The first time I saw this world
I thought it must be a dream
It took time to realize
That it was me who became a nightmare

<> 

“Show yourself you little rat!” Richard’s shout echoed through the school yard. “You know I will find you!”

Natasha looked up. It was long recess in the Polloop Elementary School and she was sitting on her favorite spot, on a putrid old wooden bench next to a smelly trashcan, to eat her lunch. She liked this place because nobody else did.

Richard’s head turned left and right as he scanned the yard until finally his eyes fixed on Natasha. The girl sighed, giving a sad look to the tuna sandwich in front of her. She should have eaten faster.

Richard ran to her and leaned into her face.

“Where are they?” he demanded.

Natasha gave him a blank stare.

“Who?”

Richard grabbed her by the hair and pulling on her red locks, forced the girl to stand up.

“Don’t you mess with me, spit it out where they’re hiding!”

Her eyes teared up from the burning pain in her scalp, but Natasha made a grimace to prevent the drops from running down. She’ll be damned before she sheds any tears in front of Richard.

“Why would I cover for them?” she asked angrily. “If they’re stupid enough to get in trouble that’s their business. I’m not gonna burn myself because of an idiot like that!”

After a moment, Richard let her go, still eyeing her suspiciously. If anything, it was true that Natasha usually knew when she was in for trouble and didn’t hesitate to run for it. The coward she was, why would she just sit here calmly if she knew anything?

Richard turned his attention toward the food. He grabbed the tuna sandwich and raised to his nose, giving it a few sniffs. Then he bit a huge chunk out of it.

“I’m not stupid, I know you two hang out together all the time,” Richard pointed at Natasha, spitting dry breadcrumbs into her face as he was speaking. “So next time you speak, tell them that when I find them they’re dead. Dead like… like a…”

“Like a very dead thing?” Natasha suggested with an innocent look.

Richard slapped her across the face. He didn’t bother holding back his strength and the hit pushed Natasha back on the bench. A palm-shaped red spot rose on her cheek.

Apparently, the boy decided that was enough lesson for now. Munching on Natasha’s sandwich he jogged away and soon vanished behind the school building. Only a few kids looked up at the scene to begin with and as Richard left, they continued to play, eat, and chat, not paying any more attention to the short, skinny ginger girl.

“Thanks a lot, Nash,” Natasha whispered under her nose.

The trash can wobbled and its lid fell off. A short kid with messy long hair  climbed out and jumped on the ground. Their cheap, stretched out clothes were covered in stains of things better not to think about. A fishbone was stuck between their blonde locks.

“Thanks,” they smiled at Natasha. “That moron had no idea.”

“You pissed him off on purpose again, didn’t you?”

“What if I did?” Nash shrugged. “As long as he’s busy chasing me, he isn’t after others. Not like he can ever catch me.”

“Oh yeah?” Natasha gave an angry frown. “Then guess you don’t need me to cover for you next time. What do you do then? Just because you’re a bit faster…”

“I’m a lot faster,” Nash corrected, leaning closer to Natasha with a playful smile. “I’m even faster than you.”

Natasha pulled back with a grimace, even though it was mostly for show. She dealt with much worse smells than Nash’s odor of trash.

“You’re being cocky. And you know what happens to cocky people? They get caught.”

“Maybe… but if that happens, I have tricks Richard doesn’t know about.”

Natasha rolled her eyes.

“Again? We’re not in kindergarten anymore, if you keep making up stories about magic, Richard won’t be the only one after you. Tims looking for an excuse to send you to institute. That’s what you want?”

“I’m not making it up,” Nash said with a frown. “I don’t have that kind of imagination. It’s all true.”

“Whatever,” Natasha sighed.

“That’s why you’re always angry at me? Because you think I keep lying to you?”

“If I were angry that would be because I’m hungry,” she said with a flat look.

“Oh, right. Sorry about your lunch,” they quickly rummaged their pockets. “Apple or chocolate?”

Natasha gave a suspicious look to the food that accompanied Nash in the trash and took the chocolate bar. She recognized the brand, it was popular from the more expensive side.

“Where did you get these?”

“I can tell, but you won’t like it,” Nash said, taking a bite of the apple.

“I don’t care if you stole them,” Natasha said, tearing down the wrapping.

“I don’t steal,” Nash said.

“I’m not calling you a liar,” Natasha said. “Because lying assumes the intent of deception. If everyone knows that your stories are fake that’s called fiction.”

“Why is it so hard to believe me? Just a little.”

“Believe that magic exists and you can do anything?” Natasha huffed. “I don’t know, maybe because you never actually showed it to me?”

“You wanna see something?” Nash grinned at her, quickly destroying the rest of their apple.

“No. I don’t have to test it, I just know it can’t be true. If you could do the things you say, you wouldn’t be stuck here like me or Richard. You could just go and live a good life.”

“Why would I want to go anywhere else?” they shrugged. “You’re here.”

Natasha gave them a weird look but this time she didn’t say anything.

“Don’t get it wrong,” Nash said quickly. “I’m not trying to hit on you.”

They made a grimace just thinking of it.

“That would be weird, for multiple reasons.”

“Well, I’m glad we’re at least on the same page about that,” Natasha said dryly.

“I mean, you’re all I have for a family,” they smiled. “You’re like… my little sister I never had.”

They chuckled, like they said a joke only they could understand. They did that often and it always annoyed the hell out of Natasha.

“’Little’? We’re the same age, dumbass. That’s why I don’t believe you, because you keep saying nonsensical things then pretend that it all makes sense. How should I know when you’re serious?”

“I’m sorry Nat. I promise, one day I’ll tell you in a way that makes sense to you. It’s just, there are some things even I’m not sure about. Things I need to figure out. Until then, here.”

They raised their hands and showed their palms to Natasha, showing that they’re empty. The girl sighed – another stupid magic trick.

Nash clenched their right into a fist and waved over it with their left. Then they blew at their fist and opened their hand, showing it to Natasha.

They were holding a pendant, shaped like an irregular tear drop. It sparkled in the light of the sun.

“Wha-” Natasha stared at the jewelry. “Is that real silver?”

“No.” Nash moved their hand and the pendant changed its color, now looking almost black. “It’s called ruthenium. Pretty, isn’t it?”

“That’s not an actual metal, you just made it up.”

“Yes it is! Its atomic number is 44 and it’s a rare transition metal from the platinum group. Look it up online if you don’t believe me.”

“Yeah, great. Anyway, thanks but I’m not taking it.”

Best case scenario it would end up in Richard’s hands. Worst case, Mr. Tims or another social worker finds it and she have to face some inconvenient questions about owning such an expensive item. She never wore any jewelry anyway and felt weird about changing that.

“It’s okay, you don’t have to,” Nash said. They pulled their hand back a bit, but still left the pendant in full display. “That would make you my partner in crime.”

“Crime?” she raised an eyebrow. “You just said you’re not stealing.”

“So what you’re going to believe?” they grinned mischievously. “That I can do magic – or that I’m a better liar than you think?”

Driven by a sudden pulse, Natasha snatched the pendant and hid it in her pocket.

“If someone finds it, I won’t get into trouble for you,” she warned. “I’ll just point at you then you can explain yourself to the Civil Guard.”

“Then better keep it secret,” Nash winked. “Partner.”

<> 

Ruthen landed on the empty rooftop, then, before rushing forward, they took a moment to calm their rapid breath and thumping heart. They couldn’t rely on their magic sense, they had to be able to hear the smallest noise to identify the approaching danger.

The sound of the softest step hit their ears. They spun around and saw a dark figure rising up above them, striking at the hero like a bird of prey. But Ruthen had their weapon ready and blocked the attack just in time – a loud tang echoed over Pollapolis’ skyline as their broomstick stopped the other mid-air.

“You won’t be sneaking up on me this time,” they grinned at Nocturknight.

They swiped over the ground, trying to kick out her legs. The girl jumped up, pushing against Ruthen’s weapon with her own to gain enough momentum and somersaulted behind her opponent. Landing in a squatting position, she swung her stick at Ruthen’s knees, but they were prepared and blocked the hit, then the next too as she jumped on her feet and aimed at their throat this time.

“She doesn’t stop even for a moment when I block her, just goes immediately after the next opening. I need to be more offensive too.”

Remembering when Igne attacked them in the Botanic Garden, Ruthen pushed their broomsticks upwards, then trusting their small size and high speed, dropped on all fours, jumping ahead. They felt Nocturknight’s broomstick whoos over their head just as they slipped through between her legs and jumped up behind her back.

She spun, holding up her weapon defensively, but Ruthen didn’t went for the hit just yet. Instead, they struck toward the ground and spun around the stick, making a kick through the air. Their foot hit Nocturknight’s hand and kicked her weapon far away.

Returning to the ground, they quickly stabbed toward their now disarmed opponent, but in their excitement, they put a little too much momentum into it. Nocturknight side-stepped the attack easily, but Ruthen wasn’t able to pull back in time. She grabbed their wrist and turned around, pushing her back against Ruthen’s chest which brought her into the dead zone of their weapon where they couldn’t possibly aim at her. Still holding their wrist, she warped their arm around herself, then with her free hand, tore the broomstick out of Ruthen’s hand.

Having turned the situation completely, she broke away and stroke at the silver haired hero. Ruthen dodged, gaining some distance, then threw their scarf, trying to wrap it around their stolen weapon. But Nocturknight was quicker, caught the scarf in the air and pulled on it strongly. Instead of letting go of their last trump card, Ruthen clung to the scarf and used the force of Nocturknight’s pull to jump over her, landing right next to her dropped broomstick.

They grabbed it and jumped on their feet, ready to block Nocturknight’s next strike – but instead they found their stick all tangled up in their own scarf. The girl still held the other end of it and just finished running around Ruthen, warping the scarf around them completely. With a last pull, she tightened the loop and sent Ruthen to the ground. She touched her stick against their cheek.

“I give in,” Ruthen said, looking up from the binds of their own scarf.

“Be this a lesson that cheaters never win,” Nocturknight said as she freed them and helped them on their feet. “We agreed that no powers during training sessions, didn’t we?”

“You mean my scarf? I was thinking of it more of an accessory than one of my powers.”

“That’s rules lawyering.”

“Okay, sorry if it wasn’t fair. But you still bested me easily, so guess I need all the advantages I can get,” Ruthen said, pulling a water bottle and a pair of sandwiches from their cloak. They offered one to Nocturknight who took it after a moment of hesitation. “I’m just glad that we’re actually on the same side.”

“I don’t think it will be enough if we run into Scarlet Wind again,” she said gloomily, catching a slice of tomato that slipped out of her sandwich. “And he doesn’t care about fair play. We’ll need to be stronger.”

Their crushing defeat was haunting them since that day, and thinking about that he was only one of the Sorcerer’s elite soldiers… the power gap between him and the normal people who stumbled into Artifacts was staggering.

“Well, that’s exactly why we’re training,” Ruthen shrugged. “And we’re getting better, but it takes time. It’s not some kind of shonen where we can unlock our hidden potential and become super overpowered in three days… or maybe it is? I don’t know, technically our increased strength and speed are magic too, so maybe if there’s a way to train our magic power instead… but I don’t know how that would be possible other than using our Enchants a lot to get used to them.”

“It’s so frustrating to know that Nox and Artemis are sitting on an arsenal of powerful Artifacts, but we can’t use them,” the girl said. “I bet there’s a lot of stuff in the shop that could obliterate most of the threats we’re facing.”

“Yeah, but it’s too risky. If we go crazy from the Artifacts then who will protect the city from us?”

“I know,” she sighed. “It’s just annoying. The Enchants make me so much stronger than most people, something I never thought I’d feel. But I’m still as helpless as ever. I’m tired of just taking the hits and trying to survive. Just this once, I want to strike first.”

<> 

Bianca was off duty that day, but she still chose to hang out with her friends in Cafe Velvet. The others told her that it was okay if she wanted to go somewhere else, but she actually liked the place. She was pretty okay with the job too, even though sometimes it was a bit much besides school. And being an employee did come with some benefits.

Normally the cafe was furnished to serve smaller groups, up to four people, but since she worked there, nobody complained when they pushed two small tables together in a single box, so she, Chile, Gregory, Matis and Igne all could sit together. It was a somewhat unusual sight, as most highschoolers stayed in their own age group, but after the incident with Igne, they, Matis and Flow started to visit her workplace regularly. Chile and Gregory already dropped in quite often, so it only took time before the two groups met and Bianca officially introduced them to each other.

At first Igne was very apologetic and tried to insist to pay for the damages they caused under the coin’s influence – even though they had admittedly no idea of from what money would they do that. But since the event was reported as a warlock attack, the Knightfall Foundation would cover the repairs completely – this, and Bianca saying a good word for Igne convinced the staff to leave the whole thing in the past.

“Apparently the Foundation has some kind of agreement with the city. They offered to pay for any damages caused by confirmed or even suspected warlock attacks, so it wouldn’t be a strain on tax money,” Chile said. “But nobody talks about what they get out of it. Is it just their normal charity stuff?”

“There’s lots of conspiracy theories about them,” Matis shrugged. “Most of those are pretty ridiculous stuff, but the fact is they do seem to have endless funds in an otherwise sinking economy. And also, we apparently live in a world where magic exists, so I’m somewhat more willing to consider absurd claims I would be a year ago.”

“Some people online say that’s the actual reason the city doesn’t seem to do anything about the warlocks. That they secretly agreed that they let the Foundation handle it with their own methods as long as they take the financial burden.” Bianca said. “I don’t know if I really believe that but… well, after the whole Poison Rose thing, the gendarmy invaded the Botanic Garden, right?”

“Yeah, they took…” Gregory said, but he had to stop to yawn loudly. “Sorry. They took witness reports and brought some doctors who checked everyone medically, then let us go. What about it?”

“After that medical check, they brought me aside saying that they had further questions,” Bianca remembered. “And that part would be handled by some ‘civil experts’ as they said.”

“Seriously?” Igne’s eyes widened. “That’s creepy.”

“That’s what I thought, but actually they were super patient and polite with me,” the girl shrugged. “I just had to tell them everything again then they asked about some details but never pushed me if I couldn’t answer. It didn’t look like they were with the gendarmy.”

“Did you tell them about the Sorcerer and the magical flower?” Chile asked.

“Yeah. I don’t know if it was a good idea or not, but I was frightened. They had records of me doing all those things I barely remembered, I was sure they would convict me of being a warlock and lock me away. But they just thanked me for my time and gave me a number to call if I remember something more or if I ever experience ‘anything similar’.”

“Igne, what about you? Didn’t they seek you out too?” Matis asked.

“No. Actually I thought it was weird, but guess they couldn’t identify me by the reports. I wonder, should I call that number they gave to Bianca and tell them that I was affected too?”

“I don’t know,” Bianca said. “They were nice to me, sure, but it’s one thing cooperating with the authorities, and another knocking on their door and asking for being investigated. I wouldn’t want you to get in trouble, so I say, if they don’t come to you, don’t go to them.”

The cafe’s door opened and Flow jogged in, almost tripping on an empty armchair an earlier guest left in the way.

“Hi, sorry for being late,” they said, sitting down with the group.

“It’s okay,” Igne shrugged. “I’m just a bit worried, you always seem to be in a rush lately. Hope you’re not too overwhelmed.”

“It must be their mysterious school project with Natasha,” Matis waved his hands. “What do you do with her again?”

“There’s nothing mysterious about it,” they forced a nonchalant shrug. “Moving here in the middle of school year was a bit rough, so she helps me to catch up. She already learned this stuff last year so it’s no big deal for her.”

“Oh, if you had issues you could ask me too,” Matis said. “But guess it’s a good thing the two of you are on good terms again. Even though…” He looked at Flow resting their head on the table. “I hope she doesn’t go too hard on you.”

“Yeah, she must be a rough teacher,” Gregory said, yawning again. “You look like you ran the mile.”

“Speaking of which, you don’t look too good either,” Chile looked at his boyfriend. It was true that Greg had dark circles under his eyes and he looked like he could fall over any moment. “Still can’t sleep properly?”

“Nah, these damn nightmares kicking my ass,” he groaned as he mirrored Flow’s posture and leaned on the table.

“Nightmares?” Flow looked up.

“Yes, but like the most cliche horror movie stuff,” Gregory said. “It’s always the same, I’m in a dark, scary forest and I’m running from someone or something. It looks like a person, but I can’t see their face, and then when I think I got away they grow tentacles to reach out for me. Then I ran into this tall blonde dude in fantasy armor and he babbles something about that I don’t belong there. I wake up in cold sweat and I can’t sleep back for the rest of the night, no matter how exhausted I am. I just want to pass out for the whole night and don’t dream about anything, but it just won’t happen.”

“That sounds stressful,” Bianca said. “Did you try counseling? Maybe it’s something weighing on you?”

“I tried. We talked about the stress of coming out and how it sucks that I’m still not sure what to do after highschool. It was good to talk that stuff out with a professional I guess, but didn’t help with sleeping. I’m thinking of asking my doctor to prescribe me sleeping pills because it really starts to wear me down.”

“That might be a good idea,” Flow said, scratching their chin. “But would you like to try something else too? Something kinda… unorthodox?”

“What do you mean?” Matis gave them a side look.

“Well, as you said, I was pretty tired lately too. There were some stuff that…”

Don’t think you got rid of me just yet.

“… err, bothered me lately.”

I know what you really are, deep down inside. Whenever you peek into the mirror, I’ll be hiding right behind your back.

“Oh… wanna talk about it?” Chile looked at them with a bit of concern.

So be very careful what you think about in the night when nobody’s around. I’ll never be more than a bad wish away from returning.

“It’s nothing serious, just the whole moving thing,” Flow scratched their head. “You guys already helped me a lot to get comfortable here. But I was looking up stuff that might help with sleeping and I found this… meditation kinda thing? It didn’t really work out, but they say it’s better to do it with others. I thought you might want to uh, try it with me Gregory?”

“Hmm, I never tried meditating before, but guess I’m desperate enough,” he said with a painful grin.

“That actually sounds pretty interesting,” Bianca said. “Would you guys mind if I joined too?”

“Uhm,” Flow said. “No, of course not. The more the merrier.”

“Hmm, I’m intrigued too,” Matis said, giving Flow a weird look. “Hey Igne, why don’t we try it too?”

“Huh?” Igne looked at their friend wit surprise. “I can sleep all right, but guess why not? If nothing else, it might be fun to do it together.”

“Would that be okay with you Flow?” Matis asked.

“I… can’t see a reason why not,” they said awkwardly.

“Great,” Matis said with a smug smile that Flow couldn’t decipher, especially from him.

“Guess that means we have a group of five,” Gregory said. “Where could we do this kind of thing? I love the place but I don’t think the cafe would be ideal.”

“Fret not dear Gregory, as you see, there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for the well-being of my boyfriend,” Chile winked. “I’m in the school’s dance club, but we’re on a break now. I talk to our president, but I’m sure chir would be okay if we used the room when it’s not occupied. Plenty of space, pillows to sit on the ground, all the stuff. And guess that means I’ll be joining too.”

“That’s great!” Bianca smiled. “If you can arrange it we might have our first session tomorrow after class? If that’s good for everyone? I’m pretty excited to try this out.”

Everyone agreed, so with a nervous smile, Flow nodded too.

“Yeah, okay, let’s meet there tomorrow.” they said.

They took out their phone to set a reminder, but they also quickly sent a text to Natasha.

“I need your help with something.”

<> 

“So let me get this straight,” Natasha said. “You thought you could help this boy with his sleeping issues using magic, and now you’re the president of the school’s newly founded meditation club?”

“Well, it’s not a real club and I’m definitely not the president of anything,” Flow said. “But otherwise yeah, that’s kind of how it went down. I thought I could be sneaky, but then everyone jumped on the idea and now I’m a bit afraid of how will I manage this.”

“Okay, well, how you planned to do it in the first place?”

“With this.”

They raised a small pin in the shape of a cloud.

“Oh yeah, that’s the Enchant that puts people asleep, right? Guess that makes sense.”

“It’s a bit more complex than that,” Flow said. “Its power is called Trance and as Artemis explained to me, it creates a shared dream experience between the user and the target. It’s not as much a Sleep spell from an RPG, more like… well, people under the effect of Artifacts can get quite emotional right? And also dangerous. This lets you try to calm them down in their sleep, while they can’t hurt anyone.”

“So you jump into Gregory’s nightmare while he’s sleeping then… what? You beat up this bogeyman and hope it won’t return next night?”

“He seems to be stressed about a lot of things… I don’t know, guess I thought if he could confront those things in his sleep that might could help him to calm down and get some rest.”

Natasha sighed.

“You’re aware of the risk of casting magic while in your civilian form, right?”

“I am, but I can’t really go up to him as Ruthen and say ‘hey, Flow, who happens to be my secret best friend told me about your sleeping issues, let me fix it for you with this magic trinket’. If something, that would be really suspicious.

“Look, I got myself into this mess,” Flow said. “I don’t expect you to be a part of it, I just didn’t want to act behind your back. And I really think he could use some help.”

She crossed her arms and looked away.

“Well… guess we talked about doing this kind of stuff. I mean… doing something together. Other than fighting the Sorcerer.”

“Huh? Yeah, I guess so. Even though this still very much involves magic and I was thinking like, watching anime or something. But guess this counts too?”

“So it would be you and what, five other people?”

“Yes. I know, it’s a pretty big group…”

“It’s not like I’m afraid of crowds. But… wouldn’t it be weird? If I just showed up at your meeting?”

Flow smiled at her.

“I’m sure they would be glad to get to know you.”

“Fine, I’ll do it,” she rolled her eyes. “Guess that means no training tomorrow.”

“Too bad, I was so going to kick you in the butt.”

“I think you’re already dreaming.”

<> 

So the next day, when everyone finished their classes they all met up at the dance club’s room and Chile let them in.

“Hey Natasha, glad you could make it,” Igne gave a wide grin to the girl.

“Yeah because I love… meditating and… finding my inner peace and stuff like that,” she said, a bit tense.

“Flow talked a lot about you,” Bianca greeted her too. “It’s nice to finally meet you in person.”

“Yes? Uh, yes, same.”

“Crap, I forgot that oficially I never met Bianca – only Nocturknight did,” Natasha thought. “I have to keep in mind to not give myself away.”

The place was really spacey, it even seemed a bit too big for seven people. The big windows let plenty of sunlight in even at this afternoon hour. Chile opened a small closet and brought out a bunch of red pillows and they all sat down in a cozy little circle on the ground.

Flow sit next to Gregory, hoping not to seem too weird or suspicious about it. They never tried to use Trance before, so it seemed to be the safest if they were as close to their target as they could. Natasha quickly took the place at Flow’s right. On Gregory’s left sat Chile, then came Matis, sitting right in front of Flow. On his right Igne, then Bianca closed the circle, sitting between Igne and Natasha. Natasha squirmed around a bit, but stayed in place.

“This is already starting to feel like a sleepover,” Chile said jokingly.

“Okay, uh,” Flow quickly looked up some notes on their phone. They did look up some meditation techniques since yesterday in order to not look totally clueless. “Next we all should close our eyes.”

“Wait,” Matis said. “How you’re going to read the instructions if you close your eyes?”

“I’ll just tell you all what to do, then I’ll join in.”

“I can take over with the instructions if you want,” Matis offered. “After all you’re one of the people who need help with sleeping, you should be able to focus.”

“Thanks, but I can manage,” Flow smiled weakly. “Now, we take three deep breaths…”

They all closed their eyes and followed Flow’s orders, focusing on their breathing and thinking about peaceful images. After a while, everyone seemed to sink into a relaxed state – or at least, nobody wanted to bother the others, it was hard to tell. Flow peeked out under their eyelids before opening their eyes completely. Natasha opened one of her eyes too, looked at them, then closed it back. Flow turned to Gregory next, who sat with closed eyes, taking deep, calculated breaths.

“Trance” Flow whispered under their breath.

Wind blew through the room, then everything went dark.

<> 

Flow opened their eyes, looking around. They were standing now, even though in their last memory they were sitting on the floor in the school. It was dark, and crooked trees loomed above them all around. Their feet were half sank in dry and mucky leaves.

“Are you sure this is how this supposed to work?” they heard Natasha’s voice.

Flow turned around and saw the girl, in her jeans and white blouse she was wearing for school, standing not far away.

“Whoa, cool,” Igne looked around.

“Where are we?” Bianca asked. “And how we got here?”

All of them was there, all seven people.

Whoops.

“This looks exactly like the forest from my dreams,” Gregory said. “Except, you never were here before guys.”

“Flow,” Matis said, looking at their friend. “Any idea why did this happen?”

“H-huh? No, why would I…” they stuttered, sweating bullets.

“Yeah, why would Flow know what happened to us?” Igne looked at Matis.

“I don’t know, I’m just trying to figure out what’s going on,” the boy shrugged. “It all started during meditation, right? And we know that magic exists, so…”

“Enough of this,” Natasha said impatiently. “Yeah, weird things have happened lately, but there’s no point in accusing each other.” She sent Flow a biting look. “Flow wouldn’t be so stupid to cast magic on us they didn’t understand.”

“Yeah, uh, because that would be such an obviously bad idea,” they said awkwardly.

“I will listen to this for weeks, huh?”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to accuse anyone,” Matis pulled his mouth. “I mean, accidents happen… but sorry if I came off too harsh.”

“Don’t worry,” Flow said. “Let’s just try to figure out where are we, and how we can go back.”

They heard rattling from the forest. Everyone looked around warily, but they couldn’t see anything – except for the shadows between the tress, stretching toward them unnaturally.

“Uh, don’t wanna panic, but this was a nightmare, right?” Chile asked. “Remind me Greg, how did it continue?”

He didn’t answer. Flow turned toward the spot where the boy was supposed to be standing, but he was nowhere to be seen.

“Huh?” they turned toward the others who might seen what happened.

Natasha, Igne, Matis, Bianca, Chile and Gregory all disappeared.

They were alone.

“So, still think that a little magic can make everyone’s life better?” they heard a familiar voice.

A short teen walked out of the forest. They had light brown, half-long hair with a bit of a curl at the end and wore a long, baggy gray hoodie that almost looked like a dress on them. They looked at Flow with their own brown eyes and smiled, flashing a row of pointy teeth at them.

“Yo! Did you miss me?” the Vessel asked.

<> 

“Hey, where did everyone go?” Bianca looked around at the suddenly empty forest clearing.

“Oh come on, don’t act so surprised.” someone said behind her. “Even you’d ditch yourself if you could, don’t you?”

She turned around and saw a girl with black hair and red eyes. She wore heavy make-up and a dress in a color similar to clotted blood. A jet-black rose bloomed on her chest.

“What the hell are you doing herre?” Bianca stared at the apparition wearing her own face.

Poison Rose’s black lips bent into a mocking smile.

“Aren’t you tired pretending that everything is all right? I thought at least you learned something.”

“I’m not pretending anything,” Bianca protested. “This time I  acknowledge my negative feelings – and I’m actually working to feel better. There’s a difference.”

“Is there?” Poison Rose stepped closer. “Come on, admit it. It was so much easier to be me and let your bitterness flow freely. You’d still do that if those meddling Enchanters didn’t stop you.”

“So instead of trying to get better I should just cling to that poisonous feeling and let it all out on others? No matter who I hurt?” Bianca scoffed. “How is that better?”

“You see, that’s your problem,” the other said. “At the end it’s never about what you want, it’s about not causing any problem to others. If you’re so afraid of being a nuisance to your friends then why do you want to be around them to begin with?”

“That’s stupid… it’s not what this is about.” Bianca whispered.

“If not bothering them about your pesky little feelings is what makes you a good friend then to be an excellent friend, shouldn’t you just disappear?” Poison Rose chuckled. “I can help you with that.”

She blew into her palm, covering Bianca in black pollen. The girl suddenly felt dizzy and collapsed on the ground as her vision turned black.

<> 

“Guys, this is not funny,” Matis shouted into the dark. “Igne, can you hear me?”

“Matis?”

A short, silver haired figure in gray and black clothes stepped out from the woods.

“Ruthen?” Matis gasped. “Thank god you’re here, I don’t know what…”

“Matis stop,” Ruthen waved him down. “Look, I know what you’re doing.”

“W… what do you m…”

“You were trying to figure out who I was, right?”

“I…” Matis looked away. “I didn’t really do anything. I was just thinking that…”

“Disenchant.”

A magical gust of wind rushed over the trees around them, then in the next moment, Ruthen disappeared. Only Flow stood in their place.

“Here. Are you happy now?” they looked at the boy with a sad look.

Matis stared at them with dropped mouth.

“I see you as a friend Matis,” Flow said. “I trusted you, I even gave you an Enchant so you could help Igne. You must have realized that there’s a reason I can’t tell anyone who I am. That it would be dangerous. Why couldn’t you respect that?”

“You… you get it all wrong,” Matis said. “I didn’t want to reveal it to anyone, I just… I just wanted to know if I was right, that’s all.”

“That’s all? Really?” Flow asked. “So it’s not about this?”

They held up their palm, holding something. It was the Hourglass Enchant.

“You thought if you figured out my identity I’d have no choice but make you a full-time Enchanter, didn’t you?”

“You make it sound like I had some big evil plan going on,” Matis raised his arms helplessly. “I mean yes, of course I did think about being Sandstorm again, who wouldn’t? But…”

“Igne was able to give up their power when it mattered. To protect others. But unlike them, you couldn’t let go of yours.”

Matis clenched his fists.

“Once in my lifetime I actually felt helpful,” he said. “When I was Sandstorm I finally wasn’t just the guy who warned everyone to look around before crossing the streets, I was able to actually get people out of harm’s way. Is that so bad? That I want to be able to help?”

Flow looked at him intensely, then at the pin in their hand.

“Okay.”

They took a step backwards, stepping into a shadow between two trees. They stretched out their arm, offering the Enchant to Matis.

“If that’s true then take it.”

Matis looked at them with confusion.

“I thought you were angry at me.”

“That doesn’t matter now,” Flow said. “The others are in trouble. If you really want to help them, there won’t be a better time than now.”

Hesitantly, Matis reached out. As their fingertips touched the pin, suddenly Flow grabbed his wrist.

“What are you…?”

Before he could finish, they pulled him into the shadow of the forest.

<> 

Igne ran through the forest, looking left and right for traces of their missing friends and also trying not to run head-first into any trees. Again. They stepped out to a small clearing that looked familiar with a big rock and a twisted tree-trunk. They groaned as they realized they were running in circles the whole time.

“It’s not enough that they all disappeared, I’m lost too.”

Well, technically they were lost even before the others vanished, but that’s beside the point. Maybe the others were looking for them too, and they all kept avoiding each other in this twisted maze of creepy trees. Igne really hoped that they are at least together, wherever they went.

“Feel free to lie down in the dirt and cry,” they heard an all too familiar voice. “If you can’t get any less pathetic then why don’t go all the way?”

Suddenly, in the middle of the clearing, there stood Richard with crossed arms, giving Igne the smuggest smile.

“Richard! How the hell… well, I have no idea how did I get here, so that question is kinda pointless. Did you see the others?”

The tall boy laughed.

“What’s that? Little Igne lost their babysitters? Why don’t you look for a nice pile of junk to sleep in, like when you got lost in the Ghost District? I always told you that was your most authentic moment.”

“That was in Elementary, could you finally drop that story?” Igne lashed at him. “This is serious!”

“No. I’m serious.”

The boy let down his arms, hanging them by his trunk, but Igne knew all too well how fast those hands could be. They unconsciously repositioned themself too, for better balance and quick movement. The years they spent knowing Richard taught them to recognize when he was out for prey.

“There’s nobody here,” the boy said. Now his grin was replaced with a menacing grimace. “Do you get it? No one. No teachers, no parents, not even the cops can save you here.”

“What do you want Richard?” Igne snarled.

“You got such a big trap, going on and on how you will ‘show me’ when there’s others around to get your back,” he said. “But it’s just the two of us now, two… well, one man, and a whatever you are, alone in the wilds. No laws, no rules, just our bare strength. So, I wonder,” he raised a fist. “Will you finally make good of all those threats? Or will you just run away squeaking like the dirty little rat you are?”

Igne felt all their limbs shaking, but they steeled themself and put on a confident grin.

“You know,” they said to the boy. “I know I should say something like ‘I don’t wanna fight’ or ‘we don’t have time for this right now’. But screw that.”

They spread their legs and raised their hands in the air, trying to copy one of the stances they saw in martial art videos.

“You asked for this too many times.”

“Oh wow, so you actually do have some guts,” Richard grinned.

“Shut up and come at me!” Igne shouted, protecting their face.

“Oh no,” Richard shook his head. Then he spread his arms in the air, leaving himself wide open. “Be my guest.”

Igne hesitated. They got into many fights with Richard before, he beat them up without mercy all the time, but Igne never was the one hitting first. Attacking someone when their guard was down like that… but then, when did Richard cared if his victim was defenseless? And if he was that overconfident maybe it was well within time he learned he wasn’t invincible.

Igne shouted a battle cry, running at the boy. They half-expected him to back off and punch them in the face in the last moment, but no, Richard just stood there, letting Igne punch him in the guts. As the hit connected and Igne pulled back, he raised an eyebrow.

“That’s all?”

Then he burst into laughter.

“I take back everything. If that’s the best you can ditch out then you’re not brave at all, you’re just incredibly stupid.”

Igne panted with frustration and humiliation. They were sure they hit Richard right in the cardiac opening, how he was just standing there, completely chill? He was big but he wasn’t made of iron.

“Now, my turn,” the boy said.

Igne jumped to the side, trying to get into a better position to defend, but Richard was faster. He raised his gigantic fist and dabbed Igne on the head lightly. Their eyes turned upwards and Igne fell on the ground.

Richard grabbed the flimsy teen from the ground and threw them on his shoulder. Then, whistling a cheerful tune, he walked into the thick of the forest with them.

<> 

“Here we go again,” Gregory sighed as he found himself alone among the crooked trees.

The rattling noise got closer. He turned around to finally face the shadowy figure who haunted his sleep for weeks now.

“Okay, enough of this,” he said firmly, even though his voice was shaking. “I’m awake now… I think. So I won’t just mindlessly run from you. I don’t know who are you and what business you have with me, but come closer and show me your face.”

“Why Grego?” a familiar female voice spoke. “You can’t even recall how I look anymore?”

A woman in her late forties stepped into the light. She had curly, dyed red hair and she was wearing what looked like a hospital gown. She looked like half of her normal height as she was leaning heavily on a cane. Her steps were uncertain, it seemed like she didn’t yet get used to the aid.

“Aunt Mary?” Gregory looked at her with widened eyes.

“So you at least remember my name,” the woman smiled at him dryly.

“How… what are you doing here? You still should be in…”

“The hospital? Right. Don’t you think it’s a bit late to worry about me now?”

“Wha… of course I’m worried! Why are you acting so weird?”

“Is that so? Then why couldn’t you come with me that day?”

Gregory fell silent, his stomach tightening.

“Not that long ago, I was the one you always ran to. Whenever your parents were a bit too much. Or with things you couldn’t bring up to them. With your little crushes you couldn’t confess to… I was there to calm them down when you finally came out to them.”

“I… I know, and I was always so grateful that I had you…”

“Of course, that was when it all ended too,” the woman gave a bitter smile. “Once you didn’t have to hide anymore with your boyfriend you also didn’t have much time left to spend with your old aunt.”

“I’m sorry, I know I didn’t visit as much lately,” Gregory said desperately. “But you told me that you were happy to see me with Chile. That it was normal that we wanted to spend…”

“Well what else to say when your nephew is in so much love, right? Honestly, I just didn’t really expect you to ditch me like that. The only time we really talked since then when you introduced me to Chile… I’d be happy to spend time with both of you, you know.”

“I’m… sorry,” Chile hung his head low.

“That day, I invited you to go to shop together, because I hoped we could get some time together,” the woman continued. “But of course, you had a date, so I went on my own. Now I’m not saying I wouldn’t trip on that escalator if you were there. Maybe my leg would be a mess then too. It’s not like I’m blaming you for having to walk with this cane for the rest of my life, that would be ridiculous. But you know…”

She shrugged.

“Would have been nice to have someone with me in the ambulance.”

“I…” Gregory shook his head. “This is not real, right?”

“You think so?” Mary asked.

“It just doesn’t make any sense. Why would my injured aunt show up in a place like this,” he waved around in the dark forest. “Then start to guilt trip me with the exact things I’m afraid of her thinking?”

He shook his head again.

“I’m still dreaming, right?”

“Well, there’s only one sure way to tell that,” the woman smiled. “Let’s see, can you feel any pain?”

Suddenly, tentacles burst out of her back and wrapped around Gregory.

<> 

“Bianca! Greg?” Chile shouted. “Guys, where are you?”

He heard quite sobbing from somewhere. Following the sound among the trees, he soon stepped out to a clearing. He saw Bianca, sitting on a large rock, covering her face in her hands. Next to him knelt Gregory on the ground, apparently trying to comfort the girl.

“Here you are,” Chile sighed. “What happened?”

Greg gave him a quick look then turned back to the crying Bianca.

“What do you think what happened?” he asked coldly. “You vanished.”

“I didn’t go anywhere… or I don’t think so,” Chile said. “I just blinked and suddenly everyone was gone.”

“Oh I see. So it’s not your fault, just the circumstances conspired against you. Figures.”

He still didn’t look at his boyfriend. Chile stepped closer.

“Guys, what’s wrong?”

“Stop asking that!” Bianca screeched at him. She finally looked up. Chile saw black tears running down on her face.

“No… did you…?”

“You know, it wasn’t that bad that you were gone for a while actually,” Gregory stood up. “It gave the two of us a bit of time to talk things out. Turns out we were both secretly afraid that the other hated us. Funny, huh?”

“But…” Chile blinked. “Why?”

“God, you can’t be this dense,” Bianca sighed, now seeming more angry than upset. “Since the Botanic Garden Greg was afraid that he’s ruining our friendship.”

“And before that? She was afraid of doing the same to our relationship,” Greg said.

“But as we talked about it, we realized… we didn’t put ourselves into this situation.”

“It was you, Chile. Then when it blew into our faces and Bianca snapped, you just rejected any responsibility. It wasn’t you. You didn’t know. It’s not your fault… does that sound familiar?”

“I… know my first reaction wasn’t great.” Chile stuttered. “But I really never wanted to make any of you feel this way.”

“That’s really nice,” Bianca said. “But what if instead of just saying that all the time, you put some effort into fixing the damage you did? Because guess what… emotions don’t just go away because you don’t want them around anymore.”

Black magic covered her body as she transformed into Poison Rose before Chile’s frightened eyes.

“Greg, get away from her!” he screamed.

“No Chile,” Gregory said calmly. “I don’t think I will.”

He turned toward the girl. She smiled at him and with a blow, covered Greg in her black pollen.

Gregory’s eyes and lips immediately went black. His outfit changed into a fancy dark green attire and thorny vines formed a crown on his head.

“You can call me Prince Thorn from now on,” he turned to Chile.

“We were playing secondary roles in your life long enough,” Poison Rose said. “We decided to write our own story instead.”

“And guess what?” Prince Thorn smiled. “This time you will be cast as the victim.”

He snapped his fingers and vines entwined around Chile. He shouted as he felt thorns sinking into his skin.

<> 

“What the hell are you doing here?” Natasha asked, staring at the woman standing in the clearing.

She had long, blonde hair and she was wearing a tight-fitting red pipe dress and high heels – ridiculously formal for this environment but Natasha knew even this attire was very casual for her. She hid her face behind a white and golden colored fan, but the girl could recall her features even if she was waking in the middle of the night.

“That’s what I should ask you darling,” the woman spoke. Her voice made Natasha think of a bottle of honey full of tiny glass shards. “Didn’t I already tell you what I must do if you try to run away again?”

“I didn’t…” Natasha gasped sharply, but then she stopped, her face in a frustrated grimace. “Why do I even argue with you? I’m pretty sure you’re not even actually here… but even if you were when did arguing made any difference with you?”

“Still, you keep opposing me, don’t you?” the woman asked.

She closed her fan and let her hand fall in waist-height as she slowly walked toward her, dead leaves crackling under her heels. Natasha wanted to move, even though she had no idea where. Run into the forest? Jump at her throat? But her feet just didn’t move.

“I dug you out of the dirt, gave you a home,” the woman continued slowly. “A life that any brat in your place would grovel on the floor to have a chance at. But all you ever did to repay it was being disobedient and causing me trouble.”

She stepped before Natasha. The girl was staring down at the forest ground intensely, refusing to look up.

“Well?” Mrs. Alexton said. “Don’t you have anything to say?”

“You’ll learn one day,” Natasha scoffed at Nash.

She looked up.

“Defiance will only get you in trouble.”

“Yeah, guess you really gave me a lot,” she told in a dead tone. “I didn’t show much grate for that, huh?”

“If that happens, you can tell me that you told me so,” they grinned.

She looked her adoptive mother in the eyes.

“When that happens, I won’t be around to see it.”

“Maybe you should think about what that says about you,” she said coldly.

Mrs. Alexton’s face flinched with anger. She raised her fan and slapped Natasha across the face with it.

<> 

“How are you here?” Flow asked. “You were… gone.”

The Vessel laughed.

“You can’t even say ‘dead’ out loud, but you thought I’d stay away? That someone like you could kill me? You’re such a fool.”

“Wait,” Flow frowned. “It was you? You caused us getting here?”

“You’d love that, don’t you? If it was me instead of your carelessness that endangered all of you. You humans love to dump all the responsibility to others, but you don’t stop there. If there’s no one else around to blame, you just make up a guy, like a kid blaming mischief on an imaginary friend. ‘Satan made me do it.’ ‘God wants me to be hateful.’ But in the end, it’s always one of you, messing up everything. You can’t avoid consequences forever.”

“I remember pretty clearly that it was you who attacked me, Natasha and Richard,” Flow said dryly. “And those are only the ones I know about.”

Their doppelganger grinned.

“So that’s why I had to die, huh? For justice? Or to save others from me?”

Flow tried to stand their look, but eventually they turned away.

“I just tried to take the bracelet.”

“Oh yeah, so Artemis could do it for you, then your hands would stay clean. You see, that’s what I’m talking about. You want to be a ‘hero’ you want change in the world. But you don’t want to accept what it takes.”

Flow clenched their fist, they were getting tired of this lecture while their friends might need them.

“Then why don’t you tell me?”

The Vessel smiled.

“It’s simple. When you take a life, you have to give up something as well. Do you know what it is?”

Suddenly, they disappeared from view then showed up again, now standing right in front of Flow.

“I don’t think you’re gonna like the price.”

Flow stumbled back, but they weren’t fast enough. The Vessel’s arm raised up and they thrust their bare hand into Flow’s chest. The enby gasped from the explosion of pain, but also from the suffocating feeling. They looked down on the Vessel’s hand as it sank deeper into Flow’s rib cage.

“You already gave me so much of you,” they whispered. “I’ll just take the rest and be on my way.”

“Di… Disentropy!” Flow coughed.

The Vessel jumped back as a glowing white aura rose around Flow. The teen looked down on their chest – the wound was gone, together with the hole on their hoodie. Their hair and clothes waving in the sudden wind, they looked up at the Vessel as their power cast a white light over the gloomy forest around them.

“Sorry, but you overdone it,” Flow said. “The Vessel might be creepy, but the last time I fought them they couldn’t just bypass my Enchant’s protection like that, otherwise I’d be already dead. I don’t know who you are, but I can tell you’re just trying to play with my head.”

“Ts.”

The creature looked at their hand, the same one they used a moment ago to seemingly punch through Flow’s body like cardboard paper. It seemed to flicker in and out of existence in the light of Disentropy.

“And I can tell that acting like a smartass is how you cope with fear. But you’re acting way too confident for how little you know,” they said. “Emotions are magic, but they aren’t all equal… my personal favorite for example is fear. And especially in this place, your fears can eat you.”

“Why? What is this place?”

The creature laughed.

“You came a long way, trusting only the word of your misty friends, but believe me, if they told you what you’re really getting into, you wouldn’t stop running. You brought me some easy prey today, so as thanks I let you go for now. But don’t celebrate yet. Soon I’ll find my way to your home, and I’ll be able to feast on all those delicious fears bubbling in your people’s hearts.”

With that, their figure vanished like a ghost phasing out of existence.

<> 

The force of the hit sent Natasha flying through the air until she landed on the trunk of a nearby tree with a loud thud. She fell on the ground, her face in the mud and the grass. Mrs. Alexton gracefully walked to the lying girl.

“I had high hopes for you darling, but you managed to prove that no matter how well you try to train a mutt, it never be like a true bred.”

She opened her fan again, hiding her face behind it.

“I can only blame myself, really,” she said. “The circumstances of finding you should’ve told me everything. If not for my good heart, I let you rot in the dirt like your little friend.”

Natasha looked up. She slowly pushed herself on all-fours.

“Singularity!”

With a metallic flash, the top of Mrs. Alexton’s fan fell on the ground.

“I think I’ve listened enough to your bullshit,” Natasha said coldly, holding the tip of her longsword to her throat.

Mrs. Alexton chuckled, dropping the severed fan.

“How brave and strong you became with your new magic trinket, didn’t you? But you should have learned by now, you don’t live in a fairy tale. In this world beggars don’t become knights if you gave them a blade. Poor people who arm themselves and attack others are called thieves and murderers and they die in the severs and dumpsters they belong to.”

She leaned closer, until her neck almost touched the tip of the sword.

“No matter how hurt and angry you are darling. You can’t just cut the world into a shape you like. And if you keep throwing yourself against brick walls that will only leave a mark on you. So, did you make up your mind? What do you want to be?”

Natasha’s grip tightened on the handle.

White light filled the clearing and Mrs. Alexton’s form scattered into nothing. A short teen appeared in her place, their brown locks in a mess.

“Flow?” she let down her weapon and took a step toward them, but then she stopped and raised the sword again. “Wait, no. How do I know you’re real?”

“Here we go again,” Flow sighed, holding up their hands. “Do you remember our first meeting? Well, the first when I was Ruthen. You thought I was a warlock and tried to knock me out with a ruler.”

“That doesn’t prove anything,” Natasha frowned. “These illusions or whatever they are obviously have access to our memories.”

“True.” Flow said. “Look, I still couldn’t really figure out what’s going on, or how this place works, so as far as we know, anything could be an illusion. But that won’t help us proceed, we have to put a little trust in each other until we know more, or we’ll be stuck here forever. Here, I’ll make the first move.”

They removed the Broken Enchant from their hoodie and held it off with the Cloud Enchant and all the other charms they had on them. They stared on the pins in their hand for a moment – if the Natasha in front of them was a fake, this move can be the end of them. But they couldn’t just stumble around in this forest of nightmares, assuming that everything is fake. They needed an anchor and right now Natasha was their best bet.

They stretched their arm, offering the pins to her.

“Here, you can take my Enchants until you’re sure I’m real,” they said. “If you want, you can cut me a bit, just to see that I’m bleeding, then use Disentropy to heal me. Just… try to be gentle, okay?”

They gave her a nervous smile.

Natasha looked at them for a moment. Then she reached out toward their hand – she closed Flow’s fingers around the Enchants before pulling her hand back.

“No, that seems overboard,” she said. “I got the feeling that if you were one of those apparitions then you’d be trying to get into my head with some half-insightful bullshit instead of reasoning like this. Maybe we don’t know the extent and limits of how this place is messing with us, but for now we shouldn’t jump to assumptions we didn’t see evidence of.”

“Agreed,” Flow said with relief as they put back their Enchant.

“So you don’t want to test if I’m real?” the girl asked.

“No. The thing doing this to us feeds on fears. Not to say that you can’t be scary on your own way,” Flow nodded at her sword. “But you don’t act like an apparition meant to evoke my deepest fears.”

“So you did manage to figure out some things,” Natasha noted. “God, of course that stupid bitch wouldn’t spill anything useful.”

Flow raised an eyebrow, but decided to not pry for now.

“Well, I was attacked by the Vessel… or a copy of it I guess. It made it look like that they injured me, so I tried to use Disentropy to heal. But since the wound wasn’t real, guess it did the second best thing it could and dispelled the illusion.”

“So that’s why my boogeyman vanished too,” Natasha said. “We weren’t separated at all, that thing just made it look like. But…” she looked around. “Then where’s everyone else?”

Flow bit their lips.

“I’m not sure, but I don’t have good feelings… before it vanished, the creature called them ‘easy prey’. I think… because of our Enchants it had a hard time to get to us, but the others…”

“You don’t think that they’re…”

“I hope not,” Flow said with sinking heart.

“You don’t belong here!” a loud male voice spoke behind them.

They turned around to see a tall, blond man, maybe in his twenties, standing at the edge of the clearing. He wore what looked like leather armor reinforced with thin plates of some silvery metal, with a red cape hanging from his shoulders. His eyes were a shade of green Flow never saw before, they almost glowed in the shadows of the woods. He was wielding a long spear, but at the moment he held it pointing skywards, maybe to avoid threatening them.

“If you want to scare us, that’s a pretty weak attempt!” Natasha said, holding her sword in both hands.

“Put your weapon down,” the man said calmly but firmly. “Humans were banished from this realm under the Mist Law, but I know you’re not here on your own volition. If you stop antagonizing me, I can send you home right now and this all won’t be more than a bad dream for you.”

“I don’t think he’s an apparition, Natasha,” Flow said, eyeing the man.

He frowned.

“Apparition? You mean… the two of you already encountered the Beast?”

“Yeah, we did, and I’m pretty sure it took some of our friends. We’re not going anywhere without them.” she kept her sword ready, but at least she didn’t point it directly at the stranger anymore.

“That doesn’t make sense,” the man said. “Why would the beast leave its prey behind? You’re just children.” He took a few steps closer, now looking them over more carefully. Then he turned to Natasha again. “That weapon you have… is it magical?”

“Sure is, so better keep your distance,” the girl said, tensing up. Flow suddenly remembered what she said about being cornered. They really didn’t like the direction this interaction was going. “That fancy cosplay won’t do much good for you.”

To demonstrate her words, Natasha swung her sword, cutting a nearby rock in half easily. Instead of backing off, the man raised his spear a bit and with firm steps walked toward the girl.

“Hey!” Flow stepped in his way. “Calm down, we’re not looking for a fight.”

The stranger stared at their chest for a moment. Then raised their weapon – Flow stepped back, but the man carefully touched the pin on their hoodie with the tip of the spear.

Tingling ran through Flow’s body as their protection activated. Their Enchant let out a small wave of energy, pushing the spearhead away. The man stepped back immediately.

“Impossible.” he said. “You’re Enchanters… but you’re only children, don’t you?”

“That’s a long story,” Flow said. “Look, it’s true that we are Enchanters, but our friends we were talking about are not. We ended up here on accident and now they got kidnapped by some creature. Please, could you help us, or at least tell us where we are and what’s going on?”

The man breathed sharply and stroke his hair, like he was unsure what to do.

“My name is Emaril,” he said eventually.

“Mine is Flow,” they said with a friendly nod.

Natasha spun her sword and stabbed it into the ground.

“And I’m Natasha. But I think we’ll need a bit more context than your name.”

“This is beyond my jurisdiction,” Emaril said. “You’re not just some bystanders as I first thought – you came here as Enchanters, using the magic of our own folk, which clearly violates the Mist Law. The Guardian of the Slumbering Wilderness has to say judgment over you.”

Grabbing his weapon, he turned around and swiftly walked to the trees.

“Follow me! I’ll lead you to her hall.”

“Judgment?” Natasha gave a side-look to Flow. “I don’t really like the sound of that.”

“I’m not going to force you or fight you if you don’t comply,” Emaril looked back at them. “If you ever want to go home, with or without friends, you’ll need the help of the Royal Blood. Alone you can’t even navigate the Slumbering Wilderness – you either come with me and abide our laws, or stay here, lost and face starvation.”

Flow looked at Natasha.

“If nothing else, this seems like our best shot to learn anything. Let’s figure out who these people are and what can they tell us then worry about the rest later.”

With a resigned sigh, the girl pulled her sword out of the ground and walked up to Flow and Emaril. She looked Flow in the eyes.

“You know, you start to remind me of someone who used to get me into a lot of trouble.”

<> 

Emaril led them through an intricate path between the trees. He wasn’t lying, Flow had to admit that without someone knowing their way they would be hopelessly lost. It also meant that they were at the man’s mercy – if he decided to leave them behind, Flow and Natasha were pretty much done for.

Eventually they stepped out to another clearing and they saw the “hall” Emaril was talking about. It was more like a giant pavilon that seemed to grow naturally from the nearby trees bending over each other. Thick foliage covered all the entrances, but warm, yellow light filtered through the leaves. Several people stood around the “building” in similar clothes as Emaril and holding their own spears.

“Stay back a bit,” the man told them as he went ahead to talk to another person guarding the entrance.

“Do you really trust him?” Natasha whispered without looking at Flow.

“I don’t know, we just met him,” they answered quietly. “But he could just leave us to our fates so at the very least I don’t think he wants us dead.”

Emaril came back.

“Okay, the Guardian will see you now.”

His voice was… nervous? Worried?

Following him, they stepped through the leave curtain hanging from the trees and entered the hall. It was large and well-lit – above their heads, orbs of light floated in the air in seemingly random patterns, reminding Flow to giant fireflies. By the walls there were more guards, this ones armed with short swords and tiny shields instead of spears. Flow could feel Natasha tensing up again and they weren’t exactly comfortable with being surrounded with armed men either, but they tried to stick close to Emaril and stay calm.

At the wall right across the entrance, ancient tree roots formed a natural staircase, leading up to some kind of podium, hiding behind more low-hanging leaves. They were escorted through the empty middle-section of the hall, before the staircase. A guard stepped ahead.

“The Royal Guardian of the Slumbering Wilderness, protector of the Borderlands, her highness Lady Serafine!”

The leaves covering the podium split in two, revealing a giant wooden throne. Like everything else around, it looked like it grew into this shape by itself – it’s back split into several branches that connected to the trees making up the wall behind it.

The woman sitting in the throne had long, jet black hair absorbing the light of the magic orbs above them. Like everyone else they met, she looked young, maybe twenty at most, but there was something striking in this freshness – her skin was almost unnaturally clean and smooth, like it was never scratched or tainted by anything. She wore a set of clean, white robes and no weapon. Her eyes were sparkling with golden and orange colors.

“So,” she said, after measuring them for a while. “You’re the intruders I was told about.”

“We didn’t want to cause any trouble,” Flow said. “We wanted to help our friend who had nightmares lately, but we don’t know what this place is and why we ended up here. You… you people are belong to the mistfolk, right?”

A muffled uproar ran through the hall. Emaril squirmed a bit next to them but said nothing. A guard with fiery red hair looked angrily at Flow, their grasp tightening on their weapon.

“How dare you,” they filtered through their teeth, but didn’t step closer.

Lady Serafine raised her hand and the hall went silent in a moment.

“Listen carefully, Enchanters,” she said firmly. “You’re walking the Dreamlands now. In the spirit of the treachery your kind committed against ours, humans were forbidden from this land under the penalty of death. If your case warrants an exception from that ruling or not is up to me to decide, so if you hope to walk away with your heads in their place, keep in mind: I am the one asking the questions.”

Natasha frowned.

“Listen, you uptight bossy little…”

“Khm!”

She turned to the side. Flow and Emaril both gave her a look. She rolled her eyes and sighed, but remained silent.

“I’m sorry your highness for breaking into your… realm I think?” Flow said, struggling clumsily with the courtesies. “The friend I was talking about had nightmares about this forest for a long time now. All I wanted to do was entering his dreams with magic, hoping that I might ease whatever bothers him, but instead we and our whole group ended up here. I had no idea that it was an actual place and not just something in my friend's mind.”

“Emaril, what can you tell me about this?” the woman asked.

Emaril bowed his head respectfully.

“The Evil of the Forest was much more active lately your highness. With my men we managed to keep it away from the inhabited areas, so instead it started to pull humans from the Waking World into ours through their dreams in order to feed on them. Most of the times we could intervene and send the victims home before they could realize what happened to them, however…” his shoulders fell a bit. “There were a few cases when we didn’t get there in time.”

“How is that possible?” Lady Serafine asked. “I know that the Dream Beast is powerful, but humans weren’t able to enter the Dreamlands since the Mistfall.”

Another man stepped forward, who was standing in silence so far. Flow noticed he didn’t look like a guard – instead of an armor he was wearing an ornate tunic and a small, hexagonal hat on his head.

“Your highness, Captain Emaril’s experiences are complate my own findings. Lately, the level of magic in the Waking World increased exponentially, pushing the two worlds, that have drifted away in the past, closer to each other. Every evidence suggests that… the Entity have returned to the Human World.”

“Entity?” Flow blinked. Increasing magic? And it returned recently? Something clicked in their head. “Are you talking about the Sorcerer?”

“Sorcerer?” Lady Serafine repeated coldly. “So that’s how she calls herself now?”

“She?” Natasha raised her eyebrow.

To be fair, the only time they talked to the Sorcerer directly they had other issues than asking for proper pronouns. And they never asked Artemis and Nox where they got that their enemy was a man.

“The creature that has been plaguing the hearts and minds of your kind was around for centuries,” Lady Serafine said. “I’m sure they went through countless aliases since then. But yes, the first time they showed up to deceive you all, they assumed the identity of a powerful and widely respected woman.”

“The first time?” Flow frowned with confusion. “And it was centuries ago? How is that possible?”

The people around them looked at each other, like Flow was asking them for the solution of two plus two.

“Many hundred years ago, our people were close allies with yours,” the scholar-looking guy from before said. “We shared our magic with you and helped to found the Order of the Enchanters to protect your world from the dangerous Artifacts and their users. But then someone appeared among your folk – a very charismatic person with strong magic who kept speaking ill of us. She said that in fact we were robbing you from your own magic that resides inside of you, that we seek to deceive and oppress your kind.

“The Enchanters of old age did their best to keep the peace between the two people, but the liar’s influence kept growing and with it the situation grew more dire. Eventually, to avoid a bloody and devastating conflict, the Order had to find a way for our people to part ways.”

“Most of us have returned here, to our homeland,” Lady Serafine added. “Others stayed behind, some of them as punishment and others out of their own decision, to live in the shadows of the Human World that has forgotten about magic and us.”

“So that’s what the whole Mistfall thing was about,” Natasha said. “And you say that the person who started it all is the same we’re fighting now?”

“Humans don’t live that long,” Flow reasoned, forgetting to watch what they say out loud. “If that’s true, it must be someone from you.”

“Enough is enough!” the red haired guard shouted. They stepped ahead, readying their short sword. “How many more insults we must take from these insolent intruders? The law is clear about what fate befalls on traitorous humans who violate our land. What are we waiting for?”

“You’re forgetting your place Cortas!” Emaril told them firmly. “You may know the law, but it’s the duty of the Royal Guardian to decide about its application – not yours!”

The two stared at each other for a long moment before Cortas turned their gaze. They bowed their head toward the throne.

“Your highness, I apologize for my outburst.”

They stepped back in line and didn’t speak anymore – but Flow could see them sending hostile looks toward them and Natasha.

As the scene was over, Natasha crossed her arms with an inpatient look on her face.

“This is stupid. Human or not, man, woman or nonbinary, from what I collect you all have a lot to pay back to the Sorcerer. We have the same enemy. So instead of pestering us for coming here, you should tell us what you know about his weaknesses, so…” she stopped for a moment, like she was contemplating something. But then she continued. “So we can kill him.”

Flow looked at her. Natasha turned away for a moment, but then she met their look.

“I know, okay?” she said. “We’re supposed to protect lives, not take them. But this guy threatens thousands of people every day, and when we stop him, he just jumps onto his next victim. It must be pissing you off too.”

“Of course it does,” Flow said.

“I know it’s a heavy thing to say, and I’m not saying it to be edgy. Maybe we can help his victims – and that’s assuming that we can get to all of them in time – but I want to do more than cleaning up his mess. Life should be about more than merely surviving. You said you want to give people hope. Well, I don’t know if I’m able to do that – I definitely don’t feel like it. But I know I want to give them a little peace. And if that means I have to put a blade through that asshole’s heart – so be it. If you don’t want to go that far, that’s okay. But we’re together in this, you have to know what you can expect from me.”

“I understand,” Flow said, but they couldn’t help of feeling heavy in their heart.

When you take a life, you have to give up something as well. Do you know what it is?

I don’t think you’re gonna like the price.

Lady Serafine stood up and walked down on the root stairs. Everyone, even Flow took a step back as she stepped to the group. Only Natasha stood her ground, looking up at the regal woman with stubbornness – or maybe it was determination. They locked eyes for a moment before the Guardian spoke.

“You speak strongly, but you never shed blood before.”

“There’s a first time for everything,” Natasha said.

“Hmm.”

She went back to her throne and sat down, then turned back to Natasha from above.

“So you ask for my help in slaying the evil plaguing your own world. If that’s the case, I assume you are willing to lend your help in slaying the one plaguing mine.”

Emaril winced.

“Your highness, may I speak boldly?”

“Speak of your mind, Captain.”

He bowed his head.

“I’m not one to question your decisions your highness, but it does seem cruel to send these children into a fight with the Dream Beast that they clearly cannot win.”

“I’m not sending them anywhere Emaril. If they wish to, they can leave right now.”

“Wait, really?” Flow looked up.

“I’m willing to release you from the Dreamlands and pardon your trespassing if you swear that you never return.” Lady Serafine confirmed. “However, if I understand everything correctly, you have friends who are in the clutches of the Evil of the Forest.”

She turned back to Emaril.

“I’m not going to risk the lives of my men – your men in a rescue mission for foolish children who came to our land without knowing the dangers of it. If they want to save their own, they have to do it on their own.”

Emaril lowered his head in resignation.

“Understood, your highness.”

“Captain, you may think that I seek to punish these children for the sins their ancestors committed against our people. But I can assure you, I do not. They might be young, but they have the glow in their souls and they wear the Enchants by their own choice. If they’re really planning to challenge the trickster in their world and attempt to right the wrongs of old time, I may be willing to provide them with the power needed to do so. However, first I need to make sure they have what it takes to wield such power. I’m sure you can understand that.”

“So you’re testing us, huh?” Natasha spoke. “If I can be honest, I’m not a fan of that entitled attitude. But I never planned to leave without the others, so whatever. I accept your offer.”

Flow looked at the Cloud Enchant in their hand.

“I was the one who brought us all here. If we have to fight some kind of monster to get everyone home safely, I obviously won’t stay behind.”

Emaril looked at the two teens, like he was considering talking them down. But he saw the looks in their eyes and could tell they were bent on going through with it. He sighed.

“Your highness, please at least allow me to assemble a small squad to accompany and aid them.”

“You’re allowed to take any volunteers you can find.”

“And if I get it right, after dealing with this beast thing you had so much trouble with, we’re not just free to go, but you can also help with the Sorcerer?” Natasha stared at the Guardian.

Lady Serafine gave her a cold smile.

“If you overcome the Dream Beast then you are already going to have everything I can give to you and I won’t have any right to ask it back. The deal is going to be settled on both sides. But don’t get your hopes up just yet. Some of my best men tried to claim the power of the Nightmare Spear to no avail. If it refuses you as well, I don’t expect you to put your life on the line in vain. My offer of safe passage will stand, but you have to cut your losses and leave.”

She turned to Emaril.

“Escort her to the armory. At the end of it, it won’t be up to me or you to decide if she’s up to the task. Only the Spear can pick its wielder.”

<> 

Turned out, the hall was connected to a much bigger and more complex structure. One of the exits led them to what looked like a mixture of a forest path and a corridor. The ground under their feet felt like normal forest floor crackling with dried leaves, but unlike the path they followed here it was unnaturally straight with no trees in the way. The trees at the edge of the path grew unusually close, almost creating solid walls on both sides. The light-giving magical orbs were present here too, letting them see where they were going.

Emaril led them through a series of cross paths, until they arrived what could be considered either as yet another clearing or a large room. It seemed to be empty other than a tall pile of rocks at the middle – it took for a moment for them to realize that they were looking at some kind of hut built of irregularly shaped stone pieces.

“It’s weird to see an actual building here.” Flow said.

“My people find it easier to work with living materials,” Emaril said. “But with this weapon we can’t take risks. Even though it was dormant for centuries, it might have unforeseen effects if it was left surrounded with living things.”

Flow shivered.

“That sounds an awfully lot like an Artifact… and dormant for centuries? Artemis thought the same about the mirror that had the Vessel in it.”

The “armory” had no real door, just a big hole on its front. Following Emaril the two Enchanters entered the small building.

Its floor was in covered in stones as well. All it hid was a tall stone slab, holding a single spear. Its handle was black with silvery shapes on it – Flow couldn’t guess if they were just decorative or spelled something in runes they couldn’t recognize.

The spearhead was silvery white with a black core. Where the two colors met, the black bled out in the shiny outer part at a few places, drawing the shape of four eyes in different sizes symmetrically at both sides.

“So this is it?” Natasha asked, staring at the Spear.

“Yes,” Emaril said. “The Nightmare Spear is said to be the only weapon that ever could take down any of the Dream Beasts. They were plaguing our land for longer than anyone can remember. Over the centuries we found ways to protect ourselves from them, but the Spear was our only way to ever fight back. It is said to give terrifying power to its wielder, but in exchange, it takes a great toll on the soul.”

“So it works kind of like our Enchants?” Flow asked. “Drains our glow and gives us powers?”

“No. The Enchants were created by our people, as a safer alternative for humans to use magic rather than creating unpredictable Artifacts. But the Spear is neither. According to the legends it was left behind by a wandering god, with powers exceeding anything mortals could ever imagine. It is said that only the person awakening its power can fully comprehend the true price for it. However it has definitely nothing to do with glow.”

He looked at Natasha.

“Most of these are only stories. It takes long for the Dream Beasts to mature and start to hunt and they also tend to sleep through long periods of time. This one only been active for a couple of years. However there was nobody in centuries who could awake the Spear. It looks like that Lady Serafine thinks you might be able to.”

“Well, it couldn’t hurt to try I guess.” the girl shrugged.

Flow frowned and looked at Emaril.

“Could it hurt to try?”

“Honestly? No idea.” he shook his head. “I did hear stories about people who went mad because of it, but it’s hard to tell gossip apart from reality. All I know that I didn’t see anything like that to happen since it was entrusted to Lady Serafine, even though many of ours tried to claim it. As far as I can tell, if you try to use the Spear but it does not accept you as its wielder it just acts like a pointy stick in your hand.”

Flow turned to Natasha.

“Look, I know what’s at stake. I want to see the others back in one piece. But I also like you in one piece so… if you really want to try it, I won’t stop you, but be careful, okay? Honestly, I feel like since it was me who got us into this I should be the one risking my skin, not you.”

“The witch queen seems to think that I’m the chosen one or whatever,” she said. “I’ll give it a go. If it doesn’t work and I don’t go crazy either you can have a try too.”

Natasha stepped to the stone slab and reached her hand toward the Spear. She stood there for a moment, her arm stretched hesitantly. Then she closed her fingers around the black handle.

She raised the weapon into the air and stayed like that for a moment. Then she pulled it closer, now holding it in both hands. She raised it to her face, eyeing the strange patterns on the spearhead. She swung it along a few times clumsily.

She turned back to the others.

“I can’t feel any-”

Her eyes widened as a violent stroke of wind ran through the room. It surrounded Natasha like a whirlwind, simply waving her hair and shirt, while smashing Flow and Emaril against the wall. Flow’s body went completely numb, all they could feel is their Enchant pulsating on their chest, stronger than ever.

“Put that thing down!” they screamed. “It’s dangerous!”

“It’s a weapon, it is supposed to be dangerous.” Emaril said, trying to shield his face against the wind.

Natasha looked at her hand holding the Spear.

Her fingernails turned completely black. Thin, black lines crawled up on her fingers, taking the shape of tattoo-like marks on her hand, copying the silver adornments of the Spear’s handle. They continued to spread on her skin, slipping under her blouse, like they were seeking to cover her whole body.

She looked at Flow. They saw her scleras turning completely black around her green irises as the sigils crawled up on her neck, covering her face.

You’re crying again? Gosh, you’re hopeless.

“Argh!”

Natasha clutched her head.

You’re screwed either way.

Why don’t you have some fun while you can?

“Are you okay?” Flow shouted through the wind.

Holding her head, the girl crouched on the ground.

Don’t worry, it’s just magic.

I’m not lying to you. I don’t need to. I’m stronger than you.

Because I swear to God if you’re hurting anybody else I’ll-

If we go, why don’t we go with some fireworks?

The game is just about to start.

MaDolla sounds perfect.

I want everything.

Come on kid, this is a special occasion. Today you can cry like there’s no tomorrow.

Give up, Maris, you’ll never win!

It's a trick they use to tie you up and have control over you.  If you ever fall for it, it's over. You lose.

Time travel is nonsense.

Can you push me into the abyss without darkening your own Soul?

I am Sylvana!

If you grant my wish I’ll help you bury this world one more time.

I guess now I finally know what happened to you.

“Enough!” Natasha filtered through her teeth. “I don’t remember saying any of that!”

“Okay, that’s it! Enchant me!”

No point doing a full transformation, Flow only summoned their scarf. Defying the unnatural wind, it flew through the air and coiled itself around the Spear. With a strong pull, Flow yanked it out of Natasha’s hand and caught it.

The wind immediately died down. The girl looked up, the black markings already vanishing from her face. Her eyes returned to normal too.

“What happened?” Flow asked, looking from Natasha at the spear, then back at Natasha.

“I heard voices… they sounded like me, but also not-me at the same time.” the girl blinked. “That doesn’t make any sense, is it?”

“In the endless chambers of the Cosmos we are all echoes of other people, living in other places and other times.” Emaril said. “Or at least so I heard. If the Spear let you listen in the voices of the other ‘yous’, it means it must have accepted you as its wielder.”

“You could warn me that it could do that! It was creepy.”

“I’m sorry, but there was really no way to know what would happen before you tried. As I said, we only had gossips for a long time.”

Flow looked at the Spear in their hand.

“I can’t hear anything.”

“Then it is decided,” Emaril sighed. “The Spear choose the girl. We can accompany her, but only she can slay the Beast.”

“Great, just as we planned.” Natasha said.

She stepped to Flow, stretching her hand. The enby looked at the Spear, furrowing their brow.

“I don’t know Natasha. A moment ago it looked like this thing was completely overwhelming you. I don’t trust it.”

“It caught me off-guard, that’s all. Next time I’ll know what to expect. And it’s not like we have much choice if we want to get the others back.”

“I know. But be honest, if it was the other way around and I had to use it, wouldn’t you at least try to talk me out of it?”

She crossed her arms.

“Yes, of course I would. But let me make this easier for you: it’s my decision to make, not yours. I understand your concern, but going through these circles will only waste whatever little time the others have.” She reached out her arm with her hand open. “I’m doing this.”

Flow sighed and put the Spear in Natasha’s hand. They all tensed up for a moment, but the weapon didn’t seem to activate the second time. Maybe now that it made its decision clear, it was waiting for the right time for Natasha to call upon its power.

“Okay,” the girl said, looking at Emaril. “What’s next?”

<> 

He led them to an empty hallway and asked them to wait until he collected volunteers for the mission. In a moment, Flow and Natasha were alone among the tightly grown trees. Flow wondered what Lady Serafine would think about them being left without supervision – but it was made pretty clear how much at the local’s mercy they were already. They had nowhere to run.

“Hey Flow,” Natasha said. “Here, take this.”

They turned to her and saw Natasha holding the Star Enchant.

“Huh? Why?” Flow asked as they took the pin.

“I already have this,” the girl raised the Nightmare Spear, almost looking like she was saluting. “Having the ability to summon another magic weapon seems a bit redundant, especially that spears aren’t really made for dual wielding, so I’m switching to another Enchant. You on the other hand could use some extra offense if things go badly.”

“Maybe you’re right.”

Flow had an uneasy feeling, but they fought it off and put the pin on their hoodie next to the other. It was risky, wearing two Enchants alongside each other, as it could wear off the user more quickly. But Flow got the feeling that if things really go bad, they wouldn’t have the chance to switch on the fly.

Natasha looked them over.

“You’re nervous.” It was a statement, not a question. “I mean okay, that’s understandable. What I mean is, I don’t think I ever saw you this tense, and that’s saying something.”

Flow took a deep breath and tried to relax, only now realizing that they kept their shoulders strained and their face crumbled into a grimace in the last few minutes.

“Yes, I am. I just realized this will be the first time we’re fighting something this… inhuman.”

“The Vessel wasn’t human,” the girl pointed out.

“So it was okay to kill it?”

Flow pushed out the accusing voice from their head.

“Yeah, but they were created by an Artifact. Or they were the Artifact, I’m not sure. The point is, they were created from human emotions. They were creepy, but human in nature.

“Bianca and Igne were just victims of someone taking advantage of their vulnerability. And Scarlet Wind… okay, I don’t know what his deal is. He’s worryingly comfortable with causing death and injury for his age. But even he backed off when he got what he wanted.”

“What’s the point?” Natasha crossed her arms.

“This Beast thing seems to run on different logic from anything we met. I don’t know how our usual tricks will fare against it. And now we might find out that the Sorcerer is something alien too. I just…” they remembered the Beast’s words from the forest. “I don’t want to freak out and let you down. I’m just starting to realize we might didn’t know what exactly we got ourselves into.”

“Look,” Natasha said, trying to sound calm, even though Flow could sense her tension too. “Yes, this monster or whatever can stalk our minds and use our memories and fears against us. That’s obviously scary. But would it need all that if it was that tough? It uses illusions and deception, playing mind games, but that’s not inhuman at all. I know the type. If we don’t let it get to us it has nothing.”

Flow really wanted to believe her, but…

“If it was that simple I think Emaril’s people got rid of it a long time ago. I don’t think it simply plays on our fears to get us off-guard… I think it uses them, feeds on them to become stronger.”

They turned toward the darkness slipping through between the trees.

“That’s why I’m nervous,” they said quietly, hugging their upper body. “If you know that fear itself can make you fail, you can start to be afraid of being afraid. It can become and endless circle until your mind turns into your worst enemy.”

They bit their lips.

“I hate this. I got us into this, I should be on the front when we try to save the others. But if that thing can use my fear against them they might be better off without me. Putting up a brave face won’t change what I actually feel. It never did.”

“Hey.”

Natasha put a hand on their shoulder, trying to sound reassuring.

“Don’t forget that we still have magic. Last time your Disentropy was enough to make it turn tail. And this thing,” she looked at the spear. “If Emaril’s stories are anything to go by it’s supposed to have the power of a freaking god. Don’t you think we should at least give it a shot and see how it goes before we give in to despair?”

Flow gave her a weak smile.

“No. She must be just as scared as I am. But that doesn’t mean I don’t want her on my side. Maybe having anxiety makes me more vulnerable to that thing, or maybe not. Either way, I can’t start to think of myself as a burden.”

“You’re right. Thanks.”

They heard footsteps and Flow looked up. Their heart sank a bit as they saw Emaril return with only two other people on his side. The man seemed to hope that he could assemble a decent number of volunteers to help them, but it looked like that most of the locals were either too afraid of the Dream Beast or didn’t want to work with humans. Or maybe both, Flow guessed.

Then they blinked, having to do a double-take as they recognized one of the people.

“You want to help us?” they asked Cortas doubtfully.

The red-haired guard gave them a stern look.

“Don’t misunderstand this. I do not trust you and even less I am happy that you are here. But…” they looked away first, then glanced at Natasha. “The Spear chose her. It is my sworn duty to protect this land from everything that may threaten it. I am not happy about this, but I am also not too proud to know, sometimes you have to take the lesser evil.”

“I… see.”

Suddenly Flow remembered what Lady Serafine and Emaril said – that many of their men tried to claim the Spear to themselves to no avail. By some hard to explain intuition, they were sure that Cortas was one of them.

“Great,” Natasha said. “But the real question is, should we trust you?”

Cortas’ eyes narrowed.

“Are you questioning my loyalty, human girl?”

“You were the one lobbying for our death not long ago,” the girl pointed out, returning their look. “And now you asking to join us to a trip in the big, dark forest, with weapons and very few people around to see? Not suspicious at all. What’s the guarantee that you won’t slit my throat the moment I look away?”

The guard’s features turned into a wrathful grimace as they stared at Natasha – then they took a deep breath and looked down.

“You are the holder of the Spear.” they said, their voice forcefully composed. “If you don’t wish me in your company, it’s within your right to dismiss me.”

They looked up again, now their look radiating calm resolve instead of anger.

“But do not think that you can keep me away from the battle. Spear or not, you’re a guest here at best. This is our land and our battle to fight.”

Flow leaned closer to Natasha to whisper into her ear.

“I don’t think we can afford being picky about our allies.”

She sighed and nodded.

“Okay,” she said, then she gave a mirthless smile. “The more the merrier. You can come. But I warn you, if you do betray us after all, or any of our group gets hurt because of you…”

She spun the Spear in her hand.

“You’ll learn that this Dream Beast is not the scariest thing you can meet in that forest.”

“I am certain human girl, that by the end of this journey we will both learn what the other is made of,” Cortas said dryly.

“Okay, rule number two,” she said flatly. “My name is Natasha. Not ‘human’, ‘girl’ or ‘human girl’. Start to learn it.”

“Very well, Natasha the human.” Cortas answered, keeping their face straight for a moment, before letting their lips form a poisonous smile.

The person on Emaril’s other side burst out laughing. He was a tall, muscular man with a beard, his long brown hair in a ponytail. He wore the same armor and uniform as the others, with a great sword hanging on his back.

“You two already seem to get along great,” he said, attracting some skeptical looks from everyone. “My name’s Brakos. Too bad we had to meet under such circumstances, it would be good to chat a bit about what’s going on in the Waking World. But nonetheless, it’s due time that someone show it that creeping bastard in the forest.”

He flashed a bright smile that seemed to be at odds with the general atmosphere.

With introductions out of the way and nothing else to say, they dived into the shadows of the Slumbering Wilderness.

<> 

They formed a single line as they pushed through the narrow paths webbing the seemingly infinite woods. It wasn’t ideal as if an enemy would appear either ahead or behind them most of their people would be stuck behind the others, but Emaril warned the two humans to avoid straying away from the path or touching the shadows between the trees.

The Captain took the lead, always looking ahead as he guided them through a series of cross-paths toward the area where the Beast resided. He held his spear at the side with a confident, almost relaxed grip, ready to strike with it any moment if the need arises.

The second was Natasha, her eyes jumping from shadow to shadow at the sides of the path, clinging to her own weapon much more stiffly. At least it was somewhat similar to her bladed staff, but she still wished if she could get some practice with it. But the others might don’t have that much time.

Behind her came Flow, looking ahead and continuously fidgeting with Ruthen’s scarf which they kept wrapped around themself – maybe for comfort, or maybe in hopes that it will be enough of a weapon and they don’t have to rely on Singularity after all.

Fourth in row was Cortas, walking in silence and holding their shield and short sword ready. Brakos provided the rearguard behind them, but he kept his sword on his back – it would only hinder him in such a small space. In stark contrast with the other’s tense silence he kept humming to himself all the way, sometimes switching to whistling, then going back to hum another song. It was unclear that he really felt at ease so much or he did it as a trick to defend himself from the Beast’s influence.

The more they walked the weirder Natasha felt. Emaril said that the paths should be safe but she was sure that the forest was still messing with her head. It was like the monotone rhythm of their walk, the crunching leaves under her foot and Brakos’ humming from behind slowly put her in some kind of lucid dream, until the point she felt like she was merely observing herself as she walked and she couldn’t stop even if she wanted. She wanted to try, giving order to her limbs to stop, just to see if they obeyed, but that was stupid. Why would she want to stop now? They were getting close… wait, how did she know that?

From time to time, she heard a loud breath coming from Flow behind her, breaking the mesmerizing timelessness of their march. One time she could swear she even felt the warm exhale tickle the back of her neck, even though Flow wasn’t walked close enough for that to be true and their mouth was covered by their scarf.

Natasha found herself wanting to reach back, grabbing the scarf, or Flow’s lackluster gray hoodie or even their hand – anything, just to make sure that her friend was really there, that they were real, occupying the same time and space as she did. Then, finding those thoughts silly, she gripped her Spear even harder. The silver ornaments of the handle pushed into the flesh of her palm, coldly and almost painfully. That was real enough.

“Still trying to pretend that you’re strong?”

Natasha looked up and saw a young boy in red clothes sitting on a tree nearby ahead. She couldn’t get her legs to stop but even though she kept walking, the boy and the tree never seemed to get any closer, like they slipped back into the forest with every step Natasha took. None of the others seemed to notice him.

Scarlet Wind gave Natasha a cold look.

“You are not. You know that.” he stated matter of factly. “You’re trying to look dangerous so at least those who you can fool leave you alone. But your teeth and claws are fake. The one time you thought you could actually hurt me you immediately dropped your guard and I brought you to your knees.”

“That’s different,” Natasha thought to herself defiantly, as she couldn’t find the strength to actually speak. “Not wanting to kill a child doesn’t make me weak.”

“That’s exactly how weak people think,” Scarlet Wind said, like he could hear every word she thought. “Do you really think that there’s some kind of ethics of killing to follow? That there’s good murder and bad murder? There are only two kinds of people, the ones who can do what needs to be done no matter the consequences and the ones who can’t. And you already know what type you are.”

He suddenly vanished from his tree, just to suddenly show up right before Natasha. He walked backwards behind Emaril as he spoke.

“You accepted long ago that you can’t change anything. It’s coded in the rules of this world that your kind cannot win. You’ve built your whole life around that notion. Without the strength to fight and without the spine to die you settled for survival as the lowest being of this universe. Living in the shadows, scraping for crumbs. Playing lapdog for that bitch, let her dress you and play with you like a doll. So what do you hope from this charade now? You’re leading all these people to their demise.”

He vanished from sight again, and this time Natasha only heard Scarlet Wind’s voice whisper next to her ear.

“And I will eat you all.”

“Stop!” she shouted, suddenly halting her steps. “It’s here.”

Everyone stopped, looking either at Natasha or around themselves. The image of the path melted before their eyes, turning into a small clearing, surrounded by crooked trees. Peeking back the way they were coming from, Flow didn’t see the path anywhere.

“Dammit,” Cortas said under their breath. “We walked right into the illusion and didn’t even notice. It led us straight into its lair.”

“We should have sensed something… it must have gotten much more powerful than we ever realized.” Emaril said, grasping his spear with both hands.

Natasha took a deep breath and stepped ahead as the group spread out behind her.

“Knock-knock!” she said loudly into the dark.

Then she turned back to the others and shrugged.

“I couldn’t think of anything better to say.”

With a shuffling noise, five shadowy figures stepped out from between the trees. Igne, Matis, Bianca, Greg and Chile stopped at the perimeter of the clearing, staring ahead blankly.

“Thankfully, they’re alive,” Flow let out a deep breath. “But… what are those things on them?”

At each of their friends’ neck, they saw a small, grayish-green object, roughly in the shape of an egg, only somewhat bigger. From its side, small tentacles sprouted out, clinging to the teens’ skin at their necks and faces. It looked like a small squid was glued to all of them, pulsating slowly.

“That must be why the Beast became stronger,” Brakos said calmly. “Instead of devouring its victims a whole, it keeps them alive and leeches on their fears, squeezing every bit of power out of them it can.”

Without saying a word or even looking at them, their friends spread out, forming a half-circle before the tree-line. They all seemed to staring aimlessly at the ground. From an empty spot, right in front of Flow and Natasha’s group, a sixth figure stepped ahead, a tall, young looking man wearing a wavy long-coat, with curly blonde hair and horns.

“Well, look at this,” Artemis said. I recruited you two to help everyone, but it looks like all you can do is put more people in danger. That’s a disappointment. I think it’s time you give up your charms so I can find better fit Enchanters to do the job.”

“Flow, can you get those things off of them?” Natasha asked.

“On it. Disentropy!”

Flow felt the energy build up int their Enchant and rushing out in a wave… then it crumbled into nothing as it reached their friends.

“Why? I could counter Poison Rose’s mind-control, at least partially. Why doesn’t it do anything against this?”

The Beast, wearing Artemis’ face smiled a grin way too wide for comfort.

“Do you think I control them? Please, that would be way too crude. I’m only controlling their fears and it’s their fears that control them. Try as you want, you can’t rid of them something that originates from their very soul. It’s part of them.”

“Well then,” Natasha said, raising the Spear and pointing at Artemis. “Guess that leaves one way to solve this.”

Looking at the Spear, Artemis frowned, the first time showing an expression other than arrogance or threat.

“That thing? You got some guts to bring it into my woods.” then his sadistic smile returned. “As a reward, I’ll have your own friends tear you apart. Get her!”

The five teens looked up and with sudden aggression ran at the group.

“I don’t think so!” Brakos said cheerfully as he jumped before Natasha. He caught the running Gregory and Chile and brought them on the ground, trapping each of them under one of his stout arms.

The next quickest was Bianca, stopped by Cortas stepping front of her.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” said the guard, holding their shield and short sword ready. The girl let out a loud scream and jumped at them, flailing her hands madly. She scratched deep marks into Cortas’ face and neck as she tried to get to their eyes. The guard grunted, pushing their shield against Bianca they managed to get her away for now, but the girl continued her assault relentlessly. “For the Celestials’ sake human, calm down!” They looked like someone trying to hold an agitated cat still.

Igne let out a battle cry and jumped into the air, trying to strike a saw-in-the-TV-last-week kung-fu pose mid-air. They flew guts-first into the handle of Emaril’s spear, who hold his weapon horizontally before Natasha to block them.

Igne ungracefully fell on the ground and Emaril quickly bent their right arm and left leg into a position that no matter how much they struggled, they couldn’t get out of his grasp.

“Your resolve is admirable,” the Captain said. “But your technique needs refinement.”

That left Flow to deal with Matis.

“Matis, please, snap out of it!” they tried to reason with their friend. “If we win this, we can all go home safely.”

The boy growled and instead of an answer, jumped at Flow, trying to grab their throat. They dodged deftly and wrapped their scarf around Matis, tying them up safely with a single move.

“I’m sorry. This is for your sake.” Flow said as the boy fell on the ground.

“Liar!” Matis shouted, trying to break free to no avail. “Why can’t you tell me the truth? I thought we were friends!”

Flow frowned with confusion.

“What are you talking about?”

“We hold them off and keep them safe!” Emaril shouted at Natasha. “Go ahead and do what you must.”

The girl nodded, holding the Spear closer to herself.

“Okay.”

She closed her eyes.

The winds of magic rushed through the clearing, quickly escalating into a storm, raging around Natasha who stood seemingly unfazed, holding the Spear. The Beast grimaced angrily and took a step back, covering his stolen face with one hand from the wind.

The black markings appeared again on Natasha’s skin, quickly spreading through her arms and face. Then the wind died down. She opened her eyes, haunting green before pitch black. She smiled.

“That’s more like it!” she said with wild cheer. “This feels much better than the last time.”

She spun the Spear around with confident skill, like she was using it in her whole life.

“No! Why would the Spear accept someone like you?” the fake Artemis spat. “A coward and fraud.”

Natasha’s smile turned into a wide grin, worryingly similar to what the Beast was wearing a moment ago.

“Is that fear I hear in your voice, darling?” she struck the spear ahead and without wasting another moment, ran at the Beast. “You are mine!”

A whip appeared in Artemis’ right hand. He snapped it, tying it around the Spear, Natasha’s hands and both arms. He yanked the whip roughly, trying to pull the girl to the ground. She spun around, retaining her footing, but now her whole body was tied up instead.

Artemis summoned a short sword in his left.

“Silly girls that forgot their place will have their guts spilled!”

He jumped ahead to deliver a lethal cut.

“Outburst!” Natasha called out.

A rush of energy ran through her body, increasing her already enchanted strength threefold. With a single flex of her muscles, she broke free from the magical whip, tearing it into tiny shreds. Artemis was already too close to get the Spear into a good position, so she let go of it with one hand and punched the man in the chest with full force instead.

Time seemed to slow down for a moment as the hit connected and Natasha felt something, bones or something else, crack loudly in the shapeshifter’s body. Then the force of the hit carried the man far away, through the cleaning and right into a tree.

Natasha took a split second to retain her grip on the Spear as the power of Outburst roared around her. It was a dangerous Enchant – hard to control, took a lot of energy in a single use and usually accompanied with a lot of collateral damage – but there was a reason she liked to keep it on herself. If used in the right moment, it was brutally effective.

Not wanting to waste the short-lived power boost, she pushed herself away from the ground, diving through the air toward the Beast.

“Iiiiiiiiiiiiiiii got youuuuuuuuu!” she screamed, sticking the Spear ahead.

Before the Beast could recover from the rough landing, Natasha drove the Spear through his shoulder, nailing him to the tree. Artemis shouted, black ichor splashing from the wound to the forest floor. His head fell forward and his body went limp.

For a moment Natasha was unsure what to do, but then…

“Not yet!”

Suddenly, the Beast’s hand clutched Natasha’s around the Spear and he looked up.

It was a disturbing look. Artemis’ eyes turned into completely black holes. His face almost seemed to melt as black goo leaked from his mouth, creating sticky lines between his lips as he spoke.

“Did you forget Natasha?” he said with a terrifying grin. “You can’t win the loser’s game!”

She pushed his hand away and backed off, pulling out the spear.

“What’s the point‽” the Beast shouted with a distorted screech that now barely reminded of Artemis’ voice. “You were born a looser and you will die a looser. You can’t change your own nature! And even if you could…”

Suddenly, his form shrunk, turning into a short, skinny kid with blonde hair and stained clothes. They might be around the age of ten. They retained the leaking black wound on their shoulder and their face still looked like a wax sculpture left too close to the fireplace.

“… don’t you think it’s too late for it?” they asked gently.

Natasha’s hand trembled with the Spear.

“Drop it,” she whispered.

“What’s wrong?” Nash shook their head seemingly confused. “I thought you wanted to see me. That you wanted to tell me something. Why don’t you go ahead and say it?”

“I said drop it!” she shouted. She held the Spear more tightly, but she couldn’t stop herself from shaking.

“Or what?” they smiled sadly. “You kill me?”

They took a few steps, standing right before the tip of the Spear.

“Go ahead. Not like it matters now.”

Natasha closed her eyes.

“It’s not them. Don’t fall for it, it’s not them!”

She tried to command her arms to thrust, to impale the child with the weapon, but her muscles wouldn’t obey.

“Focus Natasha!” Cortas shouted suddenly, still keeping the frenzied Bianca at bay behind them. “The Beast is weakened from the wound you inflicted. If you strike again, you can end this, right now!”

Natasha opened her eyes and looked at the child, their clothes getting damp in the black blood soaking from their wound.

“I don’t get it,” Nash said, not showing any sign of fear or pain. “Why do you try so hard to be a hero now? It’s not like you can change the past.”

“Natasha!” The alarm went off, echoing through the deserted corridors of Knightfall Center. Nash grabbed at the steel bars that suddenly fell from the ceiling, cutting them off from the girl. They looked at Natasha, a flash of fear on their face.

“You ran away.”

She turned away. She never looked back when she heard the running footsteps of the security. She never looked back at the face of the only friend she ever had.

“You left me.”

She ran.

Nash smiled again.

“I’m not mad at you Nat. I know that’s the kind of person you are. I was even happy that you made it out unscathed. But then what’s different now?

They looked at Flow and the rest of the group struggling with the brain-washed teens.

“What these people do have that’s worth fighting for if I didn’t? You can still survive this. All you have to do is turn around and run. It’s not like their life is your responsibility. They should have known better than to come here.”

Natasha lowered her head. The markings of the Spear faded away from her skin. She twitched her head at the side as a slimy squid-like thing sprouted out of her neck. Soon, wriggling tentacles covered her face.

“You can’t fall for it too!” Flow shouted, still trying to keep the struggling Matis down. “Please, fight it!”

“And with that, guess I win,” the Beast said with satisfaction, reaching out for the Spear.

“Like Crawl!” Cortas grunted.

They pushed Bianca away and dropped their shield, running at the Beast from behind. Before their child-hands could touch the Spear, Cortas stabbed their short sword through their body.

The kid’s whole body twitched and suddenly, without turning around, they faced Cortas who still held the sword’s handle that now stuck out of Nash’s stomach.

“Now, what do we have here?” the Beast asked with a hungry smile.

“I’m not afraid of you,” Cortas spat defiantly.

“You’re really not.” Nash narrowed their eyes, studying them. “What a shame. That means I have no use of you.”

A black, lizard-like tongue snapped out of their open mouth, pecking at Cortas’ neck then retracting immediately.

“Argh!” the guard shouted, holding the wound. In a second, their veins turned black and their skin went pale. Their body fell on the ground twitching.

“Enough of this!” Flow shouted. With a single punch, they knocked Matis out and spun their scarf, throwing it at the Beast.

It took only a moment for them to tear the scarf into pieces, freeing themself, but that still gave Flow some precious seconds. They jumped into the air, calling out

“Singularity!”

A simple knife appeared in their hand with a black handle and silver blade, with no hand guard or any ornaments. But it was glowing with a silvery white light, almost blinding in the gloom of the forest. Flow swung the weapon widely, trying to build up momentum to slash at the Beast.

The small figure jumped ahead and caught Flow by the neck mid-air. Even though they were shorter and much thinner, they had no problem holding them up, squeezing their throat mercilessly.

“What’s up with bad guys choking me?” they thought with a clouding mind as their gasps failed to get any oxygen for their brain.

Nash tore the glowing knife from their hand – and grimaced as it burnt their hand with a sizzling noise, but they raised it to their eyes regardless.

“Interesting.” They let the blade fall into the grass where it vanished. They looked at Flow, then at Natasha, still standing there frozen.

“A Heart of Glow and a Soul of Shadow, together, will announce the new Emperor.” the Beast said with contemplation. Then they lowered Flow a bit, staring into their face. “Could that be the two of you?”

They let out a hoarse laugh.

“If that’s the case, I really hit the jackpot, didn’t I? Devouring two useless, stupid kids like you and the whole world… no, all worlds will fall into my hands.” They licked their mouth. “Guess there’s only one way to find out.”

Tentacles burst out of their hand, covering Flow’s body.

Suddenly, Nash’s body trembled. Their tentacles jerked around without order and they dropped Flow on the ground.

The Beast looked down and saw the head of the Nightmare Spear sticking out of their chest. Behind them, Natasha held the handle of the Spear with a stern look. The squid was still pulsating slowly in her neck, but the black markings returned to her skin and her scleras turned black again.

“Idiot.” the girl said coldly. “The real Nash would have known better than to show me their back.”

She pulled the Spear out.

“They knew me better than anyone else did.”

Slowly and shaking, the Beast turned around, reaching out for the Spear or maybe for the girl.

“They were a thief. And a liar.” Natasha continued. “And I’m sure that they knew way sooner than I did…”

With another thrust, she stabbed the doppelganger in the chest.

“… that I am a murderer.”

The monster wheezed one last time, then fell on the ground. It’s body quickly degraded into black ichor then leaked away somewhere in the ground under the thick grass.

Natasha fell on her knees, shaking. The markings have vanished, but she still clung tightly to the Spear, her hands soaking in black blood.

Struggling, Flow got up on all fours and crawled to her.

“Are you, uh…” it felt like such a stupid question, but they still had to ask. “Are you okay?”

“No.” the girl said simply, staring ahead. “Go, check on the others.”

As Flow hesitated, she looked at them for a moment.

“Please.”

Matis, Igne, Chile, Bianca and Greg were unconscious, but a quick check let Flow know that they all breathed, snuffling away absurdly peacefully after what happened. They let out a relieved sigh. It looked like with the Beast’s demise all the squids turned into black goo. Emaril and Brakos laid down the knocked out teens next to each other in the tall grass.

The two men were now kneeling next to Cortas and looking that way Flow’s stomach sank. They stepped to them and looked down at the guard.

Their veins turned completely black from the Beast’s poison, with the rest of their skin being almost blue. Their head turned to the side, with open but completely empty eyes.

“Please,” Flow said quietly. “Let me try.”

Without a word, the two warriors gave space to them.

Flow knelt down and raised their shaking hands over the body, silently wishing for a miracle.

“Disentropy!”

The magical light covered Cortas, but went away almost immediately, like their power failed to find anything to fix.

“Why?” they asked, closing their eyes tightly. “I can fix whole buildings, once I healed a man with a hole in his skull. Why can’t I help them?”

It wasn’t really a question aimed at anyone, but Brakos put a giant hand on their shoulder.

“It’s all right pup. Their soul already joined the Astra, you can’t just drag it back and plug it into their body. You’d need a god for that.”

Flow’s body shook as hot tears ran down on their face.

“I’m so sorry.”

Emaril sighed. He knelt down and closed Cortas’ eyes. Then he got his cloak off of his shoulder and covered the guard’s body. Only after that he spoke, only with tiredness and some regret in his voice.

“There’s no need to be. It was our fight and you were the ones who got dragged into it, not the other way around. Cortas was hotheaded and brash but they knew the danger and accepted it with pride. It’s a tragedy, yes, but we saw many of those thanks to the Beast. Knowing Cortas, I think they would take it with content if they were told that they would be the last victim.”

Flow tried to stop, but their body kept shaking with crying. Scratching his head helplessly, Emaril crouched down next to them, slapping their back clumsily.

“It’s… it’s all right. Everything will be fine. I promise.”

“What now?” Flow asked, struggling to swallow their tears.

The man sighed.

“Normally? You would return to the Halls – not as prisoners but as heroes. There would be a feast and days of celebration, for the honor of the Beast Slayer…” he looked toward Natasha, still sitting silently and motionlessly next to the spot where the Beast perished. “But honestly, that just doesn’t feel right. You are children. None of you should have experience any of this. I wish I could do anything to make it up to you, but I don’t think keeping you from home any longer would achieve anything good. And besides, it would be the best if the rest of your friends only remembered this as a dream.”

Flow nodded silently in agreement.

The man pulled something from under his tunic. It looked like a carved wooden charm.

“With full authorization from the Royal Guardian, I deem your quest complete and release you from the Dreamlands.” He recited with little emotion, as he gave the charm to Flow. “And also… thank you for your help.”

He pointed at the charm.

“You should have no problem using it, it works similarly to your Enchants. When you’re ready, just think of it and you’ll be home.”

“Thanks,” Flow said tonelessly. They stood up and looked back at the two men. They remembered how both of them and even Cortas refused to fight back seriously against their friends, that they rather risked giving the Beast enough time to get to them than hurting the strangers who come to their land uninvited. They licked their lips, trying to figure out anything to say.

“You’re…” they hesitated. “You’re good people, you know? I’m happy I ran into you. I just wish it went differently from there.”

They walked back to Natasha. She was still sitting in the grass, staring ahead blankly.

“That bitch.” she said without turning around as she heard Flow’s steps. “She led us on.”

She raised her hand, showing the Nightmare Spear to Flow.

Or at least whatever left of it. Its head cracked and the handle turned to dust as they were looking.

“No wonder nobody remembers the last time anybody used it,” she said sourly. “Looks like the legends left out the part that it’s a one-shot thing.”

She looked up at Flow.

“Which means we have nothing against the Sorcerer. It was all for nothing.”

Flow blinked and looked away, unsure what to say. Then they answered.

“No, it wasn’t.”

They heard muffled moaning and pointed to the spot where some of the others slowly started to move around in their sleep. Igne unconsciously threw their arm over Gregory’s face, which made the boy squirm around until his head touched Chile’s. Then he calmed down and seemed to fall back into sleep.

“We’ll deal with the Sorcerer, eventually,” Flow said. “For now, let’s just go home.”

Natasha looked at Flow and nodded. She let go off the remains of the Spear, which crumpled into dust on the ground. They walked over where their friends were lying on the ground, and Flow raised the wooden charm.

With a flash of light, the Dreamlands vanished from their view.

<> 

“Ugh,” Flow groaned drowsily as their eyes opened. They found themself in a world of orange, unable to see anything else.

They felt hard floor under their body and as they moved their head, their vision suddenly cleared and it became obvious what happened. As Trance put the group asleep, they fell on the floor, probably followed in a split second by Natasha sitting next to them, and her ginger locks covered up their face.

In fact, a handful of hair was still stick to a blot of saliva on Flow’s face – they couldn’t help but whenever they were really tired, they always drooled in their sleep. Feeling embarrassed, they quickly wiped the hair away and sat up, just as the girl started to move too.

“What the-” she tried to sit up too, but she was quickly stopped by the weight of a green-haired head, lying on her stomach.

The sudden movement shook Bianca to her senses too.

“Huh, what happened?” she looked around and it took a second for her to realize that she was half lying on top of Natasha.

“Oh my god! I’m so sorry!” She quickly jumped up and pulled away rom her. “I must have dozed off.”

They were back in the dance room. Igne was lying prone, face-down in the middle of the circle. Matis was curled up at their feet, around his original sitting spot, hugging the pillow he was sitting on earlier. Gregory and Chile seemed to be cuddling in their sleep – it was quite cute.

In a minute, everyone woke up on their own.

“Wow, did we really just… all fell asleep?” Gregory asked. “That’s some impressive meditation technique Flow.”

He chuckled, but there was an air of confusion in the room.

“We were probably just really tired,” Natasha shrugged, trying to play it off nonchalantly. “There was a lot of stuff going on lately.”

“Hey, that reminds me… did it work?” Igne turned toward Greg. “Did you have any weird dreams?”

Flow clenched their teeth nervously. Of course they wanted to know how much did the others remember, but they would have preferred to talk to them separately. If they start to share their experiences right here and turns out they had a shared dream, there was no way to cover up that something supernatural happened. But objecting would be really suspicious too.

“I’m not sure… actually I don’t remember dreaming anything,” Greg shrugged. “Guess that’s good?”

Nobody else added anything. Flow remembered that you’re only supposed to remember your last dream and only if you wake up from it. The others were unconscious before returning while they and Natasha were awake – maybe that’s why only they remembered, or maybe it had something to do with their Enchants, Flow wasn’t sure.

But how did it work? It looked like they have simply fallen asleep and their bodies were in the same position since then. Only their mind traveled? It looked like they could get hurt. What would have happened if anyone…?

Suddenly Cortas’ body flashed into their mind and they quickly stopped that train of thought.

“Wait, is it getting dark out there?” Bianca asked, looking at her phone. Then her face went pale. “We were sleeping here for three hours? I was supposed to get home by six.”

She jumped up, quickly grabbing her purse.

“Thanks for inviting me, it was fun to, uh, sleep? See you guys tomorrow.”

They quickly got their scattered bags, with some people helping Chile to clean up the pillows. Soon everybody was ready to leave. By a sudden pulse, Flow called for Matis as he was about to go.

“Huh?” the boy looked up.

“I just wanted to ask…” but they weren’t sure what. They couldn’t just ask what he meant when he was controlled by the Dream Beast. “I don’t know, are you all right? You just seem… bothered.”

Matis blinked.

“I’m fine. What do you mean, did I do anything weird?”

“N-no, it was just a hunch. I’m glad you’re okay.” It would feel wrong to push him about something he said under influence and couldn’t even remember. For all Flow knew, the Beast could show Matis anything that made him upset with them. And if there was something really going on… Flow really hoped Matis would open up to them eventually if they gave him the chance.

“Actually, can I still take on your offer?” Flow asked. “About helping me with studying. I got stuck on this book report pretty hard.”

“Well sure, but wasn’t Natasha helping you?” Matis looked at the girl.

“Huh?” it took for her a moment to connect the dots and catch on. “Yeah, sure, but I hated this book last year. Eighty-eight pages about the ashcen civilization and it’s all wallowing about how we don’t actually know anything about them – how are you supposed to do a report on that? So yeah, if you could help out Flow there that would be great.”

Flow gave her a surprised look and she barely visibly shrugged.

“Okay, sure,” Matis said. “Let’s talk about it tomorrow lunch break. There’s still lots of time before the deadline, I don’t think we should have any issues.”

With that, he left too, leaving Flow and Natasha alone in the corridor before the dance room. They shouldn’t linger much longer though, the building would be closing soon.

“How did you know that we were reading the ashcen book?” Flow raised an eyebrow.

“I saw you reading it the other day and remembered it from last year,” she shrugged. “But if you’re going to tell others that I’m tutoring you then you should keep me updated about your studies. We barely dodged that bullet.”

Flow nodded and sighed.

“And now what? Will we just… pretend that all that was a dream?”

Natasha shook her head.

“Hell no. It’s exactly like you said, we weren’t told what we were getting into. I want answers.” She frowned. “And we know only one place to get them.”

<> 

Artemis pulled the teabag from the richly decorated porcelain cup, depicting a blossoming tree. He kept the bag hanging in the air for a moment, until the last drops of tea fell back into the cup, then quickly disposed of it into a tiny silver bin next to the teapot. He stirred the steaming tea a few times, then carefully raised the cup to his lips, tasting the hot drink carefully, before setting it back on the table.

“So you have met the Royal Blood,” he said eventually. “That wasn’t something I’ve been expecting to happen.”

“Maybe it wouldn’t if we knew that they’re even exist.” Natasha said. She tried to keep a neutral tone, but there was an edge to her voice she couldn’t quite hide.

“You’re right,” Artemis nodded. “Humans weren’t able to cross to the Dreamlands in centuries and we failed to take it into account that the Sorcerer’s machinations might change that. Because of that, we didn’t warn you about the danger in time, I’m really sorry.”

Natasha didn’t seem impressed, she just frowned at those words.

“So is there anything else you failed to tell us about?”

Nox was sitting before a plate of untouched cookies. He was looking from the kids at Artemis then back, but he didn’t add anything to the conversation since the two finished their tale.

“Well, yes,” Artemis answered simply. “There are many, many things we couldn’t tell you about yet.”

Natasha’s face flashed with anger and her grip tightened on the armrest of her seat. Even Flow couldn’t hide an upset frown at those words.

“However it’s not because we’re trying to keep you in the dark on purpose.” Artemis continued in the same calm tone.

I’m sorry Nat. I promise, one day I’ll tell you in a way that makes sense to you.

“What does that supposed to mean?” the girl demanded with a snarl.

“It’s pretty simple actually,” Nox said. “Art and I were living among humanity for the last eight hundred years. Witnessed many things that are history for you in real time, including even things that your kind already forgot about. To put it lightly, it’s a lot.”

“Flow, Natasha,” Artemis continued. “You must understand that you are living in a much larger world than you could ever imagine. Your world, and I don’t only mean this planet but the entirety of the material universe, is only part of a reality with a scope beyond what I could start to describe here. There are words both above and below ours, worlds next to us and worlds overlapping with ours. Then there are several other realities throughout the Cosmos, following rules what might confuse even the most powerful beings of our world. Only getting you started on the basics could take us years while the Sorcerer and his warlocks on the loose.”

“We are pretty much winging this on they fly,” Nox said. “Trying to teach you as much as you need to survive and continue to your mission. We know it’s hard on you. We’re trying to make it easier and sometimes we fail. All we can promise is to try even harder the next time.”

“So what you’re saying is,” Flow said, fidgeting with the Cloud Enchant. “that you simply can’t tell us everything you know, because it’s too much for us to understand, so we have to accept your judgment on what’s important enough to tell? Even though you admit that your judgment isn’t faultless, it’s either this or we quit and gave up the chance to help avoid a disaster?”

“You’re smart people,” Natasha said flatly. “I’m sure you get it how anyone would feel about this.”

Artemis exchanged a look with Nox, then leaned ahead in his chair.

“I understand that you trusted us and that trust suffered a heavy blow today. So how about this?”

He opened his commode and placed the familiar box holding the Enchants on the table. He solemnly put his hand at the top of the box and the silver adornments on the dark wood lit up with a bright light.

“I, Artemis Holmes, member of the Order of the Enchanters bind myself in a magical Contract. I swear upon this pledge that I will never purposefully withhold information from you, Natasha and Flow. Should you ask me a question, I will answer truthfully, to the best of my knowledge and avoid omitting information for the purpose of fooling or deceiving you. I cannot withdraw this Contract unless you willingly free me from it. Should I ever willingly break it, I shall lose my place in the Order, my control over the Enchants and my ability to cast magic.”

The lights slowly died down, leaving only a heavy feel of tension in the room. Nox hummed to himself but didn’t show any particular reaction to what Artemis just did.

“I hope that will suffice for now,” Artemis said with a reserved smile. “Now that you know you can take my word, why don’t you go ahead and ask your questions?”

Flow and Natasha looked at each other for a moment, before turning back to the man.

“Where were we?” Flow asked simply.

“The Slumbering Wilderness,” Artemis said. “One of several worlds in the Higher Realms, together called the Dreamlands.”

“By Higher Realms, we refer to places with inherently more magic than the Human World has,” Nox added. “There are also the Lower Realms which are the exact opposite. Humans of the past crafted the model of the World Tree to make it easier to understand. Places like the Slumbering Wilderness are the closest to this world so to speak, acting like as an inter-dimensional borderland.”

“The Dreamlands are like a federation or alliance between several worlds across the Higher Realms. It’s governing body is what we call the Royal Blood – or, as your kind called them long ago, the Dreamfolk or the Fae.”

Natasha raised an eyebrow skeptically.

“Fairies? Are you saying that those people were… fairies.”

Apparently, while magic and magical worlds were acceptable, even she had her limits.

“Their image has… changed in your culture in the past centuries.” Nox said. “Anyway, if you ever ran into them again, don’t call them that face to face. But yes, they were the original inspiration for the idea of fairies.”

“We mistfolk are all coming from the Dreamlands,” Artemis continued. “We came here when the Royal Blood was an ally to this world and some of us worked together with humans to found the Order of the Enchanters. When the peace broke between our people and the Order was officially disbanded, some of us chose to stay behind to keep protecting this world.”

“That didn’t make us too popular with the Royal Blood,” Nox added. “From their point of view, humans have betrayed their alliance. Protecting them further was siding ourselves with traitors. There’s a complex system of magical Contracts to ensure that the people of the Dreamlands won’t come to the Human World and that humans won’t go to the Dreamlands. However, there’s a loophole. The Mistworld doesn’t belong to neither, but it closely overlaps with the Human World. Long story short, the Royal Blood allowed us to stay and keep a close look on the humans but by doing so we had to give up the right to enter the Higher Realms.”

“So… you’re stuck in the middle?” Flow asked. “You can’t live in the Human World anymore, but you also can’t go back where you were coming from… that sounds terrible.”

“It’s not that bad, really,” Artemis smiled. “As Nox said, we were like this for a very long time. During those centuries what started out as exile became our normal life. We stayed to keep the Order of the Enchanters alive, so that’s what we’re doing. We protect places like this shop, where ordinary people could slip through the worlds and encounter dangerous things. We fight back dangers threatening from the Lower Realms. The only thing that I truly detest about it that I’m helpless against the Sorcerer and that we have to put this responsibility on your shoulders.”

“Talking about the Sorcerer,” Natasha said. “They said he’s the one that pitted humans and your folk against each other back then. Didn’t you think that would be important enough to tell us?”

“Well yeah,” Flow said, scratching their head. “All this time, we thought we were up against a human being, not some ancient magical terror.”

“Honestly, we did consider that possibility, but it just seemed too unlikely,” Nox said. “The person behind the Mistfall didn’t show up in eight hundred years, it seemed to stand to reason that she was a human and died sometimes after the events. Everything pointed to that we’re dealing with a new threat.”

“Well, Miss Forest Witch was pretty sure that it’s the same.”

“That means we should reconsider our assumptions,” Artemis said. “Even though they’re locked out from your world, the Royal Blood still have much more power and resources than we do. And while she got a strong temper, under the surface Lady Serafine is reasonable and dangerously clever. She wouldn’t throw around assumptions like that if she didn’t have a reason to believe them.”

“That changes things,” Nox sighed. “We already knew that the Sorcerer was dangerous but this means he was around for centuries and managed to avoid our attention. To reveals himself now… who knows what does he plan and how long he been planning it? The stakes might be even higher than we thought.”

“Great,” Natasha said, sinking into her chair. “Guess that means more training tomorrow.”

<> 

As usual when leaving the Ghost District, the tramcar was almost empty, only Flow and Natasha sat against each other in a double seat. They could have taken the roofs but they both felt taped out for the day. They stared ahead of them, trying to digest everything.

“A Heart of Glow and a Soul of Shadow.” Flow said suddenly, breaking the silence.

“Huh?” Natasha looked up, staring at them in confusion.

“It was something the Dream Beast said,” Flow explained. “A Heart of Glow and a Soul of Shadow, together, will announce the new Emperor. The Beast said it might be talking about us. I wanted to ask Artemis but completely forgot… it sounded important.”

“I’m sure we can dig into it later,” the girl said, exhaustion pouring from her voice. “It was a very long day.”

Flow nodded.

“So, uh…” they hesitated. “If you don’t wanna talk about it that’s okay, I won’t pry. But the kid the Beast copied…”

She stayed silent for a moment.

“Nash. They’re someone I… used to know.”

The girl stared out of the window, but Flow was unsure if that meant she considered the topic closed.

“Your friend?” they risked.

“I guess so,” she shrugged. “But maybe partners in crime would be a better way to put it.”

“Crime?”

She sighed.

“It was back when I was in social care, you know? Things got a little bit better lately thanks to the funds from the Knightfall Foundation, but at that time, the city was at the verge of collapsing. They put as little into social services as they could, so if you weren’t old enough to work and wanted a decent meal every now and then, you either had to be big and strong, or quick and sneaky. Me and Nash… we were the latter.”

“I don’t get it why are you so cocky. All you ever do is run away, just like me.”

Nash grinned.

“And isn’t that the best superpower?”

“How so?”

“They were… annoying. Always did stupid stuff that would get them into trouble. And somehow, they always railed me up to it too.”

“People like us don’t have anything, right?” they said.

“Yeah, and?”

“That means they can’t take anything from us. Nothing, except your life. But they can’t do that if you always run away, if you can hide from them. As long they can’t get you, you can get anything from them. That’s how you play the loser’s game.”

“A game? And how you win?”

“You don’t. That’s the point. You lost before the game even started. But that means you don’t have to play by the rules. You can focus on having as much fun as you can before it’s over. You can do anything.”

They blew on their closed fist and opened it, showing Natasha two candies hidden in their palm.

“Even magic.”

The girl snorted, but she took one of the candies and quickly opened it.

“Then one day we got into trouble together. And we weren’t quick enough to get away.”

“Nash!” The alarm went off, echoing through the deserted corridors of Knightfall Center. Natasha ran up to the bars separating them from her friend.

“There must be another way to this corridor,” she said. “I go around, meet up with you then we search for an exit.”

“No,” Nash said. “You go for the exit, now. I’ll go around and find another way out.”

“I won’t leave you here,” the girl said firmly.

They smiled.

“Did you forget Nat? How do you play the lo-”

“It’s not a game!” she snapped. “Stop messing around and let me help you!”

“I’m faster than you,” they said simply. “There’s no point risking both of us. If there’s a way, I’ll find it.”

Natasha didn’t answer, her fingers turned white as her grip tightened around the bars. The distant shouts of security reached their ears.

“Hey. Do you still have it?”

She looked up. Then she reached for her neck and pulled a small pendant from under her shirt.

“I knew you will keep it,” Nash grinned. “Do me a favor, okay Natasha? Stay in the game. If you do, one day I’ll show you real magic.”

The girl didn’t say anything. She let go off the bar and turned around.

She ran.

“Of course they caught me anyway,” Natasha said. “A Civil Guard patrol saw me ran away from the building and they took me in. I was looking into a lot of trouble but then like in a stupid movie, Agatha Alexton showed up at the guard station. She made a big speech that punishment wasn’t what I needed and that a safe, nurturing home would help me more to change my ways. It was an award-winning performance, really. At the time even I thought she must be pretty okay for someone with that much money. She brought me home, to her home, and in a few days the papers were done for my adoption. No questions asked about the trespassing I committed.”

“And Nash?” Flow asked.

“They weren’t so lucky. I learned this much later, but they were caught by the private security then transferred to the gendarmy.”

“What, for sneaking into a public building after closing?” Flow asked in disbelief. “You were children!”

“I don’t know,” Natasha shook her head. “Apparently the Knightfall Foundation have some high ties with the government. I don’t know what do they do behind closed doors that they were this paranoid about we sneaking in. All I know why Nash wanted to bring me there… they said they would show me something. Something that would finally make me believe them.”

“About what?” Flow asked.

Natasha looked up, looked them right in the eyes.

“That magic is real.”

She waited a moment so that could sink in. Flow opened their mouth but didn’t say anything.

“I always thought that they were either delusional or yanking my chain, even though I never could tell which one. But after everything lately… well, obviously I’m taking a double-take. I want answers Flow. I don’t care where from.”

“Did you talk to Nash since then?” they asked quietly. Natasha shook her head.

“The last thing I heard that they ended up in one of those ‘behavior correctional institutes’… it’s a fancy name for jail for minors. We were often threatened to be sent there if we didn’t behave. The staff is often abusive and they won’t protect you from people like Richard either.

“When I learned that Nash was there, I asked my adoptive mother to let me visit them. I hoped that if she could help me then we could help them too. But she said no and that I didn’t need influence like that in my life.

“I got angry. I told her that Nash was caught for the exact same thing I did and if I deserved a second chance then they should have it too. But she said that was different and refused to explain why.

“I couldn’t accept it, so… one night, I sneaked out of the house. I don’t know what I was thinking. My plan was pretty much to go to see Nash on my feet and figure out the rest when I’m there. I ended up living on the street for a short time. Stole some stuff when I ran out of food. Then they found me and brought me back.

“Mrs. Alexton was furious. I tried to explain that I wasn’t trying to run away from home, not really, but she wouldn’t listen. I never understood why someone like her wanted to adopt a kid anyway. She never seemed interested to spend time with me or get to know me better other than overlooking my studies and nagging me to do better. Guess it was a PR trick of shorts. She made a big show of taking me in, making herself the saver of orphans or something like that. She said that by escaping I made her look like a negligent mother. She called me ungrateful and a delinquent.

“Then, I was pretty much a prisoner at home. I was never left alone, there was always around from the staff, checking on me. I was only allowed to leave with escort, and only for prescheldued events. I didn’t even have a key to the house. She only loosened my leash when I entered high school. Her business got hit by the warlocks pretty hard last year so right now she’s traveling to move the center of her interests outside of the city. She must think that taking me would be a bother and that she broke me in enough the last years so I wouldn’t cause more trouble. So I have some slack, for now.”

She talked calmly, but Flow noticed her hand, gripping tightly at the railing next to her seat. They wanted to say something. They knew there were official ways to deal with abusive parents and being an adoptive parent probably could make it an even bigger deal. But Flow didn’t know the system and even if they did, they had a hunch that if you had more money than god, like Agatha Alexton did, then those usual rules didn’t really apply to you.

They wanted to help her somehow, but couldn’t say anything useful. Without thinking, they felt their hand move, reaching out for Natasha’s, still clutching the railing.

The girl winced and she yanked her hand back before Flow could touch her. She held her lower arm raised ahead of herself in a clearly defensive manner. Her fist opened, and Flow could see four tin scars on her palm, short, slightly arched lines, like she was clenching her fist too tightly sometimes in the past, to the point where her fingernails dug into her flesh.

“I… I’m sorry.”

Natasha relaxed, letting her hand fall into her lap.

“It’s okay. I… appreciate what you do, really.”

“I don’t feel like I’m doing much,” Flow admitted.

“Then you’re wrong,” the girl said simply. “Since Nash, I didn’t really have anyone I could trust with anything. Guess I got out of practice of how to do it. But that doesn’t mean that it’s not good, I just…”

She looked away.

“I’m just afraid when I will let you down too.”

< ⋁ >

Nox opened a small cabinet and took out an ornate rounded bottle with long neck. He pulled out the cork, releasing the smell of honey and spices into the room. He filled two small glasses with the fragrant drink, putting one ahead of Artemis and the other for himself as he sat back to the table.

“That was rough. Are you sure that Contract was a good idea? These things have a habit to come back to bite you.”

Saying so, he absentmindedly scratched one of the crystals embedded in his gray skin.

“I know. I’ll pay the price if it comes to it,” Artemis said tiredly, taking a sip from his drink. “We can’t afford to be divided right now.”

“Because of the Sorcerer?” Nox asked. “Or because of Natasha’s soul?”

The blonde man swore under his breath.

“I still can’t believe it that Serafine gave the Spear to a child.”

“Are that much different from her?” Nox asked. “We recruited these children and sending them into war against actual murderers. However sinister this power is, honestly I don’t think we have the right to ask Natasha not to use it if it gives them a better shot at survival. And I don’t think she would listen anyway.”

Artemis gave him a gentle look.

“You sound resigned. Should I worry?”

“I’m just having a mood,” Nox waved him off. “It will pass. Sometimes I just realize that we’re actually two fools clinging to an idea from almost a millennium ago. Then I shrug it off and keep going because that’s the right thing to do.”

“Do you think we are outdated?” Artemis smiled.

“Not the idea. But for us… you’re not allowed to quote me on this, but sometimes, just a bit, I feel old.”

Artemis stood up and walked over to him. He sat on Nox’s lap and hugging his neck gave a kiss to his cheek.

“You know that I’d have given up on this a long ago if we weren’t in it together, right?”

“Yes, I know.” Nox said.

“You’re right. We can’t tell Flow and Natasha how to fight this battle. But I still want to make sure that we give them all the chances we can, so they only have to fall back on that power when it’s absolutely necessary.”

“I was afraid you’re going to say that,” Nox groaned. “Guess there’s no way around it, huh? We have to involve her. I really hoped we could avoid this.”

“Come on, she’s not that bad,” Artemis chuckled. “Well, at least not all the time.”

“I was wondering when you two will fail so utterly that you’d give up your pride and ask for my help,” spoke a hoarse feminine voice. “But it happened earlier than I imagined.”

From the chair Artemis left empty a moment ago, a big, dark tabby cat looked at them, its tail slowly swinging in the air.

“Hey Narwia,” Artemis greeted the cat in a chatting tone. “For how long were you spying on us?”

“For how long you had the impression that I wasn’t?”

The cat arched its back and its shape changed. In a moment a humanoid feline stretched her arms, sitting in Artemis’ chair. She kept the tabby fur form her other form and was wearing a mint green sleeveless shirt and some torn jeans with a long leather jacket.

“All right, I will do it,” she announced. “I will train your little proteges. They seem surprisingly tough so far.”

She grinned, flashing her predatory teeth.

“They will probably survive the first day.”