Tears For The Gifted

Ben watched the child’s Gift spread across the ground, turning lifeless dirt into ash. The air was still, wind dying before it could reach her. Trees which had stood for decades crumbled, their leaves turning brown, their trunks collapsing. Everything within a mile’s radius was dead. Flesh and bone decayed faster than it should, leaving no semblance of corpses, only a hollow village and a fragile, crumbling forest.

The child lay in the dirt abandoned; her skin green with nausea. She wept, her tears mixing with the ashes of those she’d killed.

Ben cupped her little face into his hand. Her eyes didn’t open, but she moaned at his touch, the first warmth she’d felt in hours. Ben shook his head. This was the worst case he’d seen yet.

They were called the Gifted. Children bestowed by with extraordinary power, but usually to the detriment of those around them. Ben was Gifted himself. He murdered his own parents on the day of his birth, leveling an entire castle along with them. Others, such as this girl, did not realize their Gifts until they were older.

Ben looked at the decay of the forest. Another tree fell over, exploding into dust as it struck the ground. What a Gift, he thought bitterly.

Shaking his head, Ben collected the girl into his arms. He could feel her power creeping into him, trying to rapidly age his body, to render him into a decaying corpse with a beating heart. Ben forced it out easily. As a scrawny old man himself, he should have died quickly, but he forced the power away.

He was, after all, the most powerful Gifted to ever live. But even though his Gifts gave him powers akin to a god, he could never change the world the way he wanted. No matter how much he’d ever used his power, he’d never been able to do much good. For a short while, he had been known as a tyrant. He had united a quarter of the world, spliced poverty and brought smiles to the faces of millions. But he could not save everyone, and there were always loud voices to compel armies against him. The bloodshed grew worse and worse each year, and anyone close to him would die within a few years. The mental toll had been too much. Ben was not a god. He could not do as gods do, even with their power.

Now, he lived as a monk, running a sanctuary for especially Gifted children like this girl. The simpler life was better for him; better for the world.

But it would be too dangerous to take her to the sanctuary. Ben took off flying, creating a barrier around himself to keep the child from freezing. This was just a spark of his abilities. Ben’s Gift in its simplest explanation, was that he could create or destroy anything. The wind roared, drowning out the child’s whimpers, but he could still feel her squirming against his chest, and her fever was rising.

Ben supposed he couldn’t bring the child to a doctor, so he brought her to the peak of Mount Darosk, where her decay could harm no one. He then set to building a house. From the rocks, he made walls, raising and flattening them with a simple swipe of the hand. From the snow, he created windows, to let in light from the outside world, and from the air, he created an ever-burning fire, which infected the walls, and sat in a pit in the center of the room, keeping everything warm for the child.

He placed her on a bed of his mind’s creation, then stared for a while. As long as she stayed atop this mountain, she would be safe. But to live this secluded life would be no life at all. Ben would find a way to help her, as he had done with so many children before. Rhydenna the West Phoenix instantly came to mind. He remembered hearing that the girl had burned down half of Haenia. If not for Ben, she may have burned down the other half.

Rhydenna would often combust like that in her youth, especially in her sleep. The girl was plagued with nightmares, a horrible coincidence that she was also explosive. In the end, Ben had been forced to spend fifteen weeks with her in a stone house at the center of a lake. He would sing to her, giving her peaceful sleeps, but no matter how well she seemed, there were always times when she would explode anyways. He had hoped to find a solution to her problem, a single act which she could take that would fix everything, allow her to live a peaceful life. There was no such solution. Rhydenna had been forced to sleep in a stone coffin within a stone house at the edge of his sanctuary. When she came of age, she left without a word. He did not know if she still exploded in her sleep, if she ever created fires which devoured forests and villages where she might have rested. He did not know if he had helped at all.

“Auntu,” the child muttered. Ben pressed his palm against her forehead and knelt down.

“Are you awake, child?” he asked softly. “You are safe here. All will be well.”

The child’s eyes flickered open, and she stared at him, her face still green with nausea. “Or tono auntu. Tye henuka…”

Ben pressed his lips together. He barely knew any Kurnic. Besides yes, no, hello, and goodbye, all he knew was dryo ka niq, or ‘this is the end’.

“I...am sorry, child. I don’t understand.” He rested his hand on her cheek, and forced himself to smile. The child gulped, her eyes twinkling with tears as she said, “auntu,” then pointed to her chest. “Auntu,” she repeated three more times.

Ben curled his nose. “Is that your name?”

She noticed his confusion and cried harder, letting tears run down her cheeks. “Auntu!” she screamed.

Ben did not know what to call her, so he called her Puanala. He did not know what auntu meant, but was set on finding out. He tried to feed her, then tucked her in and waited until he was sure she was asleep. Her Gift pulled at his life force, and again, he pushed it back. It was growing stronger, but it was still a long way off from being a danger to him.

Ben flew down from the mountain, going to Limetown and consulting their doctors. He asks what afflicted the child, but without a personal examination, the doctors could only guess. They handed him a few medicines, screaming his name in either praise or fear. Ben hated both reactions.

He asked around for anyone who spoke Kurnic, but the effort was hopeless. Not wanting the child to be alone any longer, he made his way back to the peak of Mount Darosk.

Nothing the doctors gave him helped the child in the slightest. She continued to writhe in her bed, her fever stagnating. She barely ate, and if she spoke, it was only to say “auntu” over and over again. Ben began to wonder if it was the name of someone she knew, someone her Gift had killed.

Ben’s hope began to falter. He had only failed one other child before. Dais the Strong, who had been brought to him after he ripped the arms off his own father when he was just two years old. The boy had been too strong for his own good, fearing that anything he touched would be destroyed, which was partially true at times. He had trouble eating because he would crush any bowl, fork, or apple you put in his hands, and it was out of the question that he would ever play with the other kids, for even Gifted children could be torn apart by his accidental strength. The only person he had ever been allowed to touch was Ben himself, for he was the only person who could survive it. He used to leap at the chance to hold Ben’s hand, gripping so tightly that even he was strained. More often than not however, Dais would cry and beg Ben to cut off his arms so that he might never harm anyone again.

In the end, Dais found some extent of control over his Gift, enough that he left Ben’s sanctuary, and had not been seen since. Ben often wondered if he ran out of resentment, or out of shame for all the children and monks he had harmed. Ben was always there to heal them (he could heal any wound or ailment), but as long as they screamed, he knew Dais was terrified.

Ben cried as he thought of Dais, his tears drying on the child’s bed. He gripped her hand gently, but could feel her evil Gift attempting to take him. Ben looked closer, and finally realized that the child’s ailment was being caused by her own Gift, but that Gift was also keeping her from complete decay. It was healing her. It was killing her. An agony which clung to her soul for dear life.

Ben’s tears multiplied, and he bit his cheek, wondering if it was possible to rid someone of their Gift. For the child’s sake, he needed to find out.

He stayed with the child for another two days before he left again, going back to his sanctuary so he could see his Gifted, as well as learn some Kurnic from those there who spoke it. There were none as powerful as Rhydenna or Dais had been, but the sanctuary still served its purpose; the children were safe and happy.

But when he arrived, he found it empty. Frowning, he checked to find that everyone was in bed, and only a stumbling Sister Irus was still standing. She walked the compound, feeding and taking care of every child and monk, even though they were all as sickly as herself.

“What has happened? Where did this sickness come from?” Ben asked.

“Oh, Great Clement,” Sister Irus murmured, finally lying in her bed. Ben was surprised for her to use his formal title. The monks knew he disliked it, and only said it when they were specially inclined. “We do not know. It appeared not three days ago, starting as nothing more than a headache, and growing to…” she threw up, dirtying her bed.

Ben clenched his jaw and pressed his finger against her forehead to heal her ailments. Nothing happened. No life force was restored, no sickness was cured. Sister Irus stared blankly at the ceiling, her face green with nausea.

Ben had never encountered a sickness he could not cure. It terrified him, but he knew the source almost immediately.

“Sleep, sister,” Ben said, cleaning Sister Irus’s sheets before tucking her back in. “I will fix this.”

Ben returned to the peak of Mount Darosk. The child remained where he had left her, the bed drenched in sweat as her fever only worsened. Ben took her hand and wept, trying to think of a solution. He could bring her to the middle of the ocean, far from any civilization. But then the creatures of the sea would die, and who knew if the wind or water could carry her poison.

He looked up and thought to place her in a tower that stretches into the sky, high above the clouds where the stars could be seen at any time of day, and the world became nothing more than a blur. But a normal human could not survive up there for long, not without much of Ben’s assistance. He could not keep it up forever, and he had no idea how far the child’s sickness would reach, but as of now it seemed to be growing.

“Auntu…” The child found his hand and grasped it. Her eyes opened and she pointed at his tears. “Auntu…”

Ben bit his cheek. Did auntu mean ‘sadness’? Did it mean she wanted to cry? Just as that thought reached his mind, he realized the true meaning

Auntu

Ben lifted her little hand to his mouth and kissed it, staring into her eyes with tears running down his cheeks. He thought of one of the few Kurnic words he knew, putting in together with auntu.

“Auntu niq,” he muttered. The child pressed her lips together, lifting her back. “Auntu niq,” Ben repeated. Pain end.

Perhaps there was a way to save the child. Perhaps if he spent another day with her, he would figure out how to hold back her power, how to let her live a normal life. But Ben could not spare another day, and he knew, deep inside, that there was no other choice.

He pressed his palm against her forehead, closing his eyes and saying one last time, “Auntu niq.”

Her eyes lit up for only a brief instant, before fading into a grey, blank stare. The evil forces that had been pressed against Ben’s body for the past three days dissipated, leaving only the sad warmth of the house atop Mount Darosk.

Benign Clement listened to the soft winds outside, mixing with the crackle of his magical fires, and he wept for the Gifted children.

THE END

Bio: "I’m S. A. Locket, another college student who’s aspiring to become a published author. I started world-building when I was only 8 or 9 — building Lego kingdoms with my brother, and naming different regions of the house. Growing up beyond that, I was always a big fan of fantasy(ASOIAF, Stormlight Archives, Legend of Drizzt), and despite building extensive universes — rich with pseudo-languages, detailed maps, and long incoherent histories of various nations and worlds — I never even attempted to write a story until I was 19. I guess there’s not really anything inspiring to say here, I’m just happy to be writing every day." S. A. Locket has an earlier story called "An Odör's Duty" which appeared in Bards and Sages Quarterly in their July 2021 Issue

E-mail: S. A. Locket

Comment on this story in the Aphelion Forum

Return to Aphelion's Index page.