The Death Lady

CARA

The sun shone brightly as her mare trotted along the asphalted road of Acolyte Town. On each side of the road, vendors yelled their wares and prices in shrill, loud voices. She constantly moved her head left and right, looking at old women haggling with vendors, at children running around corners, and at performers doing just about anything to get the people's attention. The town feels so alive, she thought. With The Choosing so near at hand, they ought to be. Behind, her siblings rode noisily, shouting and laughing and cursing at each other. She glimpsed Daron hitting their bastard half-brother Krazen at the back, while Pretty Lysa flirted shamelessly with every boy chance-met upon the road. Children, all of them, though I am the youngest. Daron, already twenty nine years old, is the first trueborn son of Cleos Nymera, though their bastard brother Krazen is two years older. Nine years after Daron was born came her sickly sister Lysa. Cara came not long after. Beautiful, powerful and cunning - and only eighteen years old. She brushed her long blonde hair slightly and trotted forward.

Just ahead, the Great Citadel of Aquilor loomed. Its walls stood almost ten times her height, with bricks gleaming black and shiny against the heat of the sun. Behind it, she saw, lay the Four Towers, soaring proud and mighty to the sky. She could almost hear her mother tell tales about the white and shimmering Holy Tower, dull Stone Tower, the Iron Tower of the Shakk, and the twisted Black Tower, the highest of them all. Her mother knew all these by heart, and so did she. I always knew that they were tall, though not this tall. Why, they are almost higher than the sun. And growing higher still, as I come nearer. As she approached the Citadel, she saw that the wall has neither gate nor guard. The wall was black all over, without anything on it at all. She remembered one of her mother's tales from when she was little. "The Black Wall of the Citadel is enchanted," she had said. "You can pass through it like it is made of thin air, though it is impenetrable when the Council wills it to be." Indeed, she saw an acolyte emerge from the wall, as if coming from the wall itself.

"I can hardly wait to get inside." As usual, she never noticed when her half-brother Krazen came up beside her. He is always so silent, she thought.

"Well, here we are." she answered.

And as she spoke, a human face suddenly appeared on the wall.

The face was almost featureless, yet remarkable. Its nose was pointed, the holes appearing like elongated circles a little bigger than she is. The mouth was tightly closed, with very thin lips, barely perceptible, twisted in a very small, wicked smile. Its eyes are hollow, circular curves at the stone. By looking closer, one would notice that it has no eyeballs. The rest of the face is pure black stone, as smooth as the wall from which it came from.

"WHO GOES THERE?" it said.

She almost jumped and bolted home. The face looked very wicked, almost evil to her. And with her heart thumping hard on her chest, she answered, "W-we..." I am not afraid. Just startled. "We are the Nymeras of Northwynd. Sons and daughters of Lord Cleos Nymera." She sounded like a child. "We are the NYMERAS of NORTHWYND," she repeated, much louder, "Sons and daughters of Lord CLEOS NYMERA." Shouting it made her much more confident.

"You may pass." answered the face on the wall. And just like that, it was gone. Swallowed by the wall like it was nothing at all.

"But how are we to pass?" she asked her siblings.

"We go through the wall, stupid." Lysa answered her.

"You go first."

"No, you go first."

"No," Krazen interrupted suddenly. As the elder, everyone listened to him. "We go together."

And so, the four of them went through the wall together.

She half-expected to feel something strange while passing through the wall. But she was disappointed. One moment, she was looking straight at the black wall, and then she was inside the Citadel, looking straight at the Four Towers themselves. They looked much bigger when seen up-close. Much farther apart, too. At the center of the Four Towers stood a low, wide building, made of the same black bricks as the wall. But wide as the building is, it is still dwarfed by the bases of the round towers, which are probably bigger than the Castle of Aquilor. She glanced to say something to her siblings, but found that they are gone. She spotted Lysa talking to a group of male acolytes near the Stone Tower, while Daron is watching a performer dance with magic. She did not see Krazen anywhere. Showing off to some girl, most like. She turned her attention toward a large gathering of people near the low building. She tried to take a peek at the center of attraction, but couldn't, for the crowd are too many. Easily remedied, she thought. She closed her eyes, concentrated - and turned to ash in an instant, only to reemerge at the front of the crowd, with a clear view at the center. Everyone who saw gaped at her in astonishment. Some even clapped their hands at her or shouted for more. That was just a taste of my Magic, she thought with a smile.

Hers is a rare kind of magic. Everyone agreed on that since she was little. She was four years old when she first used it. She was running around their garden with her mother when she suddenly slipped. And before her mother could catch her, she turned to ash and emerged two meters away from where she fell. They thought that was all. But it was two months later when they learned the true nature of her magic. It was when an alley dog tried to bite her. As the dog was running towards her, she closed her eyes and covered herself with her hands, waiting for the dog's bite. It never came. When finally she opened her eyes, the dog is dead, without any trace of how it died. It was then that they knew that hers is the magic of Death.

"So The Choosing has begun, huh?" Krazen suddenly appeared beside her. He was using his Invisibility, alright. When she looked around, Cara knew that her half-brother is right. A large number of hooded people clad in red stood scattered around, holding strange black rods. Citadel Masters holding Talent Rods, she knew. Talent Rods are used to reveal the true form of a person's magic. Touching a man with one of these will trigger his Talent immediately.

"Are you scared, Krazen?" she mocked.

"I am never scared," he answered. "I shall prove it to you when they assign me to the Black Tower."

It is I who shall be in the Black Tower. The rarest and most powerful Talents are assigned in the Black Tower. There they are taught in the ways of Magic, depending on the person's nature. Talents that are more inclined to combat are assigned to the Tower of the Shakk, where they are rigorously trained to fight; those with healing and support magic are to the Holy Tower, which specializes in teaching and training Support Magic; lesser Talents are assigned to the Stone Tower, where they are sorted as to which tasks they are more suitable. Persons with even lesser Talents are rejected, or given minor jobs in the Citadel. Of these towers, the Stone Tower is the most populous, the Black Tower the least.

She glanced as a mid-aged man was touched with a Talent Rod. A sphere of faint violet light encircled him. When the Citadel Master tried to touch it, sparks flew and jolted his hand. The man is a Shield. An awesome Talent, but common. Still, he was sent to the Holy Tower. Probably because his Shield is unusually strong. Another turned invisible when hit with a Talent Rod. Invisibility. Another common Talent, yet one that I do not have. He was sent to the Stone Tower. She looked around and saw how The Choosing went. Two more Talents with Invisibility are sent to the Stone Tower. A man with an arm that turns to iron was sent to the Shakk, while more than a dozen were rejected. Only a few Talents are strong enough to be chosen, it would seem. She watched as a young man, whose Invisibility is incomplete that his head remains visible when he uses it, begged for another chance.

Then came Krazen's turn. She knew his Talent, but it always thrilled her to see it. And when the Talent Rod touched him, he did not disappoint. All at once, a large number of deadly sharp blades appeared all over his body. Each blade is roughly three feet long, with razor sharp points. One almost hit the Master in the face. Many cheered and whistled at the sight of it. He looks like a pineapple, she thought. But in the end, Krazen was assigned to the Shakk. He protested that his Talent is worthy of the Black Tower, but the Master only sighed and said that though his Talent is not common, it is not rare either - and not that powerful, too. Krazen grumbled, but he went to the Shakk all the same. Lysa's turn came not long after. Her Ice Talent was impressive - the Master said so - but she will be transferred to the Citadel Elementia at Hrazea Kingdom, which specializes in Elemental Magic. Daron soon followed, but his incomplete Invisibility was rejected.

Finally, her turn came. As she was walking towards the kindly old Citadel Master, fear suddenly gripped her. She had put much confidence in her rare Talent, but now she is not so sure. After all, they thought of Krazen's Talent as rare too, but that had not been enough to put him in the Black Tower.

As the Master started to touch her with the Rod, she decided to close her eyes. Not long after, she felt the light touch of the Rod. She waited for what seemed forever.

Nothing happened.

She closed her eyes even tighter. What has gone wrong? Why is my Talent not showing? Her mind strained for an answer. Maybe there is something wrong with the Rod. Maybe the Master had done it wrong. Or maybe rare Talents don't show up just like that. But she mistrusted her speculations even as she thought of it. My Talent has betrayed me, and that is the truth of it, she thought.

But suddenly, she heard the collective gasps of everyone around her. She heard someone - no, more than one - from the crowd scream. She thought - or had she only imagined it? - that it was Lysa. She opened her eyes, and saw. Around her is a wide radius of death. The grass beneath her feet withered and died. Insects and rodents alike are dead. There are even a few birds on the ground.

And at her feet lies the dead body of the Citadel Master, along with the bodies of almost half a dozen others.

Then all hell broke out.