Chapter Text
Chapter 1
Sloane
“You’re a Mairi”
“I killed your mother”
“You can do this”
The overwhelming pulse of power runs through me like a knife. Violet screaming. The general’s face draining of all color, fading away. I can’t let go or she dies, I die, we all die. I burn and I burn. I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe I can’t breathe I can’t....
I jerk up, clawing at my neck as I gasp for air. The sting in my lung ebbs, but my heart still pounds as fast and hard as wingbeats, my breath coming in ragged pants. I’m alive. I’m still me. Not one of them . I’m in my own bed. I glance down at my hands, raising them from my lap. I can’t keep them from shaking violently as I examine them back to front, as if I look at them enough times, I can separate them from the weapon they’ve become.
“I’m pleased to know you’re evidently capable of reviving yourself from nothing. Perhaps do it quicker next time?” Thoirt says with an edge at odds with the fact I nearly just ran myself out of air. Right. Because I chose to be plagued by this shit.
“You always have a choice of what you will and won’t believe” she huffs with what almost sounds like a yawn. I look at the clock. Fuck, its three in the morning, I still have to deal with the rest of the night. I suck a breath through my teeth as I lower my hands back to the sheets.
“If the tortures of my own mind bother you so much, get out of my head” I snap back. Not the best plan to argue with a dragon but I’m too exhausted to care.
“It would be easier for both of us if you would just put some of your power to use and try to develop some useful shields.”
"You know I can’t do that!’
Not a single other rider here has to deal with a signet that is literally sucking the life out of people. There is nothing about this signet that creates something positive. All I can do is drain away power like one of them .
“It does not make one a dark wielder simply to transfer energy” Thoirt says with clear exasperation.
“I don’t see you being stuck killing every time you touch someone!” I fire back at Thoirt. She doesn’t deserve my rage, but she will never understand. To feel someone die at your hand by you draining away their life force through your fingertips. To feel that rush of power strip from them and jolt through you. Feel them getting weaker and weaker until...
“The general made her choice. A wise choice, someone was going to have to forfeit life if we were to raise the wards. She chose to protect hundreds. That includes you. I will not mourn her loss if it means you still draw breath. She died honorably.”
“I know. I know. I just...”
I just... what? Can’t come to grips with death? With killing the woman who murdered my own mother? I shouldn’t care. We lived. She died. That’s it. We kill and die all the time around here, its a fucking war college for Dunne’s sake.
Then why is it impossible to even touch my power without feeling crushed with the weight of what feels like an entire dragon pressing in on my chest?
My bond with Thoirt where the light streams through the window of my childhood home dims, she must have gone back to sleep. Good, I wouldn’t want to keep her from sleeping on my account, at least one of us should probably be rested before maneuvers today.
I scrub my hands over my eyes, swinging my legs from the bed. No use trying to go back to sleep tonight, there never is. May as well use this time for something more productive than laying here marinating in my own nightmares. Then I might at least have hope of having my thoughts in order in time for physics this morning, the class is difficult enough as it is.
I cross the room to my small desk beneath the window, its surface lit brightly by the moonlight. I reach in to remove a large flat bound leather book and small wooden box. Opening the book, I flip to the page with my current nighttime project. Since I don’t sleep half the night anymore, I’ve returned to the love that used to make me happy, used to relieve so much tension in the years after mom and dad. It has yet to work in that way again, but I must hope that maybe one day, it will. Or I’m going to explode. I slide open the small wooden box to remove a wide charcoal stick, turning my attention back to the open page. It’s my childhood home, the one that lives in my mind every moment of every day. In this version it's summertime, and the outdoor courtyard is decorated with every form of light and flower garland for a party among the families of the leadership and aristocracy. So much music and dancing and carefree happiness. Like nothing here at Basgiath.
If only I knew then it would be the last time. I would’ve danced more, spun around with every single boy under the lights. I would’ve listened to every single note that the band played and written them on my heart so I could have them forever. I would’ve laughed with my brother more instead of being cross with him for whatever childish reason I had claimed to have that day. My chest aches at the memory. I bring my charcoal to the paper, beginning to add more flowers to the end of a wreath. A lone tear makes its way down my cheek and falls to the page, wetting the place I was just working. I smudge the drop with my finger, letting it blend into the foliage. I vow I’ll find that happy again one day.