Reflections And Consequences

[Cyrus the virus]

Luc hadn't felt his own face for some time, but he did now.

He was running a hand along his chin, feeling the bristles of his beard on his pale, pruned hand, a hand that hadn't seen the light of day in years. On the oak table in front of him lay his gloves - plated, protective mitts that protected his hands from his own destructive magic. They were burned in places and were missing many of their armored scales, but Luc had never noticed. He was not a man of keen senses. He wasn't even a man who paid attention to his own thoughts.

Even now he was lost in contemplation, but was somehow only semi-aware of what he was contemplating. His mind was careening in some dark, invisible pit in his mind. It was a semi-conscious existence Luc Kraus had adopted, though not by choice; irresponsible exploration of magic, alternate dimensions and the toying of time had destroyed a part of him.

He was in an isolated cave in the upper mountain ranges of Raeaira, where he could keep a close eye on Eluriand, a city he'd convinced himself to hate many years ago. Something about elves and a school of magic... Luc couldn't quite recall.

He'd built a pathetic life for himself here away from the difficulties of civilization, not that any city would have welcomed a murderous wizard anyway. With the ability to summon food from an otherworldy plane and no love for the luxury of bathing, Luc had delved deep into the tome he'd discovered so long ago. He'd given his services to Xem'zund in return for the favor of translating the massive textbook, but the lich hadn't been quite honest in his promise. Rather than actually translating the book, he'd buried a hand deep into Luc's mind and given him the ability to understand the text.

The knowledge of an ancient and forgotten tongue was given to the mage, but that wasn't all. The undead lich's hand had infused Luc with language, but had dulled his ability to physically feel; it was as if the lich had accidentally prodded the wrong part of Luc's brain.

The tome itself, for all of the wizard's effort in finding a way to read it, detailed the secrets of life and death. At more than a thousand yellowed pages, it explained the methods and components required to reinstate life. Not to create animation where there is none, but to re-invigorate a body with the life it once had. To resurrect.

[Cyrus the virus]

To animate an inanimate object was a different process, one that Luc had learned long ago. The spell gave an object the power to move and act of its own accord, but there was no thought process - such constructs were bound to Luc's will, and a steady focus on the animated object was necessary to maintain its 'life'.

To bring back the dead was an entirely alien concept in regards to animation. It required, according to Luc's tome, a ritual that would take hours to complete. It also required the ritual's creator to sacrifice his own life, essentially trading his life for the life of the one he sought to resurrect. Needless to say, Luc had never made a friend dear enough for him to even consider using the ritual. All the same, it was a power he had a thirst to command.

A breeze made its way into the mouth of his cave, but it wasn't able to tousle his hair - it hadn't been washed in months. He was naked except for a pair of black, linen pants, everything else lay crumpled in the corner of the cavern, including the cape he'd once cherished.

His emerald eyes had glazed over as he stared at the cave wall, but they refocused suddenly, darting around in mild surprise. He hadn't really been here for the past few minutes; his mind had left to explore some other place, as if his thoughts were divided and distributed around different dimensions. There was no telling how long he'd consciously be in Raiaera.

"How long..." he asked aloud to himself. Luc was aware of his mind's wandering, of his consciousness simply leaving to go elsewhere, but he never remembered whatever it had done, or thought, wherever it was that it went.

He stood, using the crude earthen chair he'd made for himself to stay stable. His legs had mildly atrophied, as he almost never rose from his chosen place of study.

Stumbling over to the pile of clothing in the corner, Luc knelt down and searched through them. After a moment he produced a small scrap of paper, stained with dirt and yellowed with age - it was crisp and easy to unfold, but Luc handled it with the care of a small child holding his favorite, most fragile toy. His eyes darted left to right, reading it for the thousandth time.

[Cyrus the virus]

Fifteen Years Ago...

Radasanth was bustling as always. The bazaar was a popular destination for buyers from all over Althanas, a hub for goods from every edge of every island and continent in the world. It was a relatively safe, certainly the most safe, place for merchants to do business with people they would have never encountered otherwise.

A young, patient, but exciteable Luc Kraus weaved through the meandering citizens, his eyes shining with vibrance and joy. In his hand he clasped the most precious thing in his world: another hand. And he wasn't wearing gloves.

Behind him a girl of stunning beauty followed, a yellow, flowing dress clinging to her body in most places. She was giggling frantically, her eyes shining with that same youthful vigor. They were green, but more jade than emerald.

"Luc, slow down!" she cried between laughs.

"You don't mean that!" he responded, ducking the outstretched hand of a woman pointing across the way. "You're even more excited than I am and you know it!"

She was Alice, a woman Luc would spend the next fifteen years trying to forget. She was the reason his obsessive thirst for magic, relics and literature began. His heart raced when he was near her, when he tasted the flavor of her lips, when they touched.

They'd been together for a year, the fastest year of the mage's life. With no parents or family to speak of, Luc latched onto his relationship with Alice even more solidly than an 18-year-old normally would. She was his everything.

He'd set up a picnic north of the city, atop a grassy hill overlooking Radasanth's port and bazaar. He rushed up the side of the hill, dragging her along. Luc had hired a peer to guard the site, and in accordance with the youth's instructions he'd disappeared when he saw Luc approaching.

She gasped when they crested the hill and she saw the picnic. A large, plush, red blanket had been spread out, and atop it were wines, salads, lit candals (despite the daylight), and sandwiches. Her surprise came not from the thought, but at the idea that Luc had put some effort into making food.

"You actually made sandwiches," she whispered. "Amazing."

Their time passed too quickly, as it always did. Unlike every other day, however, Luc and Alice would not get the chance to walk home hand-in-hand and lament that they had to part for the night.

Raiders and thieves were not uncommon in Radasanth at the time, especially because the military had not taken the steps necessary to protect the outskirts of the city. On this fateful day, a band of thieves climbed that very hill, catching Luc and Alice naked and in each other's arms, wrapped in that red blanket.

What followed was hazy in Luc's memory. All he remembered was that in the end, Alice and the thieves were dead, and he was hunkered over his love, staring into her eyes. They were cold, bleak, nothing like the bright eyes he'd drowned in so many times.

He could never care for anyone again.

[Cyrus the virus]

Present.

"Cold, jade eyes that liquify
Eyes that are merciless,
staring in mute mockery
and in mockery of the muteness."

He read the poem aloud to himself, kneeling in that dark, isolated cave in Raiaera. They were the first words he'd spoken aloud in a year or more.

The words were printed almost illegibly in black coal pencil, but Luc knew them by heart anyway. He hated the poem, hated how it sounded, hated the words, hated the implication that those eyes were staring blindly, mocking him with the promise that he'd never hear Alice's voice again.

It was amateur work and the writing of a young fool, but he couldn't bear to part with it. This was the closest connection to his humanity that Luc had, a link to a time in his life when he had a choice to make, a decision whether to follow the path of a hateful man or to be strong and overcome. Luc never did make the right decisions, and the former road had led him here, to a cave where he existed alone and in perpetual anger. He no longer felt loneliness, at least.

The mage stood and dressed himself in dirt-stained clothing. He wandered aimlessly to the mouth of the cave, where the blackened sky stretched endlessly beyond him. He could see heavy clouds, could sense the rain coming by the smell of the air - or was that just his sense for the elements? He could no longer tell the difference between his human senses and his other, magical ones.

Miles and miles of lesser mountains splattered the landscape below his cave, grey mounds in the distance that ran over and around one another. As he stared at them, his eyes glossed over and his pupils dilated. His mind was elsewhere again.

Minutes later it returned, and Luc blinked away the dryness in his eyes. Again, he was dully aware of what had occurred.

He stepped into the sky, summoning a gust of wind beneath himself to hold his body aloft. Such a trick was all too natural to him now, hardly requiring a thought. His cape billowed behind him as he descended, seeking the spot he'd gone to every day for the last month.

[Cyrus the virus]

Twenty Years Ago...

A stream of fire coiled around a younger Luc like a snake, spinning around with increasing speed until it was a blur.

Then an orange flash and the roar of flames grew too much. The mage recoiled and tried to back off, but he was surrounded. The flames singed his back - the pain drove him forward and into the fire in front of him - instinctively he threw his hands out to brace himself. The flames washed over them and he cried out in agony.

They disappeared almost immediately, but Luc crashed to his knees and pounded the floor of Eluriand's School of Magic, specifically the advanced elemental manipulation classroom.

"How many times am I going to tell you to stay calm?" asked the ever calm Illidan, Luc's professor and harsh taskmaster. The elven wizard possessed a command over fire as advanced as Luc's ability to breathe. "You don't get a free ride for being gifted for your age."

"Qua ten' i ilavi, lle vin. Qui kai hianil vi illili en' queli quessir."

The response had come from a seated elf behind the professor, a youth among many who were watching intently. This was only Luc's third day in Eluriand and his second of class, but already he knew how hated he was here. This particular elf, with glassy aqua-blue eyes, seemed to take exceptional joy in Luc's failure.

"Silence," Illidan responded. He himself didn't enjoy Luc's presence in the school, but had a sense of duty that overrode his personal taste. He had fire-red hair and turquoise eyes, and dwarfed Luc at more than six feet. Illidan would go on to aid in draining the young Luc's magical abilities in a ritual, years later.

Luc stood without using his hands as support - they were burned and smoking. They were later healed by an attending nurse who had a strong command of holy magic, but Luc would never again mess with fire without gloves.

"It's too hard," he whined. "You're giving me too much, it's too fast an-"

Illidan grabbed Luc by his arms and pulled him up with hardly an effort. Then, the human clearly remembered, Illidan took Luc's damaged hands into his own, squeezing them tightly.

Luc cried out, but Illidan didn't release him. "If you do not control the fire, bend it to your will, dominate it, it will hurt you. It will run amock, embarrass and enrage and destroy you. It does not have a mind, it is a tool. Use it!"

Illidan released him and Luc fell back to his knees, sobbing. He wanted to be home, but had no home to go to. He was embarrassed and beaten, with no drive to continue.

This experience was only one of many Luc remembered from Eluriand, and there were many more that he'd forgotten. Through these trials he'd learned much, but the mage wasn't strong enough to respect his past - though he'd eventually become masterful in his command of the elements, he associated Eluriand with anger and distaste. He hated the city, and more than once tried to destroy it.

(("Gifted for a human, you mean. He's nothing special among a handful of common elves."))

[Cyrus the virus]

Present.

Luc descended through the dark sky like a spectre, his cape, shirt and pants flapping in the violent wind that had manifested. Rain fell from the sky as he contemplated his time in Raiaera, soaking him to the bone.

He finally reached his destination, a small plateau among a range of mountains where a clearing void of tree or shrub overlooked a valley. Here he had carved an immense glyph, a circle seventy feet in diameter filled with arcane symbols of varying complexity. The grooves of the carving were filled with crimson, flowing blood.

Luc looked over the glyph as he had done so many times before, over this past month. It looked intact, as it did every time he examined it, but he was never sure enough to be satisfied. His arm, dangling at his side, was covered in scars and cuts - the blood was his own. He'd steadily added more and more, as much as he could manage per day, keeping his strength up with overwordly foods and drink summoned from beyond.

This life-giving ritual required not only the sacrifice of the caster's life, but an offering of thirty days' worth of it in advance. This would be Luc's last such offering. His last day of living on Althanas.

He cut his arm with a blade of wind, summoned in an instant and slashed along his flesh just as quickly. Grunting, the mage knelt by the grooves of the glyph and dipped his arm into the pool of blood, letting the fresh offering stream forth into it.

[Cyrus the virus]

Seventeen Years Ago...

Luc Kraus lay on the floor of Bloodfist Citadel, in a pool of his own blood, feeling the warm liquid on his back and all over his body.

He could see the ceiling clearly, a high stone roof with arcane etchings, ivy and dirt all over it. He remembered that they were dull when he'd entered the ruins, but they now glowed with power, reverberating with the gentle hum akin to that of modern electricity.

Luc tried to move his head to the side to see who was laughing, but it was if his blood-soaked hair was too heavy to lift. He quickly recognized the voice of Illidan, one of his teachers from Eluriand's School of Magic. Luc had a vague recollection of how he'd ended up in this position.

"It worked!" Luc heard the elf cry. By now, the human had learned to speak elven very well. "By gods, the legends of this temple were true!"

Luc heard another voice, a gutteral, droning tone. "Draining the magical abilities and potential of a person... This is overwhelming. We can't allow this place to exist any longer, now that we've used it."

There were murmurs of agreement, but Luc could sense excitement within them. Something had occurred here that he hadn't been informed about.

All around the bloody teen two men, a woman, and three elves stood, each on a corner of a hexagram carved into the floor with Luc in the center. The rumors about Bloodfist Citadel, in accordance with the legend, was that it could be used to rob someone of their power, potential and life. In reality, it locked away the mystical abilities of its victim and divided the magic, sending it across the world in six directions dictated by the hexagram's points.

Because they were standing on the six points of the carving, the power drained from Luc was cast into each of them. And because his power had been over the elements, each of Luc's betrayers gained the ability to manipulate one element especially well.

The six were all teachers from Luc's school who had noticed his potential. In his youth, the mage had power greater than any of them, truly remarkable ability - they'd only gotten him here through an elementary lie. They promised him that his parents had both been found; it was simple for one of them to knock him out from behind. Gambling on the citadel's legend, they'd tried the legendary ritual.

There were hundreds of details regarding this event, but Luc forgot most of them. He remembered clearly the sound of Illidan's laugh, remembered the feel of his insides being torn from him while he lay in the temple, remembered that he only survived because the teachers believed that the legend meant the citadel's ritual would kill him. They destroyed the temple around him, but he eventually crawled out of the rubble.

[Cyrus the virus]

Present.

Luc snapped out of his revarie, pulling his arm out of his own blood. The sensation of his hand in the warm fluid had brought him back to that moment so long ago.

A rush of dizziness flooded him. How long had he been pouring his own blood into the glyph's grooves?

The mage placed his bare hand against the cut, muttered a phrase, and a bright light between his palm and bicep shone on the gloomy peak. In an instant his laceration was healed, though a scar still remained. He stared at it for a moment in quiet contemplation, trying to search his past for the details surrounding that moment seventeen years ago.

It took him years to regain that which he'd lost. He left for Radasanth and read every text on magic and spellcasting he could find in Corone's biggest library, slowly remembering that which had been torn from him. He learned to fight with his elemental manipulation, battling the likes of Seth Dahlios, who would go on to be the biggest thorn in Luc's side. He never could overcome the manipulative effects of Seth's hex magic.

Meeting Alice was the only thing that ever interrupted his seemingly tireless thirst for magic. For one year he was with her, and when the time came that he needed to defend her, he could not summon the powers he was trying so hard to recall.

Yes, that was it. He remembered now. Being with Alice made him forget why he so desperately wanted to become powerful again, and losing her to a band of thieves ensured he would never lose that motivation again. Where would I be now, he wondered, if she'd lived?

Certainly not here, he knew, hunkered over a glyph in the ground filled with his own blood, ready to sacrifice his own life to bring hers back. Over time he'd convinced himself not to think of his past, not to consider his motivations for what he'd done. It was easier that way.

His mind disappeared again. It wandered across the universe, across planes of existance, across dimensions. When it came back, the rain had passed and the sun was shining on his face, though he was still wet.

In the center of the massive glyph, Luc had erected an altar made of earth. All that was required now was his willingness to cast the spell while he lay upon the altar. His body, if he'd done everything properly, would be replaced by Alice's.

He would have to leave her a note and a way to descend from the mountaintop. And a sweater, perhaps, with some food and drink. He didn't know if she'd return with clothes or not, nor if she would be hurt or disoriented. The tome only explained the method, not the result.

If only he could be here for her, to continue where they'd left off. He could protect her from anything now, or anyone.

Luc stood, inhaling deeply and carefully maintaining his balance. He made his way to the altar.

[Cyrus the virus]

He lay there for a few moments, his eyes staring emptily into the sky above. The clouds were only now disappearing from the air directly ahead, and he saw beginning to see the blue beyond them. Sunlight crept against his skull from somewhere behind him.

He knew the incantation to begin the spell, had the words in mind, but he held them on the tip of his tongue. The mage had already forgotten the preparations he wanted to make for Alice - he was entirely focused on this, the final moment before the end of his life.

Five minutes passed. Then ten. Soon the minutes were melting together like droplets from a candle.

Ultimately, Luc could not bring himself to speak the words and activate the spell. As much as he knew his life was void of meaning, as much as he'd loved the girl from his youth, the man was ultimately too selfish to sacrifice his own life for hers. All of the time he'd spent studying the tome before Xem'Zund's influence on his mind was for nothing.

How could a man who'd lived his life so selfishly suddenly devote it entirely to someone else? He simply could not.

Luc stood up suddenly. He cried out in rage, in hatred of himself and of everything he'd done up until this point in his life. Below him, the altar shattered and crumbled - bits of stone and earth cut his legs and back, but he did not fall down. The ground below him rumbled and broke apart, spires of earth stabbed out of the stone while simultaneously, other parts of the glyph sank into mud.

The mage allowed himself to descend to the ground below and pounded it with his bare fist, punching the stone and dirt with all of his might, not stopping until the pain was too great for him to possibly continue.

Simmering like the water of a kettle just after boiling, tears streamed down Luc's face. He whispered a word and transformed himself into wind, soaring back up into the sky.

[Cyrus the virus]

Five Years Ago...

Luc slumped over the woman, her hair matted with blood against her forehead. He'd choked her to death with his gloved hands while having her way with her, against her will. Luc was not a physically imposing man, but at this point in his life, his ability with the elements gave him many tools with which to do what he pleased.

He was spent, now, exhausted and relieved. She'd had too much fight in her, and squirmed so much he couldn't really enjoy himself.

"All done now, Luc?" he heard Dan call from the other room.

Luc stood and pulled up his pants. The blonde lay before him, a cruel macabre puppet of what she had once been, iron bands from the building's foundation torn up and wrapped around her limbs. "Yes. Give me a minute," he called.

He and Daniel Wilmhearst left the abandoned home and stood on the outskirts of Radasanth, in a residential district where the poor were given housing by the government. The pair had the impression that they owned the city and could do whatever they liked, an accurate impression.

Dan himself was a hulking creature of a human, bursting with muscle and rage and oddly controlled ambition. He was often level-headed and a dangerous companion to Luc, who was angry at all times and constantly looking to punish somebody. When Dan said to attack, he did so in a way that easily justified the move to Luc.

They had been friends for a time, and each seemed to have his own ambition for their current lifestyle. Luc was without goal, simply existing and taking a cheap thrill where he could. There was nothing for him in this world, it was simply where he lived.

They walked through the city as if they had purpose, though they were there simply to enjoy the thrill of the fear they put in others. They strolled through the bazaar and people stared, too afraid to run, too afraid to call any attention to themselves. The government and the guard did all they can to keep the pair peaceful, but were powerless against the wizard and his friend.

Spending their days killing, stealing, drinking and eating, and taking a woman's flesh whenever they wished, the deadly pair put a permanent impression on Radasanth.

Luc remembered this time clearly. He and Dan terrorized Radasanth like cats toying with a mouse. When they finally tired of the lifestyle, the two separated and went about their lives. The mage soon found the tome of ressurrection, and spent the next five years obsessing over it. He and Dan never met again.

[Cyrus the virus]

Present.

He lay there for a few moments, his eyes staring emptily into the sky above. The clouds were only now disappearing from the air directly ahead, and he saw beginning to see the blue beyond them. Sunlight crept against his skull from somewhere behind him.

He knew the incantation to begin the spell, had the words in mind, but he held them on the tip of his tongue. The mage had already forgotten the preparations he wanted to make for Alice - he was entirely focused on this, the final moment before the end of his life.

Five minutes passed. Then ten. Soon the minutes were melting together like droplets from a candle.

Ultimately, Luc could not bring himself to speak the words and activate the spell. As much as he knew his life was void of meaning, as much as he'd loved the girl from his youth, the man was ultimately too selfish to sacrifice his own life for hers. All of the time he'd spent studying the tome before Xem'Zund's influence on his mind was for nothing.

How could a man who'd lived his life so selfishly suddenly devote it entirely to someone else? He simply could not.

Anger steamed up in him, threatening to burst from his pores and tear out of his veins. Luc stood and screamed to the heavens, clenching his fists and shutting his eyes tightly, fighting back furious tears. This was supposed to be his final shot at redemption, a single act that could redeem him for years of bad choices and the consequences of them. But the mage could not overcome his selfishness and give up his own life - not for Alice, not for anyone.

The ground around him shook and crumbled. It turned to mud and then to stone and then to dirt again, shifting rapidly as its manipulator roared. The glyph in the ground was ripped up and apart, spilling Luc's blood about the clearing.

It wasn't long before he had destroyed the plateau entirely. It was if there had never been a place to stand to begin with, as spires of earth jutted out from every angle and much of the dirt had slid down the side of the mountain.

Luc looked at what he'd done, examined closely the remains of his hard work. He wondered what it was he'd been working toward for his whole life; was this the climax of his young life? This, one of his many failures?

Perhaps it was time to return to Radasanth.

[Cyrus the virus]

It was hours later when Luc appeared on the outskirts of busy Radasanth, a whirlwind of green and black congealing into solid form. His feet slapped softly against the grass of the woods, a sensation seeming very foreign but simultaneously familiar.

He was pounded by the light of the sun through the trees, the kind of brightness that simply didn't exist where he'd been; its warm, inviting kiss was rejected by the mage, who grimaced and put his face toward the ground. There was the vague sensation of taste on his tongue, a dry, bitter flavor. He tried to swivel it around and hack it out of his mouth, but could not.

There'd been plenty of time to think on his way beyond the mountains and across the ocean, his thoughts floating endlessly within his wispy form. He once had a home in Radasanth, a tiny cottage by an eastern road leading out of the city – it wasn’t a busy area, and he could conceivably make his way there unnoticed. Simply traveling there as wind was out of the question, given the strange green glow that surrounded the form.

No matter, he thought to himself as he produced a small blue rod from his belt, a thin tool with a broad triangular tip. Prodding it against his chest, Luc closed his eyes and willed his form to change. From the tip of the rod came a dull, beige blanket of energy which enveloped him, covering his form and fading in merely a moment. His face was not handsome, his clothes were unremarkable. It was fitting enough. He threw the rod aside without a thought.

Fixated on his goal, Luc walked through Radasanth’s bazaar without event. People moved about him as because he was there, but one could not say that he was present. The mage’s mind wandered into his own being, explored what it saw there, and ran.

His dazed eyes barely registered the horizon ahead as Luc’s body went through the motions, carrying him steadily toward the home he’d once known. He did not want to confront what he would feel when he arrived, for this was where he’d stayed when ‘teamed-up’ with Daniel Wilmhearst.

As that thought processed and he snapped back into reality, Luc saw that he was standing in front of that very building. It was a small, one floor unit on the far corner of a deserted street, the ends of which led from the bazaar to a run-down district and onward to the edge of town. A cottage it was not. It was a hovel.

The taste in his mouth was gone.