Here's the next chapter. Hope you like it!
She seemed… innocent, like she was ignorant of schemes and dangerous underhand plotting. She acted like any other girl her age as she browsed the stalls looking at the last items before the stalls' owners would pack up to leave south the next day before winter came. Her acting was very convincing, but if one had a deeper insight they would see that she was not as naive as she seemed. Rhylite was one of those people.
He kept his distance as he watched her closely. Out of his cloak he took a small plain sealed wooden box. It was like any other box except when acted upon with magic.
"Kodthr kvetha," Rhylite whispered. Capture sound. Anything she said or anything someone said to her would be recorded. The sound waves of them talking would be captured and trapped and then could be released so one could hear the conversation whenever they wanted to. The sound waves could also be re-trapped and re-released over and over again.
She stopped at a stall selling ornate glass cups when a man approached her. He looked relaxed though he wore a large cloak in a way to hide his identity.
"Miss Marthasdaughter," said the man.
"It's Abigail," she said without turning to face him. "What are you doing here?"
"The Domia abr kyn wonders about your plans," he replied.
"As I of theirs."
"What is your plan? Where are we to extend our help!" he asked bypassing her comment.
"I'll tell you in time."
"If you want us to help, you need to give us information first."
"You should have inquired about it when we first made our deal." She turned her head to look at him. Her gaze pierced his face. "I will tell you in time," she said more firmly and turned back to continue browsing the stall.
"The Domin does not like being kept in the dark. If we do not know the time, we cannot protect you."
"Cannot or will not?" Abigail picked up a vase and looked at it with an intuitive eye as if bored with the current conversation.
"Our connections will take care of you, but if they have to do it unexpectedly it will be sloppy and not hold. We need the date and the event so they will be ready," the man said.
"The event will remain a secret. Now, concerning the time, I will reveal that right this second, but only if you tell me when you plan on using my connection with a brother."
The man was slow to respond. "We have not decided."
"Then you will get no time in return."
He grabbed her arm and squeezed painfully. "Let me tell you one thing, petty bitch. If you make one false move in betraying us, like making a run for it without paying your end of the deal, we will hunt you down and make you feel consequence's raging fury."
"Did your boss, Edoc'sil, say to specifically tell that to me? Give him the same tidings from me, will you?" She did not disguise the smirk on her face.
The man did not reply. Before letting go, he squeezed her arm more tightly and walked away briskly.
Rhylite closed the box and ended the spell. He had enough substantial evidence to make a case upon to capture and detain her. But he feared that the process would take too long and then they would be too late. The stakes were higher than Rhylite had originally believed. The event Abigail was planning would most likely prove dangerous itself, but what was worse was that the Domia abr kyn would be involved. If she really did have a connection with her brother, they would never let her go. Rhylite had heard of the rare connection that some twins shared.
If they really do have this connection then the Domia abr kyn could use her to not only hurt Walker but to also hurt anyone around him, thought Rhylite. And her brother is a Rider! There's too much at stake to risk running out of time. Something has to be done. Soon.
Abigail paid for the glass she had been looking at and walked away with Rhylite following behind her. She walked out of the market, down several crowded streets, and then abruptly jerked to the left down into an alley out of sight. Rhylite picked up speed while reaching his mind out to hers. She knew that he was following her and was planning on attacking once he rounded the corner.
As he rounded the corner, he whispered a warding spell. She was standing in the alleyway, waiting. When Abigail saw him she threw the glass she had purchased at him. It deflected off of his ward and shattered against the building's wall. Deep down in her mind Rhylite felt a tinge of fear but neither did she plan on running away or surrendering.
They stood yards apart, facing the other, making no move. Since she had never learned to develop a mind shield Rhylite could easily read all of her thoughts. He knew of her attack long before it came. But he was still surprised. In her casting her spell she had used no words of the Ancient Language. Of course he had assumed that she didn't know any of the language, but he was amazed by how deliberate her attacks were without it. Most did not have that kind of concentration and were blown to bits by losing control of their spells.
The brick stopped a foot from his face and dropped straight to the ground by his feet.
Her eyes now plainly showed her fright. That spell she had cast had already drained her of valuable energy and she could not break his wards. Abigail did the only thing she could do. She ran.
It took only a few steps for Rhylite to catch up with her. He grabbed her by the waist and slammed her to the ground. She clawed and kicked but he was still able to pin her down. He cuffed her left wrist in his handcuffs, got to his feet, and half-dragged her to the building's wall and cuffed her to a protruding pipe. Abigail quickly stood up. She tried to kick him but he moved out of reach.
By the pipe she was cuffed to was a loose brick in the wall. Abigail drew into her mind to find her magic but where it should have been was a dense foggy area. Her magic was lost in that fog, unable to be touched by her. She tried to cast a spell but nothing happened. She was powerless. What has he done to me?
She turned toward the man who had attacked her. The last thing she remembered was seeing his balled-up fist coming closer and closer to her face.
A sharp pain tickled the left side of Abigail's head and her right eye throbbed. Her hands were still bound to some pipe but she was in a different location. She was sitting on the floor propped up against a wall in a dark room. A heavy curtain was drawn across the one window and a lit candel a few feet in front of her provided the only light. Behind the candle sat the man who had attacked her. He sat hunching over his knees staring at her in a chair.
Abigail reached into her mind. The dense fog was still there. What if it doesn't come back? Once she had let the thought in, panic had shot through her whole body. She forced the fear down. This was not the time to panic. If she panicked then there was no hope of escaping from him. It will come back, she told herself.
The man sat there motionless. His gaze never left her.
"Who are you?" she asked. She cursed herself when her voice shook.
He didn't reply.
Abigail took a deep breath and tried to calm her mind. "Who are you?" she asked louder.
He still didn't reply.
His silence was getting on her nerves. He had attacked her for no reason; she deserved some answers. "I know that you're not one of the Domia abr kyn," she said. "You used magic to deflect my spells. But if you're not one of them what reason do you have for attacking me in this way. Who are you?"
"My name is Rhylite," he said and then resumed his silence.
"You're obviously not from here. Magic blood does not run in people's families in Carvahall. That's why there are so few magicians here."
"Good observation," said Rhylite. "But not entirely correct. Everyone can become a magician if they look deep enough inside themselves. But there are some people whose magic is more accessible, which is a trait that does usually runs in families. When one becomes a Rider, their magic is pulled closer to their conscious mind no matter whether or not magic runs in their family. But you are right about the absence of magic blood being the reason why there are so few magicians in Carvahall. Doesn't that make you wonder if whether or not magic blood runs in your family?"
"What?"
"You're a magician. And your brother is a Rider."
"I have reached into very deep places in my mind. And magic blood does not affect one's chances of being chosen as a Rider."
"But ancestry does."
"But mine and Walker's family have lived here since the city was rebuilt. We have no distant relatives who live in other cities or have secretive pasts. All of our family lives here. We are as normal as anyone else living in Carvahall."
"You becoming a magician and your brother becoming a Rider is no coincidence. The chance of it being one are very low. The only explanation is if magic blood runs in your family from an ancestor who was a magician, a very powerful one I assume."
"But as I just said 'we have always live in Carvahall; our whole family has'. And we have no long lost relatives," she repeated.
"What about before your family came to Carvahall?" asked Rhylite.
She opened her mouth to reply but stopped for she had no answer. Aunt Luthia had always taken pride in their family history and had told Abigail and Walker tons of their family's stories which had bored Abigail nearly to sleep. But there were no stories about their family before Carvahall or even about how they came to settle here.
He's probably right, she thought. I could be descended from a very powerful magician. Who knows, I may even be descended from Galbatorix himself, but I doubt that. Maybe my family isn't so boring and normal after all. There may be some old ancestor that I can be proud about being descended from.
"If I do have a magical ancestor from very long ago," she said, "then how did magic go so far down my family line without someone noticing it until now?"
"Carvahall is a very quiet city. There is little reason for someone to have to reach into their mind and accidentally discover their magic," replied Rhylite.
"And I was the first in my family to want to become a Rider," Abigail said, more to herself than to him.
A thought clicked in her head. Over a fifty year period, only three magicians had been found to live in Carvahall all of whom had mysteriously disappeared shortly after them being found out never to be seen again. And if those are only the magicians that were found out, how many more magicians, who have kept themselves secret, have been captured too? "You're here to take me out of Carvahall," she said, "just like the others."
"What others?"
"The other magicians from Carvahall. All of them disappeared shortly after their existence was found out. You and whoever you're working for capture them and drag them away from here. Why do you do this? Why not just leave us alone!"
"Because as long as you all are left unsupervised and untaught you are dangerous to the whole community. By doing this, we are merely protecting the people of Alagaësia."
"But once they are taught why not let them go back home?"
"There are more people that are wary of such things as magic that live in Carvahall compared to the other cities. How do you think they would react if some well-educated magician started living among them? Most don't even want to come back in the first place," said Rhylite.
"So you just detain them for the rest of their lives because they're different and 'dangerous'."
"As we train them we get them to work for us. And once their training is over, we offer them a job permanently. Do you still blame us for their decision to stay and work?"
"That still doesn't excuse you kidnapping magicians in the first place."
"We give them a better life. We give them work, a chance to use their magic for good. A number have thanked us for what we do."
"I will never work for you," said Abigail. "And I will never thank you."
"Fine. There's always an alternative."
"What alternative?"
"We detain you in a secure place until you are pronounced no longer dangerous."
"Or in other words : until I agree to work for you."
He shrugged his shoulders. It didn't matter to him either way as long as he was removing a threat.
Abigail's emotions closed in on her. There was no way she would be able to escape from Rhylite with her magic gone, a thought which frightened her. It was also equally frustrating knowing that once she had made her plans to escape from her current 'prison' she was only going to be imprisoned yet again. And this time it would be impossible to escape.
This can't be happening. It won't happen. I will not let.
If I can create a distraction, then all I have to do is break out of these cuffs and make a run for it, and with some luck I'll make it. The cuffs were too small for her to even begin to slide her hands through. Since the chain was small she might be able to wear it away against the pipe. It was a slim hope that only a desperate person would consider. She moved her wrists up and down making the chain scrape against the pipe which produced a loud high pitch screech. Damn.
"You've got some nerve, or should I say stupidity, if you think that you can break free," said Rhylite. She ignored him and continued sawing the chain against the pipe. "Stop it. It's useless. Give up!"
Shivers went up her spine at his last two words. She stopped dead in her struggling. Her father's voice repeating those words over and over filled her head. A deep rage awoke within her. Most people lived their entire lives without ever harboring the amount of hate that she held.
She would not give up. It was not an option. She would succeed. And she would take him down.
Abigail gave searching the dense mind fog for her magic one last try. Since her rage was so vivid it pushed back the fog enabling her to tap into her magic. The cuffs around her wrists immediately shattered on their own accord. To the second she was out of them, the fog disappeared.
Rhylite jumped to his feet in amazement. No one had ever broken free from those handcuffs nor accessed their magic while wearing them before. She made a run for the door but he quickly ejected a mind attack to incapacitate her. Her mental attacks she ejected in defense were useless because of her ignorance in the area of the mind.
He chose this time to dig into her mind to extract any useful information concerning her plans. Rhylite went through her most recent memories first. He saw her making her deal with the Domia abr kyn and the moment when she unlocked her magic and decided to get her revenge.
His probe was jerked by another force. Abigail took hold of his probe with her mind and pulled it deeper into her mind. She was anxious to do anything useful and that was the only thing she could do. Rhylite passed through all of her older childhood memories, her emotions, her deepest desires, her thoughts, and so on. Her entire being was rushing through his mind. He saw her need for vengeance against her father, the wound in her soul made by Walker, her solicitous longing for freedom, and the devouring fear of that dream never coming true. Nothing about her was hidden from him, not even the deepest parts of her soul. Rhylite broke her hold over his mind probe and drew completely out of her mind. Abigail clutching her head crumpled onto her knees on the floor.
Rhylite stood over her and stared. His gaze had changed because of his new found knowledge of her. No matter how long they would detain her, Abigail would never stop trying to get away, but if they left her alone she wouldn't stop using her magic to accomplish her own ends either. What she was planning to do would not endanger the entire public thought. But he'd advise her against it anyway, but it was her decision to make, though he understood her reasoning behind it. She won't ever change mind anyway.
But as long as she continues to use her magic like she is, she is a dangerous liability. In this instance, the only thing to do would be to execute her. Rhylite took out his knife. Now would be a better time to kill her. There's no chance in changing her mind and there would be too many times for her to escape if he dragged her against her will all the way to Kuasta. The Du Vrangr Gata doesn't have to know about this either. When they notice her absence, they'll assume that she died some natural death.
Abigail was still kneeling on the floor with her head bowed. Drawing back his knife, Rhylite prepared to strike. Empathy stilled his hand. How could he kill someone he knew so well? How could he kill someone when he understood all of the reasons behind their actions? In her mind what she was doing was just. And if he was her, he would kill too. She was a hurt and vengeful human being and not as evil as he had first perceived.
Rhylite sheathed his knife and sat back down in his chair. Abigail looked up at him. In her mind he sensed that she was readying to cast a spell.
"Go," he told her.
She stopped reaching for her magic but remained kneeling on the floor.
"Go!" he repeated.
She stood up and ran out of the room.
Abigail ran back home as fast as her legs could take her. When she was a few buildings away from her house, she slowed to a walk and healed her injuries. Once she released the magic she stumbled and fell to the ground in a near faint because of the great amount of energy leaving her. I alone don't have enough energy to cast practically any spells. There must be some great store of energy out there that I'm missing, she thought.
After waiting for the dizziness to pass away, she continued home. Echoing from the kitchen were the sounds of her mother preparing dinner when Abigail walked through the front door. She was thankful that her father was still working so she wouldn't have to face his combing questions asking where she had been all day. It was already twilight, which was way past when she had been expected to be home.
"Abigail, is that you?" asked her mother, Martha, from the kitchen.
"Yes, Mother."
"Where have you been all day?" Martha came into the foyer to meet her. Concern was obviously shown in her eyes.
"I got carried away at the market"
"You've been gone for hours."
"There was lots to see." Abigail hurried up the stairs. "Excuse me," she said as she passed her mother.
"Come back down here."
Abigail stopped and came back down the stairs.
"Are you alright? You look pale," Martha asked her.
"I'm a bit dizzy, but I think that it's just because I'm tired. I don't feel like coming to dinner either, so I think I'll go straight to bed." It was the truth.
"Alright. You are looking kind of sickly. It would be best to get straight to bed, but let me feel your forehead first." Abigail came closer and her mother felt her forehead. "You don't feel warm. Rest may be all that you need. Go and get into bed. I'll bring you up something to eat in a few minutes."
Martha went back into the kitchen and Abigail went up to her room. She changed into her nightdress and crawled into bed. Her eyelids were already beginning to droop when her mother walked in with her dinner. Abigail took the tray eagerly. She had hardly eaten lunch and her stomach was begging for something to be put in it.
When her mother turned to leave Abigail blurted, "Why did you marry Father?" The question had come out of its own accord.
"Because he is a strong, hardworking man that can care for a family," she replied.
"Did you ever want to travel and see the world instead of getting married?"
"No, actually. I know that is what you want to do, but I always wanted to meet the right man, settle down, have children, and die having lived a pleasant life. My dream did come true. I have a strong husband that can protect me and our family, a firm roof over my head, and two lovely children." She reached toward Abigail and rubbed her cheek with her thumb. "I love my life and I wouldn't trade it for anything."
"So you agree with Father in that a woman's place is to be a wife and a mother?" asked Abigail.
"Not exactly."
Abigail was surprised that her mother didn't agree with her father's views completely.
"I want you to live your dream, and if you want to travel, so be it. All your father wants is for you to live a happy life. I believe that the key to a truly happy, complete life is family, even if there are many other components too. Do you understand?"
"Yes. But I disagree with you about Father. Even if he only wants me to have a happy life, he's crossed some lines." Abigail couldn't remember the last time she had been so honest with her mother before.
Martha's face looked sad, but she did not object. She kissed her daughter's forehead in goodnight and left the room.
As Abigail ate her dinner she began to feel sad and confused. Her emotions toward her father mushed together. The sensation was frightening so she pushed away the emotions replacing them with her familiar hate. It was easier to be angry. And she liked feeling that way too.
After she finished eating, she laid her head down on her pillow and instantly fell asleep. She did not stir until deep into the night and once awake she could not get back to sleep. The whole day was coming back to her and refusing to leave her thoughts. There were too many confusing things to think about.
Where did he come from? Who is he working for? How did they find out about me being a magician, and how did they find out about those other magicians too? And how did they get them to work for them? Will they come after me again? How did those handcuffs keep me from casting spells? Why did Rhylite let me go? Am I really related to a powerful magician? All together it was overwhelming. I have to think about this one question at a time.
First question : Who is he working for? What group of people trained in magic would want anything to do with hermit magicians? The answer came to her and she cursed herself for her stupidity. The Du Vrangr Gata, of course! They're meant to monitor all magic and to keep order between magicians and non-magicians. And the mirrors! The foggy mirrors! Somehow they sense where magicians live and they use mirrors to spy on them and find out about them so they can capture them. Who knew their way of keeping order was kidnapping magicians and forcing them to work for them like slaves. They restrict magic and kill those who refuse to comply. It's sick. I won't let them catch me. Not again. I barely escaped from Rhylite. Well, I didn't really escape; he let me go.
Second question : Why did he let me go? After he drew away from his mind, something was different. Well, going through someone's entire soul would change how you look at them and what you do with them. He must have lost his appetite for kidnapping me once he had looked through my eyes and learned where I was coming from.
Third question : How did those handcuffs keep me from casting spells? They must be made with magic, very powerful magic that takes lots of energy, magic that I could never hope to cast.
The whole day had left her physically drained. How to find more energy to fuel spells? was the question worth answering the greatest. If they attacked again she would need to be way stronger if she would even have a chance of fighting them off.
Life is energy. Life is all around us, so energy must be too. Rhylite could reach outward with his mind and control other things, so I must be able to do the same. If I can feel energy with my mind, then I must be able to use it for magic.
She tried to reach out off her mind by concentrating on the world outside her window. After several tries she felt her mind loosen from her body. With her mind she reached down to the ground and felt the energy giving life to the grass. She was able to take the energy by wrapping her mind around it and pulling it back to her body. Once it was within her, she used it to make a fireball out of midair. For several minutes, she held it there before the energy loss started to become too much for her and she had to let the magic go.
It's still not enough, she thought.
She reached out again. This time she bypassed the living things that you could easily see and looked for a more elusive store of energy. Abigail felt in her gut that there was something buried very deep in the fabric of the world. I know that I'll find it.
She searched and searched but did not find it. Her mind was getting tired and soon she could barely keep going. I'll look again tomorrow. Abigail closed her eyes and fell once again into sleep
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