It was with a grateful breath that Alistar awoke on this day, his body slick with sweat that seemed just as cold as his skin. It felt as if he had a fever, though he knew that his strained condition was due to the detestable dreams that had driven him to the brink of madness throughout most of the previous night.
Again and again he had been forced to relive his father’s death scene, always followed by the murder of his uncle Raidon. Kaila had been there too, an emaciated corpse that had constantly pulled at his tunic in a desperate attempt to get his attention all throughout each of the nightmarish memories, an ever-present reminder of his greatest regrets and most perturbing anxieties. And then there was his mother’s eerie, saddening silhouette, undefined as she had been in all of his previous dreams, who would either stare at him with her featureless face or embrace him with a cold, alien touch.
Noticing fresh tears from the warmth that tracked down the sides of his face and into his ears, Alistar sat up and wiped them away. His mind was still recoiling from images of that devious pit of the dead that he and his uncle Raidon had discovered following their escape from captivity, a sight that he had promised never to think of again, the final promise that he’d ever made to the man. This pit was a common presence in his nightmares, the backdrop always punctuated by the close-by calls of hungry creatures, as well as the presence of his frantic family. As with all of his previous versions of this nightmare, the pit had served as their final resting place.
Suddenly sick, Alistar tumbled from his bed and vomited into an empty bucket at his bedside, which usually contained extra water for his wash bowl. An uneasy feeling was festering within him, as if it were a mocking gift from his nighttime misery.
You’re still alive, right? Thinking of Kaila, his chest filled with longing. You have to be.
Pulling himself to his feet, Alistar rested a hand over his stomach and activated a basic mending spell, which gave life to a small green glow within the darkness of his windowless room. Even with how much he had progressed in using the technique, it didn’t have much effect in this moment other than to regulate his blood flow and allow for him to collect his wits a bit quicker than he otherwise would have.
Taking a deep breath, he lit all of the candles within his room with a wave of his hand, just as he had seen his uncle do many times before. Glancing at the bucket that he had just set aside, he willed some water from the stone basin on the other end of the room to float over and into the foul-smelling container. He froze this water with a basic freezing spell that was usually used to preserve foods and chill drinks, since he didn’t want to bother anyone with the smell once he set off to clean it.
He quickly stripped down and washed his body, forgoing a washcloth for his own magical manipulations. He then hesitated in front of his dresser, though only for a moment before he opened his top drawer and then retrieved the outfit that Madeline had set aside for him the previous night.
Anice arrived outside of his room just as he finished getting dressed, though she didn’t rush in as had been a habit of hers in the past. Instead, her voice followed an abrupt knock on the door.
“Alie, hurry up! Papa says they’ll be here soon.”
“One minute,” he called, slipping on his mother’s locket after making sure that the latch on the back was secure.
Looking down at himself, Alistar felt a bit self-conscious. His pants were close-fitting, black throughout with silver trimming on the fabric around the pockets as well as the hems. His boots were new and freshly polished, made from dark, strange leather that came from an unknown animal. His shirt was made from loose, thin fabric that rubbed at his skin in an uncomfortable way, a silver garment that provided a stark contrast to the black vest that he wore overtop it, which was covered in expensive silver brocade. The outfit was very flashy by Alistar’s standards and he much preferred the simple and comfortable clothing that he usually wore, but today was the day that his relatives were set to arrive in Distan so he had to look presentable.
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“I was just getting changed.” He opened the door to find her tapping her foot in an impatient manner. “You seem to have learned your lesson, which is a good thing.”
She crossed her arms, which were laid bare by her sleeveless dress, and turned her crimson head to the side. “Who wants to see that?” Glancing at the bucket in his hand, her expression slackened. “You threw up again?”
He nodded, but brushed her off with a light smile. “It’s okay. I just had a particularly bad dream, is all.”
She stopped him with a hesitant tug on the sleeve of his tunic, sending a jolt through his heart as he recalled Kaila’s presence in his most recent dreams and the role that she played within them. Feeling his eyes begin to water, he immediately made to meditate in an effort to quell the disarray within his mind, but Anice surprised him by giving him a tight hug.
“I know you’ve got a lot on your mind, Alie. It’s okay to feel sad. That’s how anybody else would react. Just don’t forget that you’re not alone, okay?”
He didn’t do anything for a moment, though eventually returned her hug and nodded. “Thanks, Anne.” Feeling a shiver run through her body, he noticed the uneasiness in her disposition, the anxiety in her eyes. “I think that’s something we should all remember, including you. Don’t worry about our cousins. I’ll bring you to practice with me today, even if Master doesn’t like it. We can take our time coming home, okay?”
She nodded, but seemed unconvinced. “Papa said that they’re staying for five days. I’m afraid I’ll have no choice but to spend time with them. Knowing them, I…”
He placed his free hand on her shoulder and then gave her a gentle push, breaking the hug as he stared into her watery, silver eyes in the most reassuring manner that he could manage. “Don’t worry. I’ll only be living here for two more years, so if I have to offend them then that’s just what has to happen. They’ll never be able to find me later on, anyhow. Not when I can do this.”
Smiling, he focused a practiced concentration of inner energies around is eyes, which abruptly changed colour. One moment they were black and the next they were red. Finally, they settled back to their normal mixture of solid silver and gleaming gold.
“Stop showing off,” she sniffled, suddenly going red and pushing his hand off of her shoulder. “Who do you think you’re grabbing?”
“You’re so weird sometimes,” he sighed, taking the lead as the two of them headed upstairs and began making their way to the dining hall where many others had already gathered.
She fell into step beside him. “You’re really going to leave after your next Name Day?”
“I don’t have a choice. If I was strong enough, I would have left already.”
“I wish there was some other way.”
“You and me both, Anne.”
He saw his cousin to the dining hall, though excused himself and left to clean his bucket at the fountain within the central gardens. Once he had finished, he returned to his room to drop it off and then retraced his steps to meet up with the others. Before he walked through the double doors, which were currently shut, he erased any traces of gold from his eyes, leaving them a startlingly pure shade of silver. After examining the results of the spell within a nearby mirror that was hanging from an adjacent wall, a small smile spread across his face. His heart was warmed by the fleeting thought that his eyes looked a lot like his mother’s had, as he’d simply duplicated the colour that naturally traced his irises. Now, he truly looked like a Silverkin.
His hair had settled on the same honey-brown that his father’s had been, kept at a modest length thanks to Madeline’s constant and insistent maintenance. She said that he looked best with his hair shorn short in the back and at the sides, with about a finger’s length at the top. He didn’t quite care for how it looked, but she had been very good to him over the years so he couldn’t help but relent every time she stopped by his room with her pair of silver scissors.
“Alistar, my boy. How did you sleep?”
He returned Caedmon’s smile with his best imitation. “Same as usual. How about you, Uncle?”
“Hardly a wink,” he laughed, a bit half-heartedly. “So same as usual, I should imagine. Ho, look at those eyes of yours!”