Chapter I - The Chains That Bind
The rattling of wagon wheels against a hole in the cobblestone road was what first jolted Wymare from his nap, their thinly constructed wood hitting each bump on the path with a relentless lack of subtlety. As the jostling carriage knocked him up and off his seat, he groaned as the allure of sleep was stolen away by his rude awakening, rubbing his closed eyes with his fingertips before opening them to behold the same scene he'd fallen asleep to earlier: the poorly lit interior of a station wagon, its parallel benches lined with young men and women in ragged, worn-out clothing. A mother near the door held her baby in her arms, soothing it as the infant protested the carriage's sudden lurch. A young pair to his left - siblings, he ventured - clutched each other tightly by the hand, their looks and postures betraying a fear in each that letting go meant losing the other. An old squatter huddled up with his knees drawn to his chest in the back corner, fervent insanity dancing in his vacant stare like songstresses on a stage.
The faces surrounding him were unique and alien, but the circumstance was far from unusual. He had been waking up surrounded by warm bodies and noise at the old Colkirk orphanage for as far back as he could remember, and he had seen enough faces come and go in those days to be comfortable sleeping around anyone. In thinking about the building in which he had grown up, he almost wished to be back in the massive, empty bunking room, curled up on a stained white mattress and watching the other orphans as their chests rose and fell. Then he remembered that there was nothing left for him there anymore and, in turn, the words of the orphanage's director three nights ago.
"Sorry, boy. Your time's up. Carriage to the capital city leaves in an hour with you on it."
Shifting in an unconscious effort to move away from his thoughts, Wymare turned in his seat on the carriage bench and pressed his face against the wall. Through a small knothole in the plank, he could see that it was still deep in the night as their transport continued its journey, the clicking of horse hooves on the ground tapping away in his ears all the while. As stars glittered overhead in the cloudless night sky, he remembered once hearing that each star was the soul of a king who had passed on and they glowed more brilliantly over Brilan's capital than anywhere else in the lands, watching over the kingdom from their seats in the Great Godhalls. The tale's purpose was to display the interconnected nature of Brilan's royal house and the Church of Bahamut, but it seemed, Wymare thought, to more accurately capture the inherent superiority of the lives - and afterlives, for that matter - of those of the Caeso caste.
Movement on the plains below the glittering sky appeared in the periphery of his sight, and so he turned his gaze downward to look upon a family of deer dashing through the tall grass. The carriage must have spooked them, he figured, as there was nothing else that he could see around the creatures that would warrant such a sprint across the grasslands. At the front was a buck with an impressive head of antlers, leading the way for a doe and their fawn to follow behind him. As Wymare watched them hurry through the wilderness, the fawn came close to stumbling over on its own underdeveloped legs, but each time it came close to losing its headway the doe would turn and help it continue, ensuring the youth that they would not be left behind.
As he observed through the wagon knothole, Wymare became acutely aware of his every breath, the air dragging through his lungs and past his heavy heart. He had never been known to be a loud child during his early years, and indeed, this reputation held to the present day, but at the sight of the family of deer lurching to the side and disappearing into the thick of a stretch of forest off the side of the trail, he was as silent as the night itself. With nothing left to see through the knothole as the carriage followed its route into the forest as well, the boy lowered his head and rested his eyes, his mind suffocating under the cover of a dark, muddled haze.
Drawn out by the sight of the deer, dismal memories played out against the back of his eyelids. He watched as the other orphans were adopted out, one by one, while he stayed in the same building year after year, watching the world outside pass by. The orphanage staffers were never keen on divulging the reasons that seeking adopters had passed him over with such frequency, but the one time he'd managed to infiltrate their staff offices and taken a peek at some documents pertaining to him, the repeated recordings of "plain-faced", "too quiet", and "lack of appeal" in written feedback from those seeking to adopt were enough for him to know beyond his own doubts. Even back then, he was old enough to understand what their words had meant.
Wymare recalled the enraged scolding he had been subjected to by the director. That night, after the enraged old man had his fill of lecturing him about his offenses, he was sent to bed without supper. He shed no tears that night, for despite the pangs of hunger that had risen from his empty stomach, it was not a physical infliction that caused him the most pain as he laid there in bed, the words from the papers bouncing about in his head. They had lingered there since that day, and even now he could remember them as clear as the daytime sun, a clandestine reminder of the faults in his nature.
In the midst of his reminiscing, Wymare became aware of the carriage's movement slowing, dragging to a halt as the horses at the front were reined in. Realizing that something must have been going on while he was trapped in thought, he shifted back to sitting up on the bench, waiting with curiosity as he heard the soldiers dismount the wagon and shuffle about on the trail. Around him, the other passengers nervously shifted their gazes between one another and the rear door, unsure of what the cause was for the sudden stop. Dirt from the grassy forest path scraped and dragged under the soldiers' boots as they circled the wagon, coming to a stop behind the door as the sound of keys jangling and a lock coming undone could be heard.
The door to the back of the wagon swung open, and just outside stood three members of the Brilanian military, one armored and two in simple travelers' garb with a sheathed sword at each of their hips. His fellow passengers waited for them to speak with bated breath, and though Wymare was hard-pressed to glimpse their faces through the evening dark, he noted their stiff, attentive posture and remained calm, presuming their reason for stopping to not warrant worry.
"Listen up, Scadarah," the armored captain commanded. "We're stopping to give the horses a rest and to ensure the wagon's fit for the last leg of the trek to the capital. We'll have you all sit trailside in the meantime, so stretch, rest; do as you see fit until we board you again."
Looks were exchanged among the passengers at the captain's announcement, but Wymare knew there was little point in considering running away. Not only would the knights almost certainly catch him, but there wasn't anywhere he could escape to aside from the depths of the forest, and having grown up in the walls of an orphanage in one of Brilan's largest cities, he didn't know the first thing about wilderness survival. He would last a day or two at most before some lucky predator would happen upon his weak and malnourished frame, and it would all be over then. That would almost surely be the case for the rest of the Scadarah passengers as well; members of the lowest caste were more accustomed to living on the street than they were in the thick of nature.
That, Wymare thought, must have been why the soldiers hadn't bothered with threats of being recaptured if anyone tried to escape. They knew there was nowhere else for them to go.
One by one, the passengers were helped down from the back of the carriage, starting with those closest to the open door. Wymare was the fourth to dismount after the mother and the twins, sliding down from the step and brushing past the knights' extended hands. He didn't meet their gazes as he shuffled toward the grassy patch off to the side of the trail, but he could feel their disapproving looks on his back, their true feelings toward people like him melting through their proper exteriors for just a moment.
Their judgment didn't bother Wymare as he sat cross-legged on the cool evening grass, stretching his legs and arms now that he had room to do so. It wasn't anything personal; that was just how people like him were addressed by those in the higher social castes: begrudgingly, if at all. The only use someone of a high caste had for a Scadarah was hard labor, and that's exactly where he was headed.
There had been a few kids over the years at the Colkirk orphanage that ended up outgrowing their place there after not being adopted by anyone. 'Aged out' was the term they had used for such people, but Wymare knew what they were really saying: they had worn out their welcome with the organization's charitability, and so they were sent off elsewhere to carry bricks, paint walls, or clean stables - whatever the Brilanian capital's labor unit needed them to do. He wasn't the strongest or the fastest, but Wymare already knew that he was going to be doing that kind of work for a long time to come because the labor unit was notorious for keeping its grip on its workers, keeping them earthbound and unable to leave.
Within the course of a day, he would be there too. And from there, Bahamut knows where he would end up.
The knights had almost finished unloading the passengers from the wagon as the female wagoner tended to the horses at the front. Wymare watched them quietly, the others sitting on the grass around him entertaining themselves however they could. There was only the squatter in the back left to exit, but judging from the knights' annoyed faces and glances between one another and the far corner of the carriage, he figured there was something wrong. One of the knights stepped up into the back, resting his left hand on the blade sheathed at his side.
"Hey, old man!" he shouted at the lingering passenger, drawing the attention of the other Scadarah sitting on the trailside. "You dancing with the faeries back there? We said to get off the-"
The soldier was cut off by the old man suddenly appearing at the door and tackling him with his shoulder, knocking both of them out of the carriage and onto the dirt path. The squatter was on his feet in a matter of a second, and before either of the two other knights could move to help their winded brother-in-arms his sword had been stolen up by the old man.
"I won't let you! I'm not going back to that damned city to work for the bloody caste!" cried the elderly attacker before throwing his new weapon at the armored captain and turning to the right, running past the other Scadarah passengers and toward the forest with surprising speed.
The blade struck the captain in the chest, and although his heavy armor kept him safe, he was still staggered by the surprise of the attack. His subordinate, concerned for his superior's wellbeing, hesitated between tending to the injury and chasing the fleeing squatter, but a sudden flash of light from the front of the wagon eliminated the need for pursuit as a bolt of fire shredded through the tranquil forest air and blasted the old man in the back. He screamed out in pain before falling to the ground in a heap, struggling to move but pained to do so.
Like the other passengers watching the sudden rebellion take place, Wymare's gaze quickly shifted to the point where the blast had come from, and he saw the wagoner with her arm extended and a glowing circle of runes hovering in front of her palm. His eyes widened, awed by his first time seeing a caster use magic to attack someone. He had only heard whispers of what those proficient in the magical arts could do during his time in Colkirk, so to see their potential displayed firsthand brought a fresh sense of understanding in terms of how much higher she was in the world compared to him.
As the squatter grunted in agonizing pain while crawling across the leaf-littered ground and the mother's baby began to cry from all the noise, the caster lowered her arm and shot a deadpan look at the knights, who had barely managed to get themselves back in order before she had managed the situation.
"It would seem," she remarked, "That my assignment to this transfer was not completely unnecessary. Now, do you need me to carry him for you, too?"
"Mind your tongue, caster," growled the captain, although his annoyance at having been shown up so easily was tangible in his voice. Nevertheless, he and his men quickly mobilized, chasing down the squatter and apprehending him by pinning his arms to his back and hoisting him up from the ground.
"Gah... Bugger off... you... Dämian dogs..." growled the old man through gritted teeth.
At this continued defiance, the captain rolled his head to the side in irritation before swiftly kicking the elderly would-be escapee in the back. There was a sharp wheeze of pain that escaped the old man's lips before he collapsed face-first into the grass, what little strength he had left fully exhausted. As the mother's baby continued to scream its cries out over the otherwise quiet scene, the captain's men got down on the ground to restrain and cuff the resistant elder, and the caster responsible for his capture walked to the small crowd of Scadarah passengers, her composure remaining cold and unwelcoming.
"I trust that nobody else has any intentions of attempting to flee?" she asked, casting a sweeping glare over the rest of the Scadarah passengers. Each of them cowered in fear now that they knew for certain what would happen to them if they were to try anything, and though he felt little fear relevant to everyone else around him, Wymare was certainly wary of the caster's magical power.
"...As I expected," she continued when nobody spoke up. "You all would do well to remember your place if you think that old fool was just in this. A better life is earned through work and diligence; rising up against the order that offers that opportunity to you is the height of insolence."
While she was speaking, the captain and his men carried the unconscious old man back into the carriage, likely fastening him to the bench so he had no way to attempt another escape. Wymare could not deny the twinge of anger he felt in his heart on the man's behalf, but he knew the caster spoke the truth. There was no point in fighting the roles of the castes when he was nothing but a Scadarah, the lowest of the low in the social order. No matter how he or anyone felt about how people like him were treated, their capacity to change things paled in comparison to those in the upper echelons of the nation.
"Once we reach the capital, you would do well to remember..." the caster continued, drawing Wymare's attention again when he realized she was staring directly at him. "You will assume full responsibility for all of your actions."
The caster held Wymare's gaze for a few seconds, leaving him afraid to look away or move at all, before breaking her stare and returning to the horses as if nothing had happened. The other Scadarah passengers were either still silent or had begun to quietly whisper to one another, and the knights were back to inspecting the wagon for signs of wear and tear from the trip.
It was then that Wymare realized he had been holding his breath for some time now, and he let out a controlled sigh, allowing the tension in his muscles to go with it. Now that the shock of the moment had faded, his eyes were starting to become heavy again, and seeing that it was likely still going to be some time before the knights loaded him back into the carriage, he scooted back on the grass to sit against the base of a tree and close his eyes. He felt the slow, steady approach of sleep creeping up on him once again, only for a slight tickling on the tip of his nose to catch his attention.
Wymare opened his eyes halfway, expecting to find an invasive fly or a hungry mosquito, only for his eyes to fly wide open as an ethereal blue butterfly stared off to the left, perched mere inches from his face. Beyond its shimmering aura, Wymare could only see a void of black, the passengers, knights, carriage, and woods all erased by its expanse. Despite this, he dared not move; the creature on his nose was gently spreading its wings in a slow flap, exuding an almost royal presence that Wymare dared not intrude upon. When the insect hopped from his nose and down to his right knee, it took every ounce of Wymare's will to not react in a way that would give it a start.
As he watched it crawl across his ragged cloth pants, a dull throbbing in the center of his skull began to cause him pain, making him gasp and recoil somewhat. He felt his eyes squeeze shut on instinct as the pain intensified, and yet the butterfly remained in his vision, taking flight from his knee and flying away from him into the darkness. The pain got worse still, and as Wymare doubled over with his hands clutching at his head, flashing visions began to manifest in his mind's eye, interrupting the sight of the butterfly: a town in ruins, a castle swallowed by fire, a brewing storm in a sky of green, melting bodies writhing and dragging themselves across the ground, and finally, a wooden door with a golden plaque, affixed to a wall at the end of a corridor. Wymare could feel his chest shake and his throat burn as he screamed out, but the only thing he could hear was a fierce wind raging around him, the tempest stealing the sound of his own voice before it could reach his ears.
And as soon as the sensory overload had begun, it was over. The hallucinations ceased with the winds in an instant, and when Wymare slowly opened his eyes after his screams stopped, the butterfly was no longer in his sights. Instead, as he looked up from his curled-up position on the 'ground', he found himself alone in the void, his surroundings completely devoid of scenery and sound.
At least, that had been his assumption, but all of a sudden he could hear what seemed like carriage wheels rolling on a dirt trail. Thinking he was being left behind by the transport, Wymare sprung to his feet and began to run into the darkness, desperately trying to follow the sound. It gradually grew louder and louder as he ran, but despite this, the dark abyss around him showed no sign of abating, and he wondered for a moment if he was hallucinating before a bright light shone in front of him, taking him by surprise and forcing him to cover his eyes as they adjusted to the abrupt shining.
When he was able to look directly into the light, Wymare observed what seemed to be the side door of a carriage hovering in the air level with his own height. This was not of the same kind of wagon he had been traveling in before now, however; the carriage this door seemed made for would have been so fit for royalty that no Scadarah would ever be permitted to lay hands upon it. The trim of the door and the handle were forged from a dazzling silver, whereas the door itself boasted a soothing shade of blue and was composed of a material that Wymare could not place a name to. The only other defining feature of the mysterious door was an ornate silver fixture on the center, displaying a very formal-looking letter V.
"Ah..." a disembodied voice rang out, startling Wymare and spurring him to step away from the door before he could muster up the courage to open it. "It would seem we have a guest... It's been quite some time since we've had the privilege."
"Wha... Who's there?" Wymare asked, twisting his head as he looked for any other place the voice could have come from besides the door.
"Hmhm... There is no need for alarm." the voice answered, slight amusement barely detectable in its response. "Please, allow us the pleasure of introducing ourselves in person."
Wymare heard the click of a lock opening from in front of him, and when he turned again to look at the carriage door, he laid eyes upon it creaking open just slightly, evidently having been opened from within.
"Come in, come in," the voice ushered. "There is much for us to discuss."
At first, Wymare was hesitant. The incomprehensible circumstances had him on edge, and with the sudden appearances of the mysterious door and the equally mysterious voice, every instinct in his mind urged him to turn and run as far away as possible. Given that there was nowhere else to run to in this endless space, however, he wasn't sure there was any other choice but to enter the door. And so, after a few careful steps forward, Wymare reached out, grasped the silver handle, and pulled the carriage door open, only to be blinded by another sudden light.
As his sight recovered from the sudden flash, Wymare felt himself sitting upon a comfortable bench, a similarly padded backrest supporting him from behind. The familiar sounds of a horse-drawn carriage filled his ears, accompanied by something far less familiar to him: the beautiful, elegant notes of a piano, echoing around him as if he were in a concert hall. Aware that he was still in an unfamiliar environment, Wymare forced his eyes to open and take in the scene before him.
He seemed to be sitting on one end of a luxurious carriage interior, designed with plenty of space and cushioned seats. There were four windows in the walls of the carriage that showed nothing but empty darkness beyond them, and separating them were two doors to Wymare's left and right that he identified as matching the one that had appeared before him moments ago. The design of the carriage also matched that of the door, with silver trim and ornate blue padding lining the walls, floor, and ceiling.
More important, however, was the fact that Wymare was not alone in this new place. Sitting on the bench opposite his were three oddly-dressed people: a tired-looking woman with a large book in her lap on the left, a towering man with striking facial hair and bulging muscles on the right, and a long-nosed old man in a black suit between the two, his gloved hands clasped over one another as his elbows rested on a small table. A toothy smile crossed the old man's face as he regarded Wymare, who looked at the three with a mix of confusion and intrigue.
"Well now," the old man began, his voice identical to the one Wymare had heard outside the carriage, "It's much nicer to converse face to face, is it not? If you would, young man... Tell us your name."
"My... name?" Wymare repeated, unsure of why these strange people had taken such an apparent interest in him. "It's... It's Wymare. Wymare Thiebaut."
"Hmm," nodded the old man. "I see. It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Wymare."
The old man's eyes seemed bloodshot and wiry, but his gaze was intense nevertheless, and as he looked upon Wymare from across the carriage, his smile only grew. Despite the otherworldly circumstances he had found himself in, Wymare could not help but feel as though this place was the strangest of all the things he had seen in his life, and that, though he had no way of knowing, the man slouched across from him was of a higher power than anyone in the world.
"My name is Igor," the old man said. "Welcome... to the Velvet Room."