A few days passed in much the same meaningless blur as every other, the smear of time coloring her life. She was left to her thoughts too much; with her mind moving slowly, she didn’t appreciate this too much. She had given up on the putrid green lines appearing- all she could control by this point was control the haze appearing around people. If she blinked three times in quick succession, it would vanish or rematerialize.
She spoke little to her parents in these days, but there was an implicit common understanding in the silence that wasn’t said. What little words were spoken were restrictions on her: She can’t leave the house; She must go to sleep; She can’t see her friends. She didn’t bother to argue, she knew it was a losing game at the best of times, and this was certainly not. She didn’t even bother to vocalize a reply, just nodding gently as the hollow sadness encroached on her. She eagerly awaited the end of this.
She explored his memories, and Eos found a treasure trove: An understanding of Mathematics, Computer Science, and Economics; Knowledge of various sciences from chemistry to physics to biology; Years of experience watching people, influencing people; Engineering and architecture; how cars and engines work. She also found more intimate memories: trauma and lovers and bitter rivalries and lessons learned, the value of work, mistakes, and successes no one else could understand. It would have taken her a lifetime to get this knowledge, but instead, it was there in an instant.
And it was all useless.
She knew it all- she knew that she knew it. But she also knew it was useless.
And she still didn’t know magic.
“Dead end after dead end.” She muttered to herself in English.
But I probably understand magic better than anyone else, She thought. But understanding isn’t application- he knew that much well.
Eos threw herself onto her bed. Midday light streamed through the open window, the wind blowing the curtains gently in a hypnotic sway, while trees and birds conversed. The sounds of animals were heard off in the distance- but she perked up at the ever-loudening sound of horses. She tried to look out her window to see who was coming, but her window faced away from the town. After a few minutes of trying to crane her neck, she heard the front door open, and Moore speaking to someone. She couldn’t make out any of the words but decided to head downstairs regardless.
Leaping off the windowsill, she moved across the floor and to her door. However, in her attempt to go downstairs, she couldn’t open the door- it was locked. She still heard Moore discussing something with the man who had come to visit. Eos decided to play along with whatever was planned here and crawled into her bed. After a few minutes, the muffled conversation fell to mum, and she heard their footsteps come to her door. She saw a faint, light green glow from beneath the door, followed by a slight click emanating from the door and a middle-aged man walking into her room.
He was large, with a small pair of glasses and neatly trimmed snow-white hair. He had olive skin and wore an expensive-looking suit, and his ears were curved, not sharp. He is a human. At his side was a small case that jingled as he set it down beside her bed, and he kneeled next to the bed. Standing up again, he smiled gently at her.
“How are you doing, Eos?” He asked, smiling.
“Who are you?” She responded, flatly.
He shook with mirth, a short but hearty laugh. “My name is Doctor Meddyg, but you can just call me Meddyg. Your father called for me after you had an accident.” He explained, “So would you mind describing how you feel?”
“Well, I feel slow.” She sat up in her bed, “And my eyes were blue, not green. I feel like… I’m not thinking fast?” She said, questioning herself.
Meddyg muttered in agreement, and Eos noticed he wasn’t writing any notes down or anything. “Is that all?”
“I just feel like… things are weird?” She said, “A few days ago, I saw… green. Like green…” Eos began to make hand gestures to describe a line, pointing a finger out and moving her hand left and right “Green these in my vision, spelling out words- words I know, but I can’t say its name. And, and I can see people’s… green… greenness around them, but not you.” she began to make a different hand gesture, motioning around her body. She didn’t quite know why she was saying this, she’d never told anyone before.
“I see,” Meddyg said, “And this green you can see, it’s the same color of your eyes?”
She murmured in agreement, and Meddyg continued “And as for your head, you feel slow you said? Is it painful to look into bright lights, like outside?”
“Sort of?” she said, mindlessly tracing a pattern on her blanket, “Like when I open my window it hurts, but then everything becomes more dim and it doesn’t hurt anymore.”
Meddyg nodded before replying, “All right, I’m going to run some tests on you if that's okay.” Again, Eos murmured in agreement, and he put his hand on her forehead and laid her back down in bed.
“Close your eyes.” He said, and she complied. A light green glow, similar to before, appeared over her and she heard Meddyg muttering above her. Before long, the light show above her ended, and she heard the telltale scratching of quill on paper.
“Alright, you can open your eyes now.” He said, and she immediately shot up, summoning a chortle from him.
“Was that magic?!” She exclaimed, eyes wide.
“Yes, of course.” He replied, laughing from his belly, “How else would I run diagnostics?”
“Diag…” she muttered, “Err, can you teach me magic?!”
“Hummm,” He said, “I’m not sure.”
“Please?” She pleaded, eyes wide.
He seemed to pause for a moment, before rummaging through his bag and pulling out a small vial. Within the vial was a black, runny liquid. He swished around the vial a tiny bit, and small white bubbles formed within the liquid.
“Watch closely,” He said, placing the vial down. He said unintelligible words, and simultaneously his hands moved in some seemingly random movements- causing glowing lines to begin appearing across the lines he was drawing with his fingers, with the same light green as before. The light green lines glittered, small sparks jumping off the line as it worbled in a straight but messy line. The aura covering the line seemed to straighten it out when Meddyg’s hand turned. The light green magic seemed dazzling to Eos, with her being stunned by the simple light show. The muttering died down after a moment, and the black liquid began to radiate with the same light green.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
She watched the entire scene in stunned awe, her mouth opening slightly, and he heartily smiled. “This is a spell for detecting poison. To cast a spell, you have to get all of the words, and all of the movements correct. Even more so, you have to be concentrated on it the entire time.”
Eos nodded, and Meddyg placed it in front of her. “I’ll give you one shot.” He said, “you have to match what I said and my hand movements exactly- if your off by a little, or if your not focusing, it won’t work.”
She looked at it and tried to position her hands how she saw Meddyg do it before he started. “Like this?” she asked, turning her head to him.
He shook his head slightly and moved her hands in a small change but into a significantly more uncomfortable position. Meddyg began to speak the unintelligible words, trying to guide Eos’s hands as she repeated after him. She tried to focus on it as much as possible, trying to detect poison within the vial, trying to get the poison to glow. However, despite her concentration, no green emitted from neither the vial nor her hands.
When Meddyg took his hands off of hers, she visibly deflated and felt an upwelling of tears. Before Meddyg could say a word, she began to bawl at her failure.
Meddyg held her head against him like a bear and gently comforted her “It's okay- Most people struggle a lot with their first spells. Your words were really good for only hearing them once too.”
“Really?” She said, sniffing.
“Really, you did great for so little preparation,” Meddyg replied, wiping her ears with a handkerchief.
Eos nodded, and Meddyg began to pack his stuff up. Eos had a question cross her mind as Meddyg packed up, “Where did you learn magic?”
“Humm” Meddyg paused for a moment, “I enrolled at the SHARD when I was only about your age.” Eos wasn’t sure how to reply, but Meddyg was the first to. “Would you like to come to listen to the diagnosis with your parents?”
Eos replied positively, and jumped out of bed, heading down to the main room with Meddyg. She saw her parents sitting at the table, the same as when she asked about learning magic. The atmosphere in the room was tense, and even more papers were littered on the table than before. Meddyg sat down at the table, and Eos jumped into Thea’s lap, with Thea beginning to run her hands through Eos’s hair.
“A few of the most obvious things first,” Moore began, “Eos has been very clearly not transformed into a demon. We’ll get to her eyes in a moment, but the most significant issue she seems to be having is a concussion- she should be fine in a week or two, with how much time has already passed.”
Thea seemed to visibly relax with the information, but Moore remained tense as Meddyg continued.
“However when it comes to the eyes, she seems to be a rare case.”
“Rare?!” Moore exclaimed.
“It's something I don’t see often- an enchantment that is random seeming from nature. However, whenever this enchantment manifests, it is always a boon- it seems to have occurred in the same event that gave her a concussion, and allows her to see things others can’t. For instance, when I was running my diagnostics, I could see that her eyesight was extremely good.” Meddyg turned to Eos, “From this house, can you see clearly what is going on in the town square.”
Eos nodded, “When I look outside the windows, or I’m at the front door, I can see Saer and Aderyn and Cedric playing. Just the other day, Cedric managed to beat Saer for the first time!” Her pervasive happiness died down after a moment, “I wish I could have congratulated him.”
Meddyg looked at Eos, before turning to Thea. “I’ve had a few patients like this- one whose torso could not be pierced with the sharpest of scalpels or magic. Another, whose sinister arm negated all magic that came near it. But, the effects of this are super rare- I’ve only seen two previous. There’s no name for it, but it seems Eos, your daughter, has this in her eyes- perhaps her entire head. It’s extremely rare, however; this is only my third time seeing this type of enchantment.”
Eos’s parents looked mutually stunned at this information, “and they’re all fine?” Thea spoke, “So everything will be okay?”
“Her eyes might never go back to the color they were before, but the enchantment has exclusively enhanced the individual whenever I’ve seen it in the past, and she seems to be enhanced by it now.”
Thea nearly jumped out of her chair and clutched Eos in her arms. “Oh Eos! I was so worried!” Eos wasn’t sure, but she felt that Thea was choking back tears in her words.
However, despite Moore looking more relaxed than before, he still had an air of tension about him. “I’m glad that’s resolved,” Moore began, “But we have other matters to discuss. We only have about…”
“A week.” Meddyg said, finishing Moore’s sentence. “I won’t be able to return to the capital in time if I needed to return here in time. I’m planning on visiting other towns nearby before circling back here. I’d only return here after about 2 towns, and I’m not sure how much space would be left in the caravan- I can’t ensure everyo-”
“Just the kids.” Moore interrupted, “Saer, Aderyn, Cedric, and Eos. They’re too young to do anything- we should be fine in only a few days, I can send a letter when it's all done with. I think we can… give enough tribute.”
Thea turned to Moore, still holding Eos, “Do we need to use euphemisms? We’ll live, but they’ll likely raze the town. We don’t have enough people or farm animals in this town- they’ll take whatever they can get in exchange for that though. Even teenagers can help fight them off, but… there’ll be losses. We’re not fighters, no one in this town is. We can’t really stop them, and there’s no point for ad-”
“I know.” Meddyg responded, “I’m the best you’ll get, but we all know they won’t kill you all. It’ll be brutal, but the campaign isn’t to kill people, not exactly. They want your money, your animals- the crops will die, and it’ll be a hard year. I think that the best you can hope for is that the town’s crops can grow next year, and you don’t lose too many people. When I bring them back, I can help with the triage.”
“Thanks, Meddyg. We owe you another one.” Moore was still clearly tense but seemed more content with the incoming fate.
Thea finally let go of Eos’s head, with Eos largely confused about what words were just said- she could hear despite Thea hugging her tight, but many of the words she did not understand- at least not in common.
“I should be on my way- I need to get three towns over. It should take only three days to reach them, and three towns to visit past that.”
“Mhm, we shouldn’t keep you. We just…” Thea seemed to choke up, and Moore was looking around pensively, “Please, just remember to keep at least 4 empty seats open.”
Meddyg simply nodded, and, without saying another word, bid farewell to the elven family, leaving the premises of their house. It was only as Meddyg left that Eos finally looked out the window, and saw a simple covered wagon, with two horses at its head. The wagon looked to be aged and old and rickety, and Eos wondered why she hadn’t heard it before. The wagon looked like it also had some amount of medical supplies in it, and she saw Meddyg clamber into the front of the wagon. Both the horses were brown, with a brown mane and white spots and patches first appearing on the crest, appearing down to their flank, slowly dominating their normal brown bay. Both horses additionally had white markings across their face: The right with a blaze and the left with a star. Their forelegs were fully brown, however, both horses' hind legs had white boots intermixed with brown dotting.
By the time Eos had finished examining the horses, Meddyg was taking off. Wordlessly, he began to use his whip, and the horse-led wagon began to move. Only after the wagon had left earshot and Eos could no longer hear the whip or horses, she wondered why she never heard the creak of the old wagon or rustling it did in the grass.