The night had fallen still, and Aveline felt herself reaching for the book she had knicked from the vault. Her fingers moving across the pages, as she felt herself be swept into the world of the 1300s.....
1367
Expectations perhaps can be more equivalent to burdens. Shackling you down into a version of life you don't care for, nor you wish for. It can make a person feel resentful, depressed even, as they become a slave to a future that is not for them
Mallory Balcom was one of these people.
Mallory Balcom was one of those people who craved adventure in her every breath. The type of woman was born with rivers dancing through her veins, and starts dancing in her eyes. She dreamed to see, to experience , to live with every part of her she had.
There was many reasons why she couldn't do this, but the most important one is the fact she was a woman in the year 1367. Regardless of the fact that she was a witch, her duties were still the same as muggle woman— marry, have kids. That is it, and that is all. There was nothing more then that.
She was no more then 16 that year, a witch of little skill she would be soon expected to marry and most likely suffer extreme pain during child birth.
Mallory Balcom was the type of young lady who liked to spend her days sneaking out to the meadows behind her little village, and letting herself run free. Mud caking her pale feet and debris flying into her wild blonde curls.
She was also the type of young lady who would do anything to not have to marry.
"He's a pig! Nothing but a foul pig!" she shrieked at her aging father, when he informed her of the decision he was making to marry her off the widowed man three doors down.
"You need a husband! And with your behaviour no man will take you!"
Fights like this happened often. Her parents reprimanding her for being to wild, fists being thrown in her face and her hair being yanked.
It wasn't her fault, she was merely a girl.
It was on one particular night of a harsh fight, In which Mallory fled her small home with blood running down her nose, tears in her eyes, that perhaps the little witch had flown to close to the sun. She was angry, boiling angry as she let out a shriek in the meadow of her home.
Knowing exactly what she ought to too.
For the next couple months Mallory stayed quiet. Doing everything her parents pleased and acting on her best behaviour. Though when the sun went down she was sneaking out the creaky back door, running to the meadow till she came across an abandoned barn with stained wood she had known to become quite acquired.
And here, in this tiny little run down barn with rats and rotting boards, is where Mallory Balcom planned her escape.
At first it was a lonesome thing. The girl sitting with a couple of wizarding books she stole from her father, trying to teach herself spells that could help. They didn't teach girls any of the important spells. Only the ones for cooking and cleaning and such.
Though slowly, word started to spread to the other young village witches. Girls of similar ages and circumstances who whispered into eachother ears the tales of the Balcom girl.
"I heard she's teaching herself real magic. In the little barn north of the sunflower meadows."
It was news travelled in dark corners as young woman met to knit blankets, weave baskets and gossip about their daily chores and future husbands. None of them dared to whisper a word of it out loud to anyone who wasn't young or a woman. For certainly that would end with them and Mallory being hung by their neck in town square
And ever so slowly, like animals coming out of bushes after a brutual storm, the young woman of the village began to come to her.
At first she objected, yelling at the girls who showed up in her barn once the sun had gone down to get out. Though it got to the point where they were begging. Dropping on there knees in front of her with tears and grabbing onto the edge of her skirt with pleads falling from their mouths.
So Mallory did the only humane thing she possibly could. She helped the girls learn as she was doing with herself. Most of them didn't read, Mallory was lucky her father had taught her how.
And ever so slowly a little moon light club began to form. The young woman of the quiet wizarding village of Dalleth teaching themselves magic when no one was around to stop them.
For Mallory— young Mallory who still had yet to be married— the whole thing was horribly eye opening. When the young girls who were already married would show up crying with bruised eyes and hips. Or the ones who would sob into the other girls arms, clutching there stomach in a motion Mallory didn't understand.
Truthfully she didn't understand a lot of what these woman were talking about. About the horrible things husbands did when the sun went down. About the bruises, about the tears, about the way some of these young woman cried at the mention of their husbands names.
Though she did know she didn't like it. And she did know it made her angry. Just as angry as the prospect of her father marrying her off to one of these men.
They were witches for christ sake. Wild, powerful witches who were being treated like the breading cows farmers used to produce calf.
"We can do something. We can stop this all. Don't you lot see? With enough power we can create our own villages, our own lives," she told the woman on one night.
Her wild hair blowing behind her as the door of the barn was slightly creaked open.
"We have enough skill now. We can all run away together and—"
"Mallory," one of the woman cut her off. She was 21, her name Margaret and perhaps one of the kindest people she had ever met. She already had seven kids at her young age "You know we can't do it. Our power is nothing compared to what the men have."
Perhaps she was right. Most of the wizards had been trained in proper magic since they were children. Though Mallory did good, for a girl who could barely read her options were limited.
She fell quiet as Margaret began comforting one of the smaller girls. Her name was Audrey. She was only 13 and had been married off last week. Never had Mallory seen someone cry so much. The child balling into Margaret's arms as if the woman was her mother.
"Besides there's so many woman here who need our help," Margaret continued, as she rubbed the back of Audrey. "Ones that will never be able to escape."
For awhile Mallory dropped the idea. Continued to teach her classes during the evenings when every one else was asleep. More and more woman showed up. Everyonce in awhile one of the woman would simply stop showing up. Disappearing off the face of the earth as if they were nothing but a crushed flower in a meadow.
It was on a sunday, Mallory remembered because Sunday had always been in her favourite day of the week, when Margaret burst in. Her pale round face wet with tears.
"Audrey's gone," she gulped, visibly trembling. "Her husbands been seeing her sneaking out. Figured she had a secret lover. Dumped her body in the river this morning."
There was a collective gasp and shrill cries around the woman in the room. No one knowing what to say as Margaret stood there, shaking like a leaf.
Well all of them except Mallory, who pulled an something from behind her back. It was a brown leather book, one she had stolen from her fathers study.
It was full of some of the most bizarre magic she had ever read out. Claiming of ways to get god like power by calling on the stars, the sun, or the moon. Speaking of beings, and other worldly creatures who channeled this energy to do stuff normal witches and wizards couldn't even dare dreaming about.
"There's a way we can get revenge. There's a way we can end this all," Mallory spoke above the cries. "I just need you all to trust me."
Mallory Balcom was also one of those people who were highly convincing. Charismatic with her brilliant rosy cheeks and dazzling smile. The type of person who could probably convince people to join a cult.
Mallory Balcom was also perhaps one of the most powerful sorceress ever to exist. Though she didn't know that yet.
So as Mallory suggested it, the young woman confident as she stood in front of them. Like some sort of angel with her glowing skin and blonde hair, all they could say was yes— that they would do anything she needed of them.
Though some of the woman left. Claiming they wanted nothing to do with her antics, 13 stayed.
And 13 was all she needed.
And so, the woman worked through out the night. Sitting in a small circle in the barn, hands linked together as a group of small candles billowed in the center. It was draining work, chanting of spells, surging of powers. Till sweat dripped down there foreheads and there body's shook with exhaustion.
It was magic like this that required two things—
1) a large group of people
2) and pure desperation
It was not magic that anyone or any group could pull of. It required soul reaching pain and desperation. The type that ripped at your very will to survive.
Eventually, when the sun finally began to rise over the horizon, creaking into the small barn with its beautiful rays, it was like the trigger of a bomb.
With the power of 13 exploding suns, rays of intense heat flew from the barn. Burning it down along with everyone it came across. Like a raging exploding storm, it billowed into the village. Dancing into the homes of the villagers, till there skin burnt and crisped. The snow on the ground evaporating into nothing in mere moments.
By the time the sun was high in the sky, every single person, animal and plant in a 100 mile radius of the village of Darreth was dead. Burnt to a crisp of ash.
All of them dead— except the 13 woman who sat on the middle of the fallen barn hand in hand.
A group of rageful woman with enough fury and heat in their blood it burn down the whole world.
Or as we now call them, the woman of Helios.