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It was late afternoon when I arrived. I steadily eased back the magic flowing out of me into the stone board beneath my feet, slowing it to a gentle stop. Ruined buildings reached up, trying to escape their sandy tombs to no avail. Eventually, Shurima reclaims it all, if it dies. On closer inspection though, there were signs of disturbances in the sand. Almost footprints, but you wouldn’t describe anything that could make a shape like that a foot. The creatures of the Void come in all shapes and forms, all different, all hideous. Don’t let me stumble into one, please. I petitioned the Great Weaver.
Huh, the Great Weaver. How long was it since I last called on her name? It’s been so long since the day I left my family, a day that split my life in two. Taliyah, daughter of the Nasaaj, who was one day destined to weave fabric, and Taliyah the magus scholar, who was said to be one of the most promising researchers of her time. Then, I had sixteen summers to my name, now, twenty-four. Much can change in eight years. Who would have known that leaving my family and tribe in search for a master who could teach me about my giftings over the earth would have led to me playing a part in vanquishing an ancient ascended archmage alongside the reborn emperor of new Shuriman empire, eventually propelling me into a career I couldn’t even have dreamed of back then. I never returned to the Nasaaj; perhaps the Great Weaver had forgotten about me.
It was unsettlingly silent. Why was I here again? I complained, but I knew I couldn’t turn back. Even with the dangers, I had questions, and this place whose shadow I’d grown up in had answers. Ever since the old prophet of the Void, the menace known as Malzahar, was slain, something hadn’t felt right. Whispers that lay just outside my conscious mind, fleeing whenever I tried to find them, inexplicable feelings of longing that hit me late at night without warning… I couldn’t understand it myself, but there was a calling that demanded my attention, no matter how I tried to ignore it. I couldn’t begin to explain how, but I knew this place stood at the centre of my wrestlings.
Icathia.
I didn’t know what I was looking for, but that thing inside me, those quiet whispers, were stirring, like a dog that heard its master’s voice. I followed their urging, but held onto the lead with a steady hand. If there was one thing I’d learnt in my life, it was control. I turned this way and that, cutting a path through the ancient structures, the sound of my boots on salt and sand my only companion until it led me back out of the ruins to the cracked rocky plains east-southeast of the city.
I’d long suspected this area housed the origin of an arcane thread, as I liked to call them. Enigmatic sources of magic leaking in from other worlds and fanning out for miles, like a river flowing from the ocean. They’re what makes sorcery possible. Did this have something to do with my affliction? As I was led from the ruins, running in the ever-dimming sunlight, organic structures of alien likeness started to appear. They were repulsive, and infinitely diverse in appearance, defying description. The one thread that bound them together was their organic armour of dizzyingly intricate arrangements, and a soft purple glow emanating from their masses. I studied their forms as I passed through. I’d never seen anything like it before...
A crack of thunder shook me out of my thoughts just as I reached the precipice of an abyss. Perhaps the Great Weaver does still watch over me, I thought. A refreshing breeze travelling from the eastern seas carried a storm along gently, but the ever darkening day would be spent and I’d be gone long before it arrived. The jagged formations surrounding the canyon were hints that something had ruptured upwards from the earth long ago. It was too deep for me to see the bottom, but I could feel bundles of magical energy wafting up past me. Was this the origin of an Arcane thread? I thought about what my next move would be, but then I noticed I wasn’t alone. I looked around. There was… something. Nothing I’d heard- felt?- before. Some sort of presence. It didn’t talk with words, whatever it was, Yet it promised me a future of knowledge and peace, it whispered of beings that possessed unfathomable knowledge willing to teach me, and a world unified, no more bickering city-states or factional infighting. What it asked for in return was a conversation. It asked me to open my mind to it. It asked for my co-operation.
The offer sounded very tempting, but I could recognise an empty promise when I heard one. I resolutely refused. I would make no such bargains with invaders from another world.
The presence’s sweet promises swiftly turned to harsh threats. My mind seized with visions of a future I couldn’t bear! Death and ruin! everywhere! No! I can’t let it in! I won’t let it in! I dug my heels in and pushed against its mental attacks, wave after wave! My heart thumped in my chest, My breath was sharp, I didn’t know what it would do with me if it won. That wasn’t an option!
I strained under the pressure. I couldn’t battle with this force forever. I had to take action. I opened myself up to the arcane energy surrounding me, this land drenched with it. The power running through me was immense! Enough to close up this entire accursed canyon, I wagered. That’s where these attacks were coming from, wasn’t it? I’d shut it in where it could never see the light of day again! The strain of gathering magic while fighting off an invader in my mind! My head was splitting apart! My legs were weak, yet the power still grew… the sound of stones grating against each other chipped at my ears, the force of my foe’s magic slammed against me! But too late for it, the earth was alive with magic, it was time! Lightning cracked on the horizon! I willed the canyon to close! Power surged out of me into the canyon’s walls... but nothing happened.
What!? I couldn’t believe it! The presence almost grinned with satisfaction at my confusion. My magic just…. didn’t go! I willed the canyon closed again, but the stone refused my call! I… That had never happened before! Magic was leaving me, but there was no feedback that I’d hit something, no friction, no resistance! It wasn’t like I was heaving against a boulder too heavy, but like I had no arms to heave with at all!
A chill fell over me. The sun had all but fallen below the horizon. I lifted a stone near me. There was that familiar, subtle resistance. I tried to hurl a section of the cliff down into the abyss, but no response. My magic was still there, but it wasn’t listening to me. Why not? How could this be!? Eight years of coming to understand my powers, and still there were mysteries I hadn’t even uncovered! This was unprecedented. I’d never heard of someone’s magic refusing their master like a rebellious servant!
Voiceless laughter echoed in my head. I didn’t understand this, not at all. I thought I’d mastered my powers...
But this was no time to wallow! I took flight, conjuring a board of stone from the earth beneath me, praying it would obey me too.
★
Cold dusk wind whipped past my ears and through my hair as I fled back to Shurima’s capital. It dried the sweat in my clothes I hadn’t noticed before, sending icy tendrils from my skin down to my bone. I couldn’t make sense of what just occurred. I’ve committed my life to studying the mechanics of magic. I racked my brain, had I ever read anything about magic refusing their master’s call?
I came to Icathia looking for answers, but like it always seems to go, all I got was more questions. One of them more concerning than the rest. I’d just assumed I’d received my command over the earth as a gift from the Great Weaver, but now, I wondered just how I had gotten that power. And more disturbingly, why I had gotten this power.