Life

The mageling may be useful. She is more powerful than her father, and I am not too proud to admit she has done things I was incapable of even at ten times her age. Rare is the mage who can return someone's life without reanimating a corpse.

Viren is no corpse. Even through my cocoon, I sense him. He is warm and alive, filled with magic, and healthier than he was before he fell from the Storm Spire.

If Viren were less determined, or I less starved for choice, I might have been ashamed to call him my vessel at Lux Aurea. His daughter? Her power could make her so much more than a mere vessel!

Were she an elf, connected to a Primal Source, she could become an Archmage. As a human who must rely on insects' life forces, she will always need that crutch.

And yet. Is that still true?

When the Moonshadow girl knocked Viren and my mouthpiece from the Spire, I released Viren. It was instinctive, as if letting go of him could keep me from falling with him. I twisted, and I saw the Moonshadow turn as she fell, reaching up to something. Someone. The human boy who had been on the Spire, perhaps.

I saw the boy, plummeting from the Spire. Young love is so foolish. I would never choose to die simply because my puppy-love crush had foolishly chosen to throw her own life away. I was grateful for his foolishness. I, in my prison, would survive, and I might even be able to keep my mouthpiece alive. The human and the elf were two of Viren's biggest obstacles. With them gone, and their friends heartbroken from their loss, rising to power would be ten, one hundred times easier.

Yet, as I watched, the human sank through the clouds. His mouth moved, though my mouthpiece was too far for me to hear the words. And feathers sprouted from his arms. He plunged toward the Moonshadow, who wrapped her arms around his neck, and they soared upward.

If he could learn Primal magic, could not my talented mageling learn it too?

Moments later, I heard an unpleasant splattering sound. My mouthpiece was protected by its exoskeleton and my magic, but only barely. It could not retain consciousness, and when it was not conscious, I was trapped in my prison.

An onlooker could not have guessed my fury. I stared through Viren's mirror, which somehow no one had found. It was still in his dungeon. A mouse scurried across the floor.

I took three hundred and four deep breaths. I paced. I made chocolate, and took a nap.

When I awoke, I was in darkness. Before I could figure out what had gone wrong, I heard Viren's daughter's voice.

"Okay, Claudia," she said. "It's not a total disaster, right? Dad's still here. Just… Impossible is just another kind of possible! You're a Dark mage in Xadia. You can do anything!"

As the day wore on, the darkness giving way to faint gray light, then darkness again, I heard Claudia frequently. Sometimes she seemed to be talking herself through something. Other times, she only repeated, "There is no synonym for cinnamon, there is no synonym for cinnamon."

I wanted to tell her to give up. Many Dark mages had tried to bring the dead back to life. None but I had succeeded. Oh, there were many who managed to return the body to half-life, but only I had ever reconnected the body and spirit, only once, and only after nearly a thousand years of study.

One day, I heard him. Viren.

"Claudia?" he said. "How… How did I survive?"

"You didn't." The girl sounded exhausted. "But it's okay. You're okay now!"

Gods of Xadia, she's really done it. A barely-trained sixteen-year-old sorceress has become the second person in Xadian history to truly restore someone to life.

Imagine what she could do with proper tutelage!

No thank you, Aaravos, I don't really want to imagine what Claudia could/would do under your tutelage. In case you hadn't noticed, you're evil.

To anyone who cares, I'm just over 14/20 of the way to getting a Tumblr! Turns out, Tumblr is a good motivator for writing.

Also, I just found out I can charge my phone from my computer, so that's cool.

Lily, that sequel is in progress! All I'm gonna say right now is, Runaan very much does not like his daughter keeping secrets from him. XP