Playing with Fire - Of loss and grief

Chapter Five: Depression

Trying to prevent me from doing something stupid was like trying to prevent the sun from shining. My Master's wisdom would try to keep me on the right way, but eventually I would wander off. It is my nature.

A lifetime ago, I was used to waking up with a shaft of sunlight hitting my face, the birds singing and the noise of the city coming from the open window. No birds were singing now, and a drift of cold wind found its way beneath my sheets, making me curl into a ball and pull the covers around me tightly. A lifetime ago I would wake at Silvermoon in my own warm bed, in my own home - that scent of herbs and potions, of hot and spiced infusions - and this seemed nothing but a poor imitation of that, a bad illusion of my dream of coming back to the time before the fall.

Once again I was awakened by the sun - a cold and pale sun, not warm enough to dissipate the shivers of the night from my freezing bed. I blinked in the light as I sat up and looked around. The first days were confusing to me, and I usually had to take a couple of minutes to look around and take in my surroundings as understanding slowly sank into my sleepy mind. I sighed, the same way I did every morning there, the moment I realized that wasn't the cozy and warm room of my childhood. I couldn't see my chaotic self in that room of naked walls and its few, simple pieces of furniture. My warm nature tended to own the place I would take as a nest, but this could have easily been the bedroom of a stranger - an outsider.

And as far as I knew, it was the bedroom of a stranger. I slid out of my bed and shuffled to stand before the small cracked mirror I'd hung on the wall, and the story it told me was the same as the day before: the reflection showing the tiny chamber of a pale elf with discrete dark circles under her eyes. The clothes seemed just a bit larger than the last time she'd worn them, and she had all the signs of a person who wasn't sleeping well. Or eating.

I tried pinching my cheeks to bring some color to the pale face in the mirror. I kept telling myself I looked paler because of the black and golden tabard I'd traded for the red and golden one. I wore the Scryers' tabard willingly, and at a certain point, with pride, but the change was certainly taking a toll on me. We surely couldn't have the same extremely luxurious life we had at Tempest Keep, but on top of that, I forced myself to a greater work load.

Once I made myself presentable enough to be seen by other people, braided hair and new tabard, I headed outside to get something to eat. The soft, lush red carpet muffled my footsteps as I took a good look at our recently finished base through the refreshing morning light. The building of the Scryers' Tier was done in a couple of days of our arrival in the city - it was now a small red and gold elven nest with the elegance and greatness we would never give up. The same magic that had allowed us to rebuild our beloved Silvermoon nearly overnight, made it possible for us to bring a piece of our essence to the Broken City in a matter of a few days.

But there was still something missing. Someone.

I trapped myself in my daily chores, working for the Scryers as a master alchemist. And if people would call me obsessed and feverish about my work, they wouldn't be wrong. As I entered my small, empty laboratory, I began my ritual: lighting the boilers; taking flasks and books out of the shelves; bringing them all to where my open notebook rested. My working place was a sturdy wooden table filled with alchemical utensils, pots and herbs, and I would rarely leave it during the day. I spent hours in front of that table, brewing potions and extracting oils, researching and testing. Alchemy was a part of me as much as magic itself, and now this perfectly set, focused and neat routine kept me sane, bringing some reasoning and logic to my mind. Sometimes I was surprised to notice the sun was already setting, while other times I spent so much time without eating anything that my vision got blurred.