FicL Element, Fandom: Original, Rated: PG-13, Genre: Fantasy
Title: Element
Author: in_excelsis_dea
Characters: Danny
Fandom: Original
Genre: Fantasy, maybe a bit of horror mixed in
Rating: PG-13
AN: Written for 31_days prompt May 3rd: One is company. This is a bit...odd, and it ended up twisting on me at the end. I seem incapable of writing anything without some kind of fantasy element. Constructive criticism is always appreciated, as are comments in general.
We wish you a merry Christmas,
We wish you a merry Christmas,
We wish you a merry Christmas,
And a Happy New Year!
The melody filters through the air vent and even in her cold, pristine prison, Danny can hear the music, feel the joy that joins everyone else together. Instead of being on stage, sharing in the merriment, she is locked into one of the tiny bathroom stalls, sitting on the toilet, knees pulled up to her chest, eyes red with tears.
My day was ruined already, Sarah didn't have to do that.
Her parents had finally announced that morning that they were getting a divorce. Everyone else said that it was a long time coming, but Danny didn't feel that way. That her parents had problems was obvious - her mother was never home and her father tended to lock himself in the study day in and day out, writing melancholy theater scripts that would never see the light of day - or at least Danny hoped that they wouldn't. She had once read a few pages of one and had had nightmares for a week, a fact that she had hidden from either of her parents.
She didn't exactly trust them.
She had been late to school and her parents had refused to give her a note. She missed her bus stop, because she was so caught up in her misery and ended up having to walk the mile and a half. Finally reaching the school building at nearly ten in the morning, she had instantly received a detention and her parents were called. They, of course, didn't stand up for their daughter and the look the school secretary had given her was merely icing on the already pitiful cake of a day.
She had left her math homework at home, which earned her a failing grade and another detention. She failed the pop-quiz in English and the one subject she really enjoyed- choir- was the subject she had missed completely, thanks to her walk through the town. Laura, her best friend, had tried to be comforting, but the girl had two parents who weren't getting divorced and would stand up for their daughter if she had missed getting off of the bus or was too upset to go to school. Laura didn't understand what it was like- the Corbin family may have looked perfect on the outside, but the inside was desolate and full of tears.
Zach, her older brother, had managed to escape by behaving so poorly (at least that's what her father said) that he got sent to military school and then enlisted in the Air Force as soon as he was eighteen. He never dropped by the family home any more, but he did send Danny covert text messages on occasion, with coordinates or addresses she was supposed to meet him at. Zach was twenty-four to Danny's seventeen, and had said that she could live with him once she graduated high school.
Though that might not happen…
If there was one thing St. Joanna's Preparatory School for Young Ladies was known for, it was the little geniuses that walked the halls. While money and influence and your family name were certainly important (as well as legacy- Danny's mother Aileen had attended the school as well), what really mattered were grades. The school was privately funded and privately owned. If the school did not want you there anymore, you were kicked out onto the curb - literally, in some cases. Every student was expected to have at least a B-average and if you got lower than a C in more than two classes during your entire stay at the school, you were "invited" to a conference and had to convince the school to keep you.
Danny had been informed by her art teacher that she was going to get a C this term, and while Miss Dean was new to the school and didn't seem to realize what that meant, Danny knew very well. She was already failing both social studies and PE - this C was her death warrant - literally. Her parents were going to kill her, especially since her mother had been valedictorian while at St. Joanna's.
And then, after school, during the dress rehearsal for her last choir performance, Sarah Willows had appeared with the droopy-eyed stray puppy Danny had secretly been feeding after school every day and dropped it at her feet. "I am so sorry," she had said, her voice dripping with animosity, "but my boyfriend just happened to run it over."
Danny lost it.
"Go to Hell," she swore, with as much ferocity and malice as she could summon up. "Die." And she fled.
It was two hours later and no one had found her yet. The concert had started without her, but she was past caring. She idly traced the runes carved into the bathroom stall, one for strength, one for power, one for confidence - runes that students had carved before performances to ask for power. She wondered if this entire day was just because of a curse or if she really did deserve it.
Zach had the power of sorcery, of runes, and while he had attended a non-magical school, he still excelled in his powers. But she had always shrunken away from her gift, knowing that it was too big of a burden to bear. She couldn’t let it control her, no matter how tempting it might have been. Her classmates thought she was ungifted, mortal. Laura knew that she had a gift but did not like to use it, and Danny had heard her stand up for her once, telling a would-be tormentor that it wasn't Danny's fault that her gift wasn't as powerful as others.
What Laura did not know- what even her parents did not know- was that her gift was of the abyss, a dark gift that was fueled by darkness and night and was so strong that it threatened her humanity. While the other gifts were gifts of healing or strength or manipulating words or runes, Danny's gift was purely elemental.
It terrified her.
There were seven elements, and only one elemental controlled each. Unlike healers, which were a dime a dozen, or sorcerers, which were rare but still usually found in families, there were only seven elementals in the world at one time and they fought hard not to be consumed by their element as they manipulated it.
Elementals were both revered and cursed. Only an elemental could understand the power and the curse behind it. All the other Gifted thought it was an honor. Danny thought it was a horrible strain and refused to tell anyone. She would definitely get away from her family if she did, but she'd also be trapped in a facility, forced to manipulate her element for the rest of the Gifted until she wasted away and her powers were released to be given to another.
The curious thing, though, was that there already were seven elementals: fire, earth, water, air, light, dark, spirit. The elemental council was full and there was no possible way for there to be an eighth elemental- no matter how her powers manifested themselves. She was an elemental of darkness when an elemental of darkness already existed: Adrian of the Dark.
"Oh my God! She's dead! Someone help me!" The screams interrupted the concert and Danny could hear shuffling feet, pounding feet, raised voices. Something had happened- something bad, but she did not care anymore. She traced a rune on the door, an unfamiliar rune that appeared to have been carved years ago: a weird, straight kind of Z with short arms. She frowned, curious that she hadn't noticed it before.
"There you are!" The door finally swung open and Laura stormed in the cubicle, the black gown all the choir girls wore mused and dirty. "I've been looking everywhere for you, Danny- we have to go. Sarah was found dead and the whole place is in a panic. It was a spell or some kind of magic because there wasn't a mark on her and she's been tested for poisons and other potions, but with the wards haven't fallen, so it should be impossible and everyone is worried and we're ordered to get out right now."
Danny merely nodded, allowing herself to be pulled out of the bathroom. Sarah was dead. Sarah deserved it, she couldn't help but think, but it was still curious. The wards that kept out dark magic were still present in all their glory, yet a girl was dead by means that could only be some form of magic. And light magic didn't kill.
Before she stepped over the bathroom threshold, Danny couldn't help but look back at her prison, her cubicle. The door was swung open and the rune she had traced was still there, looking darker than it had before. She frowned, deciding to ask Laura about what it meant - runes were Laura's specialty as a sorcerer like Zack, but it faded away.
The girls walked through the labyrinth of corridors under the stage, before coming up to the top and were greeted with a mob of people. Sarah's body was covered with a white sheet and her parents - or Danny assumed they were her parents - were holding each other while the woman wept into the man's shoulder. The scene did nothing for Danny, who merely bowed her head and clasped her hands. This didn't involve her, and to be honest, she didn't really care. Sarah had always been a cruel person and the puppy-incident had just been the last straw.
That was when she noticed where Sarah's body was lying. The sheet just covered the edge of the very vent that led into the bathroom, which meant that Sarah's body was lying over the very stall Danny had been sequestered in.
"Laura," she hissed, not-so-delicately nudging the girl's arm. "What rune looks like a Z, but straight up with short arms?"
"What?" Laura turned to her and then frowned in thought. "Well, there are several runes that look like a Z. But the short arms and straight up…that's probably Eihwaz." She traced it in the air, adding just enough power to give it form, but not enough to use it in any way.
"And what does it mean," Danny pressed on, clutching Laura's arm.
"Well, it means 'yew' traditionally. But it's also associated with death."
"Death," Danny repeated dumbly, full of disbelief. "It's a rune of death."
"It can be," Laura allowed, standing up straighter as she began the lesson - a lesson Danny didn't really care to have at the moment. "There isn't one specific rune for death, but many that can be interpreted that way. You know," she mused, "a death rune would probably be the only way to kill someone in a warded building, except there aren't any. While Eihwaz symbolizes death, it can't be used to create it. Death is a force, not a power. It's like how there are runes for water, but only the water elemental can truly create it."
"But- but spells can be used to cause death." Danny forced out, her mind working furiously to put the pieces together.
"Well, yes…but spells aren't runes. Runes are tied to the elements, used as substitutes. Spells usually aren't as powerful. It's why witches are common, and sorcerers aren't - because of the level of power."
Go to Hell, Danny had said. Die. She had traced a rune of death, and a girl was dead above that very spot. She had used a rune - when she had never been able to use runes before - to cause death.
A feat that was impossible.
Yet she had still done so.
"I have to get out of here," she said, suddenly suffocating on the knowledge. "Tell- tell everyone that I went home."
"All right…" Laura looked at her, her eyes filled with something Danny couldn't place. Sorrow, maybe. Or worry. Emotions Danny wasn't used to, not with her parents and life.
"I'll see you tomorrow." She forced out the mundane words and left, slinking through the crowds that barely noticed her departure. Standing on the steps of the building, taking in deep breaths of clean air, she was able to think.
She closed her eyes and felt. She was alone and yet she wasn't- there was something on the edge of her consciousness that pressed against her, warmed and cooled her at the same time. Not darkness, for this was deeper than that. This was…ancient, powerful, consuming.
Right.
"I'm not alone, am I?" She whispered to herself and felt the nudge of the power answering her with an affirmative.
"I'm not an elemental of darkness." Another affirmative nudge. "I'm an element of…of death?" The force of the power at her statement was so strong that she almost staggered off the stairs. She gripped the handrail to keep her balance and the world twisted in her vision for a moment.
"You're what tells me things. My 'curse'," she muttered, putting the pieces together. Her entire life, she had been an outsider. She did things that no one else did, or didn't do things everyone else did. Laura was her friend and Zach was her brother, but neither of them really understood her either. And forget her parents… she had written them off long ago. She preferred to be alone, saying that one was company enough.
Except now it turned out she wasn't really alone. Her power was behind her all this time, influencing her and guiding her.
It was exhilarating to finally know. She could do things now. She could break free of those stupid bonds her parents had placed on her, monitoring her, and break the bonds of society as well. She was different and no one came before her.
With only a handful of change in her pocket, she stepped down the stairs and left, never turning back.
Author: in_excelsis_dea
Characters: Danny
Fandom: Original
Genre: Fantasy, maybe a bit of horror mixed in
Rating: PG-13
AN: Written for 31_days prompt May 3rd: One is company. This is a bit...odd, and it ended up twisting on me at the end. I seem incapable of writing anything without some kind of fantasy element. Constructive criticism is always appreciated, as are comments in general.
We wish you a merry Christmas,
We wish you a merry Christmas,
We wish you a merry Christmas,
And a Happy New Year!
The melody filters through the air vent and even in her cold, pristine prison, Danny can hear the music, feel the joy that joins everyone else together. Instead of being on stage, sharing in the merriment, she is locked into one of the tiny bathroom stalls, sitting on the toilet, knees pulled up to her chest, eyes red with tears.
My day was ruined already, Sarah didn't have to do that.
Her parents had finally announced that morning that they were getting a divorce. Everyone else said that it was a long time coming, but Danny didn't feel that way. That her parents had problems was obvious - her mother was never home and her father tended to lock himself in the study day in and day out, writing melancholy theater scripts that would never see the light of day - or at least Danny hoped that they wouldn't. She had once read a few pages of one and had had nightmares for a week, a fact that she had hidden from either of her parents.
She didn't exactly trust them.
She had been late to school and her parents had refused to give her a note. She missed her bus stop, because she was so caught up in her misery and ended up having to walk the mile and a half. Finally reaching the school building at nearly ten in the morning, she had instantly received a detention and her parents were called. They, of course, didn't stand up for their daughter and the look the school secretary had given her was merely icing on the already pitiful cake of a day.
She had left her math homework at home, which earned her a failing grade and another detention. She failed the pop-quiz in English and the one subject she really enjoyed- choir- was the subject she had missed completely, thanks to her walk through the town. Laura, her best friend, had tried to be comforting, but the girl had two parents who weren't getting divorced and would stand up for their daughter if she had missed getting off of the bus or was too upset to go to school. Laura didn't understand what it was like- the Corbin family may have looked perfect on the outside, but the inside was desolate and full of tears.
Zach, her older brother, had managed to escape by behaving so poorly (at least that's what her father said) that he got sent to military school and then enlisted in the Air Force as soon as he was eighteen. He never dropped by the family home any more, but he did send Danny covert text messages on occasion, with coordinates or addresses she was supposed to meet him at. Zach was twenty-four to Danny's seventeen, and had said that she could live with him once she graduated high school.
Though that might not happen…
If there was one thing St. Joanna's Preparatory School for Young Ladies was known for, it was the little geniuses that walked the halls. While money and influence and your family name were certainly important (as well as legacy- Danny's mother Aileen had attended the school as well), what really mattered were grades. The school was privately funded and privately owned. If the school did not want you there anymore, you were kicked out onto the curb - literally, in some cases. Every student was expected to have at least a B-average and if you got lower than a C in more than two classes during your entire stay at the school, you were "invited" to a conference and had to convince the school to keep you.
Danny had been informed by her art teacher that she was going to get a C this term, and while Miss Dean was new to the school and didn't seem to realize what that meant, Danny knew very well. She was already failing both social studies and PE - this C was her death warrant - literally. Her parents were going to kill her, especially since her mother had been valedictorian while at St. Joanna's.
And then, after school, during the dress rehearsal for her last choir performance, Sarah Willows had appeared with the droopy-eyed stray puppy Danny had secretly been feeding after school every day and dropped it at her feet. "I am so sorry," she had said, her voice dripping with animosity, "but my boyfriend just happened to run it over."
Danny lost it.
"Go to Hell," she swore, with as much ferocity and malice as she could summon up. "Die." And she fled.
It was two hours later and no one had found her yet. The concert had started without her, but she was past caring. She idly traced the runes carved into the bathroom stall, one for strength, one for power, one for confidence - runes that students had carved before performances to ask for power. She wondered if this entire day was just because of a curse or if she really did deserve it.
Zach had the power of sorcery, of runes, and while he had attended a non-magical school, he still excelled in his powers. But she had always shrunken away from her gift, knowing that it was too big of a burden to bear. She couldn’t let it control her, no matter how tempting it might have been. Her classmates thought she was ungifted, mortal. Laura knew that she had a gift but did not like to use it, and Danny had heard her stand up for her once, telling a would-be tormentor that it wasn't Danny's fault that her gift wasn't as powerful as others.
What Laura did not know- what even her parents did not know- was that her gift was of the abyss, a dark gift that was fueled by darkness and night and was so strong that it threatened her humanity. While the other gifts were gifts of healing or strength or manipulating words or runes, Danny's gift was purely elemental.
It terrified her.
There were seven elements, and only one elemental controlled each. Unlike healers, which were a dime a dozen, or sorcerers, which were rare but still usually found in families, there were only seven elementals in the world at one time and they fought hard not to be consumed by their element as they manipulated it.
Elementals were both revered and cursed. Only an elemental could understand the power and the curse behind it. All the other Gifted thought it was an honor. Danny thought it was a horrible strain and refused to tell anyone. She would definitely get away from her family if she did, but she'd also be trapped in a facility, forced to manipulate her element for the rest of the Gifted until she wasted away and her powers were released to be given to another.
The curious thing, though, was that there already were seven elementals: fire, earth, water, air, light, dark, spirit. The elemental council was full and there was no possible way for there to be an eighth elemental- no matter how her powers manifested themselves. She was an elemental of darkness when an elemental of darkness already existed: Adrian of the Dark.
"Oh my God! She's dead! Someone help me!" The screams interrupted the concert and Danny could hear shuffling feet, pounding feet, raised voices. Something had happened- something bad, but she did not care anymore. She traced a rune on the door, an unfamiliar rune that appeared to have been carved years ago: a weird, straight kind of Z with short arms. She frowned, curious that she hadn't noticed it before.
"There you are!" The door finally swung open and Laura stormed in the cubicle, the black gown all the choir girls wore mused and dirty. "I've been looking everywhere for you, Danny- we have to go. Sarah was found dead and the whole place is in a panic. It was a spell or some kind of magic because there wasn't a mark on her and she's been tested for poisons and other potions, but with the wards haven't fallen, so it should be impossible and everyone is worried and we're ordered to get out right now."
Danny merely nodded, allowing herself to be pulled out of the bathroom. Sarah was dead. Sarah deserved it, she couldn't help but think, but it was still curious. The wards that kept out dark magic were still present in all their glory, yet a girl was dead by means that could only be some form of magic. And light magic didn't kill.
Before she stepped over the bathroom threshold, Danny couldn't help but look back at her prison, her cubicle. The door was swung open and the rune she had traced was still there, looking darker than it had before. She frowned, deciding to ask Laura about what it meant - runes were Laura's specialty as a sorcerer like Zack, but it faded away.
The girls walked through the labyrinth of corridors under the stage, before coming up to the top and were greeted with a mob of people. Sarah's body was covered with a white sheet and her parents - or Danny assumed they were her parents - were holding each other while the woman wept into the man's shoulder. The scene did nothing for Danny, who merely bowed her head and clasped her hands. This didn't involve her, and to be honest, she didn't really care. Sarah had always been a cruel person and the puppy-incident had just been the last straw.
That was when she noticed where Sarah's body was lying. The sheet just covered the edge of the very vent that led into the bathroom, which meant that Sarah's body was lying over the very stall Danny had been sequestered in.
"Laura," she hissed, not-so-delicately nudging the girl's arm. "What rune looks like a Z, but straight up with short arms?"
"What?" Laura turned to her and then frowned in thought. "Well, there are several runes that look like a Z. But the short arms and straight up…that's probably Eihwaz." She traced it in the air, adding just enough power to give it form, but not enough to use it in any way.
"And what does it mean," Danny pressed on, clutching Laura's arm.
"Well, it means 'yew' traditionally. But it's also associated with death."
"Death," Danny repeated dumbly, full of disbelief. "It's a rune of death."
"It can be," Laura allowed, standing up straighter as she began the lesson - a lesson Danny didn't really care to have at the moment. "There isn't one specific rune for death, but many that can be interpreted that way. You know," she mused, "a death rune would probably be the only way to kill someone in a warded building, except there aren't any. While Eihwaz symbolizes death, it can't be used to create it. Death is a force, not a power. It's like how there are runes for water, but only the water elemental can truly create it."
"But- but spells can be used to cause death." Danny forced out, her mind working furiously to put the pieces together.
"Well, yes…but spells aren't runes. Runes are tied to the elements, used as substitutes. Spells usually aren't as powerful. It's why witches are common, and sorcerers aren't - because of the level of power."
Go to Hell, Danny had said. Die. She had traced a rune of death, and a girl was dead above that very spot. She had used a rune - when she had never been able to use runes before - to cause death.
A feat that was impossible.
Yet she had still done so.
"I have to get out of here," she said, suddenly suffocating on the knowledge. "Tell- tell everyone that I went home."
"All right…" Laura looked at her, her eyes filled with something Danny couldn't place. Sorrow, maybe. Or worry. Emotions Danny wasn't used to, not with her parents and life.
"I'll see you tomorrow." She forced out the mundane words and left, slinking through the crowds that barely noticed her departure. Standing on the steps of the building, taking in deep breaths of clean air, she was able to think.
She closed her eyes and felt. She was alone and yet she wasn't- there was something on the edge of her consciousness that pressed against her, warmed and cooled her at the same time. Not darkness, for this was deeper than that. This was…ancient, powerful, consuming.
Right.
"I'm not alone, am I?" She whispered to herself and felt the nudge of the power answering her with an affirmative.
"I'm not an elemental of darkness." Another affirmative nudge. "I'm an element of…of death?" The force of the power at her statement was so strong that she almost staggered off the stairs. She gripped the handrail to keep her balance and the world twisted in her vision for a moment.
"You're what tells me things. My 'curse'," she muttered, putting the pieces together. Her entire life, she had been an outsider. She did things that no one else did, or didn't do things everyone else did. Laura was her friend and Zach was her brother, but neither of them really understood her either. And forget her parents… she had written them off long ago. She preferred to be alone, saying that one was company enough.
Except now it turned out she wasn't really alone. Her power was behind her all this time, influencing her and guiding her.
It was exhilarating to finally know. She could do things now. She could break free of those stupid bonds her parents had placed on her, monitoring her, and break the bonds of society as well. She was different and no one came before her.
With only a handful of change in her pocket, she stepped down the stairs and left, never turning back.