Moirai

The words were delivered with a tone of disbelief and amazement and I realised too late that I should have some reaction to them. However, having never heard those words before in my life, I just stared blankly, waiting for her to continue. When she didn’t, I asked, “What’s the Amulet of Kochor?”

“Oh.” She muttered. “I should have remembered. You would not have read about it, although I thought Loni or Amber may have mentioned it. The Amulet was made by a human aurae, Armitrand, over three hundred years ago. Armitrand’s vision was to use the Amulet for good, to help protect Renenta from any and all threats. But an aurae with darker ambitions, Dryad this time, by the name of Kochor, heard of the Amulet and tracked Armitrand down. He slew him and took the Amulet, weaving great forces of evil across the land. However, eventually, the governing body of the Dryads that I told you about earlier imprisoned Kochor until his death and hid the Amulet in a secret place that only they and few others know the whereabouts of. I am one of those few.”

“But I still don’t understand.” I pointed out softly. Despite my dislike of magic, I was too curious for my own good. “What does the Amulet do?”

She laughed once without a trace of mirth. “The Amulet amplifies the wearer’s aura to incredible levels, allowing them to do things that normally would kill them.”

“Kill them?”

She laughed more genuinely this time. “I thought you didn’t care about magic?”

I bit my lip. “I don’t…but as you said, it’s relevant to what you’re telling me, so I may as well understand a bit about it.”

She nodded, almost in approval. “Well, I told you that the aura within magic users is an energy source. A more accurate description would be to say that the aura acts on the individual’s own energy. So, the bigger or stronger the feat attempted, the more tired it will leave you. For example, healing usually is quite easy as it shares the energy of both the victim and the aurae, whereas controlling a large body of water or creating a small earthquake would leave an aura user extremely weak. Trying something too difficult before your aura has been trained could kill you.”

I felt a frown crease my forehead; so my fear of magic was justified. “So auraics have died from using their magic?”

Kasanda nodded. “That’s one of the main reasons why they need to be trained. Auraics need to know as early as possible what their limits are so they don’t go too far.”

I felt a cold shudder ripple through me.

“I understand that this isn’t making you see magic in any better light, but you must also consider the benefits. From simple, everyday tasks, to aiding yoursDryad and others in battle, to protecting Renenta, magic is an enormous asset to both auraics and non-auraics alike. For those who are born with an aura inside them, even if they try to avoid it, eventually it will become known to them, often as an example of just how much of a benefit it can be.”

I could see that she was trying to get me around to her way of thinking, but it wasn’t working. All I could see in my mind’s eye were the images conjured up from my childhood; a fearsome beast, rolling waves and the sound of screaming people as lightning lit up the scene, not from the sky but from the palm of a wrinkled old man…

“I see now why it was so bad that this girl asked for the Amulet.” I said, in an effort to keep my mind focussed on the conversation.

Kasanda nodded, accepting the subject change. “Yes. She grew increasingly persistent until I finally told her that if she did not turn her mind from thoughts of the Amulet I would no longer teach her. She was gone the next morning, leaving nothing but a note which read: Dear Kasanda, you have taught me all you are willing to, but I desire more. My ambition is to become the greatest aurae Renenta has ever seen. To bring a peace over the land, with me as its ruler by my birthright, that can never be broken. A peace where there is no class, except those with an aura and those without. Those who were not gifted with an aura do not deserve to be rulers and nobility. They deserve to be our slaves. We are the ones with the power. You will eventually see my outlook, dear teacher. I look forward to that day.”

I found myself cringing into the back of the chair with each sentence, horrified. It was one thing to read about various villains’ plots in the books I would read, but another entirely for someone to be that evil in the real world. “That’s…that’s ridiculous!” I gasped.

“I know.” Kasanda agreed gravely.

After a few moments in which I could only stare at her, stunned, I managed to ask, “What did she mean by it’s her birthright to be a ruler?”

She sighed and turned to look beyond me out the window. “Because the girl who arrived on my doorstep, the girl who grew to have such darkness in her…is the lost princess; Indina.”

There was another pause. I knew the name of course from Loni and her parents, but I didn’t know that she was a princess. Kasanda, realising that I did not know, she explained. “The Princess disappeared twenty-five years ago. No-one knew where she had gone or why she had run away. The king and queen suspected a kidnapping, but there was no evidence to support their claim and there was no hostility from Azterka, the Dryads or anyone else. She had always been a lonesome person; she hardly ever made public appearances and when she did, everyone could see that she was unhappy. With what, no one knew. Possibly the palace life, possibly her lack of authority while she remained a princess. I have suspicions that she even had plans to murder her own parents. She looked down on the common folk, even the nobility, with a sense of superiority. She was disliked by most. It is said that she was more beautiful than the queen, but that her appalling outlook ruined the effect.”

I wondered what had turned her evil, or whether she had just been born with the notion that she was better than anyone else. “So…do you know where she is now?” I asked.

Kasanda held up her hand. “I will finish my tale and then explain what I know. However, she has not yet found the Amulet of Kochor.”

“How do you…?”

“Because if she had, her wicked dream of Renenta would have been implemented immediately.” Kasanda said shortly. She was silent for several seconds, gathering her thoughts, before continuing the story. “Several months after Indina had left, I experienced a vision. Some Dryads have this ability; to see the future in times of great peril, but it is a dangerous gift. It leaves us exhausted and often with very little information to go on. It was the first such vision I had ever seen.”

She took a deep breath and her eyes went slightly glassy, as though she was seeing the vision again as clearly as she could see me. “It showed a girl standing outside a huge and ominous black castle, with sharp turrets like harsh mountains cleaving the dawning sky apart. The girl had outer-world energy about her. Her hair was as dark as night, her eyes glinting like emeralds. In one hand she held a sword; the other was glowing with her aura, the aura that she had embraced and near enough mastered. That castle, I knew, was where Indina had…”

Kasanda stopped suddenly as I jumped up from my chair and backed away, nearly tripping over in my haste. My extremities felt numb, and my head had gone cold. My vision narrowed significantly and I could hear a dull buzzing in my ears. It took me a couple of seconds to understand what she was implying, and every single cell in my body rejected it.

“No, no…” I whispered, staring at Kasanda with wide eyes. It was one thing to read stories and dream, to pretend as a child, but this…?

She stood and approached me, but I cringed away from her hand. “Alnya, please…”

“No!” I cried more forcefully, backing away towards the door. “You’re wrong! No…I…I can’t be…it can’t be me…I…magic…” I wasn’t able to form a sentence as my mind seemed to have fractured. Out of all the possibilities I had considered, this was not one of them. I could not be an aurae. I simply could not.

My breath was coming in quick gasps and I struggled to calm mysDryad down. The very thought that an aura existed within me, as Kasanda had implied, made me feel ill and scared. The images that had been created when I was four years old came to the forefront of my mind once again. I was pulled into the memory and Kasanda’s room vanished, to be replaced by another, far more familiar room.

All my older cousins, fifteen years old and more, were having a sleepover with my sister and, of course, I wanted to join in. I was banished from the lounge room as they all gathered to watch a film, but snuck back in anyway and hid behind one of the sofas, watching through the gap between pillows. I felt guilty, but I was angry at not being included. Of course, being four, I conveniently forgot that they had all watched a childs’ film before their own.

I cannot remember what the title of the film was or where they had gotten it from, as I have never been able to find it since.

It spun a tale of someone who could use magic on a ship that had been travelling with a large group of sailors in a small fleet of ships. That ship was attacked by a fearsome sea monster. The movie depicted it in great detail; its mouth red with the blood of previous victims, its skin wet and slimy and a sickly sea-green colour, its tentacles as thick as trees. It began to destroy the ship. The magic user tried to stop it, shooting lightning and fire at it fiercely. The monster became injured, but only grew more enraged and as the ship’s mast broke, the man seemed to explode with a blast of magic, enveloping the serpent. However, this explosion blew out of control and took the ship down with it. The film ended with the ship laying at the bottom of the ocean.

The final image depicted the other ships approaching the area and the pale dead body of the mage, his eyes staring wide, floating face up in the water.

The nightmares that followed were even worse.

Since then, a fear of magic had been born. If that man couldn’t control his magic enough to save his ship and those on it, no magic was safe. That’s why I loved reading novels involving magic; because they reassured me that it wasn’t real. Now, of course, that reassurance had just gone down the drain, which was why I felt like a bucket of cold water had just been dropped onto my head.

Kasanda’s hands suddenly touched my shoulders, and I jumped, realising that my back was against the door. I stared into her eyes, breathing heavily. Suddenly, she seemed frightening. Her green eyes were now glowing slightly, and I imagined that her hands were claws, gripping me like a vice. I struggled, pushing her off.

“What is wrong?” She asked, allowing me my space.

Briefly, with a shaking voice, I told her of the memory. She didn’t seem quite so terrifying once I stepped back, but I still felt cold. “Do you see, now?” I asked.

Her expression was one of surprise and mild horror, though I could tell it wasn’t because of what I had described. “But…how could that have happened…?” she whispered, so low that I could barely catch it. She said something else as well, but I couldn’t make out the words.

“What do you mean?” If possible, the thought that Kasanda was hiding something from me made me even more anxious.

“It’s nothing. Alnya, please, calm down.” She said quickly, breathing almost as hard as me. “Listen to me. This is not something that you can refuse. You can use magic. Or rather, you will soon be able to. Once you allow yourself to. It is dangerous, but it’s not something that you should be scared of. You cannot do what you must without magic.”

“But what do you want me to do?” I demanded, easing the space between us further. She allowed this, too, taking a couple of steps back.

She stared at me with sympathy clear on her face. “My vision is what you would probably refer to as prophetic. Any such vision, as history has shown, shows what will occur and what has to occur. There is no option of flexibility, or a thought of ‘it could be someone else’. The moment Loni found you, I knew you were the one and you have to go to where Indina has hidden hersDryad and rid Renenta of her evil. If you do not, then, as I told you earlier, the only other outcome is for Renenta to fall into the care of Indina, and we both know what she would do with it.”

“What…you want me to kill her? Kasanda, I’m seventeen!” I shouted, my voice growing louder with each word.

Kasanda, to my surprise, shook her head. “No, do not be ridiculous. I would not ask you to commit murder. Indina would not be killed. By now, she would be so surrounded by dark magic that she wouldn’t really be human anymore. She would be more dead than alive. Besides, there are more ways to stop her than merely killing her.”

“But the sword –”

“Will probably be necessary.” She interrupted. “Indina’s princess days would have granted her education in more than just bookwork; she will be an accomplished swordswoman. The lack of a prince, until years after she and I met, meant that she was taught swordsmanship and the use of many other weapons as well.”

I put a hand to my head as the light-headed feeling returned; it was just too much. “I…I can’t…”

Her hand returned to my shoulder, but this time I found it comforting.

“You don’t have to decide right at this moment.” She murmured softly. “Take a few days, talk with Loni and her parents. Think carefully. If you decide to accept your destiny,” I winced at the word; it sounded so…obligatory. “Well, come back here in three days a few hours after sunrise. You’ll want to leave early.”

I looked down. “Kasanda, I can’t promise that I will be back.”

“You don’t have to. Just remember what I’ve told you. And know that you won’t be going alone. I would advise you take Loni with you. I have someone else to accompany you. If you come here in three days, you will meet him.”

Nodding, I said, “Okay. Thank...thank you for explaining things to me. I’d rather know than not. It’s just…not what I was expecting. At all.”

She smiled sadly. “No. I can’t imagine it was. Good luck, and goodbye.”