Library of Rain

Unnamed Contract

Darkness pulled Rain’s mind into oblivion, or at least it tried. Rain didn’t let it. If she fell unconscious now, Sunrise would wake up in the morning and find Rain slumped against a wall covered in blood. Rain could already see the worry and fear on her sister's face, and she would not allow that to happen. 

With a heroic effort, Rain forced herself back to consciousness. Her whole being felt like it was on fire, and darkness gnawed at the edge of her vision, but she pushed through, forcing herself to her feet and shakily walking to the bathroom.

Rain spent several agonizing minutes washing her body of all the blood. Never before had she been so grateful that her cloak could clean itself because, by the time she finished washing, it was already spotless. Rain wasn’t so sure whether she was completely clean, but it was good enough. She wasn’t sure how much longer she could stay awake.

Stumbling out of the bathroom, Rain wobbled quietly over to the spot where she had been sitting. It was too dark for her to tell if she’d stained the carpet, so Rain simply covered the floor with the unused papers, picked up the scrap of soft leather that had caused this whole problem, and rocked over to her bedroom to finally get some sleep.

***

Rain closed the black book. It had been two days since she went somewhat crazy and created her blank scroll, and in all that time, the pain never left. Rain felt like she was on fire every waking moment; it was hard to eat or move, leaving her no choice but to pretend she was sick. The pain was so bad that, at times, she started seeing a pair of glowing eyes watching her as she tried to sleep. She still worried Ise; even Lucus had taken time away from his preparations for the Gathering to sit and talk with her.

The problem wasn’t Rain’s body, though; it was her soul. Her rash creation of a second ensouled item before she had time to heal from the first had caused her soul to fracture. Even now, Rain could feel heat radiating off her wounded soul as she kept a mental hand on it, trying to hold it together. Rain had spent the last few days rereading about souls, and nothing in her book mentioned how to fix this. One passage even said that if a person’s soul was injured, then it was best to let them die.

Rain wouldn’t be taking that option. If she had to keep a hand on her soul and live with this pain for the rest of her life, so be it; she would learn to deal with it. Besides, it wasn’t like she didn’t get anything out of this. Rain reached out a hand, and darkness seeped out of her palm, twisting and forming into the dark scroll she had spent so much to create.

Rain didn’t care how many times she did that, it was still cool. She couldn’t wait to do it all dramatically the next time she was acting as Tyix. 

And the dramatic summoning wasn’t even the best part; she could clearly remember Mr. Purple's message.

[Congratulations on creating the soulbound item: Unnamed Contract. When the terms of a deal are written in blood on this reusable contract, and two parties sign and seal it, the contract will hold both parties to the agreement. Should one party break the terms of the deal, their very being will be forfeited to the other except for a small portion that the Unnamed Contract itself will consume.]

Every time Rain thought about the description, it made her happy. This was better than she had been hoping for. Now Rain could use her library without having to compromise her morals. After all the self-loathing she had endured for breaking her morals to spare the Estoms, this victory was worth the physical pain she was in.

Before, Rain had to be careful not to give too many people access to a tome from her library for fear of creating another Merchant Killer - a problem she still hadn’t fixed. She could have simply tricked her victims into raising their corruption to the max and then used ‘Artisan of Abominations’ to enslave them, but Rain hated slavery, and the very thought of taking a person’s free will made her sick.

But now Rain had a way to get people to do what she needed without completely enslaving them! She would get them to walk into her traps with their eyes wide open. It was perfect. Rain’s only complaint about creating this scroll - other than the constant mind-rending pain - was that she couldn’t remember exactly how she made it. She vaguely remembered getting help from someone, but she couldn’t remember who. 

That was another question she had been searching through the black book for, but she had found even fewer answers for it than for her problem with her fractured soul.  

In the end, she simply had to accept that that uncertainty was just a part of the cost of getting what she needed. 

The night was dark, and Ise had gone to bed a while ago. Rain had nothing better to do, and the pain wasn’t going anywhere. There was nothing holding Rain back from finding some new pawns to share a book with. And Rain had an idea of who might know some people. Closing her eyes, Rain dragged herself out on the string connecting her to Ms. River.

When Rain arrived at the now-familiar tavern that Ms. River enjoyed running, she was surprised to see that she wasn’t the only guest. Sunrise and Ms. River were sitting at a table talking. Rain checked that she didn’t have a body yet and floated over to listen in on their conversation.

“If Rain is hiding something from you, maybe she has a reason.”

They were talking about her? Rain was a little disappointed. She’d hoped Ise had made a friend and was here to talk about fun things. Ms. River might be a bit old, but it would still make Rain happy to know her sister had at least one friend. 

“But if something is hurting her, then I need to know so I can stop it.” Ise pouted.

“Maybe she’s just sick.”

“Then what about the blood on the carpet?”

Oops. Rain really should have put more effort into cleaning the carpet. She’d just been in so much pain at the time - not that now was much better. 

“Have you tried asking her about it?”

“No.”

“Why don’t you try that?”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“I just can’t.”

“Okay, well how…”

Rain was done listening. She had tried to hide her self-inflicted harm because she didn’t want to worry Sunrise, but once again, she was only doing damage by trying to protect her sister.

Floating back to the tavern's entryway, Rain focused on forming a body. The strain on her mind caused her soul pain to flare up, but Rain pushed through. 

“Hi, Ise! Hi, Ms. River!” 

The two turned to look at her with guilty expressions on their faces. Rain decided that she should be honest.

“Um, I overheard you guys talking. You’re right, Ise; I am hurt right now.”

Rain walked over, sat at the table with the other two, and began explaining what had happened when she made her earring and contract. Rain noticed that as she did, the atmosphere in the tavern changed, the once cheerful patrons losing their boisterous chatter for subdued muttering. Rain wondered if Ms. River was doing that on purpose. 

“So your soul is hurt? Is that why you’re so blurry right now?”

Ise’s question caught Rain off guard. Blurry? Looking down at herself, Rain found that she was indeed blurry. Her body was there; it just looked uncertain if it wanted to be there around the edges.

“Huh, I didn’t realize that, but probably.”

“What do you need to feel better? Do you need some of my soul like when people share blood?”

Ise was breathing heavily again. Rain was starting to recognize that as a bit of a bad sign. Plus, there was no way for Rain to use her soul to… actually, that might work. Not that Rain would ever tell Ise that. Rain had touched Ise’s soul, and it was perfect and unblemished. Breaking a piece of it off and marring it would be just wrong. 

“I don’t think so,” Rain said, refusing to wince at the puff of dark smoke leaking from her lips right after she decided not to lie to Ise. 

The way Sunrise slumped at the words made Rain feel even worse. Rain couldn’t take it, so she stood up and hugged the still-sitting Ise. The position was kind of awkward, and Rain ended up just hugging Ise’s head, but Ise didn’t seem to mind as she nestled her head into Rain's chest. 

As Rain hugged her sister, her ears started to turn red. The reason was Ms. River, who was watching the two sisters with a big smile on her face. The moment Ms. River saw she had been noticed, her grin widened.

“You’re a good big sister, Rain.”

Rain's face turned red to match her ears, and she looked away. Between the embarrassment at Ms. River’s words and the gentle warmth from the hug, Rain hardly noticed the burning pain that had been ever present since her foolish decisions. Some things were just stronger than pain. 

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