The infirmary was quiet, the soft rustling of leaves from the open window the only sound as the evening breeze stirred the curtains. Aelric lay on the narrow bed, his body still aching from the beating, though the sharpness of the pain had dulled to a lingering throb. His mind, however, was far from restful. Elda’s words about his unnaturally fast recovery echoed in his thoughts, and the knot of dread in his stomach refused to loosen.

The weight of his secret pressed down on him, as heavy as ever. He had come so close—too close. And now, lying in the stillness of the infirmary, his mind finally allowed the darkness of sleep to take hold.

...

Aelric was a boy again, no older than seven. The familiar smell of his childhood home filled the air—the earthy scent of the wooden beams, the faint aroma of bread baking in the hearth. It was comforting, a place of safety. But even in the dream, he knew something was wrong.

He stood in the small kitchen, his hands sticky with dirt from helping his father in the garden. The kitchen knife his mother had used to cut bread sat on the table. As a curious child, Aelric reached for it, eager to mimic the grown-ups, though he knew he shouldn’t.

The blade slipped, and pain flashed through his hand. A thin line of blood welled up on his palm, and Aelric stared at it, his heart racing. He expected to cry out, but the sound never came.

Then, something strange happened.

The blood didn’t flow as it should have. Instead, the skin simply knitted itself back together, the wound sealing before his eyes. Aelric blinked, his breath catching in his throat as he stared at his hand.

What had just happened?

He glanced around the room, but no one had noticed. His mother was busy stirring a pot at the hearth, his father outside, humming as he worked the soil. Aelric stood frozen, his heart pounding in his chest. He flexed his fingers, the skin unbroken where the cut had been. It was as if nothing had happened.

But it had. He had felt it—the strange, cold sensation that had rushed through his veins, the unnatural way the wound had closed itself. It frightened him.

The boy dropped the knife and backed away, his small chest rising and falling with panicked breaths. He looked down at his hand again, almost expecting the blood to return, but the skin remained smooth. He had no words for what he had seen, no way to explain it. He was too young to understand.

He turned and fled to his small bedroom, pulling the thin blanket over his head as he curled into a ball on the bed. His heart continued to race, fear and confusion swirling in his mind. What had he done? Was it a trick of the light? Aelric tried to convince himself that it wasn’t real, that he hadn’t just seen his body heal on its own. But the image was burned into his mind.

Sleep came slowly, the shadows in his room shifting as the fire in the hearth flickered in the next room. Eventually, exhaustion claimed him, and he drifted into a fitful slumber.

But the peace didn’t last.

...

Aelric woke to the crackling sound of fire.

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His room was aglow with orange and red, the shadows on the walls dancing wildly. The air was thick with heat, and smoke stung his eyes. He blinked, confused, his heart hammering in his chest as he sat up in bed. The fire wasn’t in the hearth anymore—it was everywhere. Flames licked at the wooden beams of the ceiling, crawling along the walls, consuming everything in their path.

Aelric scrambled to his feet, his small body shaking with fear. He tried to scream, but the sound caught in his throat. The air was too hot, too thick with smoke. His room was ablaze, and there was no escape.

He stumbled toward the door, but the flames had already spread, blocking his path. The heat was unbearable, the fire roaring louder now, as if it was alive. It surrounded him, closing in, and Aelric could feel the panic rising inside him.

But then, something else stirred.

It was the same feeling he had experienced earlier that day—the strange, cold rush that had sealed the cut on his hand. But now, it was different. Stronger. Wilder. It surged through him, a flicker of something dangerous, something primal.

Aelric’s chest tightened, the fear in his heart flaring like a match struck against stone. And then, as if in response to his fear, the flames in the room seemed to shift. They grew, the fire roaring louder, more frenzied. It wasn’t just burning—it was feeding off him, growing more powerful the more afraid he became.

The magic.

It was him. The fire was reacting to him, feeding off his emotions, his fear. Aelric backed away, his breath coming in shallow gasps as he stared at the flames, the realization hitting him like a punch to the gut. The magic inside him wasn’t just there to protect him—it was dangerous. It was out of control.

He tried to calm himself, tried to push the fear down, but it was too late. The fire raged around him, and he was powerless to stop it. He could feel the heat closing in, suffocating him, and the more he tried to resist, the stronger the magic became.

And then, in a burst of searing heat, the world around him exploded into flame.

...

Aelric woke with a start, his breath coming in ragged gasps as he shot upright in bed. His body was drenched in sweat, his heart pounding in his chest as if it was trying to escape. The infirmary was quiet, the room dark except for the faint light of the moon filtering in through the window.

For a moment, he wasn’t sure where he was. The dream still clung to him, the smell of smoke and the roar of the fire lingering in his mind. His hands shook as he ran them through his hair, trying to calm himself, trying to remind himself that it was just a dream.

But it hadn’t been just a dream. It had been a memory—one he had buried deep, far away from his waking thoughts. He had forgotten that first flicker of magic, the way it had healed him so effortlessly. But he couldn’t forget the fire, the way the magic had turned on him that night, making everything worse.

He knew now that the magic inside him wasn’t something he could simply ignore. It wasn’t just a gift—it was a threat, a danger to him and everyone around him. It had been with him for as long as he could remember, lurking beneath the surface, waiting for the right moment to emerge.

And now, it was getting harder to control.

Aelric lay back against the pillow, his body trembling as the dream faded, leaving only the weight of unease behind. The magic was growing stronger, and he didn’t know how much longer he could keep it hidden. His fear had kept the magic at bay most of his life after that, as the powers within grew with time, he grew to hide them, or to learn to control them. The only evidence of his ability being the unconscious powers that all magic users had. Of course, he had experimented with it over the years, he was not naïve...

Magic held some amazing powers. He was more resilient than a person without magic, had unnatural intuition... akin to a gut feeling, and could influence the world around him in unimaginable ways.

impressive enough, Aelric had shown through tests of his magic on his own out in the forest, his affinity to fire... even without wanting to, by concentrating and willing the warmth he felt every now and then and had noted as the magical energy inside in his body to his hand, he felt the warmth travel in waves through his entire body toward his arms... move down to his hands... which proceeded to burst into weak flames and nearly burn down said forest.

luckily, the surprise broke his concentration, warmth surging back to his chest and flooding the rest of his body, and the flames wavered and weakened, heat dissipating into thin air before his unblemished hands were all that remained, albeit tingling.