Black Heart Chapter One

Sophie's little journal was about half writing practice and actual journal entries and about half prophecy that had been written just speculatively and vaguely enough to come off as idle musing about the future.

Or, and much more frequently, as unclear rambling, with tidbit lines like 'Rmndr for dung grndg. Bk out & rdo frm strt for LV gains bfor BOSS' fitted in between a dozen repeated practice lines of writing difficult words to memorize the spelling and a drawing of a happy fluffy cloud in the sky.

It was strange, looking at such light and whimsical sketches, to recall that the person who had drawn them had chosen to attempt murder for their long term ambitions. Malicia wasn't sure when that would stop stinging, or if she really wanted it to. She had always seemed like a sweet and innocent girl, the sort that made people want to gravitate toward her like the sun, to bask in the warmth of her personality. The cutting calculation and choice to not even try to look for a better alternative to the future she might have seen than to kill Malicia first was in many ways jarring.

Thankfully, there didn't seem to be anything written down in Sophie's journal that would implicate either herself or Malicia of the intent to commit a crime. If there were, Malicia would have had no choice but to get rid of it. To burn the whole thing, not just torn-out pages that would draw attention from anyone who leafed through the journal to the fact that they were missing.

It wasn't evidence of anything, though, which was fortunate as it meant that Malicia could take her time pondering the occasional grains of knowledge that... if she were to speak frankly, that there was no way that Sophie could have known to write down without some kind of vision of the future backing. If it was at all true, the bits and pieces that Malicia had been able to glean from it wove a compelling story.

Sophie was, at the very least, convinced enough that Malicia was going to be adopted by the nobility that she was willing to jot down loose plans for the future around it. Not featuring Malicia by name, of course... these plans all revolved around Sophie herself as the one who was taken in. The context of her intentions was quite clear to Malicia, who was the only person who knew that her oldest and best friend among the others had brought a knife out into the woods to try and make sure of things. She had needed to take an extended break from reading the journal in order to calm herself down once the realization set in of just how long Sophie had been convinced of how things would have to be. That, if not from the very beginning, Sophie had already decided early on into their friendship that only one of the two of them would be able to survive it.

It was very emotionally draining, knowing that. She wasn't sure if it was better or worse that a fair few of the lines of maybe-prophetic conjecture revolved around Malicia. Like Sophie either had had trouble deciding that the murder really needed to happen, or she just thought it would seem suspicious if someone got into her private journal and noticed that she hadn't written down anything at all about her dearest friend's potential future.

Setting aside her personal turmoil... the Future Malicia seemed to be heavily invested into changing her class to something more traditionally priestly and from there advancing it to 'Saint'.

And Malicia had no idea why she would fixate on something like that.

... Well, maybe she had some idea. The 'Saint' class was one of those that were broadly respected and had some political pull in its own right, out of respect for the hard work and personal fortitude required to rise up the ranks to it. It it was possible to reach that goal, there would be a number of benefits no matter what else someone put their life to doing.

Malicia just didn't really believe it was a feasible goal, given... Even the initial class change would be ruinously expensive, after all. If she actually went through with it, though? Her Status wasn't a match for the Classes. The options which were known to be able to progress into Sainthood were magic-heavy, after all, and the ones that relied on physical capability in any particular way... didn't advance to Saint.

Without any further context to explain things, it felt as though this theoretical future-Malicia was obsessing over something she couldn't have, to the point of ruining herself with the attempt to grasp at it regardless.

... or perhaps this was one of those hints at the future that used Malicia's name, but were actually one of Sophie's long-term goals? Embarrassing as Sophie's Class might have been to admit to, once they started to understand what it was, her Status had been more in line with a long-term plot such as that.

The honest truth of it was that most of the potential hints at a future that might be in the works were the unclear sort of comments that might only make sense to Malicia if she had an epiphany or something happened that lined up more or less with what was written down. If it ever made sense at all. Some of it was... just clearly missing critical information that Sophie never actually wrote down. References meant to trigger the recall of memories that were only in Sophie's head, and which could well wind up being nonsense for Malicia forever.

At times, it was difficult to believe in any of the lines at all. It seemed easier to think that Sophie might have just gone insane.

That was, after all, one of the reasons that orphans were seldom adopted. The potential for an ancient heritage to crop up unexpectedly in a child of uncertain lineage, where they still looked the same as any other human child... Sometimes that was a good thing. Much more often, it was not. It wasn't uncommon for inhuman impulses and instincts to rise up in such unfortunates, and the general mental stability was... often questionable. Usually not dangerous... but there were no guarantees. Overall, it was more common for the children that physically showed obvious quirks of their ancestry to be adopted into a family. At least then the parents had a decent idea of what they were getting themselves into.

Not that it was common either way. Most successful adoptions happened before an infant was old enough to stand up and walk around on their own, after all. After that, it was far more likely that visitors to an orphanage were looking for small employees with nimble hands than a child to raise.

Still.

It acted as a benchmark to see how much of Sophie's notes could be trusted and relied upon. So far, all that Malicia had to work with was a confusing confession and a murder attempt, after all. It would be easier to put stock in some of the things that had been written if Malicia had even a little bit of actual confirmation on it!

And eventually, after first months and then years passed, after she had halfway forgotten to keep an eye out for even the possibility of it happening, that confirmation came.

Malicia didn't really believe it was time as the nondescript brown-haired butler entered the orphanage. It wasn't unknown to choose maids and serving staff from the unfortunate. It had happened at multiple points during her time at the orphanage and it was likely to happen multiple more before she reached an age where she would start being encouraged to find ways to support herself and move along.

They weren't asked to line up, like what usually happened when someone came looking for trainee staff, gauging who they would pick by body language or... hair color, or who looked most like they would fit the old uniforms that they already had with the least re-stitching, or whatever inscrutable selection criteria the go-between happened to be working off of. Instead, the man didn't spare them a glance initially and moved instead to the caregivers.

A few minutes passed before she was singled out and brought in front of him.

"This is Malicia." the doughy cook said, as the butler examined a sheet of paper that had her Status and details written down on it. "She's recently twelve years old. Born a Monk."

"Hm. Not ideal, but adequate." the butler replied, joining the woman in not addressing Malicia directly at all. "Is she more or less intelligent than the average, would you say?"

"Oh, she's quite clever. Used to learn how to do her chores faster than we could explain them, I'll have you know." the cook declares, talking Malicia up like a goat at the livestock market. "Reads and writes better than some men grown, to boot."

"I'm sure." the butler replies, tone incredibly dubious. "Well. There will be four years before she has to make any public appearances. That will surely be enough time to make certain that she will not make a complete laughingstock of the family name, one supposes. Girl, you will be coming with me. My employers are in need of a child with qualities that you just so happen to match. Collect whatever personal items you may possess and bid the other urchins farewell."

This was not a request, and Malicia's opinion on the matter was not being asked. How an orphan felt about being adopted was never a question that anyone asked, they were merely expected to be grateful.

All the same, Malicia's mind felt like it was struggling to catch up with the situation as the obligatory hugs and well wishes between orphans were made, and she made the traditional promise to keep an eye out for anyone who came after her... nonsense, of course, and everyone knew it. Even on those rare occasions where someone was adopted into money, the odds were drastically against them having any say in hiring policy until well after all the rest of their orphan peers had also moved on to their own lives, or died.

Nobody really expected Malicia to so much as remember their names a few years from now, but it was the expected thing to say and the spirit of the thing, with the resentment of wondering just what stroke of luck that one orphan had that others didn't washed away with an empty promise of at some point sharing the wealth.

Her head didn't catch up with her body until some hours down the line.

Oh.

So this was really happening.