Life's not fair. That concept burned itself into Emery from a very young age. 

He recalled the days that Monroe would return from the training field when they were kids, covered in mud and dirt. Blues and blacks spotted his skin, sore ribs, and broken bones from all his efforts to refine his magic. 

"Master Arx tells me your training is going well," Elsie praised her son, tending to his wounds, dressing a fresh bandage around the gash on his forearm. As she smiled softly, she said, "We'll have a new Vazeer in the family." 

"Me too! Me too!" Nadia squeaked, jumping her way from the archway to join her mother and brother at the large, polished oak dining table. She held her hands together, the light green beaming from her cupped palms. 

Elsie chuckled, patting Nadia's head, wild with thick waves of dirty blond locks. "Have you been practicing, too?"

"Yes!" Nadia held her light closer to her older brother, the light just barely touching his bandages.

"Mom! It's going to blow up like Emery!" Monroe protested, pulling himself away from Nadia's light. 

"Monnie, it won't," Elsie assured. Still, her lips pursed, her inner eyebrows tilted upwards, uneasily watching the green glow in the little girl's tiny hands. "Nad, come here." She pulled Nadia along further into the kitchen, where she found a short, sharp blade. 

Elsie pushed it into her palm, beads of red surfacing before a stream ran slowly from it. Elsie offered her hand, softly directing, "Show me how you've improved."

Nadia pressed her lips together, her eyes focused. Her heart thumped rapidly, her hands shaking with unease as she saw the blood from her mother's hand. 

Her mother leaned forward, softly squeezing her shoulder. "You'll be okay," Elsie whispered. "Relax. Feel the energy inside you. You are only a guide; let it flow."

Closing her eyes, Nadia took a deep breath and slowly let it out. She held her hands over her mother's fresh cut. The green grew brighter, darker, the energy wrapped around her like a gentle hug. Her mind and body eased into that feeling, allowing the world to speak to her soul. That moment was peaceful. Sounds resonated together with beautiful euphoria. Flowing through her hair, she could feel the air around her. It felt kind and gentle, and she allowed herself to be swept away by the ebb and flow of a gentle stream. 

It was then that Elsie's skin threaded back together as the fresh blood evaporated, leaving her hand without a trace of the cut.

Elsie let out a shaky breath, a grin stretching from ear to ear as she held her hand closer. Her fingers traced over her palm. Observing this, Monroe parted his lips, blinking a couple of times before dropping into his chair. 

"That was amazing!" Her mother applauded, lifting her seven-year-old into the air, pulling her in for a tight hug. "Where did you learn to do that?"

Nadia giggled, holding her mother. "I don't know. I just did it." 

Monroe pursed his lips, fingers pulling out the loose thread from the edge of his bandage. "It was just a little cut," he grumbled.

"Wait until your father hears about this! We're so proud of you. The both of you!" 

Monroe perked up. A grin tugged at his lips, no matter how much he fought against it. 

Elsie pulled both of them in close. 

Just them.

Emery sat alone in the dark hallway where the light didn't touch. He pulled his knees to his chest, comforting himself. 

As the years passed by, Nadia continued to develop her magic. She was healing a dozen sick a day, barely into her teens. The paralyzed and terminally ill visited the Adkin's for a miracle, and Nadia delivered every single time.

His blades by the thousands cut through the air, hitting every bullseye yards away from where Monroe stood on the training field. Metal bent to his will as effortlessly as breathing.  

Emery trained, too. Every single day with no breaks. He would awake before the rising sun every morning to study. He would memorize the texts in the Archiver's library. After breakfast, he took to the training field, summoning his flames as the sun trailed in the sky until he collapsed to his knees, his skin burned, and his lungs felt hot. 

On the day his brother became a general, he studied. When his sister was celebrated as the youngest female Vazeer in Carpathian history, he trained. He worked twice as hard for every one of the countless rewards and achievements made by his consecrated brother and sister. 

But it never changed a damn thing. 

He would be condemned as a failure for the rest of his pathetic life. 

"No," Arx had told him, tossing Emery's handwritten request to the side without a second thought. 

Emery could hardly breathe. "Master, please, I beg of you just to read it."

The old man reached for the cup to ink his quill; he stopped to close his eyes with a sigh. Calmly, he gazed upon his student once more. "Have you managed to keep a constant flame?"

"Yes."

Arx threw the quill down on his papers. "Show me."

Emery didn't move, hesitating, "Okay, I can't, but I-"

"The answer is no. Leave me," Arx waved him off.

"No, please!" Emery shot over the desk, snatching the sealed envelope from his master faster than the old man could discard it. His fingers trembled around the corners of the paper. "Please, Arx," His voice shook.

His teacher's gaze burned, his jaw clenched. "You are playing a dangerous game with me, Em."

Emery bit his lip, desperate to find the right words to say to make him listen. "Arthur left a week ago."

Arx cocked a brow. "I was made aware that his indenture was paid."

"The library has no attendant, and a new Archiver hasn't been selected yet."

The old man leaned back, stretching out his bad leg. "I am sure the library will be fine unattended for a while."

"Master," Emery stood tall, his expression solid as his eyes met with his friend and teacher. "Allow me to head the library."

"You?" Arx deadpanned.

"No one knows it better than I."

Arx was quiet. "The Archiver doesn't belong to a high division," he explained, mindful of precisely what his student was after.

"Please, sir, let me serve my country."

Staring coldly into Emery's gold eyes, Arx folded his hands over the scattered paperwork on his desk. "If that is what you wish. Then, I will allow it."

First division Archiver was the single most remarkable achievement of Emery's entire life. It also served as his greatest disappointment. 

The cold air pulled Emery back to the present. The pain wrapped around his neck like a noose; he could barely breathe. After everything he'd done. All those years of tirelessly working towards achievements he would never reach. He learned to be okay with it all. His mother would never praise him, but that was okay. His country would never scream his name, but that was alright. Magic would never be more for him than a faint, flickering light. He knew that. He accepted that. 

His mind wandered back to the explosion on the train. The power he felt was so raw and wild. It was everything he wanted. He really thought that it was finally his. But now as he stared at his open palm, warm at the center where the flame once lived, his heart felt empty.

"I didn't work."