One of Craig's earliest memories was from when he was about three years old. He couldn't say when exactly, but his grandmother was still alive and it was definitely before his mother was pregnant with Tricia. It was springtime and from what he later realized, it was a peaceful, prosperous time for Kupa Keep. The weather was nice, the harvests plentiful, the knights were seen as heroes who protected Sundorham.
The wildflowers were growing beautifully, so his mother sat him down in a patch of them so she and Craig's father could tend to the land. He tugged on her necklace as she placed him down, but she carefully with a laugh removed his tiny hand and told him not to wander off too far. His grandmother usually had watched him and together they tended to the animals, but he later learned that her mind was failing her and she ended up letting him wander into dangerous or reckless situations with the animals too many times. Nearly getting kicked, getting between an angry sow and her babies, stepping on chicken eggs, pulling animal's tails-his parents informed him that from now on he would join them on the field. Craig loved his grandmother, but he didn't mind being near his parents either, especially when there were so many beautiful flowers to play with.
He soon realized that more exciting than the flowers were the butterflies. They were just as colorful and beautiful as the flowers, but they had the added bonus of flying around. He was the only child in the village born the same year, and older children didn't want to play with him. So instead he enjoyed chasing them around as if they were his friends.
He liked chasing them and all, but eventually they always flew away. No matter how hard he tried to catch one they were always just out of reach, eventually flying too far and high and fast-never to be seen again. Although he liked the chase, this was frustrating to the young three-or-so year old. He wasn't going to hurt them, he only wanted to be friends. Why couldn't they understand that?
He saw a particularly beautiful bright blue butterfly resting on a bright yellow flower. He had tried to catch it twice already, but both times, despite sitting so still on the flower, the second he approached it would fly away from him. And you see, he had had it up to here with this butterfly. With a determined frown, he decided on his third attempt he was going to catch it no matter what. He kept low in the grass and flowers, very slowly approaching it. He sat quietly, analyzing it for a few more moments as it slowly fluttered its wings while resting on the flower. He took a deep breath and lunged for it, hands out to catch it.
Of course, it flew away.
Craig was angry. Why? Why did they always do that? It flew much higher up than before, and this time he knew it was going to go off, out of his reach forever. Face turning red, he reached up his hand and let out a yell.
"Stop!"
It was then that it was as if a heavy stream of wind came directly from the young boy's tiny hand, directly for the butterfly. The shock and pushback nearly caused him to fall backwards, but he managed to stay on his feet only taking a single step backwards. Of course, that was nothing compared to the fact that the butterfly listened.
Or maybe it wasn't that it was listening. It was frozen in place where it was in the sky, wings frozen mid flutter. It couldn't be just that it was listening to him, he knew from his mother that it was the flapping of wings that kept birds and insects flying. It must be that stream of wind that came from his hand. He still felt the energy from it, pulsing out of and back into his hand. As if second nature, like another limb. He easily felt that he could control it. Doing so, he bought the butterfly from the sky, closer to him.
Craig's tiny face lit up. He didn't know what he was doing, but it was just so cool! He was able to move the butterfly at will around him, never once flying away. Naturally, he wondered if he could do it to other things, but he didn't want to let this butterfly go to test it. Not yet!
"Mama!" the boy called out, green eyes sparkling bright, "Look what I can do!"
Craig's father noticed him first, but his expression was not that of pride for his son. Instead a look of fear. He alerted his wife, and soon she looked upon him too.
"Craig no!" she yelled. She dropped her plow and ran to him with a look of absolute horror. She practically tackled him and in turn, Craig found himself losing control of his new found trick. He could feel the butterfly fly away as his mother hugged him tightly.
"What I do?" Craig asked, eyes wide.
"Craig," she let go to look him directly in the eyes, "You mustn't ever do that. Do you hear me?"
"But I-"
"Listen to me, Craig," she told him, her voice practically shaking as she spoke, "You mustn't ever. Do you hear me? No matter what."
"But why?" he asked, tilting his head to one side, "I don't even know what I did."
"Mama, how come there are other babies Patricia's age, but none the same as me?" Craig asked. His baby sister was only a few weeks old, his mother still taking off from the hard labor of the farm to take care of her. Soon, however, his baby sister was going to join other young babies in the village, all cared for by a village elder.
"There were others the same as you," his father told him.
"Thomas," his mother glared at her husband.
"What happened to them?" young Craig asked, "Where'd they all go?"
"It was a very cold winter," his mother tried to explain with motherly tenderness, "Many of them got sick and were too young to recover."
"All of them but me?" Craig asked, eyes widening.
"Well, no, not all," she said sweetly, yet clearly still side eyeing her husband.
"You might as well tell him," his father scowled back at his wife. He then turned to his son and stated matter of factly: "The others were taken away when they were one year old."
"Taken?"
"Because they could do magic," his mother cut in, deciding that it would be better for her to explain it, "Kupa Kingdom...they like to limit the amount of magic in the kingdom. If a child is a serf like us or has too much power...the Kingdom takes them away."
"But...can't I do magic?" Craig asked.
His parents didn't answer.
Craig didn't know for a long time why the couple to the house to the left of his family's always glared at him. They didn't glare at other children, they didn't glare at Tricia. He later learned that they all three children they'd produced had been taken away for their magical ability at one years old. The youngest was born just a few days apart from Craig.
When Tricia had not even lived one year the knights, accompanied by some person in uniform came to their home. As the knights picked up little Tricia, Craig's mother grabbed tightly onto her husband's arm, fighting the urge to cry out from fear. As they all held their breath, the uniformed person said a single word.
"Clear."
His mother broke down crying as she took back her baby. Not out of sadness, but out of relief.
Another family was not so lucky.
"Magical."
A mother screamed as her baby was taken away.
The family that always glared at Craig looked at his family with intense skepticism. Craig would later learn that the skepticism was wrong. Tricia wasn't capable of magic, and if she was their family wouldn't have been able to do anything to save her.
Craig wouldn't be able to describe definitively when exactly things started changing. Probably around when Tricia was beginning to walk wherever she could on her increasingly less wobbly legs. Definitely by the time his grandmother died.
He had listened to his mother's order and didn't do the butterfly trick again. He knew that magic was bad and he couldn't do it. To be fair, he didn't even mean to use it the time that he did. So instead, he just actively avoided doing the very same thing.
He still didn't really understand magic or what it was. Just that it was something bad. It was hard to ban a child from doing something he didn't understand, but at the same time his father insisted to him that those who could use magic had to go through extensive training to be able to use it. It wasn't some easy second nature thing. The butterfly incident was a fluke, but as long as he never learned about magic he would be safe, his father told him. Craig merely nodded, trying to pretend he was mature and actually understood what he was saying.
There were a few times weird things happened, but with no understanding of what magic really he didn't until later in life realize that that's what he did. He thought it was just normal. Like the time when the barley bread he was given was so rock hard that he merely willed it into being softer. Or the time he was annoyed that one of the older children bragged about finding a four leaf clover and yet no matter how hard he searched, he simply couldn't find one. He thought making a three leaf clover grow a fourth leaf was cheating...but not magic. Or the time he wanted to give his mother a pretty pink flower but could only find white ones. His mother was so impressed by how he was able to find a pink daisy as she had never seen them before. When she complimented him for having a good eye, he didn't want to admit he cheated again.
Then of course, there was the day a bee stung him. It was spring again. A lot of bees were about, and Craig had thought he had done his best to avoid them. Yet there was one that he didn't see that stung the back of his hand. It hurt.
It wasn't even on purpose that he caused all the bees within ten yards to spontaneously explode. He was just mad at bees for hurting him. It wasn't on purpose.
et he soon learned that to all the other farmers, including his parents, whether or not he did it on purpose didn't really matter.
Craig tried not to use magic. He really did. He soon came to understand more and more what magic was in order to actively avoid it. Yet he couldn't. Not on purpose-he simply couldn't control it.
"You're going to have to do something about your boy," a villager complained loudly to his parents. It was a late night village meeting lit by a bonfire in the very center of their small community. They had these meetings in secret very late so that the knights or any other Kupa representative wouldn't have knowledge of them occurring. Craig never cared about them and was always put to bed with his sister hours before they went on. After he knew that the topic of the meeting was to be on him however, he couldn't help but exit his tiny house and eavesdrop.
"You don't think we're trying?" Craig heard the voice of his own father insist, "We just-"
"Well try harder," another cut in, even more angrily than the previous, "That boy is putting all of us in danger. We should have never let-"
"We understand completely the seriousness of this," Craig's mother cut in. Her voice was calm and dignified, making it harder for him to hear, "We are incredibly grateful for all this village has done for our family. We are incredibly indebted to all of you and we will never be able to repay you."
"Listen," a kinder, calmer voice of reason added. Craig recognized it as the voice of one of the village elders. "We don't hate you folks. We were glad to take you in, Laura. But even if that boy isn't a danger to us he's a danger to himself. One of these days he's going to slip up in front of the knights. Say we all agree to feign ignorance, to pretend like it was all some unknown mistake and not something we're in on-the knights are still going to take him away from you. You have to know that at this point, with how he's been...it's only a matter of time."
"Why not just let them take him away?" a voice piped in. He instantly recognized the voice. It was wife of the couple that always glared at him. "We had all three of our children taken away. So many of us have. Why do they get to keep their son at the risk of all of us? What makes him special over ours?"
"You know the answer to that, Mary," the elder told her sternly.
"Yeah because nothing in this goddamn kingdom is fair, is it?" her voice cracked, "This noblewoman gets to keep her baby, but not us?" He could tell that she had begun to cry.
"With the power he's showing, it wouldn't have mattered if I was noble or not!" his mother said defensively yet, as a mother, sympathetic.
"That's not what we're talking about!" the husband joined in, "Don't act like if you were born a serf like us anyone would have felt sympathy or believed your story! The only reason that kid is alive is because you fucking nobles are always privileged, always valued over everyone else!"
"Wanna say that again to my face?" Craig heard his dad practically growl. Craig could hear the meeting erupt into chaos. He couldn't even distinguish individual voices anymore.
Craig couldn't take it anymore. He went back to their little home and crawled into bed with little Tricia, pulling the blanket over his ears so he couldn't hear any more of the commotion.
They kept him away from knights when possible. He was told to go inside when they passed through the village, to keep still if ever they came close to him. He was firmly warned by his parents-if he slipped up and used magic they would take him away.
"Are knights bad?" Craig asked.
"No of course not," his mother insisted, "They want what's best for us. They just...they don't understand is all."
"What don't they understand?" he tilted his head.
She gave him a sigh and bent down to his level. "Craig, you have a great power. A power you should never be ashamed of."
"But you always said I should never use it," he argued, "All the other kids who have it are taken away!"
"You see the thing is, Craig..." she trailed off, thinking of the best way to carefully phrase it, "As great as it is, it's also incredibly dangerous. You can do great things with magic, but you could also do terrible things as well. To the kingdom, they only see what terrible things could be done, and want to protect people with power from abusing it."
"But if I told them that I would only use it for good...would that be okay?"
"Craig...First of all, none of that matters when you can't control it."
"I can control it," he announced to Tricia. Her toddler speech was still pretty incomprehensible and she was far more interested in pulling up grass, so she didn't respond. He frowned, but continued on. "I'm not supposed to use magic cuz they said I can't control it. But if I can control it and only use it for good then everything will be okay." Tricia ate a blade of the grass.
Craig frowned at his apathetic sister and focused on a flower. Spring was ending and turning into the heat of summer, so the beautiful spring flowers were slowly withering away. He focused on one next to his sister. Outreaching his hand, he focused heavily on the flower. Slowly but surely, the brown crust at the edge of the petals fell away and oh so slowly it turned into a bright yellow flower once more.
Tricia clapped her hands and squealed happily. Craig smiled.
But the flower wouldn't stop. It grew bigger and bigger until it couldn't take it anymore and expanded until it ripped itself apart like a little, fireless explosion.
Tricia cried.
Summer was in full heat so the flame in the middle of their house used to cook their food made Craig even hotter. His mother prepared some fish his father had caught, while his father gave some of the extra fish to a neighbor. Despite the heat, however, Craig himself was under the blanket of his bed fiddling with magic.
Craig enjoyed practicing magic. He actually felt that by focusing on how to use it, it was easier for him to control. Sure, saying he could control it now would be a huge reach, but he thought he was getting better. He might not be able to fix wilting flowers without making them explode, but he was able to do it to multiple at a time now. Instead of willing for the color of one flower to change, he could will it to a whole patch of them. That was progress, right?
He was also getting better at making things levitate. As he had the blanket thrown over him, he played with a tiny stone he found near the riverbank. He had it go back and forth between his hands, spinning in little loops, freezing mid air. It was more fun than any of the toys his father had made him.
"Craig, can you help me?" his mother called out.
"Sure," he agreed, letting the stone fall and throwing the blanket off of him.
"Your sister keeps coming too close to the fire, can you please keep her attention until your father comes back?" she asked as she flipped over the fish.
"Okay!" he nodded. He really didn't mind his mother's request. He loved his little sister, and she was virtually the only other child he could play with. She was getting heavier, but he picked her up and carried her over to their bed, sitting himself down on the straw mattress and her on the floor in front of him.
"Fiuh!" she protested, reaching to the fire.
"No Tricia, that's too dangerous!" he insisted, pointing a finger scoldingly at her.
"Fiuh!" she frowned again.
"Fire hurts!" he found himself scolding his little sister more harshly, "You'll burn yourself!"
"I wike fiuh!" she pouted, stomping her feet. Before Craig could protest, she turned around and ran straight towards the fire as quickly as she could.
"No Tricia!" he yelled, raising his arm. He hadn't intended to use magic. Not that that ultimately mattered.
From his arm came a clear blast. It went straight through Tricia and into the flame, making it twice the size for a moment before returning to how it did before. Thankfully his mother was a few feet away from the fire to grab some plates and didn't get burnt. The fish on the other hand were completely engulfed and were instantly burnt to a crisp. Of course, the fish weren't that important as Tricia laid silently and motionlessly face down on the dirt floor.
"Patricia!" their mother screamed, running to her daughter. She picked up her up and brought her into her lap, tears instantly falling onto the toddler.
"What the hell just happened?" Craig's father burst through the entrance, sounding like he had just been running. He saw his wife clutching their oh so still daughter and ran to them.
With shaky legs, Craig stood up and walked over to his family. His mother still held Tricia while his father desperately shook her, calling out her name. With a gulp, he looked down onto her, expecting to see terrible burns.
But there weren't any. Instead, there was an almost slimy slick clear gloss that appeared to cover her, from her skin to her clothes to her hair. She looked perfectly fine, except for the fact she was completely unconscious. She could have just as easily been asleep.
Craig's father stood up and grabbed his son by the collar. "What the hell did you do to her?" That was angriest tone he had ever heard his father use.
"We have to do something about him, Laura," his father said after he thought Craig and Tricia were fast asleep.
"I know, Thomas," his mother answered in a melancholic voice that was practically a whisper. Somehow, her words cut far deeper than that of his father.
"I'm serious. We can't just have him running amok with this shit. It took her three days to wake up. How long will it take next time? What if he killed her? What if he kills someone else's child?"
"I said I know!" she said, raising her voice slightly yet still quietly enough to try and not awaken her children.
Was Craig dangerous? He knew he had a dangerous power, he knew that the kingdom's rules were for him to be taken away, he knew that the others in the village didn't trust him. But was he himself dangerous? Could he just...kill someone?
Craig felt sick. He never wanted to hurt his sister. He only wanted to protect her. Yet she slept with no response for three torturous days, no one knowing if she would ever wake up. The doctor couldn't do anything and no one else could know that it was from magic or else they would almost definitely force them to send Craig away.
Maybe he should be sent away. Afterall, the rules were in place for a reason, weren't they? He wasn't ever going to be able to control his magic, was he? His existence only endangered his family, his village. Was he only a terror to them? His family, the village of Sundorham...they were good people. They deserved to live long and happy lives. He was just an outsider with no friends who...who shouldn't even be here! Didn't they deserve better than to live in constant fear of him?
"What are we gonna do?" his father asked, exasperated.
His parents would send him away, but he would be okay with that. He wouldn't be able to ever hurt Tricia again.
"I was thinking about...going through with that."
"Laura," his father gasped, "Are you sure?"
"What other option do we have?"
"You heard the risks," he told her, "You know what'll happen if it goes wrong."
"I know," she sighed. She paused for a moment, "But our boy is a fighter. If anyone can go through the process, he can. Plus if it works, he can be like any other boy."
"But what about-"
"Forget about that," she cut him off, "We were wrong to ever impose that on him. This is something we should have done a long time ago."
"We're going to seal your magic up," his mother explained with a sympathetic but clearly fake smile as she served him his bowl of gruel for breakfast.
"Seal it up?" he asked with his spoon hanging out of his mouth.
"I guess you can think of it as, well...turning it off!" she explained.
"You can do that?" he asked skeptically, "Why didn't you do that before then?"
"We're doing it now and that's what matters," his father interjected sternly.
"Why doesn't everyone just get their magic turned off then?" he pressed anyway, "If you can just do that, then why not have it done instead of taking them away?"
"Enough questions," his father's voice grew sterner ever still. Craig looked to his mother to see if she would object, but she merely avoided eye contact with him as she served a bowl to Tricia.
After breakfast he saw his pebble he found near the river resting on the ground next to his bed. He picked it up and took it with him as he left. When he passed the pigsty without any sort of hesitation he threw the stone in it.
Craig remembered it actually taking a few weeks before his magic was to be sealed. Of course he gave up practicing magic as soon as he hurt Tricia. He slipped up and accidentally use magic a few times, which made him long for the day to come when it would be sealed away already. Sure, he had overheard his parents say it was dangerous for his magic to be sealed, but frankly he didn't care.
Apparently, someone special needed to come to do it. Craig didn't know who it was or how his parents even contacted them, but nonetheless one very early morning before the knights would make their way to the village a man in a hood came knocking on their door. His hood was so large, that it completely concealed his entire face, making Craig wonder how he saw anything in front of him.
"This is the boy, I take it?" he pointed to Craig, his voice deeply serious.
"Yes," his father said, his emotions unreadable.
"Then come with me," he motioned for Craig.
"Wait!" his mother interrupted. She quickly ran over to Craig. She bent down on one knee and gave him a strong hug, her feldspar necklace painfully indenting into his chest. Slowly she let him go, looked him in the eyes with a smile, and told him he could go.
Craig went with the man through the village and a few nosy neighbors stuck their heads out to get a quick look. Not wanting to deal with their questioning gazes, he kept his chin high and looked forward as the man guided him outside of the fenced area of the village and across the vast farmland.
"Are we leaving the village?" he asked. He was almost afraid to ask questions, given how intimidating the man was.
"No," he responded simply without stopping or looking back, "But we're going to the very edge-far enough from the village proper and away from any current crops."
"But why?" he asked, tilting his head.
The man stopped, but still didn't look back. "How much did they tell you about this?"
"That you're turning off my magic."
"I see…" he said. A moment later, he continued walking. Craig struggled to keep up.
They walked for a few more minutes until finally they were at a flat open field full only of grass turned yellow by the burning sun. Craig had never been out this far in his life.
"I did...overhear a few things," Craig admitted, "I know this is dangerous. It has to be, otherwise they'd just do it to all kids with magic instead of sending them away."
"Are you afraid?" the man asked.
"No."
"Then don't worry," he said, his voice suddenly more sympathetic and...human, "I will make sure the ritual will be done as best as I can. If it goes wrong, I will make sure...Actually, no. I won't let anything happen to you, Craig."
"Okay," Craig agreed.
"Good," he nodded beneath his hood, "Now lay down on your back over here and stick out your tongue as far out as you can."
Craig couldn't remember the ritual itself. Was it part of the ritual for him to forget? Or was it a repressed memory on a psychological level? He did later come to know that he screamed so loud that people back in the village could hear. He also presumed there was an explosion of some kind. The grass all around him had gone from dried out yellow to pitch black in a perfect circle around him. Yet from the earliest he could remember after it happened, when he sat up, he felt...fine?
Though his tongue was sore in very weird, tingly way.
The seal was a marked seal in the literal sense. An intricate black round circle with an intricate laced design. It could theoretically go anywhere on his body, but the man who performed the ritual liked to place it on the bottom of the tongue so that it would be hard for anyone to see. It was placed back enough on his tongue so that he wouldn't accidentally cut the seal if he bit his tongue too hard heating. Craig was told to be careful to never accidentally cut the seal, or else it would be broken. He wasn't told what breaking it would entail, just to make sure he never did it.
The man politely helped him up and took him back home. His mother rushed and gave him the biggest hug, asking him if he was alright.
"I'm...okay?" was all he could say.
He was to stay in the house for the entire day to rest up, the man watching him to make sure nothing went wrong. His parents wanted to stay with him, but ultimately, as serfs, they had to work. Yet he didn't exactly feel like he needed any rest. If anything he felt...emptier? Like a big part of him was just...gone. If there was a box that represented him, it was as if roughly a third of it was taken out, leaving behind just...nothing. Not only inside of him-it was like everything in the world around him had suddenly become...subdued.
It was weird not having magic anymore. No longer accidentally sending out blasts or being able to change things at will. He didn't even feel like he had to test it. He just knew it was gone.
Yet despite the subdued nature of the world, despite the emptiness as if he lost a big part of himself, when he looked upon his baby sister running about, all he could think about was how he would never hurt her or anyone else in this village ever again. For that reason, he had never felt more content in his life as he did in that moment.