And Undo The Damage - Part 1
Aeon was born in the kingdom’s capital with a keen, curious mind and only the barest hint of magic. His family had no hope of Aeon becoming a great mage, and so when the time came they decided to forgo teaching Aeon traditional magical arts, instead sending him to study under the great thinkers of the court using his father’s connections as a government official.
Aeon grew up on the words of great philosophers, studying mathematics and language and history, so that he might one day as great an advisor to the king as his teachers.
The summer Aeon turned fifteen, the court magician surprised everyone by announcing his intention to take on an apprentice, and that the apprentice would arrive at the capital that coming winter. The court magician was something of a recluse and had never before been one for dealing with people, especially young people, and so whispers immediately began to circulate that the court magician was ill and wanted to pass on his knowledge before his death, while others believed that the apprentice was a secret love child of his, conceived many years ago but no longer able to be kept hidden because of their immense magical talent.
For his part, the court magician paid no mind to the gossip and refused to even acknowledge the rumors’ existences, and Aeon refused to make a judgment on the matter in his own mind without further information.
The days grew shorter and the nights grew longer, and Aeon spent most of his time in the library, reading in front of the fire. Aeon was doing just that and studying some rather complex alchemical theories when the bells started to ring, summoning people to the Council Chamber for an unscheduled meeting. It must have been important for the king to call his advisors so unexpectedly. Aeon rose swiftly, carefully setting his book down, and ran as fast as he could down the corridors to the Council Chamber - he didn’t want to be late and miss anything.
The king sat at the head of the chamber, his advisors in chairs on either side of him in lines down the room. Aeon slipped in and tried to compose himself, out of breath as he was from his impromptu run. Aeon stood towards the back with the other apprentices, assistants, scribes and assorted people not important enough to be one of the king’s advisors themselves. The king raised his hand for silence, and the court magician stepped forward.
“My King,” The court magician said. He was old, his hair and beard graying, but still possessed a great deal of life and power. Truth be told, Aeon had always been a little afraid of him and had avoided him at all costs. “I present to you and your advisors my apprentice, who will learn from me to be a proper mage and, in time, to be a good advisor to you and your family. Malachite, step forward,”
There was a wave a quiet whispers from the people filling the room. No one had expected the court magician’s apprentice to arrive so suddenly, they had thought that there would be some kind of message or warning giving them a chance to prepare. But that was just like the court magician, they said, to keep things secret until the last moment and catch people off guard in the process. Out of the corner of his eye, Aeon saw a group of chamber maids take off at a sprint to make a room ready for the newcomer.
Aeon’s sympathy for the maids was cut short by the magician’s apprentice coming forward. He was dressed in a dark, heavy cloak, which meant that he hadn’t been in the castle long and had probably come straight to see the king. Aeon thought he could see faint traces of rapidly melting snow on the cloak. He removed his hood, revealing curly black hair and a handsome face. Aeon was surprised to see that he was so close to Aeon’s own age and not younger - most apprentices, especially the ones who studied magic, began their studies at much younger than 15 years.
“My King, it is an honor,” Malachite said, hand over his heart and head bowed in respect.
The king nodded and gave Malachite a smile. “I have heard promising things about you, young magician. Let’s hope they weren’t exaggerated, hm?”
Malachite’s lips quirked into a smile in response.
“I’m afraid we don’t have many people here your age,” the king said. “Though there is one…Aeon! Come here!”
Aeon froze up in surprise at being called on for a moment before pushing forward.
“My King?” Aeon asked hesitantly.
The king smiled at him. “Ah, Aeon, there you are. Malachite, this is Aeon. He’s currently studying under some of my advisors. Maybe the two of you will be friends. It’s not just formal learning that’s important to young people like you, having friends and people your own age around is what makes the hard work worth it!”
Aeon nodded and tentatively held out his hand for Malachite to shake. Malachite took it, and his hand was warm in Aeon’s despite the fact that he’d been outside in the cold and snow not that long ago. Malachite looked at Aeon curiously for a moment before he nodded.
“I think we’ll get along,”
Aeon found himself suddenly with company in the library, when Malachite’s magical studies had finished for the day. Malachite was never intrusive with his being there, just a quiet, steady presence. Malachite spent most of his time in the library researching magic.
Neither of them felt much like studying that night, however, and they found themselves on opposite sides of a chess board that they had found tucked away in one of the library’s various corners.
“I must confess, I’ve never been much good at this game,” Malachite said as they set up the pieces, giving Aeon a self-deprecating smile.
“Well, that’s just because you haven’t had anyone to play against. That tiny village of yours couldn’t have provided you with very many worthy opponents,” Aeon said.
“Ah, not exactly,” Malachite admitted. “But if I had wanted to play Tablero down at the tavern, there would have been no shortage of challengers for me to face,”
Aeon laughed. “And that is a game I must confess that I have little skill at!”
“Then we shall make a deal. You teach me chess, and I will teach you to win at Tablero,” Malachite said, offering his hand over the chess board.
“You have yourself a deal,” Aeon said as solemnly as he could while he was grinning, and shook Malachite’s hand. “Now, the first move is mine,”
“Tell me, why is it that you never studied magic?” Malachite asked one night over the chess board, giving Aeon that same curious look that he’d given him when they’d first met.
“I don’t have the ability, sadly. Before I was born, my parents had hoped…but the magic passed me by, and I like the path I’ve been set on. Alchemy is fascinating, so it is no great loss to me to have never learned magic, and to tell the truth I don’t envy you. Having to work with the court magician would give me nightmares,” Aeon said with a slight laugh.
Malachite looked confused. “But that’s not true at all. You have the ability. It’s weak, and you probably wouldn’t be able to do much more than the basics, but it’s there. I felt it when I shook your hand my first night here,”
“Oh,” Aeon said, barely above a whisper. He wasn’t sure what he felt about that. Malachite had no reason to lie to him about something so trivial, but… “My parents never said anything,”
Malachite stared at Aeon for a long moment, his brown eyes never leaving Aeon’s face. He stood abruptly, reaching down to knock his king over in surrender in the same movement.
“Stand up,” he said, and when Aeon didn’t move he repeated the order.
Aeon stood, confused. What was Malachite thinking?
Malachite took Aeon’s hands in his and led him over to a nearby chaise.
“Mal, what…”
“Sssh, just stand there, alright?” Malachite said. “Now close your eyes,”
Aeon did, his breath shallow. He heard Malachite take a breath of his own, and then there was a flood of sensation running through Aeon’s skin, starting at where his hands were entwined with Malachite’s and spreading outward through the rest of his body.
Aeon gasped at the tingling, sparking feeling running through his body, and his eyes flew open to meet Malachite’s steady gaze.
“Mal…?”
Malachite grinned. “Can you feel it, Aeon? That’s your magic, I’m just illuminating the pathways,”
“Really? That’s…” Aeon muttered, looking down at their joined hands. It was amazing. He felt powerful, like pure lightning was flowing through his veins.
“You have the ability, no matter what someone else may have told you, and it’s a shame that they let your potential rot away like they have. With your intelligence, you could have made a good magician, maybe even a great one, even if you were never meant to be particularly strong. You would have found a way,” Malachite said, voice firm. He believed every word he said.
Aeon felt the illuminating power of Malachite’s magic withdraw slowly, probably so as to not send Aeon into shock. When it was completely gone, Aeon could still feel a faint sense of his own magic. Aeon felt dizzy, like the world was spinning in circles and the only thing keeping him steady was Malachite.
He liked the path that he’d taken, he liked learning under the king’s advisors, but that had never stopped the wondering about what it might have been like if he’d been born with magic. And now he did have magic, weak and undeveloped though it was, and Aeon didn’t know what to do. He sat down heavily on the chaise, briefly thankful that Malachite had had the foresight to pull his little experiment there.
“If you’d like…I could teach you,” Malachite offered.
Aeon looked up. “Yes. Yes, I would like that. Very much,”
Malachite grinned brightly and squeezed Aeon’s hands, which he still held firmly but gently in his own. The tingling after effects hadn’t quite faded away.
“Then I will have to come up with a good first lesson, won’t I?”
Aeon and Malachite were hidden away in the northeast tower, in an unused area where Malachite could teach Aeon the basics of magic undiscovered and uninterrupted. It was chilly, and Aeon shivered against the cold. Aeon sat across from Malachite on the floor. They’d been going over basic magical theory until now at Aeon’s insistence, but Malachite was adamant that they should move on to the more practical aspects now.
“Take a deep breath and clear your mind,” Malachite said.
Aeon did his best, but it was hard. His mind had always worked in overtime, and quieting it was a task he wasn’t sure he was capable of.
“Hold out your hands,” Malachite said. “and picture a flame floating above your palm,”
Aeon closed his eyes, seeing the fire in his mind.
“Focus only on that, block everything but the flame from your mind. Feel the warmth of it brushing your skin,”
Malachite’s voice was low and firm and Aeon found it hard to concentrate on anything other than Malachite’s words.
“Take the heat from inside your body and force it out through your hand. Take the potential, the energy, take everything make it ignite in your hands,” Malachite urged.
Aeon gasped, feeling a tug somewhere deep within him, and when he opened his eyes there was a very small flame dancing merrily above his cupped hands.
Aeon looked between it and Malachite in awe. Malachite grinned at him proudly.
“I knew you could do it,” he said. “It took me a lot longer than that to first summon a flame. How dare they try to keep this from you?”
Aeon smiled at Malachite’s indignation, but was hit by a sudden wave of tiredness. The flame dissipated with barely a flicker, and Aeon let out a jaw cracking yawn. Malachite chuckled and stood, brushing dust from his clothing.
“Magic takes up a great deal of your energy. Eventually it doesn’t affect you so much, but when you’re first beginning…” Malachite offered his hand to Aeon. “Let’s take you to your room, so that you can rest and rebuild your strength,”
Aeon smiled weakly and took Malachite’s hand. Unfortunately, Aeon’s feet weren’t quite listening properly, or maybe Malachite had miscalculated the strength needed to pull Aeon up, because Aeon stumbled straight into Malachite. Malachite held him steady for what seemed like a very long moment to Aeon’s drained mind, and Aeon idly wondered what it was that Malachite had done in his village before coming to the capital to give him such strong arms. But the next instant after that thought, Malachite had put a respectable distance between them.
He walked Aeon to his rooms, hovering close but not too close, just in case Aeon stumbled or fainted from the exertion. Aeon was glad to have have him by his side, and trusted that Malachite would catch him if he fell.
“Good night, Aeon. You did incredibly,” Malachite said, once they reached Aeon’s door.
“Good night, Mal. And thank you. It was…amazing, even if it did leave me nearly too drained to function properly,”
“Just be careful now not to burn anything, or my master will have my head,” Malachite said.
Aeon couldn’t hold back a yawn. “Of course. I wouldn’t want to get you in trouble,”
And then Malachite left, and Aeon fell into his bed gratefully. It had never seemed so comfortable as at that moment. Aeon fell asleep almost immediately.
The Spring Festival was a grand affair held every year to say goodbye to the cold, long nights of winter and welcome the new life that came with the melting of the snow. There were flowers everywhere, of every size and color that could be found. Everyone gathered together outside. Merchants decorated their booths in bright colors, street performers showed off their skills, and children ran and yelled through the crowds because they could, no longer kept cooped up inside as they had been during the winter. Couples who were courting walked hand in hand, enjoying the sights under the watchful eyes of their chaperones and secretly trying to find ways to slip past the constant supervision and spend precious moments alone.
Aeon liked the Spring Festival, the joy was infectious and the opportunity for socializing in the warm outdoors after months of cold was always welcome.
“Are you enjoying yourself?” someone asked behind Aeon. Aeon turned around.
“Mal! You made it!” Aeon said, grinning wide. “I was afraid the court magician would have you studying instead of enjoying the festivities,”
Malachite simply pointed over the crowd. Aeon followed the path with his eyes, and couldn’t help the laugh that was startled out of him. The court magician was currently surrounded by children, all of them climbing and tugging at him and demanding that he show them some magic tricks, pretty please? And the best part was that he didn’t look upset by it at all, or at least not truly upset, but he was putting on a show of irritation.
“He loves the festival, no matter what he may say to the contrary. He wouldn’t keep me locked inside the castle practicing when there is food to eat, songs to hear, and good company to be had,” Malachite said.
“Well then, now that you’re here I have to take you to the best food stand, and then we’ll have just enough time to catch the play at midday!” Aeon said excitedly.
“What are you studying now?” Malachite asked curiously, peering over Aeon’s shoulder to look at the book Aeon was reading.
“Oh, it’s just an old alchemical theory about immortality. It’s all wrong, of course, but it laid down some very solid ground work for future theories in medicine and other areas, so it’s still mildly useful,” Aeon said distractedly.
“Immortality? Really?” Malachite asked, intrigued.
Aeon looked up, frowning. “Yes, it’s the subject of a lot of study, and that’s lead to a lot of discoveries of other, more important things,”
“Are you saying you don’t want to live forever?” Malachite asked, expression dubious.
“Well, what would be the point?” Aeon asked. “I think I’d go mad with boredom after a while. Forever is a very long time, Mal,”
Malachite shrugged, but didn’t look convinced by Aeon’s reasoning.
Aeon looked around the ball room, trying to take in every sight he could. This was the first time Aeon was attending one of the King's grand parties as a full, trusted adviser. Aeon had grown up among the court, but he'd only ever seen these parties from the fringes, looking in as a child in awe of all the fancy clothes and how special everything seemed.
But Aeon wasn't the only one who was being suddenly thrust into the life of a full adviser after years and years of study, and with that thought Aeon's attempts at seeing everything became a search for his friend. Malachite had probably never been to something like this in his life since Aeon doubted very much that parties like this happened out in the small country village that Malachite had lived in years ago.
Aeon's searching found Malachite hiding in one of the more inconspicuous corners, watching everyone intensely. He didn't look like he was exactly having fun, though, and that wasn't something that Aeon could let happen.
Aeon made his way through the crowd, weaving through all the different dancing people to get across the room.
"Aren’t you enjoying yourself?" Aeon asked, leaning on the wall next to Malachite.
Malachite shrugged. "Well, I don't want to kill everyone here. But it's close. This kind of decadence isn’t really what I’m comfortable with,"
"We need more alcohol, then, to take your mind off it. And for what it’s worth, I think you fit in just fine with this ‘decadent’ crowd," Aeon said, laughing and tugging at the soft, high-quality fabric of Malachite’s sleeve.
So they both had another mead, and by that point Aeon - who had always been a lightweight when it came to alcohol - was well and truly tipsy.
“We should go dance,” Aeon said. “This is a celebration for us, the two of us have worked far too hard over the years and should be dancing, not hiding in a corner!”
Malachite grabbed Aeon’s hand and dragged him towards the area where everyone was dancing. They nearly knocked the librarian’s assistant into her suitor, trying to get through the crowd, and their chaperone gave Malachite a dirty look. Malachite didn’t apologize.
“Mal! Mal, what…everyone’s staring!” Aeon said. Malachite ignored his protests, shifting their positions into proper dancing form.
“You wanted to dance. We’re dancing,” Malachite said. Aeon snickered and nodded, too full of good humor and good liquor to really want to protest and the two of them started moving to the music being played.
Aeon could feel the warmth from Malachite where they touched, and the tingling that Aeon knew came from Malachite’s latent magic. But Aeon couldn’t tell if the dizziness he was feeling was from the drink, or the dancing, or the way Malachite was looking at him. Malachite’s eyes were darker than usual, and he looked like he wanted something more than just keeping a respectable distance. Malachite had a hand on Aeon’s waist and his fingers entwined with Aeon’s.
They danced for a good portion of the night, and then because Aeon was still tipsy Malachite led Aeon back to his rooms. They stopped outside Aeon’s door, and Aeon smiled drunkenly at Malachite.
“I’m glad you danced with me, I know you probably didn’t really want to,” Aeon said.
Malachite shook his head. “Why wouldn’t I want to dance with you?”
“Good night, Mal,” Aeon said. For just a moment, it seemed like Malachite was going to do away with respectability. And in that moment, drunk and happy, Aeon would have welcomed it.
“Come find me tomorrow if your hangover isn’t too bad,” Malachite said.
Malachite touched Aeon’s cheek lightly. He licked his lips, expression nervous but intent.
“I would have leave to court you, if you’ll allow it,” he said, perfectly formal and respectable.
“Mal…” Aeon said, confused and a little breathless from the way Malachite was looking at him. He’d thought this might happen eventually, especially after they’d danced together at the ball a few weeks ago, but he’d put it firmly out of his mind, except in the darkest, loneliest hours of the night, hoping that he was wrong.
He wanted it, wanted very much for Malachite to try to win him over, but…
Malachite must have seen it on his face, because he dropped his hand and pulled away. His expression was instantly closed off, the hope and desire gone in a fraction of a second only to be replaced by a bland mask.
“Forgive me, I hope my forwardness did not offend. Think no more of it,” Malachite said and walked away.
Aeon closed his eyes and let his head fall back against the wall.
Things were awkward after that. Malachite was avoiding him, burying himself in his magical research and focusing on the idea he’d had for a power amplifier. And Aeon couldn’t even blame him for it, for trying to avoid the awkwardness, but he missed Malachite. He’d turned Malachite away because he’d wanted to keep him around, and it looked like his plan had backfired spectacularly.
Everyone in the castle was starting to notice that the two brightest up and coming stars of the court were no longer ever seen together. Aeon tried to put on a brave face, but he still heard the chamber maids whispering to each other about how sad it was, and didn’t poor Aeon look heartbroken? Why, it simply must have been something terrible to drive a wedge between such good friends!
And even worse were the older maids, who took the opportunity to give each other significant looks over the heads of the younger maids like they thought they knew more about the situation than those naïve, younger girls who knew nothing about matters of the heart.
Aeon was the one who broke down and went looking for Malachite. He found him in the stables, brushing his horse. Malachite didn’t look up when Aeon entered, and so Aeon just stood there awkwardly for a moment before he realized that Malachite wasn’t going to acknowledge him.
“Mal, will you please talk to me?” Aeon asked.
“I didn’t think there was anything more to say,” Malachite said.
“I don’t want to lose you. And if we…started courting, things wouldn’t be the same anymore. No more late night chess games and talks, no sneaking off to the tavern to play Tablero, no secret magic lessons, constant chaperones watching our every move. I couldn’t deal with that, I’m sorry,” Aeon said, hoping desperately that Malachite would listen to him and forgive him.
Malachite finally looked at him. “I understand,”
“Do you forgive me?” Aeon asked.
“Maybe eventually,” Malachite said.
Aeon felt relieved. It wasn’t a yes, but it wasn’t a no, either, and he had hope.
Malachite came back to the library study that night.
“Mal!” Aeon said happily.
“Set up the chess board,” Malachite said, and Aeon nodded, abandoning his research for the night.
Things didn’t go exactly back to normal after that, but it was close enough. Malachite was still more distant than he had been, but Aeon understood. And Malachite had apparently made some sort of breakthrough in his research, which meant he would have had less time for Aeon anyway.
Aeon had taken to spending some time in the stables, when he wasn’t working or with Malachite, because the horses liked the attention and the stable hand liked to have someone to talk to.
The stable hand’s favorite topic of discussion was the girl he wanted to court. She was a dancer and tough as nails, and he was smitten with her. He hadn’t worked up the courage to ask her, yet, but he thought that her older brother would agree to chaperone them if she said yes. Aeon did his best to be encouraging, because someone should be lucky in love, even if it wasn’t him.
The stable hand was in the middle of telling a story his beloved told him, and the two of them were nearly hysterical with laughter.
“Aeon,” said a voice by the entrance. Aeon and the stable hand both looked over, trying to rein in their laughter.
Aeon’s good mood dissipated quickly when he saw that it was Malachite standing there, arms crossed and expression thunderous.
“The Head Cook is looking for you,” Malachite said.
“Right, of course. I’ll see you later, then,” Aeon said to the stable hand.
Aeon saw Malachite glare at the stable hand as they left, but Malachite didn’t say anything, letting his obvious anger simmer.
“Neither of us are children, Mal, so don’t act like one,” Aeon hissed. He wasn’t going to let Malachite retreat into silence and anger again.
Malachite shot Aeon a sharp glare but didn’t retort. Aeon decided that saying anything more would probably just make things worse.
The stable hand left the castle rather abruptly that night, claiming an ill family member. Aeon didn’t even get to say goodbye, which was made all the worse by the rumors spreading through the ranks of the maids. Apparently one of them claimed to have seen the stable hand leaving, his face disfigured almost beyond recognition.
“Well the only thing that could have done that so quickly but be healed is magic,” one of the maids whispered, giving her companion a significant look. The other maid nodded.
“I wonder what made Master Malachite so angry?” she asked idly.
Aeon turned and fled. He really didn’t want to hear anymore. Malachite hadn’t actually done that to the stable hand, Aeon thought. But then Aeon remembered how angry Malachite had been, and doubt began to creep in.
All the advisors were gathered together in the meeting chamber, looking at each other nervously. No one knew what the meeting was about, but the King had seemed unusually troubled lately and that could not mean anything good.
“I have been thinking,” the King said from his spot at the head of the table. Malachite was seated at his left, and Aeon at his right. They had worked hard for many years to earn those positions. “This country is too divided,”
“Divided, my King?” One of the lesser advisors asked.
“Yes, divided. Between Magic and Alchemy, tradition and progress, two very different ways of thinking about the world,” the King said, and Aeon had no idea what to say to that.
It was true that Magic and Alchemy were frequently incompatible, part of the reason Aeon had so much trouble mastering the magical techniques that Malachite taught him was that he couldn’t turn off the part of his mind that wondered the ‘how’ and ‘why’s and tried to pick apart the situation. Magic was about wanting something and forcing the world to conform, Alchemy was about using the rules of the world to get what you wanted. Combining the two was extremely difficult, but not impossible.
“And…what do you plan to do about it, my King?” Aeon asked eventually.
“I haven’t decided yet,” the King said thoughtfully. “but I’ll think of something,”
The meeting went on as a normal advisory session, and Aeon had almost forgotten about the strangeness in the beginning until the King asked him to stay behind as everyone else was leaving. Malachite frowned in confusion, hovering. They were supposed to continue their latest chess match after the meeting had ended. Aeon shrugged helplessly and waved him off.
“I wanted to ask your opinion in private, where it wouldn’t be…unduly influenced,” the King said, after Malachite had left.
“My King?” Aeon asked.
“If I was to devote the kingdom to only one path, which would you choose?” the King asked.
Aeon’s eyes widened. The King wanted pick just one path for the entire kingdom to follow? That would change everything. The entire power structure would shift, and what would happen to the citizens who had previously been on the other path?
“Why are you asking me? I can’t pick!” Aeon protested. “The new Court Magician is my best friend, and I’ve studied Alchemy my entire life, I -“
“That’s why it has to be you,” the King said gently. “You’re in the unique position of having been exposed to both paths,”
Aeon sighed, and thought. Giving the Kingdom completely over to Magic would mean the abandonment of his beloved Alchemy. And not only that…Malachite would be in a position of immense power, even more so than he already was.
And Aeon couldn’t help but remember the awe and satisfaction on Malachite’s face as he completed the gem for his gauntlet that would increase his power, or the anger that had been in him when he’s spoken of Aeon’s ‘wasted potential’, one of his favorite ranting topics. The jewel was a sickly, jealous green color, reflecting Malachite’s soul, and Aeon couldn’t help but remember the rumors about the stable hand who’d once been his friend.
“Alchemy, my King. That is my choice,” Aeon said eventually, feeling sick to his stomach.
But his choice was for the best, wasn’t it?
“Don’t worry yourself,” the King said, obviously seeing Aeon’s distress. “it was only a theoretical question,”
Aeon had never seen Malachite this furious before. The King’s announcement had snapped something within Malachite, he practically glowed with anger, and it was all directed at Aeon.
“How could you?” Malachite asked. “You betrayed me!”
Aeon shook his head frantically, “No! The king simply asked my opinion on a theory, I had no idea he was going to do it, I swear it,”
“Of course not, not pure, perfect Aeon! You would never do something so underhanded and hurtful,” Malachite said scornfully.
“Mal, listen to me-“
“Don’t call me that!” Malachite yelled, and it felt like the room shook with the force of it.
The stone on Malachite’s gauntlet gave off a bright flash of light and suddenly Aeon was being pulled forward by the invisible force of Malachite’s magic. His feet scrambled against the ground, trying to stop himself from moving, but they couldn’t find purchase and Malachite grabbed him as soon as Aeon was in his range. Aeon could feel tremors of fear running down his spine.
“Do you know what the punishment is for traitors?” Malachite hissed, staring Aeon in the eyes.
And that’s when Aeon knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that Malachite meant to hurt him, horribly and to the very core of his being, and that he wouldn’t hesitate to kill Aeon. There was no way that Aeon could reason with him now.
“Malachite, I’m so sorry,” Aeon said, and he twisted painfully out of Malachite’s grip. He threw one of the packets of smoke producing powder that he had luckily had in his pocket, causing Malachite to start coughing and be blinded just long enough by the thick smoke that Aeon could escape.
He ran as fast as he could, trying to get to his room before Malachite could catch him. He needed to get to the lodestone ring. He had hoped that he would never have to use it against Malachite. Its purpose had been for peace. But there was no other choice. The lodestone ring was the only thing strong enough to stand against the force of Malachite and his bejeweled gauntlet, and it was the only hope Aeon had of surviving the wrath of his once friend.
Lodestone was a powerful mineral and especially useful in Alchemy. It had the power to draw things to it, to find them and bind them. It was something every good Alchemist had in their supplies because it could be used for so many different things.
Aeon had used the last of his to create the ring he now sought. It had been originally designed to help with healing, and drawing illnesses out of a person, but Aeon had quickly discovered that it was far too powerful to use except for in the most dire of circumstances without harsh, unintended consequences.
But almost anything could be used as a weapon, and Aeon knew that if he could just get to the ring he could use it to stop Malachite. Aeon ran, feet barely touching the ground before pushing off again. He could hear Malachite behind him, having dispersed the smoke and able to breathe and see again.
There were crashes and curses getting closer and closer, echoing against the stone walls, and Aeon ran up the stairs. He could see chamber maids and other hapless bystanders dashing into side rooms and such to get out of his way. They obviously heard the commotion the two advisors were making, and they were frightened by it. As they should be.
Aeon’s room was just at the end of the hall, he was so close. Suddenly Aeon’s feet tangled underneath him like he’d been tripped, sending him flying to the floor. As Aeon scrambled to get upright and resume his running, Malachite finally caught up to him.
He loomed over Aeon. “Did you honestly think I wouldn’t catch you? You were never any good at this kind of game,”
He reached down to grab Aeon, going for the throat, and Aeon panicked. He lashed out, and managed to knock Malachite off balance enough that the chase could start again.
He nearly slammed the door to his room on Malachite’s fingers, but the magician was just a second too slow, and Aeon slid the lock into place to buy more time. He had to get to his desk, and only had a few seconds before Malachite tore through the door’s protections.
Aeon flung open his desk drawer, tossing aside papers and quills and containers of things for his alchemy. Where was the ring? He was sure it was in this drawer…wasn’t it? Or was it the second...Aeon cursed himself for being so disorganized.
Aeon could hear the door starting to give way under Malachite’s will, and he opened the second drawer, praying that the ring would be in there. If it wasn’t, Aeon didn’t have any hope. There wouldn’t be any time left for another search, and Malachite would probably destroy him.
Aeon breathed a sigh of relief when he caught sight of the pink stone he was looking for. But his relief was short lived, because the door opened with a soul-sickening bang. Malachite stood in the entryway, triumphant.
“There’s nowhere else to run, you’re trapped,” Malachite said. He walked forward over the threshold, and the door shut behind him at a flick of his wrist.
Aeon shook his head and clenched the ring in his hand. “I’m not. I’m sorry,”
Aeon ducked and dodged blasts of magic that Malachite was sending at him. He slid the ring onto a finger and held that hand out. Malachite’s magic seemed drawn to it, and it was absorbed helplessly. It acted almost as a shield, protecting Aeon from Malachite’s wrath.
Malachite’s face twisted in anger that Aeon had managed to avoid being hurt. Aeon concentrated and twisted his hand. The energy produced from the motion of the ring knocked Malachite back against the wall.
The two of them fought, throwing magic at each other and totally devastating Aeon’s rooms. Eventually, the two of them exhausted and breathing heavily, bodies weak from the exertion of a magical battle, were forced into a stalemate. Their magic pushed against each other, trying to force the other into submission.
Malachite glared. “You can’t stop my revenge! Even if it takes thousands of years, thousands of lifetimes, I will destroy you and you’ll know every second of it!” he roared, and Aeon felt the familiar tingle of Malachite’s magic affecting him.
Aeon felt fear grip his heart, even more intensely than he had before. Aeon had no idea what that spell was going to end up doing to him, it had been unfocused and full of rage, but those were frequently the most powerful of curses.
“I never meant to hurt you, if you would just look into your heart-!”
There was a burst of power from the lodestone ring. It overpowered Malachite’s magic, sending the magician flying head first into the stone wall with a loud thud. Malachite crumbled limply to the ground, unconscious. Aeon stumbled forward to Malachite’s prone form and dropped to his knees. His eyes were beginning to water, but Aeon couldn’t tell if that was from the immense pain he was in or from the betrayal of his best friend.
“I’m sorry, Mal. But you weren’t ready for the kind of power the King would have given you, and you’re not ready for the power of this gauntlet,” Aeon whispered and he took Malachite’s hand and removed the gauntlet. He had to work quickly, who knew when Malachite would awaken?
Once Aeon had the gauntlet off and in his hands, he hesitated. Without the gauntlet, Malachite was much less powerful, maybe it would be safe to…No. He could still feel Malachite’s last spell underneath his skin. It was an unpleasant sensation, like slime or spiders or something creeping slowly through him.
Aeon desperately wished there was a way to disperse it, or to make it go away like scratching an itch, but Aeon didn’t have the skill to do it himself, and he knew, just from the feeling of the spell, that there would be no way that Malachite would reverse it for him.
And that meant that Aeon had to leave, before Malachite woke up, and disappear. Without Aeon’s presence as a reminder, and without the temptation of the gauntlet’s power, maybe Malachite would calm down and return to normal.
Aeon leaned forward and kissed Malachite’s cheek briefly before getting up and grabbing his cloak and the few supplies he could gather quickly. He had to get as far away as possible before Malachite awoke and started tracking him.
He escaped into the woods and covered his tracks as well as he could, but it wasn’t that long before his injuries from the fight caught up with him. The lodestone ring wasn’t any help healing him or getting rid of the curse Malachite had laid on him. Aeon’s vision was beginning to darken around the edges, which meant that he had to act quickly.
If Aeon was going to pass out or worse from his injuries, he had to make plans to keep the gauntlet safe, because there was no way that Malachite would give up looking for it.
There was a very large tree, nearly as big around as a house - or at least it seemed that way to Aeon’s exhausted mind- and very, very old, with large, gnarled roots and thick branches that protected it.
“Well, this will just have to do,” Aeon muttered to himself. It was a yew tree, and there were rowan trees around it. It was probably the best hiding place he could ever find due to the trees’ natural protective qualities, especially on such short notice.
So Aeon hid the gauntlet within the yew tree, and as he was doing it he heard the crack of twigs snapping. His heart leapt up into his throat. Had Malachite found him already, was that possible?
He closed his eyes tightly, curled up with the yew tree at his back, and prayed. Please don’t let him find me, keep me hidden, please don’t let him find me, let no magic user find me, I am secret the chant played desperately over and over in his mind.
He felt the stirrings of his own magic, aided by his lodestone ring and his proximity to Malachite’s gauntlet, responding to his panic. There was a rustling, and Aeon opened his eyes fearfully, anticipating the worst. He wouldn’t be able to fight Malachite off this time.
A rabbit hopped in to view, and Aeon let out a choked laugh. And he kept laughing until tears were streaming down his cheeks. The rabbit twitched its nose at him, and hopped over to him. Aeon felt it nudge at his hand as the darkness in his vision spread.
The next thing that Aeon knew was pain. A lot of pain. It felt like he was being ripped apart and torn in every direction at once. He was burning up until he was white hot and being flattened with a heavy hammer like a piece of metal. He tried to scream but it wouldn’t come. It was the most intense pain that Aeon had ever felt, on an entirely different plane. It felt like his very soul was being stretched and beaten and molded. Forcibly remade into something new. And it hurt.
He died under that yew tree. His soul was reincarnated and shoved into a new body. It was such a traumatic experience that the memories of his life as Aeon didn’t return until he was seven years old. Thankfully his parents in this life dismissed his talk of the king’s court as a fairy tale he had concocted in his young mind, a game of make believe. And eventually he learned to keep Aeon bottled up inside of him and not draw attention to himself.
But he couldn’t help being curious about the spell Malachite had put on him during their last confrontation, and when he had the opportunity he started reading all that he could about curses. And everything he read just gave him a sinking feeling in his stomach.
There was no way for him to break the curse that he could find, not a curse as powerful as this one. Which meant that, from the way things had gone the last time he had died, when his time came up in this life he was going to experience that all consuming pain again.
He had a small break down after that. Malachite had lost, but at what cost?
And so Aeon was reincarnated over and over again. The world changed as the years passed, Magic gave way to Aeon’s beloved reason and Science and faded from people’s memories. Aeon became adept at hiding who he was and who he had been. People didn’t take it well when a 12 year old boy corrected them about something, or spoke with knowledge he shouldn’t have, or told stories about things he could never have experienced.
He did his best to be a normal child, a normal young man, and eventually a normal adult. Old men had much more leeway, but that was a harder state to achieve than one might assume. He locked his life as Aeon away, and tried to focus on his present and not his past. It was easier to do that the more distance he had and the more lifetimes that separated him from the man that had condemned him to walking the Earth forever.
He noticed something else, too. Every time he went through the reincarnation process he felt something slip away. He wasn’t sure what it was, until the lifetime when people started giving him strange looks again, after lifetimes spent trying so hard to blend in and be normal, and avoiding him on the street.
It was his sanity.
He was losing his mind, more and more with each reincarnation. Sometimes he was able to hide it fairly well, but it was still there, taunting him. Like the phantom itch under his skin he could no longer remember the cause of.
Because along with his sanity, he lost his memories of being Aeon. He had done too well, locking them away, and the trauma of repeated reincarnations had kept the box tightly sealed.
In one life, he was a boy named Wayne, helplessly besotted with a girl who was cruel and kind by turns, who could cut him down with a single word and yet had the biggest heart of anyone he knew, and he forgot the taste of the cookies Malachite liked to snack on when they played chess.
Once, he was Solomon, known simply as ‘S’ through some combination of affection and fear, and sought solace in the warm bodies of strangers that he kept safely at arm’s length, and he forgot the feel of Malachite’s hands on his as he taught him magic.
Then, he was Spencer, a man with no home, and no family, and his madness caught up to him. He turned to alcohol to make everything stop, and he forgot the smell of spring flowers mixing with fresh cooked food.
In another life, he was Noah. He was sent to a therapist by his parents fairly young and put on medication, and he forgot Malachite’s face.
He was also Leslie, who moved to Hollywood with a screenplay about magic and kings in hand that no one wanted to read, desperate to capture something that danced at the edge of his mind. He wound up taking a job doing movie reviews for a man he hated, and who hated him. He forgot everything.
At first, when the reincarnations began, Aeon thought that Malachite was going to come after him looking for revenge. But it never happened, and as Aeon’s memories faded his guard dropped.
Then one day he was walking down the street he saw a man sitting at a table at one of the outside cafés and sipping a coffee. There wasn’t any reason for the man to have caught his interest. He was handsome, sure, with long, black curly hair that he had tied back under his hat, and smooth dark skin, but that shouldn’t have been able to stop Leslie in his tracks. He was experiencing a strange rush of conflicting emotions and he had no idea why. There was sadness, and longing, and betrayal, and affection, and fear all tangling together with confusion in a way that just made him even more scared.
The man looked up from his coffee. His eyes were hidden behind sunglasses, but Leslie could tell that he was looking around, surveying his surroundings. And for one heart-stopping moment, Leslie would have sworn that the man looked straight at him before moving on.
He could not have explained just why he felt so unsettled, or why he practically fled the area. But there was something deep inside of him that told him it wasn’t safe there anymore.
His latest reincarnation was the worst yet. It felt like he was dying for real this time. He was being pulled apart, like something had grabbed his arms and legs and started yanking until his soul finally gave way and ripped down the middle, leaving it uneven and torn around the edges. Fraying where it had once been whole.
And so a mother gave birth to twins.
Part Two. Bonus Content. Master Post.