The Dragon Games

Obsession

Before Regan knew anything else, she knew hunger. She saw it in the mirror, in the outline of her skeleton buldging through her too-tight skin. She felt it at night, dreaming of cakes, pies, and other goods she could not afford, then woke up to it in the morning, the sharp cramps twisting her stomach to ribbons. Having spent her childhood watching people wither away and waste, Regan thought she knew the worst of hunger. And yet, she had never known a hunger like her obsession to pass the DRA. An orphan from the back allies of the burrow getting the Divine was the fluke of the century. She planned to milk the fluke for everything it was worth.

To pass the DRA, you had to levitate The Complete History of Scaldril over your head. The book was thick as a brick and twice as heavy. She had enough Divine to fling the book across the room, but her control snapped whenever she tried to manipulate the book's direction for any sustained period of time. She was good at short bursts of energy, but the long form killed her. Getting the book an inch off the ground made her whole arm shake uncontrollably. As soon as it rose above her ankles, Regan lost control of her wrist. The bone snapped back with a pop, and the searing pain rocking up her arm was bad, but the sight of the book falling stung a thousand times worse.

Regan had to start small, levitating a sheet of paper over her head, and adding more sheets with each passing day. At first, the other orphans watched her practice, but as hours bled into days bled into weeks and months, they quickly lost interest. They liked the stories of knights flinging bandits across the room with a snap of their fingers. Regan's Divine wasn't half as powerful or glamorous. In fact, 'glamorous and powerful' were the last words they'd use to describe her Divine.

For one, Regan's Divine had no practical use, seeing that it took her ten times as much effort to use it, only to be ten times weaker than her normal strength. For another, using the Divine any longer than half an hour made Regan sick. But the problem was, The Complete History of Scaldril was nine hundred and twenty-seven pages, and the DRA could only be taken prior to one's tenth name day. If Regan wanted to pass, she needed to add at least three sheets per day, which she usually couldn't accomplish without practicing for at least three hours.

The first two were manageable. The last felt like she was poisoning herself. Her head started to pound, and her vision clouded over. Her stomach throbbed, and more often than not she'd win, keeping the food in her belly out of pure stubbornness. When she lost, she made sure to do it in secret. The other orphans wouldn't let her eat anymore, if they knew she was just going to yak it up at night, all for a few measly sheets of paper.

But there was no way they didn't know something was going on. Before long, her excessive use of Divine took a toll on her. Her skin turned pale and waxy, darkening in hollows under her eyes. Pounds fell off her that she couldn't afford to lose. She had to rearrange her hair to hide the clumps falling out. Whenever she used the Divine, black flooded into her eyes. It was supposed to clear after she stopped using the Divine, but after each session, the black took longer to fade. The orphans too young to understand the Divine began hiding when she approached. They thought she was possessed by a demon. Even the older children who used to steal off Regan's plate began to fear her.

Regan was sitting on the porch, levitating a ream of paper when Angelo and three of his friends approached her. His glasses glinted against the sun as he squinted down at her.

"I have a job for you," he said.

"I already finished my chores," Regan mumbled, keeping her eyes on the ream. It crawled higher, inch by inch. These days, it was all she did. She didn't spend time with Iris anymore or go outside or play games. Her world had shrunk, narrowing down to the Divine, the mystery of her parents, and The Complete History of Scaldril. She spent every day all day staring at it and had yet to read a single word.