Chapter 14 – A Taste of Vulnerability

Laying on the floor of some deserted cellar, Adam was forced to reassess his earlier statement: he most definitely was not ‘fine.’

Although all his wounds had closed by now, every single part of his body hurt in one way or the other. He lay on his side in a twisted foetal position, as that was the only way his spine didn’t throb with burning pain. Wanting to stay as inconspicuous as possible, he clutched his rumbling belly in a feeble attempt to dampen the noise. His stomach protested with a keen imitation of the mating call of a whale.

Adam groaned in frustration. Staring at the dark walls and ceiling of the cellar, while Emily foraged for food, made him feel utterly useless. If even a damn lettuce would come rolling in, he would barely be able to fight it. He’d tried to get up numerous times, but every time his body screamed at him to stop. So here he was. Alone in some stupid room, in some stupid ruined town, waiting for Emily. He scrunched up his nose, repulsed by his situation. It reminded him of hatchling birds in a nest, chirping helplessly for their mommy to bring them worms.

Enough of this. Maybe if I just… Adam carefully moved his legs and held his back at a different angle to stand up. Gruelling pain shot through his back, neck, and arm like white-hot knives. Squeezing his eyes shut, he flopped down again on the hard floor.

It would’ve been awfully convenient if Emily could’ve healed him with Novaseering. The problem was—as she had patiently explained again—there was a high chance she would do more harm than good. Novaseers didn’t have an Awakened left heart, like Adam, to heal their wounds. Instead, they used the complex network of Meridians for healing. With the right heart at its core, this network was comparable to the veins that ran through the human body. Using the signals sent through them by the right heart, they allowed people to consciously and subconsciously control their bodies. It also fulfilled several other important bodily functions, like cooling it in times of heat and defending the body from disease.

Using the Weaver gesture, Novaseers could command Meridians to redirect the natural healing functions of the body in a more focused way to heal wounds. Furthermore, the Weaver gesture could be used to command and manipulate matter, for example, to knit skin and flesh together where necessary.

First problem: whether he liked it or not, Adam had an awakened left heart and that meant it was particularly hard to heal him with Novaseering. The vile energies coursing through his veins barely tolerated his own network of Meridians, but Oquira controlled by an outsider was a whole different story; adding that to the mix, without knowing exactly what you’re doing, was about as good an idea as throwing water on an oil fire.

Second problem: As Emily stiffly reminded him, she ‘preferred to focus her training on different aspects than healing.’ In other words, she had to redo her healing courses at the Academy five times before she passed. Barely. Many things had changed in recent years, but her ‘skill’ at healing wasn’t one of them.

So, Adam had little choice but to wait in the darkness. Clenching his fists in frustration, he imagined how Ajax, his old foe from the War of the Prophet, would have laughed if he saw Adam now. The words of the savage female warrior he and Emily had just fought echoed through his mind. ‘The years haven’t been kind to you, old man. That fight was a damn disgrace.’

Adam gritted his teeth. He couldn’t claim she was lying about that; if he had trained these past years, if he had retained even half his old prowess, these fights would’ve gone differently. He hadn’t been able to stop Caine from taking his family or sending them to this damned place. And who was really to blame for that?

“Schultora,” his heart whispered.

A painful shiver ran down Adam’s spine. Slowly, the realization of what he’d done settled in; he had consciously used the Forbidden Arts. He had used two Invocations, actually. One against the peacock in which he could tell how it would move, and one against the snake in which he had used Schultora’s crazy Invocation.

Probably, he would have died if he hadn’t done it, but he’d undoubtedly broken his old vow to never practice the Forbidden Arts. He had damned himself and couldn’t expect a warm welcome in the afterlife. Adam sighed deeply and pressed his forehead against the cold floor.

Had it been worth it? If he’d had any expectations of what it was like to be a sorcerer, he hadn’t imagined laying down like a broken heap of garbage. Whatever it takes. Oliver, Eric, Catherine—we’re coming for you. Adam tried to release the knotted tension in his shoulders and closed his eyes for just a bit…

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Adam was warm and comfortable. Wiping tears of laughter from his eyes, he sat in his leather chair near the hearth in the Three Toads inn. The trusted scents of sweet potato stew, meat pies, pipe-smoke, and ale were all around him. Oliver drank his wine, sitting in the largest, most dignified chair of course. Emily stood at the bar and awkwardly turned down a sad-looking lad. Caine sat with his legs wide and had a pipe in his grinning mouth. A girl without a face sat on his lap and laughed at his jokes.

With a grin on his face, Adam looked around at the many familiar faces around him. Alef’s blue eyes almost glittered in pride as he showed the locket which held a tiny portrait of his newborn. Several children ran around the inn: the street rats who had roamed the alleys back when Adam was a kid himself. Old housemates from his time in Ziecherhein laughed while playing a board game, as they had done so often back in the Badger. Lucas kept explaining how he’d calculated all possible moves, while Julienne just played something on gut feeling and ended up winning the game, somehow.

Everything around Adam was fuzzy and blurry. Have I been drinking again? What time is it?

“—so what do you do when you’re caught skinny-dipping in the swimming pool of the chief?” Caine asked everyone around. “Adam and I hid in the bushes until the coast was clear, o’course! Naked like newborn pups!”

Whooping and whistling noises erupted from the crowd.

“Izabell and Jessica ran off somewhere when they heard the guards,” Caine said. “However… there truly was a real hero amongst us!” With the dramatic finesse of a circus performer, Caine waved his arm towards Oliver, who closed his eyes and sank back into his chair.

Caine made a mocking, high-pitched impersonation of Oliver’s voice. “ ‘I paid thirty knots for those pants! And I’ll be damned before I let those pellet-headed guards keep them!’ ”

The crowd laughed. People held up jugs of ale and pipes, cheering Caine on. Oliver sighed and laughed along, but kept his eyes closed.

“—he grabbed some sticks with leaves!” Caine continued. “So considerate, eh? Hiding the titanic size of his package before the guards get insecure! And this hero just barged back in there! Yelling that the gold-threaded pants are property of—”

Adam laughed and laughed. All the old, trusted stories came by. How Adam had lost a wild chariot race through Gotterburg to Caine. The crowd howled in laughter as Caine acted out how Adam had fallen from the bridge. They laughed even harder when Emily reminded Caine of the time she had won a bet and shaved off Caine’s long black hair. Adam reminisced with pleasure how smooth Caine’s bald head had felt.

Adam wore his comfortable, long leather coat. The same one that Caine had bought for him, as many places wouldn’t allow poor people in. People like Adam. It was the coat that had warmed him during countless drunk adventures, and the entire War of the Prophet. It was the coat he had worn to the Menhir League, where he chased his dream to research the ancient cultures. After Caine had paid Adam’s tuition fee.

Caine pointed at Adam with a drunk, wobbling finger. “This man—no, not that idiot—THIS man! Yeah, Adam saved my ass big time in the War of the Prophet. He lifted my dead moose off me like it was nothing! While I lay there, wetting myself like a pup, this guy beat up three soldiers of the Pure with his bare fists!” Caine stood up and walked towards Adam. “I’ve never properly thanked you for that, have I?” He spread his arms and they embraced each other.

A stabbing pain erupted in Adam’s back. Then the pain came again, again, and again. His mouth open in astonishment, Adam looked at Caine, who merely smiled at him. Adam loved the man as a brother, it couldn’t be Caine who was stabbing him, right?

“You were there for me,” Caine whispered. His mouth didn’t grin and even quivered a bit. “Everyone told me to ‘toughen up,’ that the loss of my mother was simply part of this war.” He swallowed. “You’re the only one who really listened to me, in the darkest hours.”

As much as Adam wanted to listen, the stabbing pain continued. He clenched his teeth, trying to force through the pain and thank Caine for helping him off the street. For helping him to put down the bottle.

After a final stab, the knife came out on the other side of Adam’s chest. Adam tried to pull his hands from Caine’s back, but they stuck like glue. When he pulled again, his arms stretched out like rubber. Useless.

The people around them were still laughing, but there was no joy anymore. They surrounded Adam and Caine in a wide circle. In their pupil-less eyes shone the white light of the Pure, the followers of the Prophet. After their vows, all of the Pure had forsaken their free will to become mindless puppets in the hands of the Prophet. All to attain a state of endless, painless euphoria. Everyone around Adam smiled in the same blissful grin. Adam’s eyes darted around in panic.

“No free-willed man is capable of making the right decisions,” the deep voice of the Prophet erupted from all around him. “War, conflict, self-harm, and misery—all are products of humanity’s incapability to make the right choices. All with free will hurt themselves and others in their greed, their jealousy, and short-sightedness. The only answer is to turn to the light; to submit to my guidance, join the Pure, and be as one with all others who live in eternal happiness.”

Adam looked back at Caine, but Caine had turned into a gruesome version of Adam himself. The Adam in front of him was covered in blood, had glowing green eyes and grinned savagely. His enormous left heart hung in front of his chest, its heavy beats drowned out all other sounds.

Cold sweat broke out on Adam’s back as he stared wide-eyed at himself.

The savage Adam growled like a beast and opened his mouth wider and wider, showing nothing but darkness within. As the black void swallowed Adam, a single question echoed through his mind.

“Why?”