the white of death.
Elisa screamed again before collapsing on the ground before him, unconscious but clearly breathing.
D’Arden could do nothing but stare.
Part V: Confrontation
The Arbiter's mind spun uncontrollably. How could something like this have happened? Elisa had been dead for hours, he had felt her body stiffen as the soul had fled after the heartblade had failed to save her…
The heartblade. Could its power have had something to do with this?
The artifact that was the very continuation of an Arbiter's existence, that piece of utmost importance had been created centuries ago by the greatest sorcerers of the time. It was the key to the creation of an Arbiter, and it was the key to their survival. They could bathe in manna to replenish their strength, but in order to continue living and continue their resistance to the power of the manna's energy, the heart itself needed to be regularly exposed to the power of the energy, something that was impossible from the outside. The tapered pinpoint blade was the only way to do that without risking severe injury to the flesh and stopping the heart cold.
Despite this knowledge, however, the true power of the heartblade remained something of a mystery. The design specifications, the method of creation were all known by the Arbiters and they could be created at the Arbiter's Tower, but exactly what the depths of the concentrated power could achieve was beyond comprehension. The heartblade was not to be used on any except a fully ordained Arbiter, and yet he had broken that rule, and achieved… what?
Could this now have brought the girl back from the dead?
Still the light from the manna font fell upon her unconscious form, and yet still she lay there, unmoving but breathing steadily, unchanged by the power of the radiant energy that should have been twisting her form to suit what lay within, and robbing her of any life that remained in it.
He knelt down beside her and placed a hand on her shoulder. Her eyes fluttered open, and slowly she turned herself to look at him. The fear had mostly gone from her now, but still she looked uncertain, a small amount of the previous panic still remaining in her gaze.
'I was… I was trapped in there!' she said, her voice barely above a whisper. 'I could hear, I could feel, but I couldn't see once you… once you closed my eyes! I heard everything that the townsfolk said to you, but it was like I was frozen, and I couldn't move or tell them that I was okay…'
His brow creased in a slight frown. 'How do you feel now?'
'Warm…' was all she answered.
D'Arden looked to the blue light from the font that radiated down upon them, and he felt the same. He felt the warmth that the land offered to its servant, the light that infused him and made him feel both loved and as though he belonged perfectly, as though nothing could ever be wrong or separate him from that power.
Had he unintentionally created an Arbiter?
'Elisa,' he said softly, brushing the hair from her eyes. 'I need you to do something for me. Can you stand?'
She slowly nodded, and began to push herself to her feet. A few seconds later she stood facing away from the font, looking only slightly unstable, and quickly adjusted her awkward stance so that she was standing more comfortably upon the uneven ground. She looked down at herself, noting that a majority of her clothes and her armor was gone, and immediately flushed with shame and embarrassment.
'Elisa,' he said again. She looked at him, and there was still a bit of the wild uncertainty in her gaze. 'I need you to turn around.'
'I'm afraid to,' she whispered.
'Turn around,' he urged.
He could see her tense, unwilling to move for a moment, and then she turned, the blue light of the manna font illuminating her face fully. She stood there, and D'Arden waited expectantly, still with the thought that this could all end in a moment, and she would be gone again as quickly as she'd returned.
Nothing happened.
'It's so… warm,' she said, staring into the light.
He stepped up and placed a hand around her shoulders, guiding her forward. She gave some resistance at first, but then she relaxed and allowed herself to be pushed closer to the almost blindingly-bright light. With one hand he grasped her right wrist, and as they approached the font he reached out her arm to touch the crystalline structure. He wrapped her fingers around it, and she gasped.
A piece of the crystal broke off in her hand as though it was little more than dirt. It came free, a long, slender piece drawn from the ground to exactly the proper length, and though it cut her hand and blood flowed and she cried out, the blood that dripped forth burned with tiny flecks of blue flame.
He had created an Arbiter.
This event invalidated many of the things that he'd been told about the creation of an Arbiter from the masters. He'd always been told that the exposure had to begin at a young age so that the human form could become accustomed to the energy, and that it took a period of several years before they could Draw their first manna blade from the earth. Here it was, it had been merely hours since her first heart exposure and she had already Drawn.
It was incredible, it was beyond comprehension, but the truth stood before him in a radiant white shift, glowing with all of the power of the manna. There were things about his profession that had been lost to history, and this was apparently one of the more dangerous – and also potentially useful – that had been found once again.
And for all of that, he thought bitterly, the Elders will almost certainly have us both executed for blasphemy and heresy.
He pulled his manna blade free from its confines with its rasping sound, and gently guided her to face him. Still her blood ran in rivulets down the crystalline shard that she held in her right hand, and it burned and infused the crystal with her essence just as it had done for him all those years ago. He grasped his own blade with his free hand, slicing deep into the flesh, and then placed it over hers so that their blood ran together down her new sword. There was a bond between the student and the master that ordained them that, according to teachings, could not be invalidated by any means.
But now, he was forced to think, Can I really trust any of those teachings?
'You are ordained an Arbiter,' D'Arden whispered, his voice still incredulous. He repeated the words of the creed with little intervention of his own mind. 'Search out evil and corruption. Strike it down with the power of purity. Keep your mind and your body free of corruption, walk the path of the righteous, and forever strong you shall be in the light of the manna.'
She stared at him with her green eyes that now also glowed blue with the light of the manna. The words that had been stated by every ordained Arbiter since the beginning of their order, the words urged by the manna and by the flow of the land tumbled almost unwittingly from her lips. 'In the light of the manna I serve.'
D'Arden couldn't help it – he smiled. In the face of everything, the corruption that permeated this city and the danger that still lurked within it, he smiled. He had found a light here, a light that would go on and would not be extinguished. A new Arbiter, accidentally discovered and added to their order by the virtue of simply trying to save the life of a talented sword-slinger. Now there was another voice, another sword of light to battle the darkness that was ahead. She was untrained, she was still rough with the sword and she was young, but she would learn, and the power that they shared would stand against any darkness that might impede their path.
The smile faded. He could not share with her the lurking dread he felt about their return to the Arbiter’s Tower; it would have to remain silent and hidden for now. Perhaps his fears would not come to pass.
With concentrated effort, D’Arden shook off the gloom that threatened to overwhelm him, and forced the smile back to his lips.
'Come, Elisa. We have much to do here.' He held out his free hand.
