“I won’t explain it well.” Fritz shook his head doubtfully. “Here, read this.”
Vhalla looked at the title of the manuscript the messy-haired librarian placed reverently into her hands: The Windwalkers of the East. It was an old manuscript, and the library apprentice in her noted immediately that the book would need to be rebound soon. A quick flip and the inspection of a few middle pages proved that at least the ink was still legible.
“Thank you.” It was like a breath of fresh air. Something about holding a book again made her feel better.
“Don’t worry about it!” Fritz smiled a wide and toothy grin.
“Can I read here?” Vhalla had no interest in returning to the room she had been recovering in.
“This is a library.” He chuckled.
Fritz led her over to a window with a wide bench placed before it. It wasn’t quite a window seat, but it was close enough that Vhalla instantly relaxed into her new surroundings.
Flipping open the book, she diligently started reading at the first page. Vhalla did not count a book as read unless one’s eyes fell on the very first word of the first page and the very last word of the last.
Her brow furrowed, and her fingers trailed over the script. She tucked some flyaway hair behind her ear only to have it fall in her face again.
Something was amiss.
The writing was familiar. It was slightly less jagged, less spiky than what she knew. This was written by a steadier hand, likely a younger hand. But it was impossible. Vhalla blinked at the title page.
The Windwalkers of the East
A collection of accounts from The Burning Times
Composed by Mohned Topperen.
MOHNED TOPPEREN. THE name had to be a mistake. Perhaps, it was a very common name, and Vhalla did not know it. Why else would the Master of Tome’s name be in a book on magical history? Then again, the master could boast authorship of more than a hundred manuscripts. Why should he have a problem writing on magic?
Vhalla paused, suddenly feeling very small. This whole time she was fearful of sorcerers when the man who was her mentor, who had been like her father in the palace, had written about them long before she was even born. She leaned against the wall, her head swimming. What was wrong with her?
Mohned had raised her better. Her father had raised her better. Vhalla had lived in the South for so long that the Southern fear of magic had seeped into her. Yes, sorcerers were different. But the South had been different, and she hadn’t feared moving into the palace, she had been excited at the prospect of expanding her knowledge. Her world had grown and, as a child, she had accepted that better than as a young woman.
Why did growing up shrink her mind?
“Vhalla?” the library boy whispered softly, sitting next to her.
“Yes?” She blinked at him, worried her magic was acting up again; he was inexplicably blurry.
“Hey, you okay?” He placed a hand on her knee, and Vhalla stared at the foreign contact. It was strangely welcome. “You’re crying.”
“Sorry.” She shook her head, looking away, rubbing her eyes in frustration.
“Don’t apologize.” Fritz shook his head. “It must be a lot.” Vhalla nodded mutely. “Were you in the palace before this?”
“I was,” Vhalla answered, finding talking helped work out the lump in her throat. “I was a library apprentice. I’ve lived here since I was eleven. Almost seven years now...”
“That’s good,” he smiled. Vhalla stared at him, puzzled. Before she could ask what was good about her situation, he elaborated. “Some of the new apprentices are dropped off by their families. They’ve never lived in the palace before—or even out of their homes. The worst is when their family disowns them as well.”
“Disown? Their own family?” Vhalla blinked. She didn’t know what her father really thought of magic, but Vhalla wanted to believe that nothing would make him abandon her on a doorstep. He had been teary eyed leaving her in the South.
“They’re afraid.” Fritz shrugged. “They don’t think it’s natural, even though people can’t choose magic.”
“Is that what happened to you?” Vhalla asked.
“No,” Fritz chuckled. “No one in my family is a sorcerer, but they hardly minded. My sisters thought it was hilarious when I couldn’t stop randomly freezing things.”
“Freezing things?” Vhalla mused aloud. “That would make you a-a—” She couldn’t remember the proper name. “You have a water Affinity.”
“A Waterrunner,” Fritz filled in the blank helpfully. “Okay, right, well, I’ll let you read. I just wanted to make sure that you weren’t in pain.”
“Don’t,” Vhalla grabbed the hand resting on her knee as he went to stand. “Don’t leave.” She looked away, a flush rising to her cheeks. Vhalla didn’t want Fritz to go. He was the first stable person in the whole Tower, and she needed someone warm and genuine right now. Something about his Southern hair and eyes reminded her of Roan.
“All right,” Fritz agreed with earnestness, settling next to her. “I’ll read with you; it can’t hurt to brush up on my history.”
They began reading together and Vhalla appreciated that he read almost as fast as she did.
The story of the Windwalkers started centuries before the last Windwalker died during the great genocide that was known as The Burning Times. It was a rich history of Cyven, the old East, that Vhalla had never been taught despite being born there. The story was incomplete in some areas, being taken from oral histories, but it wasn’t until Vhalla reached the middle section on The Burning Times that she began to have questions.
“I don’t understand.” Vhalla shook her head. “The King of Mhashan was invading Cyven?”
“Mhashan could have been greater than the Empire Solaris if they had kept Cyven, some say,” Fritz confirmed.
“Why didn’t they?” The book took a distinctly Eastern viewpoint, and the explanations for the West’s actions were lacking.
“King Jadar claimed the invasion was to spread the word of the Mother Sun.” History was clearly a favorite area for Fritz by the way he spoke and through the animation in his hands. Vhalla wondered how many nations would use the Mother as an excuse for conquest. “But really, what he wanted was the Windwalkers’ power.”
“Why?” Vhalla tried not to sound too eager. The prince and minister’s conversation was still fresh in her mind.
“I don’t really know,” Fritz replied apologetically.
Vhalla felt her chest deflate. Whatever the reason, the king had enslaved every Windwalker found by his armies and a specially trained secret order of knights. In the process, most of the East was put to the flame. There came a point when the Windwalkers admitted defeat, hoping to spare the rest of their people. Compared to the West’s military, they were disorganized and weak. The king accepted their surrender; after the last of the sorcerers were in irons he burned every remaining resistance or love for those with the air Affinity, as though he wanted to erase them from the earth.
Vhalla stared at the words, realizing she was nearing the end of the tale. The last quarter of the book focused on what the West did with their captives. Live experiments and forced labor that churned contents of her stomach sour.
“Why would they do this?” she whispered.
“I don’t know.” The Southern man patted her knee. “But it was a long time ago. Things are different now.”
“How have I not known this happened?” Vhalla tried to wrap her head around what she had just read.
“In my history lessons they always told us that the East made all magic taboo following The Burning Times. Cyven was afraid of drawing the wrath of the West anew so they banned magic, discussions on magic, or books on it,” Fritz explained. “Eventually magic was forgotten by the average person, and the laws became social norms.”