She walked in the ruins of a land that had lost its name.
Dark-purple clouds hovered far above, bearing a spiral-shape of immense, unfathomable proportions.
She could hear the weeping of a man not too far away as something primordial had just birthed itself from the realm of the idea into the material world, as if it wished itself into existence by sheer force of will.
But it was not this man-made god that terrified her so, no, it was something that had yet to reach apotheosis.
It was..
Morning came.
Sascha decided to try and get a few hours of sleep in after meeting with Albert, but like most other nights she couldn’t stay asleep for long.
As per usual, the nightmares came.
Vague and abstract imagery of death, fire and fear ensured that she did not get the rest she so desperately needed.
Her little brother was the one to wake her up, cheerful as always.
Not understanding the gravity of this specific day due to his young age, the sweet boy enthusiastically kept calling her name as he annoyingly but lovingly tugged at her sheets.
She tried to smile at him, but she saw on her brother’s face that it was not convincing enough.
Kind as he was, he immediately hugged her arm and wouldn’t let go until they both made their way downstairs.
Their parents’ home was one of hard earned wealth and warmth.
Full of paintings and works of art both self made and bought, it was a place of precious memories and of great triumph.
A golden sword crafted by the Great Reumann himself decorated the space above the stairs, acting as one of her father’s greatest prides.
The shame she felt of bringing the first big, significant failure to this family was overwhelming.
She looked around the living room, searching for the rest of her household.
Her parents were already seated at the dinner table.
At the head sat an old family friend, the man who would take charge and bear the burden of ending her dreams today.
The venerable Priester-Bibliothecaris named Oswald looked up towards her with a small, caring nod.
She could see the sadness in his reluctant eyes.
Her father couldn’t look at her at all, his gaze fixed immovably on the table.
At the same time, her mother couldn’t do anything but look.
Strangely, she did not nearly feel the same sadness coming from her mother as from her father.
Which, truthfully, surprised her as she knew she was deeply loved by both of them.
Even this proved a reminder of today’s loss.
This would be the last day she could physically feel these kinds of emotions in other people, and it stung.
‘Sascha,’ started her mother.
‘Are you holding up well?
Given these horrid circumstances, of course,’ she shyly added.
Sasha looked up without much emotion and mumbled back.
‘Not really, no.’
Her mother immediately rushed up and went in for a hug.
Her little brother joined as well, but her father refused to move, still unwilling to so much as even glance in her general direction.
She looked closer at the man, only then realizing how wet his cheeks were.
After they set back down, Oswald coughed uncomfortably and spoke.
‘Teun, Cornelia, Sascha and sweet little Willem.
None of us have looked forward to this day but we all knew it was coming.
Unable to continue her studies as a Zuster..’ he started.
Sascha was glad he used the word unable and not unwilling, as she felt it lessened the blow a bit.
‘..she loses her right to practice medicine within the boundaries of the many city-states of the Niedling, and with it all the benefits of having such a position.’
He sighed and took a breath.
‘Furthermore, because Sascha is now twenty-three years old and without a proper college degree of worth, she will be mandated to enlist and make war to put an end to these turbulent times.’ Sascha did not need her gifts to feel something break in her father.
Her mind moved elsewhere after that, too tired and unwilling to experience the rest of it.
The walk with Oswald towards God’s Needle was unpleasant to say the least.
Both kept awkwardly silent, while Sascha struggled with the bright light of the sun after having spent so many of her recent days asleep.
Black ravens watched their every step as they walked through the busy city centre.
It was a place which she had called her home for the last few years.
No speck of dust or lost leaf littered this part of Vendaal.
Unlike the muddy, dirty roads of most cities in the Niedling, inner Vendaal had proper marble roads.
Its buildings too were shining white-grey with a touch of lost brown.
All stone-made, sturdy and generously spacious.
Despite the size of the place, few people actually lived in Sascha’s district.
Whether it was earned on the battlefield or behind a desk, these were the streets and homes of the winners.
Despite the breathtaking beauty of its advanced architecture and the serenity of the public garden they chose to walk through, she longingly wished for the rooftop of that nameless, shoddy building instead.
They had finally stopped before the Eye of the Needle.
Despite knowing what awaited her within, she had to admit the absurd perfection of the enormous construction lifted her spirits greatly.
The gentle light it radiated was nothing as crude as the suns’, or that of candlelight.
It was warm, oddly pleasant and it filled her with the energy and courage she needed to pass through the Eye.
While she did so, she contemplated the situation she was in.
Were she anyone’s daughter but her fathers, she would have never needed to enlist.
It was unheard of that an inner city girl was sent to the front lines, their overly privileged parents usually having more than enough sway to prevent such a thing from happening, even if their children were technically not exempt from the forced conscription that had seen most of the Niedling’s youth off to the battlefield, never to return again.
Strangely enough, her father lacked such influence.
The dizzying height of the interior gave Sascha immediate vertigo, making her feel small beyond comparison.
Every floor circled around the center of the Needle, leaving it open for one continuous, nausea-inducing view.
The balustrades of each floor served as a flimsy barrier that protected those privileged enough to walk the higher levels from accidentally falling to their doom.
Each floor contained hundreds of bookshelves and a thousand times more books, all of it surrounded by exotic and strangely colored flora that never needed pruning.
It was no wonder that the scholars often lovingly called this place the Garden of Eden.
And just like in the Rein story it was named after, there was no shortage of forbidden knowledge to be found here.
Even the most learned and respected of the Priester-Bibliothecari were only allowed passage up to the seventh floor, any further trespasses severely punished with the Nine Familial Exterminations, a horridly extreme and over the top punishment that sought to eradicate one’s entire extended bloodline, from the crippled elder to the infant child.
Needless to say, trespasses were incredibly rare.
In comparison, it was said that the Needle contained two hundred and seventy-eight floors.
Who exactly benefitted from the preservation of all that tucked-away knowledge, no one knew.
Although as a point of conversation it was sure to rile people up with all kinds of wild conspiracy theories, ranging from the feasible to the laughable.
As she stared in bewonderment at the beautiful, the ugly jealously glared back.
Sascha turned towards the center of the grand hall they were standing in, no longer able to ignore its oozing, darkening presence.
The flora around it had become a sickly grey, and the nearby floor tiles were cracked, rotting and devoid of color.
Its very creation had been a declaration of war against God himself, and all who met the mocking gaze of this un-creation knew instinctively to hate it.
An Ambtenaar from an age lost long ago had cheerfully named it the Clock of New Beginnings.
Carved out of some dark, twisted stone unfamiliar to Sascha, its face bore fifteen markers rather than the usual twelve.
Stone-trapped faces of children that decorated its supporting body cried tears of dark red, caught in the basin carved below.
The blood of its more elite subjects, the blood of her family.
Those that did not weep bore mocking imitations of smiles and warped looks of innocence.
Deciding not to lessen her already waning mood any further, she chose to instead focus on the slouched figure of Oswald who was walking in front of her.
Too caught up in his own thoughts, or perhaps too used to the abhorrent sight, he did not even so much as glance at the man-made monstrosity.
They left the bright, self-lit hall in favor of a darker, and far more disturbing place.
Downwards they went, through ever-dimming and less visited hall after hall, lit only by the occasional, fading torches hung on the sides of the now ordinarily stone walls.
These had not been made in ancient, more enlightened times, instead this so-called “dark reflection” of God’s Needle was a modern, undoubtedly man-made addition to the holy place.
Oswald had once called it an abomination and an outright insult to the priesterhood, but only amongst friends, in the safety of their family’s home.
It was a place of shame and judgement, hers to bear.
While they walked down the smaller, now spiraling stairs, Sascha could not help but think back on Albert’s heartfelt proposal, and the incredible effort and risk it must have taken to prepare for such an escape.
As Sascha started hearing the first echoes of their begging screams and unfiltered wailing, she wondered if she had played the heroic fool by not giving in to his many caring pleas.
At least, her shaking legs seemed to know her heart well enough.
Even still, she pressed on.