Lucky Rabbit

Carl didn’t touch Thaniel. Instead, he pulled up the chair and sat beside the bed, staring at the boy’s sleeping face. Thaniel was smiling, as he so often did – a fact which only made this worse, because Pandy actually felt slightly guilty at how much she wanted him to wake up.

Several long beats of silence dragged by as the man traced the child’s sleeping features with his gaze. Just as Pandy was getting ready to do… something, the air started to feel heavy. It wasn’t unpleasant, at least not to Pandy. Something like a particularly large and dense blanket being tucked in around her. Or at least like she imagined that would feel, since she didn’t actually have any memories of being tucked.

At the same time, a now-familiar sense of refreshing coolness surrounded her. Carl’s breath began to plume in tendrils of twisting fog, but he didn’t move. Behind him, Healer Sinnett’s mammoth mustache developed ice crystals beneath his nose, and he gave a single, full-body shiver, but he didn’t try to back away.

“No one wants to leave happy dreams,” Carl said conversationally, gaze still locked onto Thaniel’s face. “So without the original mage, the best way to end this spell is to change those dreams to nightmares. But if you go too far, you risk breaking the victim’s mind.”

Something like a mask slipped over his face. His skin paled, and his brown eyes darkened to black, the color spreading to cover the sclera in a tarnished silver shell. When he spoke again, the space within his mouth contained only shadows, and he produced no breath to turn to frigid vapor.

“No dreams of toys and games for this one,” he said, voice hollow and oddly distant. “He has suffered true loss, and seeks to forget it.” The strange gaze flicked back toward Sinnett. “Risky. I also see-”

His brows drew together, and he reached out with fingers that were a bit too long, tapered to narrow, inhuman tips. Pressing these digits against Thaniel’s cheek, he murmured, “There’s a memory block here. Made by someone who knew what they were doing. But it’s old, and beginning to break.” He gasped, pulling back, and all the strangeness drained from him in a single breath.

Standing, he spun to face the healer, who looked startled at the abrupt shift. “If that block breaks now, so will the boy’s mind,” Carl said bluntly. “There’s something terrible behind it, and it would spawn a nightmare that would wake him, yes, but I’ve seen full-grown adults shatter beneath less pain than lurks in this child.”

Turning back to Thaniel, he frowned, reaching out once more, this time with hands that looked entirely normal – slightly swollen knuckles and square fingernails, a bit of dirt visible beneath a few. Just before he could touch the spot where the heartstone lay concealed beneath Thaniel’s blanket and clothes, Healer Sinnett caught his wrist, which was good, because Pandy was going to have to intercede, and Bite seemed like an overreaction.

Carl stared at the healer, then shrugged and pulled his hand back. “It doesn’t matter to me, Quenten, but whatever is under there is anchoring the memory block, which is why it’s lasted this long. I could refresh the spell, hold that memory in place until he’s old enough to deal with it, but not without figuring out what’s going on.”

He stepped back, sighing. “I can’t help while the original block is about to fail, but I might be able to repair the spell enough to last until he’s ready to deal with it. Not that it matters, unless someone is willing to pay to keep him here for at least,” he eyed Thaniel’s small form, “four more years.”

Healer Sinnett hesitated, then shook his head as he moved to stand between Carl and the bed. “Then that’s something we know now. I’d hoped this would be easy, but of course it’s not, and I can’t make any decisions without consulting the family. Thank you, Carl.”

Carl shrugged, then grimaced, rubbing his side gingerly. “Not the way I’d hoped to get some time off, and not the way I’d hoped to spend it,” his voice took on wry amusement, “but at least now the best Nature elementalist in Knightmere owes me a favor.”

The healer chuckled. “I don’t know about the best. I’m not the Royal Healer, after all, but I have a poultice for you that should help that burn finish healing without further scarring.” He took a packet from his pocket and passed it over to Carl, who accepted it with a grateful nod. “Apply twice a day, no more, no less, and completely change the dressing every time.”

Pandy found herself with a conundrum. Now that she knew Carl was injured, her instinct was to heal him. But if she healed him, he would definitely know something was up. A good something, but she had a feeling that whatever he thought she was – cough, a Demon?, cough – wasn’t usually good at healing, and she really didn’t want to attract any more attention to herself.

The moment slipped away as the two men returned to the door, with Sinnett admonishing Carl to rest and take care of himself, and Carl saying he’d been doing exactly that until Sinnett’s message arrived, then they were gone and Pandy was alone with Thaniel. Alone, and with quite a bit more information than she’d had before.

So, there was a third way to break this spell. Or maybe it was an extension of the second way? The original mage could release the sleeper, or the sleeper could choose to wake. But another Dark mage – and she had no doubt that was what Carl was, even without the comforting flood of Dark Aura, which was another interesting thing she’d have to think about – another Dark mage could also change the dream to a nightmare, which should get the dreamer to wake, lickity-split.

Now, the real question was, could Pandy do the same? Or, better yet, craft a dream that just wasn’t quite as enticing as whatever Thaniel was currently dreaming. After all, there was a large gap between a flying dream and a falling one. Maybe Pandy could bore Thaniel to wakefulness? She’d had a great deal of recent experience with boredom, after all. Maybe she could just send him her own viewpoint, which would just be like an out-of-body experience to him, given that she was literally lying on him.

After a quick glance around, Pandy crept up toward Thaniel’s head, staring at his face just as Carl had done. Then she focused on communicating with him, pushing her thoughts out like she did when speaking to Keros. she thought as loudly as she could.

There was no reaction. She tried again, and this time Thaniel giggled. Giggled! Then she realized her whiskers were tickling his cheek, moved away, and the laughter subsided. Well, but maybe tickling would work, too? Though surely if there was a solution as simple as tickle-torture, someone would have figured it out before now. Still, Pandy shifted back up, wiggling her nose so her whiskers brushed along his jawline. Little snorts of laughter emerged from Thaniel’s nose, but his eyes never flickered.

Pandora?

What are you doing?

Oh. Yes. She wasn’t actually alone, was she? she told the god, only slightly flustered. This was Keros after all. He’d seen her do far worse… or at least stranger.

Oh.

That’s not an entirely bad idea.

I don’t think you can yell loud enough to reach him, though.

Pandy ignored the god’s pessimism, continuing to try to wake Thaniel until her nose was pressed to his, and even her mental ‘voice’ was hoarse. Finally, however, Pandy deflated with a sigh, a beaten bunny balloon bubble bursting. She felt like she was on the right track, but this wasn’t working. Wasn’t doing anything. She closed her eyes, thinking.

Light magic wouldn’t work. That was all right, Pandy didn’t actually have Light magic anyway. Pandy had Dark magic, because she was a Dark elemental. The Darkest of elementals. She was Dark, and the heartstone was Dark, and the spell keeping Thaniel asleep was Dark, and they needed a Dark mage to wake Thaniel up, and… 

She sat up abruptly, paws braced on Thaniel’s chin. But she had the edge of it now, and she wasn’t going to let go until she pried it loose. Because they didn’t need a Dark mage, did they? They needed a Dark elementalist, because what they really needed was a Dark elemental. And obviously Carl had one of those, but he, himself, wasn’t one, so he had to tell that elemental what to do, but no one had to tell Pandy what to do, because Pandy knew. Pandy knew.

She thought about a spell she hadn’t used in quite a while – Innate Magic. Pandy’s Innate Magic was Dark, and once she’d understood that, she’d been a little bit afraid to use it. But people… humans used their innate magic all the time. Pandy herself had used her spell something like two thousand times, without any effect. Of course, the one time it did work, it also used all of her Mana and terrified Saskia. But that was when she was trying to do something Dark magic wasn’t good at.

Still, this was Thaniel, not a fraying sleeve, so Pandy thought,

I… don’t know.

You might be able to take control of it, but you also might get sucked into it.

It might take all of your magic, and become even stronger.

Well, that last one wasn’t good, but the first one was exactly what she was hoping for.

It’s possible, I suppose.

I don’t know that I would-

But Pandy wasn’t listening. Pandy was using magic. Real magic, not a spell or skill defined and controlled by the System. The magic that was just a part of her, or at least a part of Demon Queen Asparagus. She was going to save Thaniel, again, and this time she was going to do it with the power of Darkness.

she thought, feeling almost confident for once. This was right. This was going to work. This was-

Innate Magic successful.

Conflict detected.

Target currently occupied by active magic.

Resolution initiated.

Someone punched Pandy in the gut. Then they did it again, but with intent. She gave an involuntary squeak as every speck of air was forced out of her lungs. She didn’t need it, per se, but it still felt very odd to be hollowed out so thoroughly.

Resolution failed.

Integration begun.

Wait, integration? Who was integrating with what now? Pandy had a very bad feeling that she’d messed up somewhere.

Integration complete.

Maybe next time be more specific.

Whoops. Pandy blinked.

She blinked.

“Bunny!” Fingers encircled her chest, lifting her into the air. Pandy’s legs kicked, then stilled as she was snuggled into a very familiar embrace. Thaniel. She’d found him. Or rather, he’d found her. Holding her slightly away from him, Thaniel grinned down at her. “I’ve been lookin’ for you everywhere!”

Pandy stared. This was Thaniel as she’d never seen him. His skin still showed that he spent plenty of time outside, but his curls were shorter, brushed neatly out of his face. He wore blue shorts and a simple white shirt, but it was almost clean, with only a single small brown stain on the front. The top two buttons of the shirt were undone, revealing his collarbones and just a bit of his chest. His unblemished chest. Not a single scar could be seen.

She shook her head, ears flippety-flopping. No, this wasn’t Real Thaniel. This was Dream Thaniel. Somehow, Pandy had entered his dream. That was what the System meant by ‘Integration’. Honestly, how didn’t even matter though. What mattered was that she was here, and she could finally talk to him.

Pandy thought.

There was no answer. It wasn’t even the pointed silence that indicated the System was unhappy with her. It was just… nothing. Pandy felt a chill run down her spine. she thought. Nothing.

Pandy had no System.