Not if the force was enough—a brief thought, one drowned by mother's calm words, "No one has such force."
Argon regarded her, temperate. "This is a threat to the clan."
A likely exaggeration. Ivory felt the sleek bedsheets covering up to her torso. Before she could respond, the door slid, disgorging a tall, slender woman in a dark skirtsuit, one made from a special fibre, flowing down to the ankles, below that were oredite heels. Just the legs alone brought revelation.
Mother.
Samara Valor walked in that sa slow elegance, not bothered by anything. Her hair, like Ivory's, flowed in a silvery fluorescent hue. Lustrous. Head non-adorned by the usual floating crown, just her. A thing that sohow brought a pounding dread.
Samara sided Argon and said, "You were attacked?" She observed the walls—sa as Father had done.
"Yes." Ivory heard the timidity in her tones.
"And you again chose not to reveal it before the lateness."
"I was in the dream. I could not."
"Excuses." Samara said, then, "Argon, what did you see?" Such splendour, Ivory saw in her. Power infused in elegance.
Argon seed enamored by that grace. "A caster with enough force to break the defences."
"Was that what you saw, or was that what Ivory made you believe?"
He frowned and Ivory trembled within—an expression she hoped to Almighty was unseen by Mother. Samara was adept in the ways of Kinesics. She could fool Argon, but not mother, never mother.
Argon fell into obvious ntation. He glanced at her, then at Samara on his side. "He had a sloppy use of his force—below the vested."
"Did you see his features?"
Argon said, "No, for so reason, he chose the greater concentration on his face."
"An unconscious thing." Samara said, "A novice caster able to break the barriers of the Valor castle, that cannot be allowed to exist." She locked her gaze on Ivory. "Twice he has co to you. A reason is admitted in that action. The risk alone should deter all, not him. Why?"
"How would I?"
Samara raised her hand, and the world—the chamber was tided by a sudden silence. Mother's voice bood now. "What-did-he-offer-you?"
Ivory resisted hiding her hands—this she knew would provide answers to Mother. Do not accept fear, she repeated inwardly. That is the thing of the beasts called n..Ivory faked, "I DID NOT KNOW ANYTHING!"
Mother froze for a mont.
"HE CA TWICE ASKING ABOUT VALOR AND ITS HISTORY!" A lie. "THAT'S ALL."
"A difference from before." Mother.
"HOW WOULD I KNOW?"
"SILENCE!" The room trembled, roof quaking, wall-lamps flickering in their illumination, even the created silence was shattered. None could endure. Argon had gotten big—the mind gas. A reality imposed by his force. "You do not speak that way to your mother."
Ivory depressed her head, thought, It worked. That was the only path. She had to know; was there truth in his words? Could he truly grant power to her? For that, for that assurance of her future as the Highness, this was worth it. That she told herself, a hopeful attempt to calm the mad pounding on her heart. Now, it reverberated through her very self.
Samara said. "You hide your desires well." Tone laced with doubt and sothing else…pride? Ivory dismissed that possibility. "Co with , Argon, we must feed this information to the deadEyes and see if a path is provided. In the anti, you shall not go anywhere without the Excubitors."
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Ivory felt the need to resist, but knew the low chances of success. Her affront had been overlooked; now was not the ti to aggravate.
She fell into the needed silence.
I am born and I die. I am born and I die—the shortest story by the fern. Velira Prophecies
rrin fell through the greyworld—his senses tumbling, living in a state of intense vertigo. In that mont, he gasped, alert, head snapping back, warm, constricted—a tepid ache seizing his skull. What? The confusion.
Before him was the spread of stone pillars, a giant, tall wall in the distance, behind him, too. A breath—hectic—loud. He fell back, finding the stone wall. There, he trembled, curled himself, arms wrapped, knees bent. Cold. It reached from his legs, like threads—fingers crawling closer—closer. Chilling. Feet tensed solid, claid in a pressure-bound shivery. No movent allowed itself his command.
He wanted to, couldn’t.
Just a stayed existence, numb. rrin felt the stinging warmth of tears, steaming away. Beside, Yoid and Catelyn remained, lying close. There was a tactical need for that. If he hadn’t awakened, proximity provided a facility for protection; that being Yoid guarding Catelyn.
rrin looked away, awareness buried inwards. His legs were in a state of intense coldness, quivering; he knew this. Heavens, he knew it. There was no sensation from them, outside the cold, no attachnt that marked it as an extension of himself. Not a dead slab of flesh. What had happened to him?
What had that man done?
The terror of the Caster!
What was going to happen now? Conditioning told him the weakness he possessed. Such a state was enough to mark one futile. A title he could not bear, not now, the Witness required him to be much more. Their savior.
He brushed the legs, felt the non-sensation from them. Dead, his mind told him of that likely possibility. Dead legs ant the true death, in enor at least. He gritted, clenched, and fisted the floor..
Mist it! The hand pain.
Why is this happening?
Here now, rrin thought back to many things—the witnesses—Leim. Was this his death bed? Leim had died in a similar space—stones on all sides, smaller, but the sa. Now, I die too? The wash of cold flowed through; fear.
I don’t want to die! He saw Catelyn and Yoid asleep. They need . There must be sothing. His mind delved into the collection of relevant mories. It was a sorting of pertinence. What to do? What to do?
He heard a distant sound, dismissed it. What to do? The premier question. His outer awareness had dulled, birthing the within one—the inner eye. With it, he saw the mories—there was sothing. He knew it, a becknoning that held salvation to the currentness. Which?
Naturally, he resisted the pull to familiar mories, the awareness told him so. What he needed was held in a conversation. His eyes drifted to Catelyn, asleep, good. He noted her hair, an odd color for a darkCrown—it made one wonder the difference between. Her’s appeared lighter than the average brightCrowns. That, of course, could be the ocular error brought by his night vision.
Her breath sounded calm, a good thing in contrast to the unsteady, rhythmless breathing. Yoid. He was asleep, though his breath told a slight disagreent. rrin left the unnecessary distraction. The numbness proceeded; he wondered then of the limit. Would it stop, or would he be palsied from movent? Forever.
There was great terror in that prospect. He would miss the wind—soday, he hoped, freedom would be assured. At that ti, he could once again dance over the mountains—feel the rain on his ashed hair and skin, and hum and sing with the heavens’ judgnt.
Would that never happen again?
The mind is the dominator!
rrin closed his eyes, tried the calming breaths, found them ineffective. His fear was beyond it. He saw it as an expression of his ultimate loss. This state marked the sure death of the witnesses—never again would he stand beside them. To speak or even laugh with them.
How betrayed they would feel.
Ron—Moeash. All of them.
The tingling of searing flesh entered into his imdiate awareness—the pain. Odd how this was once the greatest threat to his person. The Earth’s warmth seed nothing now. Just as the mines had intended, he had grown immune to its heat—either that or the various pains had fitted themselves into his mind, granting a certain guard against the milder ones.
There was still a need to turn, he could not.
But the need remained—a nagging at the corner of his mind. An almost reactionary type want. He felt addicted—to turn, to move his body, his legs. He knew the folly, yet that want pressed on. Move Move Move.
It was sothing known to him, a thing expressed by the mountain moss addicts. The withdrawal symptom, so call it. Or perhaps sothing else. Regardless, now, his body urged for the return of the familiar limb. To move and run as he once did.
Never again.
The mind is the ultimate dominator!
rrin heard the fleeting thought—an assertive information from a past conversation, he knew that. But which? He allowed his mind to trail that ntal path, while the rest wallowed in the loss. There was a comfortable state about it; to know no future existed was lulling.
He opened his eyes, staring at the pillar siding Yoid. An intricate thing to say, at least; not the spirals of Valor or the squares of Night, sothing else. Writings. Likely the oldest language, he could not read it. So, however, though rusted, bore a mural style art—an image.
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