A Rose in a Field of Thorns

[::WOLFURchik::]

"What?! How can this be true?!" The man was yelling at the top of his lungs. Krystine cupped her hands over her ears, leaning against the cold wooden walls.

"We don't know sir! We just found her body... we have no idea how she died! Secondly, nearly half of our forces were wiped out by the winged people." The soldier looked nervous, which he had every right to be. Sylvester Monofest had a reputation of having a temper when he heard bad news.

"How am I suppost to explain this to the counil?!" The elder paced, scuffing his feet on the wood beneath him.

Krystine frowned. The shamin was dead? This was bad news. She was hoping that she would never have to take over as city shamin, but now, things were looking bad, fast.

"Krystine!" The elder shouted, and Krystine looked over at him nervously. "Y-yes sir?" She responded shakily. "Your training is about to get rough. Lady Raasha has left us with no heir. I understand that your powers are not natural, but you are the only one with shamin abilities."

It was exactly what Krystine was regretting. She bit her lip, fear evident in her eyes. "But, sir, I'm not ready..." "You will be!" He bellowed, then turned around to the soldier once more.

"Tell the troops to gather the bodies, and bring the prisoner to me. This has Shifuto Hiru written all over it, and I wont stand for it!" He slammed the end of his rod at the ground, splitting some of the wood and reveiling the ice underneath.

"Yes sir!" The soldier shouted, then turned and hurried off.

The elder turned around to Krystine. "I have no doubt in my mind that Raasha has prepared you for this moment. The shamin's hut, and all the money in it is yours. From now on, you will have more classes. If there is an emergency, I will call you emmediately. The fate of this city very well could rest on your nimble shoulders."

Krystine glanced down at the wood beneath her feet. She wasn't ready for this. She knew she wasn't. This had happened so suddenly... how was she supposed to keep the city safe? Did nobody care about her personal life?

"Return to your home, now child. I will send a tutor straight away... There is no time to waste anymore. I will call on you if anything comes up."

"Y-yes sir."

The elder frowned as he watched the new shamin walk away. More than anything, he was ashamed that the former shamin had failed, and that he himself had not stopped the bird people's attack. Obviously, Shifuto Hiru had new allies, and they should have been watching the skies a little better.

"SHELIM!" He shouted, and a small man crawled out of a large hole in the wall. He was scrawny, and almost inhuman, and his skin was iced and cold. "Not so loud. My ears can hear you well, Sylvester."

The elder turned around and nodded, bowing slightly. "I'm sorry, Shelim. I need your assistance. Please inform the neccesary tutors that their main focus will be on training the new shamin. Invite Mikael to her hut right away. Let him know that it is urgent. Also, keep an eye on Krystine. I trust that she isn't too fond of the idea... she is sneaky, and we can't afford her getting away."

"Yes, ofcourse, Sylvester. And please, do say hello sometime. I get aweful lonely in there." His eyes narrowed, and his skin darkened. Slowly, he seemed to break apart, until his shape melted into a mass of black spiders. Emmediately, they dispersed across the room.

The elder turned around and folded his arms. From now on, things were going to be hard, and he still wasn't sure what he was going to tell the council.

----

Krystine took one step inside the hut. It was filthy, and it smelled like fear and death. She hated the place, even after living here with the shamin for so many years.

It was hard to think that it was all hers now. In all honesty, she didn't even want it. If she could have, she would have burned it. There were so many experiments and pain that happened in just that one house. It gave Krystine the willies.

"Atleast the place may finally be cleaned." She mumbled to herself, grabbing a small broom and sweeping up a pile of broken glass from what looked like a black mug.

She sighed and walked over to a wall. The candles jutting out of it were hardly flickering, and the room was kept dark and frightening. She placed her hand on the ice, closed her eyes, and concentrated. A moment later, the candles flickered, and the light became brighter, filling up the room with a soft, blue glow.

A small smile crossed her lips. Maybe it would be a blessing in disguise. Perhaps this place wouldn't be so creepy if it was cleaned out. Maybe she could turn it into a place of peace rather than torture, and instead of hurting others, she could bless them. Maybe, over time, she could change everybody's view on the shamin, and she would never have to fight again.

Yeah right, like that would happen.

She felt a cold sensation on her leg, and nearly jumped. "Pascal!" She turned around and crouched infront of an ice-made mechanical creature. It looked like a mix between a cat and a dog, with a few other attributes as well.

Krystine smiled and patted the machine on its head. "Pascal, you silly pet. What is it now?" As if on command, the ice robot opened its mouth, holding a small spider. Krystine looked at it curiously, then picked it up in her hand.

The spider was cold to the touch, and almost appeared dead. The warmth from Krystine's fingers defrosted it, and it jumped back to life, its many eyes glancing around.

"Hi there, spider. What are you doing here?" She asked, obviously not expecting a response, which is why the next thing made her nearly go into shock.

"Simply enjoying watching you, m'lady." The tiny spider replied.

Krystine fought not to drop the spider. "Oh... you talk?" The spider crawled a bit in her hand. "Only when I have something to say." Krystine smiled. "You are a very special spider. Do you have a name?"

The spider crouched, as if bowing. "Shelim." Krystine nodded and curtsied. "Nice to meet you, sir Shelim. As long as you are a friendly spider, you may stay as long as you need."

"Thank you." The spider said, almost gentleman-like. "I shall indeed take you up on that offer." It then scurried up her arm and onto her shoulder. From there, it leapt onto the wall and hid itself behind a candle.

Krystine smiled and looked back down at her icy creation. "Pascal, you are always bringing friends home." She patted it on the head, stood and turned. "Well... I guess I had better finish cleaning this place. I can't stand the smell..."

[✪]

The sun was warm enough to melt the ice sky that hung over his head. Even now, every few hours or so a melted drop would fall and hit the ground. This world was so quiet, never did this ice groan as it shifted and the noise of footsteps bounced off the walls and down into abyss like caverns below peoples feet. It always smelt so fresh, like running water. And though the humidity would leave you in a cold sweat it was still a beautiful place to live. So quiet, isolated and haunting.

That was until a large rumble exploded through the air, hissing and buzzing as the solid bazooka shaped piece of ice shot through the roof of the glacier and let the sunlight through its hole, a perfect circle. Another was added to this, and another, and another. Each time followed by a small chime of cheers from the group that stood not too far away.

“Nice shot Mikael!”
“Do it again!”
“No wonder he’s gotten so many metals in battle.”

These same words would continually flow from his so called friends lips, especially when he allowed them to follow him to training. With his greyish blue gaze, he narrowed it towards the group who stood a few meters away from the armed noble. Mikael’s arms were engulfed in ice up to his elbows, bulky and resembling make shift weapons, the ice sculpted barrels smoking from their last ignition. Yes, Mikael Olesen was one of the few skilled in weaponry created out of ice. As well as heir to one of the royal noble families and famous for his teaching and military careers all only at the age of nineteen. Not to mention, popular in his peer group, like the people who watched him now, shooting at the invisible targets above their heads. For a moment silently preying that if he aimed right the sky would crash on his fans. It didn’t, too his dismay and it only caused his fans to become more excited at the danger Mikael practised. He shot again, the ice stored inside the weapon shooting out at incredible speeds of pierce the thin ice above them.

“Hey Mikael!”

When one of the few called his name, he turned away from the newly made whole to the group. His dark blue, almost black, dread locks swinging at the violent turn of his head. “What do you want?”
“Apparently you have to go to the shaman’s hut, something about training?”
The idea of the shaman caused Mikael to scowl. The shaman was a woman who had no dignity and someone Mikael found destructive with how she worked. He did not want to go, he could of just ignored it. But the order probably came from Sylvester Monofest himself. Causing the young man to sigh out of irritation, he could not ignore this order.
“Perfect.”

As if the weapons were nothing, the ice shattered from his toned arms and he brushed away the remaining particles as if they were just dust. “Guess I better go and see what its about.” He could see the disappointment in the face of his so called friends, he offered them a smile though it never reached his eyes and moved towards them. Reaching out for what they knew he wanted.
“Are you going to be at the party tonight Mikael?” A girl questioned him, reaching out to grab at the royal purple jacket he wore. He hated it when people touched him, and he pulling his arm out of her grasp.
“Of course I am, as if I wouldn’t.” Another moved through the crowed with what Mikael wanted, handing the noble young man his dark grey scarf. It dragged across the floor and the large decoration of black feathers hung off it.
Quickly Mikael snatched it up from their grasp and wrapped it back into its place, the long fabric still dragging across the ground. “Alright I’m going to go, I’ll see you all later.” Mikael rolled his eyes at the excitement they held before turning his back on them and leaving them to inspect the sun light that peeked through the holes in the roof.

~

Many greeted him as he passed by, the scarf was a clear give away to his noble family. He travelled through Shifuto Aisu’s course but beautiful glacier world to reach his destination. The hut was a stomach turning image compared to his home, one of the more sophisticated and more constructed buildings of Shifuto Aisu. Mikael had taken leave from the army for the past few months, the government wanting him to educate newer soldiers. He hopped he wasn’t expected to get pointers from the shaman. Mikael thought he was extremely skilled compared to the woman and her young assistant.

But Mikael knew he couldn’t deny orders, he might have been better compared to this shaman. But he still went by the rules.

[::WOLFURchik::]

"M'lady?" Krystine glanced around, searching for the familiar voice. Finally, she found the person who was talking to her, settling into place on her shoulder. "Oh, Shelim, my quiet friend. What's the matter?"

"Nothing is wrong, M'lady. I simply came to inform you that ice weapons master Mikael will be here soon to start your training. I assume he knows nothing of the death that has fallen to our previous shamin." Krystine sighed. She knew this day would happen, just not RIGHT after she recieved the news in the first place. Sylvester really did want her to be trained up... this wouldn't be fun.

"Thank, you Shelim." She said sadly. The spider crawled down her back and scurried across the floor, running off to its usual hiding spot. "Pascal!" she called to her ice companion. The robotic creature came to her side, its icicle tail wagging stiffly. "Stay hidden Pascal, until my guest leaves." The bot acknowledged her orders, and hid itself beneath a table.

Krystine glanced around. Atleast she had cleaned the place up. It was still shabby, only the front wall was made of wood, and the rest were just the walls of the glacier, carved out to make room for the hut. The furnature looked ancient, and there were lots of antiques and items that she could never guess their use. Worst of all was the blood stain in the chair. Krystine remembered it as being the shamin's favorite chair, and guessed that that was where she must have died.

A few minutes later, Krystine felt a weird aura approaching her new home. A presence. It was the only part of her powers that she actually liked; being able to sense when somebody was close by. Slowly, she walked over to the door, and rested her hand on the door knob.

Raasha, the shamin before her, was well respected amongst the citizens. Infact, the shamin had control over most anything that happened in the city. If the shamin told somebody to do something, they did it, no questions asked. Even though Raasha creeped out many people, they had trusted her, because she was powerful, and brilliant. The shamin was always looked at as a savior, and nobody ever spoke down to her.

But now, it was Krystine who would be the shamin. She was scared. She wasn't sure how they would welcome her as the new shamin... would they be hateful towards her? She was old enough to be the shamin without a doubt, bt everybody knew that Krystine was not born with the shamin powers, and that she had recieved them unnaturally. That is what scared her. She was afriad to be blamed for the shamin's death, or that people would expect too much out of her.

She took a long, deep breath and twisted the door knob. It creaked open, and she took a step outside. She glanced at the boy and recognized him emmediately, not because of his looks. Infact, she had never seen Mikael. She had only heard about his skills with ice weapons. Whenever he had come to the hut previously, Raasha had always sent her away.

However, his aura was familiar to her, and that was how she recognized him. As he approached, she could get a feel on his mind, as if she could reach out and touch his emotions. She tried to go a little father, to read his mind, but a pain shot through her head, and she had to stop herself.

"...Mikael...." She spoke. Her voice was innocent, sweet, and timid. Nothing at all like the cruel shamin before her. "M-my name Krystine. I'm the new sh-shamin. Please, come... inside."

[✪]

When the door opened, he waited to come eye to eye with Raasha. But instead his gaze had to be diverted down. Though the two had clearly heard about one another, this had to be the first time he’d ever set his narrowed gaze on the blue haired assistant. She was young, younger than he expected. There had to at least be three years age difference between the two of them, and Mikael rose his eyebrow. This was different to what he expected. Never had Raasha let her assistant show herself when the young prodigy came around. What also surprised the young man was how different they were. The creepy old woman, now replaced with a young, timid girl.

For a moment, his gaze turned to the appearance of the hut. It was a hut, sure, but still looked as worn out as ever. Mikael could only imagine what it looked like inside. Mikael’s home was built into the glacier, but its interior was protected by wood to give it a more modern look. The furniture was new and always clean. Just looking at the outside of this hut told Mikael it would be totally different. His attention was taken by this until he heard her next set of words. At calling herself the new Shaman, he snapped his attention straight back, his gaze narrowing again at her words.
“New Shaman?” He echoed her words as he shamelessly shifted past her, already prepared for what horrors lay inside. “What happened to old Raasha?”

His gaze shifted across the hut, expression set in a frown. It was as he thought, walls made out of the glacier with no cover at all, mess everywhere. The piles where Krystine tried to clean still visible. Mikael’s attention turned to the chair Raasha would sit in on his visits. Where she would scowl and he would scowl back, forced to show her his skills or to simply give her a message. Un like others in Shifuto Aisu, who respected this woman with such high power. Mikael thought she was too old to call the shots.
The blood stain splattered the chair and one would of thought Mikael’s stomach would of turned. But he had seen enough death to bite the bullet. And he knew exactly what had happened.

The nobleman turned his attention to Krystine. “She’s dead?”
His question was more of a statement, but still he wondered if it was true. “This explains why I was sent to teach. Raasha was an old dog, you can’t teach them new tricks.” He diverted his greyish blue gaze as he spoke, eyes scanning over the dusty floor and for a second he felt pity for the young girl. Before she had Raasha to keep her company. Now she was all alone. Mikael had never really felt that feeling. So many loved him that it was impossible to be alone, so many friends, women who wanted to be more than friends, even students and comrades in battle.
“So I guess they are expecting me to teach you.”

[::WOLFURchik::]

Krystine's eyes dropped to the floor. "Raasha was killed... yes." She didn't dare look at that old chair. It needed to burn. That chair held so many haunting memories for her.


"Krystine!" The witch said in a loud, high pitched scream. The girl dropped her tea, biting her lip. She wanted to clean it, but when Raasha called, she needed to go. Hurridly, she scurried up to Raasha, sitting ontop of her favorite chair as usual.

"Ah. Krystine." Raasha said in a hushed voice. Krystine hated her. She wasn't really cruel... but she was akward, and terrifying. She always acted so... inhuman. "Krystine, I have seen something." She spoke seriously, something the girl was always surprised to ome from the odd shamin.

The girl poked her head forward, looking into the filthy mug that Raasha was holding out for her. Inside, the liquid was black and tar-like in consistancy. It looked repulsive. "Krystine, its time to further your abilities... focus. See what I have seen."

Krystine tried, but she couldn't see anything. "I'm.. I'm sorry. Nothing..." Raasha sighed and set the cup down on the floor. "You still can't control that? No matter. We will keep trying." She dispeared, startling Krystine. No matter how many times she had seen it happen, she couldn't get used to it.

When Haarsha reappeared, she gave Krystine a small shove. The girl twisted and fell into the chair in a relaxed sitting position. "Please, Haarsha, I don't want to do this..." Raasha shook her head. "please know... We have to do this. There is no other way. You must see what I have seen. Again, this wont hurt..."

She vanished, and reappeared behind the chair, grasping the girls head. "Shamins can see the future... if something happens to me, you must carry on this information." Silent tears flowed down Krystine's cheeks. "I don't want to see it! I don't want to know!"

Haarsha frowned. "Someday, someone will kill me. She once went by the name of Haarsha. She is a shamin. When that day comes, you will have to take over. YOu must know this information. You have to endure the pain you see."

Krystine shut her eyes was was thrown into a vision of torture and pain. Flames licked the streets of the city...what city? She couldn't tell. The people's faces were blank, but she could see the creature ravaging the city, destroying homes, murdering lives...

It was like this everytime Raasha had gotten a vision... It terrified her. The vision continued, until she let out a horrified scream, and Raasha let go of her head. She snapped back into reality, gasping and crying.

Raasha appeared infront of her again, holding out her hand to help her out of the chair. "We are getting close... to figuring out this mystery. When all the visions are realized, I have an important mission for you..."


The memory faded away, and Krystine shuddered. She was never meant to be a shamin. She had never asked for these powers... those visions scarred her for life. The worst part about it was that she wasn't sure if she had seen the future or the past, and now Raasha was gone, and she would never figure out. She would never finish Raasha's mission...

"Erm... I suppose, yes. They told me that I will be training hard. We will be training with ice weapons?" She wasn't sure how she really knew for certain, she just knew. She walked over to the wall and placed her hand on it. Emmediately, she pulled it away, pulling out an ice shaped like a short sword.

She held it in her hands and sighed, looking back up at her new teacher. "W-would this be acceptable?"

[✪]

Mikael’s view on war was that the world could not live without it. There always had to be conflict. Sure you could fight for peace, but the main fact was you had to fight, and you wanted to win. This was how Mikael thought, even at the age of nineteen. Being the son of a general did this to you. Mikael had everything. The money, friends, power, intelligence, women, parties. But peace was something he didn’t have, neither did the city. So why wouldn’t he be obsessed with the idea of war, and winning.

His attention was on the short sword made out of ice. At first he was relieved she could at least do that much. But Mikael narrowed his eyes at it, shoving one of his hands into his pockets as he moved towards the smaller girl, his pale finger tips brushing across its surface. It was a sword, a weapon. But for the war lord mind of Mikael it wasn’t enough. “It would be, as a secondary weapon for land combat.”
Mikael knew slack needed to be cut for her, she was only young, the only human to live with her had died. Her life had only changed entirely. “The opposing city has allied with the bird people though. I am going to train you to make air born weapons.” He explained this as he flexed his fingers, the tips pressing up against one of the ice walls. “They’re going to be a bit more dynamic as well so it will be hard at first to make them work smoothly.”
Quickly his hand was engulfed in ice that retreated off the walls. The ice ran up his arm, over his sleeves and jacket to his elbow before he pulled away. With the ice came a weapon, build into his arm now as if he was a weapon himself. It was the same as before on his training field, a large cannon like weapon built around his arm, the ice ammo kept compacted up his arm where it would then fire out through the singular large barrel that Mikael rested against the ground. It was heavy, but powerful. “By the end you will be able to create something like this.”

Mikael reached back out to the wall and the ice quickly rushed back into the foundation as he touched the nozzle of the cannon to the wall. “Don’t worry I will be teaching you more simple things before that.”

{ short :'c }