Aim Shorts

Invoked

Aim to Engage 2023, prompt #14: An ordinary kitchen maid discovers she is the reincarnation of a legendary sorceress, and as dark forces converge on her, she must embrace her true identity to save her realm.

Word count = 999

**** Aim to Engage 2023 Flashfic Winner ****

I've always had this strange sense of the Aether, and how the Mysts condensed possibility into reality. An eerie sensation, but beautiful it was. Yet something ominous lurked beyond creation, something soulless and hungry.

More recently, came the dreams. Blue flames consumed a poor old woman, searing her flesh, but in the painful horror, there was calm acceptance. Her eyes blazed, a rare piercing violet like mine, and somehow, we connected. She mumbled a single word, "Invoke."

What did this mean?

A head smack jolted me from my thoughts. "Ember! Are ye daft?" The chief steward scowled. "Do not tarry lest they take ire upon us." He shoved a pottery wine jug into my hands. "Let no cup go dry!"

"Yes, sir," I mumbled, bowing.

I dared not complain. Life as a castle kitchen maid was hard, but far better than the cruel streets from which I came. At least here, I had safe quarters.

Like my brown dress and white apron, I was rather plain in appearance. Except my eyes. No suitors had I to whisk me away. 

Flickering brass candle sconces supplemented the fading evening light cast through high west-facing windows. The new young apprentices, near my age and seated around the long wooden table in their best clothes, paid rapt attention to Magus Oris, the King's chief mage. Wearing a traditional white robe, he stroked a long white beard as he began the symposium. "From the Aether, comes magic..."

Knowledge was my key to a better future, so I would often volunteer to serve at lectures, listening as I brought food and drink.

But while I bent over to fill a cup, a wayward hand grabbed my arse and squeezed. The street girl in me lashed out. "Do not touch me!" I hissed, swatting the hand away.

Magus Oris abruptly halted his lecture and cast narrowed eyes at me, followed by all other eyes. And I froze, gulping. What had I done?

But then, Oris' eyes widened, holding me in unexpected astonished gaze. Then they shifted to the owner of the offending hand, narrowing again in disdain. "Jonathan, do my words bore you such that you must torment this maiden?"

"No, sir," the young man mumbled, slumping in his chair.

Had the esteemed Magus come to my defense? Me, a lowly kitchen maid?

When the Magus resumed his lecture, I found the will to resume my duties, filling cups and removing used plates. No hands dared to touch me now.

Later, the Magus asked an open-ended question, "What is the nature of the Aether?"

A few students raised hands and answered by rote, explaining it as the source of magic. The responding frown indicated he wanted something deeper.

Lifting gray eyes, the Magus pointed at me. "You, what think you of the Aether?"

"Me?" I gulped, once again the center of uncomfortable attention.

"Yes," he nodded.

"The Aether," I stammered after a brief pause. "It ebbs and flows like a river... The basis of everything. All probable outcomes exist within. But it has a will of its own, as if, in a way, alive."

A few muted snickers rose from the throng, to which Oris silenced with a raised hand. "You answer truly, my dear. It is so."

Warmth blossomed within me as mocking eyes transformed into wonder or admiration — to me, a lowly servant.

After the lecture ended, I stopped in the hallway leading to the kitchen and gazed at a particular painted portrait, along many others depicting honored heroes. I knew this woman.

"You have her eyes," a voice behind me said.

Jerking, I spun around to find the Magus gazing at me.

"Sir," I said, bowing. "About the disruption--"

"No blame do I place on you," he replied with a dismissive gesture. His attention turned toward the portrait. "Magus Azura, the most powerful sorceress that ever lived. I was once her student in my younger days."

"In my dreams..." I said, staring. "I have seen her in my dreams."

"What is your name, my dear?"

"Ember, sir."

"Well, Ember, you have more than her eyes. I sense her aura in you, and her power."

I sucked in a breath. "Me?"

"Yes. In you, her spirit is reborn."

The revelation left me speechless, but it explained so much.

Oris continued, stroking his beard. "Magus Azura created the magic barrier holding back the demon realm, at the cost of her life, but now it falters, and soon will fall. Few know of this. We need you, Ember."

"But how can I help?" My heart raced as an unasked destiny bored down on me.

"I will guide you--"

An exasperated woman rushed around the corner, eyes wide. "Magus, sir," she pleaded. "There has been a breach."

Oris pulled me by my hand. "No time like the present, my dear Ember."

In the green courtyard, we looked up to a jagged glowing tear in the sky. Black vaporous wraith poured through, swirling and screeching. Their evil aura twisted my gut. Other mages assembled and fired shimmering blue balls of magic, evaporating the wraith upon a strike.

But there were far too many.

A spear wielding soldier on the wall screamed in terror as a wraith embraced him. Then he collapsed lifeless, face paled and eyes wide open. Icy fear rose from my core.

Glowing blue threads from Oris' hands wrapped around me. "I shall activate your magic. You only need let it out."

Pressure grew within me, burning and pressing on a cage I could not open. "I can't... It won't come out!" I bent from the pain.

"There must be a key... Something..."

The dream... Her word. "Invoke," I muttered.

The light of a hundred suns burst from my body as I screamed to the sky. Then stilled silence, and all eyes turned again toward me. The wraith were gone, and the tear mended.

"Did I do that?" I whispered.

"Yes, well done." Oris' eyes narrowed. "But your technique needs work. Training begins tomorrow."