Chapter Two: Near Death Experience

Joseph woke up with the sun. For a moment, his mind began to wander down familiar pathways: rebelling against having to get out of bed, wondering what was for breakfast, trying to think of what chores needed doing today.

Then he remembered.

Laying awake the night before, anxiety wrestling with excitement. Stumbling out of bed to the window. The night sky alight: rent with glorious, raging fire. His body burning, burning out of control. And now…

Joseph raised his head from a pillow. He looked around his room. His grandma was asleep in one of the kitchen chairs by his door, snoring softly at intervals.

“Grandma?” he called. Then, “Grandma?” Again, slightly louder, when the first was not enough to rouse her. She startled awake with a snort.

“Joe! You’re awake! Thank the Heavens! Are you okay?!” She drew herself up out of her chair with some effort, and came to his bedside. His automatic answer was ‘yes, fine’ but a mental check of his body proved that he might not be. In fact, he felt decidedly odd.

His body felt as though he’d done a hard day’s labour, sore, but in the good way that lends a person’s body a contented, satisfied air. His mind felt clear, but that in itself was a little strange: he always felt groggy and out of sorts when he woke up. It was a tired joke in their household that Joseph and mornings were mortal enemies.

Neither of those things would be much cause for concern. No, the most concerning thing was his mana.

Usually, it was a small pool sitting in his lower abdomen, just behind his navel. The pathways it traced around his body, like an extra set of veins, were small as straw. It felt warm to him, generally, and comforting. It had all changed.

Now it felt cold. Not unpleasant, but cold nonetheless. It was the first refreshing breath of winter air on a frosty morning, the pleasant shock of swimming in a spring in summertime.

It also felt… lazy? Previously, his mana had been neutral and responsive, not that he had much he could do with it. Now, it felt like it was …tired? That wasn’t the right word, either. He didn’t know what to think.

He circulated his mana from the nexus in his navel, rotating it through his pathways, trying to feel out more differences. It responded as it always had, he was glad to find. The feeling was just that then - a feeling. An impression.

As he circulated his mana, something changed. The revolutions came quicker. Much quicker, as a matter of fact. It shocked him, the speed of it, and he quickly halted the exercise. His mana immediately became still, his nexus a tranquil pool. That was new too. His mana had always taken some moments to slowly wind down to stillness. Now it was almost instantaneous.

One thing was abundantly clear: he had awakened. A sinking feeling swept through him. He was fairly certain which element he had awakened, too.

He realised he had been staring off into space, and his grandma was staring at him worriedly.

“I’m okay, grandma,” he told her. “I saw it last night: the Fracturing. I was still up when it started. I… I’ve awakened.”

“Well, that’s wonderful news, isn’t it?!” she exclaimed. “We thought you might have, when we heard the yelling. We saw the sky too, when we came to your room.” The look on her face was complex, though. Pride and joy were clear, but sorrow and worry and pain were there too.

“You’ll be ravenous, then, won’t you? Your mother was, when she awakened. Why don’t you come downstairs for breakfast? I’ll fetch you grandfather, he’s been tinkering in his workshop since we found you on the floor.”

Joseph realised he was indeed very hungry. His stomach gurgled and roared like a beast. He smiled at his grandmother, “That would be fantastic, thank you. I’ll be down soon.”

His grandmother wandered out, and soon the sounds of her pottering in the kitchen floated up the stairs to his room. Joseph’s mind turned back to his mana.

He circulated it again, trying to tease more impressions from it. He could channel it out of his hands: every youth learned the basics forms for shields and strikes, even if they couldn’t actually do them without being awakened, but it could be dangerous, depending on which element he was now aligned with. Unattuned mana would simply dissipate once he pushed it out of his hands. He didn’t think his grandparents would be happy if he blasted a hole in his wall, or set their house on fire, though.

There were four base elements, the most common ones that people awakened: air, fire, water and earth. Those base four elements were also the only four that dragons could awaken too. A good eighty percent of all awakened, awakened a base element.

They were versatile, reliable, powerful in nearly all situations, though each had their specialities. His mother had been Firesworn, and his father, Earthsworn. Joseph had wanted to awaken Air.

They were the most nimble, the most agile, the fastest of the awakened. They could create devastating winds, and they could call those same winds into surprisingly sturdy defences. Airsworn dragons trended smaller, but they could outstrip any others in terms of speed. Other dragons could fly, but the skies were truly home to Airsworn.

Therein lay his problem. Air mana was supposed to be light like a breeze. It was said that it was cool, but not cold, and that it gave the impression of being mischievous, or whimsical. His mana felt nothing like that. It definitely did not feel hot and hungry and passionate, like fire mana was described, or solid and dependable and loyal, like earth mana.

Water mana was sometimes described as being cold, but it was also called smooth and balanced. He had never heard it described as lazy or tired.

There were four more elements, of course: the sacred elements. These four, only humans could awaken, and they were much rarer than the base elements.

They were more nebulous, more esoteric, than the base elements. Not as versatile, but more powerful in the right situations. They were incredibly dynamic too: so few people awakened them that new applications for them were found every Fracturing.

If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

Heart and Soul were the first two, generally thought of as a pair. They encompassed the conceptual, subjective aspects of reality, but did cross over into more objective aspects too. Heart mana was intense and joyous, and Soul mana was vast and wise.

Life and Death were the last pair of the four sacred elements. They were not so arcane as Heart and Soul, dealing more with physical aspects of reality. Life mana was vigorous, but also uncompromising, and slightly harsh.

Death mana was cold, but soothing. It was unyielding, ponderous, inexorable.

It was circulating through him right at this very moment.

Joseph was unclear on many of the complex interrelations and interactions between the four sacred elements, and Death especially so. Simply not enough people awakened it, perhaps only two or three each Fracturing.

Joseph felt afraid. Death was not necessarily bad, but it was heavily stigmatised. It was so rare that he was almost guaranteed to get a chance at his own dragon egg. The kingdom simply couldn’t afford to waste anyone that awakened a sacred element, let alone Deathsworn.

The wrack could awaken all the same elements as humans, with the exception of Heart. None had ever awakened it, and no one knew why. Death was nearly the same for humans, so rarely was it awakened.

Even though not much was known about the four sacred elements, people still knew Death wasn’t evil. Theirs was a pragmatic society, and death was simply a part of life. The wrack awakened Death in abundance, though, and that was why it was so taboo. Deathsworn wyvernriders were easily among the most dangerous things in the wrack’s arsenal, and they extracted a heavy toll on them.

He would never be celebrated as a famous dragonrider. His dreams of following in his parents footsteps had been dashed before they had even gotten off the ground.

Joseph wrestled with his emotions for a while, then made a deliberate effort to be happy. He had awakened, even if he had awakened Death. He would be a dragonrider, though he would be looked down upon even as he soared through the air.

With aspected mana, and a dragon by his side, he could still do good for his country. He could still fight the enemy. And he could still make his parents proud.

He would just have to work harder to prove himself to the people, but he was no stranger to hard work, growing up as he had in this small town. He could do this. He would do this.

His newly formed resolve affirmed, he swung himself out of bed and made his way down for breakfast.

His grandmother was just plating up eggs and bacon and thick slices of bread as he entered the room. Joseph’s stomach growled like one of the bears that wandered the nearby woods. He sat down and attacked his meal like it was about to murder his grandmother. She watched him with a wry expression. He had nearly cleared his plate by the time his grandfather came bustling in from the door to the shop, his arms laden with all manner of trinkets.

“Morning, Joe. You’re alright then? Thought you would be.” He seemed distracted. “By the Heavens, you’re just like your mother! She ate a whole loaf of bread with no butter when she awakened!” Joseph finished his meal, and ran a curious eye over the objects his grandfather had put on the table.

“What’s all this, grandpa?”

“Well,” he said, adjusting his enchanted spectacles on his nose. “We can’t send you off to the capital with just the clothes on your back. A dragonrider needs enchantments! Proper ones! There’s no telling what kind of quality they give out to new recruits down there. I won’t have it said that the Washs can’t provide for their own.” He began to spread out the objects in front of him.

“Enchanted goggles, though you won’t need those for a while yet. Still, they could come in handy. It can get dusty out there in the wilds.” He moved the goggles towards Joseph, setting them down in front of him.

“Enchanted leathers.” He moved a larger bundle down the table. “The best I could make. These’ll turn a sword as well as an arrow.

“Boots and gloves, both with self-repair runes, just like the armour.” He put the relevant items next to the bundled leather armour. “Nothing fancy, but you don’t want them falling apart in the wilderness.

The next item really grabbed his attention. It was a sword. "Any good rider needs a sidearm. You can never tell when you’ll be unseated.” He paused for a moment, his attention drifting off. Sorrow crept onto his face, until he made a purposeful effort to banish it, bringing himself back to the present. “And you won’t be riding any dragons for years yet, anyway. This’ll serve you well until then. I made it myself, just for you.” He proffered the blade.

Joseph grasped the handle, finding it bound with tough, expertly bound leather. He could see the stitching on the grip was done in tiny enchantments: self-repair and friction runes, if he wasn’t mistaken. He didn’t think he was; he had spent many hours helping his grandfather in his workshop.

The blade was of middle length, broad and single edged, with a slight curve to it. It had a single quillion, and a solid, looped guard, too. A cutlass, the traditional rider’s sword. Both blade and guard were densely inscribed with strengthening, durability and self-repair runes, but the blade also had sharpening and channelling runes too.

It was perfect. Joseph began to open his mouth to thank his grandfather, when he placed one last item on the table. He placed it gingerly, like it was a newborn. Both his grandparents watched his reaction with teary eyes.

“Is that…? Is it…?” Joseph whispered.

“Your mother’s lance. It could only be yours, now, Joe. Take it.”

Joseph stood, rounding the table. His grandfather nudged him to take the lance. He reached out with a reverence akin to that he held for the Heavens. My mother’s lance…

Lances were the primary weapon of all dragonriders. Most combat they engaged in was aerial, after all, and so they needed a weapon with range. The enemies’ enchantments were far inferior to their own, and for centuries their lances had made the difference.

Joseph held it, cradled it, like it was a dragon egg. To him, it was just as precious as one. The lance was some four and a half feet of Forged metal: bronze, for conductivity. It was mostly straight, but a foot from one end there was a recurve, bound with enchanted leather, for grip. The grip also had a looped guard, just like his sword.

The stock, the foot of metal past the grip, was flatter and broader, so it could alternately be raised to shoulder to fire, or tucked beneath one’s arm. The other three and a bit feet of the weapon formed the blade. The top side of it was a thin tube, the barrel, slightly thicker than a thumb, and inscribed all down with intricate channelling runes. It was the main purpose of the weapon, after all: to channel the rider’s mana into a deadly lance.

Below the barrel there was a blade, more than an inch wide, starting from just over a hands’ breadth from the grip. This was to facilitate the rare occasion when the lance would have to be wielded in two hands during a melee. A small set of quillons protected the rider’s lead hand for this reason. They also helped with securing the weapon when not in use. The bottom quillon was longer than the top, and could be used to grip when aiming. The top quillon was shorter, and could be used for sighting.

The blade below the barrel ended in a vicious hook, recurving back towards the grip, and was blunt at the end. If you could stab an enemy with a lance, you could shoot them with it, and so a point was useless.

It occurred to Joseph that, aside from the lance, that the enchanted gear could not possibly have been made in a single night. There were no dragonriders in their town that they could have been made for, either. His grandfather, as opposed as he was to Joseph becoming a rider, had been working on these for him for Heavens knew how long. He was always going to let him go.

It was all too much for Joseph. He felt his throat burn, and tears swam in his eyes.

“Thank you, grandpa,” he managed, through a throat that suddenly didn’t want to speak. “Thank you, grandma.”

“Your parents would be so proud of you. We’re proud of you too, Joe. You’ll be a fine rider, the best this kingdom’s ever seen, if I know you. Now, come. You’ll need to be away tomorrow morning, and not a day later. There’s much to do before then.”