Aeris' Past, Part III

I felt a kind of melancholy at the sight of the cloth “resetting” itself. I wasn’t sure why it had to happen that way. A mural would have been nice, but then again… I can always make my own. I don’t know what becomes of those who are erased like that, but at the very least, I can try to help them. I can let them know they were acknowledged, not forgotten. I’ll keep their memory safe.

“Is that even enough?” I wondered. I could do more, no, I should do more. Maybe keeping a record could help them, heal them. Maybe… it could heal me, too.

I pushed the thought aside. My own wellbeing comes second. A teacher’s duty has always been to nurture others, to help them reach their dreams, their goals. That will never change.

Thinking of my students made my heart ache a little. I missed those kiddos. Teaching had been fun… a joy I’ll never forget. It’s a shame I can’t do that here. After all, I’m a criminal now. But someday, I’ll prove my innocence.

Maybe I’ll find someone here I can take on as a student. And when I do, I won’t repeat my old mistakes. I know I’ll be better… for your sake...

At the thought of him, a wave of sorrow and dread swept over me. I did the only sensible thing I could imagine, laying down. The cell doesn’t have much going for it, which I suppose makes sense. Still, I managed to make a makeshift mattress out of some fabric, and the rest of the bedding, pillows and a blanket, appeared on its own. If only it had conjured a real bed as well… that would have been nice.

When my eyes closed, I wasn’t sure if I was dreaming, or being shown something the prison wanted me to see.

I’ve always heard about this place, part of me imagined it was only an old wife’s tale to keep the kids from wandering into the forests at night and encountering harmful monsters out there, but alas, it’s real.

This prison that is older than time immemorial, this prison that no one has ever escaped from. It’s where I am now. I saw the ancient magic earlier during lunch, so who’s to say that the magic here can’t showcase visions.

Logic will only get me so far when he is standing before me, looking down at his own feet, feeling like a failure. He wasn’t a failure, I wish I could’ve told him that back then, I wish I knew what he was going through back then… what he planned on doing.

“You’re dead, so how are you here, Everett?”

“Why… why would you say that? I… I thought I could trust you!” tears poured down from his face before he started to run off.

A pain swelled inside me more hurtful than anything anyone could imagine, I knew he wasn’t real, that I’m asleep, but…

“I’m sorry!” I cried out, “Please! Don’t go!”

But Everett didn’t stop. His form dissolved into speaks of cloth-like dust, scattering like the mural before. The fragments spiraled upward, getting absorbed into the ceiling’s dark geometry.

I clutched my chest, the ache spreading like wildfire. This wasn’t just a dream, it couldn’t be... Something else was here.

The silence stretched too long, and in it I heard… no, I felt the weight of something vast. The prison itself, looming behind the dream like a stagehand holding up the scenery. My body tensed, and instinctively, the magic that lingered in my blood stirred. Not a spell, not even willful, simply my nature as an elf, a passive current that sensed what eyes could not.

And there it was: a gaze without shape. The prison was watching me. Not from above, not from the walls, but from inside, as though the stone and the silence were only masks hiding its true face.

My choked on my breath. I couldn’t look away, though there was nothing to look at. Then, a murmur vibrated through the marrow of my bones:

Aeris Faelan, you are not yet whole.

The words, different from the booming I heard earlier, carried no malice, no mercy, just truth. It was like a judgment was deferred.

I wanted to demand answers. To scream, to ask why they had brought Everett right before me, to ask why I had been forced to watch him leave again. But the weight in my chest pressed harder, until even thought became a trembling thing.

And then, I felt nothing.

The dream, the presence, the ache, it all unraveled like fabric tugged at the seams. Darkness folded over me.

When next I opened my eyes, I was back in my cell.

How long had passed, I couldn’t say. The stale air was the same, the gray stone was the same, yet I was not. I could still feel the echo of the prison’s gaze in my chest, as if it had burned its words into my soul.

I leaned against the wall, clutching my knees. My time imprisoned will not end anytime soon. Until I became whole, whatever that meant, I would have to remain here.

*** 

As I left the Judgement chamber for the third time, the idea of 'not being whole' rang in my mind, before I knew it I had walked myself into my cell.

I sat there, in the corner, thinking back on everything that has happened in the past few months. Maybe past few years, I lost track of the time.

A noise broke the stillness, distant at first, then nearer, the dragging of chains, the thud of a heavy door. Someone else had been brought in.

I closed my eyes and reached outward with my own elven instincts. What I touched was chilling. Not anger, not sorrow, not fear. Nothing so sharp. This was dull, stagnant, like ashes where a fire once burned.

"Apathy."

The word slipped unbidden from my lips, sinking into the stone between us. I was somewhat afraid, who might someone be to have apathy in their hearts after being imprisoned. Where there others here who weren't innocent?

And with it, I knew my long silence in this place was about to end. But it turns out, I was wrong about a few things. I was wrong to try and think of getting a new student to fill the hole in heart, I was wrong about my approach, I was wrong about him... both of them.

As I finished my desert, I found myself truly smiling. Maybe now, I'm becoming whole.