Chapter 14 #2
To be home, curled into the familiarity and comfort of my own bed as I let go of all the emotions that were now beginning to wither me from the inside out. To let Merle comb her fingers through my hair and lift the burden from my shoulders.
"Prince Kairen has arranged a quest for your third trial," she began. "Before I accept his request, I wanted to confirm that this is truly what you wish for, instead of one given by myself and the other Potion Masters?"
I nodded once.
"Very well then, I will sign and get the necessary paperwork back to him. You are dismissed." She shuffled some papers gathered on her desk, her hand waving me towards the door.
It took a moment to stand, the pain of my ravaged hand finally beginning to throb back into my consciousness.
Just as I was about to take my leave, she called out to me once more.
"Oh and Apprentice Sommers." I paused, my back stiffening.
“The next time you interfere with the treatment of a Luanthian within my Institution, I will have you whipped bloody on the charge of sympathizing with a traitor to the Crown.
You're lucky not to be tied to the stake for treason yourself today. Merle Sommers’ niece or not, I will not have the King's ire turned upon me.
Do not allow it to happen again, I will not be as merciful. "
I stepped through the door and did not look back.
It should have surprised me to see Roan Delmar leaning against the wall just outside the door of the High Master’s office, his head turning slightly as I stepped into the hall.
It didn't.
There was no surprise, there was nothing. Nothing, but the all consuming despair that threatened to drag me beneath its relentless, pounding waves.
His eyes caught on the arm that I clutched defensively to my chest, to the wound that festered and bubbled there.
His lips pursed before he spoke. "Syra—”
I walked past him, my body shaking, not showing even a hint of acknowledgment that I saw or heard him.
The hall of the fifth floor was empty, not another soul lingered after the devastation. Had the other apprentices scattered so swiftly after the trial because they too felt horror at what had taken place, or were they simply happy to have passed and been quick to go celebrate?
Reaching the stairs, shaky steps took me down and down and down.
I needed out.
Yes, little shadow.
They were not writhing, but soothing. Brushing against my tattered soul, against my whirling, ravaged mind like a cat greeting their beloved owner. They wrapped around my pain, my rage.
Now you see,
You can never be free.
In a world of such torment
in a kingdom of actions so abhorrent.
And see I did.
Will you still not allow retribution
for this horrid persecution?
I had lived within the bubble of Merle's protection my entire time with her.
I knew the mistreatment, and saw it everyday.
I saw it in the Old Quarter and witnessed it in the markets and streets of Amori City, but had never truly encountered it again like the night of The Cleansing.
I knew there were still burnings, that Luanthians were tied to the stake for treason, but I never attended the public horrors.
Never acknowledged them when I knew there was nothing to be done of it.
But this.
I had no choice but to acknowledge it, to see it.
To feel it.
To know that I was a coward.
How long had I been ignoring what was truly happening within Tavari, keeping my head firmly planted within my books, to study and pursue my Potion Mastery, while people within this Kingdom suffered? Was it fear or just a lack of care?
A hand firmly wrapped around the bicep of my uninjured arm as I reached the landing of the second floor, dragging me into a hall and through a door that led to an empty classroom.
His presence was suffocating as he released me, hovering and assessing. His eyes scorched wherever they landed on my body and I curled into myself. I didn't want him to see, to really look, scared that he would uncover the blackened soul within.
The withering heart that fluttered so painfully within my chest.
"Syra."
My name was soft, almost desperate.
Finally, my eyes met his and what I saw there broke me, every emotion flooding in all at once.
It was like the breaking of a dam, stone shattering as they flooded through, ripping and tearing everything in their path. Despair, rage, horror, disgust.
It was an unrelenting and never-ending pain.
I rushed forward then, hands shoving into his chest, but he did not falter. Not even when the attack continued, my fists beating upon the hardened muscle as tears ran rivers down my cheeks.
It wasn't until I gave a little cry of pain that he moved to stop me, his hand encircling the wrist of my injured one. The pain tore through my mind and I slid to my knees. The sobs that escaped were unrelenting as I tried to breathe through them, the air getting trapped and stuck within my lungs.
He crouched down, his fingers brushing softly, hesitantly at my tears, as his other hand still held my wrist.
"How can you do that?" My voice broke as I stared into those silver and green depths trying to see what laid within them.
"Do what?" His response was quiet, his jaw twitching, tensing.
And I realized it then.
That he was scared of what I would say. What judgements I would lay upon his soul, what burdens would be added to his shoulders for him to bear.
So I shook my head, my eyes roaming over the little silver scar just beneath his green eye.
My fingers reached out, brushing over it, fixed upon it. Perhaps he was more like me than I had originally thought. Opposite sides of the same coin. Children of a damned fate, one hidden within shadows and deceit, the other displayed as a prize for all the world to see.
"You hate it here too, don't you?"
His silence was enough of an answer, a sanctuary for me to burrow within and find relief.
Roan Delmar may have been raised within these palace walls, may have been the Captain of the KingsGuard, may have killed his own family and slaughtered innocents—but I could see it as we sat there upon the floor.
The shadows that danced in his eyes, the slump of his shoulders, the mask that was cracking as my touch softened something within him.
Roan Delmar was Luanthian, and he hated this just as much as I did.