Opalina (prime)/The Question That Should Never Have Been Asked
The Question that Should Never Have Been Asked
Title: The Question that Should Never Have Been Asked
Author: Opalina Jalcon
From the journals of Opalina Jalcon- 2002
There are moments when the world changes not because of a battle, nor because of some ancient spell loosed into the sky, but because someone asks the right question.
I never meant to.
Thurfel stood before me with all the confidence of one who believed he understood the game. Nine vessels remained, he had said. Nine relics to find. Nine pieces to keep from the Council's grasp.
Yet something tugged at me.
"Why nine?" I whispered. "There are ten."
His answer came so simply.
"Mine is the tenth."
The words settled uneasily inside me.
If he possessed one... why?
I pressed further, each question born from the last, as though someone else were laying stepping stones before my feet.
"Why would you need a vessel?"
"We all need vessels."
All.
Not just the Nine.
Not just the Council.
Everyone.
For a heartbeat I forgot to breathe.
I had believed the vessels were creations of the Council—tools, prisons, weapons forged for the liches. But Thurfel only shook his head, as though I were the child and he the patient teacher.
Then another thought surfaced.
"Then... I have one?"
He nodded.
The realization chilled me more than any winter wind.
If everyone possessed a vessel, then how could anyone know they had found the vessel of one of the Nine? How many forgotten souls might lie hidden in the world, their vessels mistaken for something far more important?
I voiced the thought aloud.
I watched Thurfel's expression change.
First confusion.
Then surprise.
Then horror.
"My goodness..."
He frowned deeply, speaking more to himself than to me.
"I hadn't even thought of that."
The great Thurfel.
The man who carried centuries of knowledge.
Stopped in his tracks by a question from me.
He thanked me.
Actually thanked me.
Then I asked the question that frightened even me.
"What if the Council gets one of our vessels?"
"You're doomed."
He answered without hesitation.
Yet before I could dwell on those words, he corrected something deeper.
"Nay, we are far from doomed yet."
With that, flames erupted from his scepter, engulfing the air around him before he vanished in a rush of fire, already racing to warn the sages.
And suddenly I was left standing amid a circle of confused faces.
Everyone wanted answers.
I had none.
I repeated only what I had learned.
"The vessels... they aren't something the Council created."
The room erupted into disbelief.
Questions flew from every direction.
Who made them?
Were they born with us?
Were they only for liches?
Were they our souls?
I could only answer honestly.
"I don't know."
I only knew what Thurfel had told me.
That everyone had one.
Living.
Undead.
Every soul beneath the sky.
No one believed me.
Iscikella insisted our souls lived safely within us, tapping first her chest, then her temple, as though certainty could be found beneath flesh and bone. Others argued that souls could not be carried, could not be placed inside a container.
Perhaps they were right.
Perhaps Thurfel was wrong.
Or perhaps we were all trying to describe something far older than language itself.
Eventually the debate dissolved into laughter, jests, and sideways glances. Someone questioned whether I was speaking for myself or for the thing inside me.
I smiled.
"It's me."
At least...
I hoped it was.
As I walked away, their voices faded behind me.
But one thought refused to leave.
If every person carries a vessel somewhere in this world...
Who is searching for mine?