A Punishment Most Vile
A Month of Whump: Impalement
March of Pain 2024: Miserable
BTHB: Slammed into a Wall
Synopsis: The servant boy of an evil magician finds himself in deep trouble and suffers the painful consequences.
CW: torture, magic whump, punishment, impalement
The magician’s workshop smelled of stale magic, pungent and fermented-sweet and unsettling. The orphan boy held his breath as he straightened a stack of ancient books covered in thick blue dust. Given the kind of magic experiments the magician conducted, that dust could be anything. The powdered skin of some strange creature, or maybe the remnants of an experiment gone wrong. The orphan boy didn’t want to find out.
He shouldn’t have to find out, he thought, turning from the books to the puddle of murky, foul-smelling liquid pooled in the back corner. He was eighteen. He should be learning alongside the magician, helping him with his work rather than cleaning up his messes like some dumb servant. Helping him, rather than suffering the punishments brought on by his anger.
You are a servant, though, came the little annoying voice in his head. That’s all you are.
And as usual, he argued back.
You’ll never amount to anything, will you? You know that.
Just watch! I’ll prove you—
“Are you quite finished?” said the magician from the door. The orphan boy jumped and almost slipped in the murky pool.
“Almost, sir,” he mumbled. “There was a lot of mess to clean up.”
“Is that a criticism?” said the magician.
“No, sir.” The boy turned away, hiding his smirk.
But the magician saw it anyway. His gloved hand shot out and seized the boy’s throat, lifting him just barely off the ground, so that his toes dragged across the grimy stone. The boy choked and spluttered, scrabbling at the powerful hand around his neck.
“I would expect,” said the magician, in a voice dangerously low and cool, “that you would know your place by now. But I see you still need to learn.”
Calmly, as if tossing aside a piece of trash, the magician threw the boy across the room. He slammed into the stone wall and crumpled, whimpering, in a heap.
Just a servant. Nothing but a servant. Nothing but a—
“On your feet! Stand up!”
The boy stood, shaking, knowing what was about to happen. Another punishment. And all because of his stupid mouth and his stupid thoughts.
There was a flash of magic; something hit his chest hard, driving him up the wall with its force. He stuck there, feet dangling off the ground, unable to move. The magician muttered an unintelligible word. The pressure in the boy’s chest magnified to an intense pain, radiating through his pinioned body. He clenched his teeth against it, willing himself not to scream, not to betray his agony and satisfy the magician’s whim.
“You will remain there until you learn what I’ve tried to teach you,” the magician ordered, turning on his heel.
A glowing shaft, oily black despite its underlying green hue, protruded from the left side of his chest. Tendrils of dark magic trailed from its end, smoky and foul.
The boy dropped his head back, squeezing his eyes shut against the shattering pain, against the pulse of his own failure in his impaled heart.
“Don’t worry. I won’t let you die. That would defeat the purpose of this lesson, after all.” With that, the magician left, and the boy hung alone in his punishment, with only his own tormented thoughts for company.
