The sky was full of clear, almost transparent clouds.
They looked soft, they seemed to be made of cotton wool. One could only imagine the peace one would feel when lying down to sleep on one of those beds.
The blue sky stretching to infinity represented total and ultimate freedom.
The dream of mankind from its humblest beginnings.
And he, Desmond, was experiencing that dream with every fiber of his being. Crossing the sea of the skies on black wings. The wind howled loudly, but, though it parted the clouds, to him it only seemed to infuse strength.
The effect it had on him was to make him fly a little, just a little, faster, higher, each time it passed through his body.
The wind didn't go against him, but pushed him forward. It helped him every step of the way.
It was his ally.
For the sea of the skies belonged to him, the only human being who could reach it by his own means. With these wings. With this power. It was incredible, the freedom he enjoyed!
And he couldn't take it any longer.
He shouted his joy. His voice rose above the clouds.
Shouting as if he had lost his mind, he did all kinds of acrobatics.
Testing his wings, so to speak.
The sky was full of clear, almost transparent clouds.
They looked soft, they seemed to be made of cotton wool. One could only imagine the peace one would feel when lying down to sleep on one of those beds.
The blue sky stretching to infinity represented total and ultimate freedom.
The dream of mankind from its humblest beginnings.
And he, Desmond, was experiencing that dream with every fiber of his being. Crossing the sea of the skies on black wings. The wind howled loudly, but, though it parted the clouds, to him it only seemed to infuse strength.
The effect it had on him was to make him fly a little, just a little, faster, higher, each time it passed through his body.
The wind didn't go against him, but pushed him forward. It helped him every step of the way.
It was his ally.
For the sea of the skies belonged to him, the only human being who could reach it by his own means. With these wings. With this power. It was incredible, the freedom he enjoyed!
And he couldn't take it any longer.
He shouted his joy. His voice rose above the clouds.
Shouting as if he had lost his mind, he did all kinds of acrobatics.
Testing his wings, so to speak.
But it's not as if he had any doubts about how maneuverable they were. They were, after all, parts of him, using them was as natural to him as moving his arms. Like breathing.
How could he be in danger, when to him this was the equivalent of what it was like for a normal human being to walk on the ground?
It was unbelievable. It was everything he had dreamed of and more.
He didn't need anything else. So, he could forget everything he had left behind, on the ground. And what had he left behind, anyway? Nothing to miss. Just pain. Sadness. A broken heart. Here he didn't have to suffer any of that.
There was none of that.
There was no one who could hurt him, and there was no one he could hurt.
Paradise, in other words.
Hell is other people. He had read that in a book once. He had to agree with the writer. The root of pain was the chain formed by people. Everything flowed from there, directly or indirectly.
Alone, no one would have anything to fear or anything to cry about.
But, in that dream of paradise, Desmond overlooked something fundamental.
That, just as a person could fall to the ground and break their neck...
What was natural didn't have to end well.
His eyes opened wide.
He could tell something was wrong before anything happened, but there was nothing he could do to stop himself from losing control, for no reason that he knew of.
So, he fell.
Spiraling, uncontrollably, through the clouds. And...
His eyes opened before he hit the ground. He found himself surrounded by white again, but not the white of the clouds, but the sterile white of the walls and floor of an infirmary. All the hospitals and infirmaries in his country were cut from the same cloth.
As if to say that a place of death should have no color. He wasn't dead, though.
The pain he felt all over his body was too sharp.
Too real. He looked back, but he felt confused, lost, and he couldn't remember the chain of events that had brought him here.
A realization penetrated his confusion as sunlight passed through the clouds.
Silence.
That meant the battle was over, and with victory on his side, for otherwise he would not have opened his eyes again.
Not in this world, anyway.
The room was empty.
Desmond crawled out of bed. With a staggering step, he went to the window to take a look. All he saw around him was devastation. Blood and corpses. He would like to say that most of them were soldiers of the Empire.
The truth was that such a thing was completely impossible to tell.
Not even their mothers would be able to recognize them in such a state.
Very few of the corpses were whole.
He had assumed, unconsciously, that he was in the infirmary of the main building. That was not true. The main building was nothing but a pile of rubble. And, no doubt, a body pit that he couldn't see from here. The biggest corpse pit that had ever been made.
Still, it wouldn't hold a quarter of the people who had lost their lives in this bloody war.
Of course, it wouldn't. It had lasted more than a decade, nearly fifteen years counting the false peace during which what they'd had was undoubtedly a cold war, and it showed no signs of ending.
It would not end so easily.
The Azure Empire was too powerful and their hatred too deep. Besides, they kept feeding Albion's hatred. With atrocities like this.
No. The Azure had started the war, but they would have to be the ones to end it.
The ruins of the main academy building and the dead scattered about stabbed him in the heart.
But it didn't distract him from what he should have been concentrating on all along. The smoking ruins of the spider. Part of him couldn't believe his eyes hadn't stopped there.
The rest knew he couldn't blame himself. He had recognized it as the Empire's war machine only after a second glance. It was even more wrecked and unrecognizable than the main building.
It was stupid.
From the silence, he knew they had won this, somehow. And that wasn't possible without taking out the spider. It was that sight, however, that made his legs tremble.
Not the pain that coursed through his body, nor the blood with which this victory had been paid for.
Desmond put a hand to his head, clenching, beset by a sudden headache.
Fragments of memories, hazy as a dream, floated through his mind. Wild and powerful like a natural disaster, he saw himself tearing the mechanical spider apart with his bare hands. Had he really been able to do something like that? Or was it just what he wanted to believe, how the story had to play out?
Desmond closed his eyes, concentrating.
More memory fragments came to him, and he brushed them with his fingertips, trying to make them form a complete picture that would help him understand what had happened to him.
However... although his memories followed a more or less coherent order, there was no sense that he could find.
His memories were full of inexplicable things that, if they followed any logic at all, it was the logic of a dream. Was it so important to separate truth from fiction? The point was that he had survived and they had won.
Even if he didn't break his head, he would end up knowing the truth from the survivors' mouths.
Desmond couldn't be the only survivor.
Although no one had been waiting by his side to see if he woke up, or guarding him with a spell. He wasn't important enough for them to focus on him. Surely there were many survivors who needed medical attention more than he did.
Among Desmond's confused and disorganized memories, with pieces still missing, were memories that didn't even belong to him.
That woman who had saved him being burned alive. Screaming.
A hallucination so vivid... because it couldn't be anything else. He didn't want to say it. But he was losing his mind, wasn't he? Becoming unable to distinguish reality and fantasy.
In the dream, or rather nightmare, he had had, he had also flown on black wings.
It could be said that reality had influenced the dream. But he didn't have such a wonderful power, and discovering it at the most crucial moment, before he died, was too convenient to be credible. The world wasn't such a sweet and simple place.
It was on the level of a miracle. And well, even if miracles did exist, he wouldn't be the one to whom they would do that favor. If only to make up for all the other shit.
Yes, he had gone crazy.
Or, rather, he'd been crazy from the beginning. Wasn't it always said that he was broken, that he was missing something? He thought he had it figured out, but he was reluctant to admit it. How bad it had been for so long.
And that somehow, he'd found a way to sink even lower.
Desmond raised his head.
He held his gaze in the mirror.
In the process, without realizing it, he held someone else's gaze. Someone had appeared behind him in the mirror. The figure of a woman he knew well, even though the sunlight blurred her. The one face he would never forget even when he fell into hell.
There was a lump in his throat. Slowly, slowly. This can't be happening, said the rational part of him.
But the rest of him, most of him, turned around like an excited dog to see her. Because he had to know. Because she could have come back in his greatest moment of need, as he had always known she would, deep down.
She was still there. Staring at him silently, as if waiting for something. And now that he could see her face clearly, there was no doubt that it was her.
I've really lost my mind. I've really lost it, he thought as his lips traced a smile. His thoughts and his feelings didn't match.
"It's you," he said, taking a staggering step forward. His voice was as weak as his body, "It is you, isn't it? I knew you wouldn't leave me. I always knew you were alive."
His eyes were filled with tears. He couldn't believe this was happening, but to deny the reality in front of his eyes would be just as irrational. He took another step forward. If he could touch her, feel her, then he would be sure.
Or see her smile. Smiling like that day. That would be enough for him.
"I've been waiting my whole life... every second." He stretched out a hand, walking slowly and awkwardly, like a child learning to walk for the first time. "And now you're here. All my efforts rewarded. "
She moved.
Not towards him. She turned and disappeared down the corridor.
"Wait. Wait, come back here!"
He broke into a run in such a hurry that he tripped over his feet, fell forward, had to grab onto a corner of the doorway to keep from falling headlong to the floor.
He glanced down the corridor and....
There was nothing. No one. But it was too soon to give up. He could still hear her footsteps.
He was there.
It had to be real, he had to be being rewarded, after so much suffering he deserved it, his one wish had been fulfilled, now, now, now, now, it had to be true, true, true, how could it be a lie?
As he rounded the corner, he collided head on with someone. HE could NOT keep his balance and fell backwards on his ass.
For a moment, he let his imagination run wild.
Because it was clear at first glance that he had bumped into a woman. But the clothes were completely different, and her face bore not the slightest resemblance to that of his savior.
She was a nurse, an ordinary being, whereas she had been like an angel.
So beautiful that she didn't incite sexual feelings, but the admiration one might feel for a work of art.
At least, that was how she lived in his memory.
"What are you doing out of bed? You're not yet... "
"Have you seen a woman?"
"What?"
"She just got out of here. She's taller than me and .... and divine." He stopped suddenly, his mouth dry, licked his lips. He felt like a stupid child. Or innocent, it was practically the same thing. "She's... She's..."
The nurse was looking at him with pity. Desmond stood up again, grimacing.
He could take a lot of things. He could endure the worst pain imaginable, if necessary, and he could put himself on the brink of death every day for the sake of his dream. But someone's pity, that was too much.
Don't look at me with those eyes. You have no right to.
"Whatever," he said half-heartedly. "If you'd seen her, I wouldn't have had to tell you anything."
Yes. Perhaps he had twisted his impression of her over the years, and thanks to the circumstances of their first and last meeting, but he didn't believe it.
He believed that anyone would feel the same way he did when he saw her for the first time.
And why was that?
Rationally speaking, she was special only to him, for she had not only brought him out of a war zone, she had healed him after a metal rod had pierced his stomach, tearing his insides apart. Since when healing wizards were capable of such a thing?
So, what are you saying? Tell me what you mean by that.
Desmond pressed his lips together in a thin line, mute. He had no words with which to express himself. But the conviction within his heart didn't waver, and that was what mattered.
She was someone special. Someone to be admired.
And she hadn't been here. He had seen what he had desperately wanted to see, a sweet mirage, nothing more. As a result, he could no longer trust his own senses. In this state, how would he do his job as a soldier?
Hell, how would he function even if he gave up everything and lived a normal life?
One could only hope that this was temporary.
For the wounds, for the shock of this day. For whatever it was. But that it would pass.
His eyes were filled with tears. He couldn't believe this was happening, but to deny the reality in front of his eyes would be just as irrational. He took another step forward. If he could touch her, feel her, then he would be sure.
Or see her smile. Smiling like that day. That would be enough for him.
-I've been waiting my whole life... every second. -He stretched out a hand, walking slowly and awkwardly, like a child learning to walk for the first time. And now you're here. All my efforts rewarded."
She moved.
Not towards him. She turned and disappeared down the corridor.
"Wait. Wait, come back here!"
He broke into a run in such a hurry that he tripped over his feet, fell forward, had to grab onto a corner of the doorway to keep from falling headlong to the floor.
He glanced down the corridor and....
There was nothing. No one. But it was too soon to give up. He could still hear her footsteps.
He was there.
It had to be real, he had to be being rewarded, after so much suffering he deserved it, his one wish had been fulfilled, now, now, now, now, it had to be true, true, true, how could it be a lie?
As he rounded the corner, he collided head on with someone. HE could NOT keep his balance and fell backwards on his ass.
For a moment, he let his imagination run wild.
Because it was clear at first glance that he had bumped into a woman. But the clothes were completely different, and her face bore not the slightest resemblance to that of his savior.
She was a nurse, an ordinary being, whereas she had been like an angel.
So beautiful that she didn't incite sexual feelings, but the admiration one might feel for a work of art.
At least, that was how she lived in his memory.
"What are you doing out of bed? You're not yet..."
"Have you seen a woman?"
"What?"
"She just got out of here. She's taller than me and .... and divine." He stopped suddenly, his mouth dry, licked his lips. He felt like a stupid child. Or innocent, it was practically the same thing. "She's... She's..."
The nurse was looking at him with pity. Desmond stood up again, grimacing.
He could take a lot of things. He could endure the worst pain imaginable, if necessary, and he could put himself on the brink of death every day for the sake of his dream. But someone's pity, that was too much.
Don't look at me with those eyes. You have no right to.
"Whatever," he said half-heartedly. "If you'd seen her, I wouldn't have had to tell you anything."
Yes. Perhaps he had twisted his impression of her over the years, and thanks to the circumstances of their first and last meeting, but he didn't believe it.
He believed that anyone would feel the same way he did when he saw her for the first time.
And why was that?
Rationally speaking, she was special only to him, for she had not only brought him out of a war zone, she had healed him after a metal rod had pierced his stomach, tearing his insides apart. Since when healing wizards were capable of such a thing?
So, what are you saying? Tell me what you mean by that.
Desmond pressed his lips together in a thin line, mute. He had no words with which to express himself. But the conviction within his heart didn't waver, and that was what mattered.
She was someone special. Someone to be admired.
And she hadn't been here. He had seen what he had desperately wanted to see, a sweet mirage, nothing more. As a result, he could no longer trust his own senses. In this state, how would he do his job as a soldier?
Hell, how would he function even if he gave up everything and lived a normal life?
One could only hope that this was temporary.
For the wounds, for the shock of this day. For whatever it was. But that it would pass.
■
Desmond looked down at his hands.
He turned them over, opened his hands and closed them, clenching his fists.
He had killed many enemy soldiers. Not with sword or gun, but with his bare hands. For they were demons who had come to slaughter him, who wished to exterminate them because they had not been blessed by the gods and lived in darkest envy.
All this was still true, and he had no regrets. Quite the contrary. He had enjoyed it more than he was willing to admit. Every second of it.
He still did, looking back. But somehow, remembering those he had killed with his bare hands felt different, even though the circumstances were identical. That he was giving them what they deserved.
Perhaps because it all had the tinge of a nightmare over which he had no control.
Or maybe...
"Desmond?"
He raised his head.
Jacob, the headmaster of the academy, was sitting next to his bed for some reason. Christina was there too.
Or maybe, he said to himself, completing the thought, maybe because I wasn't myself.
He was beginning to think that the thing with the wings, that he himself had taken care of the Empire's war machine and the state it had been left in, none of it had been a figment of his imagination.
Jacob leaned forward, seeing that he was paying attention.
"You must be confused. Hurt. And the last thing you want to do is talk to me or anyone else. But we have a lot to talk about. A lot of questions you have to answer."
No, quite the opposite.
"What happened to me?" he said with an effort, his throat was dry. He cleared his throat several times.
The headmaster's serious expression melted into confusion and a hint of fear. Or something like it.
-You mean you don't remember?
-What do you remember? -Christina asked, her arms folded. She was acting strange again. Or should he say normal? After all, this, a withdrawn and shy person, was the first impression she had given him.
Was it because she was in the presence of the headmaster and felt the need to mince her words?
Or was it because of what he had done?
"I remember the forest. I remember fighting in the building that is now in ruins and outside, not knowing how I got there. Only that..."
That it's ridiculous.
But less ridiculous than the idea of the headmaster paying special attention to you, of all survivors, for no particular reason, an inner voice told him.
"What?" Jacob prompted him to continue.
"Wings. Black wings."
"Then you remember a lot. But not enough. You were shot. In the heart."
There was silence.
"How?" Desmond asked, sure he'd heard wrong. The heart that wasn't supposed to be working was beating hard against his ribs. He wasn't dead. Evidently, he wasn't dead.
But Jacob wouldn't joke in this situation, especially in such a twisted way. He was serious.
"You fell in battle and then came back to life. Are you going to tell me you don't remember how or why?"
Desmond couldn't look into those cold, accusing eyes any longer.
"I know you have no reason to believe me. But it's true. I'm not capable of using magic that powerful. All I can do is physical reinforcement magic, that's my greatest weapon. And I can also cast the occasional spell that doesn't require an affinity to use, but the fact remains that I'm easily the least talented of the candidates. I'm telling the truth."
It must not have been very convincing when he couldn't even look him in the eye as he said it. But he had to notice the sincerity in her voice. He had to.
"That your affinity, your true affinity, would awaken at the most opportune moment... It's very convenient and unlikely, but not impossible, I suppose."
Desmond almost let out a sigh of relief. It seemed he had believed him after all.
"I have just one more question. Who is this woman you were talking about?"
Desmond tensed.
He couldn't hide his reaction, to avoid falling into the director's trap. Why had he let his tongue wander? He had done nothing but get himself into trouble. If he hadn't said anything about her, he might have managed to avoid suspicion.
Now, since they didn't believe him, how far would things go? No, no, what was he thinking?
His mind was in a mess because he'd been through the second worst day of his life, so similar to the first. They wouldn't do that. Not his kingdom, not his people.
They were nothing like the demons they were fighting. This was certainly suspicious, but to discover the secret he was hiding, the secret that even he didn't know, they wouldn't be able to.... No, no way.
Christina was surprised. She hadn't heard about that part. Speaking of which, why was he here anyway?
"I thought I saw someone I know. But I was wrong. I suffered a hallucination. I realized that."
He looked at Jacob, this time. Trying to pretend he was being sincere.
But he wasn't used to it, he wasn't used to practically anything to do with interacting with other people anymore, and anyway he was talking to the headmaster of the most important academy in the kingdom and a military hero, prior to that.
Jacob's expression changed slightly, and then he knew without a doubt that his attempt to deceive him had been as clumsy and transparent as if he were a five-year-old.
"You're lying," he said, without the slightest trace of doubt in his voice. "Don't you understand the situation you're in? Listen, among the candidates, you are one of the ten who have survived this massacre. Only ten. But even counting the teachers and the medical staff, we don't reach twenty."
"That many?"
He couldn't... no, he didn't want to believe it. They had almost been wiped out. Victory had cost them too much. Just today more than a hundred people had shown up for the initiation test. A few hours later, only ten remained.
It was too many.
"In other words, this was a resounding victory for the Empire and the end of the false peace we have been embroiled in for almost five years. Only almost five years. The war is about to start again and you have secrets from your homeland? You can pay dearly for that silence. Besides, you wanted to be a soldier, didn't you? What do you think a soldier's duty is if not to give everything to his country?"
"I... She's really no one important. Not to you. I've no idea about..."
"You're lying!"
Desmond gasped. His heart, which had been pounding from the start, stopped abruptly. It hurt.
"I don't know anything," he insisted, though it was useless.
He didn't even feel why he was being so stubborn about this. Apparently, his instinct had gotten ahead of his mind, which was trying to catch up with him.
"Headmaster. Stop it, please," Christina said. He's telling the truth. I know because it was me who did it.
"You?"
She bowed her head.
"Yes. I'm sorry I haven't told the truth until now."
"You control shadows. How would that allow you to regenerate internal organs, stop someone from dying even with a shattered heart?"
"It does. That's what counts. You saw like me that he had black wings, didn't you?"
"No shadow magic user has ever demonstrated that ability."
"Because, I imagine, they all wanted to keep it a secret, knowing the commotion it would cause. Death is a fact of life. Something immovable... A lot about how we live, how we think, is based on that, though it's not entirely true."
Jacob couldn't take his eyes off her, he seemed to have completely forgotten why he had come here originally, that he existed.
He was going through the same thing. Of course he was.
Christina had saved his life. The same tragedy had repeated itself, despite his best efforts, and, as on that day ten years ago, he had been saved from certain death by a woman to whom he now owed everything.
Always, always, without exception he was the saved, not the one who saved.
One could argue that he had saved a few people by killing the soldiers he had killed, before they could continue their slaughter. But that was not the same thing, not really, and in any case the ones he had 'saved' had surely died soon after.
Statistically, with only ten survivors in total, that was most likely.
He felt anger.
Because his greatest value in this situation had been to prolong the inevitable.
And because it was as if she were trying to replace her in his heart. An absolutely ridiculous idea, of course. Christina didn't have a clue that she existed to begin with, or what she had done. She didn't have any reason to desire such a thing, which was the most important thing.
The problem was him, so childish despite his age.
"Would you be able to cure me?" Jacob asked.
"I'm sorry, headmaster, but that's impossible for me too."
"Impossible," he repeated, his voice full of bitter venom. "This boy was not only shot through the heart, killing him instantly. After he came back to life, he tore himself apart in order to finish off the enemy's war machine, tearing off a wrist, breaking a great many bones. His arms were like jelly when he was done. One of those bones was a rib that punctured a lung. Yet it has taken him less than a day to wake up and he has been in good condition for many hours before that. And it is not possible for me?"
Christina felt deeply uncomfortable. Of course she was. She didn't know what to look at or say.
"I'm really sorry, but you know I'm right. His wounds were normal. Severe, but normal. Yours... I can't do anything about that. I'm sorry."
Jacob took a deep breath.
He ducked his head, rested a fist on his chin.
"Yes. I'm sorry. I was out of line."
Jacob drifted back into his thoughts. Desmond didn't want to turn his attention back to him, but it was unavoidable, so he asked his question.
"What's going to happen now?"
"The course of things will be back on track. We'll rebuild the building, call in another batch of candidates for another test. The survivors won't have to take it, of course, you're guaranteed a place. The test you passed is more than enough."
"I understand. I was afraid it would be over before it started. Sir."
"What happened today is all the more reason for the school year to go on. We need more soldiers, better and younger, and the sooner the better. Goodbye," he added, turned his wheelchair around and walked away.
Leaving the two of them alone.
Desmond, his cheeks red, glanced at Christina out of the corner of his eye.
"It slipped my mind before, I didn't realize. Thank you for saving me. Thank you for revealing yourself for my sake, even though I'm just a stranger. I know I can't repay you..." Suddenly there was a lump in his throat. "But I will try. Even if it takes the rest of my life."
Christina walked over to his bed. She didn't get up because she had been standing all this time, and she leaned over him.
Towards him.
He blushed for a different reason. That, here and now? He didn't want to be kissed, but he'd feel too bad if he turned her down, so he had no choice really. If he turned down the kiss, not a relationship. He wasn't going to get into a relationship on a momentary whim.
But her lips didn't meet his, didn't even brush his. Instead, she laid a hand on the bed. He felt her warm breath on his skin.
And a couple of other things.
"Listen to me, I didn't do it. I lied," she said as she put a finger of her free hand to her lips, as if the hand over her mouth wasn't indication enough that he should bite his tongue. Both hands were shaking, not exaggeratedly, but a little. "I have no idea what happened or how it happened. But you can't tell the truth, especially not now. You and I will pay for it. Okay? Just keep quiet, if you want to return the favor."
Desmond nodded slowly. He had no problem doing that. He was worried about suddenly being left without an explanation, without that assurance, but it could have been worse. He could have received an explanation that was anything but comforting. Not knowing was easier, in that sense.
Besides...
He had his suspicions.
"Just tell me one thing. Do you know? Do you know the truth?"
"Neither do I," he murmured.
Christina nodded, as if to say I figured as much. She pulled her hand away and then...
She kissed him.
Briefly, but she kissed him.
She pulled back, smiling as if she were in love with him.
"I'm so glad you're okay."
He realized that it had been a charade performed out of obligation, so that the teachers wouldn't get suspicious, since they might be watching.
Still...
Her beautiful smile and tear-filled eyes. He would like to think that her happiness was not feigned, merely exaggerated so that it could be easily misinterpreted. What was between them.
This inexplicably strong bond between two strangers, where would it lead him?
For a long time, he had had his life's path very clear.
But now he could only see darkness in front of him, in the best possible sense.
Desmond smiled back. Feeling different, feeling a peculiar tingling in the muscles of his face. He had forgotten about the pain ravaging his body.
Because he felt like a child again.