The tears that rolled down my cheeks were the only thing resembling warmth that I could feel.

  Precept Jasna stood over me, a black silhouette in the grey light of the new day.

  “Give up, maiden,” She said, her voice not unkind. “Desire alone is not enough. You have fought hard, failure does not distract from that. We will help you gain entry to one of the lesser schools.”

  I rolled onto my hands and knees, trying to stand. My body no longer moved like it should. Every motion I tried to take came slow and sloppy, like I was still underwater. The snow was slick with the water I had brought from the river after my most recent failure and I could not keep myself off the ground.

  Three more times since Reese had succeeded had I tried. Three more times since Sam had impressed upon me how absolutely necessary it was that I did not fail had I thrown myself back into the bitter deeps.

  Three more times, regardless of my need, I had failed.

  Each had happened quicker than the last as I had become more and more exhausted. An all consuming numbness had replaced the pain of the cold. When I managed to bring myself to my hands and knees, it felt distant in a way that made it seem like I was not the one moving at all.

  I had become a senseless and unfeeling puppet, animated by the force of my will alone.

  Precept Jasna, with her feathers and her sky blue eyes, did not understand. She did not understand that there was no lesser school for me. She could not understand that I would lose the little I loved in my life as soon as the trial was over.

  If I did not make the precepts think my soul was blue and clutch one of the two remaining charms in my frozen fingers, all of it meant nothing.

  I had made two promises to The Mother in Red. I had promised Rhiannon that I would be myself, but the colosseum and the stone table might as well have been a long forgotten dream. I could not be myself, I had to be Maiden Ire. Even if Maiden Ire shared the perfect red of my power, she could not use it without the precepts sending her away like they were Reese. Lun Arcanicil was for those whose souls were blue. To make them think that I was one of those souls, the lie I wore as a mask would have to find a way to lie through our aura.

  Shaking all the way, I let out an involuntary groan and forced myself to stand. I unstuck my soaked white dress from my frozen body and let new air chill me once again.

  “The other maidens are already gathering to leave. It is over.” Precept Jasna said as she steadied me by placing her hand on my shoulder.

  “A full day has not yet passed. Those are the terms of the trial.” Sam growled from where he stood below us.

  After Maiden Tana had discovered him and brought almost every other soul in the camp out to see, he had not left my side. Every time Precept Jasna had pulled me from the river after I had failed, he had been there waiting.

  He had not helped me with anything, there was nothing for the big blue cat to do, but he had stayed.

  “Do you have any idea what happens to a familiar if their sorceress dies? Maiden Ire,” Jasna said down to Sam and then looked back up to me. "Whatever you think you will gain from this, it is not worth it."

  I took a staggering step towards the bitter deeps and tried to speak. "N-n-no gain. W-w-what I will l-lose is worth everything."

  Sam followed behind me as I stumbled towards the ever roaring rapids. Beneath the sound of my shivering and the noise of the river, a low growl rumbled in his chest.

  Precept Shanti and Bellum stood in the distance with all of the maidens who had failed. Each wore thick coats and scarves that the precepts had given to make the journey back to the school less brutal than the journey away from it. Shanti had come and offered them to me sometime before the sun had risen, but I remembered what Reese had said.

  It was about will, all of it was.

  I could not find the chocolate eyed maiden amongst the crowd, but I knew if she was able, she would have been at the riverside.

  She had done the work. She had made herself my friend.

  Maiden Tana stood away from the gathering with a maiden I did not recognize. Between two snowy evergreens, I could see the sharp sneer on her face and what looked like pleasure in her eyes as she watched me.

  My failures appeared to be pleasing to her for reasons I did not understand.

  I reached the starting point and slipped on the snow that had been hard packed into slick surface from the feet of all those who had attempted.

  Sam's growl rose into a thunderous peak and the big blue cat struck the snowy ground underneath him with his savage claws.

  "My lady," He growled, pain apparent in his deep blue eyes. "Succeed, and I will agree to what you have offered."

  "R-r-really?" I stuttered.

  He raked his paws over his head and ears as he continued. "Your guard, Hymneth, this river, they all bring me to the barriers of my mind. Pass this wretched trial by whatever means are necessary and I will allow you to assist me in understanding why."

  That should have made me happy. I wished I could have told him without doubt that I would, but I felt no such joy or confidence. I barely felt anything at all anymore. All I could do in answer was to let myself back into the bitter deeps and allow it to take me once again.

  The freezing water no longer cut at my flesh.

  It was only the hammering force of the current that I could still feel.

  It struck my arms, legs, and every other part of me and spun me wildly as my head sunk beneath its violent surface.

  My feet found the hard rocks of the river bed.

  With the little strength I had left, I kicked off of them and broke back through the white water above me.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  I gasped for air.

  There was a blur of blue on my left that must have been Sam.

  Two silver charms hung over the river above.

  A shimmer of gold flashed between two evergreens on my right. It was so brief, that I barely had the time to understand what it was before the river pulled me back down again.

  Azza.

  Sam’s words repeated in my mind.

  The Mother in Brown is doing the same. She eagerly awaits it.

  The golden eyed Mother had come to see me fail.

  When the river bested me again, it would be her that the current carried me to. She would take me to her domain. She would take me away from Anna and I would be powerless to stop her. That had been the reason for The Mother's letting the Laos stay when I had returned to Zenithcidel from the mortal plane. In her eyes, they had given me a set of toys just so they could take them away if they felt the need to.

  I had not hated Azza despite every reason Anna said I should have.

  She had healed my broken hand in the rose colored dust of Vowkeeper's Anguish. It had not been her intention, but without the golden gift she had once locked around my throat, The Lady in Red would have removed my head near the bridge to Erosette.

  I had known the reasons she treated me the way she did well enough. I hated it, but I had not hated her for it.

  Even then, knowing that she was standing somewhere above me while I flailed uselessly against The River Eae, I did not hate her.

  I had feared her.

  I had wished that I would never see her again.

  I had felt her weight and pressure in my mind long after her choker had unclasped from my flesh.

  Within the freezing water, so cold that I somehow felt like I could drift off to sleep if I quieted my mind, I didn't even feel that.

  I felt nothing beyond the need to reach the charms.

  There was no part of me that knew what would happen once I left the river, but I did not care. I would be with Anna. I would learn how to use my power properly. I would help my familiar slip past the barriers in his mind. Anything else was irrelevant, be it the cold, the color of my soul, or Azza. Just as I had broken the seal of The Nine Mothers twice before, just as I had defeated the horrible hands that the lich had sent after me, just as I had escaped to the mortal plane with nothing but knowledge gained from The Well, I would clutch one of the silver charms in my fingers.

  I will will it so. I spoke to myself and reached for my aura as my feet met the riverbed once again.

  The red of my soul that hung within the center of all that I was had dimmed. I did not bend the branch and try to build it bigger. With the little focus I could hold, I brought myself inward to bring it into my unsealed hand.

  The jagged ends of the upturned river rocks stabbed into the soles of my feet, but I did not flinch away from them despite the new pain.

  I brushed against it and felt a hint of warmth from it. My touch was too numb, too cold, too empty and all of those things rushed from me and into it. Like morning dew turning to frost over a grassy field, my frozen touch spread over my soul in a white tide and every last ember of red smoldered out.

  The roaring of the current filled my ears and the burning need for breath in my lungs tore into me and nearly shook my focus away.

  Blue like Sam. Blue like Nami's eyes. Blue like the clear skies over Erosette. I thought, imagining each shade as the words passed through my mind.

  The charms. I will reach the charms. I will will it so. I demanded from myself. I pressed through the pain in my soles and bared down onto the sharp stones. Every inch I pushed my left hand forward against the current and it sent violent quakes back through my arm.

  Diluted, dim, thin, the frost within me obscured the color of my soul until I could see it no longer.

  The rock underneath my feet gave way and I let go. I let go of my focus, I let go of my blue thoughts, I let go of it all and waited for the river to take me for what would be the final time.

  I will will it so.

  The violent current swept my legs out from under me, but I was not washed away.

  I snapped my eyes open against the freezing water of the bitter deeps.

  Bright blue light shone out from my left palm and vanished within the white water.

  The last of my air burst from my mouth in a silent shout as I coiled my fingers around the power and used the tension to bring my legs back underneath me. Bringing my right hand against the current as I had my left, I clutched the cord of blue light and took a shaking step forward.

  What I held in my hands was no glamor. I had come no closer to splitting my mind than any of my previous attempts.

  I had brought blue to my soul.

  I had willed it so.

  I would not be washed away.

  The River Eae would not best me again.

  Truth. The Autumn I liked agreed as I took another handhold from the river.

  I would not fail.

  Truth. She spoke again, the absolute certainty in her voice compelling me against the rapids.

  I would be a new moon of Lun Arcanicil.

  Truth.

  I would not be taken away from Anna.

  Truth.

  With every agreement from the calm and collected part of me, I pulled myself through the cutting current of the cold torrent and found my footing.

  I would take my charm.

  Truth.

  My head broke through the surface of the river and I filled my lungs with frigid air. Without the need to fight to keep my head above water, I saw Sam and Precept Jesnah standing on the bank to my left. The sorceress's sky blue eyes were wide and her mouth hung open in obvious surprise.

  Much longer and thinner than my red chord had ever been, the blue line of my new power ran from my hands, through the rapids, and up the river. The end of it was buried into the stony riverbed of the shallows above and it was tight from the tension of my weight.

  "I will be an underwitch in full!" I shouted into the evergreens as I took the steps from the river that it could no longer deny me.

  When I grew close enough to see that the two remaining charms were little crescent moons made of gleaming silver, I let the cord fall limp from my left hand and ran.

  The same golden shimmer I had seen on the right side of the river when I had been drowning in it flashed between the trees on my right.

  I did not care.

  All that mattered were the charms.

  I hoped she had witnessed the impossible thing I had just done.

  I wished with all of my bright blue power that she understood what was truly futile and what was not.

  From my middle to waist and then down to my knees, I coiled my slack power around my wrist as I reached the shallows. All of me shivered uncontrollably and my feet dragged across the stones underneath them as I went.

  I had done it. I did not have the faintest idea as to how, but I had done it.

  The silver charms were nearly within my reach.

  The water only barely covered my ankles.

  Not coiling the bright blue cord fast enough, it caught the front of my foot and sent me crashing to the ground. Pain shot through my knees and my hands as I caught myself on them. Water splashed up against my face, but I paid it no mind.

  I had done it.

  I had passed the trial.

  I crawled forward over the river rocks and the tangled mess of power.

  The charms hung over my head and I raised my eyes to the little silver moons.

  I reached up and snatched both of them off of the wire, the small loop of fabric that held them tearing easily.

  I took both for no reason other than that I wanted them.

  Without knowing it to be so before that very moment, the days that I did not get what I wanted had ended in a wash of bright blue light.

  Truth.