Orphan At The Edge Of The World - 263 The Magician 21

She wanted to be mad but it was her own fault. She didn’t want to explain herself because it sounded too much like asking permission. There was also a small voice in the back of her mind that whispered a contrary thought. It would have been far more humiliating if she had cleaned herself so brazenly in front of him and he hadn’t cared at all. As embarrassed as she was at what she’d done in ignorance, there was some comfort that she was attractive and he was enough of a ‘gentleman’ that looking was all he had done.

Unable to process her complex feelings, she silently returned to working on repairing the gate enough to get them out of their underground prison. When he interrupted her to politely ask for a similar opportunity to clean himself, her mind nearly short circuited. It was a request that she had a hard time ignoring for many reasons.

Supernatural compulsion aside, she might have been her own person but her personality was crafted from pieces of her patron. The most meaningful love of Orison’s life had been a deep elf and he had grown a strong appreciation for their unique beauty. Although she’d never admit it, her first moments in her new life were spent admiring the vivid pinks and reds that stood out so prominently on smooth skin like dusted, crushed black velvet.

While she assisted him in cleaning up, Deacon’s thoughts were a bit tangled as well. When she had retreated to the back corner of the room and doused her mage light, he had assumed that she was preparing to take care of personal business but was surprised to see her undressing. At first he wondered if she was coyly seducing him but her nervous glances in the dark in his direction and the purely functional movements told a blander story.

After all he had seen in his short forty years of life, barely viewed as an adult by his people’s standards, an unintentional bold display of nudity hardly registered enough to attract his attention. It was the humble and timid body language, as if she were doing something naughty. It was the faint smile of enjoyment in cleanliness being restored, the pebbling of skin and soft gasp as the wicked water took her body heat with it. She had created a moment of innocent eroticism that the deep elf steeped in sinful, self indulgent culture hadn’t witnessed the like of before.

As he donned his armor, the pleasant feeling blooming inside of him was cut short by a flash of another pale skinned woman. The echoes of her screaming rang in his ears as his matron slashed open the human’s swollen belly to remove the elven blooded child within. His anguish at seeing the tiny life move weakly a few times before growing still, painted the scene vividly in his mind’s eye.

The images of the matron looking at him with a smile on her face, as she flung the dead infant to her pet demon spider, came back to him even as he tried to fight off the unwanted thought. He recalled the accusation of keeping his dead father’s b******d a secret from her right before he was flailed to the brink of death. The inescapable knowledge that it might have been his was only salt added on the wound of a memory.

His father had forced him to perform those acts with the human. Deacon knew it was so that he would keep his father’s secret. For his father, it was a way to enjoy guilty pleasures and escape light retribution from his powerful wife. For Deacon, it was the first of many cracks in his sense of belonging that shattered the moment a tamed creature of the abyss was given his dead infant brother or son as a treat.

A slender arm wrapped around him and he suddenly realized that he was silently crying. Out of reflex, he pushed her away and tried to quickly remove the signs of his momentary weakness, one far more shameful than unwanted arousal. Publicly showing emotional pain wasn’t only mocked, it was punished. Delighting in causing it was all but directly rewarded.

After he calmed himself and turned to her, he expected to see anger or possibly disdain. Instead, Deacon saw a collected and carefully neutral face. There wasn’t even the look of pity some of the newer slaves that were still alive inside would show each other from time to time.

“Wherever you were just then, it’s not here,” she said.

Giving space, she returned to her work.

Once the silence stretched into a less comfortable version of what it had been the last couple of days, Wren added, “Not that this little hole is any slice of paradise. Our current hell might not be any fun either but it’s an impersonal hell. There’s no cruel tormentors, just heartless and soulless dolls that will kill us without any feelings at all. Is it strange that I find that a little… less horrible?”

Deacon looked at a spot on the floor not that far away. He knew if he were to step there, a magic trap would kill him or activate a golem that surely would.

He said, “Oddly, no. There are things much worse than death. It would even be quick if you didn’t fight back.”

That DID cause her to look at him in worry.

He made a dismissive wave of his hand. “It was only an observation… You’re somewhat of a mystery to me. Sometimes you seem young and sometimes much older.”

Returning back to her work, she said, “Because I am. A small part of me is a young woman who thought she survived an abusive man until fate made a mockery of her escape. A much larger part of me is a woman named Reese. She was a bit of soul that my patron picked up along the way at some point without realizing it.

“She was a brilliant person, an inventor of magical technology. Her most well known work was a hovercraft but her greatest contribution was also her greatest mistake. You see, she had a vision. She wanted to put magic in the hands of mundane people, give them a way to stand on equal footing with those born to the talent.

“A collection of demonic artifacts gave her the missing piece to that puzzle. She… found a way for mundane people to use magic, alright. But the cost, it was life. Caster guns, rift sealers, even powered suits were suddenly available for anyone to use but it ate away their controllers. Even worse, her research was leaked and darker minds created something so close to the demon artifacts in purpose, they might as well have BEEN the damned things.

“Marketed as talent testers, anyone with a magical gift could be sucked dry, capturing some of their life force in the process. The greater the gift, the more they could take. To the rich and powerful, life became a form of ultra currency. They stole from a possibly brighter future to preserve old monsters bent on staining it in their corrupt colors.

“That world, it no longer exists. It would be more accurate to say that it never did. Reese would have loved Them for that act alone but They gave her a chance to live another life. She even found some self forgiveness and the courage to spend her last moments in the arms of the man she loved.”

Silence descended again. Hours went by and she was finally forced to rest for awhile before renewing her efforts. During that time, Deacon couldn’t find a way to break through the wall of their mutual personal ghosts.

During a paste break, she said, “Sorry. I didn’t mean to unload like that but… I just want you to understand how precious and important this life is to me. To you, maybe even our patron, I’m little more than this helpful creation but I’m alive and I have my own thoughts, desires.”

Deacon asked, “Do you remember those creations, how they were made?”

She gave him a dour look and said, “No and good riddance.”

“You say your patron picked up this Reese soul along the way. How is such a thing possible?” he asked.

She said, “It shouldn’t be. Greater Reality doesn’t allow for soul cores to merge. It’s something that has to be done outside of existence but… if a person is almost destroyed, core and all, you can pick up pieces of others if they’re shoved into the mending. From that point on, those pieces are recognized as you by Greater Reality, I guess.”

“Are there any more ‘others’ inside of you?” he asked, deep in thought.

Hesitantly, she said, “Well, Reese is the only core fragment in me but there is another spiritual inheritance. The patron calls him ‘White’. He is a part of the patron that They aren’t comfortable with. White lived his whole life for others, the most caring and compassionate part of not only myself but of the patron as well.

“White was the part of Them capable of loving… differently. He was deeply saddened by people’s inability to see love as more important than petty surface details. His unfulfilled wishes, I inherited those too. Before all the parts that make me are called back home when this life is done, I plan on giving my all to leave not a single speck of regret behind that I can help.”

For lack of anything better to say, he offered, “It sounds complicated and confusing.”

She smiled and said, “Not at all. It couldn’t be more clear. I’m going to live like every second matters, wear all of my emotions with pride and be resolved not to treat any of those feelings as something I should fear or be ashamed of. Most important to me, I’m resolved not to betray my conscience, even if it costs me my life.

“If I live long enough I’m sure I’ll screw up, cave to pressure or make mistakes. But as long as I can find the strength to dust myself off and do what I need to do, can do, I won’t think of it as a failure at all… Parts of me have lived a life unafraid of sacrifice or death. Now, I want to be unafraid to live, to take the risks of great suffering for the chance to taste the greater joys only available to those who are. Unafraid to live, I mean.”

Gathering up his own courage and ‘resolve to live’, Deacon said, “I’m going to tell you my life… But I do not have the trust that you do. I order you to not share it, even with your patron.”

A chunk of the debt between them disappeared as he unburdened all of the horrible things he had done, forced to witness or take part in. He told her all the things that had damaged him. It was raw and ugly but it was real.

When he was done, nearly another day had gone by. She felt like her mind had been dipped in tar, coated in the filth of a violently lanced wound filled with infection. Some of the things he told her would haunt her but it was his need. And for once, she was more than happy to obey his ‘order’.

The part of her that was Reese helped her to not judge. The part that was White allowed her to show compassion despite an inward revulsion. The part that was Green instilled fear of what he’d become if Wren didn’t kindle that flickering ember of goodness in him into something more substantial.

He was a monster who lived in a place so depraved, that he had been pushed past a bottom line he didn’t know he had until it was broken. That moment awoke a feeling of dread in what he was and where he came from. It may have started out as a suicidal whim but he wanted to defy that darkness for hurting him.

He was strangely childish in that defiance but he was also stubborn. There was no doubt that a skilled matron would have snuffed that resistance in an instant but he had escaped. She had found her reason to stay by his side. If she couldn’t take that childish impulse to defy and use it to set him on a course of redemption, she’d kill him herself.

Deacon felt horrified at first. A lifetime of training to think and act in certain ways pressed an overwhelming shame on him for unburdening himself to the woman. There was a quality to her that made him want to, though. Whether to bask in the warmth of her light or smear that light with his degeneracy and spiritual filth, he was unsure.

A gibbering voice within begged him to defile her, ravage and devour that light, but a more rational voice within knew that would gain him nothing. What she had couldn’t be claimed by another, only freely shared or broken. He’d seen it many times in lesser lights.

A small flicker of growing intent lit within him. It was beyond the carnal pleasures he’d indulged in whatever way struck his fancy but far from the alien and mostly unknown emotion of love. It wasn’t for her specifically but for what she possessed. He wanted to wallow in weakness and pollute his darkness with searing light. He’d let it burn away all the outer layers and find if there was something inside or if nothing would be left but a hollowness large enough to enfold and snuff out all the light.

“I give you permission to hold me,” he said.

She gave him a saintly smile. “I give you permission to kiss my a**.”

Deacon moved faster than she could follow. She felt a pair of steel vices grab her waist and pull down. The coolness was replaced by a sudden warm breath behind her. A soft and warm sensation lingered there for a second before sharp pain joined it.

She wheeled around and slapped him with all the force she had. As she pulled up and tied her slightly torn pants with trembling fingers, she watched him lick the trickle of blood from his split lip.

“You bit me!” she said in shaky disbelief.

He said thoughtfully, “It wasn’t my original intention but… I had a peach once when I was young-”

“Don’t even finish that story!” she pointedly ignored him as she returned to work.

Wren was angry and scandalized. But for some reason she couldn’t identify, she didn’t heal the throbbing bite mark on her bottom either. She tried to justify it as a reminder that the man she was tethered to was not someone she could let her guard down around but it rang a little false.

Finally, after days worth of targeted mends, the gate pulsed with a weak and fragile connectivity. Instantly, echoes rang out from the activation of golems. With a quiet hiss, Wren asked for the partially broken planar travel device. She shoved the bent and cracked artifact that looked somewhat like a tuning fork into the destination ‘dial’.

“We have less than few breaths til we’re laying in pieces all over this room,” Deacon said calmly.

She said, “There’s only one lit destination and it’s weak. I don’t think it’s sa-”

The deep elf covered her with his body as a flying sword sliced into his back. With little choice, she activated the gate and pulled them through while he gritted his teeth in pain. They shot out the other side into solid dirt.

Residual magic shunted them like a cannon ball to the nearest open space. Over the short distance, the damage of displacement from occupied space shredded and mangled them both. Whether from the over robe or residual qualities of her patron lingering within her, Wren fared better than Deacon. She was badly hurt but not in a critical condition unlike him. He was once again hovering between life and death.