A metal box sits on the table in front of Draken.

“Can you open it?” The sorcerer asks.

He holds the box in his hand, examines it for openings and catches, sees nothing. As he shakes it the box rattles, indicating some object inside. He puts the box down.

“Can’t open it, guess I fail.”

The sorcerer smiles coldly, like a snake.

“What sort of master would I be if I rejected you so easily? It’s my job to motivate you to do better.”

Draken snaps to alertness, thieves instincts warning of a trap. Even as he tenses his muscles to spring from the chair iron manacles close around his wrists and ankles.

“What the fuck is this?!”

The sorcerer stands and slowly, calmly strolls to the boy’s side. He reaches into the Draken’s pocket and produces the stolen purse followed by his own smaller, more worn equivalent.

“Call it a robbery,” Morro chuckles, tossing the goods onto the table and rifling through every pouch and pocket on the youth’s body.

“Give those back!” Draken shouts to the sorcerer's amusement.

“Take them back,” he replies, “or do you need more motivation?”

He snatches a tarnished copper locket from Draken’s neck. As the familiar chain slides away from his skin a lance of mental pain pierces the boy’s soul.

“Please, not that!” He shouts, eyes fixed on the old trinket. “It’s all I have of her.”

“Your mother's?” The sorcerer asks, “I think I’ll sell it.”

“Why are you doing this, what the hell do you want?” Draken struggles against his bonds.

Morro looks coldly at the metal box, “I want you to open it.”

Draken reaches out with that intangible skill he’s only once touched to do anything other than thieving. He feels the box in his mind, feels himself touch the cold metal and the box moves. It doesn’t open.

“Good, good,” the sorcerer says. “Just, not good enough.”

The chair folds flat, forcing Draken to his feet and pulling him upright. He rotates counterclockwise and his eyes widen as the flattened chair edges him toward an open metallic sarcophagus.

“I see I must motivate you farther, perhaps fear will do the trick. If not there is always pain to consider.” Morro sips his tea as the chair pushes the boy in. Draken feels the square box shoved into his open hand just before the coffin closes around him.

“You have two choices, open the box and use the key to let yourself out or you can unclamp the latches holding this coffin together from outside.” The sorcerer laughs a shrill laugh.

The stifling air, the lack of space, the darkness all seem to close in. Shackles no longer holding his arms in place, he probes the wall with his hand, withdrawing in sudden pain. He hears Morro’s metallic voice echo through the thin walls.

“It might interest you to know the walls of this metal box are lined with tiny razor-sharp needles, it’s makes things more exciting.”

Draken decides probing with his hands wont work and reaches out with his mind feeling the curves and the contours. He counts the latches , thinking of each as a purse to be lifted. Delicate but firm, dropping one means getting caught and getting caught means thirty lashes. One by one he touches them with his mind and with each touch he hears a snap. Piercing pain jolts him from his concentration. The needles are slowly growing, agonizingly inching into his skin.

Gritting his teeth, he closes his eyes and pushes the pain to the side of his consciousness. He’s taken worse before, scars from beatings and stabbings mark his young body a little more pain won’t kill him. He tells himself that the needles are nothing even as the boor into him.

Snatching at the latches again and again he hears the casket begin to creak, feels the door pitch.

The pressure of the needles stops and he meets the cold ground. He squints in as the full light of the room meets his eyes and heaves. Wobbling to his feet on shaky legs, Draken snatches his belongings up from the table, stuffing them into his pockets.

“These are mine.”

The sorcerer slowly claps.

“Do you see now what the proper motivation can do?”

Draken’s blade stops inches from Morro’s face, turns slowly in the air and flies backwards.

Too weak from his ordeal the boy cannot dodge the blade and braces for pain as it spins in the air twisting and turning until it slows and lands softly back in his belt.

“You have my leave to go,” Morrow says.

Shooting the sorcerer one last contemptuous glance, Draken staggers past the curtain.

Legs, back and arms still stinging from the dozens of pin pricks Draken wonders just what he was thinking when he volunteered for this torture. Who cares if he can open a puzzle or a coffin, is this kind of pain really any better than the lash?

He notes he’s not the only one in the common area to take damage from his trial.

Many of the other youths are passed out, bloody or sobbing. Rolling the bead between his fingers he looks at it in the light. Plain and white to suggest the trifecta he’d inadvertently volunteered for.

His body aches at the thought of handing himself over to these maniacs twice more. One can only be expected to subject himself to so much agony.

Beams of white light invade the tent from the entrance, cutting the darkness like blades.

Walk out, keep walking and don’t look back. The penalty for quitting can’t be worse than the trials themselves. His feet move before his mind has made a choice.

“Don’t be so hasty, think of what you're risking.”

A young man in fine silk robes pushes past Draken. He obscures the light as he marches briskly toward the exit. The mage with the rat-like features is at his heels.

“It can’t possibly be riskier than spending another moment with that madman!” The boy shouts.

The magician firmly grips the young man’s cloak by the collar.

“If you really believe that you can’t complete the trial than I strongly suggest you beg master Hood’s leave lest you face terrible consequences for breaking your contract.”

The youth sneers, pulling himself from the older man’s grip.

“I fear no retribution, I have two uncles on the Magician’s Council and my father is a courtier of the High Wizard himself. Your wizard would be beyond insane to harm me!”

With a flourish of his bright green cape the boy turns on his heel, gold trim of his robes sparkling in the sunlight. He takes three confident steps toward the exit. The fourth step touches ground past the tent’s threshold and is followed by the thud of his lifeless body.

The chamber falls suddenly silent, save for the anguished cries of a tortured soul at the mercy of the masters trials. Draken takes one more look at the bead and tucks it into his pocket.