Glancing at Beron, a stab of guilt enters my stomach. He’s been steadfast and loyal to me for years, but as far as I’m aware, he’s never taken much time to pursue a relationship. He insists that it’s fine, but he also has to watch me flirt with women, and frankly, I think that’s a horrible task to endure. Not least because of my flirting skills, though confidence tends to make up for any other pitfalls.
I think of Roze, of her proud and stern features. Beautiful if unadorned, the light catching her cheekbones from all the candles, and how flushed with excitement she’d been when we first met.
Now my emotions twist into a disgusted knot when I remember how terrified and miserable she’d been when dragged up onto that stage, with betrayal wrought in her expression when she realized I’d been the one to buy her. That same expression manifested itself in Alex and Tiffany as well, and it stings, because it feels like a door’s been shut on me.
Maybe if the night had been allowed to continue, I might have found myself with Roze, Tiffany or Alex in an entirely different scenario. Maybe we’d have spent their holiday exploring Halberg comfortably, and screwing in the night, if my flirting had achieved any success in that department..
But that particular scenario is dead in the water. Reality presents a different face. If only I’d tried negotiating harder with Gentleman. If only I’d thought of another alternative. Explained myself better.
I sigh.
The faint smell of vanilla candles permeates the air of my now occupied suite. The other dragons prefer roosting on the top floors, with balconies for their dragon forms to stretch out in and soak up sunshine.
I like the damp cool of a cave, and the solemn mood of the candles, though Beron thinks my choice of accommodation would be better suited to an evil vampire’s lair. He’s probably not wrong, but I’m happy with the result.
Inside my suite at last, I see Alex and Roze sitting opposite Tiffany, and it resembles an interrogation. When Roze turns her eyes to me, they’re raw and red rimmed, like she’s been crying for a good part of the night, and Alex isn’t faring much better.
My original intention to triumphantly announce Octavian’s presence vanishes in the sucking, pervading atmosphere of the room I hadn’t previously picked up on. “What’s up?” I glance at Tiffany, who wears a bored, imperious expression on her features. From what expressions I’ve seen on her, it doesn’t match at all. Like the expression was made for another face. “Is it… there hasn’t been another incident, has there? With the call of the void?”
Beron had phoned me to say that Tiffany made another attempt on her life, but it seemed like Roze got to her in time, since Tiffany was up and walking shortly afterwards. Roze had needed recuperation from overextending her magic, but no one mentioned anything else interfering.
“Not another incident,” Roze says, in a dull, colorless voice. She rubs at her reddened eyes, and Alex leans into her, a dry cough leaving her mouth.
“Then what?” Again, I glance at Tiffany. Something’s not right. The way she holds herself, the expression she uses, haughty and arrogant as opposed to eager and cheerful, along with how her nails drum the side of the armchair in a detached way – all of it serves to reinforce the unease.
“What am I going to tell her parents? Her brother?” Roze was saying, in a quieter tone of voice which I suppose she thought I couldn’t pick up on, but unfortunately for her, my hearing’s better than most. “There’s no way they can understand.”
“It’s freaky,” Alex hisses back. “Like a zombie. Wearing the face, but nothing like...”
“I want her gone.”
Tiffany/The Morrigan clears her throat. “I told you that there was nothing you could do to save the girl. Not with such a powerful rejection of bone and body.” Her smile becomes cold, heartless. “With the house empty, the owner gone – why not occupy it?”
“You had no permission. No right,” Roze chokes, shaking, unable to tear her eyes away from Tiffany. “There must be some law against this.”
Oh, bother. Beron catches on the same moment I do. “Tiffany’s possessed?” Cautiously, I sniff at the magical energy in Tiffany’s body. It’s being concealed, which instantly speaks of the signs of a powerful magic. Those with enough control and confidence don’t need tattoo marks to conceal their whereabouts. That’d be why I didn’t suspect anything off at the start.
“Yes,” Roze says, while Not-Tiffany smirks.
“Not precisely,” Not-Tiffany says.
“There are laws against that,” I reply. “Fifteen years in jail if proven to be in direct mental possession of a body not your own.”
“Don’t forget the sub-clauses,” Not-Tiffany says, stopping her slow, annoying finger drumming. “If the possessed body is an empty vessel, it can be claimed under extenuating circumstances. Such as if the possessor’s own body was destroyed illegally, but enough of their essence remains to reform in a new body. Active reincarnation. That was in Irish law. I’m sure you brought some of the old laws from Ireland here, did you not?”
Irish. Cold, regal manner. Roze’s apparition in the mirror, that I’d been dubious on believing. “The Morrigan,” I groan, and Beron lets out a small gasp. “How is this possible?”
There are some things in magic that aren’t supposed to be done.
Once a person’s dead, that’s it. Their essence might cling to their bones, but the thing that makes up their minds, their souls, doesn’t. And as far as I’m aware, The Morrigan is nothing else but a collection of bones with potent magical energies, scattered throughout the world.
“Never mind that,” The Morrigan says. She then lets out a dramatic sigh. “This isn’t ideal, admittedly. I don’t have all of my essence here, so my power is a pittance of former strength. The garden fairy bone is quite powerful, though. Not something to be underestimated.” The Morrigan inclines her head towards Roze. “It was unfair to your friend, placing something like this inside her. I remember the garden fairies in my court being capricious and unwilling to bow to rules.”
Roze gazes at me with a miserable expression. “Please tell me you can do something about this. That you can get her back.”
Her pleading voice wrenches at my heart, and if I could, I would have booted The Morrigan’s soul back to whatever hell it came from. A powerful being like that should stay dead. I’ve only ever heard rumors and stories about The Morrigan, but she was one of the oldest, strongest creatures around. Part of the Irish court of preternatural beings that had existed when humans first started forming major settlements. Not that being old and strong could prevent being taken by surprise, and killed before gaining a chance to fight back. I can think of a great number of absurdly powerful beings caught with their pants down, so to speak.
But if Tiffany had succumbed to the call of the void… if what The Morrigan says is true, then we have a ghost wearing the face of another ghost.
“Beron, stay with them and Octavian,” I say grimly. Unwilling now to look Roze in the eye. “Get the tattoos done. Morrigan, you’re coming with me.”
The Morrigan smiles primly, threading fingers through her hair before standing up and gliding over to me. When I risk looking at Roze, her expression is a mix of grief and anger. It seems like a chasm has opened up between us. If being contracted into slavery was bad enough, then how would losing a dear friend to an ancient, morally ambiguous and previously dead sorceress feel like?
Seems like this trip to Halberg is more of a one way ticket to hell, for humans unfortunate enough to find themselves on the wrong side of the world.
“I’m sorry,” I say to Roze. The Morrigan is not my fault, but I can’t help but feel like it is. The magic’s something from my world. The world humans still struggle to accept, because of the atrocities magic can commit. Though I’d argue the atrocities humans commit with technology and chemistry is far worse. Because at least magic tends to operate on a karmic scale. “I’ll see if there’s a way to get your friend back.”
Roze nods, but I can tell s
he’s not convinced. “Please. Get her back.”
A part of her has already processed the possibility that her friend is dead.
I squeeze Roze’s, and as an afterthought, Alex’s hands in reassurance. There is nothing else I can say to comfort them right now.
And I have to deal with the worm that’s inside Tiffany’s body. A worm that I want to cross even less than a demon.
The whole situation’s spiraling more and more out of control, and all I can do is weather it as best as able, and work out what to do next.
Roze
The needle stings my flesh, but I accept it, because I don’t want to be stuck in this place any longer than necessary. I get it between my shoulder blades, in a place people won’t see, since a lot of jobs out there frown upon those with tattoos, and I have to make a living once I’m out of Halberg.
All Beron and Cato seem to be able to do is apologize. I’m sorry. I’m sick of hearing it. I get that none of us asked for this, but I don’t want to keep hearing sorrys out of their mouths. I want action. I want a solution to this predicament. No patient ever fixed themselves just by wishing for it and saying sorry, though we have dealt with some cracked ones over the years who sincerely believed all they needed was prayer and a good, toxin free diet to “purge” themselves of impurities. Let alone the ones asking if we’re going to inject them with mercury. I engage in small talk with Beron and Alex, noting again how animated he is when he talks. He just resembles a brick when he’s still, his cheek muscles unmoving, but in motion, there’s a certain elegance to his expressions I can admire.
Trailing down to his arms, I think privately that one punch from him could kill me, let alone whatever power he possesses when he shifts into his bear form.
When Beron offers to transform to fill up an awkward stretch of silence, where the emptiness was occupied of thoughts of Tiffany, of The Morrigan, of the fact that all of our families right now must be sick with worry.
It’s been four weeks since our impromptu kidnapping. I can only imagine the flood of messages I must have on my phone now.
Beron trots out to the center of the cavern where Cato likely sleeps in his dragon form. I’m yet to see that as well, but the thought of some twenty foot lizard that can breathe fire being nearby causes marginally more anxiety than the thought of a bear.
Beron shifts, his thick, squarish features melting like candle wax into thick, wiry brown fur, his bulk expanding until he squats on all four limbs, big grizzled snout facing our way.
Jesus. I think he’s bigger than a normal bear. he’s at least three times as big as me, and when he rears onto his hind legs, he towers, multiple shadows dancing at his feet.
“Suddenly I’m jealous,” Alex says, a small attempt at brevity on her part. She’s taken it harder than me with Tiffany, and focusing on helping Alex is keeping me grounded. As long as I’m doing something with my hands or brain, I’m okay. I can keep it at bay. She continues with: “I don’t have a power like that. If I could have had a choice of magical powers, I’d love to be able to shapeshift, I think.”
Beron lets out a grunting laugh, his surprisingly small ears wiggling. His snout also twitches from side to side, and he plops back onto all fours, ambling over to us, so we can inspect him closer. I wonder if a shifter is able to keep full control of their own minds, or if something more primal takes over when they’re encased in their animal forms. I’ve heard tell that this is the appeal behind them. Why romance films involving shifters have exploded in sales.
People like the idea of taming a beast. But it seems to me that there’s something wonderful and human in Beron, as he noses his snout into our hands, offering his shoulder for us to pat, and lock fingers in the thick, rough fur.
“Seriously? You’d be a shapeshifter? I’d like to stop time, or control people’s minds,” I say, before realizing with a jolt of shame that controlling minds isn’t the most appropriate thing to mention at this point, given what’s happened to Tiffany. With that, comes that shivering, maddening grief, which takes a great deal of effort to suppress.
Thankfully, Alex doesn’t notice the mishap. “That’s boring. Plus, space-time control would be paradoxical at best.”
Beron chooses this moment to shift back into his human form, and I note that he’s able to take his clothes with him in both cases. Interesting. Where do the clothes go?
I latch onto those thoughts, instead of letting my mind go to the one place I don’t want to touch. “I think they’re both amazing powers. I’d stop time, catch up on a few hours of sleep.”
“That’s what you’d use it for,” Alex says in a flat tone of voice.
“Yep.”
“You have powers that could literally change the world, and you’ve worked in surgery, and your first thought is that you’d use them to… sleep.”
“Sleep’s really important.”
Beron chuckles, before offering, “While sleep is important, I agree with Alex that any manipulation of temporal reality is paradoxical. Those who do have time based powers are more able to look into the future or the past. Those who have physical time powers – they tend to end up in an alternate dimension where then that dimension just ceases to exist if they continue altering things. Best not to mess with time.”
“I’m sorry, what? Alternate dimension?” I’m also surprised at the articulate words coming from Beron’s mouth. I keep getting surprised, because he does have the kind of face that makes you think he’d barely be able to string together more than three syllables at a time.
“Long story,” Beron says. “But it’s also why you don’t hear about time travelers going back in time and killing dictators. Moment they do that, they just create an alternate reality. A quantum break in what we know.”
“Neat,” Alex says, while I just nod and hope I look like I understand. “Say, speaking of sleep, do you hibernate? Like a real bear does?”
Beron shrugs. “I can do. Usually best not to stay too long in bear form during the colder months, because it does create quite the impulse. But some of us like it traditionally, having quiet dens for us to slumber away the winter months. Not ideal if you live in human society, where bills have a tendency to not get paid if you decide to sleep for five months at a time. Though I can stock up on sleep hours if I want to, and then go for a mega power sleep to catch up on it.”
I chuckle at that image, and when Beron smiles, I stare at his lips as he does so. It’s a really nice smile. Doesn’t look like he does it enough, because the lines that appear are thread-thin, barely making an indent in his features. His eyes have a far more human color than Cato, who feels alien. Beron just looks warm. Inviting. Like you could snuggle next to him at an event or on the sofa, and he’d loop his big arm around you, giving off the deception of safety.
Another time, another circumstance, and I’d consider dating someone like that. But this isn’t the time or place.
We continue our small, distracting talk, finding out we all like the same color (green), that Beron also has a passing interest in crime documentaries like Alex, and he’s also partial to nature ones, and loves the birds of paradise because they all do elaborate dance routines, and have ridiculous extra appendages. Alex of course, starts talking about her serial killer based shows, and I’m asked once why it is that I wanted to become a surgeon.
Not for the best reason, I admit. My mother pushed me into it, for the most part. I mean, I was interested from a young age to help. I watched veterinary documentaries, and medical dramas that my mother liked. I also knew there was a demand for doctors and surgeons, and figured it to be the one path where I was guaranteed a job once I’d gone through all the training and gained residency. How many times had I heard the whole you mustn’t let yourself fall far from the tree spiel from my mother, who had an uncle I never heard of, one who fell into drink and depression shortly after becoming redundant in his job. She didn’t know what became of him, but it was assumed he had died, since there had been no contact for years.
&
nbsp; The talk’s good, but it’s all a distraction.
A distraction that ends once Cato enters the fray once more, and Tiffany/The Morrigan is behind him, wearing different clothes, and her blond hair tied back into a severe bun, making her look years older.
Our talk dies out, and Tiffany/The Morrigan finds an armchair, plonking herself upon it. Her expression isn’t as arrogant anymore, and I wonder for a fleeting moment if Cato found a way to reject The Morrigan from her body.
“I don’t want to be the one to tell you this,” says Cato, and his words deliver the sensation of a rock sliding from my chest and into my stomach, “But your friend is dead. Even if The Morrigan left her body right now, it would not return your friend. The implant in her body killed her.”
“No.” It escapes my mouth in a whisper. My heart feels like lead, along with my lungs. Air struggles down my throat, and I know, I knew Tiffany was gone, knew it the moment I poured everything into her to try and revive her mind, but I’d hoped all the same. Refused to process it.
“Then what –” Alex pauses, her eyes slits, “– What’s she still doing in Tiffany’s body? Get her out.”
“That...” Cato looks even more miserable. “That won’t be in our interests.”
“Why the fuck not?” Alex asks, while I just sit there, numb, trying to muster up energy to speak, to express my feelings, but finding myself unable to. Finally, I raise my eyes to examine The Morrigan (no longer Tiffany, but god, it’s her face) – and she stares back impassively. If she’d been smirking at me, I might have seriously considered lunging at her, just to wipe it off her face. Tiffany’s body or no.
“According to The Morrigan, it would be in our best interest to keep her within Tiffany’s body,” says Cato, and now he looks like he’s swallowed something hard and disagreeable. “Since someone’s trying to assemble all of her bones. So as long as she has one bone out of their reach, and a body to occupy, they can’t assemble her, even if they have all but one thing left to collect.”
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