27 Without You

“In life, things change & people change. It doesn’t mean you forget the past or try to cover it up- it just means accepting that some things were never meant to be. You do not give up because you’re weak, you give up because you are strong enough to let go.”

Maya Fey
Fey Manor
September 5, 2020, 5:30 AM

As Maya was only now finding out, as soon as the disgraced Misty Fey had gone, her duplicitous sister had assembled the Kurain Elder Council, composed of similar-minded old cronies who shared her warped vision and maneuvered the power structures into amendments taking decisive influence away from the village leader and into the hands of the boards of Elders across the country, hastily rubber-stamping them on behalf of the Master in her absence, citing this as temporary emergency means of action, mere damage control, until the day the Misty returned. Amidst such pandemonium, everyone had believed her.

By the time it was entirely clear that Maya’s mother was never coming back, the new order was already conclusively embedded. The elders’ hostility, too, was mostly built on lies, inflated out of proportion. The new Master tried to assure herself that she was the one in charge, and they knew it, so the things they thought and said shouldn’t have mattered, and that they were just trying to intimidate her.

However, that was easier said than done.

The hostile elder council made little to no attempt to hide their disdain for the new Master.

“We don’t respect you. You have yet to prove yourself to us. All we have to base our judgement on is your past ‘questionable’ associations and ‘crimes’.  You will always carry the lingering stigma of your disgraced mother until you lead us to believe you’re different than her – that you won’t be like her. What’s more, the stigma of Misty and her disgrace still lingers on you. Are you going to throw in the towel and abdicate as she did? Become swayed by outside influence? If you can’t fulfill your duties sufficiently, you’d be doing us all a better favor to just slither away and drop dead!”

Words like these were tougher to dismiss. Even the strongest of wills could become battered and near broken to hear such cruelties hurled at them like rocks. By continuously bringing up her mother, they knew exactly how to hit her where it hurt most.

What’s the point of being the leader of Kurain when all I do is train and get told what to do?! It’s ridiculous! I’m supposed to be the leader, right? They should do what I say! After I was nearly killed over this stupid position it’s the least they could do. And right after I lost and barely had any time to mourn over my mother…

Misty, Misty, Misty. Ultimately, it always came to Misty Fey. The plaguing aura that would never go away. The whole issue of the deceased Misty Fey to deal with on top of everything else.

The diviner didn’t blame her mother for abandoning her. Her mother had thought she was doing the best thing for her daughters; not transferring the mantle of shame and dishonor down as an inheritance. Though, in reality, Aunt Morgan had never really allowed Maya to forget it, and in Misty’s absenteeism, she’d wielded significant influence, as the Master’s sister, even with her lack of spiritual powers.

Her thoughts had frequently drifted to her mother. She’d never known her, she’d always been a distant and almost mythical figure in her mind. Mia had already decided quite early on to submit the Master position to Maya by default. The necromancer wished she’d been old enough to understand what that accountability had truly entailed. If she had, if her sister had ever properly discussed the decision with her, has she known all the bullshit the position entailed, she would have told her sister she didn’t want it. Let Pearl have the role!

But the elder Fey sibling hadn’t, and so the psychic could barely recall a period of her life when she had not had Kurain Master as her inherent future, mapped out for her, to take over from her mother. It wasn’t right for Maya, as second-born, to have been faced with this tremendous responsibility.  There wasn’t a day that went by when she didn’t feel beyond miserable about the fact that Mia was really the one who deserved the leader role, instead of centering her life on her dedicated mission to expose those who destroyed Misty. It was the late legendary attorney who should have been able to succeed in her quest, and then claim her rightful place as Master.

In terms of administrative affairs, however, that burden had passed to Maya as soon as Misty Fey’s soul departed.

Her mother was a confusing figurehead; at once an impossibly legendary ideal to emulate while simultaneously being an ultimately fallible, vulnerable example of what not to become; disgraced and still ostracized by many in Kurain for her shameful ‘betrayal’ of her duty and responsibility after her destroyed reputation and subsequent breakdown.

The diviner was torn between feelings of outraged dignity by her poor mother’s name still being besmirched posthumously, and being terrified that there was some actual underlying truth in the slandering… would she too, fall victim to these same types of devastating weaknesses, which kept being brought up repeatedly to uncompromising light?

Her mother had died effectively so that she, Maya, should take over the Kurain Master position.

The village leader couldn’t repress a creeping sense of guilt. Her mother, though dedicated to her daughter’s succession, had never really known her. Would her mother have sacrificed herself if she knew the truth about her daughter? That Maya concurred with Lady Macbeth’s mindset?  Admittedly, Morgan’s attempts to kill her had been extreme actions to resort to in achieving her lofty goals, the reluctant Master actually didn’t disagree with her aunt’s notion that Pearl should inherit the accursed title, as the child’s spiritual powers and dedication were exponentially superior to her own. Would Misty have been horrified to learn that as far as her youngest child’s goals and aspirations went in life, the only one she was clear on wanting to achieve was acquiring just enough spirit medium power to become a fully independent adult, who could then exit Kurain without restraint or re-requisition so she could be with Nick, wholly uncompromised?

I can’t live, if living is without you.

Nick, who had issues he knew he still wasn’t fully divulging to her. Nick, who she yearned to help more than anything in the world if only he would let her…

Maya couldn’t remember a time in her life when she hadn’t been so seized with futile frustration and helplessness. She wished she could help her boyfriend, but could not comprehend how. Maybe she was becoming a pain in his ass by constantly begging to visit with him. Perhaps laying low and not bothering him for a bit until he sorted himself out would be for the best.

I can’t give. I can’t give anymore.

But how could she forget about Nick, today of all the days? Maya shut her eyes against the hot flood of tears stinging behind them. September 5. The most bittersweet day of her existence. The day life had taken her beloved sister from her forever and simultaneously presented her with the man who she would grow to love till her dying day.

Phoenix … was her pillar of strength. He’d always believed in her, believed she could handle this Master position. For him, for Pearly, she had to find the vigor and gumption to carry on, despite all the obstacles, and the misery. It was the least she could do.

So many people had sacrificed themselves so she could become Kurain Master – her mother, Mia, Diego… she would just have to attempt to her utmost to dedicate herself to the Kurain Master position with fervor, to heighten her powers, and to somehow attempt to become the daughter her mother had envisioned she was saving.  She needed to become a Master worthy of such sacrifice, one Misty would have been proud of. She had to make a Kurain her mother could be proud of.

I will not let them break me, Maya vowed. I will let them change who I am. And I sure as hell won’t let them change Nick, Pearly, or anyone else! I refuse to let them tear down my Nick just because he chose a profession they don’t like, or my mother because she was sold out! 

Maya knew she had to prove herself, and for the past nine months, at the unwitting near-expense of her personal health, she’d been striving to show her worthiness by throwing herself headfirst into her training. Pearl was there to cheer her on, even assist in some areas and offer guidance in some areas where the new Master was lacking. It was a shame that at the age of eight, her cousin had been able to power Nick’s magatama for him, whereas the spirit medium herself as of late, had been unable to even channel Mia, despite her strenuous efforts, never mind her mother, who seemed content to remain as obscure from her daughter in the afterlife as she had when she’d been alive.

It was a depressing realization to know that she was truly alone – and despite knowing she was being silly – if she channeled them, she couldn’t talk to them anyway! – the necromancer couldn’t help but feel abandoned and vulnerable. Was her mother still afraid to face her, even now? Was Mia so disgusted with her lack of prowess as Master that she’d decided to wash her hands of her little sister completely, henceforth?

These desertion issues must have been taking their toll on her psyche, and manifesting themselves in her dreams. They plagued her at night, causing her insufferable insomnia, because the alternative, sleep, was too terrifying. For the past month or so, she’d been having night visions so harrowing that if Hollywood had been able to stick a projection screen into her brain and made a movie out of it, they would have had the biggest blockbuster horror film since The Excorcist.

She felt inexcusably guilty for worrying her cousin, who’d taken to sleeping with her lately because of the alarming frequency and intensity of the night terrors. Maya had been unable to suppress herself from waking screaming from one of her nightmares – just a mental replay of witnessing her mother dying as she was stabbed, often superimposed with the moment of Mia’s death and that haunted, dead look in Phoenix’s eyes after he’d been disbarred. Perturbingly, they were recurring with increasing frequency and disrupting her sleeping patterns, a matter she was unable to obscure from Pearl, who seemed generally concerned with her. Just yesterday, she had been roused from her nightmare, drenched in sweat from the terror of her dreams, and shot up in the bed, looking frantic and wild-eyed at her cousin. The child’s huge Bambi eyes were wide with apprehension.

“Are you okay, Mystic Maya? Your alarm clock just went off, but it’s only 5:00 in the morning. You just went to bed a couple of hours ago. Are you sure you shouldn’t rest instead of doing more training? You look pale.”

“I’m OK, Pearly, please don’t worry,” she had assured the girl, despite the protesting ache of her overwrought body. But giving it the further slumber it so desperately craved simply wasn’t an option. She had to train or die trying.

She’d recently re-tried – and failed – her magatama-charging benchmark test. She’d ignored the fact that her head pounded, her jaw tightened as if it had dislocated, and that it was sometimes difficult to perform tasks that involved recalling many steps. There were infinite tasks to perform – that channeling for the foreign ambassador, the monthly meeting with the region’s Kurain Elders, and the Ultra Course she’d booked for the next morning… obviously, she just required further training to stay focused.

Rising her exhausted body out of bed, she’d half walked, half dragged herself to the Kurain Master’s Library, a collection of thousands upon thousands of ancient books and manuscripts covering numerous centuries of secret esoteric knowledge. She planned on consulting some of the scriptures before she headed over to Hazakura Temple the next morning for that Special Training Course.

And since she’d been meditating obsessively for most of the last month, her powers should be heightened.

Should have been. But they weren’t. Where had she gone wrong?  Was it because she was so damn tired all the time? The average two hours of sleep got per night after getting off her late-night phone calls with Nick probably wasn’t helping her weakened state.

Maya read and re-read the almost incomprehensibly archaic instructions with intensity. She locked herself in the Master’s Wing of rooms and attempted to focus her powers to accomplish the task described.  She concentrated her powers until she felt both nauseous and radiated with pain and collapsed to the ground, limp and shaking. Her vision blurred, she gasped for breath, and she was on the verge of unconsciousness.

There are six lines to the Sacred Writings. Cleanse thy soul… Open the door to the spiritual realm beyond… Converse with the departed… …Cast on thyself Protection… Maintain the spell… Release the spell…

All to no avail. Her powers simply had not reached an effective threshold to affect her Magatama in any way, shape, or form. She had failed. She was a failure.

Disgusted with herself, as soon as she was able, the village leader crawled back to the Library.  There was an entire shelf of many hundreds of torturous and brutal masochistic training endeavors that she was supposed to perfect as Master. Maya resolved to complete every one of these in succession. When she’d finished, she’d repeat them. Maybe then her powers might heighten to an acceptable level for the type of person her mother had wanted to save.

Well, she’d begin with that one- except she’d commit herself to the Advanced Level, of course – and then she’d busy herself with all the other torturous rituals outlined in the books here. Whenever she wasn’t taking channeling clients, Maya amassed her schedule with constant training ordeals.

These past nine months were starting to take their toll on her, mentally and emotionally, but still, she pressed onward with little thought to her diminishing physical state as well.

She’d stacked her schedule with tasks at odd hours to distract herself from the reality she couldn’t sleep, was gripped with insomnia, and was fraught with repeating nightmares fracturing when she did doze off. It gave the illusion of control that she took several short naps of an hour or two by choice to balance out the lack of sleep she got at night.  

“All Masters must be able to endure such rites and I have not seen much evidence of your training.”

 Mildred’s obnoxious taunt from the other day came floating back to her mind now.

Her new title of Kurain Master immediately brought a succession of high-profile clients – government officials, international diplomats, celebrities… and in her first critical job she had almost failed, her powers seemingly too inferior to capture the required spirit. Maya had been beyond mortified and didn’t know what had been the worse to endure – the knowing smirk on Mildred’s smug face, or the one of saddened dismay on Pearl’s.

She was the Master, Goddammit! She could do this! All it required was just a little more intense training and just a little more time.

So train she did. Rigorous, grueling, punishing training, which would have brought even the mightiest men to their knees nine days in. She would prevail – even if it killed her!

Maya Fey
Hazakura Temple, Sacred Cavern
September 5, 2020, 6:30 AM 

Maya was barely mindful of the howling winds that rustled Dusky Bridge as she crossed it en route to the inner temple and the gate leading back to the garden. She smiled wanly at the jovial Sister Bikini as she greeted her at the temple doors, then followed the tiny, hunched-over shrine maiden to the Sacred Cavern. Maya took a deep breath to calm her nerves and moved further down into the belly of the mountain. This would be the final step of her Master’s training. If she could endure this after all the rituals she’d gone through for the past year before, she was golden.

All of Maya’s excess training produced positive feedback of heightened spiritual power for some time, but then the results plateaued, and, by the time she was reaching the last book and planning to repeat the first, her powers appeared to be dwindling. Repeating the exercises seemed more difficult than they had the first time around. She was clearly too feeble and pathetic, she castigated herself. Somehow, she had to increase her inner strength and mental toughness and stop acting like a wimp. Most likely, Pearl had mastered all these by the time she had learned to walk.

Preceding the final Special Course, her training had consisted of torturous meditations lasting for 4 days, continuous spiritual fasts lasting 5 days at a time, endless freezing in ice and water, flagellation under spiritual stones, power-honing exercises which only ended when the medium collapsed… Kurain was filled with desolate mountains, secluded dingy caves, freezing waterfalls, and jagged boulders, and Maya frequented them all, far more than she did Fey Manor.

She fasted so often that she ceased to even notice when she was hungry, and frequently simply forgot to eat even when she was not engaged in training. Somehow, despite losing over ten pounds off her already tiny frame, Maya had managed to persevere for nearly a year. She also booked herself into constant repeats of the Ultra Course at Hazakurain – preludes to prepare her for the final Special Course – to the point where even Bikini was confused and hesitant. However, it was excellent for business, and she didn’t like to question the Master, even though apprehension was etched on the elderly, rotund nun’s kindly visage when she saw how drained and gaunt the Master’s formerly glowing, youthful face now was.

“So this is it?” Maya forced a smile at Sister Bikini as she grabbed a burlap sack to sit on under the waterfall. “The end of the line?”

“The final frontier!” The rotund woman gave one of her loud, booming laughs, even though there was no humorous tone to the conversation – the psychic surmised it was how the petite nun kept herself warm in these frosty mountains. “If you can get through this one, Master Maya, you can get through anything! Ho, ho, ho!”

“Yeah, finally, I get to complete what I came here for the first time.”

It only took me a year and a half to do this damn course! I would have done it sooner, but things kept getting in the way. Witnessing harrowing homicides, nearly being murdered…being possessed by the demonic, homicidal ex-girlfriend of my current boyfriend who was the one who tried to kill me in the first place…

A huge cube of ice with a magatama etched in the side slipped out and icy mists billowed off it. With a gentle push, the Kurain head slid it under the waterfall, shivering at the sight of the pounding waters under which she would be spending hours beneath.

Sister Bikini gave the room one final cursory inspection, ensuring all the holy artifacts were in place. Satisfied that everything required for the sacred ritual was present and accounted for, she bowed and made her way out of the room.

“Free your mind of all worries, Master Maya. I’ll be watching over you the whole time and will be in with hot tea the minute you’ve finished your incantations! All 100,000 of them! Ho, ho, ho!”

She smiled faintly and thanked the nun, then turned to face her frigid seat. She took in a deep breath and tried concentrating on the words to her mantras. Squeezing her eyes shut, she took a deep breath and ducked under the freezing waters. She hissed, barely able to keep from crying out. Her first few minutes were spent shivering and taking shallow, stilted breaths through clenched teeth. No matter how many waterfalls she sat beneath, starting was always the worst part. Finally, blissful numbness set in, and she commenced her chanting. Her long, sleek hair was soaked and stuck to her. Her extremities were anesthetized and she could not even feel her face. 

However, her mind was the one thing that could not become frozen or devoid of thought or sensation. All she could do was think while the icy water crashed down over her.

Think and remember.

She mentally replayed the final words of her last conversation with her other half. How she’d asked him to come and visit there, since he refused to let her come down, but he’d muttered something about letting the other Kurain officials cool down for a while over him, that it hadn’t even been a year since the ban on him had sprung. She didn’t argue with him. They both knew it was an empty proposal. Of course, the diviner wanted Phoenix to live with her… but the open hostility of some of the Kurain power-brokers would make life unpleasant for both of them, and there was nothing for him or Trucy in Kurain.

Hell, Maya wished she could escape herself, and she was the Master of the place!

“Promise me you’ll let me know when I can come and visit, Nick.” It was a plea, not merely an offer.

“I will, my love…as soon as I know it’s safe…” Phoenix trailed off, unsure of what else to say. “I’ll call you tomorrow. Goodnight, Maya. I love you.”

“I love you back,” she whispered. After hanging up the phone, she remained sitting there, staring at her cell, her mind whirling.

He’s going to keep on investigating this Gavin character, not even caring about the potential danger that might be involved. The idea of anything happening to Phoenix made her stomach churn. I should be going with him. If only I went with him.

But she was out of excuses to stay out of Kurain. The excuse of ‘General Manager of ex Fey and Co.’ was no longer applicable, either to the Elders or to Nick.

No, I can’t forget tomorrow. When I think of all my sorrow. When I had you there, but then I let you go.

It was upsetting to learn that even as a grown adult you had zero – maybe less – freedoms and control over your own life, with all those ‘duties’ and ‘responsibilities’ thrust on you, than you did when you were younger. She had less autonomy over her own life now as a grown woman than she’d had as a teenager! And worse, as Master, it was difficult to validate coherent reasoning for long-term absence from Kurain, without her former excuse of that pre-existing legal position. It was futile. Wright and Co. Law Offices was over. Maya could sense by the dead look in Nick’s eyes that it would be a long time, probably an eternity before it reopened. Something had broken in him, she could tell. Those sad eyes. And why wasn’t she still with him, to try to make things better when he needed her most? Because she was out of justification. 

And now it’s only fair that I should let you know. What you should know.

And whatever his reasons were, Mildred was right about one thing. Phoenix hadn’t exactly been knocking himself out coming up with plausible pretexts to see her, either. Maybe being apart wasn’t as gut-wrenching for him as it was for her. Maybe a part of him wasn’t dead inside because she wasn’t there to fill the void. 

I can’t live. If living is without you.

Maya set herself to a Master-level spiritual training ordeal, willing the flagellation of the waterfall’s icy daggers to numb her into oblivion.

Sister Bikini
Hazakura Temple, Sacred Cavern
September 5, 2020, 8:30 AM 

Sometime later, Sister Bikini, who had become accustomed to the familiar ritual, cheerfully returned to check on her customer.

“Ho, ho, I trust you completed all 100, 000 incantations, Master Maya?” The nun questioned cheerfully as she unlocked the physical Psyche-Lock on the cavern of the Ultra Course.

Sister Bikini peered in, letting her eyes adjust to the frosty mist. She was shocked to see the form of Maya Fey lying face-down in the pool of freezing melted spiritual ice. It wouldn’t have been the first time the good sister had seen someone fall into deep slumber under the numbing effect of the waterfall, although the Master was usually much more energized and renewed afterward, never sleepy. She wondered if the spirit medium had managed to finish her chanting.

“Are we taking a little nap? Ho, ho, ho!” Laughed the sunny nun. “Oh well, you’ve completed this so many times at 30,000 chants before and you looked completely ragged, so I guess you would be exhausted. Don’t worry Sleeping Beauty, this will be our little secret just this once, ho, ho, ho!”

The younger woman didn’t reply. Sister Bikini strode closer.

“Master Maya?” She gently nudged Maya with her foot. Something in the unnatural flopping motion of Maya’s body alerted her attention. She rolled Maya over and gasped.

The Master was immensely pale, and parts of her had taken on a blueish tinge. She was devoid of the rise and fall of breathing, or any breathing motion at all.

Sister Bikini felt a rising panic coursing through her veins.

“Master Maya!” She cried. In desperation, she flung her ear to Maya’s chest, detecting a heartbeat so shallow and erratic that she feared it only existed in her imagination.

Thankfully the nun had been trained in CPR, which she was forced to perform for the entirety of the duration until the ambulance arrived. How she wished Iris was still here to help at times like these! Maya’s condition seemed acutely injurious. She could only pray all those machines could effectively revive her.

Only when Maya had been safely loaded into the ambulance, did Sister Bikini, with trembling fingers, begin to dial the number for Mystic Pearl in Kurain Village.

Mariah Carey – Without You