1 Haze

Haze. It has always haunted my mind, yet it has become stronger and stronger as the years go by. When I was a child it could be passed off by my seniors as some silliness or a playfulness of being young, but not anymore.

It's gotten harder to describe it as time goes by. Usually, my mind is fine, yet around people... it's strange, but it gets foggy, cloudy. I see things, hear things I don't want to.

I've seen people's biggest joys and worst fears, like when I saw my mother die when she got sick and Dad visited the priest to help her. Still, never really spoke much about them. I really can't make it happen. Sometimes I think I'm crazy, but I know I'm not. I saw it. Always knew I wasn't supposed to be able to do so, because well.

No one could.

I never minded it much, it wasn't that distracting. Not like I could even control it, it would just happen.

We live a very secluded life, seeing as mother and dad took me in. We live a rural life. They were very poor and always wanted the best for me, yet they could never provide much. The town is not very close to the capital, so not many people come by.

I'm grateful for the parent's I have. Dad taught me how to hunt and mom taught me morals as well as how to write and read, something not so common in town. Yet, there's more in my mind.

There's something inscribed in the haze. I call glimpse at it, but it fades away if I try and focus. It clears up if I dwell too much on it, but it's there. I know it's there.

Today's my thirteenth birthday, or atleast that's what the locket on my chest says. It's the only thing I'm left with from before I was abandoned. Mom told me it's special and that I should keep it.

I should be happy, seeing I'm now considered a man of my own and can leave this place. Yet, I'm scared.

I'm supposed to be sent to either an academy or the army, but let's be honest, there's no way I'm getting in to an academy. Only way to do so is to either have latent magical power, which, might I add, I haven't shown a single bit of, or to buy your way in.

Ah, how I dreaded this day. Since I've turned thirteen today, I'm now an adult, says the law. It's also then we take the oath and get the curse.

Apparently, this curse doesn't work on mages. It's how they test people for their magical potential. It's function is to make people , common people, reveal their lies. Supposedly, it helps them to keep the order.

The way it does so, is to mark every lie on their body, never to erase them from their skin. That's right, common people get branded each time they lie. It can and will fade away with time, but mages can reveal every single one of them with their magic.

We were never told why we had to do it, only that we had to do it. In time, people got used to it.

The town is starting go get a bit hectic, the selection is coming up and every new adult is getting taken away to the army, where hopefully they'll make it out alive and get back to their families a few years later.

I can't help but to think.

I wish they'd just not come.

It never felt right.

I hate this.

Please leave.

It was then. I heard it. It spoke to me.

"What do you need of me, Child of.... wait, you've just awoken."- resounded in my mind. I heard it loudly, booming and crashing inside me.

It hurts. I felt my head as if it split open. My brain feels as if it is being fried and burnt. My locket lit up and it ate up the light in the room. I'm now in pitch black darkness.

I'm alone in my room. I'm going crazy. There's no one here.

Yet, I heard it clearly.

"What do you mean, I've just awoken?"- I yell, at the now pitch dark room, for some reason.

"We are not supposed to be here, Child, or the others will quickly come. We must leave. Remember, you are not like the others. Do not FEAR. Fear is a weapon and a curse. FOCUS. YOUR. MIND!"- something screamed in my mind.

"What do you mean, I'm not like the others? And what or who are "the others"? Why must you leave?"- I sluggishly said, through grit teeth.

"Well, since you've just awoken, the others won't sense you right away we suppose... Tell me, why do your Fear, Child?"- Something said back at me.

"What do you mean, what do I fear? And why must you call me child? I'm no child, I'm a man. You call me a child yet you are the one hidden. Come out and show yourself."- I spoke to the ever gloomy darkness.

"We have already told you, focus your mind. Had you done that, you'd have sensed us long before we smelt your Fear."- It uttered, seemingly frustrated.

"What is your name, and why do you refer yourself as we? That's odd, dont'cha think?"- I jokingly thought.

"There you go, no need to yell into the darkness, We can hear you loud and clear. Remember, We were given the name Razimoth, from the Razi family. I must break this connection now, or we will harm you. Remember Child, don't fear. Fear is a weapon you must control or you'll regret it."

"Wait, where are you going? And why can you hear my thoughts? Is any of this real?"- I screamed in my head, yet no response ever came.

I feel dizzy, something's not right.

Then I noticed.

There's blood. Black blood all over my shirt, and the room is now bright again. It feels like powdery charcoal, clogging my nose.

I got up and rushed towards a creek near the house, to clean myself off and air out my head. It stung and felt too heavy, I felt sleepy.

I took my locket off and something felt off. I couldn't tell why immediatly, but the inscription on it, that I longed to know the purpose to, was now gone.

I must be tired, - I thought - nothing like a refreshing bath to clear my head. I dove into the creek, lightly resting against the musk covered rock in the middle, trying to wash off the blood from my nose.

I saw it then. A red inscription marked on my skin, as if a lie were told. Right on the back of my left hand. It looked similar to the one in the locket, yet something was different.

I tried to take another look at it, but it was gone. I rushed out of the water into the house, forgetting that my clothes were still dirtied by the blood.

Mom was back home already, making preparations for today's dinner. I nodded at her, to which she franticly asked me where I had been and how had I dirtied myself to such a state. I politely tried to slip away from her questions, and finally told her that I would be taking a small nap, as I was tired.

Today was crazy. I turn thirteen and now I'm going insane? What even is happening?

I woke up later in the evening, dinner was ready and most of the townsfolk had been invited to the party. It was a simple dinner, costumary of such a simple town. People exchanged greetings, except for one lone soul, the town's fool, Barus. Or atleast, that's what his garb says.

I had always been interested in Barus. He had shown up one day, covered in his pale garb with his sickly pale white hair, and just stayed here. He never really went anywhere, nor did he make an effort to get to know people. The only person he ever really talked to was me, and that was when he was alone.

I didn't mind it, actually, it was quite pleasurable to have Barus as company. He was highly cultured and kept my mind sane from the boredom that was life in town. My mind would always clear up when I spoke to him, especially when the haziness would get stronger, I just had to be around him for a bit.

You see, Barus had been banished. I only knew of it because I once got to see him without his garb, when he was taking a rare shower at the creek near our town.

His back had been engraved with bold characters, which I never understood what they meant.

He told me they were a part of his past and something he should forever atone for, so he didn't mind them being permanently etched on to his skin.

Apparently Barus had been a mage, but was then somehow stripped of his rights. He never really talked about it any deeper than that and I didn't want to prod, so I just left it there.

Yet, now I noticed why my locket seemed so strange. Barus's inscription was red, almost as if a wound, but it very much resembled the inscription in my locket. Something that seemed so simple yet I never noticed until today.

I finally decided to ask him about them.

And so, as fate would have it, the down-spiral that is my life started that night.