Emotionless-Kato's Misery

Chapter 3

After training, Kato told us to meet her in the garden outside of the training hall where we'd first met her earlier.

We got there when we were supposed to, but we only found Ned there, still folding his ridiculous paper planes. Since Kea hadn't arrived yet, I decided to go explore, despite Kelsie's protests that it could be dangerous and that Kea might be angry. 

I wandered off into a large grove of willows. The shadows were stretched and sharp here, which reflected my current mood quite well. Pollen drifted about, and the sun shone in small patches, illuminating small clumps of an exotic purple flower I'd never seen before. 

As I bent to examine it, I saw a pair of feet poking out of the bushes in front of me, and I looked up to see Kea looking down at me, grinning as usual.

"That's Blue Phlox by the way," she informed me.

"AHHHHH!" I screamed, and fell backwards.

"Hey calm down, I'm not that scary," she joked.

"How did you even get there without me seeing you?" I asked once I'd calmed down enough to speak.

"I was standing there the whole time..." she muttered.

"Oh. Hey you were in the shadows!" I said defensively. "And what took you so long, everyone's waiting."

"Oh, sorry about that," she rubbed the back of her neck. "There was a finch stuck in the tree, so I had to get it out."

"Out of the kindness of your heart?" I laughed.

"No, not really. It was chirping a lot and it annoyed me because it was my favourite reading spot."

I began walking back towards the others, too exasperated to respond. She began walking alongside me, whistling an unfamiliar tune.

"Finally!" Aarid grumbled as Kea and I joined the others in the garden. "We've been waiting for half an hour."

"This is why it's better to arrive late," Hosah muttered.

"I find it's better to arrive early, that way you don't get yelled at. That's my opinion anyway, feel free to keep feeling the way you do," Kea said absently. "Anyway, we should get on with learning about your type of wizardry. Ned would you care to explain?"

Ned sighed and put down the plane he was folding. He sat down on a nearby tree stump, then motioned for us to find a seat as well.

"So," he began once we'd all found a seat. "Your type of wizardry is rare and honestly quite dangerous, so the first thing you need to learn is not to use your abilities unless absolutely necessary." He unfolded a piece of paper, then held it up for us to see. Drawn on the paper were the same symbols that were carved on the Starboard in the dome. 

"You need to learn every single one of these powers," he explained, tossing each of us a piece of paper with the symbols. "The powers are arranged in order of most to least powerful."

"So are you going to tell us which abilities are which?" Ashton asked, scanning the paper.

"No," Ned replied.

"Great teacher," Hosah snorted sarcastically.

"Experience is a better teacher, so that's why I'm not going to give you all the answers."

"I was being sarcastic," Hosah said, unimpressed.

"I know you were," Ned said dismissively. 

"Anyway, the most important thing to know about your type of ability, is that the more you use your abilities the shorter your life expectancy will become," Kea added.

Ned nodded in agreement. "Your abilities feed off your emotions, so if you let your feelings get out of control, your abilities will mirror your emotions and the amount of magical energy that will consume will be so great it will shorten your life span greatly, maybe even shorten your life by half.

"My aunt was an emotionless by the way. She was born after me, because my mother was about 20 years older than her. She couldn't complete her training sufficiently, but a war forced her to use her abilities and she let her emotions overwhelm her. She isn't alive anymore, and I'm only 19." Ned said.

Everyone except Kea was silent.

"Ned, you've told that story so many times. I fell asleep the last few times you told me you know," Kea complained.

"They need to know their abilities are dangerous," Ned protested.

"Hey how old are you Kea?" Kelsie asked.

"Uh, I'm only 17."

"How are you going to teach us to use our abilities, if they're that dangerous to use," Hosah questioned.

"We won't, we'll just explain to you how to harness your emotions, and hopefully if put into practice your natural instinct will make your abilities as powerful as they are in theory," Kea explained happily. 

"What's the average lifespan of a wizard?" Ashton asked.

"Average lifespan? Which wizard type are you talking about?"

"Different wizard types have different life spans?"

"Of course! The amount of abilities you possess affects your lifespan," Kea said.

"Then tell us all the average lifespans," Aarid demanded.

"Well, Fusions live the longest generally, they only have two abilities, they can easily reach the age of 60 even while using their magic. Peaceful Fusions generally go to 80 or above. Your average wizard only has three abilities, giving them a slightly shorter lifespan, but not by much. They can live up to 40, maybe even 50 while using magic. Without using magic, they could probably live up to 70, perhaps even 75 and in rare cases 80 or above. 

"Emotionless wizards aren't as lucky however. As you may have noticed from the previous two examples, the more abilities you possess, the more it affects your lifespan, even if those abilities aren't put to use. Emotionless generally only live up to 40 or maybe even 45, and that's when they don't ever use their abilities," Kea mused

"45?! That's barely even a life! What age do the Emotionless generally reach if they use magic?"

"Well, usually Emotionless do try to avoid using magic, but if they have to, they could probably only reach ages 15-20. In the circumstance that an Emotionless allows their emotions to get out of control, they'd be lucky if they even reach the age of 10."

"10?" Kelsie squeaked in alarm.

"Ned's aunt was only 14 when she died."

"Why didn't you mention what age the other wizard types die at if their emotions get out of control?" Hosah asked.

"Because it doesn't happen to other wizard types. It's an Emotionless trait, an unlucky little thing that make us Emotionless wizards oddballs."

"Hey what about Ned?" Ashton asked.

"What about him?" Kea asked, turning to look at Ned.

"What wizard type is he?"

"I was a Fusion wizard," he replied quietly.

"Was, past tense?" I asked suspiciously.

Ned and Kea exchanged a glance that told me something about Ned wasn't right.

"It's a long story," Kea replied at last.