Vallen: The Marking (Vallen series #1)

Chapter 20

What had started as one of my two favourite classes to attend had quickly became the most stressful one. I used to love going to Gift Search. Even if I didn't find my gift I would still get an hour of hanging out with Eldon, who much like his brother, always managed to cheer me up. I hadn't even thought about our visit to the wonderful town with the horrible family anymore. Nor did the underground room pop up in my head. All I could wonder was: what is my gift?

February brought nothing but rain and coldness to the castle. With the rain hitting against the old castle walls we made our way to Gift Search. The room had started to seriously thin out over the last few weeks. Just a few days ago we found out that four of our classmates all had the same gift. If that wasn't bad enough we had reached the end of level five, with still no sign of any gift for me.

I had started to lose faith in my Vallen gene. What if I didn't have a gift? The only reason why everyone in my class had gotten over my human upbringing was because my gift seemed to be a high one. Or what if Eldon and I messed up one of the tests and I actually had a level one gift? 

I had learned enough to know that I would never get a good job, or be able to fall in love with whoever I want. No family would want me to join theirs with a low or non-existent gift and a bad family name. Falling in love with a human also wasn't a good option, they would hate me just for being a Vallen. Plus I heard that Vallen/human hybrid babies didn't live very long. It was probably just a rumour, but it did shatter my dream of just going back to the human world if I mess up badly in the Vallen one.

There were six people left in our Gift Search class. The rest of them all went to Gift Enhancement, which was a little bit down the hall. Alaric and I hadn't even seen that classroom yet. Though most of the people in our remaining class were very excited to still not know what their gift was, I could tell that Alaric was worried too. He never told me why though.

"Welcome." Professor Wolfe said as we all sat down. Today the tables were placed in one line, with a chair on either side. I saw that Eldon was already sitting on one side, so I sat across from him. "Today will be the last day that we will be identifying level five gifts." Eldon gave me an encouraging smile, I didn't return it.

Eldon had become our third partner in crime. We had told him about the underground room and even went to show him. Before we got there though one of the teachers stopped us and asked us what we were doing. Seeing as neither of us could give a straight answer we were brought back downstairs and told to stay there. We didn't get in trouble luckily, but none of us thought it would be a good idea to try again that quickly.

The lesson continued as normal. We were told to do some sort of weird test that would show us if we had one particular gift. These kinds of tests could consist of anything. The level one gifts were easier to identify than the level five we were currently working on. Today's gift was Pain Extraction, the ability to take people's pain and harvest it as your own or give it through to others. The test was awful.

"Everyone be careful." Professor Wolfe reminded us. Eldon took the knife and easily cut into his own palm, like it was absolutely nothing. This was another thing that would never fly at a regular high school. I couldn't even imagine the outrage parents might be in if the teacher gave the students a knife and told them to cut themselves and make sure it bled and hurt. Blood immediately started coming out of the fresh wound.

"What am I supposed to do?" I asked, trying not to look directly at it. Blood had never been one of my favourite things in life. I could handle seeing the blood of strangers, but the moment it was of someone I knew I would get nauseous and dizzy. Once I fainted after Madelena had tried to pick up a piece of glass and cut herself.

"What feels natural." Eldon read out from the piece of paper that were our instructions. Right, what feels natural? My first step would be getting the bandage, but I am guessing that extracting pain doesn't actually stop the bleeding at all. It should just make the person feel numb.

"If you wait long enough the wound will just close on its own Eira." Eldon sighed, leaning back in his chair. Vallens did heal faster than humans, but the wound wouldn't just close within seconds. 

I put my shaking hands near the wound but made sure that I didn't touch it or the blood, and closed my eyes. That's what I saw on TV if someone healed another person. Granted that was in movies which of course never depicted Vallens but it is what felt the most natural.

Nothing happened. I tried focussing harder on the mental image of the pain going away but I could tell it wasn't working. Most of the gifts were just focusing really hard on something and waiting for it to happen, at least that's what I heard from the people that had already found it.

"Congratulations." I hear Professor Wolfe say. Did I do something? I opened my eyes and saw that it wasn't me he was talking to, it was the person next to me.

"Thank you." Alaric answered. He had not healed Nero's wound, nor could I see that he made any other difference when I looked at Nero, it was Alaric who looked odd. The veins in his arms were visible by dark red lines. He looked a little uncomfortable but smiled nonetheless. He had found his gift.

Professor Wolfe instructed Alaric how to deal with the pain he had harvested by releasing it on a small spider that had the bad luck of just passing by. The little guy didn't die from it, but he didn't look too pleased either. It hurried off to a nearby window, where it immediately fled the scene.

I thought pain extraction fit Alaric. Though he was tall and could look super intimidating I knew he was more of a gentle giant. He would never be happy with a fighting gift. Instead the only healing one there is was more up his alley. I doubt he would ever even unleash the pain he collected on someone else.