to be here among who I might consider my peers for an entirely different reason than schooling. However, every now and then Corbal would invite me to sit in on a lecture, but I couldn’t read the board he wrote on. Even if I couldn’t understand every concept he taught, I still liked hearing him speak.
After dismissing his students at the end of lectures, he’d explain to me what symbol meant which sound, sometimes for hours. Amazingly, he never once became frustrated or disheartened.
Twice in these months, the Headmaster called for an audience with me. The first time, she closely examined my brand and made notes, like Corbal did, and I questioned why she couldn’t take his notes instead. She wanted me to test my fire behind closed doors- for whatever reason, she thought it best to keep it hidden from the students. Being alone with her sent shivers up my spine, but I had to consider her ability to exile me from the RASA if she felt it necessary. I loved it here; it was my new home, and for that reason I couldn’t risk losing what comforts I had regained after losing my home. She would inquire about what I remembered from my village, and everything my people did. She delved into what I told her, scowling more often than not.
The second time, she insisted I drink something from a dark glass bottle. I complied, as usual. Shortly after I drank the strangely tasteless liquid, she dismissed me. I expected more work, but she told me to go lie down, which I welcomed. This was the easiest task she’d given me. Somehow, along the way down the stairs, I had become exhausted beyond reason. By the time I made my walk from her office on the third floor to my quarters on the first, I was nearly falling over myself. I couldn’t walk straight, and my thoughts came slowly. I tried to call for help, but there were guards already coming to my aid. After that, I slipped into unconsciousness.
I was moving, or maybe sleeping, or both; I was in and out of time and I had no idea where I was, but I felt like I was being carried. I was jostled around like a sack of flour. Voices sounded and occasionally I made something out, or so I thought. Something rubbed my wrists but was only uncomfortable when I had the strength to notice.
A scraping sound penetrated my muddled thoughts, digging through layers of grogginess and sleep. It was cold. I was cold, the ground was cold and hard, but my breath was hot and stifling, somehow trapped on my face.
I thought my eyes closed, because I saw only dark with pinpricks of light, but some rough cloth rubbed my nose and it became apparent my head was covered with some type of sack. My face was sticky and aching, and felt pressed into a cheap pillow. It felt like my hands were held out beside me, and when I reached to remove the bag, my wrist [was halted] and I heard a metallic jangling accompanied by dull pain. I was lying on my back on a stone floor, or it must have been stone for how thoroughly it sapped my body heat. My wrists were bruised, and my ankles more so, and when I attempted to sit upright my shoulders were pulled sharply behind me. It was then I knew I was bound.
Ignoring my panic was a struggle, and I fought to keep my breath even. I’ll just burn the bag off, it’s okay, don’t panic. When I tried to summon my fire, I felt a sensation upon my brow like the pinpricks of a sleeping limb. No heat cradled me- nothing grew warm, and where there should have been fire bursting into life, relative darkness remained.
I hadn’t felt fear like this since this all started. I began sweating despite the stone’s chill, and my hastening breath condensed on my face, hot and frantic.
I was captive on some table, essentially naked without my blessing, in some cold chamber. The scraping stopped and I heard the thud of footsteps approaching, then a woman spoke: “Efrit, you are a gift. Not only to me, but also this establishment. Your borrowed power is not your own.” She scoffed, “A backwoods farmhand gifted the strength of a god? You are undeserving of this ability. But how easily can it be removed?” Shock struck me. It was the headmaster! She spoke more to herself than me. “A simple obstruction of the blessing on your forehead, and it is temporarily nullified. Though I am sorry for what you must endure, it is going to be, for me, a wonderful gift. I will make better use of it.”
She pulled the bag off my head and I could see the room clearly. It was a circular stone pit with runes etched all around it. But what caught my eye was the glistening, freshly sharpened serrated knife in her hand.
“W-what are you doing? What’s going on?” was all I could utter. I was terrified. I tried to believe this was another nightmare.
She avoided my eyes as she put her free hand on my right arm, steadying it. I tried furiously to summon my fire but it was still absent. She lined up the blade on my bicep near the elbow. Fear- followed by horror- welled up in my chest. Even through my grogginess, I knew what she meant to do.
“Oh! F-fields above, please! D-don’t do this, please, I-” My pleading was interrupted by my own scream when she, with a powerful forward motion, buried the blade in my arm, and I saw white.
My running blood warmed the stone I was bound to as she sawed through my flesh with the sharpened blade, each motion of the teeth tearing and tugging at my muscle, forever it seemed like, until I could no longer feel my hand. I screamed and cried, and through that I heard a repeated chant.
Despite my fading consciousness, I returned to full wakefulness when I felt - and heard - a grinding crunch that resonated through my arm and shook my entire body with each movement- more wet than breaking wood, and much messier. Small bits of my own flesh splattered over my body, flung by the relentless sawing’s reciprocation, and acrid vomit bubbled from my mouth. With each motion, she grunted, but despite the strain, she pressed onward diligently, possessed, greedily.
The crunchy grinding quieted immediately following a sickening snap, and after a few more movements, Headmaster pulled my arm away, leaving fleshy strings that stretched and flung blood when their tension broke. Blood still spilled from my dismembered limb as she walked away and set it on a nearby table.
I couldn’t feel anything anymore, anywhere, but especially down my arm, as though my body had shut itself down. I laid there, covered in blood and vomit, whimpering. The back of my skull bled from thrashing on the stone table, and every joint I still possessed ached, and I was incredibly lightheaded and cold. My vision grew dark.
I awoke again to Headmaster tying a tourniquet around the stump where my arm used to be, and she said, “Not yet, I may need more in case this fails.” I managed to stay cognizant, and my gaze drifted to the table where my arm lay.
The flesh had been stripped from the bone and ribboned into symbols, and the bone desecrated with runes and markings carved all over. Despite feeling sickened to my core, I was able to whine, “…please, just let m-me go,” each word sputtering saliva. It fell on deaf ears, and she proceeded to stare deeply into the runes she carved. She muttered something under her breath, which grew steadily louder. With every word I felt lighter and emptier, like somehow losing a vital part of my being. The theft of my limb started the theft of my soul.
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The stone room became dark, the only light a yellow flicker on her table which seemed to reach toward the Headmaster like fiery tendrils. Her speech melded together into an indiscernible mess, and I felt myself fading, like slipping into a quiet dream despite wakefulness, but instead- a descent into nothingness. I felt removed from myself, divided, and uncertain of where I was, or which part of me was really me. Each fading thought slipped into a void. Any concept of myself was lost. Even my breath slowed and my heart appeared to lose hope, dwindling to just a whisper; a memory of a heartbeat, a leaf turning only once in a soft breeze...
And then it stopped.
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Miasmic nothingness opened to a vast meadow of faded grass with no sky or sun, where a soft light glowed beneath the grass and every breath of the wind caressed the blades in rounded curves. The softest breeze felt like the hand of an angel sweeping over the land, gathering the tiny fireflies with the current that gently wafted in its wake.
A fragile, treelike figure slowly came into view, floating face down in a mirrored lake, just out of focus. Its dried leaves trembled in the wind’s whisper from the ends of broken branches, defeated. A lugubrious half-scream shook my being, and brought with it wave after wave of immense sadness felt deep within me as though my own lament cried out. The piercing agony of heartbreak overwhelmed my thoughts and devastated my very soul.
I lay there, unmoving, above that stone table suspended between time and space for what felt like forever. Eventually, rays of light breached the sky, which faded into grey tones as the sun pressed warmth back into me wherever it touched. Superimposed over my mind’s eye was the illusion of stone walls. I grew warmer as the light spread, and the whispers of the wind swept into my ears. The whispers slowly rose to murmurs, and my body began to retake its form. Like listening from underwater, a distant muffled voice spoke but made no sense to me.
What was timeless space soon restructured itself into measurable statements, and it was a short while after then that a tapping on my cheek became apparent. The murmurs grew into speech, and vision returned to my open eyes. Suddenly, my heart started pounding, forcing the blood that had stopped back through my veins.
Like finally breaching the waves above, a spasmed gasp pulled warm, real air into my lungs, bringing with it the sensation of life returning and filling my chest. Adrenaline swept over me and cleared the darkness from my thoughts. I was lying on that stone table, the scene of the grassy field still flashing across my waking vision.
It was Corbal’s face that first broke the superimposition, who was shouting orders to others and dabbing my forehead with a cloth. He continued shortly after seeing my revived eyes, but stopped, and tears welled up in his green eyes. “Efrit! You’re alive!” he cried. The commotion around me quieted, having heard his announcement. Corbal regained composure and shouted, “Stay focused, he’s still losing blood!”
He had been straddling my stomach. He said something I didn’t hear and jumped off the table, which coincidentally met his height. I struggled to prop myself up to sit, putting my hands behind me, but I fell to my side like someone had knocked my arm out from under me. It felt unnaturally light, and when I lifted to look, a somatic-robed student pulled me back down again and with a serious expression, told me to lie still. Bewildered and exhausted, I complied. I didn’t have the energy left to do much but exist.
Being out of time gave me a rampant curiosity, and I turned my head toward my hand, and found two more students with somatic-embroidered robes fiddling around with bandages where my right wrist was bound. There was blood all over. One caught me staring and immediately called Corbal back over. I squeezed my hand but the bandages didn’t move. My fingers weren’t responding either. Again, Corbal’s face appeared at the edge of the table and reached to turn my face toward him. “Look at me. You’re in shock. You’ve lost some blood. You’ll be alright, but they have to do something first, okay? Don’t look.”
Despite Corbal’s advice, I looked.
“Where is it?” I weakly asked the students. My memory was flooded with the moments leading up to my death, and I looked at the table the Headmaster mutilated my limb on.
What remained of my arm was smashed to pieces, bone shards scattered, flesh torn. I felt my heartbeat pounding in my ears, and immediately unease formed into disgust, then into rage, and I cried out something I don’t remember. Corbal shouted something, and suddenly I felt free of worry- almost blissful. My dismemberment and subsequent death were nothing to worry about. My mind became clear of panic. With sudden lucidity I asked Corbal what he did to make me calm.
He looked exhausted, with heavy eyelids and a lethargy someone who hasn’t slept would have. “Oh good, you’re receptive to that, good to know.” His voice wavered like he just ran a marathon. I imagined him writing this down in his oversized book. He continued, “It’s a placidity ritual I prepared in case something like this would happen. Good thing I did.”
Not knowing how to feel about having my mind technically manipulated, I remembered the source of all this. “Where is the Headmaster?” I asked.
Corbal, with a face I couldn’t describe, answered, “She’s gone,” and my eyes drifted to the corner where a mangled body wearing what must have been the Headmaster’s notable robes.
“We had to stop her by any means possible,” said one of the guards, a barrel-chested and strong mearle, “Good thing Corbal caught wind of her plan.”
Plan? She planned this? I was right to have my doubts about her.
The student repaired what he could of my bloody stump. He wrapped another layer of bandages around it and removed the tourniquet. “That should hold, at least until we can give you real treatment,” he said, packing up his tools. I hadn’t noticed how many people had gathered in here. There were the two somancers- the one fixing my arm, Nebrei, Corbal, and three guards who appeared very tired. Near the Headmaster’s body lay another corpse, a smaller man’s body, and I shuddered.
One of the guards was kneeled beside the student’s bloodied body, overexerted from somancy, sobbing. She was unbothered or unaware of his blood soaking into her mail.
They used the headmaster’s key to unlock the shackles around my ankles and remaining hand, and I reached to touch my brow, which had supposedly been desecrated. I felt nothing at first, then I realized just how much I used my right hand. That’ll going to take some time to get used to… Nebrei helped me to sit upright. Now, with my other hand, I felt the outline of a small metal coin with a pointed backing. I couldn’t quite weasel my fingers under it to pull it off, so I asked Nebrei if she could manage. She just stared at my hand, then deliberately focused on her own oversized fingers, then back at my hand, and finally I understood. “Then give me a blade or something, I feel smothered by this thing!”
The other somancy student handed me a flat metal tool and I wedged it between my skin and the coin. It stung horribly, and a stabbing pain emanated from it to my eyes and the rest of my face, until it eventually gave way and popped out, hitting the floor with a sound any normal coin would. I expected more, maybe louder, or fraught with malice for all the trouble it’d caused me. Blood immediately flowed from the single spike’s hole, and Nebrei pushed a cloth onto it. “Hold still, you’re gonna bleed all over me if you don’t settle down.”
Corbal picked up the spiked coin with a napkin and after wiping off some blood, examined it, rolling it around in his palm. “This is the symbol of Tellustraine. Why would the Headmaster make this?” he thought aloud.
I held out my hand and compared it to the empty space where my right should have been. I was beginning to feel dizzy having sat upright, and I guess it showed, because Nebrei held her hand on my back to steady me. Somehow I felt safe with her around. Probably because she’s seven feet tall and has three times my strength.
“How did you know what she was doing?” I asked, disrupting Corbal’s study of the coin, which he dropped into his vest pocket.
“I found traces of paranimancy in her office. I went to ask her something, but she was gone. I had a strange feeling about the room, and I snooped a bit. I saw what she was going to do, and I came as fast as I could, and…” His resolve broke and he began sobbing as he glanced at the student’s body. “I couldn’t save everyone. I’m not a somancer, I didn’t have the skills necessary to save him too, and everything happened so fast…”
Some commotion sounded from the entrance to the stone chamber like someone was sprinting through a crowd. A sturdy guard shouted to stop and was pushed aside by someone with the same clothing- another guard, who rushed in. She was frenzied, frantically scanning the room, until she saw the dead student beside the Headmaster. She cried out and everybody present turned to watch her collapse to her knees beside the body.
She buried her face into his bloodied garb, her screaming muffled but betrayed by the vein bulging in her forehead. Corbal was the first person to approach her; everyone else was frozen in shock and heartbreak. “Corbal!” she shouted, pointing at me, “You saved him, save Remi, too! Please! I know you can, please…!” Corbal was horrified and upset, and finding a diplomatic apology, consoled her: “You know I can’t, I’m so sorry… We can’t bring back the dead.”
She was overwhelmed by the desperation losing someone close brings. Eyes wildly searching somewhere distant for a solution, she half-shouted, “Animatic energy can be reused, right? If we got enough people, and they each gave a part, we could-”
“Do not suggest that lightly.” Corbal cut her off, immediately stern. The student’s posture sank as she realized the taboo of her idea. “There’s a reason it is forbidden.”
Her face twisted and she again buried her face in his hair in a lover’s embrace.
Seeking guidance, I turned to Nebrei, but she was focused on the guard’s panicked sobbing. Concern spread across her face the longer she looked. It was the second time I’d ever seen her serious. Nebrei stole a glance back at me then kneeled beside the student. As she tried to comfort her, Corbal approached a somancy student, ears drooped and eyes heavy. There was a darkness to his expression. The look on his face told me he was shattered emotionally, but as a professional at the RASA, he was also a leader to everyone in the room, and had to control himself, though for posterity’s sake or to prevent his own grieving, I couldn’t tell.
He nodded toward me and the student walked over, offering me his hand to steady myself off of the table. I reached out, but to no result, then reached with my left hand. “Lean on me so you don’t pass out, alright? I have to take you to the medical wing.” He put his head under my left arm, one hand around my waist, and gently helped me place my feet on the floor. I stood, and suddenly the blood in my face felt like it was replaced with icy water, and the room went dark.