Page 91 of Duskbound

Being possessed of both scholarly curiosity and a particularly robust sense of self-preservation, I took great pains to distance myself from my former companions' unfortunate choices. Indeed, once Dullard had beendeposited rather unceremoniously upon the floor (still breathing, though with a newfound appreciation for personal property), I found myself drawn to this mysterious figure.

When at last he returned to his seat, I gathered what remained of my courage—bolstered, perhaps, by the remarkable quantity of ale in my belly—and approached. My inquiries regarding his service to the Umbra were met with surprising revelation, for he had never sworn allegiance to our realm's defenders. The Void, it seemed, had claimed him in childhood, the result of a foolish dare and the sort of bravado that so often leads young boys to their doom.

When I pressed him, with all the delicacy my profession demands, to speak of his time within that endless dark, a shadow passed across his face that had naught to do with his extraordinary abilities. He stared into the depths of his mead as though it might shelter him from memories that, even after so many years, seemed to plague him still. I did not ask again, for some horrors, I have learned, are best left unspoken.

I lowered the book. The Duskbound man had remembered everything, even years later. The Void's mark went deeper than just the shadows it stitched into him. Would I be the same? Would those visions haunt me forever?

I knew I should be focusing on my plan for Urkin—or something at least useful—like sleep, but something pulled me to keep reading. My fingers traced the next page, where elaborate script detailed another encounter.

I had been summoned, with no small measure of pomp, to document what Lord Sveinson assured would be a most historic achievement—the first successful domestication of those magnificent and terrible beasts known as Vördr. Had known then what bitter folly awaited, perhaps I might have found pressing business elsewhere in the realm.

The creature they had somehow managed to capture was a sight to behold, its coat as black as a moonless night, with threads of silver running through its wings like stars woven into darkness itself. They had constructed an elaborate holding pen of polished steel and preciousmetals, adorned with the family's finest craftsmanship—as if such a being might be impressed by our mortal displays of wealth and station.

"Today," Lord Sveinson declared to the gathered nobility, his voice carrying all the certainty of one who has never been properly acquainted with humility, "we shall prove these creatures can be bent to proper Kalfar will."

It was then I noticed her—a stable hand who kept to the shadows of the gathering, her face drawn with the sort of concern that comes from knowing something one's station forbids them to speak. As they brought forth elaborate harnesses of tooled leather and silver chains, I observed her desperate attempts to catch her master's attention, though protocol kept her silent.

What followed shall be forever etched into my memory, though I confess I sometimes wish it were not...

The beast's reaction was as swift as it was terrible. As Lord Sveinson's eldest son approached with his elaborate bridle, the Vördr's wings snapped open with such force that the very air seemed to crack. Those magnificent wings—how curious that they reminded me so of the darkness I had witnessed in that tavern years before, the way they seemed to drink in the light itself.

Indeed, I had heard whispers in my travels, tales told in hushed voices over too much wine, that these creatures were born of the Void itself. Some swore they had witnessed Vördr vanishing into that endless dark at strange intervals, as if answering some ancient call. Others claimed they returned to the Void to breed, though none could explain how such knowledge was obtained, if it held any truth at all.

Such thoughts occupied my mind for only a moment before chaos erupted. The Vördr's rage manifested in a display of savage grace that defied description. Steel bars bent like river reeds, chains snapped like thread, and Lord Sveinson's son found himself airborne in a manner most unflattering to his station.

It was then that the stable hand—that quiet girl who had tried to warn them—did something that changed everything. As the beast rearedup, preparing to deliver what would surely have been a fatal blow, she stepped forward. And dear reader, I swear upon my very profession that shadows moved with her...

The shadows that danced around her were unlike any I had witnessed before—not the raw power of a Duskbound, but something more subtle, like ink spreading through water. Later, I would learn these were the marks of one touched by the Void, though she bore her burns with more grace than most.

The Vördr's reaction was immediate and extraordinary. Where moments before it had raged with the fury of a tempest, now it stilled, those terrible wings folding as it turned its attention fully upon the girl. The gathered nobility, many of whom had been scrambling for safety mere moments before, fell silent as death.

She approached the beast with neither fear nor pretense, extending her hand as one might to an equal, not a creature meant to be conquered. The Vördr lowered its great head, and I swear by all that is sacred, it bowed to her. Not in submission, as Lord Sveinson had so foolishly hoped to achieve, but in recognition. As though they shared some profound understanding that we mere viewers could never hope to grasp.

"They cannot be tamed," she spoke then, her voice carrying despite its softness. She turned to face her master, and though her station remained humble, something in her bearing had changed. "They are creatures of the Void, my Lord. They answer to it alone."

Lord Sveinson's face had turned a shade of purple that rivaled poor Dullard's from my previous tale, though for entirely different reasons. Yet even he could not deny what we had all witnessed. The Vördr allowed the girl to lead it from its elaborate prison, and I noted with no small amount of irony that it followed her without need of chains or bridles.

I learned later that she was elevated to master of the Sveinson stables—the first void-touched to hold such a position. A small victory, perhaps, but one that began to change how our realm viewed both the Vördr and those marked by darkness.

I closed the book for a moment, letting the words sink in.Creatures of the Void itself. The thought sent a chill down my spine as I remembered Tryggar's reaction to me that first day—how he had claimed me before I'd even entered the Void, as if he'd sensed what I would become. Or perhaps what I had always been.

The memory of him standing between me and Aether in the courtyard took on new meaning. Had he known even then? Could these creatures truly see something in us that we couldn't see in ourselves?

Interest piqued, I turned to the next chapter.

After nearly fifty years of traversing our fair realm, collecting stories and memories I sometimes wished I could forget, I encountered something that defied all understanding. Something that, even now as I pen these words in my hundred and twentieth year, I have never witnessed again.

My wanderings had taken me to the Southeastern ridge of the Leidvra region, where villages grew sparse and the wilderness held secrets yet untamed. I had joined a group of warriors drawn by tales of some great beast haunting the rivers—a simple enough pursuit, or so I believed.

But what I witnessed that day far exceeded any mere beast. Indeed, dear reader, I scarce dare put it to paper for fear you might doubt my very sanity. A siphon.

My eyes fell upon the river as essence seemed to rise from its depths like morning mist, leaving the waters gray and lifeless in its wake. Yet this was not destruction—for as I watched, transfixed, that very essence redirected to the surrounding fields, where summer's cruel heat had left naught but ash. Before my very eyes, green burst forth from dead earth, life flowing back into land long thought barren.

Can you comprehend what I describe, dear reader? A force that could redirect the very flow of essence itself?—

My heart thundered in my chest as I turned the page, only to find ragged edges where the rest of the chapter should have been. The pages had been torn out.

I shot to my feet, pacing the small confines of my room as my mind raced. A siphon? In all my studies in Sídhe, in all the texts I'dread in the archives today, I'd never encountered such a thing. But the implications... if something could redirect essence...

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