11.

No one else sat near Vivian. The entire mess hall buzzed with chatter from dozens of robed men as well as the applicants. Not one person bothered approaching her, the applicants all seemed busy scheming with one another and the Silvians were content ignoring her existence. She noticed Lynn Jet approaching two other applicants. He didn’t seem to notice her watching while she examined him. She felt frustrated being left out and wished she could hear what he said to them. As stupid as it was, she wished she didn’t have a guaranteed position. Marked as some sort of outsider, no one turned to her for help. She just wanted to be included.

Instead Vivian turned back to her food and focused on eating it. Lord Ivory had assigned her tutors to teach her exactly how to eat food properly. Which hand to hold which fork, knife, spoon, and cup. She now knew dozens upon dozens of silverware etiquette rules. Vivian made certain to follow exactly how she had been taught. But, as she glanced around her, it seemed no one else cared about or followed the rules drilled into her.

The food on the island tasted unlike anything she had ever previously tasted. Thankfully, some unseen cook prepared her food. She would have no idea where to begin in cooking these bizarre dishes of snails and lobsters. Still, a part of her missed the simplicity of onion soup. The fruits were amazing however. Never had she seen such brightly colored fruits. Yellows and greens and oranges and purples. She daintily skewered a grape with her fork and smiled as the juice squeezed out in her mouth. Vivian brought her napkin to her mouth to spit out the seed. She considered keeping it and growing whatever plant grapes came from.

Her mother had grown a garden while Vivian grew up. She had taught her how to properly prepare the ground for carrots, potatoes, turnips, and cucumbers. Vivian also used to pick raspberries from a bush just out of town. Once, she and her friend Thomas went as far as to swipe an apple from her baron’s grounds. He and her had split the fruit down the middle and found that a star of seeds were centered in the body of it. For weeks after she doted on the patch of dirt where she planted those seeds. But nothing had grown. Maybe fruits were different from vegetables.

But that was another life. Her mother remained dead and Thomas thought the same of her. He had likely been at her funeral and maybe even tossed a flower in her grave. Lord Ivory kept her away from the burial, knowing the panic that might be spread if she appeared. He believed it at the time to be unsafe. It was better that Vivian remained dead in the eyes of her hometown. She had a new life filled with all the things she had dreamed of as a child. Vivian had become Lady Vivian Topaz, the enigma of the court. A powerful Mystic of the same element of the legendary Silvis. Reincarnated from the flames like a legendary phoenix. Far better than what she had been before. The daughter of…well a daughter at the least. Better not to think of it. Lord Ivory had insisted she push it from her mind and focus solely on who she is instead of was.

A boy slid into the seat adjacent to her, startling her from her thoughts. She recognized him as one of the applicants but drew a blank when attempting to recall his name. Orange hair curled atop his head and freckles dotted his pale face. He smiled at her.

“You’re Lady Vivian.” The sentence was a statement, not a question.

“Yes? How can I help you?” She returned a smile back at him. Even before her death she had always loved her smile.

“I have a quick question for you. I think it would be a major benefit for both of us.”

“Sure, what do you need?”

“How would you like to marry me Vivian Topaz?” A stunned silence followed that the man seemed to take for an opportunity to continue. “You see, you have no lands in your lineage due to you being a Natural, whereas I’m in line to inherit the fifth largest section of lands in Neo Regnum. It’s been proven that the stronger the Mystic, the more likely their children will be to be potentially powerful Mystics as well. As a Natural, you have some of the strongest power in the last few decades. Therefore, you also have the strongest blood in recent history. Add in my own gift as a Mystic and we’ll be set as two of the most powerful nobles in Neo Regnum.”

Vivian blinked and opened her mouth but words couldn’t seem to form correctly. She was being proposed to by nobility, it was the sort of occurrence that little girls, her past self included, always dreamed of. Straight from a storybook. This noble man had nice freckles spotting his face and a figure that hinted at the muscles underlining his tunic that girls swooned for. He looked to be the perfect man. Except nothing about him enticed her. A year ago she would have snatched this opportunity immediately. But that girl died in a fire. The girl standing in her place simply had no interest in the offer.

“N-no. I don’t think I can do that. You look like a wonderful man but I don’t know you.”

The orange haired man’s smile evaporated into a look of irritation. “So I need to get to know you before? Fine. We can have a yearlong engagement. Until then we’ll meet twice a week for hour-long sessions to know one another. Does that seem fair?”

“No,” she spoke without a stutter this time. Something didn’t feel right about this man. “I’m not interested in marriage. And you’re very confident that you’ll be permitted into the upper libraries.”

The orange haired man’s lips curled into a sneer. “I don’t need to marry you for you to bear me children. That was simply courtesy as due to your new status but it’s clear I’ll need to take you like the pig girl you are. I’ll take care of you after I remove the cripple and little boy from the running and unlock my Mystic abilities.” He turned and began walking away but as he did he clutched his stomach and stumbled to one knee.

Half of her wanted to help him back to his feet and the other wanted to kick him in the stomach. Taking a breath, she chose the former as she was now a lady and ladies probably don’t kick people on the ground.

“Are you feeling alright?” She asked pulling him back to his full height, a few inches above her.

“I’m fine, wench. A minor discomfort.” He wrenched his arm out of her grasp. Then he immediately fell to his hands and knees, spewing his dinner in a gray and yellow mess. At this point several other individuals noted his ‘minor discomfort’ and began to crowd in a circle around him. None moved to help, just remaining silent watchers. Vivian hadn’t any idea how to help him. His vomit swiftly began altering colors from gray and yellow to red. Finally, a girl burst through the throng and ran to his side. Her hair and freckles replicated the man’s. Somewhere in the back of her mind she noted the girl might be his sister.

“What are you all doing?!” The sister screamed at the crowd. “Help him!”

There were shuffling of feet and murmurs. Finally a man spoke, keeping his eyes to the floor. “We have orders that in no way are we permitted to assist any applicant. I’m sorry but only you and the other applicants can help him.”

“You’re Mystics! Use those silt-ridden powers you bastards!” She cradled her brother’s head as he continued vomiting. He looked as if he wanted to speak but whenever he opened his mouth more blood spewed out. His eyes rolled back and he began shaking on the ground.

“Ivan Quartz?” A woman’s voice came from behind. Vivian glanced back and saw Tiara. “Tell me what happened here.”

Her disdain filled eyes met Vivian’s but the sister spoke first, spilling the story out even faster than her brother could his insides. The woman considered her words while looking down at the pathetic noble boy on the ground.

The sister spoke again. “Help him,” she pleaded.

“No, I can’t do that. I’ll tell you it was most likely poison. Not one made for a peaceful death either. It will probably be a little while more before the poison fully takes him. If you want to extend his life turn him onto his side so he doesn’t suffocate on his filth. But maybe a suffocation would be preferable. It’s your dissension.” With that, she turned. “It’s a pity, I thought he might have great promise as a Mystic.” Then she walked away.

Ivan Quartz continued to thrash about as his sister attempted to shift him to his side. A flailing arm took her in the face and his feet shuffled in a dance no one else could hear the music to. Vivian grabbed the dying man’s legs and helped the girl keep him on his side as more blood poured out of his mouth.

Vivian’s own death flashed in her mind. The smoke covering her small bedroom. Pounding at the blocked door as the black unbreathable mist filled the room. Nobody deserved to suffocate. The freckle-faced Ivan Quartz might not have been pleasant or kind to her but he also had offered her his life in marriage only moments before. Willing to commit to being her husband after only a few moments of contact. In a way, it had been romantic.

His pants became moist under her grasp and the air filled with the rank scent of urine. Still, she held him in place.

Finally, after what felt like eternity, the orange haired man stopped shaking. His sister collapsed on top of him heaving sobs echoing from her throat. The mess hall emptied leaving only the two of them with the body. The sister’s cries turned to moans while Vivian continued kneeling over the dead man.

“Everything,” the sister whispered. “He offered you everything and you killed him.” The girl rose to her feet wavering.

“I don’t understand,” Vivian said truthfully. Did this girl think she had poisoned her brother? The concept seemed ridiculous. He had been poisoned, sure, but by her of all people? Vivian opened her mouth to voice this observation but cut short as the girl threw herself on her.

The freckled girl closed her fingers around Vivian’s throat, cutting off her supply of air. Vivian’s eyes bulged. She could feel the heat in her veins and lifted her hand to burn the girl but hesitated before dropping her hands to her side. She had died once. She could do it again. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t already lived a life better than any she could ever have hoped for. Better to die in this beautiful castle than hurt the grieving girl. Black spots appeared concealing the wet freckled face above her. Vivian closed her eyes.

And then the girl was gone.

Vivian gasped a lungful of air. Blinking, she sat up. Sprawled out beside her lay the freckled sister with a gray-skinned, white-haired individual sitting atop her collapsed figure. The girl clawed at his bare arms but her nails left no impression of piercing his skin. Rin’s mouth moved but Vivian couldn’t hear the words. She fell back onto the timber floor. Her eyelids fluttered closed.

---

When she regained consciousness the mess hall had been entirely vacated with the exception of Rin, who sat cross-legged on a table staring at a blank plaster wall. He seemed to see nothing and everything all at once.

“Where?” she asked.

“Tiara had the corpse hauled away, no doubt to some deep pit at the bottom of this dreadful castle’s dungeons. The victim’s sister’s been locked in her room for now.”

“I thought you couldn’t help us. Why did they lock her away? And why did you interfere when she attacked me?”

Rin gave her a smile and pointed to the gray skin at his temple. “I’m not a Regnum citizen. Tiara grasps no control over me, despite what she might insist and demand. I go and do as I please. As for why they toted her off, once she assaulted me everyone else in the room could step in and restrain her. I wish I had arrived here a few minutes earlier, I could have helped the boy. Alas, I don’t come in here very often. It was a happenstance passed by.”

“Who are you?” Nobody of normal status could exert this amount of authority without fear of consequences. “A powerful Mystic? A respected scholar? A prince?”

Rin laughed. “You’re giving me too much credit. I’m not anyone significant. Just a youthful foreigner. I’ve simply decided to relax on Silvian Island for a few years.”

“Then why can you break rules? Why are you here? And why are you allowed to wander around the library? I’ve seen you come down from the upper floors.”

“Hmm. Well you’re certainly quizzical. I could answer your questions…or I could tell you about how Quinton Silver is waiting in Lynn Jet’s room to smash his head in with a rather large stick.”

“Wait! What? Why?” Vivian lurched to her feet and felt woozy as her eyes started to black out again. She blinked it away.

“You see, Lilian Quartz lashed out at you simply because you were in the general area where her brother died. Quinton Silver, despite the fact he appears to be an oversized ape, noticed Ivan stealing Lynn’s goblet earlier. And he seems to be convinced Lynn Jet poisoned his friend. After all, how else could a cripple hope to make into the library if not through devious tactics?”

“No!” Vivian ran. She knew Lynn lived over in the next hall over from her own room but she was uncertain which room exactly. She dashed down the halls. As she rounded the corner she crashed into an uneven figure, sending them both sprawling to the floor.

"Lynn!” Vivian exclaimed. She said a silent thanks to whatever had kept him away from his bedchamber for so long.

“Vivian!” Lynn made a strangely surprised face as if teasing her.

“Lynn…I don’t think you should go back to your room. There might be some um…less than friendly people waiting for you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, ah, people might blame you.”

“And what am I being blamed for might I ask?” Lynn asked unconcerned. It seemed as if there wasn’t anything that could faze him. Could it be possible that Lynn was playing dumb?

Vivian hesitated. Did he really not know yet? “Ivan Quartz’ death.”