The flashing of light from the window were constant, prodding his eyes through his closed eyelids. A searing pain beneath his bandages kept him struggling to move; the numbness had begun to fade. He pushed the wool sheets from over him, and he turned his face to see the rows and rows of beds; men and women in white robes attended them and sallied forth with herbs and tea cups, uttering arcane charms in low voices. 

 

Cloth wrapped hands dragged down the length of his chest, leaving him to wince and grimace. They reached for the note he hazily remembered; it had remained. Wearily he held it before his gaze.

 

He winced. Though not at the pain that berated his nerves, but rather the God awful writing vandalising the parchment.

 

‘omex sed yu ned to writ a short essey on yur experensus as a mage. detale yur spels and there diffecalty. A tewter will be given after its handid in. Give it to jadana wen don.’

 

The note fell to his chest and his hand to his side. He chuffed.

 

“I should have this framed. It only needs her signature.”

 

Orpheus moved the hair from his face and touched the bandages that tightened him. Slowly did he move to the edge of the bed and press his feet to the wooden floor. A woman rushed from the rows and attended to him suddenly. 

 

“No, no. You musn’t stand. You are in no state to leave.”

 

“What? Who… Who the fuck are you?” he said, between struggling breaths. “And where in heaven’s tits am I?”

 

“The Nursing Hall. Now you must rest.”

 

—

 

The passing days were spent smothered in tea, charms and the constant exchange of bandages. It was an understatement to say he’d grown restless; and so, on one quiet night, he simply left.

 

Boredom had left him to spend his first days in the shell of a room with the note on his table; Orpheus looked at it with the utmost reluctance. Beside it lay a small stack of parchment and an inkwell. It beckoned him, and for that her cursed it.

 

“Fucking essay, yeah alright,” he mumbled. He took up a quill and laid a piece before himself. He glared a while before he’d started writing, but the ink eventually conveyed his words - more reasonably than he might’ve spoken them.

 

‘The Magic of Orpheus Blackwell,

 

To speak to my experience with magic, naturally, I must disclose the nature of it.

 

In my youth, I was tutored by an exhausting man who knew nothing but old scrolls and tomes. It was quickly discovered as to the nature of my ‘Innate Mana-Type’, I think it rather obvious what that may be, but for record’s sake it was ‘Lightning.’ It is told that the methods of discovery for one’s Innate Mana-Type vary; strange crystals, spells from seers, and so on. Mine was simple, in those tomes I read spells and their formulas. When I let loose my hands to cast those spells, cast they were.

 

Since then, the (“barbarian” was faintly written, but promptly smudged and blotted out) Dame Kezaiah has overseen my study and training since. It should be noted that the Dame has however refused to teach more than the spells I’d already attained prior.

 

As for my current arsenal…’

 

He lifted the quill. Hesitation.

 

‘...my spells mainly deal in the schools of Evocation and Conjuration. They are of no difficulty to me.’

 

The essay ended as less than of an essay, and more of a brief elaboration. Much of the page had been left empty. Had he been more inclined to tell the truth, Orpheus would have mentioned the Elder and his many haunting memories, as some of those memories unwillingly carried gifts; gifts of knowledge, gifts of understanding, gifts of power.

 

Orpheus’ gaze turned to a darker corner of the room. Figures lurked in the shadows, watching. They linked withering teeth and revelled in their own foul mists.

 

“Begone, fucking spectres. I will not speak of it,” he cursed with an azure surge streaming from his eyes.

 

They knew not of fear, but retreated from his sight all the same.

 

—

 

He reclined at the face of his door and observed his nails with a low gaze. Watching Jadana speak and yell and move her arms and hands as if her words could not be told without them. From the narrow opening of his door Ned watched with his head pressed slightly to the frame, moving his lips as if to speak but he said nothing. 

 

“And you’re not even listening! You are completely insufferable, why are you even here? You’re a toddler. Just give me the assignment and I’ll be gone,” Jadana hounded

 

“Oh for heaven’s sake, piss off with your moaning and whining. You’re like a crying bloody bitch with an injured paw,” said Orpheus. He sat up and folded his arms just below his chest.

 

“What the fuck is your problem? You know what? Fuck you, Orpheus Blackwell, you are a stain on this academy and better off put down. I’d sooner do it myself if I could.”

 

“Me? Put me down? You’re quite the fucking joke, tell me, whore, are you capable? Besides sucking all you’ve done with that mouth is bitch since I arrived,” he paused, “No, excuse me, you’re not the only laugh, this whole place is some bloody joke. The professors, the storms, Ned fucking Harrien, the cunt-wanking Archmage. It’s all absurd.” He paced in front of her as he spoke and when he stopped he turned and folded his hands at his back. “And your parents are about as retarded as the kitchen staff for sending you here.”

 

He watched Ned push the door wide and he walked and stood by Jadana. “Hey. Don’t you think that’s a little… Far, Orpheus?”

 

“Don’t waste your fucking breath,” said Jadana, glowering, “I’m going to knock him one right here.”

 

Orpheus laughed. He held his stomach with his hands and bent over and then upright. “Knock me one, and I am to be the toddler?” He turned toward her until nearly did their foreheads collide. “Absurd. I’ll leave you to ash.”

 

For a moment they spoke no word. Ned squirmed in place. Then she grabbed Orpheus by the collar and pushed him against the door and raised her open hand to strike him. Pressing his finger against the lower shirt of her flank he blinked and a brief flash of lightning from his eyelids and began to speak.

 

“Stunning Stream.” 

 

With a thinning light, like the last closing rays of the evening before the coming of night a line of lightning reached into the skin of her flesh and dispersed in a flash. Orpheus watched her struggle to move. Jadana stumbled and fell back. He watched Ned trying to keep her levelled and he turned on his heel to leave, wiping down the length of his clothes with his fingers.

 

“Orpheus!” called Ned. He could hear Jadana whimpering behind him. 

 

Orpheus moved a hand through the air. “She’ll get on her feet whenever she does. Shame. I presumed she could have fought much harder? I suppose, whores cannot conjure strong spells.”

 

As he reached the wooden staircase to descend he quickly found himself rolling downstairs, unable to grasp a thing. A boot had shoved him from behind. When he’d finally caught himself at the ground floor, a brief pulse shot from his chest. He clawed at it with a brief gasp for air.

 

By the time he’d looked, he saw Jadana flailing uncontrollably, running toward him with the thin coating of lightning from her hair to her shoulders. It ran down the lengths of her leather, leaving it to shiver and spark. The lines between her brow curved and she raised her closed fists to him and approached quickly.

 

Orpheus rose to move between the rays of lightning that peeled and fired from her knuckles. Hastily he moved to discharge blasts of electricity, but they seemed to only bounce - shooting off the sides of her clothes like soaring projectiles that burned holes into the old wooden foundations of the dorms.

 

With his back to the wall he saw Ned descend the steps behind him. He moved his fingers together and extended his hand outward. Out from the fingertips a force sent Orpheus and Jadana hurtling forward and carried with it the faint sounds of thunder. 

 

‘Cut it out, you both! You’ll break down the dorm!” He roared. “Not cool!”

 

Orpheus raised from the floor with his hands and staggered, slipping as the pulse in his chest continued. Jadana had made it to her feet first.

 

“Fuck the bloody dorm,” he said, “I’ll have you both on a fucking pike.”

 

Jadana planted her feet firmly to the floor. “Go on, then, give me your best shot.”

 

He gritted his teeth, returning to his feet. Orpheus cared no longer if she was serious.

 

“Blinding Death.”

 

Flinging his arms out before him, the ripple of lightning emerged from his hands with a moving blur; it crackled. The arc that marked the wooden hall with glowing embers fell outward. But, promptly, it disappeared.

 

Jadana had moved her hand over it as if she had taken the effect within her hands. The surging sparks that emanated from her intensified, so much so that her body began to reverberate from the energy. She held her palms forward and grinned. 

 

“I think you’ll want this back.”