by Amy B. Nixon
Heimir Aagard glared at me on our way to the corridor, then silently walked away. I remained outside and waited for Vee to make sure the comments about her hadn’t been disastrous for her psyche. I couldn’t close my eyes and pretend everything was fine while Aagard and his flock of herd-mentality-driven idiots were bullying her.
When the door finally opened a couple of minutes later and she came through it, she nearly lost her step.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. What that dick said about you–”
“Please go!” She interrupted me, closing the door. “Please! I don’t know what they’ll do if they see you talking to me.”
“Like hell! I’m not gonna watch some fucking racist, like Aagard or his pals, bully you and pretend it’s okay.”
“Not me.” Her voice was so quiet, I barely made it out. “They’ll hurt you. You’re a Dustrikke, you can’t talk to me.”
“I can do whatever I want and talk to whomever I want, Vee.”
“You must stay away from mixed breeds like me,” she whispered.
Her round, violet eyes were wide open and watery. She was on the brink of crying again, and staring at my own reflection in her eyes, I couldn’t stop myself from falling down memory lane.
When my friends slowly started dumping me, I looked like her. Hurting, filled with embarrassment, and incapable of coping with my emotions.
Before I could find the right words to say, she ran off, and I decided to head for the Dining Hall. Why did she tell me I had to stay away from mixed breeds because of my last name? The Dark Age was over, right? Necromancers didn’t use elves as slaves or blood bags anymore. So, why did it sound like she was beneath me and I’d get into trouble for even talking to her? Dann didn’t seem to think so, even if Vee or Aagard did, and he was a Nordstrøm. After all, he had called her my friend.
This world was just too freaky.
As if I didn’t have enough freaky stuff to think about during lunch, my eyes landed on the Snobbish Dick.
He was sitting a few tables away from mine, next to his sister, twisting a glass between his fingers and furrowing at something. Aurora seemed infuriated while talking to him. If looks could kill, the way she glared at that glass would have been disastrous. I was too far away to act nosy and eavesdrop, but I had a feeling she was angry with me. It couldn’t be a coincidence. She was upset exactly after I – the one she treated like a nemesis – had stirred trouble in her brother’s lecture.
Dann wrapped his free arm around her shoulders. She lifted her hand and pushed her fingers through his, then leaned back into his embrace. I winced. The entwining fingers seemed way too weird for siblings who had outgrown their childhood years.
Then again, what did I know? I had always wanted a brother or a sister, and had been jealous of other people’s siblings, but never had one.
When I entered my session with Brühl, my day went from bad, to weird, to un-fucking-believable.
“Begin!” Brühl barked, nodding at the book in front of me.
I closed my eyes and told myself if I could do healing magic, I could also lift the book in the air without touching it.
But when seconds turned into minutes and minutes became half an hour spent in fruitless attempts, I decided to try something else. A spell I had read in another book. I hadn’t practiced it, but Maksim mentioned it was a simple spell. He used it in the library when I arrived on the island. He hadn’t spoken a verbal incantation, and I tried to do the same. I stared at the book like I was trying to make it shoot itself up just with my eyes, but once again, nothing happened.
“Svevende,” I mumbled the incantation under my nose.
“What was that?” Brühl shouted, appearing in my range of vision.
“Nothing,” I lied.
“Does this look like a casting exercise to you? Try again without using any spells! Clear your mind and tap into your core! Did you read like I told you?”
“Yes, I did.”
“What did you read?”
“That some lunatic experimented on himself and his elf slaves.”
“What did you read?”
“I just told you, some Elemental asshole made inhumane experiments.”
“I asked you what you read. What did he do?”
“He suffocated himself and others on purpose to test his magic! Is that what I was supposed to read?”
“I told you to read everything!”
He was seriously getting on my nerves.
“Not to sound like a brat, but in case it’s not obvious, the library holds countless volumes. Even if I didn’t have other stuff to focus on, I still wouldn’t have been able to read everything in it so quickly!”
He started circling around the room, eyeing me with stormy scowls.
“What?” I asked after his fourth circle.
“Should I start suffocating you?”
“Are you out of your fucking mind? You can’t do that!”
“Are you afraid, Dustrikke?”
“No!”
Yeah, I was afraid! How could I not be? My parents had died in a magical accident. I had raised an undead creature and murdered two men without even trying. The Council thought I could summon a demonic entity. And now my personal mentor was asking if I wanted him to suffocate me on purpose. Who in their right mind wouldn’t be scared?
I closed my eyes, shutting them tightly, trying to let go of all these sinister thoughts, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t.
“Are you scared, Dustrikke?”
“I said no!”
“Do you want me to get you diapers and hold your hand like a baby?”
“Stop it!”
“Are you going to hide in a corner for the rest of your life because you inherited death magic from Mom and Dad instead of fairy wings?”
“Don’t talk about my parents!”
“Do you think you were born with pretty magic that makes flowers bloom and cherry trees blossom? Do you think you’re here to learn how to regrow forests? Do you think the Council is keeping all of you verdammte Kinder on a secret island because you’re some precious beautiful creatures in the eyes of the world? Open your eyes, Dustrikke! You were born with death magic!”
I squeezed my eyes even tighter. “Stop shouting at me!”
“Stop fooling yourself and I will! Look around, Dustrikke! Death is all around you!”
“Stop it!” I yelled, inhaling so sharply, I felt the air around me tremble while getting sucked in. “Stop!”
“Open your eyes!”
“I SAID STOP!”
My voice roared, rolling off my throat like a rumbling storm, piercing and ear-shattering, pounding mercilessly over my eardrums. I was shaken so vigorously by my emotions, it felt like my own body couldn’t contain them any longer, so they were beginning to tear their way through it. The shivers running all over me made my skin crawl. I was struck by countless needles, as if the air in the room was lashing over the exposed skin on my face and hands; blowing, hitting, whipping over me.
“STOP!”
Screaming at the top of my lungs, I felt them burst, releasing the oxygen from my body, making me pant and clasp my chest helplessly, gasping in sudden horror.
“Breathe, Dustrikke,” Brühl ordered evenly.
A rush of air hit my respiratory system, instantly prompting me to bend forward. I was about to puke my guts out.
And I probably would have done it, but I started hiccupping in a frantic way. It was like I had never done it in my entire life, and now my body was trying to make up for nearly twenty-one years’ worth of missed hiccups.
“Easy, easy.”
The excess air slowly left my system, allowing me to breathe normally. I opened my eyes only to be left breathless again, purely by the sight of my surroundings.
The room was a complete mess.
A devastating tornado had viciously swept through it, ravaging it violently, razing everything to the ground. The two desks and chairs were smashed to pieces. The whiteboard, once h
anging from the wall across me, was shredded to useless bits, protruding from the rest of the rubble – a pile of jagged wood and steel pieces that used to be furniture. The whites, browns and greys were mixed with shiny translucent glass-like shards. Glancing sideways to the other wall, I saw barren window frames.
All of the ear-shattering, pounding and rumbling noises, all the breathlessness and lung-bursting, and the painful lashing of non-existent winds against my skin hadn’t been figments of my imagination.
“Wh-what happened?”
“Your air element broke out.”
“I did this?” I gestured to the floor and windows, straightening up. He nodded. I exhaled, trying to silence the thousands F bombs exploding in my brain. “How?”
“You had an emotional outburst.”
Emotional outbursts lead to destructive magical outbursts, Maksim had told me. That was how I transformed the swallow into a Draug, killed two guards, and started healing Monika’s wound. I was overtaken by crazy emotions each time.
And if Maksim knew it, an experienced Elemental practitioner like Brühl also knew it.
“Were you inciting me on purpose with your abusive approach?”
“If you consider it abusive, you don’t know the meaning of the word.”
Dick. I knew the meaning of this word. “Nice, Brühl! Really nice! Now the Council is going to give me hell for trashing a room on top of all the other crap I’ve pulled so far!”
“The Council has seen worse, and don’t you ever dare sass me about my job! My methods may be unconventional in terms of me not treating you like a helpless toddler who needs gentle nursing, but they are efficient. That is why you are attending these exercises – to learn about your power in a safe and controlled space around experienced casters.”
“You call this safe and controlled? Are you out of your mind? I could have hurt you!”
“Don’t flatter yourself, Dustrikke.”
A scoffing, laugh-like grunt escaped me. “What happens if the next time I go out of control, I make another Draug instead of… this?”
“The alarm will alert us, and someone will destroy it.”
“Yeah, right, because last time everything went smoothly.”
He didn’t reply.
“If it’s so easy to destroy them, why is everyone so afraid of Draugar? Half of the island thinks I’m the spawn of Evil.”
He walked over to me, smashing the ruins under his feet to smaller bits, and caught me by the shoulder.
There was a strange look in his eyes, almost soft and parental, that I never expected to see in someone like him. It only proved something I already knew far too well – I was always too quick to form an opinion on people around me based on my own past. And it wasn’t right.
“Listen, Dustrikke, I don’t know what you’ve read or heard about necromancers so far, but back in the days there were individuals who deserved to be labeled as dark sorcerers, to be exiled from the masses. Greed, poor judgement, lack of common sense… the reasons for one becoming as vicious and obscure as them are endless. They did… horrible deeds, to put it lightly. Scheisse, they did outrageous things! Some of these necromancers used servants to do the dirty work for them.”
“Servants? Like house spirits and elves?”
He let go of me, shaking his head.
“Trapped souls, djinns, Álfar, Landvættir and other creatures, all forced to do their bidding. The most powerful casters gathered battalions of Draugar, keeping the undead hidden away until they were strong enough to march down on anyone who stood on these necromancers’ path.”
I twisted my neck to look him in the eyes.
“What do you mean by strong enough?”
“The longer a Draug exists, the stronger its bond becomes with its master. When an undead is created from the joint forces of two or more casters, the sorcerers need more time to solidify the bond between the Draug and its masters. Breaking the bond between a necromancer and his or her Draug during the early days of creation of said Draug isn’t a challenge for sorcerers who can cast complex magic.”
“I see.”
My whisper was so quiet, I wasn’t sure if he had even heard me. Moreover, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to know the answer to my next question, but it burned on my tongue, fueled by unhealthy curiosity.
“What happens if the bond grows stronger?”
“The Draug becomes more than an undead corpse. It develops certain powers through the bond, hence why back in the days people used to perceive Draugar as beings with a mind of their own.”
“Powers, such as?” I whispered with bated breath.
“Controlling the forces of nature, traveling into dreams, sensing fear and other emotions.”
I swallowed, hard and loud.
“Mirroring the magic of Elementals, Wanderers and Sentinels?”
“Exactly.”
“Doesn’t that drain the necromancer’s eitr?”
“Eitr is the deadliest poisonous quintessence known in existence, Dustrikke. It feeds on the bond with the undead.”
Despite his sinister words, a sudden ray of hope shot through me, breaking up the dark clouds gathered over my thoughts.
“Will you teach me how to destroy Draugar?”
“Nein! Absolutely not!” He shouted, pushing my shoulder and prompting me to head for the door. “You have no business meddling with such advanced casting! Now go, you’ve done enough for today.”
“Okay, how about next time–”
“Do you want to turn into a monstrous Livløs, or do you want to remain normal? Forget about any Draugar-killing magic!”
“But I always have the Eitrhals on me! I won’t turn into a Livløs with it! And I don’t want to learn how to make flowers bloom or how to cure decaying trees; I want to learn something useful!”
“Something useful would be learning to control your elements!”
“And then? Will you teach me after I learn to do that?”
He furrowed his eyebrows. “Ask me next year.”
“But I won’t be here next year! I want you to teach me now!”
“Go eat your dinner, Dustrikke!”
In an instant, he teleported out of the trashed room before I could press the subject any further.
Following his order, I rushed to the Dining Hall to look for Monika.
Strangely, she was missing most of the time, but now I quickly located her purple hair. She was sitting on a relatively empty table, with one hand writing something in a book, and the other – holding a fork.
“Hey!” I grinned, sitting across her.
Her eyes left the book. She wasn’t writing, but using a purple marker to highlight some paragraphs in it.
“Oh, hey. Why are you here so early?”
“My Elemental mentor let me go early. My air element broke out today.”
“Really? Congratulations! How did it feel?”
I made a face. “Brutal. It was like my lungs burst, and I accidentally trashed the entire room.”
Her head dropped to the side with a cheerless smile.
“When my Sentinel powers started breaking out, I wanted to drop out of high school.”
“Was it that bad?” I asked in shock, leaning across the table.
“Do you know how many people come into direct physical contact with you every day, even accidentally? Each day, I counted every single time I brushed against someone and felt their emotions. It was a month before graduation, and I was going crazy. Mom told me to say I have an allergic reaction that gets triggered by different fabrics, so I could have an explanation as to why I was always screaming at people to watch where they were going. It was either lying about allergies, or leaving my friends, being homeschooled and taking my exams privately.”
“Oh, Monika, I’m so sorry. I can’t even imagine how fucked up that must have felt.”
She shrugged with a half-smile.
“Yeah, empathy sucks. On a side note, I have exciting news for you. Our skates arrived.”
�
��Huh?”
“The ice skates we ordered last week, along with your clothes, and that tech stuff.”
“The VPN router for our room? Right, I completely forgot about that! Wait a minute. How did they arrive exactly? I thought this was a secret island and ordinary people have no access to it.”
“There’s an underwater tunnel connecting the island to a building in downtown Stavanger. They deliver everything we need there – stuff like food and our online orders – and our guards bring them to the island.”
“Oooh,” I exclaimed, eyeing the dark circles under her eyes. “Monika, if necromancers can do language spells, isn’t there something to help you read faster? No offense, but you look exhausted.”
She rolled the marker’s cap and closed her book with a pitiful frown.
“Necromancers can’t do language spells. We have a couple of guards who can do them, but they aren’t necromancers. Sadly, there aren’t any spells or elixirs to help you read or learn faster. Well, there are elixirs to keep you awake, but they don’t do anything for your focus or your brain’s memorizing function.”
“But I saw emerald light and black smoke accompanying the magic of the guards who brought me here. They did the language spell on me.”
“The color specter of magic isn’t my strong suit, so I can’t really explain how it works, but many casters can do magic that’s accompanied by green and black colors. Ours just always manifests in green.”
Yet another weird thing. I should have just started accepting how everything here was weird.
“Why can’t I see the black smoke when someone is teleporting here through Aperture?”
“Because the black smoke occurs only when you’re traveling to longer distances. Think of it like exhumes from cars. Your body is releasing energy. The greater the distance, the more energy you waste.”
Well, at least this made some sense.
“Can everyone on the island Aperture themselves?”
She made a face. “Sadly, no. Only a handful of creatures can, and the island houses so many types of creatures. Safe haven, remember?”
“Right, like the dark elves. What about the guards? What types of creatures are they, if they aren’t necromancers?”
“Some of them are, but those are only a few. The others are… Well, some are Elemental casters, but they don’t possess necromantic genes. Others are Healers. We also have Skinwalkers, who can shapeshift into any animal they want. And then there are a couple of telekinetic casters.”
