Abandoned Prison

The Ritual

Nadia felt excited and her heart was beating slightly faster than usual when they entered her experiment room. She was also nervous but she couldn't wait to start the experiment.

It was the first time that she was allowed to perform experiments on a human on her own. She didn't show any emotions on the inside as she was reciting the steps of the ritual in her mind.

The man they captured tried to look like he wasn't afraid but she knew that it won't help him to escape what is coming. 

The only thing she wanted now was for Zanzara to leave. She was a good teacher, always had a lot of patience with her and she did like learning magic by her side but it was time for her to show that she can do this on her own after all the studying.

"So, I will leave you alone here. Just don't kill him," her teacher said. Nadia didn't felt the need to react in any way instead she opened the book that was lying on the desk. It was labeled The Everlasting Mysteries of Spirits, Ghosts, and Souls by Zoran Temnar. 

The man was already dead for two decades but he was one of the first humans who explored these subjects and Nadia knew that his knowledge of souls was unsurpassed by anyone and even though his writings in the book were quite vague it was all that they had.

She heard the door close so it was only her with the man and the guard in the room. She opened the page where the ritual was described and she turned to the man.

"Go on, lie on the table," she said with her normal voice like nothing bad was going to happen to him. He was hesitating so she told him that there is nothing else he can do right now. It looked like he wanted to say something but the guard stepped right behind him so he chose not to resit and lie on the table.

The guard knew what to do. She bound his hands and legs to the table with tight iron cuffs so he couldn't escape and then she leaned on the wall next to the doors.

The first thing she needed was his blood. She picked up the small knife from the desk with the tools and she went to him. She did feel sorry for him and she wouldn't want anything of things that she will do to him done to her but studying magic was the most important thing in her life. She also knew that men like him weren't usually good people. 

She knew that he was the one who owned the settlement nearby so he must have been quite rich. He probably doesn't have anything to lose except his wealth and it is probably also the only thing that he cares about she thought. All that made what she is going to do to him a bit easier to justify.

She was thinking about what ritual to perform on him almost the whole night so she didn't have much sleep and she felt a little tired.

She could see that he was heavily breathing and he didn't seem very relaxed so he probably wasn't as fearless as he tried to look. Suddenly he started talking again. "What is this? What are you going to do with that knife?" There was suspicion in his voice but no fear.

She wasn't here to answer questions." I will bring your soul out of your body," she said with a calm and careless voice. She wasn't in the mood for talking with this man. She just wanted to finish her experiment and send him back to his cell.

Without a warning, she sliced in the middle of the man's palm. He flinched, his face was twisted by pain and he clutched his fist. Nadia grabbed a small wooden bowl from the desk and put it under his hand so she could collect his blood in it.

She didn't care about his pain even though she did imagine how painful it was. She watched as the drips of blood quickly fell into the bowl and then she turned around to prepare the next ingredients.

She looked in the book at what was the next ingredient. There was a glass with fresh violet leaves on her desk. She took a handful of them and dropped them in the bowl with the blood.