Chapter 58 - Coercive Forces

I’ve never been up this early in my life but this project is worth it. The village is still caught in the grey hush between night and day.

I stroll past the southern palisade gate and the heat from Taelun’s makeshift forge awakens a sting on my skin as it chases away the summer night's chill. 

Taelun’s face is smudged with soot and illuminated by the hungry orange glow of coals. His easy-going confidence is notably absent. 

Clovis stands beside him, her arms crossed, her posture a rigid line of academic anxiety. Between them, resting on a bed of soft leather on the anvil, is the lens.

It’s larger than I expected, a disc of polished blue mana stone. Its surface is flawless, and it seems to consume the firelight, refracting it into a hundred tiny, dancing rainbows. 

Taelun has mounted it in a simple, sturdy frame of blackened iron with two handles. It’s a work of brutal elegance.

“It looks magnificent.” They finally look up from its brilliance as I speak.

A tired proud grin cracks through the grime on Taelun’s face. “Thank you, I had to re-polish it three times to get the curvature just right, without it fracturing. She’s a delicate beast.”

Clovis doesn’t share his pride. Her crimson eyes are fixed on the lens with critical appraisal. “I just hope our size theory works out to be true.”

“There’s only one way to find out.” I say, stepping forward.

Together, Clovis and I take a handle each. The iron is still warm. 

We hold it between us and I am surprised by how light it feels. 

We both peer through, the world on the other side is washed in a faint, ethereal blue, every edge softened and haloed. 

But that’s all. The air is just air. There is no mist, no smoke, no sign of the corrupted mana anywhere.

“Nothing.” Clovis says, her voice flat with disappointment. “Can you see anything?”

“No.” My enthusiasm is quickly dismissed.

We lower the lens and the silence that follows is only broken by the crackle of the forge.

“Maybe the source needs to be stronger.” I suggest, trying to keep the desperation from my voice. “Like with the blood. Maybe it’s too faint in the open air.”

“The corrupted stones. Let’s try one of them.” Clovis pulls the small thatch bag from her belt and carefully tips one of the dull, jagged crystals onto the anvil.

We raise the lens again. I hold my breath, searching for any sign, any flicker of red.

And again, nothing. The stone is just a stone, viewed through a blue filter.

“It’s not working.” Clovis does little to hide her disappointment. But the scholar within refuses to be cut down. “Why isn’t it working? Our principle was sound.”

“Maybe the lens is too big,” I theorize, the words tumbling out in a rush. 

“What if it’s absorbing the corrupted mana before it can propagate back into the air? Or maybe we were wrong from the start. Maybe the reaction we saw with the blood wasn’t corrupted mana at all. Maybe it was some unique reaction with mana and blood?”

“I don’t know what you two are talking about.” Taelun interjects, his voice rough with exhaustion.

He gestures vaguely at the lens and the stone. “But you’re both wound up tighter than a bowstring. Why don’t you just calm down and do what you did in the first place?”

“Because we don’t have time to calm down!” Clovis snaps, her frayed nerves finally giving way. She spins on him, her eyes blazing with a frustration born of sleepless nights and intellectual dead ends. 

“You don’t understand. What we did in the first place was dangerous! The reaction with the blood, it wasn’t some neat little parlor trick, it was volatile and unpredictable!”

“Clovis.” I say, stepping between them. Her fear is justified, but Taelun’s simple logic is undeniable. We’re out of time. The expedition leaves in a few hours. Arrian will not tolerate failure. “He’s right. We have to try.”

“No.” Clovis puts her foot down, her instincts overriding her scientific curiosity. 

“It’s too much of a risk.. It can wait. We can tell Arrian we need more time.”

“He won’t give it to us.” I say, my voice steady with a resolve that surprises me. 

I look down at my left arm, at the sleeve covering the wounds that are a constant, throbbing reminder of the price. “I’m willing to try. It’s the only option we have left with the time we have.”

She looks at me, as an argument plays out in her mind, but she sees the decision is already made.

There’s no paper, no charcoal, nothing to write with. A written spell is out of the question.

The words are already there, waiting anyway. I take a deep breath, focusing on my intent, on the desperate need to see, to understand.

I begin the only incantation I have memorised at this point, ironically on a stone that can’t possibly benefit from its effect. 

“Let stone be cloud, let tether be freed. 

Restraint unallowed and anchor to sea…”

The moment the words leave my lips, the pain begins slowly and gradually. 

It’s hateful agony has become my bitter companion in my pursuit for a life with purpose.

I look down at my left arm. Through the fabric of my tunic. The sickly, violet fluid is weeping from my scars again, saturating the cloth, its rancid, metallic scent tainting the air.

I grit my teeth, fighting to hold the incantation, to keep my performance from breaking. 

Clovis holds steady beside me, but she isn’t looking at my arm this time. Her attention is utterly, completely fixed on the scene unfolding on the anvil. 

Out of the corner of my eye I can see her face light up with astonishment.

“Shikara, it’s worked you can stop.” she breathes out a reverent whisper. 

The light from my incantation stops but the pain only intensifies, I try not to show it but I can feel the fluid dripping down my arm.

“As soon as your spell got about halfway done… the stone… it just started bleeding into the air.” She hands me the lens to take a look after I place the stone down. “They’re not there without it. As soon as you move the lens away, they vanish.”

I place the lens in front of my head and there is a flurry of red wisps radiating from the corrupted stone. Some of them are entering the ground and some of them going into the air in random directions. 

It’s breathtaking. They aren’t like the smoke we saw; these move with a slow, serpentine grace, like silken threads unspooling in a gentle current.

We stare, mesmerized, at the impossible sight. We have our proof. We have our tool. 

But the joy of discovery is tainted by a cold, dreadful certainty. 

The key to this new sight, the only way to activate the lens and see the sickness that plagues this world, is for us to cause further harm to it and ourselves.