For the truth my heart never believed in...

At first, I couldn't really tell what woke me up.

The room around me was normal... it just took a moment before I remembered why exactly was I sleeping in such luxury. There were no sounds, neither from the interior of the castle, nor the mountains outside.

The problem became evident when I tried to search for any presence nearby with my mind just in case...

I jolted up, almost knocking the pillow I had my forearm under from the bed. My magic... it was still there, but it felt like it wasn't at the same time. I could sense it in my soul, but there was suddenly something that prevented me from reaching and using it, like a crystal wall that I could see through, but not penetrate...

I looked around again, but there was no one and nothing that suggested another magic was used to suppress mine. But... I've heard of old buildings having protective spells to prevent intruders with magical abilities from harming the inhabitants... Was I experiencing one of their kind reacting to me...?

Getting up, I walked over to the door. I had no idea how late it was, but I hoped to find Sharish still awake, so I could ask if he knew more about what this place was before he and his brother decided to settle down here. I just hoped I would be able to find him among the dozens of chambers...

I never even got the opportunity to face that minor issue.

The door was locked...

I pulled and pushed, giving it all I had, but it didn't as much as budge. Sharish didn't lock it when he left me alone, neither did I, there wasn't even a key in the keyhole... Did that mean that the protective magic included locking the intruder in...? The equally unmoving window surely supported that theory...

Feeling dizzy, I returned to the bed and sat down, drawing some comfort from the softness of the mattress. There was no reason to panic... Sharish would come get me first thing in the morning and either provide a solution himself, or we would search for one together. My eyes drifted shut again and I started to take deep breaths. There was an explanation and a solution, I just had to wait a bit...

Till the hooting of an owl died out among the branches of nearby trees...

... till the soft sound of some night hunter's paws went past the castle and wandered off into the mist in the south...

... till the first rays of sun peeked between the summits, starting to warm up the thick, stone walls...

... and until light footsteps echoed through the hallway outside of my door.

I jumped up and ran over to it. "Sharish?" I asked loudly, a pleading tone sneaking its way into my voice.

"Yes?" came the answer from the other side. He seemed weirdly unconfused by the fact that his guest decided to stay behind a closed door rather than open it and have a face to face conversation.

"Do you know if this castle had some protective spells put on it in the past? It seems something was triggered in the night..."

"Oh? Like what? The door locking? You feeling weaker all of a sudden...?"

So I was right. There were spells. But... why did Sharish sound so... carefree about it...? "Yes...?" I urged him on, noticing some horrible feeling starting to envelop my chest.

"Well then everything is as it should be," that statement was perfectly calm... satisfied even...

"What do you mean...?"

"I mean that my spells have worked properly."

"Your... spells...?"

"Elegant aren't they? Fitting for an Empress."

That couldn't be. He wasn't a mage, he didn't...

No. He just pretended not to be... he even preferred to get injured in order to maintain this image... And the people in Shinestone? Did he make it all up to lure me here or did he just use the circumstances for his benefit and they were now condemned to even more suffering, maybe even death...?

"Why...?" a weak whisper managed to get past my lips.

"Simple... you have something I want..."

"What is it...?"

"Your powers..."

"What...? You... you know that's impossible..."

"And you know that's not true. There is one way..."

I almost took a step back. He couldn't be serious... If he was a mage and knew where my powers came from, he was without a doubt aware what their price was...

He knew I realized what he meant because I heard his silent hiss from the other side of the door: "That's right..."

"I can't..." I tried, "do you have any idea how dangerous it is...?"

"Oh I do," he sounded completely unfazed. "But you've lived with these powers almost your entire life... You know far more about them than those fools in Ilmer did. I believe that if you really tried, you could find a way."

"Even if there is a way... it could take months... years, till I find it... and it might not even work in the end..."

"Don't worry, I'll provide you with knowledge you might not yet possess."

"... sorry?"

"It so happens that my father left something behind for me... in the ruins of Ilmer."

I frowned. Father...? Ilmer...? Those two pieces of information plucked some strings in my mind, strings that seemed distant, yet their sound harmonized... "Don't tell me... it was your father who told the people of Ilmer how to perform that ritual..."

"It was. What a ridiculous price he had to pay for merely trying to help the human race..."

"He wasn't just helping one race there. And just because he lost his life in Ilmer, doesn't mean you have the right to take the powers he summoned for yourself."

"That's not really what I'm trying to say here. It doesn't matter to me where this magic came from, I need it to cleanse our world."

"What...?" my helpless anger turned into confusion for a brief moment.

"I want to erase every single non-magical being out there..."

"No..." I whimpered. "Why...?"

"To protect the magical ones of course," he said that like it was completely obvious. There was no doubt in his voice, no regret in his decision, even though it involved eliminating thousands of innocent lives...

"That's insane... every being is important if this world is supposed to work properly..."

"Really now... why don't you try telling that to the people who wiped out dragons? Who are hunting mages whenever one of us tries to venture here from the far north? Or the imbeciles who are after the magical beings inhabiting Silivren Forest, because a rare trophy seems to be worth more than their own lives?" He was trying to stay calm, but I could sense the anger rising from somewhere deep within him... "Why are they getting away with wiping out other races, yet it can't work the other way around?"

I didn't have an answer. I knew I never would, because the situation between humans and magical beings in Earlindon became far too complicated over the decades for a single mind to understand all the reasons why. I suddenly had to fight the feeling that I couldn't really blame him. Still... that wasn't the way...

I placed a hand on the smooth walnut wood of the door. "I know..." I spoke slowly, trying to pick words that would improve the situation, not make it worse. "There are some really twisted and cruel individuals out there, who hate us without even really understanding why... But not all of them are like this... If you really have to go after them, just pick the ones who are truly responsible for all that hate... When a tree becomes sick, you don't burn the whole forest down, do you...?"

"And what guarantee will I have that I can pick them all out that way? What will keep them from hiding if their filthy cities stay where they are, if there will be others who can conceal them with lies? What will stop others from stepping onto the wretched path in the future, making this task endless?"

Whether it was just the shock keeping my mind paralyzed or there was no good way out, I still couldn't answer. But that still didn't mean I was just going to agree... "I'm sorry... but I can't let you do that... If you want to take out whoever comes after you, be my guest. But I won't allow you to harm anyone else... let alone with this magic..."

"So you refuse? Even knowing the consequences that await you?"

"Consequences...?"

"You'll stay here as long as I see fit. Your only way out now... is finding out how to give me every ounce of magic you were blessed with and handing it over."

My knees almost betrayed me. I stumbled backwards and barely managed to hold onto the cold bedpost in the feet of my bedding. "Blessed...?" I stammered out. "It's more like a curse now..."

The corridor outside became silent, not even the sound of Sharish's breath reaching my ears. I would have given a lot to know what he was thinking... What drove him to doing all this... There was no insanity in his words... just bitterness... And he didn't look like the type who was very worried about the fates of others, so it must have been something personal... Maybe there was still a way to reason with him...

"You can torment me all you want..." I found the strength to speak again after a moment. "I won't make it easier for you to harm innocent people..."

"I see..." Sharish sounded disappointed. "So you are a tool after all..."

"Excuse me?"

"You're but a tool, Yasenka Glorifiel. You were used as a tool in Ilmer when you were just a child. You were used by every single being that came whining for your help over all these years. Now you'll be used as a shield humans cower behind. And since you seem to enjoy it so much, I'm sure you won't mind if I use you too..."

His footsteps that soon vanished somewhere in the direction of the staircase told me that he wasn't interested in my answer.

Not that I was able to give him one... What he said... repeated with a weird echo in my mind...

A tool...

It sounded way too wrong... and way too right at the same time... Because...

In the end, what else was I to them...?

Back in Ilmer, no one asked me if I was alright with carrying that burden, the responsibility, the change... Not that I would have understood any of it at the age of three, but taking advantage of my unawareness didn't make it any better...

When they all started to flood Silivren Forest seeking help, no one asked about my feelings either. Aiding them seemed obvious to me, so I never tried to give it any deeper thought. But the human race always managed, always survived, whatever fate and environment threw at them, even before they heard of me. They didn't need me to preserve... which meant I was just a tool used for their convenience...

And after I unwittingly accepted that role after all this time, I was simply offering myself as an obstacle between them and Sharish, even though his rage was caused by humans themselves... because I was just used to it... because it felt obvious by now...

I closed my eyes, sinking to my knees.

Who was I to blame Sharish for what he was doing...

~

The days spent in my luxurious prison were... strange. There were no birdsongs to wake me up in the mornings, only silence or occasional howling of wind. The first to greet me was not Ertralia's sleepy purring. It was always a tray with food and a book suddenly and soundlessly appearing on the table by the wall opposite the bed.

For the first two days, I just took the tea or milk that was provided and ignored everything else. I wasn't sure yet if I preferred to stay here doing nothing till Sharish's patience ran out, or to starve myself rather than spend the rest of my days wondering if that would ever happen at all...

The third morning, I took a look into the book, desperate to distract myself from my situation. It was some sort of magic textbook... an advanced one. It contained many various summoning spells, curses... rituals...

It wasn't hard to understand why Sharish was providing me with knowledge. I just wasn't sure if he predicted that by doing so, he sparked an idea in my mind. An idea to not transfer my powers to him, but to start searching for a way to escape.

The magic surrounding my room was unfaltering. It prevented me from using any kind of magic, but that was something that gave me hope the moment I came up with my plan. Because it meant that if he wanted me to perform the ritual, he would have to either lift the spells, or bring me somewhere else, where I would be free to strike using every ounce of knowledge he himself provided me with.

The books kept piling up... they were getting more and more specific, advanced, concentrating around magic that used the elements and analyses of the construction of rituals, to the last detail...

The thirteenth book that appeared before me after the thirteenth sunrise sent shivers down my spine.

It was closer to forbidden magic than anything else till now... It contained mostly spells that no one or only a few have managed to cast, analyzed every step with every single possibility of why and where the magic might have gone wrong. Spells that for some reason focused on bringing back the dead a lot... The fact that there were more messily handwritten notes than regular text made it far too realistic... And in the middle of all that... sat a whole chapter about that one ritual...

Moonshard's Blessing...

The page on which it began was 'bookmarked' with the worn leather band of some rather ancient looking pendant. It had the shape of a branchy tree made of what I thought was copper. I examined it very carefully, but found no trace of magic in it... Why was it there and was it even in any way relevant...?

The ritual itself was... complicated. Far more than I thought. Already by reading it for the first time, I noticed three small mistakes in the author's analysis, but it seemed that either Sharish or his father did too. There were notes around and in between the lines that were made in different handwriting than all the others, and the ink that formed the elegant letters was still relatively fresh, jet black and unfaded.

It was... difficult to read. All the more because the old and new notes had such a dissonance to them. The faded words were filled with something akin to devotion, maybe a desperate one even. They were the work of someone looking for some sort of solution to a pain they carried while writing every page. What pain, I didn't find out... But the notes revealed a name: Sylvariel. He wrote in the language of my kin... was he one of us...? Was that another reason why Sharish needed me? Because he couldn't read illathan...?

The fresher notes, methodological and dry, ignored all sacrifices made with every failure of the ritual, tirelessly seeking a path to power. It made me nauseous... Nauseous, but focused... I was determined not to allow any fool impudent enough to even think of trying this ever again... nor was I going to surrender these powers to anyone whose goal was to harm others...

I didn't allow the anger to cloud my 'studies' though. Instead, I became mesmerized by the original author's passion and the knowledge he left behind. The reason why the Moonshards were this powerful was because they possessed the ability to absorb energy from their surroundings. The author went through the trouble of testing out what exactly they absorbed, asking elves and mages for assistance. The shards were rather unaffected by elements, and barely absorbed raw magical energy. The only thing they seemed interested in was the light of the sun... Whenever a shard seemed to lose its energy, it was enough to expose it to the golden rays for a while, and it would restore its power in mere hours. The author compared it to plants using the sun's warmth to grow, which sounded like a logical train of thought, but a crystal was no plant...

Finding any further flaws in the reasoning of the people who studied the ritual over the decades seemed impossible. It almost looked like Sharish's father was about to discover all of the secrets when it was performed in Ilmer, which was why it worked even if hundreds of casualties were the price, and that incident gave Sharish the last bits of information needed to complete the picture. Which meant... there was either one little piece that went unnoticed, or Sharish already held all he needed in his hand and was just afraid to do it for whatever reason. And I understood what made him believe that gifting my powers to him was possible - Sylvariel left a few confusing verses at the end of his work. He spoke of transferring the power one would gain through the ritual to something or someone else... He went from inanimate objects, through plants and small animals, and ended up with bodies of people who passed away, analyzing all pros and cons along the way... Just what exactly was he trying to do...?

All that made me understand that I needed to be more cautious from now on... If this somehow became common knowledge among mages, it could even lead to deadly conflicts between some of them and cause dozens to come after me. Getting rid of my magic was not an option anymore, if it was possible at all, it would just get snatched away by someone else by the first opportunity. I had to protect them... escape Sharish, maybe even... kill him... make sure this notebook was destroyed... and maybe... seal my powers away somehow, where no one could find them...

I stood up, leaving the book and the unfinished meal on the table and flopped onto the bed. Never before have I felt so mentally exhausted, and that just after reading... I closed my eyes. As always when I did that, I saw he Silivren Forest... Ertralia... Arneth... master Arakiel... Were they worried...? Or were they only just starting to think that something must have happened since I didn't return for so long...? Would I... ever be able to see them again...?

Vivid dreams of my home blessed me at night, giving my mind some fleeting comfort. And, like every morning the past two weeks, I awoke with my head on a pillow moist from tears that my heart seemed to shed even in my sleep...

That next day was... interesting though.

Shortly after receiving my breakfast, which once again I didn't feel like having, I heard voices...

I knew by then that one wall of my bedroom concealed a flue, betrayed by the pleasant heat radiating from the spot every evening and throughout the nights. Now though, along with the already fading warmth, came two male voices.

One I recognized as Sharish, despite being a little distorted by the thickness of the construction and a slight echo. The other was deeper, spoke calmer... much calmer than Sharish, because the mage sounded almost furious.

I stood by the feet of my bed and pressed my ear to the lukewarm bricks to hear them better.

"Isn't that good though?" asked the voice that I didn't know. "The kid is still alive and you can pull him to your side."

"If it weren't for that old fool he would already be here and working with me or dead if he didn't agree to... now there is a risk of his companions finding him first and teaching him all he needs to know to go against me!"

"So what now?"

Sharish sighed and seemed to think for a moment. "You'll go back there. I'll give you a letter to Tavris, he'll teach that idiot a lesson. You in the meantime can grab the Disciple and bring him to me unharmed and with his memory restored."

I froze up.

Disciple...?

He was looking for us...? Why...?

"Why are you panicking so much anyway?" the other man still sounded unfazed. "You have the second already here and the third is all the way in Hreshia, where your family had their influence even on the royal family since Ered. There is no risk of that kid just getting snatched away."

My breath got stuck in my chest.

Influence in Hreshia... since Ered? Ered Caydranth...?

Sharish and his father... were they the descendants of the very man who lead the last human assault on the dragon race...?

But then why didn't he...

"I don't have the certainty that she's one of them yet. Do you think we just casually talked about it on the way here? Or that she would tell me now, after two weeks in captivity?"

"Then I'm guessing you'll be trying to squeeze it out of her somehow. But what about the third? Should I go north after I'm done at the castle?"

"No. My brother was complaining that I never let him help much... I'll send him there. Besides, I believe him to be way more capable of subtle negotiations than you..."

"Can't argue there."

"You better worry about the black dragon boy. I want this problem solved, properly..."

"Consider it done."

The conversation cut off and I heard Sharish's heavy sigh. Soon after, barely audible footsteps, muffled by a carpet told me that he left the room with the conveniently situated fireplace.

I leaned back slightly and stared at the rough surface of the warm-grey stone.

He was Sharish Caydranth... he carried the blood of the dragon murderer in him...

He was looking for the Disciples of the Last Dragons, to either convince us to aid him or wipe us out...

He was holding me prisoner in order to gain a power that would allow him to erase all human beings in Earlindon, maybe even beyond...

There were only two ways to counter this...

I had to either escape and protect the other Disciples and the human race...

... or I had to take Sharish Caydranth down myself.