Power doesn't arrive like a lightning bolt; it's a slow, agonizing erosion. They say that to grow strong, one must first endure. And I have become an expert in endurance.
Every day follows a jagged, gray rhythm. Wake up. Forced breakfast. Observation. Experiments. Faint. Wake again. Lunch. I watch him through half-lidded eyes as he stirs his cauldrons and scribbles his frantic, jagged notes. Faint. Wake. Dinner. Bed. The routine is a grindstone, threatening to turn my mind to dust. Some days, madness whispers from the corners of the room, promising that there is no exit. Other days, the man vanishes entirely, leaving me alone with the cloying scent of dried herbs and the soft, rhythmic bubbling of the pots. In the silence, I trace his notes.
It isn't meaningless. I am a vulture, picking through the carcass of his obsession for knowledge. I study every careful rotation of the glass rod, every guttural incantation, every precise arrangement of root and bone. His madness has become my curriculum. At first, the symbols were gibberish, but slowly, the patterns emerged. It's like trying to learn calculus while someone is screaming the alphabet in your ear, but I persist. Every spare second is a lesson. Each hiss from the cauldron, each shift in the potion's hue—I memorize it all.
The pain is a constant companion, but I've learned to sit with it. I don't enjoy it, but I no longer fear it. My body has adapted. My mind has gone cold and detached, a silver shield against the jolts and burns. Fear and joy have both become distant echoes, replaced by a heavy, predatory calm.
My reflection is a stranger's face. My nails have lengthened into sharp, obsidian points. My hair is a spill of black silk that shimmers even in the pitch-dark. My skin is luminous, almost translucent. And my eyes… they are the ultimate betrayal of my humanity. One is molten gold, the other a dead, blinding white. He mutters about "side effects" and laughs at the glow they cast in the dark, his obsession deepening with every mutation.
Two years have vanished into the steam of the cauldrons. I am seven now. Small, yes, but I carry a weight that wasn't there before. Magic doesn't just flow through me; it is me.
Today, he brought a meal that was far too luxurious for a dungeon in Knockturn Alley. He hummed as he worked, distracted by a new concoction. When he forced the vial between my teeth, I expected the usual fire. Instead, I felt an awakening. A strange warmth flooded my marrow. Pain flared along my shoulder blades, but it wasn't the searing agony of a burn—it was the pressure of something breaking through.
Black wings, powerful and vast, unfurled behind me. Feathers as dark as a starless night stretched wide, catching the dim candlelight. I felt every pulse of air, every surge of energy in my new muscles. I wasn't just a boy anymore.
The man gasped, a terrifying cocktail of awe and greed in his eyes. He reached for me, but I flapped instinctively. The force of it sent me gliding backward, my movements sharp and precise. The room felt electric. The cauldrons hissed in sympathy.
Then, he did something I didn't expect. He grabbed his own vial and drained it.
I watched in cold horror as the potion warped him. He didn't become a creature of grace; he became a monster of the pits. His nails elongated into jagged claws; his skin turned a sickly, gaunt gray. Leathery, bat-like wings tore through his robes, and fangs dripped with a pale, viscous venom. His hair fell out in clumps, leaving a hollowed, skeletal face.
"I HAVE TRANSCENDED!" he shrieked, his voice a distorted rasp. "I HAVE BECOME A GOD!"
The arrogance of it sparked a sudden, sharp irritation in my chest. I saw the knife he used for slicing phosphorous beans glinting on the table. He lunged, his black talons tearing through my shirt and dragging lines of red across my chest.
I didn't scream. I moved.
My hand closed around the hilt of the knife just as he swung again. He leaned in, his venomous fangs bared to finish me, but my blade met him first. I drove the steel into his stomach—it felt like stabbing iron, but the knife found purchase. He gasped, his eyes wide with a very human shock.
I pulled the knife out and drove it back in, over and over, aiming high and striking with a rhythmic, cold precision until his monstrous body slumped to the floorboards.
Silence returned to the room, broken only by the settling of dust. I closed my eyes, feeling the weight of my wings and the thrum of the power in my veins. The transition was complete. The lab, the potions, the pain—they belonged to the dead man.
The power, however, was mine. My mind was clear. My body was finally my own.