The Elf Who Would Become A Dragon [A Cosy Dark Fantasy]

Tranquil, she lay beneath the weeping willow upon a bed of summer grass, content where she dozed in the daylight. All stood still, even the sun, and nothing could add to or detract from the wholeness of her much-needed rest.

Beyond where the long leaves hung and the fence encircled the tree, she knew there were people and places, feelings and meanings that would demand of her and contend with her until she was sickened. Her name was out there, somewhere; she had no care for it, nor interest in exploring its mystery. What need did she have for a name, when she was all that was and would be?

Things were much simpler on her own.

"My minina?"

She lazed, unwilling to hear.

"Come here, my minina…"

The voice that called was loving, but she did not need to be loved.

Yet it persisted. "Vamos, hablemos; vamos, Peluda."

Why had she been named?

Why couldn't she just remain a stray?

* * *

There was no pain when Saphienne awoke. Had there been, it would have been better for her.

She lay upon grass made wet by her own blood, and her only functional eye fought to focus in the night. Her face was swollen, her jaw broken, and each breath was more limited than her wheezing lungs could hold. For an age of the world she was unable to move, only think disjointed thoughts that spun and scattered their syllables whenever the grove around her blurred.

Eventually, she tried to sit.

Eventually, she rolled onto her chest.

Eventually, she knelt, and clutched the hand that hung limply and numb, bending down before the flattened joint in her wrist. She couldn't tell whether it was her left or right — but she didn't notice, for she couldn't remember the concept.

Her lips moved. She tried to say, "I'm hurt," but she had forgotten speech.

She bled instead.

Her long hair was matted, red, and stuck to her back as she raised her head. She had no idea where she was, or even who, but she knew she needed help, and that help was waiting nearby. She had to climb the mountain.

She struggled to her feet–

She fell flat on her face.

…Peluda. Her name was Peluda…

She pushed herself onto her knees, and then lifted the woodlands onto her shoulders as she stood, weighed down as she shuffled forward, swaying, toppling over.

…It wouldn't get any easier…

…Wouldn't she get used to it?

Again she stood, and limped, and dragged herself through each minute, criss-crossing the slight incline that ran to the ridge where her family home waited. She stumbled to the ground more times than she could have counted, had she still possessed any of her faculties. There was no triumph in each rise.

The door gave her trouble: she tried to reach for the handle with her useless hand, then stared uncomprehendingly until she sagged against it. Her weight pushed it open, and she caught her hair on the frame, staying upright as she entered.

You might think it bleakly funny, that Saphienne stopped to shut the front door firmly behind herself. There was no conscious thought behind the act, only the flickering memory of the wind making it slam; she was reduced to mere habit.

Then there were stairs cut into the mountainside. She stepped–

And tripped over the first, smashing her forehead.

* * *

Almon concluded the lesson on Fascination from his lectern amid the gravel, his garden encircling the home of his old friend. Iradyn joined them, fetching tea from his house, Celaena having kindly loaned him her floating tray after Iolas and Laewyn fetched it down from among the treetops.

"Fascination is difficult to illustrate," the wizard began, "for only its secondary effects are revealed to the world. Peluda was right when she said that Iradyn is fascinated — but how could any of you tell, without the Second Sight?"

Violet waves shimmered around and across Iradyn's head, twining up his arm from the elaborate bangle he now wore. He blushed slightly as the apprentices scrutinised him, yet he was calm as he met each of their gazes — and apologetic for his earlier hysterics.

Celaena spoke up. "We could infer it from the change in his behaviour, and from the context in which that change took place… but that would be inconclusive. There are many explanations for changes in behaviour."

"Very good, Taerelle." Almon leant on the podium. "Iolas, what other impediments are there to studying fascinations?"

Thessa was thoughtful as she sketched. "As we experienced when you fascinated us, our perceptions can be distorted when we're subjected to a Fascination spell, so we can't study it firsthand. How can we trust whatever we're seeing?"

Nelathiel objected from where she was bowed before the icon. "We don't choose truth… but in choosing what we abide in, and in whom we trust, we are choosing the truth of the world."

"Even so," Thessa persisted, "there is an external, physical world into which we read meaning, and fascinations distort how we perceive that world. Were an evil wizard to fascinate us, there would be no way we could trust our senses — and it would be worse than with hallucinations."

"Explain why," Almon challenged him.

She set down her charcoal. "With hallucinations, we can at least compare what we see to what someone else does. We can interrogate them with our senses. Fascinations hold the senses captive."

Having been writing down her own thoughts, Saphienne interjected. "All of that is true, but none of that matters." She glanced at her master before she continued. "It's not that fascinations change how we see the world, but that they change the meaning of the world, isn't it? We can't think about whatever we perceive. My conjecture is that Fascination spells don't touch the senses at all, and they don't have to reshape what we're thinking to change what we do: they simply change what we associate with whatever we perceive."

"Correct." Athidyn gave her a slight bow. "A Fascination can make hot feel cold, or a friend become an enemy, or substitute anything in the world with anything else."

Taerelle dropped her hammer onto the grass, nodding to Iradyn. "Or make things that would panic us feel calming?"

The fascinated artist grinned at her. "It's not like that… it's more like clearing away distractions to make space for me to be myself. When I'm not wearing this," he shook the bangle on his wrist, "feelings and thoughts clutter my head, springing up from everything around me in ways that make no sense."

Thessa was sympathetic. "You weren't stable when we talked earlier. It seemed like you were being pushed one way and then the other, moment to moment."

"That's how it feels." Hearing Iolas' commentary reassured him he was forgiven. "I don't have any control over myself… or, I find control in little pauses, like I'm blinded by rain and it suddenly eases off."

The point was clear to Saphienne. "Being subjected to a Fascination spell doesn't allow us to study it, because the fascination is invisible to the person who is fascinated… except, that isn't quite right…"

"No?" Athidyn smoothed down his blue robes. "How might a fascination spell be studied by its subject, Peluda?"

"I think…" She stared at the spilled ink on the floor before her, which soaked into the tiles, forming the sigil of the Hallucination spell. "…I think it's possible, but only if the wizard–"

"Or sorcerer," Faylar nudged her.

"–or sorcerer who created the fascination didn't explicitly prohibit recognising that you are fascinated, and didn't prohibit noticing that you are acting strangely. And even then, you would need to have the presence of mind to both notice the changes in your own behaviour and to consider the possibility of being fascinated."

Iolas was sceptical. "That seems quite difficult. And even if that were the case, how would you be able to study the spell? It changes the way you think."

"And behave," she agreed. "But that would be its weakness: noticing differences in your own thoughts and actions, and establishing through observation what you are led to do and to avoid doing, in order to tease out the influence of the fascination."

Her intuition was confirmed by Almon. "Peluda isn't wrong. Masters of Fascination have been known to deduce their own fascination when subject to powerful, but improperly formed, spells. Any person of strong mind and will who trains himself in habits conducive to noticing fascinations has greater resistance to their ongoing control."

Laewyn buried her face in the silk sheets. "It's overwhelming… like a waking dream…"

Saphienne blinked. "Am I fascinated?"

Taerelle was withering. "Took you long enough, prodigy! Go inside."

Her family home loomed over the wizard's garden.

* * *

Now, she hurt.

Crawling up the stairs was easier than standing, and she lay on her back against them as she strained and gasped, using only her legs, clutching her arm against her chest. Blood smeared the staircase, and her hair caught, forcing tears from her eyes.

When she reached the landing she was too tired to stand; she dragged herself toward the closed door to her mother's bedroom with her elbow, propping herself up against it on the second attempt.

Her lips were cracked and dry. "…Fi–"

She couldn't remember.

"…Mother…"

The word was too soft. Feebly, she hit the door with her elbow.

"…Mother…"

No one was coming. No one would help.

Anguished, Saphienne threw back her head–

* * *

"… But they can't all be so pronounced, can they?"

Amused by Iolas' question, Almon replied with one of his own, fingers steepling as he surveyed his apprentices. "Why can't they?"

Saphienne had been prepared to answer from the moment Iolas asked. "We've seen subtle fascinations at work: figments are hallucinations that incorporate the discipline of Fascination. They draw attention from people nearby, and use their minds to follow the instructions for the hallucination laid down in their spell — whether or not people are consciously aware. That's a type of fascination that doesn't necessarily exert significant influence."

Realisation made Iolas flush. "Peacock! We saw violet on the first day."

"And then there's fascinators," Saphienne went on, "like my mother uses."

Almon sighed heavily. "You shouldn't have revealed that to me, child. Now I have another way to demean you, when next you try my patience. Why keep it from me on the night of your trial, only to share it so casually?"

The answer was on the tip of her tongue.

"Fascinators are vile," Hyacinth interjected, wrapping her arms around Saphienne's waist. "I think they're horrible enchantments, lulling people into accepting things they should never be content with. They're the wine of magic; I'd smash them all, if I could."

Faylar teased, "Like you smashed the tree?"

Glowering, Saphienne kicked him. "She had good reason to do that — you know why she did it!"

Faylar blushed and turned away. "Sorry…"

"I loved her," Hyacinth whispered to Saphienne, "before they took her away. I just didn't know it. Now she's gone upon the wind, fled into the east."

Almon brought them back on topic. "There are also fascinators — have any of you ever encountered one? No? They are a form of enchantment, capable of heightening daydreams into vivid experiences. Many are used recreationally–"

Saphienne couldn't restrain herself. "But, isn't that dangerous?"

"Not at all," the wizard dismissed her concerns. "They are not intrusive forms of fascination, as they require the wilful suspension of disbelief to function. They can actually be very helpful — acclimatising people to situations that would ordinarily disturb them. Some of the finest orators have spent time with a fascinator, having first began with fears of public speaking."

There, Celaena read her master as well as she had read Saphienne. "Did you once have such a fear, Master?"

He glared. "…When I was a child, yes. But the point, Peluda," he returned his attention to Saphienne, "is that fascinators do not force a person to subject themselves to their effects. To be affected by one, the subject must desire whatever the fascinator shows them."

Tirisa sneered where she stood over Saphienne, her thick makeup cracking. "So you desired your mother's love?"

Hyacinth stretched upward, her floral body creaking as she grew in height. "Utter one more word, and I'll kill you, child of elves."

Saphienne grabbed her wrist. "Don't! Please, don't…"

Taerelle clicked her tongue scornfully as she lifted the Rod of Repulsion from the muddy ground. "Coward."

Hyacinth grinned at her. "You do it, then."

"I will." She closed to kiss the bloomkith, then pointed away from Saphienne. "Fly now! Away thou! Race that I may chase thy pretty face across the wooded vale! Thy elven grace permits relentless pace to flee this place — so run! Run thou, and flail!"

Tirisa blanched, and ran, sprinting, and the path Taerelle indicated sent her across one of the flowerbeds that had been planted in the garden — where she immediately stumbled and tripped, falling heavily onto the blooms–

As they pierced her throat, punctured her lung, and tore through her limbs, spearing her to the ground she had profaned.

Satisfied, Taerelle lowered the rod. "Why show her mercy, prodigy?" She tossed it to land before where Saphienne sat. "You and I are not merciful. Try again."

Saphienne stared at the blackened metal. "But it isn't just–"

"It's your justice. Own it. Sing it how you want it to be sung."

Faylar lay a hand on her shoulder. "You sing like there's blood in your eyes."

Eletha stopped working the bellows. "Remember the songs."

Saphienne covered her ears. "Don't. Please, don't. I'm not like her. I don't want to be like her."

"In that case," Almon accepted, pointing to the house, "go inside. Tell her that. She is expecting you."

Around her, the hyacinth blossoms wilted and collapsed, the bloomkith gone howling forward to slam open the door to Saphienne's family home.

* * *

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

Breath forced its way through her lips.

She inhaled sharply, sweat dripping from her chin. Hyacinths: she needed hyacinths.

A red stain remained where she had sagged after she pulled herself up, and the landing bobbed beneath her feet as she held the wall and groped her way toward her bedroom, through the door, throwing herself across the space to the windowsill.

Were the hyacinths black, or was it the night?

"…Don't use spit again…"

She slurred the words as she let her blood drip onto the wood. Her working wrist supported her on the sill, so she hissed as she dragged her lifeless fingers through the blood, tracing a shaky, malformed circle about the flowers.

…What was her name?

"…Kylantha…" She swooned. "…Kylantha…" She felt dizzy. "…Kylantha…"

She held her fingers to the flowers, but the bloomkith didn't answer.

Then she felt faint, and she snatched at the potted plant as she fell, hearing it shatter with her as she impacted the floor.

* * *

"… And that is their constraint," the wizard explained. "Fascinations cannot compel a subject to act against their fundamental nature. Attempts to do so present another opportunity to resist the spell and break free from its influence, as you have experienced."

Saphienne's gaze flicked to Celaena; the girl said nothing.

Iolas coughed. "Please forgive my question, but… what about death?"

Almon was not thrown. "Relevant questions require no forgiveness."

"He's just being polite," Saphienne defended her friend.

"Unnecessarily." Still, their master moved on. "A subject who is actively suicidal can be induced to take his own life — otherwise, the instinct to live is too strong. A subject who is accustomed to killing can be induced to kill — so long as they are reconciled to killing. There is a profound difference between the despairing and the well, and those who kill from necessity and those who kill without remorse, as fascinations demonstrate."

"But," Saphienne tested him, "outside extreme situations, can someone be fascinated into doing something that runs contrary to their judgement by misrepresenting what it is they are doing?"

"Manipulation is effective," he conceded, "but not sufficient to overcome extremes of character. None of you would be able to kill if commanded by a potent fascination — or so I have reason to hope."

Having brooded for a time, Celaena moved the conversation on. "You said before that there are harmless fascinations which aren't intrusive… is that to do with whether they are voluntary?"

Almon smiled. "In essence? Yes. It is socially acceptable for a wizard to use a Fascination spell to make himself appear more beautiful to an audience, so long as the fascination does not conceal itself, and can be easily resisted with the barest effort. However, another version of the same spell, which concealed its own effect, and asserted itself on the observer? That would cross the line."

Iolas frowned. "And where's the line drawn? How is it drawn?"

"By an assessment of harm first, and consent second. Where a fascination causes no conceivable harm, it may require no consent. Where a fascination could conceivably cause harm, it requires consent be actively maintained."

Saphienne leant forward. "But who judges the harm?"

"Ah," Almon grinned, "we come to the most important question! In the immediate, and in a sense the ultimate instance, the wizard casting the spell must make a judgement, and may be called upon to weigh and balance different forms of harm in doing so. More generally, the Luminary Vale requires spells incorporating Fascination be submitted for review prior to their adoption, and a wizard must answer to his peers for his use of power."

Iradyn had been quiet as the concepts behind the discipline of Fascination were explored, and he chose this moment to speak up. "The first time, I didn't consent to wearing an enchantment like this." He caressed the surface of the jewellery as he spoke. "I was too far gone to understand that I was being helped. I had to spend a month recovering under the care of Our Lady of the Basking Serpent, forced to wear it all the time, to come to understand what had been done for me."

Eager to hear more, but not willing to divulge too much, Saphienne asked, "What happened at the end of the month?"

"The priests took it away from me." He tensed. "…I became very unwell again, quite quickly, and remained that way for over a week. Then Tolduin – the priest who helped me – came to visit, and offered me this one, which could be taken off whenever I wanted. I wasn't forced to wear it."

Iolas put down his pen. "…But you wanted to."

"I did." Placid yet deep emotion ran through Iradyn. "I wanted the stability. Having tasted what it is to be well, to be normal, I understood how deeply I was suffering. So I put it on, and after a few more weeks, I was allowed to go back home, and put the pieces of my life back together."

"Not all do," Almon added. "There are those who are too sick to know how unwell they are. Iolas: you expressed aspirations to be a healer? These are the situations you will have to prepare yourself to navigate, one day."

The thought worried Saphienne. "What happens to people who are too unwell to consent?"

"I'll answer that," Iradyn cut in. He clasped his hands together as he spoke. "Those who aren't a danger to themselves or others aren't compelled to receive healing, no matter how much they are suffering. I tried to kill myself."

Iolas and Celaena winced.

"For those who are, consent is sought. But if it can't be found, then yes: I would have been forced to permanently wear this." He smiled, showing the absurdity he felt in that fact. "If I'd been dangerous to others, I'd have been forced to wear two, in case one failed — and if I was very dangerous, they would have assigned someone to take care of me, making sure nothing went wrong."

Almon resumed teaching them. "There is a man, whom I will not name, whose chosen art is assisting in reclamation. Many years ago, while in the throes of madness, he killed two others in our village. Incompetent to be held accountable for his actions, healing was forced on him, and remains so, with his life under permanent supervision." Nothing in the arrangement troubled the wizard, but his voice softened. "He lives an ordinary life, though steeped in remorse."

"He's lucky, in a way." Iradyn was contemplative. "Tolduin told me there are people who are so resistant to this magic by nature that the enchantments won't work."

All that had been said swelled in Saphienne, and she faced her family home, full of trepidation and longing. Saying nothing, feeling everything, she took to her feet, the world drifting by as she was carried to the threshold…

Where she knocked, announced herself, and stepped within.

* * *

"…Hyacinth…"

The flowers were just out of reach.

"…Hyacinth…"

She couldn't touch them.

"…Hyacinth, please…"

The floor fell away.

* * *

"Mother?"

She could smell bread baking in the kitchen; Saphienne went through slowly, the house too large for her small stride. The heat and light made her shudder, and her mother was silhouetted where she stood beside her desk.

"Mother?"

Lynnariel didn't look up. "I'm not your mother, Peluda."

Saphienne sat at the kitchen table. "You don't know how to love me."

"I know how." She scored through an entry in the ledger before her. "It would be so easy to love you, my minina. It would make me so happy, to love you."

"Then why don't you?"

"Because you're irresponsible." She set down her pen. "Because you're never home when I need you. Because you waste your life distracting yourself with books and magic, and you're only my daughter when it suits you."

Her throat burned. "I want to be good. I want to be loveable."

"You're not." She read the poetry written before her. "'Some are born to sweet delight, and some are born to endless night.' You, my darling, were born to endless night; no one will ever love you for who you are, only for what you do."

Saphienne stared at her feet, swinging her legs where they dangled above the floor.

Lynnariel closed the ledger. "There are unhappy memories in here. There are also happy memories. You will remember them all, but whether you make new memories that are happy or unhappy is your decision, my Peluda." She went toward the door.

"…I want to be happy."

"I said your memories could be happy." She paused to kiss her forehead. "You will never be happy. You and I are not happy, Saph–

* * *

–ienne?"

Faint daylight through the window.

"Saphienne?" A boy's voice was calling. "Saphienne, are you there?"

She knew him; she knew this boy.

A pebble rattled against the pane. "Saphienne?"

"…Faylar…"

Another shook the window.

"…Faylar…" She tried to move, but the woodlands weighed too much.

"Saphienne!" His voice had risen. "If you're there, please talk to me — it's not as bad as you think!" There was a pause as he considered what to say. "Whatever you're feeling, you don't have to be alone!"

"…Please…"

Yet the silence stretched, and she heard a sigh, and the sound of a stone being dropped and kicked away.

"…Please, don't go… don't…"

The sun turned away from her window.

* * *

She sat on a bench with a view of the stage where Kylantha and Hyacinth were spinning together, sipping water that Laelansa had fetched for her.

"I should go dance with them," Saphienne said.

Lensa's deep blue eyes were piercing where she reclined, cold and gorgeous, on the couch beside her. "You don't like dancing."

"I like dancing with them." Her stomach hurt; she saw blood staining through her dress at her crotch, dripping down her legs.

The older girl smiled, tapping the hyacinth wand on her thigh. "This is why I hate you, Saphienne: you've had everything you've ever wanted, and you think you deserve so much more than the rest of us."

"You're unfair."

"The way you look at me says otherwise." She slid closer. "I am well-liked. I have everyone's sympathy. Most of the village was outraged to hear the nasty things you want to do to me."

Saphienne shivered. "I don't. You're a monster. You deserve to go into the ground and rot."

Laelansa whispered in her ear. "I wish I was so sure of myself…"

Saphienne felt goosebumps rise on the back of her neck as she faced Lensa; the girl's stare was painfully blue. "…Why do you hate me?"

"Because it's the closest thing to being loved you will ever feel." She didn't say it as a rejection; undiluted lust was in her eyes. "You're a stuck-up bitch."

"Almon rejected you." Saphienne was suddenly warm.

"I didn't have your talent." She was still staring.

"He passed you over because you're selfish." Her heart was beating faster.

"But I'm powerful in other ways…" She leaned closer.

"You are… evil…" Her head refused to move.

"I like evil…" Lensa's pupils were wide with need. "I like it a lot…"

Saphienne had never desired anyone more in her life. She closed her eyes, and felt the press of Lensa's lips against her own…

And the wand, which carved through her stomach. Lensa cast it aside, and reached into the wound, feeling for the coin — drawing it out, her hand stained red.

Saphienne moaned.

She bit Saphienne's lip, then stood. "You were someone worth kn–

* * *

–ow if she's even here…"

Bright light, on the floor beside her, illuminating the blue hyacinths.

"But this is her home?" A girl's voice; a voice she knew.

"Saphienne lives here, but it's not really her home…" A friend's voice; a voice she could trust. "She might have gone out earlier. She likes walking in the rain."

"Saphienne!" Laelansa called out. "Saphienne, are you home?"

"Keep your voice down!" Celaena hissed. "You'll wake the whole grove."

"Everyone's either passed out or at a revel," the younger girl sniffed, "and anyway, don't you want to see her?"

"She'll want to be on her own."

Yet Saphienne didn't; she'd have given anything, to be able to tell her.

"I don't care." Laelansa knocked on the door, loudly. "She shouldn't be alone. What happened yesterday was horrible–"

"You don't know the whole story."

"Well, Saphienne can tell me. But that woman must have done something awful, for Saphienne to treat her like that–"

Saphienne's eyes filled, one too swollen to spill.

"–and he shouldn't have carried her out like that."

Celaena's voice was fainter. "You barely know her…"

"I know her gods; I know her heart."

"She's not very religious, you know."

"Well I am, and Our Lady is telling me this isn't right. Saphienne deserves the chance to prove herself." She hammered on the door. "Saphienne!"

"She's not here." Celaena's voice receded. "We should look somewhere else."

Lying in the shade on her bedroom floor, Saphienne let her vision darken.

"…Something's not right." Laelansa was still close.

Celaena came back. "What is it?"

"This is Saphienne's hair…"

She forced herself to see again, willed herself to stay focused on the window, on the broken pot, on her ruined arm, on anything at all–

"…There are usually flowers on her windowsill," Celaena noticed.

–Willed Celaena to listen, willed Laelansa to refuse to listen–

Laelansa made up her mind. "We should find an adult."

–Or the other way around, any way around, before the light faded–

"I'm an apprentice wizard," Celaena said. "My time's my own, and I don't wait for other people to open doors." Her voice rose. "Saphienne? If you can hear me, I'm coming in unless you answer."

–She wanted to scream, to yell, to tell her to hurry–

And then Celaena knocked upon the door so hard that it crashed open.

"…Is that blood?"

The sound of running feet, of gasps, of cries of alarm — and then despair.

"Oh gods! What happened to her? Her head–"

Celaena was snatching the hyacinths from the floor, was leaning over her. "How do I invoke a spirit?"

Laelansa used the dirt to make a circle on the floor, ripped off one of the flowers from her belt, threw it down. "Ruddles, Ruddles, Rud–"

"That won't work!" Celaena tossed the flowers aside, put the Hyacinths in the circle. "Hyacinth! Hyacinth! Hyacinth!"

"Why won't it–"

"The other woodland spirits won't heal her!"

Laelansa's confusion was visible even as the room grew distant. "Why? And her friend might still be walking with–"

"We need Gaelyn." Celaena peered down into Saphienne's open eye, her horror and fear and determination cutting through the fog. "Saphienne, I'm getting help! Stay with us!"

"I can run faster–"

"You don't know the village." Celaena leapt out of sight. "Keep her awake!"

But they were too slow.

* * *

She lay under the weeping willow, her head in Kylantha's lap.

"You're wrong, you know."

Saphienne sighed. "…It was a toad…"

The young girl giggled. "You're right about so many things, but you're mostly wrong about yourself. Why is that?"

"I don't know who I am." Saphienne held up her hands, one broken, one whole. "I don't know my name. Am I Peluda? Am I Saphienne?"

"You're both." Kylantha stroked her dented crown. "And you're neither."

"You're not Kylantha."

"No," Kylantha answered.

"Are you a god?"

Her best friend rolled her eyes. "You already asked me that, silly. Why do you want to meet a god so badly?"

"They don't exist." Saphienne was certain. "But if I'm wrong about that…"

"Then maybe you're wrong about everything?" Kylantha laughed at her, and leaned closer, her brown gaze glittering. "Maybe you're wrong about yourself? You don't need a god to tell you that you're wrong."

"I want them to tell me you're alive. I want them to tell me you're happy."

"But I'm not Kylantha," said the mortal elf. "I told you before: I'm half the elf you think you are. Do you want to live? Do you want to be happy?"

"…I don't know…"

"Well I do; but you know that already."

Saphienne closed her eyes. "Everything hurts. They just take. Everyone wants something from me, and nobody wants me."

"You're wrong."

"You're not real."

Kylantha flicked Saphienne's ear. "You're rude. But fine, have it your way."

* * *

"If your friend isn't half-dead–"

Celaena was furious. "Shut up! In there — upstairs."

Laelansa was holding her head against her waist, uncaring about the blood that covered her already-ruddied flowers. She had been crying, but the thumping on the stairs gave her hope. "In here!"

Saphienne didn't recognise the yellow-eyed elf who crouched over her, though she thought it strange how detached he appeared as he placed his hands upon her face–

And froze.

Then he was on his feet, throwing open the window, shouting, "Then go find her!" to the gale that exploded out from where he stood, unmoved by the wind as he sank down and unbuckled the book that was attached to his belt, flicking through it urgently.

"We found her like this–"

"Be quiet," the healer said, sweating as he studied the sigil before him, his brown-blue gaze darting from the page to Saphienne. "I don't have the spell internalised… I'm going to have to expend the sigil–"

His face began to melt.

"–Hold her steady!"

"What's happening to her?"

"She's having a–"

* * *

Upon the library steps she sat, but this time they were the right size. Darkness stretched away where she had expected to see the field, and she dangled her legs within it, feeling it tender and yielding.

"You're not who I was expecting."

Walking across the black came Nelathiel, his eyes golden, his war scythe slung on his bare shoulder above where one arm was loosed from his robes. His face was painted fiercely in green and black, and his smile was hungry, yet kind.

Another voice answered him, "She was not expecting us, either."

Saphienne looked across her shoulder, to where Thessa-Hyacinth sat meditatively before the library doors, blooms across her naked body, her eyes closed, the sickle sharp within her hand.

"It all evens out, does it?" Nelathiel stopped before Saphienne, and lowered his holy weapon. "She finds that hard to believe."

Fully aware of herself, Saphienne thought carefully. "…I'm having a fit. None of this is really happening."

"And yet, here you are." He grinned as he squatted. "You're good at reading icons; what is happening here?"

She pondered the emptiness. "I'm nearly dead. My mind is dying, and it's trying to find answers. You're here to urge me to give up, and go into–"

"Wrong." Nelathiel shrugged off the war scythe. "I don't want your death. Nor does she."

"You're just a part of me," Saphienne shook her head. "There's no secret truth here, no wisdom. Whether I live or die has nothing to do with this conversation."

"Correct," answered Thessa-Hyacinth, the choker of gold and silver on her neck gleaming. "You are going to live, unless you choose to die. Neither of us desires your death."

"So I'll live." Saphienne crossed her arms. "Simple enough."

Yet Nelathiel cracked his knuckles. "But why?"

"Because the healer–"

"He means," Thessa-Hyacinth translated, "for what will you live?"

Saphienne rolled her eyes. "It doesn't matter. I'll go on living, until one day I won't."

"In that case," Nelathiel smirked, "why not dive in now — get it all over with? Your life is miserable; almost everyone hates you; nobody understands you; and you despise the woodlands." He lifted his implement of death. "Shall I smite you down? Everyone you love is here. Everything dies – even time – so they're all waiting for you. Why not be with Kylantha again?"

Her heart ached. "I thought you didn't want me to die?"

"I don't." He leant closer. "You know what I want, Saphienne."

"…A chase."

"The hunt ends one of two ways," Nelathiel threatened her. "The quarry dies, or the hunter does. If you choose to be prey? All well and good." He bared his teeth. "But we both know you're a hunter, Saphienne."

"And so," the elf-spirit behind her concluded, "he asks what you pursue. What is it you want, Saphienne? And what will you offer, to balance the scales?"

Her imagination was more vivid than she ever dreamed. "…Kylantha would want me to live to be happy."

Nelathiel was unimpressed. "So what? That isn't what you want."

"If you know what I want–"

"We don't." He stood, leaning on the hilt of his scythe. "If we did, the three of us wouldn't be talking now."

"Technically, four," giggled Thessa-Hyacinth.

"So what do you want, Saphienne?" He observed his quarry. "Why live? The pursuit will be eternal, and you'll always be pouring yourself out into unbalanced scales."

Stuck between them, Saphienne sagged. "I probably won't even remember this."

"Half of you will — and there are no halves in nature."

She gave up. "I don't want to hurt people, but I want to stop people being hurt. I want to be happy, but not if someone else is forced to suffer for me. I want peace," she sang out, her voice lamenting, "but not their peace, and not only for myself! What I want is impossible…"

"Good enough." He strolled away. "It's the want that matters."

But Thessa-Hyacinth knelt behind her, sickle raised. "And what will you give in exchange?"

That made Saphienne laugh. "…All that I have…"

She offered her throat.

End of Chapter 75