The young warlock wished it had never come down to this—ending up a captive in these dark chambers, with no one left to call upon.
All his fellow warlocks had been beheaded, and only his age had spared him for last, as he was far younger than the others of the Third Eclipse Brotherhood who had fallen in the Battle of the Seven Mages.
Henry had spent only three years in the sect, and he had been promised that the warlocks there were neither bloodthirsty nor cold-hearted like those of other sects. Yet what choice had they truly been given? The King had publicly declared them traitors to the crown after their sect leader refused to lend their strength to his senseless wars.
The other sects had obeyed without hesitation when ordered to bring down their fellow warlocks. It was never a matter of cruelty or madness; it was survival. They had been forced to fight to protect their tower, because there had been no other path left for them.
Failure was what Henry regretted most. At times, he wondered if he should have fled like the other young warlocks. Perhaps then he might have seen his family again, instead of standing with his brothers against the tyrant's mages, only to lose everything in the end.
Perhaps if he had chosen more wisely, he would not be in this cell now—his hands bound in Oryx chains, the cold metal suppressing his magic completely, while those he had chosen to fight beside lay dead.
At the same time, his family was still waiting for him, expecting his return before winter. His mother, his two little sisters, and his youngest brother were all holding onto that promise, unaware that only hours remained before the same axe that had claimed his fellow warlocks would claim his neck as well.
"I can't let this happen!" he blurted, his voice echoing against the damp stone walls of the chamber.
A low chuckle answered him from the darkness.
Henry stiffened, his breath catching in his throat as he turned toward the sound. Across the narrow corridor, behind another set of iron bars, a figure shifted in the shadows of the opposite cell.
He swallowed. "Why — why are you laughing?"
The figure scoffed, stepped forward just enough for a sliver of torchlight to catch the edge of his face, revealing a faint smile that did not reach his eyes.
"It's fun to see how people react when they know their time is up." He went back sitting at the wall again.
"Why are you here?" Asked Henry, looking around the cell which lacked even the tiniest hole for clean air with all the suffocating smell. "Is there a body rotten down here, or is it just the mice?" He had caught a few movements of them in the corridor moment earlier.
The man laughed briefly, a dry, broken sound that echoed through the cell.
"When you're considered worse than being hanged or beheaded," he said, "they don't grant you a clean death. They leave you down here to rot while the mice finish what's left of you slowly."
He pushed himself upright, the chains on his legs scraping harshly against the stone floor. Moving forward, he gripped the cold iron bars and leaned out until his face was caught in the dim torchlight—ragged, hollow-eyed, his youth fading.
"That's what they did to my friend Charlie in the next cell," he added quietly. "Now the mice are feasting on what's left of him."
Henry could hear the squeaking of rats echoing down the corridor, the sound slipping through the darkness like a reminder that even the lowliest creatures still roamed free while he remained in chains.
"Worse than being beheaded," he muttered, wincing.
The man studied him for a moment. "You can do magic," he said flatly. "Don't you have some trick to get us out of here?"
"Not with these on," Henry replied, lifting his bound hands so the Oryx chains caught the light. "They seal magic completely."
"Mmm," the man hummed, leaning back slightly. "Then you're as good as dead, young mage. If it were me—"
"I'm not a mage," Henry cut in sharply.
The man paused.
Henry met his gaze. "I'm a warlock. I suppose you can't tell the difference between the two."
A brief silence followed.
The man gave a small grunt, unimpressed. "Not my concern."
Henry exhaled slowly, then added in a lower voice, almost like a warning wrapped in exhaustion, "Mages are gifted with magic. Warlocks survive what magic costs that we call upon from some old spirits or dead gods, and they grant us the power."
"Hmm," the man scoffed, "and what did you warlocks called upon — I'm not a man of faith, but gods or spirits do come to their subjects in time of difficults such as this. So where's yours?"
Henry sighed, recalling on the day he made his pact with the Storyteller, a cosmic being that his sect channelled their magic from. They were made into his subject, but there was always a rule: you must never make a call upon him.
The man just reminded him there was no escape for him, when suddenly, a daring thought crossed his mind.
"What if I can call him — " he gasped, the man on the opposite side turned his head towards him.
"Call who?" He blurted.
"The Storyteller," said Henry quickly, kneeling down,"he can help me out of this, then I'd be free again to join my family."
The man let out a harsh laugh. "Do you think there are Storytellers in these chambers? You're a madman."
Henry did not respond. The insult barely reached him. He was already moving, dropping to the floor and drawing a sigil onto the floor with a jagged shard.
His sigil was almost complete as he circled it added the fire symbol of flames on top; at the bottom, he added a water symbol forming a deep whirlpool that spiraled inward; on the left, he etched the air symbol, its lines forming a shifting spiral, light and unstable, as though it could vanish at any moment.
On the right, he finally inscribed the earth symbol, grounding the circle with heavy, solid runes that felt unmovable, like mountains bound to the world itself.
"Now… let's see," he said, folding his legs beneath him as he sat upright. His back straightened as he exhaled slowly, forcing himself to steady the cold fear creeping through his chest.
Across the corridor, the man frowned. "What are you doing now?"
Henry did not answer.
A low hum escaped his lips, barely more than a whisper. It was the sorcerers' language of the soul, a tongue that could only be spoken during ritual. His hands rested on the edges of the sigil as he murmured the words again, the sounds slipping free without thought, as though something deeper within him already knew them.
At first, nothing happened.
Doubt flickered in his chest, and he wondered if he had done something wrong.
Then, the darkness began to creep in.
It did not fall—it gathered, seeping into the edges of his vision as a sudden, unnatural cold brushed against his skin. The air grew heavy, swallowing sound, swallowing light—and then everything was gone.