Micah

Micah sat in the recovery cavern with his sigil booklet in hand, attention focused elsewhere, his presence ignored by the medical fae.

It had been a day since his encounter with the ifrit, and he’d had a chance to analyze his attack and strategy with the mage. His conclusion: he was nowhere near where he wanted to be. He had failed twice now in his eyes: first with the infrar and then with the ifrit, both situations requiring him to be saved by someone else.

His grip on the book tightened unconsciously, and he felt a flare of anger rise in his stomach as he remembered the poor decisions he had made in both cases.

How can you expect to be of use to this cause if you have to be saved every time? Goddamn hindrance, is what you are.

He stopped pretending to study, his gaze flitting down to the fay in front of him, her emaciated body wracked by the ongoing, glacial process of recovery. In his visits to the medical cavern, he had come to know her face well, with its little blue lips and dark lashes, and the ultra-fine hair on her head, thin for her age. His heart broke every time he glanced at her.

She had been found in one of the middling districts, nearly comatose and cradled in the cold arms of her mother, who had died hours before being found by Gallo. Even under the intensive care and watchful eyes of the Vanguard’s healers, her prognosis seemed dim. She retained consciousness for mere seconds at a time and suffered frequent seizures.

They fed her a special nutrient formula infused with plant medicine when they could get her to accept it, but even so she was having a difficult time working through the withdrawal from scurf.

How can you expect to help her? Handed actual magic on a silver platter, and you can’t keep your shit together long enough to even kill a single opponent.

The grisly details of his encounter with the infrar resurfaced — a broken plea made through a shattered face, the blood, Claudien’s hands on his head just before —

Micah smelled blood again and nearly threw up. He stared intensely at a single spot on the floor and let it pass, and then wrenched his thoughts away, focusing instead on the little girl.

He looked up in time to catch her opening her eyes for the first time in several days. Her eyes were pale gold discs, dimmed with a tiredness no child should know, and after a few seconds they closed again and she lapsed back into a semblance of sleep.

The little fay's tenuous health seemed a reflection of his efforts, and lately, his efforts seemed to fall far short of he expected of himself.

As if in answer to his dark thoughts, her frail body began to shake violently and her already-short breaths became rapid and shallow. Her limbs went completely rigid and her face contorted in pain.

He felt a cold bloom of fear in his chest that spread into his throat and stomach.

“Hey—” Micah called for one of the healer fae, not taking his eyes from her. She continued to seize up, and then, to his dismay, her face slackened, mouth falling open slightly. Pale foam began gathering at the edges of her mouth as she continued to shiver fiercely.

“Damn it, will somebody—” he yelled, rising from his chair and turning to the rest of the cavern. It was empty. There was only Micah and the unconscious addicts. He put his hands under her and gently turned her to her side, but he had not been instructed in what to administer to her when the seizures came on.

“Somebody get in here!” he shouted, afraid to leave her side to find one of the medical fae.

Micah turned back to her, hands hovering above her body in an uncertain panic.

Her eyes were partially open; they rolled back in her head and the half-moon of gold disappeared. He had the sudden realization that she was about to die, cold and lucid like a dive into freezing waters.

You can save her.

Asmodai. He had forgotten about the orb, who had been silent since his fight with the ifrit.

He didn't resist this time.

“Do it,” Micah ground out, gripping the edge of what would soon be a death-bed.

He felt a sense of immense satisfaction, a feeling that did not belong to him, and underneath that, a sense of relief, the sweet catharsis of giving in, and that was his own. Both feelings were then buried beneath a rush of pure energy and something other that broke loose in his body like a tsunami.

The power was alien to him, wild and coursing like a river, spreading to his fingertips and filling him to the brim. His skin tingled, the magic now possessing him as much as he possessed it.

He felt capable, almost god-like, and he laughed before he could help himself.

He bent over the girl and laid his right hand over her forehead and eyes. He wasn’t sure exactly what to do, but the intense energy surging through him needed an outlet, so he did what came naturally, opening a metaphysical tunnel between them just like when he used alchemy. He channeled his magic into her, willing her to live, feeling her feeble heart quicken through the flooding magical deluge between them. Through the metaphysical connection he could see the drugs in her system had blackened her from the inside, which would eventually culminate in nerve death and imminent shutdown of the entire nervous system. He willed the power to sweep through and cleanse the darkness. The necrotizing scurf fled at the touch of his energy.

Immersed in the open link, he tracked down every dark blossom of the drug in her, cornering it and forcing it out of her.

But the exorcised scurf had to go somewhere, now evicted from the body of the girl, and the easiest way out was through their wide-open connection. The raging wave of black illness surged up and into Micah.

Her tiny body arched so that it seemed her spine might break, and then she was still. Her body straightened on the gurney-bed as the thread between them severed. All was still but for the gentle rising and falling of her chest, and Micah, breathing hard and clutching the edge of the bed as if he had run to her side.

Through sheer force of will, Micah kept the scurf in a ball inside of himself, and he went to a corner of the cavern and he vomited, feeling a tangible lump leave his throat among the food he had earlier consumed.

Under the cave’s lights, he could see a lump of black, pulsing violently, its matter spiking and moving on its own, reaching out and finding only half-digested food. Micah straightened and used his boot to push the extricated scurf into a crevasse in the cavern floor.

He wiped his mouth and went back to the girl, who was resting peacefully. He laid her on her back again as two healers came into the room. One came to him.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

“Seizures,” he replied. "She seems fine now."

The fay looked closely over her, noting the color that was returning to the little girl's cheeks.

"This is the healthiest she's looked in weeks," she said, smiling. "Let's get her some water."

Relief flooded Micah as he looked down at the tiny fay. Her breathing was deep. The blue had left her lips, and the color that had been high spots of purple on her cheeks had turned into the red of healthy bloodflow.

“Micah?” came a call from outside the medical cavern.

He excused himself, giving a wave to the medical fae, and went to answer.

For the first time in weeks, he felt neither tired nor sore. Coupled with the satisfaction and relief of having saved the little fay, he felt bouyant.

“There you are," said Gaillard, spotting him. Next to him a fay slouched against a cave wall.

“The Wild Hunt is in just a few days, and whether or not Allie is back, we must proceed with the plan she constructed.”

The mage gestured casually to the fay by his side.

“This is Cayle. He will be part of the five-strong crew going to the palace. Allie asked for you and three others: our infiltrant, Indra, Cayle here, and Anthe, who you will likely meet soon. Not sure where she's gotten to."

Cayle raised a casual hand to Micah in greeting, an easy smile on his lips. He had dark stubble on his angular jaw and vibrant green eyes. His hair was a little too long, his eyes a little too appraising, his smile a little too guarded. Micah felt immediate distrust for the fay, though if pressed he could not have said why.

“What exactly is the plan tomorrow?” Micah asked Gaillard.

“We dress you up like nobility, send you in to blend with the vapid rabble. We’ll discuss the details more beforehand.”

Micah scowled.

“Seems like a lot of room for error.”

“You’re not wrong. This will be one of the first occasions we’ve had to get into the palace. We’re not sure exactly what to expect. Just keep on your toes and remember: subtlety and subterfuge are the aim.”

Cayle gave the mage a sidelong glance and then looked away.

Gaillard saw it and said, “Yes, I know subtlety is not Anthe’s strong suit, but your skills are not suited for… defusing situations.”

Cayle looked skeptical but amused.

“I’ll try to make sure she doesn’t become a situation herself,” he said.

Micah pulled subconsciously on his right sleeve, which was rubbing on the itchy, new scars on his back, courtesy of the ifrit.

“Go ahead and rest today,” the mage said to Micah. "We'll be preparing for the Hunt starting tomorrow."

Danica approached them.

“Ah, Danica. News?” Gaillard asked, prompting her.

She flashed Micah a smile before recomposing her features in seriousness.

“Firenze and I have examined the new chitin weapons. We’re going to need to discuss integrating them into the arsenal with you and Geir, because I don’t think the soldiers’ training thus far is well-suited to them,” she said, her delivery formal, and then she relaxed a little, her official message relayed.

Before Gaillard could answer, Cayle shifted slightly behind him and came into Dani’s line of sight.

Her posture stiffened and she couldn’t stop her emotions from flitting across her face in rapid succession before setting into cold distaste: bitter anger, molten hatred, and then, gone too quickly for anyone to see, leadheart grief.

Micah had never seen the look on her face before; even among her soldiers, her anger was a flitting phantasm, almost always followed by her quick smile. But for the scrubby fay, her face was ugly with loathing, her eyes like chips of gold ice. Cayle couldn’t meet them.

Without saying another word, Dani turned sharply on her heel and walked away from them, her back rigid, as if it were taking every iota of her self-control not to injure Cayle.

Gaillard looked nonplussed but recovered with a beard scratch and a casual shrug. All three of them seemed unwilling to acknowledge what had just happened in the silence that followed.

Finally, Gaillard said, “Get some rest, Micah.”

He nodded.

A few hours ago, rest would have sounded deeply appealing, but now, all he wanted was to test his newfound abilities — in secret, because undoubtedly Gaillard would notice such a dramatic increase in power. Questions would be asked, and he did not have good answers yet. He wasn’t sure what the deal with Asmodai entailed, let alone was he ready to justify and explain it to his mentor. Asmodai had said it would trade for a little of his own energy, but Micah suspected the deal was more complicated than that. Barters for power always were.

Gaillard gave a quick, playful salute, and turned heel and began walking away as well. Cayle took one last look at Micah before following the mage.

Micah hunted for an empty cavern in which to train, and found one, occupied only by training dummies — life-size, straw-stuffed imitations of the Pale Guard with targets and sloppy faces painted on them.

Micah stood a few yards in front of one, and after checking the cavern entrance to make sure no one was watching, he braced himself to perform his first magic without alchemy. He felt power brimming over inside him and he had been itching to try to ease the overflow.

He focused on the energy and tried to direct it in a way that felt natural, and then strained so that it was unnatural, and then made small noises to himself and threw his hands out in various, exaggerated gestures. He tried envisioning the energy transfer from his chest to his hands, but it stayed in place, thrumming inside of him like a dam ready to burst.

“How is this normally done…?” he muttered to himself, rubbing his throbbing shoulder.

He imitated the first time he had seen Gaillard use destructive magic, forming a cone with his hand and holding it up to his mouth. He blew into it, attempting to call fire forth. Nothing happened, and he felt foolish.

He paused and took a breath.

By Tyr’s mangled hand, boy, said Asmodai, you couldn’t swat flies off an ass if they had their wings clipped.

Micah scowled.

I’ve given you everything you need, and you’re still going to be useless to all these people you’re so giddy about saving, the spirit wheedled.

“Shut up,” Micah muttered.

Look, it said, you have eitr now, but you have no magicepts formed. All those alchemical sigils did the work for you.

Micah quashed the energy temporarily, and snapped, “Can you shut up? I already have enough thoughts without you in my head.”

The spirit quieted, but its words rang true.

Micah changed tactics, attempting a magicept that mimicked an alchemical sigil. The explosive sigil he had used with the ifrit had a simpler form that embodied flame alone, and Micah had spent some time working on it in the clandestine lab.

He recalled what it had felt like to use the fire sigil, feeling the reacting molecules as their temperature raised and then burst into flame, and he tried to recreate the feeling with his newborn energy.

A gout of flame burst from his throat in a fan, much smaller than Gaillard’s had been, but the dummy caught alight. The smell of burning straw reached Micah’s nose, and he grinned at the blackened dummy, feeling powerful.

Finally.