Half-Breed

    The city of Osovox, like all cities around it, is divided. Divided between humans and spellweavers. Suspended in a perpetual civil war, Osovox is split into two territories. One for spelleavers, people of superhuman nature; shape-shifters, time-benders, pyromancers, death bringers. And one for humans. 

    These two divided races are forbidden to ever dwell together, since according to ancient folklore, spellweavers are monsters, freaks of nature who possess superhuman powers. And if humans and spellweavers are to ever collide, the result would be appalling, a cursed half-breed destined to destroy the world. 

    The half-breed would have the power of a god, omnipotent and invincible. However, the unfortunate creature would have no power over his curse, taken over by an evil spirit. To avoid this, all cities, including Osovox, were divided. War broke out between the two races over who should rule over the other and in the end it was decided that each should govern independently. 

    In the city of Osovox, there are two kings, one for humans and one for spellweavers. The ruler of the humans is named Morte, Latin for death, and it fits him well. His hunger for power is like a savage flame ravaging through a forest and his hatred for spellweavers can not be extinguished. He is seldom seen outside of the grand palace, but when he does dare step outside, his presence is so potent that even a glimpse of his impossibly black robe could subdue the most chaotic crowd.

    The ruler of the spellweavers is Pyrrhus, a master pyromancer, and not much is known about him among the humans, just the stuff of myths. He is said to have immeasurable power, and have total control over flame, giving him the ability to burn a city down with a single spell. Despite his powers, no human has seen him for decades.

    Of course, all of this is trivial to most people of Osovox, spellweaver and human. The war has been going on for fifty years, with no end in sight, and has become part of everyone’s everyday lives. 

    But me, once an impossibly skinny boy from years of famish, held these stories close to my heart. I spent countless hours daydreaming about these stories, about the all-powerful necromancers and the murderous weapons the humans used to scar the spellweavers forever. How these forces assailed one another blow after blow until they reached a stalemate, both sides ravaged to the bone. How these segregated races reached an agreement to build a magical wall between them within the sacred forest to allow each other to rebuild.

    I used these stories as a sort of distraction from the pain I faced at the mines, even if it couldn’t ease it entirely, it still numbed the suffering to an extent where it was bearable. 

    I had worked tirelessly at the mines my entire life for an empty promise of freedom, given to me by the “overlords,” cruel men who beat boys like me to death without twitching an eye. The overlords were mythed to have fought in the war, covered in scars and burn marks from the countless wizards and pyromancers they faced. Having no haven to call home after the stalemate was declared, they had seeked refuge in violence, the only source of security they had. We called these “overlords” snakes, a nickname that had developed from the infamous cruelty they were known for.

    I dreamed of escaping this hellish place, not just out of the mines, but outside of Osovox. Escape from this place to a world where torture wasn’t a part of my daily routine, where I could live in peace, away from violence, away from hatred. But I knew the probability of this happening was absolute zero. There was no way out of the deep expanse of lava and and drills. I was stuck there until I wore out completely. 

    As I look back on my countless years at the mines, two days in particular stand out to me. 

    The first happened during the shun. The “shun” happened twice a year. The snakes would line up all of the miners and scrutinize each one, to see if they were in a good enough shape where the amount they work is greater than the amount they put in to keep them alive. If they didn’t qualify, the unfortunate worker was whipped and killed in front of all of their fellow miners as an “example” for others. 

    The event took the whole entire day to complete, which put the miners in agonizing stress standing in line, wondering if they’ll live to see the next day.

    This was probably my 20th or so shun, but the stress always got me. That day, I was put in the back of the line, so I had to wait the whole day, watching my friends getting slaughtered until I found out if I would end up like them. 

    One of the closest friends, Shiv, was standing right next to me. I had known him since we were both thrown into the mines when we were toddlers. Despite the famished diet and terrible conditions, we were both in pretty good shape compared to most of our peers whose bodies looked as if they had not been fed for months; which may have been the case for some. 

    “How many you think?” I asked Shiv. It was a game we played, to distract ourselves. Even if it was about a drastic topic, we found that it was still better than thinking about our own potential demise.

    “Ninety. Last time it was eighty and the time before that it was seventy,” Shiv replied, his normally reassuring voice unusually shaky, “The numbers just keep getting higher. Rats get shipped in then get put on the block. It won’t ever change. Endless supply of rats is an endless supply of dead ones.” 

    I felt a cold shiver down my spine. It wasn’t the first time Shiv broke the truth; there was no denying it. The numbers were getting higher. “Yeah. I know,” I uttered. “Try to be positive, though. It’s been over ten years and we still haven’t--”

    “What’s there to be positive about, Quiver?” Shiv snapped, his face suddenly flushed, overwhelmed, “We’re stuck in this prison for the rest of our lives, working like heck and that promise the snakes made? The promise that we’ll get outta here if we “work hard enough”? Well, let me tell you something, Quiver. That’s not gonna happen. Never in a million years will they let any of us out of here. The locks are permanent and no one--no one knows the code. The only way to get outta here is death-- nothing else.” 

    He turned away, his bare back, scarred from years of whippings and pain, facing me. In that moment I saw a terrible thing. The result of famine and abuse; a boy whose childhood was ripped away too early; hopeless and deaf to the screams and cries of his own consciousness. 

    I didn’t reply. I wanted to. I wanted to help him. I wanted to do something. But I couldn’t. Because a rat in a locked cage can’t get out. No matter how hard it tries, its impotent cries and screams would be heard by no one. Not even itself.

    Neither of us said a word for the rest of the day. As the line dwindled down to the last few, Shiv was finally called up. He looked back at me, his lifeless eyes drained of any hope that may have been there before. 

    I looked away. I knew what was going to happen. I waited to hear it. The sound of my friend’s death. Then I heard it. Complete silence rippled through the vast expanse of the mines. The overlord didn’t kill him. Shiv was in perfect shape. Shiv had done it himself.

    That day still haunts me, thirty years later.

    The days after this were some of the most grim of my life. I no longer had Shiv’s reassuring voice, or the sense of security he had always provided. Since we were both thrown into the mines, we had always looked out for each other’s backs; caring for each other and protecting one another through thick and thin, no matter what. After Shiv died, that was taken out of my life, and those few grim days seemed to last forever. 

    I found the security I sorely lacked in books. I had only a few books with me, and had little time to read them, but when I read these stories, I felt as if I was carried away into a magical world. 

    But keeping these were dangerous. If the overlords saw or heard of this, they would immediately burn them and whip me severely. But it was worth the risk, even if it could potentially cost me my life. 

    The second day I remember clearly is possibly the most important day of my life. It occurred not so long after Shiv’s suicide, so I had been in the mines for about ten years by then. That day I awoke to the deafening roar of a snake’s voice on the overhead speaker. 

    He said, “Today, we will be doing an examination of all the living quarters. An overlord will arrive shortly.” 

    It took me a few moments to digest everything. Ruckus erupted all around me inside the small shelter, as the ten or so other boys also realized what was happening. Then I remembered the books and my heart immediately jumped. I needed to hide the books somewhere where they wouldn’t be found. I scrambled under my cot and took out my books, trying to find a place where they would be safe from the snakes. As the other boys saw the books I had been hiding, everything went silent. 

    Then the epiphany hit me like a punch in the gut. If the books were found, the snake wouldn’t just hurt me. He would kill every single one of the boys that were in that room for not telling him. 

    I stood there, everyone’s eyes on me. If I didn’t hide these books, we would all be doomed. 

    I clambered, fumbling to find a place to hide the books when I heard a terrible sound: the footsteps of the overlord. 

    “Come on, hurry!” one of the boys next to me exclaimed nervously, “We don’t have much time!” 

    I ended up hiding them beneath the mattress of my cot. It wasn’t ideal, but hopefully it was hidden enough. 

    I tucked the last book just in time as the snake walked into our small shelter. I was towards the back of the room, so I waited in agonizing stress as he went through and examined each of my peer's cots.

    When the snake got to me, the whole room seemed to tighten up. He examined my bed carefully just as he had with my peers. He looked beneath my cot and under my sheets, but didn’t think to look under my mattress. Everyone seemed to let out a sigh of relief, thinking I was free. But just as the overlord was about to go to the next cot, one of my peers couldn’t help himself.

    “Wait! Look under his mattress!” he exclaimed.

    I thought I was going to explode. It was the same boy who had told me to hurry. He couldn’t take the stress and simply decided that his own life was more important than everyone else’s in that room. He doomed everyone but himself.

    The overlord lifted up my mattress and found the books. 

    “Oh, what’s this?” he said with a vicious look in his eye, holding up the books. 

    I didn’t reply and looked away. I knew what was going to happen next. 

    Then the overlord took out the device that would change my life forever: a simple kitchen match. 

    “No! Stop!” I exclaimed, lunging towards the man. But it was no use. He fended me off with ease, throwing me onto the floor of the small room. 

    “What are you gonna do about it, then?” the overlord teased, “Yeah, nothing. You're powerless. Weak and hopeless.” Then he struck the match and set the books on fire, burning the only objects that had given me hope. 

    Something inside me snapped. I scrambled straight up to the overlord, furiously gathering together what I had left in me, which wasn’t much.

    My consciousness screamed, “Have you lost your mind?” but my consciousness no longer existed. Only hatred and anger. Indeed, I had lost my mind, for all the overwhelming emotions held up inside me swelled up and burst; the hopelessness of the situation I was born into, Shiv’s suicide, the killing of the only hope I had. All these feelings combined into one great impulse of destruction.

    I lept, enraged, at the towering man. The overlord must have been at least two heads taller than me and nearly four times my weight; I might as well have thrown myself at Goliath; I stood no chance. Yet nevertheless, hope is never completely lost. Similar to how David took down Goliath with a slingshot, I had my own secret advantage. In fact, it was so secret that I didn’t even know what it was. 

    As I lunged at the man with the little energy I had left, the overlord fended me off with ease, grabbing my arm and twisting it in such a sickening way that it hung limp, sending a shock of pain through my body. I quickly realized that the overlord wasn’t going to kill me like the countless others he had murdered; he was going to make it as dreadfully painful to me as he could. 

    The overlord hurled me and my broken arm into the rock-hard mine floor. I was hopeless. I didn’t have anything left inside me to retaliate, and I looked up one last time to the overlord; the last person I would see, the harbinger of my death. Then, just as the overlord readied his last blow; the blow to kill me, I felt something inside me. It was a feeling of power, a feeling of vigor and rejuvenation. My entire body swelled; my thin figure evolving into one of a myth. And indeed it was from a myth; my back grew the wings of the Pegasus; my body transformed into one only the gods of Greek Mythology possessed, and in my hand appeared a silver trident, the weapon of choice of Poseidon, the god of the sea. 

    I fended off the overlord’s attack with ease, impaling him with the trident, killing the man who had killed so many.

    I had no control over my newly found power; my body moving as if an outworldly spirit was commanding it. The crowd of boys that had formed quickly dispersed, but it was no use. The spirit seemingly controlling my body destroyed and collapsed the whole entirety of the mines with everyone inside it; men, women, children. And soon, all that was left was the aftermath of a catastrophe. 

    Masses of people crowded around the crater that used to be the vast expanse of mines, wondering who had the power to cause this. 

    As I stood among the destruction, I wondered the same thing. Who am I? 

    Inwardly, I knew. Everyone knew. I was a half-breed.


    Now I reside in barren, deserted lands thousands of miles from Osovox, living in isolation away from anyone or anything. That last, impulsive, anger-filled act that killed so many was the first and last time I activated the powers I was cursed with. I have found that living in isolation was the second best thing I could do for the world, and for myself. 

    Inside, I know that this has always been the life I’ve wanted, a life away from violence and pain. But something inside me is twisted. The feeling is familiar, and isn’t pleasant. And I know that it’ll snap eventually, just like on that tragic day. Because if a rubber band is twisted, no matter how hard it tries, it can’t fight back. All it can do is idly wait for its own demise.