Elegy for a Star

“What are you doing here?” Gwen hissed under her breath toward Tess. She had been shocked to see Tess in the Void Chamber along with Mairaela and Joyona, as though she were a recruit of equal footing.

Tess replied softly, “I’m joining, too.”

“Tess, you-...” Gwen stammered, looking for the right words, “This isn’t a joke, Tess. You could get seriously injured, or worse. There are people that don’t come back from this exercise because they were so unprepared.”

“I’ll be okay,” Tess assured her.

That wasn’t enough for Gwen, “You haven’t studied up on the exercise, you haven’t practiced, you were seeing things in the ritual. Tess, you aren’t fit to do this, and I don’t want you to get hurt.”

Tess began to whisper back, “I met this person-...”

“If I could have your attention up here, please.” A commanding voice took the air from Tess’ words and drew her eyes up in front. The Void Chamber was just ahead, sealed behind a vault door of gears and pipes. A few guards stood by, wearing the silver-and-crimson of the Corps’ Watch. In the center, atop a podium, was a woman bathed in red silk. A red hood shaded a pretty face with bright, pink eyes. On either side of her neck, a ponytail poured from beneath the hood. Blonde, and held together with iron banding. There was a small scar beside her right eye, but even that couldn’t damage what was an undeniably beautiful face, with a button nose and a catlike curl of her lips.

When she spoke, the room listened, “My name is Philomena and I’ll be conducting your exercise today.” She didn’t smile; didn’t waver. It was a practiced line. “Let’s make sure we’ve got the right people, shall we?”

“Joyona Virkian?”

A nod.

“Mairaela Aulidwulf?”

“Yes.”

“Dame Gwendolyn Mirabenise?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Tess?” Philomena looked at Tess, nodding her head without a response from the woman, “I always enjoy seeing another lowborn here. In the Void, everyone’s name amounts to nothing.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Tess replied, unsure if she was supposed to say anything at all.

“Good,” Philomena concluded, “Then I’ll go over the exercise.” She took the scroll in her hand and set it aside, tucking her arms into their sleeves. “Two years ago, the Corps managed a ritual that extracted a piece of Void matter from the Black Sun. Normally when we depart to do battle there, we enter into the greater Void of the Black Sun. However, we severed a pocket of it—A small, separated void—for our own use,” the red-robed woman explained, “We use it for training current recruits and evaluating new ones.”

Tess looked around. It appeared like her companions already knew this, but were listening respectfully anyway. This was all new information to Tess though. She decided she needed to get used to that happening.

“Just like the greater void, this pocket is different every time we enter it, but due to it being severed from the whole, it tends to be weaker than most, making it perfect for new recruits,” Philomena lectured, “I cannot tell you exactly what your experience will be, but we do know that it will be violent.”

“Lastly,” Philomena said, sounding as though she were going off script, “The Void appears small from the outside, but is its own expansive world within. Follow the light, and I’ll see you on the other side. Don’t dally. Staying too long can mess with your mind.”

Tess looked to her other companions again. The danger of this was dawning on her. Was she really just going to take Scirocca’s word at face value? Yes, she wanted this, desperately, but she didn’t know Scirocca. And Ulrich seemed plenty knowledgeable to Tess. Would someone as young-looking as Scirocca really know more than him?

Before Tess knew it, the door to the chamber ahead began to open. The gears clicked and clanked, the pipes hissed with jets of air that carried a haze of heat, and a rush of wind surged from behind her into the vault as it opened. It was enough to be a surprise and cause her to shift her footing, but not enough to pull her in a way she didn’t want to go. 

As the vault door swung open, the view ahead became more and more haunting. Within was a marbled, pristine room, smooth on its six sides. In the middle however was a great orb—a vibrating, disorienting ball of absence. It distorted the light around it, bending and twisting it, giving a warped mirror view of the wall behind it. Before she knew it, Tess was walking forward with her three companions, stepping closer and closer to the destination of all of this rushing wind.

“Do not fear. For those of you that know your gifts, they are a good match with one another. You will make a strong team. Lady Morro be with you,” Philomena said as they passed by, “And may your soul prevail.”

The closer Tess got to the object, the more the light distorted. Everything around her was bent. Her fingertips were extended and stretched toward the Void when she looked at them. Gwen, who stood in front of her, looked like a smeared painting, and it took Tess some time to realize that Gwendolyn was reaching out for her.

The Dame said something, but the words never reached Tess’ ears.

“Thank you,” Tess replied to the nothingness, trying to reach for Gwen’s hand but missing it by an arm’s length due to the imbalance in her vision. She could hear her own voice, but only as it reverberated in her mind. The moment it left her lips, it was nothingness. Tess would hope Gwen could read her lips, but with all of the warping and distortion, there was no imaginable way.

After the next step, Tess was enveloped in darkness. Tess floated, weightless, through the nothingness.

A voice tickled her mind, “You came back.”

Tess twisted around to see her surroundings, stopping when she saw Its wide, blank ovals for eyes. It reached its hand out for her, but was met with an unseen wall.

“My little Crow. You are here, but I cannot reach you. Where are you?”

Tess tried to respond, but she had no voice.

“Where am I? I have no idea!” Tess thought to herself.

The voice in her head was not hers, yet It answered, “Come home.”

“You aren’t making any sense!” Tess screamed in her mind, “Are you an Old God?”

“Why did you leave?” It spoke into her mind, “Come home.”

“How do you know me?” Tess asked urgently, “What’s my name? Little Crow? Please, give me some kind of answer!”

“Not you,” It replied as though it were speaking to a completely different person. It sounded angry, and it looked at Tess as though seeing her for the first time. It made a dismissive wave of its three-fingered hand.

Tess was baffled. She wanted to scream in frustration, but before she could, there was another thought. Something different than the dark creature.

“It's talking to me,” Miri said.