The Beginning
Notes scribbled in longhand scrawled along lines and lines of paper trailed off the desk unnoticed by the writer as he jotted down more letters. Marking the paper as the events had marked his life. The writer pauses in the dimness of the candlelight, turning his head ever so slightly so he may glance out of the corner of his eye the two figures huddled on his study’s couch. Their small bodies curled up close to each other for comfort with only a strand of brown hair there and a trestle of red hair here. He squinted his eyes a bit, as he bit lower lip thoughtfully as he tried to see what is normally hidden. The future was shrouded he had determined, which was normal, they had their whole lives ahead of them they were so young. The thought came to him in a heartbroken manner, but he could see the red thread on one of them. He already knew who, most would be disturbed to have such an important aspect of their life chosen out for them, but he wasn’t. After all majority would go on for the rest of their lives never meeting the person at the end of that thread, still marry and be perfectly happy.
He chewed the tip of his pen, perfectly happy was not enough for the ones he called his own. Any father wanted their daughters to be happy, that was important, but… The man sighed; there was much sadness before them as well as much joy. He wanted to try and give them as much joy as he could. The thought alone spurred him on in his writing as he created the final details to his plans. No one could know the future, that was a fact, but he could at least manipulate it to suit his needs. Providing gold for their tuition for example, he had two letters upon a stack of books; one of them was to the headmaster of a magic school. Though he did not know what either girl would do with their tuition, he foresaw magic and butterflies in their future. The latter he had no clue what it meant, maybe transformation, he knew they were both due for that as well. There were notes to people he knew, banking on promises and oaths long ago given for his services. Notes to be written on his life should they ever been found, though he doubted it.
Writing like this, in the dead of the night was quite queer to him, for he was remembering the past and seeing the future all at once. Ever changing he could see where his choices had led him now, he never regretted it. Just regretted, what he would leave behind. He wondered if he regretted his strange gift. His head lifted over the piles and piles of papers and contracts, no, he didn’t regret. This thought left him as he signed the final note, in his name. Daemon Winters.
The Beginning
He didn’t mean to become a seer, and even if Daemon did, he would have chosen to become a seer in a less traumatic way. It was summer when it happened; school had just been called out for the year letting all the young children loose. He and his brother Gabe were no different in that regard, his brother whom Daemon had looked up to in his younger years was six years his senior. At the age of seven, Daemon hero worshipped him like no other, like many other little brothers, Daemon thought his big brother was cool. It stood to reason; Gabe let Daemon follow him around like a puppy, even to all his heists that he pulled off with his friends. If anyone saw reason not to let Daemon tag along, it was Gabe who stood up to him. So when school was called out on the kind of day where no child wanted to stay indoors because it was too nice out, Gabe took Daemon to the beach.
To be more accurate, Daemon tagged along to the beach. Gabe had been planning to go with his friends long before Daemon was let out for the summer. The plan had been to have a bonfire party later on in the evening; it was suppose to be an innocent gathering of friends.
If only things were ever that simple.
Daemon couldn’t remember now who had brought it, but in hindsight it was so young he probably didn’t even notice. Whoever it was, Daemon would determine years from now once it became a faded memory and only the phobia was left, that whoever it was, was someone’s much older brother. Later peers, when many years have pasted, fellow students will comment on how Daemon hated to drink, he despised beer most of all. For all he could remember of it was the foul smell, and from a little boy’s point of view he could remember how it made everyone not pay attention to him. Even his brother, who had drunk only half a bottle’s worth just waved him off and told him to play by himself. So he did, his attention caught by a small pool of water where sea life was growing inside.
If there had been any fond memory of that time, it was perhaps of himself picking up a stick along that very beach to poke a hermit crab that was in the pool. He tried to make the crab crawl between the little bits of plant life that existed. As a grown man Daemon wondered if he hadn’t been so focused on making the crab crawl if he would have seen the wave come in that day. In all his studies as a seer he knew that the difference between fate and life is that fate is an outcome that cannot be avoided, and that life only determined through choices in how you get there. Still, there were better ways to gain second sight.
The roaring of the ocean waters did not at all alert the young boy to the coming danger, and he was not aware of the wave until the icy wall hit him full force. He gasped at the sudden coldness resulting in him breathing in water. His feet knocked out from beneath him, he was caught up in the wave as it carried him like a rag doll out to sea.
“Daemon!”
His name was drowned out by the water roaring in his ears as he found himself sinking into the blue depths. It was so cold, he wanted to breathe so badly, but the cold water hurt his lungs so much it felt like they would burst. Daemon closed his eyes trying his hardest to block out the cold, but only fear seemed to drench him like a waterfall.
That’s when he saw it.
It came all at once as if someone had fast forwarded his life, rewinded it, and fast forwarded again only it was not the same as before. Sometimes he was alone, sometimes he was surrounded by people; he was under a tree, an umbrella, a bush or nothing at all. He saw places that could not exist anywhere else in the world, and cities in the clouds. He saw feathered wings and bat wings and the faces of innocent children. It meant everything and nothing to him all at the same time, and when he thought it was never going to end did a pain shoot to his very core.
Daemon threw up, water to be exact as he coughed to the point even now he wondered why he didn’t cough up a lung right then and there. Hard slaps on the back only seemed like pats as he waited for the ringing in his ears to stop. He greedily took in deep breaths of air, and only then did he look around himself. Brother’s friends and his brother stood around him staring as if he was going to simply die on them. Then again, he nearly did die on them, but that was the last thing on his mind. Instead, before Daemon passed out again he thought, what pretty colours they had surrounding them.
In the quiet lue of his study Daemon picked up a letter whose envelope had ‘Return to Sender’ written across its front. It had been nearly two decades since that faithful incident, ever since then he had been deathly afraid of the ocean’s waters, but in return he could see things others could not. The future, auras, the threads that binded them all together in one grand weaving. Yet for all his abilities he was outcasted. No one in his family ever had any sort of gift before, and most certainly no one had practiced magic before. His brother grew more and more distance from him since then, he had not heard nor talked to his brother since his parents sent him to boarding school for his gifts.
Daemon leaned forward in his desk staring at the unopened envelope in his hands. Seconds ticked away at the grandfather clock near the door. The sound of cloth sliding down brought him out of his revere as he glanced over at the couch again. One little girl shivered as her back was exposed to the night air, she huddled closer to her sister. He smiled fondly as he rose from his desk to tuck them in again. It was endearing to him how the older depended on the younger; he hoped it wouldn’t remain like that for long. Hands tucked the blanket around the two small forms, hands go back to the letter returned. Daemon’s eyes grew sad.
“I have no regrets following this path.”
But how he regretted that his brother would not talk to him long enough to fulfill his last request.
