I shut the door behind me, sliding the bolt into place. Walking across the room, I cracked open the windows, letting a little light into the dark space.
Rays of dying sunlight illuminated the mess that was my life. An unmade bed in the corner furthest from the door. A small wardrobe hanging open and empty, with clothes spread across the floor. Near the middle of the room sat a rough wooden table with my old journal sitting open, next to a carved wooden stick I had spent days fashioning. A cold and dead fireplace sat directly across from the door in the far left corner. A brown rug offering only minimal comfort from the hard wooden floors and cold stone walls. Against the wall next to the dresser was a sheet, covering the mirror.
In the safety of my room, I pulled down my hood. Reaching behind my head, I untied the mask and took it off. Immediately my left eye watered, as the dancing white light returned to the bottom of my vision. I laid the mask on the table and took off my black outer robes, draping them over a chair. Lowering myself into it, I rested my cane against the edge of the table and sighed, sitting back in my seat. Outside my window, the noise of Farburn rumbled. I cursed how close I was to the market, how close I was to the harbor.
How close I was to the people.
I tried to remind myself that nobody here knew me. It had taken all the coin I possessed to distance myself from Ironheart. I had never even heard of Farburn when I lived in the fortress; the chance any of the apprentices knew its location was slim to none.
When you lived in the fortress. It seems so long ago now, doesn’t it?
The voice, so familiar yet strange, echoed through my head.
“It’s only been five months.” I muttered to myself.
And you’re still no closer to getting back, it responded
I turned my attention to the wooden stick, grabbing it and the old dagger that had followed me all my journey here. I spent a few seconds carving, smoothing out the wood and trying to make it look right. But for the most part, I was trying to silence the voice in my head that had gotten so loud these past few months.
My body ached, and my arms were heavy with exhaustion. I had been trying to earn coin with odd jobs that I could pick up at the market or near the harbor, cleaning up stalls, counting boxes, whatever I could to continue getting by here. It was barely enough for food and shelter, and whatever was left over I was saving for passage even further west from Ironheart. Even further away from Sorin.
Memories flooded in again. Memories of the massive workshop deep within the fortress’s halls. The shelves that expanded tens of feet across the walls, carrying bottles and bottles of souls that Sorin had won or gained from deals. A portion of his power on display for anyone who dared challenge him. The light from the contained souls illuminated the rest of the workshop, allowing the master to do his work. Turning the essence of a human being into a lamp.
I put my hand on my chest, imagining that I could feel the broken soul beneath the flesh and bones. My magic was still unresponsive; the staff I was trying to fashion was nothing more than a wooden stick, the words scribbled across the pages of my journal were nothing but ink spilt across paper.
“I still own my soul.” I said to myself, “That’s more than most of Sorin’s challengers can say.”
Leaning against the wooden stick, I pushed myself to my feet. My right leg tingled and trembled under the weight, telling me its complaints through needles of pain. Walking to the center of the room, I tried to hold my balance. Holding the staff out in front of me. I spoke the words that I had gotten to know so well.
“Sit baculus meus effundio animae meae, fructus spiritus mei, et redundantia potentiae meae.”
My broken soul ached and groaned. I shut my eyes and tensed my muscles, imagining a blue light pouring out from my chest, moving down my arms, and entering into the staff in front of me.
When I opened my eyes, it was as cold and dead as it was when I bought the scrap wood that made it two months ago.
We need a soul. The voice called out, something to support our power.
I hobbled back to the table and traded my staff for the redwood cane. Pacing angrily across the length of the small room, I thought. I needed a soul, but I could not get a soul without a deal, and the only deal that someone would trade their soul for was magic, which I could not do without a soul. It seemed like an impossible task.
Farburn had no magic. The people worked with their hands instead of their souls. In a way, this was good. It was out of the sights and minds of the wizards, no reason to visit a town with no wizard, a land with no magic. But as a result, magic was strange and foreign to the townsfolk. I had heard the stories they told in the marketplace and whispered to each other in the harbor. Stories of people who cheat death, who steal souls from the less fortunate to fuel an endless search for power. Some spoke about them with awe and reverence, as if discussing a king or a god. But others spoke with vile disgust in their voices, as if the idea of magic itself made them sick to their stomachs.
The whispers had included me. Rumors had spread like wildfire through the small town about the masked stranger holed up in their rented housing. Watching eyes pierced my broken soul as I bought materials from the market or worked at the harbor. Few had dared speak to me, but their thoughts were clear in the name they whispered behind my back.
“The Masked Wizard.”
They guessed where I came from: Barewall, Neverbourne, Ironheart, Dimfell, one of the cities built in the shadows of magic, in the shadows of the wizards. Some thought I was one of the wizards of those cities: Edius, Urick, Avoldor, even Sorin, coming to hunt for new apprentices or old enemies. Others believed I was a new wizard looking to turn Farburn into a base of operations, to drag them into the worldwide system of magic and strife that had characterized the rise and fall of so many wizards before me.
The voice in my head spoke once more.
Let them write legends, let them give us a platform to rebuild our legacy.
“Some legacy,” I said to myself, “a man hidden in a room he doesn’t own, drifting along the edges of the world.”
The sunlight outside the window was dying; its rays slipping beneath the roofline and out of sight. I slowly walked over to the lumpy and rough bed I had lost so much sleep upon and laid down.
A soul needs a deal, a deal needs a person, a person needs a spell, and a spell needs a soul.
A soul needs a deal, a deal needs a spell, a spell needs a soul.
A soul needs a spell, a spell needs a soul.
A soul needs a soul.
Turning this over in my mind, I drifted off to sleep.
======
“Where is he?”
A voice rang out, muffled and distorted, as if I were hearing it from underwater or behind glass. Red lights danced around my vision, and two blurred figures approached me.
“Where is Ezer Morningsun?” the voice asked.
I tried to respond, but I couldn’t speak. The two blurred figures looked at one another quickly before facing me again.
“We’ve found the route he took out of Ironheart.” Another voice said, “He pawned off the robes he stole at the trading shop, then bought a ticket on a freight ship to Falsebrook. We can have a team there within the month to figure out where-”
A blurred hand rose from my right side, cutting off the other voice, which must have been one of the figures.
“Who knows about this?” the original voice asked.
“The shopkeeper of Barrel’s Bottom and the man who sold him his ticket. We questioned them directly.” The second voice replied.
“Where are they now?”
“As you requested, they are no longer with us.”
The hand slipped back down out of view.
“Good,” the original voice said. “We want to avoid these issues as much as possible. If this gets out to others, they will join our hunt.”
The figures bobbed their heads as if nodding.
“Keep up the search. If anyone gets too close to the truth, make it look like an accident,” the voice said.
The figures bent forward, bowing, before turning and hurrying out of sight. A sigh emanated from somewhere outside my vision.
“Where are you, Ezer? I have so much more use for you now.”
======
I bolted awake, sitting upright in my bed, pain shooting up my back and down my stiff leg at the sudden movement. Breathing heavily, I looked around at the darkened shapes that made up my bedroom. Sighing, I grabbed hold of my cane and stood to my feet. Walking to the table, I struck a match and lit a candle. Taking it to the window, I opened the wooden shutters and placed it down on the windowsill. Returning to the table, I dragged one of the old wooden chairs to the window and sat down, looking out into the town beyond.
I had come to enjoy these moments. The silence and starlight, looking out at the town below and feeling the wind on my face, unencumbered by the mask. Here I could feel normal, forget about the scar, about the hiding and running, about all of it.
Farburn was, at its core, an overgrown trading post. Hunters and fishers would come in and trade their goods with the merchants and the ships that were passing through, getting materials they needed for the next hunt and the next few months. I had consulted every map I could find, and there wasn’t much further beyond this point. The forests I could see just beyond the edge of the town felt like the edge of civilization itself, the door into the wild beyond.
It was peaceful here. A quiet town at the edge of the world.
I sat and watched out the window as the moon began its long journey back down towards the horizon. Standing up, I blew out the candle and brought it back to the table. Leaving the chair for the morning, I shut the shutters and stretched.
My eye caught the sheet hung up on the wall, covering the mirror. I instinctively touched my face, running my hand down the length of the scar.
Look at yourself. The Voice commanded.
I took a step towards the mirror before shaking my head.
“No,” I muttered.
Ezer, the Voice responded, Look at yourself’
“I don’t want to.” I responded, louder this time.
But even as I spoke, I was walking towards the mirror. Reaching out, I grasped the sheet that I had spent so long hanging up.
I hesitated. Was I really going to do it? I could easily let go of the sheet. I could go back to bed right now, wait until morning and go back out to find work in the harbor.
Look at yourself.
I pulled my arm, and the sheet fell away. The glow of my scar illuminated my face as I stared into the mirror.
The man who looked back at me was thin and wild, with black hair draping down towards his shoulders and sunken eyes accentuating the pale white skin of my face. The glowing white scar cut my face in two, and the dirty and stained inner robes I had worn to bed draped awkwardly across my thin and frail form.
“You would think after a few months of manual labor I would look stronger.” I said ruefully, turning my head to study my face.
Ezer. The Voice said.
“What do you want?”
I heard a shushing sound in my head.
Did you hear that?
I listened, trying to pick out what the voice could have heard in the silence of the night air.
“Help!”
There, a distant voice. I hurried to the window and looked out. I saw a dancing light coming from the forest, growing larger with each passing second.
“Someone’s in trouble.” I breathed.
Hurry, Ezer, we can help him, but only if we get there fast enough. The Voice exclaimed.
Moving as fast as my leg would allow, I threw on my outer robes and tied on my mask. I heard the distant voice call for help again as I hobbled out the door.
======
Hurrying down the street, I searched for the person calling for help. My leg ached, tight muscles sending daggers of pain up and down my body. Trying not to fall, I hurried towards the edge of town.
“Somebody help us!” the voice called. It was far closer now.
A few lights had come on in Farburn, and I could see heads of other townsfolk peering through the windows.
“I’m coming!” I called.
Hurry, Ezer, before someone else reaches them. The Voice said.
Passing the last house of the town, I saw the light I had seen from my room. From here I could tell it was a lantern, carried by a man with black and grey hair. He was carrying something on his shoulders and was stumbling under its weight.
“Please help me!” he said, seeing me standing at the end of the road.
Hurrying to him, I grabbed his arm with one hand. A moment of fear rolled over me as I realized I wouldn’t be able to hold him if he fell.
On his shoulders was the body of a young boy, an arrow sticking out of his neck.
“What happened?” I asked. The man looked at me with tear-filled eyes and an expression of pure fear.
“He stood right as I let go of the arrow,” he said through sobs, “he was trying to get a better vantage point, but I… I…”
The man’s knees buckled, and he stumbled to one side.
“Okay, okay,” I said, “You’re okay. Put him down.”
“We need a doctor!” the man screamed.
“Shh, someone’s coming,” I assured him. “You’re in no condition to keep going; you could fall and drop him.”
The man looked at me for a second before nodding. Dropping to his knees, he lifted the boy off his shoulder and laid him down on the cobblestone street.
I kneeled next to him, examining the wound. The arrow had pierced his neck; while it hadn’t come out the other side entirely, I could feel the metal tip pressing against the skin. As the man sobbed behind me, I studied the arrow and weighed my options.
“Please, can you help him?” the man asked.
I sat back and sighed. No doctor could get that arrow out safely. The boy’s breath was shallow, and blood spilled out from the wound, staining the cobblestone street.
“I don’t think…” I started.
This boy needs a spell. A spell needs a soul. A soul needs a deal. The voice muttered.
I spun around and grabbed the man’s shoulders.
“Give me your soul.”
“What?” the man said, looking at me with wild and confused eyes.
“I can help him, but I need your soul to do it right.” I said.
The man looked at the unconscious boy, tears dripping down his face and staining his dirt-covered brown and green robes.
“How do…how do I do it?” he asked.
I stuck out my hand.
“Shake my hand and say you give it to me, in exchange for me helping your son.”
The man grabbed my hand, speaking through tears.
“Take it, I give my soul to you, masked wizard. Just save my son, please!”
I shook his hand and responded.
“I, the Wizard in the Mask, accept this exchange.”
A deep orange light emitted from the man’s chest. As I watched, it traveled up towards his arm, crossing onto my hand, then up and into my chest. Looking down, I briefly saw the two flickering halves of my soul, dimly shining the ice-blue light I used to command so fluidly. As I watched, the orange light of the man’s soul touched mine and shifted into the same ice blue hue.
I felt a wave of energy wash over me, as if a dam had broken and the water it had held back was rushing forward with renewed vigor. Letting go of the man’s hand, I stood.
We need a staff. The voice said.
I cursed under my breath. The staff I had made was all the way back in my room. There was no time to go retrieve it.
Thinking quickly, I shifted my weight to my good leg and held the old redwood cane out in front of me.
“Sit baculus meus effundio animae meae, fructus spiritus mei, et redundantia potentiae meae.” I said.
A wave of blue light traveled down my arms and into the cane. Blue crystalline tendrils began wrapping around the red wood up the length of the cane and onto the handle, forming a teardrop-shaped crystal right on the handle’s edge. The light faded from my arms, and I placed my staff back on the ground, leaning against it once again for support.
Townsfolk surrounded us, and they all watched as the masked stranger they had gossiped about confirmed their rumors. Paying them no mind, I knelt next to the boy again.
“Hold him down,” I commanded. The boy’s father immediately grabbed the unconscious body’s legs. After a breath, another man stepped out of the crowd to grab the boy’s arms.
I placed the handle of my cane on the boy’s neck and grabbed hold of the arrow.
“He’s going to squirm. Hold on tight.” I said, then I began muttering.
“Nervus, textus, sanguis, et os. Restitue, repara, et restitue.”
Repeating the phrase I watched the blue light pour from the staff and surround the wound. Gripping the arrow, I slowly began to pull it out.
“What are you doing?!” came a voice from the crowd. I felt the movement of the boy’s father as he began to stand, letting go of the boy’s legs.
“Don’t move!” I commanded, “Trust me. Nervus, textus, sanguis…”
I slowly kept pulling the arrow out. The boy’s face twisted, then his eyes flew open. He locked eyes with me, and for a moment, there was silence.
Then he began screaming.
“Someone get his head!” I said, “If he moves, he’s going to hurt himself more!”
A woman rushed out of the crowd and grabbed the boy’s head, pulling it onto her lap.
“Be still, young one.” She said, holding his head. “He is helping you.”
I continued muttering to myself as I pulled on the arrow. After a few more agonizingly slow seconds, I saw the arrowhead cross over the broken skin, and it was out. Keeping my cane pressed up against the boy’s neck, I pulled the arrow away from him and watched the wound. The blue light around the dark red cut glowed brighter as the hole from the arrow sealed itself up. The boy slowly stopped moving, staring at the bloody arrow in my hand.
I sat back on my knees, my right leg sending an angry jolt of pain in response.
“He will be okay.” I said, holding the arrow up.
There was silence from the crowd. I slowly raised myself to my feet and offered my hand to the boy. He hesitated for a second before taking it. I muttered a quick spell, and blue light surrounded my right leg, bracing it as I pulled the boy to his feet.
The man slammed into me with a hug, knocking me off balance. He held me upright as he squeezed me so hard it felt like he was trying to push his soul back out of me.
“Thank you,” he whispered. He let me go, and I fell to the cobblestone street as he whipped around and scooped his son up into an equally emotional hug. The people who were helping me keep the boy still quickly helped me to my feet.
“Who are you?” the woman asked.
In an instant, a choice struck me. My hand reached up towards my mask as I considered taking it off.
One soul won’t protect us. Not from Sorin, the voice in my head said.
I dropped my hand to my side.
“I am… The Masked Wizard.” I said, claiming the name that I had heard whispered behind my back for so long.
The woman smiled at me as the men grabbed my arms and held them over my head. It took all I had to not drop my cane as they faced me towards the crowd.
“Three cheers for the wizard!” they cried out.
“Three cheers for the Masked Wizard of Farburn!”
======
The sun was coming up over the horizon when I finally made it back to my room. Exhausted, I dropped my cane and stumbled forward to sit in my chair. My eyes were heavy with tiredness, and my right leg was screaming in agony. It felt like every person in Farburn had wanted to shake my hand. People whom I’d passed wordlessly by on the street for months greeted me like an old friend. It had been hours before I could slip away from the crowd.
“I never gave that man back his soul.” I said to myself, looking at my hand.
The blue light danced around my fingers for a second.
“He didn’t want it back, remember?” a voice said.
I forced myself to my feet, adrenaline pumping through my body as I grabbed at my cane again and put a hand to my face. The mask was still in place.
“Who’s there?” I asked.
A movement caught the corner of my eye, and I looked towards the window. The chair that I had left behind earlier in the night still sat by the open shutters. The mirror stood on the wall a few feet away.
“I’m sorry,” the voice said. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”
It was coming from that empty corner. I took a cautious step forward.
There was a set of legs in the mirror’s reflection.
Hobbling towards the mirror, I looked into it.
The reflection was almost the same as it ever was. I saw the table with my notes spread across it and the staff lying on top of it; my unmade bed sat directly across from the mirror, and my door across the room from that, shut and barred. Sitting on the chair near the window, with its feet resting up on the windowsill, was a shadowy figure wearing the same outfit as mine, a redwood cane hanging off the back of the chair, and a white mask affixed to its face.
My reflection was nowhere to be found.
“Who are you?” I asked.
The shadowy figure put its legs down and stood, picking up its copy of my cane, it walked confidently towards the mirror, towards me.
I took a step backward, stumbling as my right leg threatened to go out. The mask’s eyeholes were blank and black, and there was no discernable face beneath it. It tilted its head slightly and looked me up and down before speaking.
“Isn’t it obvious, Ezer?” it asked. The mask stayed completely still as the voice emanated from the mirror.
“I’m you.”
I stared at it in shock. It leaned against its cane and continued.
“At least, I think I’m you. I’ve been watching out of your eyes since you woke up in Sorin’s fortress. I’ve tried to make myself known as best I can, but it’s been quite difficult with the condition of our soul.”
Blue light danced on its fingertips as it held up its hand.
“But you!” it continued, with a noise that sounded almost like a laugh, “You did excellently tonight. If there wasn’t this glass between us, I’d shake your hand too! Excellent work, really. You earned that soul, even if it was I who pointed out his cry for help.”
My eyes widened with realization. The voice! The voice that has been in my head for so long now.
“It is a pleasure to finally meet you face to face.” The figure said, “It’s an honor watching you work.”
“I need to give his soul back.” I said, more to myself than to the figure in the mirror.
“We already asked!” the figure responded. “Remember?”
The memory tugged at the back of my head: the man in the crowd, another hug that took me off my feet. His orange soul traveling down my arm and to my hand, hovering just under the skin of my palm as I reached out to him.
“Keep it,” he said, in a voice barely audible over the crowd, “you’ll do more good with it than I could.”
How could I have forgotten that?
“You’re exhausted. It’s to be expected some conversations slip from your mind,” the figure responded.
I nodded slowly. The smile on the figure’s mask broadened.
“Please, don’t let me keep you from your rest, you have far more than earned it today.” it said, “get some sleep, and if you ever need me, I am your servant, you know where to find me!”
It tapped the side of its head.
“Wh-what do I call you?” I asked.
It paused and looked up slightly, pondering my question.
“I haven’t thought about that yet,” it said.
It thought for a second.
“I suppose that since you’re the Wizard of Farburn… that leaves me with The Mask.”
I paused, thinking for a second before nodding. It hooked its cane over its arm and bowed its head at me.
“Well, Ezer, I will let you get your sleep. I’m sure that there will be far more where that first soul came from.”
Looking down, I noticed the figure’s legs shifting color to match my pale white skin. The change moved up its legs and over its torso as the figure in the mirror gave way to my reflection.
“It’s time to rise from the ashes.” It’s voice said.
And it was gone.
My reflection stared back at me, with my blue eyes peering out through the mask’s eyeholes. After a second, I turned away.
But not before I noted that the mask’s smile still looked broader than before.
Will Fall Writings 