Trash: Interlude VII Dark Art Skills (Patreon)

Interlude VII

Dark Art Skills

(Anastasia Bloom)

Never underestimate the true power held by a broken house. Nor doubt the means that a broken house will rise from the ashes once more.

For some time, Anastasia had seen the cracks forming. Lines of fate and chance needing to have a chance to blossom and take root. Minor things, moments that seem like they wouldn’t matter, but wind up mattering for everything.

General Brack had been away while the majority of his family and their lands were destroyed from under him. He had been away, serving on the front lines, protecting the border regions from monsters. Only to find that his worst nightmare had happened, that his family had been gutted from the inside.

Only after speaking with him and seeing how he and his elite soldiers, the sole survivors of the once great Dunamis Imperial Special Forces, had managed to survive. Not just survive but scout, infiltrate, and ultimately enact justice on foreign soil was impressive. It had taken them months to get to this point. Months that Madame Bloom might have overlooked entirely had it not been for the overlapping lines of fate with her own Apprentice.

The only problem is that her power comes at a cost. The longer she looks into the future, the more she burns away her own retinas, causing her own vision to go blind as an exchange. Normally this results in most so-called seers becoming blinded birds, held in gilded cages for leadership to seal away and use. Fortunately, as a Bloom and as a Healer she was doubly blessed to resist this problem.

What should have cost Anastaisa, her eyesight multiple times over can be healed, in time. Despite this, her Foresight and Hindsight Skills are ones that she often chooses to avoid. In the grand scheme of things, being able to see the future is not necessary. It is only when it comes to recent times that the need has never been higher.

Even still, she knows that using Hindsight and Foresight are considered part of the Dark Arts for a reason. They are addictive in what they offer, unlimited power, unlimited wealth, business ventures that are exceptional returns on investment. Everything and anything can be viewed with Foresight, but one should always use the Skill cautiously, especially when the first safeguard is negated. As a healer, it is especially easy to forget that Foresight, Anastasia’s own Personal Skill is a part of the Dark Arts, and for good reason. Not only does it actually make your eyesight go dark, but it has a direct physical cost in addition to Mana that adds it to the Dark Arts section of Skills. While it is not as shunned as the other Dark Arts, those that can be conducted at the physical cost to other people, it is still one that is monitored with concern.

Yet Anastasia can safely claim that she would not be where she is today without use of her Personal Skill. That the major reason why she was always able to win any battle and snatch victory for defeat was her ability to see the battlefield beforehand and adjust as needed.

Now Foresight is also considered a Dark Art Skill due to it causing obsessions. Times when you see a history that is so perfect, so wonderful that the seer themselves press for that exact future. They focus all their efforts on making one course of history happen that they lose all rationality and decency. Those times also come with a cost, often one that is unseen.

Looking at the aftermath of this outbreak where not one, not two, but a total of three Death Eaters had been released in the heart of downtown causing hundreds of injuries and dozens of casualties despite the Princeling and his elite guards being on hand to quell the outbreak. For there were forces at play that even she had not seen. She had seen the Nostrylvanian one, and the one by the Necrotin assassin still loose in the city. Yet Anastasia had not predicted the third one.

While the resources that had been deployed were enough, it was only due to the quick work of her Apprentice that allowed the third one to be taken down with the forces that were deployed. They even managed to avert a Nostrylvanian coo, by being on hand.

However, this had all come at a huge cost. First, Anastasia’s eyes were now blurry and unable to focus properly. She knew that if she but glanced ahead, she could make sure she got all of the conspirators, but it would mean that she would be blinded for a week, rather than just a day or two as she was currently.

That said, the most important factors had been tied up. By forcing fate to go in this direction, she had bonded her Apprentice with the two Dunamis royal members. Royal Members that would be granted sanctuary, which would provide a temporary refuge for both girls as they fled the general’s command. This was part of the long view plan that she had seen for her Apprentice, the one that would ultimately force her Apprentice to join the military and finally allow Anastasia to retire.

A selfish desire, and one that she felt guilty for pushing everything into place to achieve, but one that was needed. For it didn’t require one to have Foresight to realize that Anastasia’s time was coming to an end. And when that time came, she knew someone truly worthy would need to be there to replace her. By now it was clear that she had found that person who was worthy, she just needed to make sure that future that she was now banking on would come true. Even if it cost her, everything in the process.

***(Johny DiVoratore)

They say your body knows where your true home is, and that in times of trouble you will instinctively head towards your true home. Perhaps that is why Johny took off running, through the streets, momentarily feeling uncomfortable in his booty shorts and boots, but no one seemed to notice. As everyone around him seemed to be just frightened, just as uncaring about where they were going, just that they were getting away from the arena as quickly as possible.

That is why Johny was able to run, his body moving and going on reflex that ended up taking him north and east of the arena, almost the exact opposite way of where his new home was. The DiVoratore estate still felt unreasonably cold and invasive to him.

Though now, Johny could only feel cold all over. He had seen the treatment given to Sal and the others, traitors all of them. However, it was only now, thanks to the clarity brought on by running that he realized one important truth that he had overlooked. That truth was that he himself was also a traitor, as he knew that if he was shown with one of those expensive lenses that his own sins of carrying a Death Eater would be shown to everyone. Those sins never go away. Those sins mark your soul forever, worse, they make it so Death Eaters seek you out, ready to use your soul’s shadow to host them. As he realized just how badly he had messed up, how wrong his life had gone, that’s when the ultimate irony of life hit him. For he soon found himself running on unconsciously familiar and safe paths. Paths that led through dark woods, that somehow set his mind at ease, despite feeling tired and panicked. That is how he found himself at the last place he expected, staring at the Bloom manor, only stopping once he realized his legs were trying to take him forward, to seek shelter and sanctuary at the one place he knew he would still be safe.

Seeing the sprawling lawn, he saw the manor. Saw the carriage from the arena, glowing green magic shining brightly from the carriage. Just seeing that glow caused a chill to run down Johny’s body as he realized just how exposed he was, and how cold he was. Mentally he knew that if he just went to the carriage, he would feel warm. Not just warmth from being in the carriage, but from the warm healing magic that would set his body at ease, but that was a different life and time. A life he was no longer a part of, one he had pridefully abandoned. Realizing his mistake, he began to turn and head back from where he came, to go back to his new home. That was when he was distracted by the rustling of bushes behind him.

Startled, Johny almost jumped out of his skin when he realized that someone had managed to sneak up on him. For a moment, he imagined Pierre, or worse Markan finding him and mocking him first before kicking him off of the property.

“Hello?” A startled voice cried out, having not noticed Johny at all until now. A voice that at one time had sent shivers of joy down his spine, but now he could only feel like he had been caught by someone even worse than Markan.

“Hey,” Johny replied, his voice half breaking as he realized this was not the way he wanted to meet his ex. Or at least a person he mentally considered to be his ex. Showing up randomly on her property at night, wearing booty shorts and boots.

“What are you doing here?” Ithica Bloom asked, her voice going from shocked to confused.

“I’m here for you, I realized I made a mistake and I missed you,” Johny began, realizing that if he played this right at the very least, he could get some spare clothes and a warm meal, and maybe more. “What are you doing out here?”

“I’m looking for my cat? Have you seen her?” Ithica asked, and like that a wave of fear rolled down Johny’s spine but only for a moment.

“Oh no, can I help you look for her?” Johny asked feigning as much sincerity as he could in that one request. There was a moment of hesitation before Ithica relaxed and smiled, that’s when Johny knew that as bad as today was, it was finally going to get better, for him.