The Living Curse

Chapter Three: An Awaited Discovery





Within another white walled room of the academy, a figure shrouded in shadows crouched over a bed. Between its hands floated a small ball of light, blazing white like a distant star. By the light it produced, the boy’s blue eyes shone with anticipation. He whispered a few words into the light, as if to keep them a secret. The light grew, and formed a glowing square, resembling an illuminated mirror.

Cautiously, he peered into its silvery depths. He watched the girl, looking at herself in the mirror, clearly not pleased at what she saw. Suddenly, he saw the girl cross the room to answer the door; a knock, he assumed, though he could hear no sound. A girl, much shorter than she, entered the room and flopped on the bed. They talked for a few moments, and the shorter girl seemed to feign her own death, falling backward on the bed as if she had been stabbed in the heart. Peculiar…he thought, but he had seen much stranger things than teenage girls.

He tired of watching them, especially without hearing what they were saying, but he could not bring himself to recite that part of the spell, and he hadn’t seen what he was waiting for yet. He already felt as though he was intruding by watching them, but listening to them would just be rude. The conversation seemed to increase in tension by the looks on their faces. Finally, the girl sat slowly down on the bed, and lifted her foot to rest on her other leg. Yes, he thought, and his pulse picked up.

As she turned her foot, he nearly jumped off the bed with surprise and excitement. At the sight of the silver-gray mark, his own burned, as if it longed also to be in the company of another. Finally, he could close the window, and lie back on the bed. The silver portal imploded slowly on itself as he drew the energy back from it. He was slightly drained from the spell, for although it was simple, he had maintained it for a long time. He remembered conjuring the first light, then facing the dilemma of touching it to the girl. In the end, he brushed past her shoulder, not wanting to talk to her until he knew for sure. He had conjured the second, identical light closed up in his room, with the curtains drawn and the doors locked.

He had traced many, but she had been the most promising so far. She seemed strong, seemed to emanate vitality and spirit, and his Shask burned when she was near. His mind mechanically analyzed each thing that he had seen. He made his conclusions, and stored them away for later: the girl in her room was a close friend of hers, she was stubborn, and she was, of course, a Markbearer.

He smiled at these conclusions. He enjoyed mapping people out, making them seem black and white; they seemed much simpler this way. He was an excellent judge of character, and his assessments of people were hardly ever wrong.

He crossed the room and stripped off his clothes to shower, running a hand through his short blonde hair. Looking in the mirror, he pursed his lips as he realized it was longer than he liked it, the ends now betraying their curl; he usually kept it short enough that one couldn’t tell. His face was still streaked with black blood from the night before that he hadn’t been able to wash off. Some of the blood, a rust-brown, was his, but he had healed the injuries hours before, leaving only the stain as a reminder. He stepped into the shower, allowing the steam to envelope him, and the hot water to sting his skin. Washing away the blood from the battle, but not the memories, he thought about the girl he’d been watching.

Normally, he would feel uncomfortable spying on people, but desperate times called for desperate measures. With the Guild steadily gaining power, the Vine was searching for as many with marks as they could find. He had gotten his Shask about a year and a half ago, and they had found him about two months ago. Already, they had taught him basic spells, like how to make the windows he was using to find the other Markbearer in the school. They had told him that there was one other, though he hadn’t sensed one, but now he had found her.

With a newfound sense of relief at completing his mission, and his skin finally scrubbed clean after a long and restless night, he dried off and settled in for a much needed sleep. He drifted into a soft state of mind with the remnants of a smile clinging to his lips for the first time in a long while.