Cynfael

Day Zero

Born with Primal eyes to a clan in the Foxfire Bramble, Cynfael has always been considered gifted. This does not mean he has not worked for what he has, by any means, but he has always had a starting advantage. He was raised on the borders of Plague and Shadow, sequestered from the wider world. A mage in Shadow magic of some repute, he had not considered seeking other power until a Necromancer missionary visited his clan and told him of the prestige afforded her order. Having already received the blessing of one deity, what was to stop him seeking the favor of another - and the power that came with it?

Cynfael watches the others as they spread out into the basin, counting how many carry red eyes, how many carry hides already tinged tan-red - the offspring of Necromancers not yet with their earned stripes. And he wonders how many of them he will see again when this is over. The overseeing Necromancers watch all of them, but each time he glances up, he catches one of them looking away from him. A dragon with Primal eyes is rare, one not from Plague, here to take the Trials and betray the deity of their birth in all senses, is next to unheard of.

He looks forward to watching them scramble when he sheds his multicolor hide for theirs.

Most settle to vigil early, preferring to live and fail than succeed and die. He walks past them all and curls on a ledge just below the Cauldron itself. If he's going to do this, it's worth doing it fast to get back to his research and test his new power.

Day One

The few others who have settled close to the cauldron as he has shiver during that first night. It's not a desert, not like Dragonhome to the north, but bare earth and the high walls of the Rim certainly do a decent job of keeping the interior valley at a consistently dry weather pattern. He can hear thunder to the west, but the clouds never make it over the peaks. He stays warm all night, his thick fur doing its job. He doesn't worry about the coming heat of the day; his assistants are from the Ashfall Waste, he's not unaccustomed to heat.

Midday comes quickly, his neighbors shaking their heads to try to stay awake after the first long night at vigil. All save one. A Necromancer-child, a mirror with tan scales and red wings, remains prone, breathing harshly with their eyes closed. Even from here, he can hear the strain in their airways and knows that the Plaguebringer chose to bless them in the night. It's advantageous for everyone here. Their infection is likely to suffuse the air with pathogens, likely to help all those nearby become infected as well.

He smiles. He does not yet feel the onset of anything, but sitting so close to the Cauldron, having someone nearby already so deep in the throes of illness, is a good sign. A drop of the elemental goo from his eyes splashes and sizzles agains the dry earth almost acidicly, and he wonders if he's already incubating something and just hasn't felt the symptoms just yet. For now, there is little he can do but wait and see. So he settles himself comfortably and begins to meditate.

Day Two

The Necromancer child died in the night. The pneumonia they contracted the first day was too much for them; they rattled their breaths and slowly faded over the midnight hours. He watches in side-glances disguised by his monotone eyes as the overseers click disappointedly over the body, debating if they should remove it or leave it to the Mother. None of the three of them directly make moves like they're using magic, but so attuned to it, even if it's technically the wrong element, he can sense the static in the air as they ward themselves against the fumes. As one of them draws something from the surrounding air and preserves it within themselves.

It's a good look at what he can expect to be in a few weeks. He knows that supposedly the Plaguebringer does not bless those who are not devoted entirely body and soul to her, but he does not expect that to be as much of a problem as it would be for others. Perhaps he is not here out of piety, perhaps his motivations are simply for his own ambition. But does not the Mother value that? Does she not prize the determination, adaptability, and drive? He believes with all certainty that she will bless him in spite of his directives, simply to see if he can live up to her expectations.

That is his faith.

Day Three

Faith is, perhaps, overrated. And Cynfael has never been a patient dragon. Waiting is for those who cannot make their desires reality, and that has ever been his specialty. The third dawn comes, and when he does not feel the creep of illness, he calls it instead. He is still one of the most powerful Shadow mages to ever live, and in the deep valley shadows of false-dawn, he calls the shadows of the small animals around him, pulling them close and agitating the attatched creatures. A webwing alpha screeches in irritation as it dives past him, boils and skin irritation obvious on its wings and the faulty feathers of its body. As it screams by, its beak slices through the thin membrane of his wings, lifted specifically to catch the sharp edges.

Within the hour, the cut burns with infection, and his body is suffused with the heat of response to the illness quickly creeping through his blood. It burns, pain, heat, and something foreign flushing his system. It takes him a few hours, struggling with the ever-increasing heat of the sun as well as the heat trapped by his thick fur, but he feels that sense of unknown within become less a thin inkling and more a solid motion. He recognizes it immediately. Magic, just a different kind than the one he's always wielded.

But once he knows what it is, it comes as almost second nature to reach out and take it, to make it behave as he wishes, to pull the very essence of it from his bones and make it heel like a loyal hainu. By the time the sun is beginning to close with the western Rim of the valley, one of the Necromancer overseers of the Trials is standing by his side, eyeing the stripes that have appeared on his quickly-morphing hide over the course of the last few hours. He smiles at them, and raises his claws. "Test me."

They return the toothy grin and nod toward the familiar - a large Ferberus - "Infect and heal her." The creature steps close to him dutifully, and he settles his claws gently on one of its heads, and calls to the new magic resting beneath his skin just as he might have that he was born with. One of the heads hisses a few moments later, shifting uncomfortably, and with a nod from the Necromancer, he pulls everything he's spread into the creature, everything that's proliferated and spread beyond what he gave right back out, calling it home.

"Welcome, my brother," says the Neromancer, "to the Left Hand of our Mother."