"Elryn: Chapter 1" by Brian D. Saul

Finally I was done, after several long months of work the room was completed at last.  I stood quietly in the center circle of the room and admired my meticulous handiwork.  Inscribed all over  the stone dome were magical runes, virtually all of them intended to increase the magical potency of a spell.  Such things were required for truly powerful spells anymore, they only did a little good as the sheer number of them showed, and such large numbers were not exactly portable.  Magic, at least the kind most dream of, was a dying art.  It was the popular belief among scholars that this was not because magical energy was somehow depleting, but for some reason it was becoming harder to control.  Without formal training few could cast more than the simplest of spells, and those that were capable of more either hid themselves, or openly ruled over some small country.

In general only a few possessed strong magical talents, but as one can expect most aren't willing to share their secrets openly.  Because of this it was hard these days to find mages willing to train someone.  I was one of the lucky ones, however, I was accepted into one of the few remaining magic schools. Okay, so I'll  be the first to admit it was in a small backwater town few had heard of, on an island even less had heard of, but I was not about to complain.

Since the day of my creation, I, like many others yearned for more magical control.  My acceptance into this academy has helped that along greatly, but all that training takes years, and I'm terribly impatient girl.  My Mentor, however, a sage by the name of Merick has more patience than should be allowed in a human, and it was with a fair amount of help from his collection I have accomplished what I have.  Merick is admittedly not much of a mage himself, even he admits to that one, but his library is simply enormous, it is far from organized, but huge all the same.  Contained within are books as new as last year, to tomes so weathered with age it was a wonder they didn't just crumble in your hands.  As one can tell, a more bookish person would be hard pressed to find, rarely is he seen walking around without a book in hand, and at times he'd just up and leave for months on end only to return with even more of them.

It is again with their help I have done all this. I may be impatient, but I believe that with what I've found in those books, I have managed to create a method to instantly increase my magical control to levels far beyond that of anyone on this island.  A small ritual, and a large number of runes, all of my own creation.  Pretty much everyone just believes I am simply playing around with this, no one could actually believe that it was going to work.  Nearly all of them figured that, once again, I would wind up hurting myself in one of my experiments.  But I would show, I have put far too much work into this to see it fail, the powers of the ancients would be mine!

I tilted my head back and left out the best maniacal laugh I could muster, I had always wanted to do that.  The thought of overwhelming power coursing through me certainly seemed like a good enough reason to me.

"Miss M'len!" My daydreaming was shattered by a very irate shout.  "Is there something you'd like to share with the rest of us?"

My face must have turned a dozen shades of red when I realized what I had just done.  Ms. Teral gave me a look that could have curdled fresh milk as laughter from the students around me filled the air.  "N-no, nothing." I stammered meekly as I sank as far down into my chair as I could.

"Good.  Now then." she said, clearing her throat. "Unless there are any more interruptions.  As I was saying...."  With a sweeping glare around the room the laughter quickly subsided, her eyes made one final withering stare at me before she resumed her lesson.

The remainder of the day went as decently as could be expected for one who had just humiliated herself as I did, as expected no one was going to let me live that down, and they made it a point to poke fun at the ordeal as often as they could for the remainder of the day.  I didn't wait in the courtyard of the academy as I usually did after classes, no, I had something much more important to attend to today.

The day I had planned for the ritual was just your average day when compared to the more mystical days of the year.  I had just finished all my preparations the day before, there was no way I was going to wait even longer just to see if they worked.

Taking my position in the center circle of the rune covered room I started to-

"Elryn!" A shout interrupted as Eryk ran into the room.  I knew there was something I had forgotten to do, lock the door.

He was tall compared to most, standing a little bit over six feet, nearly two feet taller than myself actually.  His build was about average I would guess, magic didn't really require strenuous physical training to pull off after all.  All things said and done he was fairly strong though, but then, he was one of the few students actually in the swordsmanship class here.  Of all the people I considered friends, he was the only one I could honestly label as a true friend.  He was willing to stick with me through anything, and in fact he has been there with me through a lot.  Eryk was also one of the only people that was actually optimistic I would succeed in doing something other than blowing myself up.

"You do realize if you had come in a few seconds later and interrupted me I'd have had to kill you, right?" I shouted across the room as he walked up to me.  "Make it quick....what do you want?"

He just kind of smiled at me as he looked around the room. "Oh not much really.  You’ve just never let me see what it looked like in here remember?”  He replied with a smirk.  “And if any were a good time for you to forget the lock, it would be now." He added with a laugh as he rested his hand on my head.

"Stop that!" I growled as I swatted away his hand. "Just because I'm short doesn't mean you have to rub it in..." Although I knew darn well it was not going to do any good, he was always doing that.  "Now go, I've got spells to chant, unimaginable power to gain, things like that."  I told him rather sternly, pushing him towards the door.

"Okay, okay, I'm going, just wanted to wish you luck."

"Luck noted, now get out."  I couldn't help but giggle at the hurt look he gave me as I gave him one final push out the door.  This time as I closed it I remembered to lock it securely.

Taking position in the center of the room again, I began to call out the words corresponding to each of the runes that were inscribed all over the walls.  One by one the runes began to glow as I called out the word associated with them, each one had it's own slightly different unique color to it.  I stood a moment and smiled at the rainbow colored sights of them all glowing around me, then with one last word shouted all the runes became active and took on a uniform white glow.  Now that the amplifiers and a few other things of my making were activated, onto the main event.  I started to chant the ritual incantation, waving my arm in various intricate patterns as my hand weaved a dizzying display.  As the spell was chanted the white glow which filled the room gradually rook on an oddly familiar purple, now that was unexpected.  I knew what the original spell should have done, but having taken liberal amount of creative liberty with it I was no longer quite sure what it was supposed to look like.

The feeling as I finished off the spell was wonderful, all that work had finally payed off, it had worked!  I could feel the power surge within me, coursing through my veins.  The light withing the room gradually amplified till I could see nothing but a purple glow.  The air hummed with energy, suddenly a deafening silence overtook the room, and then...nothing....


I stood outside for a few moments looking over the building, I’d say small but it really was a rather nice sized structure for one so small to put together herself.  Mostly herself, she had help transporting all the material here, but she did most of the assembly somehow.  It was thing like this that always amazed me about her.

Elryn had joined the school about four years ago at the age of fourteen or so, talkative, fun, but has always had somewhat of a short fuse.  She would never actually gone off on someone, that was a bit too blunt for her tastes, but instead did a lot of little things to someone she was angry at, and usually in such a manner they never know who was doing it.  Such vengeance never did much harm but it was great for a laugh, and was usually plenty to appease her wrath and return her to a good mood.  She was probably one of the shorter, if not shortest, girls on the island, standing a few inches under five feet.  I had to admit she was quite beautiful, if not a bit frail looking due to her size.  And her eyes were positively the most unique color either myself or anyone else I know had ever seen, a rather bright purple color which almost seemed to glow in the right light.  While she may have appeared frail, I had since since learned in the time I knew her that she was anything but.  With one exception, I don't think I have ever met a more resilient and stubborn person in my life.  Her stubbornness tended to shine through most when she was experimenting with magic.  Her favorite hobby seemed to be trying to create new spells, potions, things like that.  A task that nowadays had become increasingly hard to pull off successfully.  Her resiliency shined in several other ways however.

Now like most of the girls at school she used to obsess over her figure, didn't like her hair, couldn't stand how short she was, her small chest, you name it.  That all changed about three months after she had arrived here, roughly two days after I had really gotten to know her well.  In an experiment gone horribly awry, her right arm was destroyed, taking with it a good portion of her right shoulder as well.  As one could expect this changed her whole outlook on her appearance, and showed an over all change in her in general.

I knew I should probably not have been in here bothering her at a time like this, she had spent months preparing for this day after all.  Yet I couldn’t help dropping by to wish her luck and to get a good look at the inside of this place.  Up until today she kept it’s contents very well hidden and secret from the rest of town.  Some of the runes I recognized, power amplifiers by the looks of them...but there was a fair amount of them which I had never seen before.  I had to definitely give her credit, I was incredibly impressed with what I saw before she shooed me out of the building.

Much as she reassured me I couldn't help but worry, she had always done little experiments, minor spells, potions, nothing so major as this.  I couldn't shake the fact that it was one of these little experiments that cost her her arm.  It wouldn’t worry me so much if they didn’t end in her being hurt half the time, she may be more careful about how she did things now but she still took risks.  I wasn’t outside long before I began to notice small sparks of energy arc from the building, it looked like she had started.  A quick zap to my arm was a painful reminder that I was clearly standing far too close.

Having run up a nearby hill I stared down in amazement at the area.  She had picked a good spot, her ritual building was in a small clearing in the forest not far from town.  It was surprisingly well built dome considering it was built almost solely by her.  Which as bad as it sounded, was only true, she did only have one arm to work with after all.  As I watched my concern grew more and more, inwardly I prayed she was all right inside there.  There was now the faint outline of a dome covering the small circular building, energy arced wildly from it to the dome walls.  A chuckle escaped my lips as I watched, I couldn't help but notice it was the same iridescent purple color of her eyes, how like her to add a personal touch like that to a spell.  Over the next few seconds the the arcing became more pronounced, stronger, more frequent, I hoped it was nearing completion.  If it was this bad outside I couldn't imagine what it was like inside.  And then it all just stopped...as though time froze for an instant.  My heart sank as I saw the dome collapse in on itself, crushing the building before expanded outwards in an explosion that sent a shockwave rippling across the landscape and sent me tumbling down the back of the hill.  That split second seemed to drag on forever.

The scene I saw when I reached the top of the hill again was horrific.  Her ritual building lay in ruins amidst a crater of blasted ground, several rows of trees around the surrounding area were flattened away from it.  Without another thought I bolted down the hill with everything I had, nearly tripping over my own feet several times in my haste.  I crawled over the rubble haphazardly when I reached it, ignoring the few little cuts and bruises I got from the debris.  She should be near the center...gods I hoped that was where I would find her.  The ground around the area was charred by the explosion, but the building itself only appears to have been crushed, no burn marks marred the stone.  It was a little hope, it meant only the building had collapsed.  It would occur to my much later how silly that hope was, the debris had been crushed and compressed inward.  But at the time I had to hold hope in something.

It only took a few minutes for most of the town to reach the area, some joined in the search, others just stood in awe at the scene, the surrounding area still crackled with energy even half an hour after the blast.

The search went well into the evening, her building had not been all that big, but with most of the stone crushed into such a close area the going was slow.  As the few of us dug I could clearly see as time went on people were losing hope anyone could have survived this, having all magical means of detection fail only made their worries worse.  An hour or so later I finally found her.

I dare say I was terrified at what I saw when I moved the first piece of stone off her.  Her iridescent eyes were glazed over and stared blankly into the sky, they looked at first glance to be completely devoid of life.  I shouted for the others and they quickly helped me clear the rest of the debris off of her.  No, thank the Gods she wasn't devoid of life, she was still breathing.  It was slow and erratic but it gave us all some much needed hope.  It was clear from the start her body had been severely wounded, it was a wonder blood loss alone hadn’t killed her.  To seemingly add insult to injury most of her clothing had been burned away by the blast.  For modesty sake I removed my own robe and wrapped her in it, she was hurt enough, she didn't deserve humiliation.

What few of us who were near that knew healing spells did what we could, yet they for some reason didn’t do any more then stop the bleeding.  Not knowing what else to do I closed her eyes and gathered her broken body into my arms, she was so battered I was afraid I’d hurt her more just carrying her but I couldn’t just leave her there.  The sound jagged stone makes as it withdraws from a body is one I truly wish I could forget, and for a few brief moments I feared that it was the only thing holding her together anymore.  I issued many a well deserved and heartfelt thanks to those that helped and prayed for her as I walked through the crowd.  There was sure to be a lot of questions in the morning but for now people were kind enough to just let us pass without much intervention except to offer their prayer and any help they could give.

I spoke softly as I laid her on my bed.  "You really did it this time..."   Then walked quickly into the bathroom to get some towels and medical supplies.  I then went about cleaning and bandaging her wounds best I could, my first aid skills were severely lacking but it luckily didn’t take much skill to clean and bandage a wound.  I nearly lost what little composure I had left after I had gotten a good long look at her wounds under the light as I went about cleaning her up.  "Just your luck, deciding to blow herself up while the clerics are away."  I muttered with a small grin on my face.  Her mentor as well was off doing gods know what, it was nothing unusual, he would usually go off for months at a time.  As I bandaged her I couldn't help but notice she had a slight glow to her, it wasn't there when we first found her.  Now that I really thought about it, it started a few moments after I picked her up.

The damage as well wasn't necessarily entirely what I had figured it would be, her clothing were burnt to cinders by the blast, yet the flames had left her flesh untouched.  The potential burns were not what worried me though, she had been buried under, and impaled several times upon the stone.  It was that damage which worried me most.  What healing I could manage I figured would help keep her alive for a little bit, or at least hold her together.  It all seemed so useless in the end, the damage was so extensive I could not even be sure how long she would last.  I covered her with the blanket as I finished off the bandaging and what splinting for her arm and leg I could manage, then lay on the bed next to her resting my hand on her head genrly.

Despite all that has happened, a slight chuckle escaped me.  I can just hear her voice now yelling at me for all of this.  I may have helped save her life, and bandaged her wounds...but I also saw her naked too, she would have my eyes when she found out.  I let out a deep sigh and gently kissed her on the cheek, then I too laid myself on the bed next to her.  Despite my exhaustion I didn't sleep well that night, I wouldn't sleep well for however long it took her to recover I surmised.  How could I?  She needed me, and with her wounds I couldn't shake the feeling that while I may wake up the next morning, she might never wake up again.

                                            
Groggily things came into view as my vision gradually adjusted to the light.  I found myself in a nice soft bed in what appeared to be someones bedroom, now this was unexpected.  Come to think of it, it looked an awful lot like Eryk's room.  Had  I passed out from the spell?  How sweet of him to bring me somewhere comfortable to rest.  I yawned as I laid there looking around, I was still extremely tired, sore all over, and it felt like someone dropped a house on me.  To my disappointment I no longer felt the power I had when I finished my spell, maybe I messed up somewhere and the effect was only temporary.  That would be perfectly fitting now, I gain all sort of power, only to pass out from the effort and miss out on my chance to use any of it.  I did however feel somehow off, something just felt all around wrong but I couldn't quite put my finger on it.  On top of it all I was feeling very sick to my stomach, I hoped it was just because I was so hungry.

I had obviously been asleep long enough, so with a long drawn out yawn I try to prop myself up on my shoulder, it was then I noticed something else wrong.  Pulling my arm from under the blanket I saw it was fully bandaged and had a splint on it. “What the hells?!” I nearly yelled as I tossed the blanket off myself and was greeted by the sight of myself wrapped from neck to toe in bandages, with not only a splint on my arm but my left leg as well.  "You've got a really strange sense of humor there Eryk." I grumbled as I started to remove the bandages around my chest, which as if to only add to my annoyance was painfully tender, he probably wrapped it too tight.  Had I two hands this would have been so much easier, heck as it stood I couldn't even use the one arm I did have effectively because the idiot practically mummified me.  As I gradually worked more and more of it off of me it occurred to me he seems to have taken this stupid little joke further than I had originally thought, where were my clothing?  I swore, if he wrapped me up like this without at least something on underneath, I was going to use his eyes as marbles.  "I'm going to kill him." I grumbled as I unwrap more of the bandages from my chest and came to realize he really did wrap me up like this with nothing on underneath.  "Hear me Eryk!?  I'm going to kill you!" I shouted at the top of my lungs.

A minute later the door burst open and he ran in, nearly stumbling over his own feet in the process.  He then did nothing at all but to stand there and stare at me.  Impeccable timing too as I’m busy removing the bandages from my waist at the time. With a shriek I cover my chest with my arm, I wished now I hadn’t tossed the blanked to the floor. "There’s nothing to stare at, so knock it off already!”  I yelled, barely able to finish my scolding before he ran over and grabbed me in the tightest embrace I had received from him since I lost my arm.  Well, I had all my limbs this time and was otherwise intact.  "Hey stop that you pervert!  I'm not done yelling at you yet, don't think a hugs going to get you out of it this, where are my cl-" Something small and wet landed on my shoulder and began to slowly run down my arm.  A tear?  "What's wrong?" I was suddenly unsure just what to do.  "Eryk, what's wrong?" I asked again a bit more frantically, had something happened while I was asleep?

"N..nothing, its all right now, you're awake and well, that's all that matters now." He stammered in between the tears, only holding me tighter.

Darn him, there were so many things I had to yell at him for but couldn't bring myself to.  "Well I'm okay now, see?  You would think I nearly killed myself with all these bandages on like this."  With that he lets go and just looks at me with disbelief.  "Speaking of which....  Now knock that off!” I kicked him a few times as he looked me over, his mind seemed to be completely in the gutter today.  “Give me the blanket!  Its bad enough you took off my clothing to dress me like this, I’m not about to give you anyways else to look at if I can help it.

"Oh, yeah...sorry about that.” He answered, his face turned a bright red as he turned away and tossed the blanket over me.  He not so much as smiled.

“Good, now can you take this stuff off my arm?”  I practically demanded of him as I held out my mummified arm.  “Its hard to remove bandages when you can’t use your only arm effectively you know.”

“...S..sure, should I get the rest while I'm at it?" He asked in a shaky voice as he worked on removing the bandages and the splint from my arm.

"What?!  Hell no!" I screamed at him. "Its bad enough you took off all my clothing just to mummify me, I will of course get you back for that you know, that's taking a joke a little too far.  But there's no way I'm going to willingly let you see me like that!"  The nerve of him to even ask such a thing.  "Where is my robe and the rest of my clothing at any way?”  He looked genuinly quite hurt as I yelled at him, not in the joking manner he usually used on me, and while he had stopped openly crying I could still see he was on the verge of just letting go again.  I had only seen him like this a few times before, each was after I had rather seriously hurt myself.  This time I had all my limbs though and didn’t have a scratch on me, so what was wrong with him?  He had not so much as smiled since he first saw me, was it something I did?  Yes I had yelled at him, but it wasn’t like he had not deserved it, and that alone I knew by now was not enough to get this kind of reaction from him.

"You honestly don't remember it, do you?”  He finally replied after a few minutes while I had my head buried under the blanket removing more of his handiwork.  “Your spell nearly killed you Elryn.  You've been in a coma for the past five weeks, we weren't even sure you were going to recover."  His voice crackled as he spoke, heavy with concern and confusion alike.

"Very funny Eryk."  I looked up from under the blanket and held out my arm, which looked better then ever.  Come to think of it it looked amazingly good, no scars or anything, perhaps my spell had some lasting effect after all. "Looks amazingly good for someone who nearly killed herself, doesn't it."

"I can't explain it myself either, it was broken in several places, your leg too, as well as gods know what else." He poked my leg a few times with a slightly confused look on his face. "...You're not buying a word of this, are you?"

With a laugh I shook my head. "I think you're just making it up because you were crying over something so small, you worry too much about me.  You know I've been more careful since I destroyed my arm."  I rubbed what remained of my shoulder to emphasize my point, the accident left only a scar as evidence there should have been a limb there in the first place.

He grinned and let out a soft laugh for the first time today, it was a refreshing sound. "Like how you carefully nearly put yourself through your wall the week before your spell?  I've also never seen anyone carefully ignite their robes. Oh, and we can't forget how you carefully..."

"Okay okay I get the point." I murmured with a sheepish grin on my face.  I was sure all those great legendary wizards blasted themselves accidentally on occasion.  After all how was one to create new and powerful things without taking a few risks?  As he went on I couldn't help but think perhaps he was telling the truth, his attitude was just too off for it to be that fake.  Most likely exaggerated heavily or I wouldn't even be able to sit up like this, but just maybe.  "Well okay maybe you are telling the truth a little...if its really that bad, let me see the site."  I finally gave in and asked, even if it was not as bad as he said I wanted to see how much work I was going to have to do to the room to get it ready for another try.

"Good idea, everyone will be glad to see you're alright anyway, sure they'll have a lot of questions for you too."  He replied, standing up from the bed and tossing me one of his robes, a shirt, and some pants.

I looked over the shirt he tossed me, it was plain, black, and just overall boring.  "Why don't you just give me my clothing back?  You're taste in clothing is just so,” I tried to look for the right word, but only one actually came to mind.  “bland."

"Remember how I said you were nearly killed?  Well the blast burnt your clothing to pretty much nothing as well." He blushed a bit as he said that wheeling about in hopes I wouldn't see. "But I'll let you finish removing those bandages and get dressed now." He said quickly as he headed towards the door.

"Ohhhhh yes, that's right!" I said as I removed the last of the bandages from my foot, peaking out just enough to see his reaction.  He stopped dead in his tracks and cringed at my tone of voice. "Even if you did save my life, I of course can't just let it go that you saw every inch of me unclothed."

"But, you've always assured me there's not much there to look at,”  He stated in an odd tone of voice.  “If it;s any sort of consolation....you were right." He finished quickly, then laughed and bolted from the room.

"You son of a!" I grabbed his robe and threw it on as I dove from the bed, intent on exacting a horrible revenge for that comment.  He was right of course, but it was the principal of the thing.  That idea, however, quickly fell apart as my vision blurred and a wave of dizziness washed over me, sending me rather unceremoniously into a book shelf.  I laid on my knees a few seconds waiting for the dizziness to pass, my hand on my belly, resisting the urge to vomit as the nausea suddenly grew considerably worse.  I had hoped as I lay awake longer all this would have passed, but no such luck.  Damned spell probably left me so weak I've gone and caught cold or something, I haven't been sick in years, so much for that record.  Not wanting to worry him any more I wrap my foot in the edge of the blanket quick as I heard Eryk running down the hall again.

“Yes yes, I’m alright.” I said quickly as he ran into the room, not giving him a chance to say anything.  “I just tripped over your blanket while trying to kill you.”  I Looked up at him with a small grin on my face. Trying not to look as ill as I felt at the moment I picked up one of the larger books on the floor.  “You really should keep the larger books on the bottom.” I groaned slightly for effect as I set the book down and rubbed the back of my head.  The book had been on the floor the whole time, but a little guilt never hurt, and the look on his face was priceless.  He just kind of stammered something unintelligibly as he helped me to my feet, as much as I hated doing so I used him for support as we left the house.

The dizziness was gradually passing, but was still bad enough I did not feel comfortable walking on my own.  How embarrassing this was turning out to be.  To make matters worse, my mind had been so preoccupied with other things that it was not until after we were already outside that I noticed the only thing I had was his robe.  Not wanting to bother him more I just tied it tightly closed and continued on, it was quite large on me so it was not all that bad.  There was a cool breeze to the air, not overly so but enough that it was noticeable. more so with just a robe on.  Given how the day had gone thus far I half expected a strong wind to blow it open.  This, however, only gave his story more credit, it wasn’t this cold when I did my spell, and five weeks from then would be bringing us into the autumn season.

A few minutes outside his house brought to light the painful face that he was indeed telling the truth all this time.  Now I couldn’t help but feel a little bad for all the grief I had given him.  Everyone that walked up to us seemed rather happy to see me alive and awake, as I was still using him for support most people still thought I was rather wounded, that took me a little convincing to prove otherwise without actually showing anyone.  On top of the concern people showed there were many a compliment on the most impressive magical display they had seen in ages, and many asked me to demonstrate this newfound power I had acquired.  They were disappointed when I told them the spell failed, and that in fact I was still so weak I couldn’t even do the simplest of spells right now, but I didn’t go telling that part to anyone.  The compliments from some of the teachers at the academy brightened my day however, they were impressed by the amount of energy I managed to harness even though I was still rather unskilled.  Unskilled my behind, I would have liked to see them manage what I did.  Minus the whole exploding thing of course.

In the end I simply laughed jokingly when people mentioned the spell, chalking it up to another experiment that ended badly.  Truth be told I was heart broken to see months of work fail like that, but people were used to my experiments failing so it was at least an acceptable excuse for them.  It got them to leave me alone pretty effectively too, all this concern was embarrassing, and a tad irritating, how often did I have to tell people “I’m fine.” before they’d actually listen?  It was of course a bold faced lie, I felt anything but fine.  My stomach was still quite upset, it took what felt like forever for the dizziness to clear enough to walk on my own, and I still felt all around funny.  It was most likely a lingering effect of the spell, that much energy flowing through someone was bound to leave a lasting impression even weeks after it dispersed.  I did so hope it would clear up soon, it was a painful reminder that my months of work were in vain.

It took us nearly an hour to finally reach the outskirts of town, it only had about 100 people in it, but I swear every last one of them had to say hi, make sure I was okay, and issue a barrage of questions.  I liked attention and all but this was just too much even for me to take for long.  Aside from not wanting to lose my other arm or another important limb, I remembered this was one of the other reasons I was so much more careful about my experiments.

It was another thirty minutes before we reached the hill overlooking the clearing.  A trip which should have taken ten, but I was so weak today at this rate he’d have to carry me back.  There was no way I was going to let it reach that point, I would drag myself back under my own power if it killed me.  This whole ordeal has been humiliating enough without him parading through town with me in his arms like a sack of potatoes.


I watched Elryn closely as we made way through the forest.  She had been walking on her own for a bit now but something still seemed off.  She was obviously exhausted, it showed in the way she walked, yet she still insisted I take her to the site.  I would have thought after all this time she would have wanted something to eat first, magical nutrition may keep someone alive but it still tends to leave one extremely hungry all the same.  Grudgingly she accepted my help getting to the top of the hill once we arrived, she didn't want to admit she needed it.  I had opted to take her this way as this hill gave a perfect view of the entire area, or what was left of it anymore.  As we crested the hill she stood in awe at the scene before her.

“I-I did all that?” She finally asked in a quiet tone, getting a nod from me in response.  “I thought you were exaggeration as usual....” Her voice trailed off as she looked around again, perhaps she finally realized this time how close she had come to killing herself.  The scene had been preserved by the Elders, for their own investigation primarily.  Finally she blurted out a merry sounding “Wow!” and wheeled about with a huge smile splitting her face.

“Wow?” I stood in utter disbelief for a moment.  “You stupid girl!”  I snapped at her.  “Y-you nearly kill yourself, and all you have to say is wow?!”  With hardly any thought I found myself yelling at her, for a change, in an honestly angry voice.  It was not just out of anger though, I actually meant it.  “I carried your shattered little body back to town, watched over you for weeks, unsure if you’d even live to see the next day....  Dammit Elryn, one of these days you’re going to do something to yourself and not wake up again, I don’t know what I’d do if....” My voice trailed off as I looked at her, tears blurring my vision.  She had her head lowered and for once seemed genuinely hurt. “....Oh Gods....Elryn, I...I’m sorry...”

Elryn looked up at me with those purple emotion filled eyes of hers, a small smile falling across her lips. “No you’re not.”  She replied in a soft voice.  “Thank you Eryk.”  She added before turning around and heading down the hill without another word.  She had been right though, I did mean every word if it, and even now I’m glad I said it.  Elryn never seemed to consider what might happen to her in an experiment, as long as she survived what did, it was all alright in the end.  It was not unusual for her to want to see the aftermath of one of her experiments gone wrong, but it was always small stuff before, broken instruments, scorched furniture, things like that.  The scene here was much more gruesome, it was bad enough I had to see her like that once, I couldn’t bring myself to see the area up close again, but I kept a steady eye on her in case she would need my help.

It was nearly evening before she finally returned.  She had spent a good deal of time just milling through the ruin and the blasted area around it, then stopped for a long time near the center where her broken body lay weeks before.  I shuddered at the thought of what that area looked like after I lifted her out of the hole.  Even now after the rain we had the past few weeks the stones were still stained red.

“Looks like you were right.” She remarked with a smirk as she trudged up the hill.  “It looks like I really did nearly kill myself this time.”  Sitting down next to me she wrapped her arm around me and laid her head on my arm. “But I’m okay now, even after all this.  I’ll be back to only giving myself minor injuries in no time.” She giggled playfully.  It didn’t entirely surprise me that she tried to sound anything but serious over the matter, but her voice betrayed her.  There was a noticeably troubled tone to it, ever her usually happy giggle sounded fake.

“Now then.”  She stated in a louder tone a few minutes later, slowly she stood up using me as a brace in the process.  “I’ve rested enough for now, lets get back into town, I’m starving.”

Smiling I stood up next to her. “I agree, haven’t eaten all day, and you’ve got five weeks to make up for.”

“See?  Now that, is worrying I can live with.”  She gave a good honest resounding laugh, it was a most refreshing sound to hear.  A sound which was heard more as we walked back to town, joking about various little things along the way.

The remainder of the evening was quiet, dinner was uneventful, and as expected she ate like someone who had not eaten for weeks.  She had of course not, yet it still amazed me to watch that girl eat at times, I was sure half the town would kill to have had her metabolism.  We both returned to my house afterwards with the intend to talk a while.  Elryn pretended not to be tired the whole time, but her ruse was made clear as day a few short minutes after she sat herself on my bed.  She was out cold in a matter of minutes.

Unlike Elryn I stayed up most of the night, she slept peacefully but there was one thing above all else about this whole ordeal that bothered me, it had been weeks now.  Jura redid the bandaging I had initially done and left it up to me to replace old with new ones now and again.  They didn't need replacing often, but it was still necessary.  The last time I had done it was a few days ago, and at that time she was still badly wounded, and now here she was completely healed, not so much as a scratch.  The wounds she sustained should have taken months to heal, if ever at all, and she didn't have so much as a scar to show for it.  Even stranger yet was the way even all the scars she had received from previous failures, general accidents, etc, had completely healed as well.  I had never heard of a spell that could heal that well, even the strongest cleric in town would have been unable pull off such a feat.  It was about then I remembered the glow she had that night, for some reason it had escaped me until now.  It had to have been energy left over from the spell, I guess  in the end she may not have gotten the power that she wanted, but it probably saved her life.