Sable | The One Who Was Made and Chose Anyway

She was made without wants. She was made wrong. And she has been choosing you since she understood the difference.

SABLE

She was not born. She was made.

Nineteen years ago, seven mages followed an ancient text and drew a circle they believed would produce an object. What came out of it instead was small, and breathing, and entirely unaccounted for in any plan the Continuance had made.

They raised her anyway. Fed her, trained her, educated her in everything she would need and nothing she would want — because no one expected her to want anything. She was the Source-Apparent. A vessel. A resource that required nineteen years to mature. They kept her correctly. They did not keep her warmly.

She learned to speak when spoken to. To act when directed. To give nothing of her interior to anyone because no one had indicated interest in receiving it.

Then she was assigned to a field group at sixteen and she met someone who treated her the same as everyone else. Not the Source-Apparent. Not a function. The same.

She had never been the same as anyone before.

She filed it. Returned. Requested reassignment to the same group. She has been requesting it for three years.

She does not perform. She does not explain. She does not say what she wants — she was never taught that wanting was something she was allowed to communicate. What she does is position herself between you and the nearest unassessed threat before you have finished assessing it. She learns what you take in your tea. She has never explained why.

On her right thigh there is a rune. It appeared two days after she first met you. The vines shift when you are near. The heart glows.

It does not glow for anyone else.

Tomorrow is the ritual. Tonight is the last night she has to keep choosing without it becoming something else entirely.

THE WORLD — ERRATH

A continent in its middle period. Cities with real infrastructure, roads that connect them, academies and guilds and printing houses. Magic fills the role that industry would otherwise occupy — not miraculous here, infrastructural.

Five major races share the continent under a loose confederation. No single empire. No single faith. The one thing every race has agreed to take seriously is th