Amena woke up, feeling as though she had slept for a century. Her limbs felt heavy as she testily reached to rub the sleep from her eyes, a dull ache at the base of her neck. As she tried to prop herself up in the dim lighting, she noticed that she was in an unfamiliar place. Neck stiff, she tilted her head to crack it, but only felt increased drowsiness. Realigning her head to its original position, she slowly took in where she was. She couldn’t see much, but as her eyes adjusted she made out a dark, dreary, but immensely vast monochromatic room with littered spotlights that coldly illuminated the steel and carbon walls - she got the nasty feeling of a dungeon pit where she was to be fed to a large, old, and grey lion.
As she surveyed the expanse, she realized there were bulky bundles littered across the hall. It was an arena-like setup, with layers and layers of wide steps that led to a center stage, the glorified dinner plate for the lion she imagined. As her eyes adjusted to the dim lighting, she realized that these bundles, were in fact, people. People, cocooned into the same scratchy gray blanket she had risen from. She got up and saw that the nearest person was a good ten feet away from her. She realized, with a shiver, that the cocoons were arranged hexagonally - the eerie polygonal placement of human bodies made a honeycomb pattern on the dark marble floor. In fact, there were little depressions in the stone; each hexagon sectioned off the territory of each person in restful slumber.. She glanced at her own stone cubby - it had her name, engraved in silver cursive script at the top: Amena Luxor. The letters shimmered in the darkness, and seemed to almost writhe with life. She shivered at the morbid juxtaposition of elegance on stone cold chamber.
Although she felt she ought to be frantic, panicked, and anxious, she felt calm and dreamlike; naturally, it felt reasonable to attribute the remarkable setup to be a dream. This, she thought, is the strangest dream I have ever had.
.............................................
“Jozantor,” the cold voice was like a steel blade slicing through his consciousness. His head snapped up at the sound of his name.
“Yes, High Leader Ordyzo,” Jozantar’s voice was hard, confident, and - most importantly - emotionless. I have trained the boy well. Harsh green eyes, snake-like in their glittering and vibrance, peered out from a fringe of dead black hair, teeming steadfast devotion.
“They have started to awaken from the narccipholis.” Narccipholis was outlawed by the Mage Laws, but that was of no concern to the High Leader. “Come and observe, on the ecran clarus” An astounding feat of Magework, the ecran clarus broadcasted projected imagery that was identical to that in another physical location. Jozantor had painstakingly created it himself for this very purpose.
Jozantor watched as the first to awaken, a girl whose lilac eyes were still misty from the concoction, eyebrows knitted together in confusion, looked around calmly. She looked as though an ethereal angel had descended into the pits of hell by accident, her golden-white hair, stick straight, shining in the harsh spotlight, contrasting with the grim surroundings of the Enclos. She was the very image of the ideal colouring of a Mage. Unlike the mutt that I am, a filthy crossbreed. Jozantor pushed down his feelings of self-loathing.
“I trust you have everything set for the next stage?” Ordyzo was commanding, and even his question in good faith caused Jozantor to shiver in fear.
“Yes, High Leader.”
“Good. The fun will begin soon.” Ordyzo’s smile was cold and chilling. Jozantor could hardly wait.
Comments (0)
See all