Sunday Showcase: June 2013

I haven't done one of these in a while, so here's a never-before-seen extract from Dawn Rising. Woo hoo!

In this scene, Luthian is about to take the final step on his path to becoming a mage. (You may find it useful to know that the people of Endarion are each born with a unique birthstone at their throat; it is the removal of the birthstone that allows someone to access the power in blood, both theirs and others'.)

As always, if you have any thoughts (positive or negative) then hit me in the comments section.

“Are you ready?” Isidor asks me. The two of us are standing on the lake shore, facing across the water in the direction of Othitali. I glance at him, but can read nothing in his calm features. My own palms are sweating, fear taking its relentless hold. I doubted my ability to come this far, yet here I am: dressed in the thin white robe of the making, my knife at my belt. Earlier I prepared that knife, sharpening it until it could cleave a falling hair, flaming the blade until it glowed red-hot. Now there is nothing left between me and the one moment in my whole life that truly matters.

“Yes,” I say. It sounds unconvincing, even to my own ears. “I am ready.”

“Good.” Isidor’s face is grave. “Luthian … the laws of our kind are all that distinguish us from the darkness. They were laid down long ago, and they have endured. Before you attempt the transition, you must swear that you will follow them, now and always.”

I know what is expected of me; we have discussed it often enough. I stand straight, taking a deep breath.

“I will never seek to gain power from the blood of another.” The words come easily, drummed into me over many a night. “I will use my power only when there is nothing else to be done. I will not use my power to kill or otherwise harm anyone who does not possess the skill. I will use my power against other possessors of the skill only in self-defence. I will not use my power for personal gain or advancement. I swear to follow these laws above all other considerations.” By now my heart is pounding at the enormity of the task I’m setting myself.

“You must understand what these laws mean, Luthian,” Isidor says softly. “After tonight, temptation will always be waiting just the other side of a heartbeat, and there will be nothing to keep you from it but the strength of your own convictions. Yet if you break the rules we have set for ourselves, just once, there will be no going back.”

He puts his hands on my shoulders, holding me at arm’s length; his blue eyes are steady. After a moment, he gives a solemn nod. “I believe, after all, I have taught you well enough,” he says, and takes a step backward. “Now go.”

Without a word, I obey. I can feel the imprints of Isidor’s fingers still on my shoulders, burning with his belief in me. Although I try, I can’t share that belief. I know I am full of fear and doubt; I don’t trust my convictions to be strong enough. Yet also within me is a compulsion, quick and hot, urging me on. This is what my life is for: if I don’t go through with it, there will be no purpose left to me. So although my footsteps are hesitant, they are also eager. The confusion of it fills my head like smoke or wine, intoxicating.

The place I have selected is a clearing, some way back from the lake shore. By now the rain is coming down fast, stinging me through the thin robe until I might as well be naked. My hair comes free of its rough knot and whips about my face, caught in a rising wind. Breathless, I drop to my knees in the centre of the open space. Above me, the constellation Athetas flickers in and out of view with the passing of the clouds: a good omen.

The knife waits at my belt. The hilt is cold and slick in my nervous palm; it makes the half-healed marks left by my fingernails ache. I grip it, taking a deep breath to steady myself, and lift it up to my throat. The blade gleams blue-dark against the night. At the touch of the chill metal to my skin, I almost drop it in the dirt.

Great One, I pray, tightening my grip until I can feel my skin taut against my bones, please … But I can find no words to complete the supplication. Instead, I set the point of the knife at the meeting-place of birthstone and skin, and close my eyes.

You must do it quickly, Isidor has said more than once, else you will not do it at all. As I hesitate, not at all beckons to me with all the seduction of a warm fire, a soft bed, safety. It is dismay at my own weakness that impels my hand inward, driving the blade into my flesh.

Immediately, a white flash of pain sears my vision. The knife trembles in my grasp; I clasp my second hand over the first, steadying it. Gritting my teeth, I continue with dogged determination, although my body is shaking with nausea and blood runs down over my hands, sticky and slippery at the same time, making it hard to maintain my hold. It is dangerous work, this: easy enough to sever a tendon, to break through the wall of a blood vessel and spill out my life. I keep the blade as shallow as I can, feeling my way with it, digging with the point. There is a throbbing in my head, beating in time to the ringing in my ears and the uneasy clenching of my stomach; but if I fail now, I know I will never find the courage to make another attempt.

A cry of protest is welling up in me, every nerve and muscle clamouring. I clamp my jaws together to suppress it, and taste sweet iron where I have bitten the inside of my cheek. Blood in my mouth, blood on my hands, blood soaking thick and dark into my white robe – but still the birthstone remains intact. In desperation I dig the blade deeper, and something tears: a pure, indescribable agony so intense it is akin to ecstasy. The knife drops from my numb fingers, to land among dead leaves beside a small dark object still attached to a strip of skin, that fades away even as I look at it. My birthstone. I am free. Already I can feel myself melting into nonexistence after it.

“It is done,” I whisper, opening my arms to the sky. The storm rushes through me, and I dissolve into it like a handful of sand in the ocean.