by Adam Witcher
We frantically looked from orb to orb, but it was too difficult to make out what was happening in each memory. I could occasionally make out the man’s face, or some object or landscape, but that was all. Lily and Camilla had the same issue.
The pale pink mass slowly grew a hooked nose, sunken eyes, and a pointed chin. Neptos’ bald head looked utterly terrifying as it hovered in the swirling purple dimension. When he saw what we were doing, fury washed over his face.
“You stay out of there you sniveling buffoons!” His head leaned forward and he charged toward us. His mouth gaped open as if he meant to swallow us whole. On the periphery of my vision, I noticed a young face in one of the smaller orbs that matched the features of the moon man that charged us. The bastard’s childhood memories. It seemed like as good a place to start as any.
“In here!” I yelled. The girls didn’t question it. Anywhere was better than getting caught in the giant jaws of decapitated Neptos. They swam toward me, we reached inside the orb, and…
...we were suddenly in the living room of an elegant house. Two unreasonably large brocade sofas sat across from each other. A younger looking Neptos sat on one, his feet dangling off the side. On the other, a woman in her twenties watched him. Her eyes were charcoal, and her long black hair was tied back from her face. Her features matched the severity of her son’s.
“Your father is going to be gone for a while. Do you understand that?”
Young Nephrum nodded his head.
“And do you know why?”
“Because somebody had a big mouth.” The boy mumbled and stared at his lap.
Her expression was callous. “There’s one thing that you should learn from this, Nephrum. Do you know what it is?”
“No.” The boy sniffled.
“If you want to succeed in a world like this, you have to be willing to do things that others may not agree with. You must be willing to look out for your own good. Anyone can betray you, so you have to be careful about who you trust. Your father did and look where it got him. Now it’s just you and me. Come, son.”
The woman stuck her hand out for the child. He grabbed it, and she led him through the room and opened a closet door. She stopped for a moment and got down on one knee.
“I’m going to show you something Nephrum,” she said, tenderly putting a hand on his shoulder. “Something I didn’t want to show you until you were much older. But it can’t wait anymore.”
She led him into the closet and unlatched something from the back wall. A door was revealed, and she took him through it. The three of us followed.
The hidden room was so large that I wondered how nobody could have noticed the missing space. I was sure when we looked inside that this was only Neptos’ flawed memory, not reality. The room was full of machinery that seemed to have no purpose. Exposed gears and metal stuck out from the devices at strange angles. Pipes pumped out steam from seemingly nowhere. Everything was shiny and novel, but nothing seemed to tie it all together. The machines beeped and flashed, ground nothing and spun conveyor belts in endless loops.
“Alastair!” The woman called out into the room.
A diminutive man stuck his head up from the sea of machines. He was mop-haired and clean shaven, but a layer of dark grease on his face gave him the appearance of a beard. He walked over to the woman and boy, a forlorn expression on his face.
“Here already, eh kid?” The man patted Nephrum on the shoulder. “Welcome to the family business. Your father was a genius with this stuff. I bet you will be, too.”
Little Nephrum just stared at the man.
“Mom,” he tugged at her dress. “But you said I wasn’t supposed to trust anybody.”
“This is your Uncle Alastair, Nephrum. He’s family. You can trust family. But nobody else. Alastair has been in business with your father for a long time. It’s easier to trust someone when you have the same things at stake. He’s going to teach you what you need to know. Do you understand?” The little boy nodded his head, but it was pretty obvious that he didn’t.
There was a crashing sound from behind us and the scene began to fade. It seemed that Neptos was gaining a better sense of self here in his own memories. No longer a floating head, he walked toward us as if still on the floor of that giant room even when it disappeared and returned to the deep purple space. His limbs were still a little out of proportion, but whatever he was doing was working. He raised a hand toward me, and I mimed swimming away to dodge a blow. I wondered for a moment if this was my real physical body. Would a blow from Neptos’ powerful magic kill me the same as it would in the real world? I hoped to not find out.
“Another one!” Lily called out. By the time I looked over she was already gone with Camilla in tow. There was no way to fight him in this strange ether. No creatures to raise. I wondered for a moment if I’d made a mistake in coming here, but there was no time for self-doubt. I followed them.
“Can’t you understand that I just want to get close to you? That I just want to know you. The real you.”
The three of us now stood in a living room decorated like something out of Lone Meadow. Multi-colored tapestries and strange foreign artworks adorned the walls. Two people sat on a long carpet on the floor beneath us. Nephrum was older here, perhaps in his mid-twenties. A thin, sunkissed girl sat across from him. She wore a flowing floral dress, and her golden hair was piled in a bun with a few silky tresses cascading around her face. She was very beautiful. Her hand was on his shoulder, and he looked at the floor.
“We aren’t close already?” Nephrum grabbed her hand and held it, but he didn’t meet her eyes. “We’ve known each other for almost a year, Natasha. We’ve studied together, taken long walks, made love…”
“There’s just this… wall between us,” she said. “And I don’t think it’s just me. It’s anyone. Look, I don’t even know what you do for a living. I don’t know a thing about your family. These are important parts of your life. If we’re going to be together, I want you to be able to share that with me.”
Nephrum thought about that for a moment.
“Look,” Nephrum finally responded to Natasha. “What I do for a living, and who my family is, is not important. Some things are relevant to our relationship. What we’re doing. How we feel about each other. Other things are separate. There’s no benefit, no reason for you to know. And you wouldn’t want me to mix my work life with our relationship, would you? That would just make me resentful. You wouldn’t want me to resent you, right?”
“Okay,” I said to the girls while Natasha furrowed her brow in confusion and frustration. “I was feeling sorry for this guy for a minute, but he’s a real piece of shit.”
They both nodded and winced at the scene before us. Natasha stood up. She pulled her hand away from Nephrum when he tried to grab it.
“You’re a manipulative bastard, Nephrum.” She pointed at the door. “Get out! I don’t want to see you again.”
Surprisingly, Nephrum didn’t seem to have a response. He left looking shaken. The room began to fade. More orbs came into view.
“I really like her,” Camilla said. “I hope she ended up happy with, well, with anyone who’s not an evil mastermind.”
This time we could not see the sorcerer, but his booming voice rang out through the expanse.
“Get out of here, damn you!” He screeched. “How are you doing this? Where are you?”
“So, we may not be able to fight him in here,” I said as we floated. “But it seems like we have him stumped. And I’m not going to lie, I’m getting pretty invested here. Let’s at least do one more before we find our way out.”
“Hey,” Camilla said, pointing at another orb. “It’s Natasha again.”
We dove in. In the distance, Neptos shouted in anguish.
It was late at night, and Nephrum stood in the street outside a brick house, staring up at its only lit window. In the lamplight, two silhouettes intertwined in lustful passion. Nephrum clutched a bouquet of flowers and shook with ra
ge, bordering on madness.
“Oh shit,” I said. “This isn’t going to go well.”
“Natasha,” Camilla shouted, “watch out!”
Lily and I looked at her as if to say, really?
“Worth a try.” She shrugged.
Nephrum dropped the flowers. He knelt, felt around on the ground for a moment, then picked up a rock. He threw it hard at the window. It broke, sending shattered glass spraying into the room. There was a loud shriek followed by a deep grunt.
“Who’s out there?” A guttural man’s voice called out from the house as he appeared in the broken window. He was older than Nephrum, but handsome. Most of his body wasn’t visible, but his arms and chest looked muscular.
“Who the fuck are you?” He shouted down.
“Me?” Nephrum yelled back. His palms began to glow faintly. “Who the fuck are you? Where’s Natasha?”
Natasha came to the window wrapped in a bedsheet. There were tears in her eyes.
“Nephrum,” she said. “What are you doing here?” She looked terrified of the answer.
“I’m here…” Suddenly Nephrum seemed to lose his confidence a little. He struggled to regain it. “Because I want you back. We should be together.” The words came out awkward and monotone. More than anything, he seemed confused.
“No— no, Nephrum.” She faltered, then made her voice stern. “You need to leave. Never speak to me again.”
Nephrum seemed not to hear her. “Why did you betray me?” he yelled.
“I didn’t!” She threw a hand up. “This is what I could never get through to you. I was always honest. Always. It was you!”
“Who is he?” He said, his voice light.
“I’m Kyro,” the man said. “And I’m the guy who is about to beat your ass if you don’t scram.”
“Do it.” Nephrum’s confidence returned. “I’m not leaving, so you’ll have to come down here.”
“Fuck it,” the man growled and turned to take the stairs. He emerged from the house wearing only pants and the face of a killer. Nephrum’s palms glowed.
“Kyro, no!” Natasha yelled. Kyro leaped at Nephrum, his fist extended. Nephrum took a step back, but the man’s fist was too fast. It connected with his jaw and sent him sprawling. Suddenly his palms were a blinding shade of purple. Kyro stepped back.
“Now listen man,” Kyro said, “I’m sorry I had to do that, but you…”
Nephrum cut him off with a bolt of lightning. Kyro flew backward and smashed into the brick wall. Natasha screamed. The body looked limp and lifeless.
As Neptos turned to run, we were thrust backward out of the orb, tumbling over ourselves in the ether with enough force to shove us into the next closest orb.
We were in the same living area where Nephrum’s mother had given him the lesson on trust. They even sat on the same couches, though Nephrum was at least fifteen years older. Presumably, his mother was too, but she had aged gracefully. Even before they spoke, the tension was apparent.
“Mother, I…”
“Stop it.” She cut him off immediately. “First of all, we will get through this. Your father made connections with the constable years ago, and fortunately for you, I had a favor to call in. But this is a big favor.”
She took a deep breath and then sighed.
“You know that our family has had to end lives before. But you understand why this is different, don’t you?”
Nephrum nodded.
“This isn’t just going to magically disappear,” she said. “I don’t know what you’re going to have to do, but you left a man dead in the street. With witnesses. This is bad. You might have to…”
“I can leave,” Nephrum cut her off this time. “I’ll disappear. Then the problem will go away. You can say you have no idea where I went. And it’ll be true.”
This was the first time we had seen a hint of softness in the woman’s face. “You have a life here. A family here. You have a business to run. You’re my only child.”
“It’s what I need to do,” he said. Tears gathered in his eyes. “I killed somebody, mom.”
“Nephrum, please.” She tried to make her voice sound feeble. “I’m an old woman. I spent my whole life raising you, and now I need you here. Your father, gods rest his soul, he needs you, too.”
Nephrum stood up and took several steps away from his mother.
“Okay,” he said. “I’ll stay.”
“Thank goodness.” His mother walked over and wrapped her arms around him. Nephrum stood still, not returning the affection.
“We need firewood,” Nephrum said. His voice was rigid. “I’m going to go pick some up.”
His mother nodded, and he turned and left.
The scene slowly faded except for the doorway Nephrum had left through. I nodded at it, and the girls followed me through. Perhaps fetching firewood was somehow a massively important memory.
We followed him through the rest of his ornate house and out into the streets of a city. We went from street to street, our ghostly bodies able to walk through the crowds. Rather than a lumberyard, we eventually reached the outskirts of the city where wagons and horses were getting packed up and ready to leave. Men and women surrounded them, all dressed in green robes. Nephrum walked up to a tall man with a long beard.
“Excuse me,” Nephrum said. “I heard you speaking in the square this morning. I’m interested in joining you.”
“I’m flattered!” The man said with a smile. “Well it is true that the Druid League of Iggoroth is always recruiting. What makes you want to become a druid?”
“I need peace in my life,” Nephrum said. For once, he sounded sincere. “I need a connection to the world around me.”
The girls and I all looked at each other. This was unexpected. The man considered that for a minute.
“I almost completely forgot he becomes a druid at some point,” Lily said.
“And gets kicked out. And turns them all to stone. I forget that you guys missed the first one. That’s the one he actually wanted me to see.”
“Well,” the man said to Nephrum. “I can see that you are a troubled soul. I was too, once. Please join us. But I’m sorry, we will be leaving very soon.”
“That’s okay,” Nephrum said. “I’m ready now.”
“You don’t have anything with you.” The man looked confused.
“I’ll be okay.”
“Trust me, dude,” I said. “He has plenty of baggage.”
The girls both laughed as the scene faded.
We were surrounded by the orbs again.
“Should we keep going?” I said. “At some point we need to find a way out of here. And I bet Neptos is still trying to find us and get us out.”
“But he sounded so sincere when he was talking to the druid!” Lily said. “We have to find out what happens.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
We were back in the temple again, and I wondered for a moment if we’d left the purple goop entirely. But it again looked different, more full of life. Sunlight streamed in through the windows, and I could see trees and grass outside.
The pews were filled with students, Nephrum among them. Leon was teaching a class, and beside him, a deer stood eyeing everyone. It seemed very comfortable in front of a crowd. One of the students was walking back toward a pew looking very pleased with herself.
“Excellent work, Lysandra,” Leon said. “Penelope seems to like you very much.”
Beads of sweat formed on Nephrum’s forehead. I could see the dread on his face.
“Now class, the reason Penelope responded so warmly to Lysandra was how she presented herself. Open body language, a genuine attempt at connection. Animals are particularly adept at picking up on these cues. They will respond to your intentions before they even consider drawing a spiritual connection to you. The Bestiagloss spell is useless if you cannot use it sincerely. Who would like to try next?”
Nephrum shrank back into his seat, but I knew what was coming. When his name was called, he
seemed resigned to his fate. He slowly made his way up toward the altar. When he stood next to the deer, he bowed to it. It did not bow back.
“Hello,” he stammered. Nephrum took a deep breath, and his hands
The deer looked up at him, and Nephrum returned the gaze. A hush fell over the room. They simply stared at one another for several seconds. Nephrum stuck his hand out toward it.
“You must actively express your welcome, Nephrum,” offered Leon. “Penelope will know if you are insincere.”
“I am sincere.” Nephrum said it through gritted teeth. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
He looked like he knew that he should stop talking but couldn’t help himself.
“I honestly wish to befriend this deer,” he said. “It’s in my best interest, isn’t it?”
Penelope lifted her head and emitted a hacking sound. A slimy ball of saliva and hair sputtered out and landed at Nephrum’s feet.
“Why?” Nephrum raised his voice. “Why would you insult me like that?”
“Nephrum,” Leon said. “I think you should sit down. We can talk about this later.”
“You vile little creature.” Nephrum seethed, ignoring his teacher. “Do you understand that you are beneath me?” As soon as he said this, his cheeks turned a deep shade of red.
“Nephrum,” Leon said, “sit down!”
The embarrassment on Nephrum’s face turned to fury. His fists glowed. Before anyone could do anything to stop him, he opened his fist and lashed it across Penelope’s face. The deer hit the ground writhing. It let out a pained whimper. The students gasped, and so did we.
“Get out, Nephrum!” Leon shouted.
Nephrum ran out of the room, the end of his robe trailing behind him. When the temple didn’t dissipate, we decided to follow him out.
“Damn,” Lily said as we chased after him. “Just when you start to sympathize with the guy, he slaps a deer.”
We went outside and looked around for him. Instead of heading back toward the living quarters, he took off for the forest. Even when the woods became thick and heavy with limbs and bushes, he still pressed onward. It was easy then for our ghostly bodies to run right through them. Eventually, Nephrum reached a clearing. He fell to his knees, tears in his eyes.