Soulburned : The School of Souls

Chapter 11 : Remembrances

Thale's whole body throbbed in time with his heartbeat. The rhythm pounded in his ears, sending him in and out of fitful sleep.

It had been days since the fight with the Soul Eater. Days since he'd claimed the Shrive Blade from the fallen Herclis. Days since he first woke up in this room. Days since he'd been able to move more than just his eyes and mouth.

The room, he was told, was his now. Each of the Guardians had a private chamber in the Iris, and this had been Herclis's. Now, supposedly, it was his. It was grossly opulent. An embroidered curtain was hung from posts around the oversized bed. Gilded crown molding traced the oval ceiling, and the room even had its own ornate fireplace. Worse than the filigree, were the traces of the room's former occupant were still all around the room. A sharp and well-used razer. A portrait of a man and woman, maybe the Late Guardian's parents. A locket hanging from the corner of a mirror. Tiny little remembrances of a life that had been brought to an early conclusion.

"I don't want it," Thale told Magnus.

"Tough, lad. You can't give it up."

"Why not?"

The big man shook his head sadly.

"Your sword, your room."

"I don't want that either," Thale argued from the bed.

The sword was unsheathed, lying across Thale's feet. He didn't want the thing, but if it wasn't contacting his skin he felt unwell.

"Well..." Magnus drawled, "That's not really up to you either."

Thale said nothing, just looked at the man.

Magnus reached down and grabbed Thale's wrist. He turned it over revealing an ugly streak of discolored flesh. Black burn marks that ran just below his skin, following his veins and running the full length of his forearm. An intricate glyph was formed by the negative space in the mark, vaguely resembling the shape of a sword.

"Sword bonded you the moment you pushed Eros into it."

"But it wasn't my Eros!" Thale said, "It was yours!"

"Doesn't matter, you connected with the sword, not me."

Thale growled in frustration.

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"Fine. What now?"

"Well..." Magnus started, "We have a problem."

"What?" Thale snapped.

"The Shrive Blades require a constant intake of Eros. They will draw it out of you whether you want it to or not. They will draw, and draw, and draw until they're full. Essentially, it's a battery for Eros, and you're the charger."

"Battery?"

"Artificer nonsense... The sword stores excess Eros for you until you need it. It basically doubles your Soul Capacity, but the dangers of overdrawing go up significantly. And since you've overdrawn twice in the same day, that may be a problem for you."

Thale sighed.

"I don't make a habit of it."

"Hey," Magnus said, "I'm not complaining. If you hadn't jumped in when you did... well, Herclis and Ambrose would have died for nothing, and I'd be right there with them... but, you're not out of the woods yet. Picking up that Blade is probably the most dangerous thing you've ever done. Second maybe only to facing down a bloody Soul-Eater."

"Why?"

"Void lad, ain't you listening? Because you're overdrawn! The sword is drawing in Eros faster than you can produce it. You'll need one of us Guardians or a Mender with you at all times, just to keep you flush with Eros. Now that the swords bonded to ye, it won't take any Eros but yours, and at the rate you're producing it, it'd take months to fill."

"Well, that's not too bad. I can tolerate being laid up for a few months."

Magnus shook his head again.

"You won't be laid up. There's another problem. Most Guardian's are groomed for the position for years before they inherit a Blade. We spend years training to increase our Soul Capacity. Without the capacity to match your sword... you'll never reach equilibrium with it. It will kill you... or it would if we couldn't give you an Eros infusion every few hours."

"So how do I increase my capacity? I thought there wasn't a way to do that."

"Oh, there's a way alright. Overdrawing. Your Eros is like a muscle. As it rebuilds itself it grows back stronger."

"Okay... so we'll do that."

"Can't! The Sword's stealing your Eros away from you. You're not able to increase your capacity until the sword is full... which you can't do because you don't have the capacity."

"Oh..." Thale said. "So... What do we do?"

Magnus sighed.

"You're not the first person to have this problem, and the Void provided us with a solution long ago. We've been able to forge special scabbards to block the Swords bond while we train.

Thale perked up.

"Great!"

Magnus shook his head.

"They're specific to each sword. Herclis was wearing his."

"It was destroyed in the fire," Thale said, It wasn't a question.

Magnus nodded grimly.

"And we can't make more... the tool we use to craft them, the Eros Hammer, was lost. "

"So... I'm dead then."

Magnus was silent.

"That's it? I'm just dead?"

"We can keep infusing you with Eros. And we'll need to... Indefinitely."

"Well...Void."

"Sorry, lad. I've got the Artificer working on it. She doesn't think we can replicate the Hammer... but maybe she can come up with something else. Keep your chin up."

Thale couldn't keep his chin up. He was still mostly paralyzed from being bereft of Eros.

"I'll be back in a few hours... get some rest, lad."