Roll With It Short Stories

Day Nine

Day Nine

Word Count 19: 650

Prompt 5: Her eyes were mesmerizing and the pendant in her hand glittered with a wealth beyond imagine. Yet, there was the feeling if you took it that only doom would befall you.

From the day I was born it was made quite clear to everyone that I would never thrive in the fields of magic. I didn't have the talent or sense for it, so eventually I stopped putting in the effort and settled for an average life. My siblings are all mages of some sort and live in the magical cities of the world. They invite me to live with them saying, "You don't need to be magical to have a magical life." "Most everyday things are magically adapted now anyway." "No one cares if you're magical here." They all make promises and assurances from a perspective that they could never understand. That's not to say I'm bitter or even unhappy.

I live a calm life in a small town, working as a delivery man. With or without magic, I don't think I would enjoy big city life. I've always lived at a slower pace and find too much stimulation overwhelming. I can recall a number of times my mother put a cool rag on my head after school to calm me down. I don't recall anything too out of the ordinary happening, I just seemed to overload from life's everyday stresses.

I would have been content to stay in my bubble of routine if it hadn't have been for the fires. Some unhappy Mage took his grievances with the world and set fire to the region and himself. The blaze so filled with his malcontent that it burned for days, spreading across cities and countrysides before it was finally quenched. Selfish. Thousands were injured or displaced, including myself. I was forced to move in with my older brother, I don't remember my initial days here, it's all fire. I dreamed of flames and ash, the crackling sounds of traffic, the burning touch of crowds, the choking smog of unfamiliarity. In time I've adjusted and know a good portion of this city. I don't make it habit to go anywhere I don't know and I don't talk to anyone I don't have to. There are parts I like, the recurrent streams of color that rule the sky from the constant atmosphere of casting. There is an indescribable melody here, its in step with everything that happens and it makes everything feel choreographed, it's comforting. Until last night when my brother didn't come home.

I've spent days searching and my nerves are razor thin. I don't know how exactly I came to be here, sweating in an oversized coat in the back of some parlor but when I look into the sky there's a clock filled with spinning sand and I know my brother's time is almost up. The police and his job say there is no record of him existing, that he may have been erased and that magic is hard to reverse, not that they tried. So I'm here, before this woman draped in silks and smoke.

"This will help you find whatever you are looking for, no matter how small the trace." Her eyes glitter but magic has never had much affect on me. It's one of the few perks of being non-magical. Her beauty also has little affect on me and yet I am trapped. No one can remember my brother and I'm the only one who can find him. I stare at the pendent, even ignoring my suspicious nature and my inner screams that I was being scammed, I can feel something off. There's an aura that I can only describe as discord that transcends the non-magical limits of my senses. If I take this I will suffer, I know this as true. "Do we have a deal?" She asks. I nod and take the pendent. The chain rattles like bones and I see what must be magic for the first time in my life.