Magic, Christine realized, was a dangerous thing.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPORVZusm0R
Crying, shouting, eyes burning red from the flames just a few feet away, the men dragged her away from the crumbling house where everything that was precious to her fell to ashes.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvuWTcf8zen
'They're still in there!' She shouted, but the noise of the fire and the sirens drowned out her pleas, the endless crackle-crackle-crackle that suffocated her voice.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrkTnRv4q4c
'Please! They're still in there...'
Christine woke.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJlSTZrUDf3
She knew now, of course, that the firemen knew that her parents were inside. They also knew it was too late to save them. But when she was a child, she felt so much anger, so much rage at them for having left her mother and father to die.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgnYJeVeJsj
It's funny, isn't it, she thinks grimly, as she gets dressed, that I can never blame myself for what happened.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQT5Q2gHFMA
You killed them!757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbV8Mle5ZeA
I was eight. I had no idea what I was messing with.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqR4S3ihP70
Every day, every day, the same internal argument. Wasn't it time I moved on?757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzjBizSAlep
She was trying. She had landed herself a job at a distinguished business, WestGo Insurance, at one of the tallest office buildings in the city center. She'd signed up for yoga classes - heck, she'd joined a few dating sites.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqjVK9d2WZx
But that night kept calling her back. The power she had felt when a flame formed in her hands.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡToM1RRiTX6
Stop it. Don't you dare think about that as a good thing. And it was probably all just my imagination - playing with matches or the like.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHB4AOQ9Hmn
The psychologists had said she simply concocted the fantasy as a way of dispersing blame. If it was magic, if it really was, she would no longer carry the entire weight of her parents' deaths.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡz1xnvNhSoM
But Christine was never one for fantasies, even when she was a child - she knew what was real, and she always liked to stay firmly in the real.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKKfyDX2XUT
Sometimes, when she was alone, she'd try to remember that feeling - try to feel the internal pulse travelling out of her fingertips and imagine the ember gently glowing from nothing. But just as she always expected, nothing would happen -757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvzKSWr07Zv
There was a reason why magic was called magic. It didn't exist.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcEpGtYaDSC
But how did that old saying go? Magic is only magic until it's understood?757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡANxKsnRhC2
Christine sighed. She had a full day of work ahead of her, and she was already tired. Forget it. You were a stupid kid, once.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZYTVYwfJ3I
It's time to leave these things behind.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEhZ9GN9CIT
So why, she wondered as she looked out her apartment window, do I feel like it's only now that these things are catching up with me?
'Why Floor Twelve Minus?' It was the boy's 27th birthday - the date when he was to learn the darkest secret of magic.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7d8Q0lNQau
'Because it's deep down in the ground. The closer you are to the Void, the easier it is to draw power from it. Makes practice that little bit simpler.'757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtaUIL6d5xH
'Which is why you always taught me magic in the tunnels. Right.'757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkoNtI6Wu4y
The older man clapped his apprentice on the shoulder. 'You're fast. That's good.'757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmCwpYmu5wQ
ding. ding. ding.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhFkoOj6bQA
The elevator stopped 40 metres below ground - the equivalent of 12 floors below basement. 757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzqdm92q4aa
'I leave you here. You can do this.' The younger man stepped out of the lift nervously, eyes straining in the darkness, while the metal doors closed behind him, taut fiber ropes hauling the entrance - and exit - to Floor Twelve Minus far, far, above him.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4xr2aoMco9
'Hello?' His voice reverberated in the black hollow surrounding him.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnTvKmbMyRk
The sound of fingers snapping, and a candelabra burst into radiance, revealing the table of hooded figures seated at a table beneath.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSgrUymnyUN
'Welcome, Xavier, to Floor Twelve Minus. Hughes has been saying very good things about you.' The voice was deep, but had an unarguably feminine undertone. It was the High Priestess Orla. She rose from the center chair. 'Your trials begin now.'
Hughes took his place in the antechamber of Floor Twelve Minus. His student would be undergoing his trials in just a few minutes - fire, revival, and telekinesis. A successful performance of those magics would prove Xavier's worth as a magician. How he responded to the unbreakable law of magic - the Bind - would prove his worth for Floor Twelve Minus.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡREfMJYTHru
Floor Twelve Minus had begun as a cult, Hughes had no doubt. Individuals scattered around the world with powers they didn't understand. Fools. Perhaps a few managed to find each other, to explore and develop their skills - Hughes laughed as he thought about their discovery of the Bind. How long they must have played before they realized magic had a price!757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6ECNmWMsCY
It must have been then that only the worthy ones practiced the art. They must have realized the potential of it all - and suddenly, magicians became hired assassins, conspirators. Mostly these days it was corporate espionage, the occasional murder - magic left no evidence.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeIv07XBuwS
Hughes gazed patiently at the door, reminiscing about all the lessons with Xavier, hoping that he would perform the trials flawlessly.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGCmMdZg1um
A stifled moan from behind broke him out of his reverie.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRMr6V3DQr6
'Shut up!' He snapped, and the gagged figure in the back corner of the room flinched. In the other corner, another figure had passed out.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeFUT8R8qrx
Hughes giggled to himself at what he was fully aware was a terrible joke - these people were Bound and gagged. Bound by the Bind.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxPtDHZKOWf
Before he realized, it had grown into a roaring laugh, amplified by the acoustics of the chamber, every escaping breath turning into a discordant ringing.757Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5c5smDgqoC
His son should be coming anytime now.
