Tell Me My Name by Mary Fan

can’t
speak to me.” My voice is so soft, it barely reaches my own
ears.
    His expression darkens. “My master may
be wise, but even he isn’t all-knowing.” He glances to the side,
pressing his mouth into a harsh line. After a moment, he shakes his
head. “I know he forbade me from talking to you, but you don’t have
to worry about what would happen if he hears me now. It’s my
concern.”
    I turn my gaze to the floor. He
doesn’t know what his master did to punish me for bewitching him,
even when I was innocent of the crime. And I can’t tell him – I’d
have to speak again to do so, and if the master catches me, he’ll
torture me again. Each time he’s cursed me, I’ve felt as if a
monster latched onto my soul and sucked the energy from it, and
that the magician released me just in time to save the last drop I
needed to regain my strength. What if next time he doesn’t, and his
curse leaves me in a state too feeble to recover from? How could I
ever escape if I’m too weak to stand?
    And what’s more, I won’t be the only
subject of his wrath, since the master said that the spell he cast
on Darien the last time he spoke to me, the curse painful enough to
take him to the floor, was a mere warning. Even if I had the
fortitude to bear the magician’s cruelty, I couldn’t allow another
to suffer like that.
    “ I’m not going to hurt
you.” Darien’s voice from the window is almost a whisper. “I know
this won’t mean much to you when you’re trapped like this, but
we’re not trying to be cruel. Our work … it has a very important
purpose, and someday the fate of the world could depend on it. The
smallest misstep might cause us to fail, and that would lead to
disaster.”
    He sounds like he’s trying to convince
himself more than me. I hear the echo of his master’s words in his;
I suppose the magician must have finally instilled his lessons into
his apprentice’s head. After the brutality I witnessed – the
slamming into walls, the curse of pain – I don’t care to imagine
what else might have happened to Darien, away from here, that I
didn’t see. Hearing him talk about the Sorci as if he’s one of them
makes my heart sink. I guess as an apprentice, that’s what he’s
working toward, but the thought of him becoming just like the
stone-faced figures – or worse, the cruel master – fills me with
sorrow.
    My head tells me to say something, or
at least ask for a hint as to what this greater purpose could be,
but the idea feels so dull that it can’t be called a desire. My
very mind has grown numb, and my thoughts drift in a dull cloud of
“what’s the point?” Everything I’ve tried has been in vain, and the
one viable suggestion I came up with – manipulating Darien to save
myself – is too abhorrent, even in my desperate state. Though I
yearn to hold onto hope, I can’t stop the voice in my head telling
me that it’s just a false promise for something that can never
come.
    So I just give another nod and keep my
eyes on the ground, hoping he’ll go away. At the same time, part of
me wishes he could stay. His is the only company I have, despite
the danger his voice brings me, and I can’t help feeling a small
measure of comfort in his presence. Once he leaves, I’ll be alone
again.
    Alone with my hopelessness.
    A great swelling presses against my
heart, and sharp tingling rises toward my eyes. I squeeze them
shut, determined to keep the tears back. But for some reason,
thinking about my impending return to total solitude brings an
upwelling of despair, and the thoughts crash into me from all sides
at once.
    I don’t know who I
am.
    I have no
purpose.
    I have no hope.
    I don’t want to surrender to these
helpless thoughts, but they beat against my consciousness like
stormy waves upon a stone that, no matter how sturdy, can’t escape
the wearing down under such repeated, merciless thrashing. Tears
threaten to escape my eyes, and I squeeze my lids tighter to hold
them back. But