ᴡʜɪᴄʜ ᴡɪᴛᴄʜ (Geralt of Rivia)

ɪ.

ᴡʜɪᴄʜ ᴡɪᴛᴄʜ

ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ: ɪ.

Thazina's room at Aretuza was dark. Candles sat in sconces on the wall, casting the room in flickering shadows. She closed her eyes, forcing away the images of the shadows shifting into terrible demonic forms, clawing at her, tearing her to pieces.

She could handle shadows. They couldn't hurt her. They weren't real. 

She was real and that meant that they couldn't touch her.

All that she could think about was the terrified look on her mother's face.

Was she truly that frightening? A little girl who had never done anything but want happiness?

Albeit she had some strange powers, but that should not have mattered.

Mothers did not abandon their children just because there was something strange about them.

The first lesson took place in the greenhouse. Thazina bit her lip as she closed her hands into fists, watching Tissaia closely.

"I sense your terror," Tissaia was saying. "And you are right to be afraid."

A girl entered the room, silent as she hurried to her spot at the last empty table. Her hair was dark, her eyes bright purple. Her spine was twisted.

On each table sat a small bunch of flowers and a rock. Thazina looked at them, trying to find something special, some reason for them to be here as Tissaia continued, "Chaos is the most dangerous thing in this world. It is all around us all the time. Volatile and powerful. But... each one of you showed an aptitude for channeling it. Your conduit moment created a new ripple in chaos, reaching me here in Aretuza." She glanced to one of the girls, smiling faintly. "Anica, you saved a drowning boy with your mind. Fringilla froze a cat."

"On accident," the next girl, Fringilla, corrected quickly.

Tissaia continued without a care. "Sabrina... turned her mother fat."

Sabrina smiled despite herself, looking down at her table.

"Thazina had what appears to be a prophetic dream."

Thazina felt eyes on her. She closed her own eyes and focused on Tissaia's words.

"But just because you are conduits of chaos... does not mean that you are capable of magic."

"I want to go home," one of the girls spoke up.

Thazina met her gaze, offering a sad look of understanding.

"This is your home," Tissaia stated. "Listen closely. Your survival depends on it."

She looked to the others. "Magic is organizing chaos. And while oceans of mystery remain, we have deduced that this requires two things." She returned to her own table. "Balance and control. Without them, chaos will kill you. This is the simplest of trials to see whether you are worthy of the ascension. Between your flower and your stone lies the balance. Lift your stone without touching it. Use the incantation." She offered a simple phrase in the Elder language, then nodded, permitting them to begin.

Thazina let her fingertips rest on the flower, feeling the soft petals on her skin as they all began to repeat the phrase. They felt comforting against her skin as she closed her eyes and repeated the incantation over and over.

She didn't even realize that Fringilla was doing something until the other girl let out a cry of horror. Thazina's eyes flew open to see that Fringilla's rock was floating indeed, but her hand was beginning to rot.

Thazina flinched back, not even realizing that her rock had begun to hover above the table, not hearing it drop, not seeing that the flower had begun to wilt at the edges.

Fringilla clutched desperately at her blackened hand as Tissaia spoke again. "This is the balance. Demonstrated beautifully. Thank you, Fringilla. There is no conjuring something from nothing. There is a give and a take." She lifted her flower up, speaking the incantation.

As the rock lifted into the air, the flower died, and once it was completely gone, the rock fell back to the table.

Thazina's eyes drifted to her flower, eyebrows furrowing as she realized that it was wilted just slightly. But she lifted it all the same, focusing, channeling the chaos as she repeated the incantation.

Sabrina's rose into the air.

Thazina clenched her free hand into a fist.

Slowly, slowly, the rock rose up.

A smile played at her lips.

Anica's rock lifted up into the air.

The purple-eyed girl was struggling. Tissaia watched her carefully. "You've lost a lot of blood, piglet," she warned her.

That just spurned her further, making the girl raise her voice, hand shaking as she clutched at the flower.

She bit off one of the blossoms, chewing it between her teeth. Tissaia watched on, moving to stand before her. The girl stopped, purple eyes lifting up to meet Tissaia's blue ones. 

"Sometimes a flower is just a flower, and the best thing it can do for us is to die," Tissaia said.

The girl didn't answer. She set her flower down on the table, leaving the greenhouse in silence.

Thazina debated following her. The look on Tissaia's face said not to.

And so she lowered her head, chewing at her lip until she tasted blood.