Shorts With Seekers

Short IV

There always was something about train tracks leading off into the distance with no end in sight that fascinated her. She'd just sit there for hours upon hours, her gaze wandering across the horizon, a million thoughts crossing through her head at a time.

No matter what she was truly thinking at the time, they always turned back to one simple day dream of two worlds. Train tracks mark the way. It was a constant thought in her head. What if there were two worlds? She would question herself, laying down on the warm earth just feet away from the tracks. Ours, the one of science, of evolution… The thoughts pushed a smile onto her lips. And one of the Arcane, of the the magicks were science was not needed, and only mastery of your abilities mattered.

She would find herself there for hours upon hours, the sketch book laying beside her, grains of sand blown across the open pages. She always drew a familiar scene, one of a world divided in half. One would show a sun shining down over a city scape with skyscrapers disappearing off into the clouds. The other would show a shadowed moon hovering above a village of only huts and wells, surrounded by a dark and dreary forest with shadows extending across the ground.

She'd often doze off in the sand, lose herself in her own mind amongst the dreams that occupied it. With the way she would tell the stories of each one, she made it seem as if they were memories of actual events progressing through time, day by day.

She would illustrate the most prominent things from her dreams, magick, the buildings. People loved the sketches of the red eyed beasts that she said would prey on only those with magical talent, not killing them but taking their power for themselves, growing in strength with each Steal. She always emphasized the fact that those who's powers were stolen would soon fall victim to the Turn, their bodies deforming faster and faster with each passing day, their forms becoming twisted and vile creatures who no longer felt human emotion, only the desire to live and prey on those they might have once called friends.

She would create the charms that were said to ward away the Thieves in the night, twisted bits of rope with stones carved with what she called 'runes' hanging from the burned ends. Her house was riddled with them, hanging from the windows, from the lights, on the doors. Some that found her found them a curiosity, requesting one made for them. She never charged for them, not once.

She had told several people that magick -the Reyan, as she called them- were ticking time bombs from the time of birth unless taught to control their abilities. She had said that there was a school for them carved into the ground and up a mountain- the Magisterium, she called it. Said it was present in the Science realm, just hidden from those without rey. It was carved out by the first of the Reyan, using their rey to reform the rock and soil to their own liking. They were the Makars- the Makers.

She loved the Magisterium, beyond the realm itself. She had said that it was more than just a school. Said it was special, but would never say why.

-expect more on this!-