Alchemist's Demise

"It stands as a sacred tradition carried by the very founder of Sovenia, way before the first snow fell on Mt. Mynareth, breaking the rules of the game would ensue in breaking your bonds to your motherland."

-Tales of the North: Queen Ingrid the Founder.

©

Miriam Blackmercy

Nightshade Heroine, Medium of the North, God-killer, Master Alchemist... these are the names of which the grandsons and granddaughters of Viridia would study from the epitaphs of legends. Always depicted as monstrous by war-weathered soldiers and vicious from tavern whispers yet if seen from a crowd, she walks as a short lady of serene features commonly associated with devout temple goers, her real age always double the initial impression. But her solemn illusion would dry once she opens her mouth to speak, profane enough to out-curse a sailor.

Her enemy's last misstep was not taking her seriously since she's not much for making noise or fighting in grandiose to garner attention. But as this dusk blankets Graygreen, she chose to make noise, to gather every ear and eye from the castle and step forward to the moonlight to claim what's hers. A name and title that she would trade for all the previous ones she has that marks her as a living legend-

Miriam Graygreen.

Diatribes were dropped on each of her steps, the patio holds heavy winds while she holds all stares; from the stars to the ground, from the torches illuminating her path, and back to the damned eyes from the shadowed walls. Short strides start to lengthen as she regains her confidence, sheer willpower manifesting, making the likes of Geraldine shrink.

Sion covers his nose and mouth with the tablecloth, a fried stench had stung his nose upon his mother's unravelling. He had spent cycles in the alchemy laboratory to recognize almost every material when burnt. But this one is different, almost new to him, the atmosphere arrests charges of mystifying energies that seem to radiate pressure. Then, bursting from the far chair of the table, the young Bluebeard warlock released a deafening shriek echoing through the open sky, ancient magic washing through his bones, his entire head engulfed in blue flames that seems to dance with anger as he postured like a cold-blooded toad on fire. Though his eyes are full-on white and burning- everyone knows where he is currently looking.

"You dare take another step and I'll bring you down myself you wretched wench!" the azure flame that crowns him spewed down to the floor, creating trails of controlled fire that collected to block the path of the Master Alchemist. Miriam stood there, unflinching while the blue flames roared at her, and as soon as her hand dipped down her satchel, a dozen of Frostguards emerged from the shadows with the edge of their weapons pointed at every side of her neck.

"Umavonavosh..." Ferj'haal Bluebeard chanted in a forgotten tongue and all the charge in the air was consumed. From the circle of cold flames emerged a hand branching out like a tree, with spiked ice as bark and bloodied tongues as leaves, dripping and waggling with inaudible curses. Sion could feel the bile burn his throat as the abomination grips his mum's frail body, flailing her high like a straw doll. But Miriam didn't once shout, not a strip of muscle stiffened and not a strand of struggle evident from her face.

A cork fell down the circle of flames, catching fire as it rolls on the stone floor, not all had noticed it except for the Ocmenian Queen.

"This is fucking futile." She spoke from the grasp of Umavonavosh, "I feel aroused... that, just a drop of this vial on my hand to one of these cunt-licking tongues and you can kiss your Ancient Abomination goodbye."

"We don't think so." The Frostguards encircled her with weapons ready to impale and slice, as If a demon of ancient legends would be released from her at any moment when the actual demon is the one keeping her immobilised.

"Please! cease the aggression, Miriam Blackmercy was invited under the Ocmenian Flag." Laguna pleads with the officials.

Vallin pinched between his tightly shut eyes, the nails of embarrassment being hammered on his temples. "Stupid bed-wetter..." he whispered, "you call yourself Syrosh'jhaal's Official? You're barely even a fully realized warlock!"

Heavy is a provincial crown, but heavier is the hand that rules it.

He kicked his chair off as he stood, "Enough of this child's play, brat. Of all the Ancients to choose from, you summoned Umavonavosh? yer' itching to prove something?" With axe in hand, he aimed at the farthest edge of the long table and there it flew, ripping the winds and slicing through every candlestick before landing on the young warlock's brume bowl, splitting it in half. The impact of its blade held the kid's throat, his pipes narrowing as he tried to speak. The spices and broth of Ferj'aal's dinner splattered on his face, his blue flames perished as if the soup extinguished his head along with the anger.

Amanita rushed from her seat to solace the trembling warlock, a tablecloth in hand for his wide and unblinking glassy eyes. "Father, he's still a child!" she called, but her words were not heard as heavy metals and sharp steel were falling loudly on the floor. The Banquet stares as a cloud of faint orange dissipate from the archways from where Miriam once was captivated, her tiny silhouette coming into view as the smoke from the recent flames cleared. From her wake, the abominable hand were nowhere to be seen and the Frostguards were lying on the floor like autumn leaves. Only the Alchemists in the banquet know of what transpired inside the cloud as they stare at two corks, rolling and scorching on the ground.

The Master Alchemist strolled behind her son's chair only stopping at arm's length. Geraldine, along with the other guards stationed at the patio was already holding firm on their weapons.

"I missed you..." Miriam said as she looked at the far stars, her eyes focused as if the celestial bodies hold a copy of her fate.

"We've only met a few nights ago darling, what gives?" Vallin's replied, which had caught the banquet off guard. An endearing reception of a Kazer for a criminal stays only in saintly books, and Vallin is far from a Saint; much more for Miriam.

"I'm speaking to our daughter, you delusional twat. Unless you wear a dress, Then you'd have me confuse you for a little girl." she threw a spiteful stare at her man before reverting to Amanita, when their eyes met, it was apparent that they saw a piece of themselves through each other's eyes. Sion could see it too. "No, don't tell me..." Amanita had let go of the young warlock on her bosom who is still fighting off tears. Her hand tried to catch the words from her speechless mouth, fingers parted and trembling.

"This is too much..." Ian'drah rushed to the stunned girl, dragging her by her wrist as he walk around the table to collect the other young alchemist too. "Sion, let's go." He grasped the boy's tricep, pulling him to stand but the boy fought his force.

"This is pivotal Ian."

"Siontuna Blackmercy, we need to go. This is for the best."

"Ah, that confirms everything." Geraldine smirks as she heard the name. She knew something was off- to send a random boy from Dirge as an ambassador, but he wasn't just random, he was the Blackmercy boy. Whatever the Ocmenians are cooking, she wants a taste of it.

"Miriam Blackmercy acting all asked for... You know that dining with an alchemist is a risk, right? In this maze of flavours and spices, it's too easy to slip a poison." Harinthal said, he knew of his dad's prohibited affair with the criminal, his old flame, the medicine to his heart, 'Etriova Fida'. He had seen the letters before and his father was never happier while writing to a criminal- all these cycles, they repulse him.

Miriam just chuckled, throwing her food-drenched cloak to the Ocmenian Queen before giving the young prince a piece of her mind, "Yet here you are, dining with three of Alchemists." She looked at her children and the Queen of Ocmenia. "But fucking with an alchemist is riskier, don't you think?" She walked to the Kazer, about ten arrows are aimed at her head from the shadows by now. "Don't get your undergarments twisted just yet, I'm not here to fight or dine with ya lots, instead, Let's play a game..." she announced as one by one, she lined five vials of unlabeled mixtures encircled around the Kazer's plate, taking her time to do so.

"Are you challenging me Woman? is this all you went here for?" the Kazer asked, though he remains seated, Miriam stands short enough to be directly on his eye level.

"We've played countless times Vallin and this might be the last." She had set the last vial from her satchel. "I'll make sure to drink the vials with you if you guessed them wrong like how I always do. Who knows? maybe from the first vial, we'll both be foaming to our death? or the next makes us all hot and bothered? either way, it would be romantic."

Vallin looked at the green vials presented in front of him, a bitter recollection taking him back to a simpler time. When he wanted to build a natural resistance against poisons and disease, he had hired a rumoured alchemist from the outskirt town of the Sovenian capital- Mynareth. In each session of Alchemist's Demise he ended up guessing the potions wrong but her hometown right, the name of poisons forgotten but her day of birth remembered, the named tonics were far yet her waist was held near. And soon, each of their session would be a hurricane mess of spilt mixtures and shattered vials for they had begun to use the table for other incentives. If only she wasn't outed as a medium...

"Alright, let the Alchemist's Demise... commence." Vallin accepted. "Watch close Ocmenian, this is how we do it in the north." he gave the Diplomat a playful smirk.

Leaning closer to test the vials, he was dumbfounded, raising his brow to the master alchemist as he marvels at her boldness. The vials she had presented were all the same; A green viscous murk, a winged spider with plum and hairy legs, and orbs of white sizzling from the bottom of the vial.

This was her original mixture, what he feared to be ignorant of the night it was first presented in their games, and grateful to know of comes the next dawn. He remembered awakening with Miriam in his arms, all bare and vulnerable with not only their physicality but also their emotions and desires.

The three alchemists know of the vial too, Miriam's agenda is apparent to them.

Vallin uncorked each of the vials, and with mead on hand, he chugged down the first one, then the second one, then the third one, throwing the emptied vials behind his shoulder up until the last one, the mead as a chaser after each. Afterwards, he still had the audacity to wipe his sloppy mouth with the tablecloth as a noble would. "I'm afraid I don't know the names of the vial." he excused himself before burping out his manners.

"Liar..." Miriam smirked. She knows that he sits far from an overdose, or those cycles spent on building up his immunity would be ought to nothing. But with that amount of Stallion's Stupor consumed, the effect should be instantaneous. She picked up one vial from the floor, taking a drop on the tip of her tongue is enough for it to take effect.

"Humour me, Lady Blackmercy, but what did you feed to Graygreen's Kazer?" Geraldine asked, she knows that it wasn't a poison or Amanita would be breaking havoc by now.

"It was Stallion's Stupor, the mixture of truth." Vallin replied instead which proved that he had been lying at the previous juncture, but not anymore.

"But why did you act ignorant of it?" Amanita asked all confused and distraught, her body still restrained by the Sailor's arm. Her father turned away, picking up his ornamented chair from the ground as he remains there standing with his eyes cast to his seat, then he spoke, "Because the Kazer before you is a spineless father, running away from the truth while barefooted on a stony field... but now, he found himself at the edge of a cliff."

Miriam broke into a peal of vigorous laughter, making Harinthal rise with an unsheathed blade ready to cut her down. "Vallin..." She replied, "there's only one reason why I went through the shitty inferno just to find myself here, and I know that you know why..." taking her time, she picked up all the remaining vials on the floor, putting them away in her satchel before facing the large Kazer. "I still remember the pain when the guards of the courtroom took her away from my arms when you signed the notice of exile." She looked up at the crestfallen man, her stare piercing through his hollowness as her swelling rage fills it.

"The grief of leaving a child changed my brain. And when you find yourself dying in foreign lands, there's only one reason why you yearn to stay alive... it was the hope of having a home to return to, Vallin!" fury flooded her veins, jutting across her reddened neck and sweat-soaked head.

"But that was also taken away from me innit? and you all can't imagine the pain to belong nowhere! So I'm sorry if a sanctioned criminal like me returned because fucking exiled or not, I still have my daughter here! take my home away but I am still a mother!"

Rage nearly consumed the small woman. Her heavy breath soaked the silent banquet.

"So answer me, Vallin, and I had got to hear it straight from your mouth..." Miriam pointed at the Grey lady on the Sailor's arm. "is she my daughter?" her voice faltered.

"Yes."

Miriam pressed against her chest, gasping for air as if her lungs had been stabbed with a new hole. She took three stiff steps backwards, uncorking another vial from her satchel, "That's it... that's- that's all I needed..." She said before vanishing into the thin air.

She left the banquet sundered in silence, the sight of the wretched woman long gone.