Rise of Winter, Week 1, Day 7

  Nora sat, her hands placed gently across her lap, her ankles crossed, the stockings on her legs thick enough to make up for the fact that she still wore shorts—despite the snow that blanketed the entirety of Fellan. Across from the girl sat High Priestess Ophelia, or Effy, for short.

  There were no fires within Effy’s office, no monstrosity of brick and mortar that produced heat. Nonetheless, the room was cozy. The bite of the winter wind could not get to the two of them, could not force its way to Nora’s bones and cause her to shiver. Not that the cold would make her shiver. That would require it to be cooler than her own mana veins—cooler than the ice of shadow mana that pervaded her very being.

  And Effy highly doubted mundane cold could do that. Not unless it was Peak of Winter, and that was still several months off.

  “So,” Effy said, her eyes crinkling as she smiled, “to Morloch again?”

  Nora’s smile was polite, but Effy could see through it. She could see the way the mana within the girl coiled tight into her core, could feel the stirring of the spirits that lived within her shadows, could—well, Effy was no fool. And thus, she could tell that Nora was still nervous. However, her face did not betray her.

  “Always,” came the girl’s smooth voice.

  The pitch reminded Effy of a dream she once had. In it, Ital had spread out his warmth, had encompassed Effy, and had allowed the woman to be reminded of what it means to offer genuine hospitality. It had been a wonderful dream—and when she awoke, her [Class] had progressed another level. That was decades ago. Effy would be hard-pressed to level from a simple Divine Vision. It likely wouldn’t even cross the threshold of acknowledgement.

  0.01% of a Level. That’s what the System recognized as worthwhile.

  “You know, there are other Divines—many of whom are more proactive in rewarding their followers,” Effy began, but paused when she saw Nora’s lips twitch.

  “Oh, I know,” the girl said, and as she waved one of her hands dismissively, one of her spirits detached itself from her shadow. It took the form of an anthropomorphic bunny as it snuggled into Nora’s side. “But don’t you remember what I said when Frill descended?”

  Effy nodded. “That you have refused Divinity before—and that some Divines have refused you, as well.”

  Once again, Nora’s lips twitched, and this time the girl let out a small laugh.

  “One refused me.” Nora flicked her gaze down to her nails—black as night, with a subtle emerald sheen—when she looked back up, her nervousness seemed to ease. “Care to guess who it was?”

  A lock of hair fell in front of Effy’s face as she looked down into her cup of tea—Cloudgazer, as she always prepared for Nora—and she frowned. Right as the storm clouds began releasing the tea back into the cup, Effy closed her eyes and placed her drink down. Leaning back into her chair, she brushed her hair back. It was then she locked eyes with Nora once more.

  “Morloch, of course,” Effy said, half a sigh on her lips that she forcibly held back.

  Nora nodded, satisfaction, and what Effy thought might have been pride, radiating from her.

  “You know, I never thought you to be lying—not when Herali detected Frill’s descent, nor when you claimed to have surpassed the First Threshold. Especially not after the drastic way in which you chose to prove you weren’t Anathema.” Effy spoke casually, as if the words were gentle nothings and not everything Nora had been afraid of. “And thus, I’m forced to see why you would exclusively pray to Morloch.”

  Effy gave the girl a small smile as she watched the tightly coiled mana relax slightly. “But you named off many Gods that do not have a particularly gentle disposition. Grel and Brel, the Twin Lords of Chaos and Order. A Goddess of Fate—when you so clearly wish to defy your own. And Abelia. The Lady of High Noon, but more importantly, a brutal Goddess with no inclination to withstand even a minor offense.”

  Wrapping her fingers around the brilliant silver chains that bound her, Effy came to a decision.

  “We have spoken before about Frill and her descent. But I am seeing why it would be such a terrible thing to you. Lady Nora—” Effy sucked in her lower lip before releasing it “—no, Nora. Those Divines, what they did, what they forced onto you, their Divinity and Skills, it was not your fault.”

  As Nora’s eyes crinkled with her smile, it was a sad thing, and it caused Effy’s heart to clench.

  “I’m not blameless—one of them I called. Purposefully, and with intent to do harm. Not to me, and not to the one that the Goddess did harm. In that, I am guilty. I know it, and I have to live with it.” Nora’s voice trembled as she spoke, but her gaze remained strong. Her blue eyes were as clear as the winter sky. Resolved. “It was selfish to call upon a Divine when I was taken by anger. It was a horrible fate I willed into existence.”

  Humming, Effy took a slow sip of her tea before weighing her response on her tongue.

  “I believe you have trusted me with many a great secret,” Effy said. “And so, I won’t be asking you what I truly want to know. In fact, I will not even vocalize my suspicion. I wouldn’t want it to interfere with the fate you are building.”

  Nora ran her hand over the bunny’s spine, her nails digging into the darkness of the spirit. Effy was sure it was Noir—the others all had a different hue. This one was simply the color of pitch.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “Thanks, Effy,” Nora said softly.

  Waving off Nora’s words, Effy leaned forward. “Now, I believe we have a lesson to begin.”

  Nora nodded, and a smile broke out across her face. “Where we left off from last time?”

  Effy gave the girl a mischievous smile. “And where, pray tell, was that?”

  Stretching out her hand, Nora examined her palm briefly.

  “We ended by speaking about how a Domain was created,” she spoke slowly, but surely, as if pulling up a memory for review. “I asked if it requires explicit intent to create a Domain—but we ran out of time before you had a chance to answer.”

  Clapping her hands together, Effy nodded. “Let us begin by talking about what a Domain is. What do you think a Domain should be?”

  Twitching her mouth, Nora thought for a moment. “A Domain, to my understanding, is a Divine’s sphere of influence. In mortal terms, it’s their industry—what they control, I guess. Only they function as a conglomerate over it rather than there being multiple businesses.”

  “That—” Effy paused, parsing what the child before her was saying, before eventually finding her words once more, “is very close to being correct. A Divine can claim many Domains, and they often begin as extremely narrow topics. There are things such as hereditary Domains passed by blood, the Dawns have not officially released what theirs is, though they often possess powers of light in their later Tiers. Much like Poplar often possesses Nature-aligned Classes.”

  “The next type is natural Domains, which are often influenced by the nature of one’s mana. You know everyone’s mana feels different, correct?” Effy asked, and when Nora confirmed, she continued. “Good. Often, the nature of one’s mana can influence a Domain, though it’s typically only found if one possesses an affinity. It’s not as common in Maeve, due to the Late Queen Lorelei’s ban on Dungeon cultivation—and the fact that the Callistan Empire has effectively issued a trade embargo with us.”

  “The final way a Domain can form is by using one’s Skill aptitude.” At Nora’s blank gaze, Effy quirked her smile up. “Have you learned about aptitudes in your lessons yet?”

  “Not really, though I know I’ve gained some aptitude after absorbing a Lesser Mana Pearl,” Nora paused, “and some of the other students at the Sword Academy have talked about having natural aptitudes.”

  “Yes, there’s actually a process in which you can learn your aptitudes—though it requires a High Priest of Morloch and a great deal of other resources. Aptitude in general affects if one can learn a Skill, what kind of Skill it will be, and how far one can take that Skill. To a lesser extent, it also affects how long it takes to intentionally gain a Skill.”

  “So, a Domain is all three meshed together? Heritage, Affinity, and Aptitude?” Nora asked, and Effy saw her pull out a series of black notebooks from her bag. She flipped through them, before eventually grabbing the third one—unlabeled but for an embossed picture of, well, Effy wasn’t really sure. It was some kind of blob with tendrils coming out of the bottom half of its body. Pulling out a fountain pen, Nora looked up at Effy expectantly.

  “Oh, no, not at all. It’s one of the three—especially at first. When a Domain is first created, it is a weak, fragile thing. And it needs to be reaffirmed by creating a Skill. Once one passes the First Threshold, that becomes a possibility.” Effy clicked her tongue. “Usually, it consumes a point or two of Divinity to create a Domain Skill.”

  Nora, who had been furiously writing, paused abruptly.

  “A point? Maybe two?” She said slowly. “And why is that? Why so low?”

  Effy shot Nora a disapproving look, but left her rebuke at that. “Because most people don’t have any more to spare after passing the First Threshold. Once you’ve crossed the line, you see, you can never go back. And usually Divinity is granted in times of great peril, or in pursuit of a noble Quest, or in the midst of a Divine’s Descent. Thus, the Domain simply consumes what it can. It can take decades upon decades for one born without Divinity to get to even the First Threshold. Less so for nobles, who are born with a hint, but it’s still a long climb up, even with a head start.”

  Nora swallowed thickly. “What would happen if the first Domain Skill was able to consume more than a point or two of Divinity?”

  Taking in the look upon Nora’s face, Effy felt she had stumbled upon yet another secret the Dawns would kill her to hide.

  “How much—hypothetically?”

  “Twenty-five points.”

  Effy’s face blanched, the blood running from her face and straight to her heart. With it, her mana began to swirl.

  “Nora, dear,” Effy spoke slowly, deliberately. “If someone’s Domain manifested, for the first time, at a point wherein they could afford such a cost, the Skill created would be nearly unstoppable by anything without at least 100 Divinity to its own name.”

  “Ah.” Nora wrote down a quick note before nervously looking between Effy and her paper, then scratching out what she wrote. “Okay.”

  Effy didn’t want to ask; she didn’t want to know.

  Oh, but who am I kidding? Of course, I want to know. Effy groaned.

  “What is the name of the Skill?” Effy said, defeated by her own incessant need to meddle.

  There was a long pause, but when Nora spoke, Effy knew she’d simply been giving her the opportunity to take it back. To refuse her own curiosity.

  “[A Shade of Dawn].”

  “So,” Effy said, breathless, “Two types of Domains, meshed together?”

  Nora was shaking her head, and Effy could see the faraway look in her eyes that said one was looking at their [Status].

  “Three, I think one of them might be my aptitude.”

  Effy gave a shaky smile, “Oh? What might it be?”

  Nora looked at Effy for another long moment, but Effy had already decided she was in for a bronze in for a gold.

  “I won’t take my question back, and I will, by the Divinity that binds me, not regret knowing.” Even if the Duchess of Dawn murders me in cold blood. Though Effy left the last bit unsaid.

  “It does list Heritage and Affinity as parts of it. The third one is what I think might be my aptitude. It just says Protection.”

  “Nora, what exactly is [A Shade of Dawn]?” Effy asked, her reluctance fading away at the thought of a child having such an aptitude for protection.

  Fury was boiling in Effy’s stomach, along with concern. The Dawns were not known to be warm, for they were more militaristic than most noble families, but to have a child be so influenced in their Slumber to need protection of all things. It was horrendous.

  “It’s a weapon.” Nora smiled, a light in her eyes. “The description simply says I can manifest it to defeat an enemy.”

  “Very well.” Effy nodded gravely. “Next time someone asks you that, unless you trust them implicitly, do not answer them.”

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