Icarus

Anonymous

 

I have an important task for you, he said, a final test, if you will. I agreed immediately, of course. That is why I am here. To learn. I didn’t even ask what it was before agreeing. I am powerful, special. I am chosen.

 

He found me here around two years ago. The Soltryce Academy was merely a dream to me. Yes, everyone had told me that I was talented enough to go there, but it was impossible. My parents could barely make enough money for us not to sleep with an empty belly every night, let alone send me to the most prestigious school of arcane arts in all of Wildemount.

 

But then, he came for me. Well, me and Eodwulf and Astrid. Eodwulf is everything I wish I am: athletic, good-looking, talented, smart. The only problem that he could pick out was that he didn’t like to speak. But that was easily fixed. It didn’t take him long to teach him how. I look up to him like he was my older sibling, wishing for his resilience and determination. 

 

I think he would’ve preferred it if I viewed Astrid as a sibling, too. Unfortunately, I don’t have as much self-control as Eodwulf does. I couldn’t keep back my feelings for her, but neither could she for me. She grounds me when he gives us tasks that require us to detach ourselves from our emotions. It is what must be done for the greater good, she would remind me, you know he means well. I… I think I love her, but I’ve been too scared to tell her. Maybe after this final test is over.

 

Eodwulf, Astrid, and I thrived at the Academy. We were all nobodies thrust into an unknown world of politics and war, but he was a good teacher. He didn’t always tell us everything, but he was both knowledgeable and powerful. We all trusted him to do things for good. For the greater good. He even attempted to increase our magical abilities with an experimental technique. Refined residuum, I think it was called. It hurt a lot, but it had to be done if we were to study and understand Dunamancy. It was for the greater good. We were to become Vollstrecker. “Scourgers”.

 

And now, how ironic it is that I find myself back here again, two years after the beginning of my journey. Now, everything is different. Never would I have thought that they, my own parents, would betray the empire. Astrid’s and Eodwulf’s, too. He showed us himself. He told us that this must be done, not only to get rid of the filth that plagues our empire, but also for us to prove our loyalty. 

 

Yes, there is no one more loyal than someone who is willing to kill their own parents for the greater good.

 

Carefully, I pull out the bat guano and sulfur from my component pouch. He had preferred the use of an arcane focus such as a wand, but I perform much better with the raw materials. It made the fire burn brighter, stronger, farther.

 

The heat increases slowly at first as I rub the materials together between my palms. Then, it becomes more and more intense, until piercing pain burns through my arms. Still, I keep going. When I was younger, when I was less resilient, weaker, my body forced me to release the spell prematurely because it feared the pain. The results were not satisfactory, not to him. So I learned to endure how the fire would burn me as well as my targets. It was necessary for the greater good.

 

Then, when the heat turns into a spinning ball of pure, concentrated pain that levitates between my hands, I let it go. It soars closer and closer and closer to everything I had known, all the lies that I was told by the people who had taken care of me, who I thought had loved me. 

 

I could feel the gentle heat radiating off of my childhood, taking away the chill of the evening. Even at its end, it still offers me comfort. Even when it can’t belong because its creators cannot belong. For the greater good. 

 

I am okay. I am passing my test. I am powerful.

 

Then, I hear their screams. The cymbals of reality crash against my ears, and I find myself stumbling back. Tears start to roll down my cheeks, the water bringing just as much pain as the fire that I held in my hands. 

 

I can barely comprehend the sight of the two plumes of smoke polluting the darkening sky in the distance. Eodwulf and Astrid. Everything felt… wrong.

 

Run.

Run.

Run.

Run.

Run.

 

And I did. 

 

 

 

I drift through an endless ocean of haze. Not drowning, but not swimming either. I was just… there. Sometimes, I find myself passing an island made up of thoughts, incomprehensible, but it’s there. It offers me comfort. Not enough, but it is better than nothing. 

 

Vaguely, I wonder where am I. What I am doing. If I’m supposed to be here. But there are no answers to be found, and for some reason, I am fine with that.

 

After forever passes, a gentle hand thrusts its way through the haze, and I hesitantly grab it. Suddenly, I am yanked out of this ocean. I am soaring. And as I pass the islands of thoughts, I feel clarity returning to my mind. As my feet skim the waves below me, the thin veil behind which reality hid finally crashed down.

 

My parents.

 

They loved me. They took care of me. And they would never, never betray the empire. None of it was real. The experiments, the betrayal, everything. But now is not the time for mourning. Now, I exist for only one purpose:

 

I must kill Trent Ikithon.