For the first time in fourteen years, I was able to leave my closed room for some fresh air, with the support of my caretaker, Gregor..
"I saw an orchard tree, just like me—weak and dry, without any sign of life, even though the grass around it was fertile."
Gregor said the tree was cursed.
"Nothing grows under it," he grumbled, sharpening a rusted blade on the porch. "The orchard avoids it. Even crows don't perch there."
So naturally, I went to sit beneath it.
My body still ached. Limbs like water-soaked cloth. Muscles unwilling. Skin like stretched parchment. But the pain was... familiar now. Manageable.
I was getting stronger.
Diet. Tea. Rest. Gregor's stubborn help. My knowledge.
But something still pulled at the edges—like my body wasn't the only thing resisting life.
It was there, under that twisted, black-barked tree, that I met him.
He wasn't from the estate.
No Dorne soldier wore tattered robes lined with constellation thread. No mage from the capital dared step foot on family land without permission.
But he stood there calmly, watching me like I was a question only he could answer.
"You've been breathing wrong," he said.
I blinked.
"Excuse me?"
He stepped closer, barefoot, as though the ground didn't dare stain him. His eyes burned gold like a sun behind smoke.
"You're not drawing mana. You're surviving off your own decaying core. That's why you're healing like a dying leaf in spring."
I stood, barely. "Who are you?"
He smiled. "A man who's died once already. Call me Fen."
He sat beneath the cursed tree, folding his robes around him like a blanket, making the earth beneath him seem a little less cursed, just by the weight of his presence.
We sat in silence for a few moments. The wind was still, unnatural, like it too was waiting for something.
I could feel the pull. The curiosity, the hunger that had only begun to awaken inside me. A hunger not for food or drink, but for something deeper—something I hadn't even known I was missing.
Fen did not speak again until I looked at him, expectantly.
He spoke slowly, like a teacher, not a prophet. He didn't use grand spells or flashy elements. Just words.
"Just breathe. And truth."
I wasn't sure what that meant, but I tried. I could still hear my breath, shallow, labored, each inhale a strain.
"Mana is not something you possess," he said. "It's something you accept."
I frowned. "So, you mean I'm supposed to take it? From the air?"
Fen didn't answer immediately. He just observed, his eyes never leaving mine.
"Your body is like a lung," he continued, his voice like the shifting of leaves. "But instead of air, it draws essence. The problem is, you've never opened the valve."
I tried to absorb his words. It was an interesting metaphor, but my body was more a prison than a conduit. Still, I nodded, feigning understanding, though my thoughts were elsewhere.
"So how do I 'open' it?" I asked.
Fen's gaze deepened as he looked at me. "You feel it here," he said, pointing to his chest. "Just beneath the sternum. The manaviscera. A cluster of tissues that responds to flow. Imagine inhaling energy, not air. Start slow. Hold it. Let it settle. Your body's broken, yes—but your spirit isn't."
I nodded, and a strange silence stretched between us.
I placed my hand where he pointed, my fingers trembling.
This was insanity, wasn't it?
I breathed in.
Nothing. I exhaled.
Then, I focused on the center of my chest, where my hand rested. The air was still. The ground beneath me was still. I couldn't feel anything but the ache of my body, the frustration, the bitterness in my bones.
"Try again," Fen said, his voice like a river—persistent, quiet, but unyielding.
I exhaled and tried again. Felt nothing. My mind swirled, my thoughts caught between doubt and the strange stillness Fen imposed.
And then...
Something cracked.
Like frost underfoot. A shiver ran through my bones. Cold. Then warmth.
Mana... answered.
I gasped. It wasn't much, but it was there. The sensation—slippery, like smoke. A pressure, yes, but gentle. Alive. And as quickly as it appeared, it dissipated, leaving me breathless, shaky, and confused.
But it had been real.
I could feel the air around me was not empty. There was something in it. And that something... it belonged to me, if I could only take it.
Fen didn't move. He didn't speak. He just watched me, his expression unreadable.
"You're breathing now," he said, after a pause. "But this isn't just breathing. You have to live with it. Understand it. Be its partner. Like a doctor knows his patient, a mage knows the flow of life inside him."
I closed my eyes and focused again. The hollow pressure. The subtle hum. My cells strained, my veins thickened, my pulse quickened. But the more I resisted, the more the pull increased, and I breathed—deeply, slowly.
It wasn't instant. It wasn't painless.
Each breath of mana sparked pressure behind my eyes. Some vessels in my arms throbbed. I tasted copper in my mouth, but I felt it. Felt the mana coursing inside me, the energy like a trickle at first, then like a slow river filling up a dry basin.
Fen guided me in short sessions—just ten minutes a day. Enough to awaken. Not enough to overload. But each session felt like an eternity, like my body was learning how to live all over again.
Meanwhile, Gregor adjusted my meals again—protein-heavy now. More bone broth. Less dairy. He didn't ask why. He never had to. He knew, in his own quiet way, that I was changing.
I modified my regimen too. Light stretches. Passive absorption. Low-sodium teas to prevent internal swelling. Slowly, cautiously, I embraced it.
"Mana integration," I realized, "worked like osmosis. You don't pour magic in—you create a gradient. A reason for the world's energy to want to live inside you."
And slowly, it did.
Each passing day felt like a step forward, but a slow one. I still felt weak, my body stiff with years of neglect. But something was shifting within me. A lightness, an unfamiliar ease. My chest felt more open, as if the air could reach deeper than before. The ache of my joints was less.
And just like that—Fen vanished.
No footsteps. No farewell. Just an empty orchard, and a faint burn in the air where he once stood.
As if he had never existed at all.
That night, I sat at her shrine in the east wing. Few visited it anymore.
My mother, Lirien Dorne, the swift tempest sword of the house.
They said she was a lioness on the battlefield—and a candle in private.
She died the day after I was born.
Now I knew why.
She had the same condition. The same body. The same burden.
Only difference was... she never had a second chance.
I bowed my head.
"You protected this body once. Let me make it worthy of you."
On the twelfth day after meeting Fen, I woke up early.
No coughing. No dizziness.
I stood.
Walked to the door.
For the first time in seven years, I stepped outside my room under my own power. My limbs felt lighter, my body more whole, and for the first time in what felt like a lifetime, I could breathe without pain.
.