Displaced

Chapter 117

Leo Feldmanis hated the chairs in the OtharianCabinet's meeting room.

Like nearly everything in the fortress, they were made from metal—tucrenyx, to be precise. The dull grey mineral no longer scared him the way it once had. Every Otharian—and all other Scyrians, most likely—grew up associating the cursed metal with pain, evil, and prisoners. After all, to even attempt an Observation, even something as minor as a candle flame, while in contact with the metal was to invite excruciating pain unlike anything else one could experience.

Leo had had the poor fortune to experience the joys of tucrenyx firsthand more than most. His first experience had come during an educational seminar in his Voice training as a young man. The instructor had passed around a small chunk of the metal for each of the students to try Observing with. The pain had appeared the instant his Observation had begun, a debilitating pain that broke all his concentration. His singular thought at the time had been that he would never touch the terrible stuff again.

How foolish he'd been.

Less than a decade later, he would find himself wearing that same metal all day, every day, for years and years. It was how Scyrian societies controlled their prisoners. Just a simple thick band was all that was needed to keep an Observer from utilizing their abilities. Feelers, on the other hand, needed much larger and sturdier setups. He'd heard that Feelers suffered less than Observers, though as an Observer he didn't know for certain.

One thing he did know for certain was what it felt like to Observe in shackles. The pain went beyond the physical, striking seemingly at the soul itself. Adding to the pain was the unnatural and unpleasant sensation of one's soulforce going awry, as if something was ripping the internal energy from powering the Observation and redirecting it elsewhere.

None of that had stopped Leo from trying to power through the pain. He tried and tried and tried, working on his willpower, concentration, and pain tolerance. None of it had worked. After about five futile years of trying, he'd given up, utterly defeated. What had followed were years of unceasing malaise, where every day was indistinguishable from the one before it—until, one day, a man covered in tucrenyx came and freed him.

Leo had been too overwhelmed at the time to realize that the armor was a sign of things to come. As if Othar himself was taunting him, he'd wound up in a place where everything was made from tucrenyx. And yet, things were different here. It was alright that the large circular table in front of him was made of the metal, as he had little need to Observe here, the free man that he was. In Lord Ferros's castle, the prevalence of his crystalline lights and "plumbing" meant Leo didn't even need to conjure up a candle flame to read or water to clean.

Even if he did, though, the tucrenyx here didn't seem to cause interference and pain for reasons he could not fathom. He'd seen several other ministers Observe while touching the meeting table and nothing had happened. It was like the rules were different here.

So no, while Leo Feldmanis did despise tucrenyx for its part in his years of suffering, he did not hate the tucrenyx chairs in the meeting room because of their material. He hated the chairs simply because they were bad chairs. They were hard and flat and cold and your back hurt after sitting in one for just half an hour. For all the wonders of Blake's powers and talents, his limited furniture design skills didn't seem to place much value in comfort. Sometimes Leo wondered if the man's paralysis meant that, since he didn't feel the discomfort himself, he just didn't give it much consideration.

He knew about the ruler of Otharia's injury, of course—Samanta had told him very early on—though he wasn't sure that Blake knew that he knew. Leo suspected that Blake suspected, but neither of them had ever broached the subject and they both saw fit to leave it that way. It was for the best.