by Lisa Daniels
Every instinct in Seon screamed at her to not trust any dragon. No matter how friendly they appeared on the outside. Her silence made Artiz sigh again.
“Always so stubborn, you humans. Won’t know a good thing even if it comes and beats you over the head. Look. You’re going to have wyrms coming through your house every week. Do you want that?”
Seon shook her head. Of course she didn’t, but she also didn’t want a great thumping drake stomping about the place, telling her what to do. No one told her what to do. Unless they asked nicely, and she saw the logic in it. “I have absolutely no reason to trust you, and I still don’t know why you’re here.”
Irritation flashed across his face. He appeared one step away from strangling her. “I just said. I’m here to rescue you.”
Seon scoffed. “I’m not a damsel in distress. I have a job, money, a life, and I live in a neutral town. What part of any of that means I need rescuing?”
“The part where when the wyrms find out you can use magic, you’ll be flayed alive and your skin used as a carpet. Trust me. They have Sniffers as well. And they will send them here, once initial efforts are exhausted. They’re on the hunt through the nearby towns for anyone who might be guilty of magic. And tavern-goers have been talking about seeing shadows in this place.”
A chill rippled through Seon.
The people in her tavern whispered of the shadows that slithered along the roads at night, or the lights that flickered on and off, without a soul in sight. They spoke of feeling a sensation as if someone had walked over their grave, and of feeling so cold inside, they wondered if they could ever be happy again. They also only spoke of it after Seon saw the slithering creatures in person.
It was because Seon saw things out of the corners of her eyes. And upon seeing them, if the shadows seemed to realize she could observe them, they became a little more substantial. And even normal people felt them. She always got nervous that if she observed them for too long, they'd grow into something monstrous.
“I have heard people talk about these things.” She hardly was going to mention that they may only see them in the first place because of her.
She didn't think her magic caused them to appear. Simply that her magic allowed her to see them. Her actual ability was far less impressive. Sometimes, when she stared into space, without any distractions cluttering her mind, without any emotions claiming her body, she could… feel things.
She sensed objects around her, picking up on the thing that made them true and real. And sometimes, when she delved hard and long enough, she sensed the mind that went with them – usually a mind formed by the perception of those who observed them.
All objects were living in some form, though not in the way a human normally understood. All objects had a place, and a conviction of their duties. Take the table. The table was strong, solid. It felt stable, brazen and proud of what it did, of the things it supported, of the elbows that rested upon it day after day. The pride came from usefulness. Of a simple life without worry, or fear, knowing that Seon depended on it being stable, as did the objects that rested upon it. That “mind” came from how everyone thought a table to be. They created its personality.
Fantastic magic power, right? Knowing a table liked being used as a table.
Definitely could change the world with that. Also why Seon worked so hard to discover if she could do anything else. No luck so far, though. Listening to tables liking being tables was pretty much it.
“So,” Seon said, pretending to humor Artiz’s advance, “say I agree to let you rescue me. What will happen?”
“You hop on my back, we take a nice flight to a distant training school in the mountains – and then you get to learn about your powers. Alternatively, you can keep working for your pennies until the wyrms trash your property one too many times, and you get pissed off enough to warrant them arresting you.” He gave her a winning smile. As if knowing she had no other choice.
Seon scowled. She always had choices. Life was full of choices. Go out, stay in. Talk back, stay silent. Sometimes the options seemed limited, but whatever the situation, the choice remained. She always had one.
She considered Artiz. Tried to drill into his mind, consider why he’d bother helping her. Certainly not out of the kindness of his heart. Oh no.
Everyone had motives. Even handsome little blondie here, with his sideburns and punched-in nose.
“Do you really think I’ll give up my life in this place? I’ve spent years here. Years working, living, learning to be by myself. Do you know what my life was like before this? Do you? Of course you don’t.”
Seon trembled as she said these words. She didn’t want to think about the past, not even for a second, but it haunted her sometimes, caught her unawares. Before this town, being little more than scum floating upon water. Being a human. Being near that wreck of a mother, who paid her upkeep by allowing men between her thighs.
“We’re not here to start opening up to your past, woman. And I’m telling you, if you don’t think about coming with me soon, you won’t have a future to look forward to. Never mind what you have now.” Artiz folded his arms, gray eyes hard. “And if you’re really going to be stubborn about it…” a wicked grin leapt upon his face, “then I can go and call the wyrms back right now. And tell them that you use magic.”
Horror forced Seon’s mouth open. “You wouldn’t!”
The drake gave her a cold smile. “I’d rather have you dead than out with rogue magic. Uncontrolled magic can be even more dangerous than a wyrm. Try me.” The smile crystallized. “Unless you have enough magic to stop me? Just like you stopped the wyrms?”
Seon hissed through her lips, shaking in incandescent fury. How dare he? How fucking dare he do this to her? Force her into a place she didn’t want to be. Force her to bend the knee to him.
He saw her simmering rage, and knew he had won. He didn’t show joy in it, didn’t rub it in her face – perhaps sensing that on a whim, or out of spite, Seon would change her mind. She might die to defend her pride.
She would have loved in that moment to strike him down, summon lightning out of the sky like a primeval god, and lay waste to all the creatures that had inflicted such misery upon her. But she had nothing. Between the choices of dying or living, Seon would choose to live. Generally.
“Can I send word to my boss, to my friends? Or will I just vanish off the face of civilization?” Seon stood straight and proud, black hair flowing, green eyes like agates. Just then, she thought she saw something flicker behind Artiz. A shadow. A brief distortion in the gaslight. She knew she shouldn't, but her eyes wandered to it anyway. When she focused completely, this time it vanished. As if frightened of being spotted.
Why did she discover these things? She wondered sometimes if she was being taunted by demons. They came out to play whenever her emotions took a dip. These flickers at the corners of her peripheral vision came too often to be mere coincidence, dismissed with the bat of an eyelid.
No. She definitely saw something. She just didn’t comprehend what she observed. Artiz peered at her with a curious expression.
“I’ll give you time to write them letters. I’ll be gone in the morning. Is that a problem?”
“Obviously.” Seon bared her teeth at him, before going to her living room to pull out a quill and what remained of her ink. She set herself to writing. Asking Anya to take care of the property here. Apologizing to her boss and Kalgrin. Hoping one day to see them again.
Chapter Two
She saw her mother in her dreams. Back in the city of Westrun, capital of the wyrms upon the western coasts. She saw the view from the closet in the bedroom of her mother lying on the bed, crying, bloody welts upon her back from the whipping the wyrm had given her.
He hadn’t paid a penny, either, considering sparing her mother’s life as payment for her services. Most people tried to get away with paying if they could. Humans, drakes, wyrms. Not a single soul had good in them. All were grubby, exploiting sons
of bitches who wanted nothing more than to lord it over everyone else. To them, a whore was the lowest of the low. A disgusting creature that existed solely for their pleasure. She needed to drink bloodtea every day to stave off the effects of pregnancy, since very few clients bothered with protection.
“Remember, Seon,” Janet had said, twinkling green eyes peeking out of a ruined, pockmarked face. Disease swept the slums at one point, taking the beauty from many humans there. Seon couldn’t remember a time when her mother wasn’t ugly. Only her eyes hinted at the beauty she must have once been – that once made her one of the highest paid prostitutes there. Now they paid her less, though she still kept in shape and carried an air of experience that appealed to those who lusted after darker things. “People are cruel. You might have better luck with your kind, but you can’t rely on anyone. We might seek relationships, we might band together, but we’re all alone in the end. We just got to make do with what we have. Do you understand?”
She didn’t at first. Understood more with time, when the misery became apparent. When it didn’t stop, and people tried to trick you with money and drink. Like that older man who spiked her drink when she was nine, tried to encourage her to drink it, before her mother and assistant leapt on them in a ball of fury, knocking the drink out of Seon’s shaking hands. She remembered how it spilled across the floor. Sunk into the wooden floorboards, staining the light plywood a darker brown.
She remembered the stale, three-month-old blankets around her when she woke up after that incident, and the heavy conviction that something was not fucking right with the world for this to happen.
She asked her mother once if she wanted to escape. And Janet refused. “You can. I'm staying here. I got me a life. A better one than most humans. And I finally got me a man that treats me right.”
A man that Seon saw little appeal in, since he spent most of his time drinking.
When Seon had made enough money, after one last attempt to persuade her mother to come, she bought her way out of the city. She travelled through the cisterns that ran underneath the city to end out by the sea. She roamed the coast then, until she made it to this town and chose to settle.
The dreaming changed, taking a slant from reality and delving instead into nightmare. Voices whispering. Fingers scratching at her skull. People moaning at her Can you hear me? Do something, do something, but she didn’t know who formed the words, or why the shadows writhed in the firelight, mocking her with the glimpses she caught. Following her wherever she went.
Listen to me. Can you hear me? Those words sank through her mind. I can, she thought.
The voice that whispered paused a moment, before she heard the weaving of a tune – one Seon had heard travelers sing as they stopped in her town. She always thought the tune simply meant for those struck by wanderlust, or those who suffered under the regime. However, hearing the shadow sing it took on a cold, sinister slant in her mind. Each syllable came with a mix of sweetness and darkness.
Hey now you're wending the world
Through streams and saddened willows
A lonely soul that knows no home
With nothing left except to roam
Maybe you'll end up at the sea
It swallows your tears of misery
Your body's cold, your heart's not free
Your soul is trapped eternally...
For what is left but endless pain?
A life that suffers again, again
The world and soul's no longer the same
No white light for you came
No guiding voice to show the way
The magic's lost its ray
They wait for your words to say
Today will be their final day
They've waited so long your words to say
Today will be their last day
Seon blinked awake as the whispering tune ended. They called that tune The Wanderer's Soul. The type of lament a human enjoyed singing whenever they wanted to bring down the mood of a tavern.
Personally, she hated it. They had enough shit without stupid bards belting out all their woes. She squinted against sun beams as they lanced through the airtight window. The light speckled along her bedcovers, blue with black spots.
She groaned and got up, reaching for her bedside table, before her mind caught up.
New room. New surroundings. I’m not in Tarn anymore.
Then her lips curled into a snarl. Of course. That bastard of a drake. He carried her here. Wherever “here” was. She’d traveled the skies, sweeping above the world, knowing that all she saw down there was a land corrupted by the wyrms’ slimy touch.
Someone pounded upon her door, and Seon groaned, getting onto her feet upon the dark boards. They creaked as she went to twist the handle.
Artiz stood outside, holding a tray of food. “Breakfast is eggs in cups. Toasted bread sliced into sticks. And a glass of milk.”
Seon’s stomach gave a grumble and she let the drake through, though not without some excessive glaring on her end. “You seem happy to be ruining someone else’s life, don’t you?”
“You have a funny way of showing gratitude, you know that? Besides, your life was ruined a long time ago,” Artiz said.
For some reason, the statement knifed at her insides. Artiz, unaware of her reaction, added, “By the wyrms, of course. Every human in this world is at issue. It’s not a personal thing.”
Seon took the tray from him, smacked one of the eggs open with a spoon, then started dipping her toasted slices into the yolk. “So, we're in the mountains north of Tarn. Quite far in the Frostlands, if I was seeing correctly the tundra we flew over.”
“Yes. We’re on the Sloven mountain range, within a stone’s throw of the school you’ll be training at. Though there’s no promise you’ll be able to get in.”
“Oh? I thought you said the school sought magicians?”
“Yes, but if you turn out to have some useless power, I don’t think we’ll consider it worth the time needed to train you.” He raised an eyebrow at Seon, who folded her arms, not happy at this revelation.
“Look, Artiz, I don’t appreciate being dragged out here, only to hear that maybe I’ll have to be sent back anyway. If you yank me away from everything, you have a responsibility to me.” Her heart pumped viciously, and her arms shook. Even just talking so defiantly like this made her nervous, because words weren’t safe. Artiz could easily dismiss her, drop her on the side of the mountain somewhere, or ditch her back in Tarn, where the wyrms waited for her to slip up.
Except… she peered out of the window. The sunlight had vanished, and now big, fat drops of snow flaked onto the window. Outside lay an impressive, bleak landscape, full of mountains, jagged paths and white washed forests. Full of tiny little wooden cabins with firewood piled up in crates attached outside. And, in the distance, she saw the lights of the school she had been carried here for. The school where people like her came.
“How have the wyrms not found this place yet?” The place stuck out like a splash of red upon a white surface.
“It’s protected.” Artiz smiled wryly, rubbing at his blond hair. Those gray eyes of his seemed guarded for some reason, as if covered by mist. “By magic.”
Seon rolled her eyes. “That doesn’t tell me much.” She didn’t understand how that worked. How magic kept the wyrms out, how people escaped their all-consuming grasp when Sniffers like Artiz could just swoop along, chasing leads to find her. Just as well the actual wyrms that invaded her house had no such ability. To think she didn't even know it existed. She might have been discovered at any moment, regardless of whether she practised magic or not.
How terrifying. She knew far too little about this world.
Seon scowled at herself. At least she never told any of the other humans about her powers. Far too many would have considered running straight to their slave masters. In spite of wyrm depravity, humans also fed it. For humans, the devil you knew was better than the one you didn't. A wyrm versus whatever so
rcery she conjured up.
She likely never would have told anyone. And perhaps never found out about this place.
“Will you stay, Artiz? Will you help me if I get in?”
“Oh, I will. Don’t worry. Because you’re such a likeable person.”
Seon scoffed, but finished off her breakfast, preferring to think alone for a moment.
Then, dressing herself up in gray wool robes and tucking her black hair into a neat knot behind her head, she gave another look in the mirror. Still too gaunt. A waspish quality about her features made her look cruel. Not beautiful.
I'd think I was a witch, too, if I saw this. Her eyes glared out in judgment, showing nothing of the thoughts inside. Though she knew how to arrange her features into a smile, laugh and act as a friend – she was no friend, truthfully. Not to anybody. Certainly not to herself.
Like her mother once said, she was alone in the world. Everyone lied, everyone found a way to betray, sooner or later. No matter what promises they made, or smiles they wore, or words of love they whispered into your ears.
No one truly cared for anything other than themselves.
She followed Artiz out of the little room and stepped outside, examining the bleak school in the near distance. Artiz insisted on walking, rather than flying, which irritated Seon, because she needed to sludge her way through cold and snow. She liked passing the small houses peppered along the range with their warm glowing lights displayed from their windows, inviting and picturesque. The pathways themselves were slippery at points, making progress difficult, and her breath unfurled in the air like hot steam from a bath. Why did he insist on walking? Her legs ached. She passed snow-covered trees with thin needle leaves. She caught curious animals peering at her from scraggly bushes. How did they live so high up, in such a cold environment? Even with gloves on and several layers of clothing, Seon found herself gradually icing over.
At last she arrived at the entrance of the school, where the structure had a compact, uniform nature to it. Not an impressive building, but a practical one. The corridors within were gray and dim, and her footsteps clacked along the stone. Gas lights illuminated patches of the school, and she spotted students scurrying from one place to another. She even passed what looked like a dining hall, with a canteen and a line of people getting their food from the serving cooks. The smell of spiced soups made her sniff in appreciation and her stomach rumble.
