· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

"..by the gods.. and will this be all, Miss?”

Varalda pretends not to notice the muttered comment preceding the question the shopkeeper asks her, as she digs around in her bag for her bag of coins. It’ll take everything she’s scraped together for the past two years, but hopefully, it’ll be worth it. “Yes, it will. Thank you.”

With that, she gathers up her large bundle and heads out the door.

As she turns in the direction of her house, a few mile walk, she runs through the plan in her head.

In her bundle, she has an assortment of ingredients, (some poison, hopefully she remembered gloves last week..) some gems, tools, and then back home she has the final piece, a very special piece of enchanted rock that she’d purchased a couple months back for.. way too much. We’ll just say that.

And when she gets home, she’s going to set everything up, and then wait very (im)patiently for the moon to rise.

Tonight is the night she brings back a dragon.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

Back home—a circle of gray stones (all carefully selected from various creeks and rivers) in a circle. Her ingredients next to her. The mortar and pestle. Her collection of gems surrounding the mortar. And the ceremonial blade in front of it.

It’s dark, the only light coming from the candlelight glow all around her. It’s finally time to begin.

Without wasting any time, Varalda starts the careful (but slightly rushed) measuring of ingredients into her mortar. She focuses on the scrape of pestle against mortar as she starts to grind. Then, it’s time for the final step.

With shaking hands, she lifts her blade, in her left hand. Wait, no, goddamnit, right hand. The sacrifice has to come from her left.

Then she pauses. Anxiety builds in her chest, along with hope—that desperate, scared kind of hope, the kind that doesn’t know if it’s going to be crushed yet.

Is she really ready to do this?

Could it actually work?

..is she ready for it to work?

She shakes her head hard. She can’t hesitate any longer, can’t give herself any more time to overthink this.

She presses the blade to her palm. Then digs a slow, careful slit down, from her middle finger to her wrist.

Fuck, that hurts, but she completes it. Blood wells up in her palm, thick and red, and she winces a bit as she carefully tilts it over the bowl and lets her blood pour over the crushed ingredients.

Nothing happens.

Disappointment rises in her chest.

No. No, this has to work. It has to. Because if it doesn’t—well, if it doesn’t, she’s out of options.

But she only stews in her rising feelings of panic for a couple seconds longer, thankfully, before, so faintly she might’ve missed it, a red glow starts to emanate from the pool of her blood.

Her eyes widen. Her body goes cold, then hot.

She chalks it up to excitement at first. She’s done it! She’s going to be the one who brings back dragons!

But that excitement is short-lived, because the hot feeling spreading through her body is suddenly overwhelming.

She jerks back as she hears a sizzle, then looks down in panic to see a blister forming across her hand, in the path of the blood dripping from her still wet cut.

Oh fuck. Oh fuck. Oh god what’d she do?!

She scrambles to her feet—to do what, she’s not sure, maybe run? Maybe get help—but before she can move she suddenly finds herself collapsing to her knees, hunching over and hugging herself, a choking cry escaping her lips as burning pains radiates through her entire body.

She’s dying. She must be dying.

She forces her eyes open as she falls onto her side, trying desperately to see through a sudden blur, a sudden red tint. Her veins are starting to glow, a faint orangeish red that looks as hot as it feels. Then she watches in horror as her own blood starts to bubble through her skin.

She’s suddenly screaming without really choosing to make the sound. It rings in her ears, making her head ache, which is just really not a fun feeling when added to the searing AGONY radiating through her entire body. There’s something dripping out of her eyes, then her nose, and her ears.. it might be blood?..it’s definitely hot enough.

Her skin starts to bubble and melt away. She’s literally boiling from the inside out.

GOD, this hurts. It HURTS. IT HURTS, HOW DOES SHE MAKE IT STOP?!

Her vision blurs even more, making it so she can’t really tell if it’s her imagination or not as something dark, blueish, starts to form underneath her melting skin. Her screams—she’s still screaming, although the noise fades into the background—almost sound like they’re starting to lower in pitch, take on more of a snarling quality.

When she opens her eyes next, the trees look a lot smaller.

Then she blacks out.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

A sharp pain cuts through her head. A shout.

“Varalda? Varalda, where are you?!”

She calls back—but then a chill runs through her as her voice comes out in an incomprehensible, animalistic roar.

And she comes face to face—her vision suddenly very sharp and crisp—with her best friend. Who are a lot smaller than she remembers them.

Their face is pale, their eyes wide. They start to back up.

Then their gaze drops to the ruined ritual circle.. the blood.. the scraps of ruined clothes on the ground that Varalda suddenly registers.

“..Varalda..?” Their friend says. Softly. Gently. Too gently. “..that’s.. that’s you?”

She manages a tiny nod. Her head feels a lot clumsier, more hefty than it should.

Her for some reason very tiny friend carefully approaches, and very tentatively lays a hand on her.

“..Varalda, what happened?” They murmur.

She tries to answer, but again, only a growl escapes.

They rub her shoulder. “Shh.. it’s alright.” Their touch is more soothing than it’s ever been. “We’ll fix this.. I-I’m sure we can fix this. I’ll get a healer. M-maybe we’ll travel, to those healers in the East. They’re better versed in magic.

What HAPPENED?! Varalda screams in her head.

But the answer is no further than her own twisted body as she looks down.

And instead of seeing her familiar, pale flesh, her humanoid hands, she sees dark blue scales. Claws.

She’s a dragon.

The spell backfired so terribly.

Or maybe it didn’t backfire. Maybe it worked exactly as it was supposed to, and she shouldn’t have torn ‘dragon spell’ out of an old tome and attempted the spell all by herself, without even consulting anyone.