Chapter Text
I must remember
What died into April
And consider what will be born
Of a fair November;
And April I love for what
It was born of, and November
For what it will die in,
What they are and what they are not,
While you love what is kind,
What you can sing in
And love and forget in
All that's ahead and behind.
~ Stanzas 6-8 of The Thrush, Edward Thomas
Harvest Close had always been Caleb’s favourite time of the year. As a child, he'd indulged in herbstlaubtrittvergnügen , brittle leaves flying everywhere as he ran, leaching their sweet decomposing scent into the air. It hung in place, stagnant like smoke, the heady aroma a reminder of life and of death. He’d always felt the most at home in the Autumn. His mother always said he was made for it, with hair the colour of recently turned oak leaves and eyes like a late Fessuran sky. Once, he had basked in the season's unique charm, enamored of the cycles that it brought, closing the seasons of growing and heralding the seasons of dying, knowing that rebirth was just around the corner. Lately, that reminder was less of a comforting thing and more of a lingering nightmare. Now that he’d come out of the haze he’d previously been mired in, he’d spent far too much time thinking about less than pleasant things, like the faces of his family as they burned alive. But that was morbid and he put it away for another time, safe and sound in a small pocket of his mind, left to rattle and moan like an old ghost shut up in the attic.
The Amber Road, a portion of which ran from Alfield to Trostenwald, wound its way through soft golden fields, lightly swaying in the gentle and mild wind. Caleb ran his hands like a whisper over the tips of the tall grass. Late bloom wildflowers still dotted the landscape in deep purples and burnt oranges and rich yellows, lending a more welcoming feel to the road along which he travelled. It was little more than a dirt track, well worn by carts and horses and feet through the years. And now, Caleb’s tracks would join those of thousands more who had journeyed the same way and back.
He closed his eyes, allowing himself to slip for a minute into the mind of the distinctly marked orangish cat that trotted in front of him, using his feline companion to guide him as he kept the pace. Looking through Frumpkin’s eyes was always a strange treat; he would see much more and much differently. The colours of the world were different, and the definition of things around him was much altered. And sometimes, sometimes, if he was in certain sort of place, it allowed him to replicate the experience that the ingestion of skein had brought others, but without the unfortunate side effect of being unimaginably uninhibited while high off one’s ass.
This day Caleb could see the shadows and lingering wisps of people long gone, coiling tendrils of liquid smoke that marred the deep blue of the sky and the goldenrod rolling hills, leaving him feeling mildly nauseous. The unfortunate fact of that matter was that many people died on the road, far more often than they did elsewhere. All the same, he didn’t retreat, allowing the cat to guide him further, catching glimpses of form in the hazy undefined living memories that dissipated into thin air as he strode through them. He looked back at himself from Frumpkin’s perspective and could see the strange veil of ashy residue that coated him in splotches as he rent more figures in half with his purposeful stride.
He shivered, chilled, and came back to himself, shaking. Self-punishment , his dear Nott would call it before gently lecturing him about his worthiness with all the tones of a concerned mother. Instead, Caleb chose to focus on the last time he’d seen her, her small green hand on his pale cheek, and her big yellow lanterns of eyes peering out at him from under her hood, telling him to be careful and I love you! Don’t forget!
It was abnormal for them to be apart, especially for so long a time, but it couldn't have been helped. Nott had had personal things to take care of, and Caleb couldn’t bring himself to leave his work behind. He'd continued on in her absence, reassuring her that they would meet up for Harvest Close at the halfway point between them. And so, Trostenwald had become his destination.
Lost in thought and only paying enough attention to follow Frumpkin, (trusting the little cat to take him where he needed to go, which usually wasn’t a problem, but then he was a cat, or most definitely sort of probably a cat, and cats were not always reliable, winding in their own strange ways about the world) Caleb was alarmed to come out of his thoughts to find himself a ways off the road in a small copse of trees. The toes of his much worn boots were resting at the foot of a mound of semi-loosened earth, dotted here and there with sparse grass and small, strangely shaped flowers, like dragon’s jaws in yellow and violet and white. The mound was rectangular in shape and of a curiously familiar dimension that chilled Caleb to the core.
A grave lay before him, a fallen stick the only indicator that a marker had ever been present.
Frumpkin looked up at him with luminous eyes and mewed. Caleb descended into the familiar vision once more and looked around. Sitting against the trunk of the nearest tree was a shadowy figure, an insubstantial mess of oily black, but very clearly a figure. His back was to the tree and he had one long leg arched, the foot flat on the ground, and the other bobbing in an unhurried manner where it rested over what would have been a knee. Form and shape took hold the harder Caleb concentrated and he could make out finer details – boots, patterned pants, a loose shirt, open halfway down the lightly defined chest covered in strange quicksilver threads that sloped up a delicate neck to features distinctly fine boned. Ghostly curls floated around his head like a halo, contrasting with the curling black of what reminded Caleb of ram’s horns. His head was lolled back against the smooth bark, and his arms splayed, one propped on the thigh of the bobbing leg and the other with nails scratching absently at the dirt. He was beautiful; the casual display of genial ease entranced Caleb.
Without warning the figure’s head inclined and bright red orbs glowed in the swirling black of its visage, looking directly at Caleb through Frumpkin.
Shocked, Caleb stumbled back and fell, his vision leaving the cat and returning to his own, eyes staring up wide at the deep blue of the sky in contrast to the bluish grey haze that filmed his familiar’s vision. He sat up slowly and looked at the tree. It was a normal tree, and no one sat beneath its welcoming branches. Tentative but compelled, Caleb stood and made his way over, walking around it, inspecting it. Why, he didn’t know. He was never able to see the things without Frumpkin’s aide, and he knew that, rationally, there ought to be no proof that the figure was there. He found none. Strangely, he felt a sinking in his stomach.
Frumpkin mewed again, a paw reaching out and touching the disturbed ground with a clawless pat.
“Komm hier, schatz, und wir waren etwas sehen, ja?” he beckoned to the familiar, fingers outstretched and tongue giving a few clicks. Ever faithful, Frumpkin did as Caleb asked. “Now," he repeated in Zemnian, "we will see something else. Yes, something else indeed."
The black figure blossomed into his view immediately as he blinked into Frumpkin’s vision, unmoved and seemingly undisturbed. It was apparent that Caleb was visible to the figure, but, as he directed Frumpkin to take a few steps towards him, he moved again, head shifting to the side, and red eyes opening in the cat's direction. This time, Caleb was prepared and continued unfazed. Something about the figure was less terrifying than the others, something in his unassuming demeanor that cast off the morbidity of the scenes Caleb usually perceived; he’d witnessed everything from a dying horse as it was put out of its misery to a bloodied man floating in a river to a woman and a babe lying still and frozen, all black and light grey in the misty remains of a snowstorm eons past. Despair lived in those scenes and a thousand others, but also a fain curiosity, and there again would be Nott tugging on his hand, and when he would come to, he would hear her whispering glutton for punishment .
But this… this was different.
He’d never seen a figure, a Shade - because that’s what they were, Caleb reminded himself, shadows of the long deceased – so utterly at peace. The thought left him bitter, and the taste of ash filled his mouth, but he pushed it down and focused on the task at hand. The figure looked lonely despite the way he was situated, so listless as if basking in the sun and not the muted thing that dominated the landscape beyond the veil. When Frumpkin edged closer, he lifted a hand, his ghosting fingers long and thin and lithe. Two more tentative steps and the mist of his fingertips passed lightly over and through Frumpkin’s fur. He opened his mouth and in a lovely lilting tone, softly spoke. “Hello there, friend.” Caleb, back in his body, shivered at the contact. “Your Master’s a strange one, isn’t he? Just standing there off in la la land. But you’re a very pretty kitty. Or rather handsome. I suspect you prefer handsome, a fey fella like you. I get lots of deer, some rabbits and birds, but not many cats.”
Caleb bit back his automatic desire to reply, allowing the phantom feel of ghostly fingers to travel through Frumpkin. It was a pleasant, if alien feeling, and he almost retracted his consciousness on principle. He didn’t deserve such a kind touch, but he allowed it anyways.
“Not many people either. It’s a curious thing that you both found your way here, I suppose, but then I’m a curious thing too, aren’t I?” A scratch under the chin left Frumpkin purring wildly and Caleb retreated finally, the feeling strange. He strode over to the grave. He wondered if the Shade was still watching him, still speaking to Frumpkin as the little cat hadn’t strayed from the spot, seemingly nuzzling thin air. Without further hesitation Caleb proceeded to cast a spell. If there was magic in that place, Caleb would know it. He felt the familiar emanating aura and focused hard on the grave. Rewarded by a faint gleam in humanoid shape, he quickly turned his attention to the tree and focused. A faint glowing outline of a hand was stroking silky soft cat ears.
Hurriedly, Caleb turned from the grove. “Frumpkin, come!” and the cat, while still mewing, followed him back to the road. In a moment he’d delved back and his vision greyed out. Before him was the figure of another Shade. He stepped back into himself and concentrated, but no aura glowed before him. “What is it about this one, solitary grave, hmm? It's curious, isn't it?"
Without much thought, Caleb’s feet carried him back to the grave, but this time he situated himself not far from where the figure sat, facing the base of the tree, and called Frumpkin to him. The cat settled himself in his lap contentedly, apparently appeased that his master was finally on the right track, eyes trained to the same spot and one final time, Caleb descended.
“-‘re back again. I’m starting to wonder if you might be more than you seem,” he was saying.
Caleb took a deep breath and spoke. “He is most certainly more than he seems, Shade.”
The Shade looked up, eyes locking on Caleb. “You can hear me? You can see me?”
“Well, I cannot, but Frumpkin can. It is little use looking at me, because I can’t see you. But I can see you through him. You are not like the other Shades,” Caleb cocked his head. “You resonate magic. Strange magic. It is unfamiliar to me.”
His features whirled, difficult to make out in the black miasma. Perhaps, Caleb concentrated very hard, he could make out… confusion?
“Well a hello would be nice, maybe a pleasure to meet you, but alright, yeah, you’re not wrong about me being different.” The Shade shrugged and shifted position a bit, leaning forward towards Caleb. “Honestly though, I couldn’t answer any questions even if you asked. I haven’t got a clue.”
“Hello. Pleasure to meet you. Do you know how you died, then, at least? Perhaps that might shed some light, ja?”
There was something about the way the Shade’s eye flickered that put Caleb off kilter and he hunched his shoulders a bit more in response.
“No clue, friend. But you can dig me up if you like. I don’t know what you’ll find if you do, though you’re welcome to try.”
Dig up a grave? While its denizen watches? Intensely curious though Caleb was, he couldn’t help but batter up against every tale he’d ever been told, ever warning he’d ever been given as a child about graves, about strange creatures, about ghosts. But the Shade was looking at him with an intensity that didn’t seem malicious at all. Just mischievous. In a strange way, on that strange non-face, it was very becoming. Without even considering what he was saying, Caleb spoke.
“If you would like me to try, I will.”
Again, a shrug. “Guess it can’t hurt either way.”
“Hmm.” The set of Caleb’s shoulder’s stiffened, his jaw shut firm. What are you doing? Why are you doing it? Insanity! But he wanted to know, wanted to understand. “Very well. I will give it a try. But I will not be able to see or hear you while I do.” He blinked against the sudden light as he left Frumpkin’s sight. “Hey Schatz, watch out for our Shade friend, okay?” The cat nuzzled against him and then slinked off over to the tree.
A sudden gust of wind buffeted Caleb as he stood, his ratty coat and old blue scarf blown back. There was a distinct chill to the air now, as the season finally turned, and briefly his superstitions loomed once more. A demonlike Shade all but asking him to dig up his grave? But Frumpkin had led him there. Frumpkin knew something, and if Caleb trust anyone, it was Frumpkin. Pushing out a breath out through his mouth, Caleb made up his mind, very firmly not thinking about the pair of gleaming red eyes, stuck his hand in a pocket, and rummaged through it. He pulled out a small clay sculpted paw and cast the spell, focusing on the area of the grave.
The giant cat paw scooped the earth out, uprooting all the lovely if unseasonable flowers. Not moments later, beneath small pockets of dirt and rocks, he could see a body. It was reasonable to assume based on the growth that had covered the grave that the Tiefling – he could make out the horns reasonably well through the dirt – had been in the ground for some months, but the body didn’t match that presumption. He hadn’t decomposed, but his clothes were eaten through in places..
Caleb crouched by the side of the grave and as he replaced the small paw the giant one vanished into thin air and he was left with nothing but himself, his cat and the body of one very curious Tiefling. He was a riot of colour, that was clear, just as beautiful in the flesh as in the transient spirit; his skin was as vibrantly purple as the flowers that Caleb had passed along the way, and the clothes he wore reflected the barest hint of details Caleb had been able to assess in the Veil. Patterned, multicolour pants, light brown leather boots and an open cream shirt, the laces mostly undone to reveal what Caleb could now understand were many, many tattoos and a lattice of silver scars. One dark wound rested above his heart, open still as if it had just been made only moments before, save of course, the near black stain of long dried blood marring the skin and shirt. A meow distracted him from the sight and he looked to see that Frumpkin was closer now, peering into the grave too, as if he was just as curious.
“You be careful, my friend. You know what happens to cats who stick their noses where they’re not meant. Wouldn’t want anything to happen to you.” Something in him to him to take his own advice, but Caleb ignored it. What was done, was done. And any knowledge he could gain in the process was sure to be useful. After a moment, he directed his gaze up from the cat. “I’m not sure if you are still here, or where you are standing at the moment, but I am going to do some things now and if you are okay with that, um, please tell Frumpkin. He will meow once for no and twice for yes, so that I will know.”
Two meows succinctly followed. Once more, Caleb concentrated on the grave, and on the body lying within it, letting his thoughts rein in and surround the corpse in an attempt to glean anything. He’d never seen anything like it.
“Göttern… Blützauber!” Apprehensive, he kept his voice to a whisper despite the fact that he was…for lack of a better word, alone. He turned again, speaking to thin air. “Blood magic, Mr. Shade. I will try something and we will see what we will see, okay?”
From his pocket, Caleb withdrew a small penknife and flicked it open. Hardly daring to breath, he pressed the tip into his thumb. Ruby droplets welled at the cut and he turned his hand over, letting the blood spill, pat, pat, pat onto the open wound. “Return, I guess, if you are able,” he said, and whispered a word or two. The blood glowed gold for a moment. The spell was… nothing official. A cobbled together bet, hedging on the strange magic imbued within the body. Caleb knew nothing of healing or any works of a cleric’s domain, but this body wasn’t quite dead, though nor, it seemed, was it quite alive.
They waited. Suddenly, Caleb could feel the Shade’s cold presence over his shoulder, tangible almost for a moment from what he could only imagine was proximity. “Hmm.” He looked from his bleeding finger to the body below him. Nothing. “Well that did not work. Obviously.” The presence was still strong. “Hold a moment, if you please and I will be able to hear you.” He blinked again and from Frumpkin’s perspective, he could see the Shade standing up close behind him, peering over his shoulder at the body in the grave. “Hallo there, I can hear you now, if you speak.”
“Yes, hi, um, yep, still here. Is that me, then, do you think? Do I look like that?” He asked, eyes narrowing, brows drawing in close. “I can’t recall, you see.”
“Ah, ja, from what I can tell, that’s your body.”
“Interesting.”
The experience was growing more and more surreal for Caleb as he watched himself and the Shade, who reminded him remarkably of his cat.
“Oh well,” he continued. “You gave it a shot and that’s great. I appreciate it.”
“Ja, aber- just because it did not work now, doesn’t mean it couldn’t. I could…help you?” What are you doing, you are stupid, dummkopf, Göttern, you’re going to get yourself killed, what are you doing? The thoughts ran rampant through his mind, but his mouth just kept moving, much to Caleb’s chagrin. “I am heading to this town you see, to meet a friend, and I am very curious how you got like this, and maybe you could come with?”
The Shade moved in front of Caleb’s body, blocking his view of himself almost completely. He didn’t walk so much as glide, such was the grace and fluidity of his movement. “And just how will you manage to take me with you?” The Shade snarked, gesturing at the body.
“Oh, em, I have a spell for that. You don’t look dead, so I don’t think it will be too big of a problem. I will reanimate you and you can follow as you are, so both parts of you will go with me. Only, before 24 hours are up, I must renew the spell. I have everything I need, I think. Blood.” He help up his thumb. “And bone and flesh. Your body will work for that.”
“Fascinating.”
Yes, that was certainly a word for it. Though his internal dialogue screamed at him to just turn around and keep walking, leaving the Shade behind, there was an itch in his brain that urged him to block out all other thought. Perhaps, he considered, this is what it feels like for Nott when she sees something shiny.
And the Tiefling was indeed shiny in the literal sense, the allure of his situation aside. Though Caleb had not been able to tell from the Shade himself, the body made it abundantly clear, covered in all manner of bangles and jewelry, horns fitted with studs and holes drilled through for dangles of various metals. He tore his gaze away.
“Okay then, I will cast this spell and you can come with me. I can stay looking through Frumpkin’s vision for a time, but I would rather have a bit outside of it while I cast and get us back to the road, if you don’t mind.”
“Certainly. Go right ahead. I’ll be here, just, you know, hanging about.”
Caleb almost snorted at the dry humour lacing the Shade’s words, but managed to contain himself.
“Before you do though, who do I thank for all the help?”
Caleb blinked rapidly, taken off guard. “Ah, don’t thank me. I have done nothing yet except dig up your grave and disturb your peace.”
This time, it was the Shade who made a strangled noise of amusement. “Was that a joke?”
“No. And um, I am Caleb. Widogast.”
“Wonderful. Nice to meet you, Caleb. I think we’re going to be great friends.”
With that, Caleb departed his senses back to his own body, reeling from the strange and prolonged interaction. To thin air, he announced, “I am going to check your body to see if you are carrying anything of note, since you can’t seem to recall anything, that might explain what happened or who you are. However, I suppose we have discovered your mode of death. That is an awfully large wound.” Caleb felt slightly strange patting around the body in its preserved form, but resolved himself to the task. It proved fruitful as he found a ragged slip of paper. He stuffed it into one of his own pockets for later and stood, brushing dirt off his knees as he went.
“Alright then. Here goes.” He squeezed out another drop of blood over the body and incanted, imbuing the spell with his will, compelling the body to rise. It stood, a foul mimicry of life , he’d heard it referred to, and it wasn’t inaccurate, as there was no real life in the thing. Just a body. It lacked all expression of movement, the likes of which the Shade had in droves, and its face was terribly blank. Caleb did his best not to look at it. “Okay, follow me then,” he muttered, feeling foolish, but Frumpkin meowed twice and so he did not hesitate in setting off. The corpse of the Shade lurched behind him, a marionette like those he’d seen at street vendors’ stalls in Rexxentrum, moving as if pulled forward by invisible strings. “Erm, walk gracefully?” He commanded. It didn’t appear to help and he sighed, moving on.
The small folded square of parchment was burning a hole in his pocket the farther they walked and with a huff he pulled it out. Immediately the cold sensation returned, sending chills up his spine. Ignoring it, Caleb unfolded the paper.
Mollymauk
I didn’t have the means to bring you back. I’m sorry. I will try and find a way before you wake up on your own like last time. If you do, ask for me at the next town over heading south. I’ll be making frequent stops.
I miss you. I’m sorry I wasn’t there. I’ll be there next time. I promise.
Yasha
The note begot more questions than it answered, and the itch in Caleb’s brain worsened. “Well. That’s interesting.” His curiosity finally getting the better of him, he summoned Frumpkin to his shoulder. “I am going to need your eyes, mein Freund, because I need to speak with our Shade companion, but we need to keep walking.” He eyed the horizon. “It is 5:09 and we need to be somewhere safe before dark, so help me stay on the path this time, okay? No detours.” Frumpkin only nuzzled into his beard before lying about his neck like a scarf.
“Oh, wait one moment!” He jostled the cat back up and removed the blue fabric that hung around him. “We don’t want anyone noticing this,” he said as he wrapped the scarf around the body of the Shade, Mollymauk if the note was anything to go by, carefully hanging it to cover the ugly wound and accompanying stain. “That’s better. Now you may lay down again Frumpkin, süße. And you,” he pointed at the body, “walk beside me. Okay. Now I will go back to the cat, okay?”
He blinked and was immediately met with the piercing red eyes, like flames glowing in the far distant black of night against the smoky substance of the Shade’s form. Startled, he stopped in his tracks.
“Sorry, sorry, I’m just really curious about that note. It had words on it, I know that, and I could read them out, but I couldn’t put all the meaning together, so if you’d be so kind, Mr. Caleb-“
“Ja, ja, okay, just, walk beside me please, so I may see where I am going?”
“Of course.”
After a moment to resituate himself, Caleb started to walk again, the Shade having relegated himself to the space between Caleb and his body.
“So, I think it is safe to determine that you are called Mollymauk-“
“That’s Molly to my friends,” the Shade blurted, before letting out a sound of confusion. “Well that was reflexive. Do continue.”
“Yeah, as I was saying you are called Mollymauk, or Molly I suppose. The person who wrote this note says that they were unable to revive you, that they were without the means to do so but wanted to. There are several apologies and you are implored to head to the nearest town south of here where the writer of this note, one “Yasha” will be waiting, should you wake up which I find fascinating.”
“Wake up?”
“It would seem you’ve done it before,” he told Molly gravely. “’Yasha’ also promises that this would not have happened if she had been there, apologizes for her absence and says she will not do it again.”
“And that’s it?” There was an edge to Mollymauk’s voice, a hint of desperation, with which Caleb was all too intimately familiar.
“Ja. Your Yasha is sparse with her words, but seems sincere. I am sure we will be able to find out more about your situation. It’s several days walk to get to Trostenwald from here, which is where I am thinking your Yasha is sending you. I don’t know of any other towns on the way south, you see, but then, I’ve not been this far south in… well. I’ve never been this far south.”
“Oh. Well, excellent. And where are you headed, my good man?” The edge to his tone was cleverly concealed, but Caleb could still hear it lingering on in Mollymauk’s false cheer.
“Trostenwald.” He answered simply.
“Oh, good! Then I’m not managing to inconvenience you, dear?”
Caleb did his very best not to trip on the dust beneath his feet as the endearment dropped like honey from Molly’s lips.
“Nein. No… no inconvenience at all.”
“Well that’s great!” His new companion exclaimed, and this time, his joy was real. “Honestly, I couldn’t even tell you what direction south is, so I’m very glad to have you. And, you know, I literally can’t recall ever being this far away from my spot. That’s the tree, I mean. What a great tree. He and I had many, many conversations. He’s better for it than the deer and the rabbits anyways, though they’re sweet. But not so sweet as your cat!” A sensation filtered from Frumpkin to Caleb as Molly stroked the cat’s ear softy.
“Frumpkin, he is called Frumpkin,” Caleb’s tone was low, but Mollymauk didn’t seem to notice.
“Anyways, since I can’t recall and you’ve never been here, this is a new experience for the both of us. But I can’t wait to see the sky, and feel the sun. That’d be nice, I think.”
The sun was warm still on Caleb’s face and he took a moment to really take it in, to remember how he felt when he’d been unable to feel the sun. Its gentle rays caressed him and he felt a pang in his chest at the thought of losing it again, at the reminder of dark rooms and stark walls and a mist in his mind. He curled his fists tightly. “You will feel it again, Mr. Mollymauk. At least, I will try to make it possible.”
Mollymauk continued to speak, keeping up a running commentary on everything and anything he saw, asking one question after another with amusing intensity, trying to cobble together some knowledge of the world beyond the glen in which he’d been tethered and the shards of shattered memory that came and went with the wind into a cohesive picture.
As darkness began to bear down upon them, Caleb was starting to lag. Walking all day was not a passion of his, and in his mind’s eye he could picture the comforting warmth of the library hearth and a stack of books by his side.
“-earing me, Mr. Caleb?”
Caleb started, and abruptly lost his focus through Frumpkin’s senses. One blink later and he was back.
“-omething happened and- are you alright?”
“I am fine, sorry. Just was getting wrapped up in thoughts,” he reassured Molly.
“Well that’s all well and dandy but I think you’re about dead on your feet. And I should know. So how about we set up camp here and you can warm yourself up and have a bite before taking a rest. I can watch camp all night. I don’t sleep.” For a hint of a moment, it looked to Caleb as if Molly was flashing a jaunty, grin, fangs and all.
The offer was enticing, and Caleb’s weary limbs protested against taking another step.
“I can tell Frumpkin to let you know if something is wrong. He can play messenger for us. How’s that sound?”
“I could certainly use the rest,” he acknowledged. “I will make us a camp. Your body will be fine through the night. Lay down,” he pointed a finger to direct the corpse and it did as he directed it. Upon looking to its owner, Caleb could see that Molly looked rather unsure of himself in the dimming of twilight. “Something wrong?”
“Well, I’m just sorry I can’t help you.” He lifted his hands and waggled his fingers. “Incorporeal and all, you understand.” Molly chuckled, but Caleb could tell he still meant it, trying hard to keep up conversation, to appear-
“I am already invested in what you are about Mr. Mollymauk, you don’t need to be useful, at least, not until you are properly alive. So, sit by your body and I will get myself set for sleeping. Guten Nacht, then.”
“Oh, er, goodnight to you too,” he heard Molly say, his figure slowly being swallowed by the night and Caleb came back to himself. Frumpkin hopped off his shoulders and made his way over to where the Shade surely was, but Caleb tried to ignore the fact.
The dim light made is somewhat difficult to see, and he didn’t want to cast another spell, so he rooted around on the road for some larger rocks and, gathering a handful of curling, dry leaves for kindling, set the fire with his magic before curling up on the ground, using his arms for cushion. While the feel of being watched did not lessen, exhaustion eventually overtook him and he fell asleep.
It was hard, not having a reference for colour in a world of murky blue and suffocating grey. Molly watched as the Zemnian wizard slept soundly by the fire and wondered about colour. Fire was red and orange and yellow, that he remembered, he was sure of it, but the fire looked to him to be only varying tones of grey, making it impossible to tell for sure. He missed colour the most. Flowers and birds and leaves were all the same, perhaps interestingly shaped or designed, but lifeless without colour. Just like him. He lifted a hand, turning it. The form of his shape shifted and diffused against the light source, black wisps of nothingness. Molly detested it.
Again, he looked to the wizard and wondered.
“What are your Master’s colours, my fae friend?” He asked the sweet cat curled up near him, purring. “Are they vibrant? Are they muted? I don't know for sure, but they’re there. I’m sure of it. Maybe he’s earthy. I think I remember earthy. It starts with a ‘b’, right? And what colour are you? Do you match him?”
Frumpkin meowed twice.
“I’ll take that as a yes. He is strange, your Master Caleb. But you seem to like him.” Frumpkin was purring again and Molly leaned himself back, gliding down to rest above the ground. “I like him too. He’s not very talkative and a little awkward, but I haven’t talked to anyone in a long time. It feels like forever, but then, I suppose it is forever if it’s all you can remember, you know?” Molly sighed long, heavy, dramatically, just to give it a little flavour.
“Is he a nice man? He seems like a nice man. I’ve seen other people you know, but no one ever saw me.”
He remembered the many patterned coat, hung on the post that once stood proudly at the head of his grave. Remembered the day a man had come by and taken it, slipping it on casually, shrugging with aplomb and walking off as if he hadn’t just desecrated a gravesite. Molly ran after him helplessly, calling him all manner of rude names, shouting in Infernal, cursing the man’s fortune to rot. He hoped it’d stuck. Suddenly, though he’d intended to follow the man until he was noticed, damn it!, Molly had been unable to go a step farther and had watched, desolate, as the thief continued on down the road without a care in the world.
It still stung to think about. For as long as he had memory, the coat always hung there, flapping like a strange bird in the breeze, and Molly would trace its designs with phantom fingers for countless hours, committing them to memory, making up stories for each one. It had only taken minutes to be lost to him forever.
“I had a fabulous coat, Frumpkin, pattern and embroidered. It was beautiful, but someone took it. Maybe, if your Caleb can get me sorted, I might be able to find it again someday. I think you would like it, but not as much as you must like Caleb’s with the nice warm collar to curl up in.”
Frumpkin blinked one lazy eye back at Mollymauk, clearly half asleep.
“Do you think it’s possible?” He asked. The stars winked above him in the clear velvet sky. “Do you think he can do it? Put me back where I belong? I don’t want to be like this anymore. It’s so lonely and I don’t think I was made to be lonely. I was made to…to…” He threw an arm up over his face. “Shite, I don’t know. I don’t know.”
Only empty silence replied.
“What business does a ghost have being anything other than lonely anyways?”
The endless blackness of night was nothing new to Mollymauk, so the watch he kept was unremarkable as well as uneventful. Only Caleb stood out as unique, and so he set about shaking away his melancholy and focused on the man instead. Lack of colour aside, Caleb, didn’t have much by way of pattern either, but texture he did in droves. The old bedraggled coat was torn in spots and obviously stained, but it looked warm and comforting on Caleb. The scarf, which was draped still around Molly’s body’s neck was woven tightly with thick yarn. It looked worn as well, but it still seemed like it did its job. The rest of Caleb’s clothing was just as plain. Boots, the soft leather of which was crinkled like spider webbing, worn almost through in the soles, pockmarked by stones and obviously dusted in dirt. His trousers and shirt were rough spun and faintly, Molly could remember that feel against his own skin, knew that he knew its touch as well. The man’s hair and face too were full of textures, his lower face obscured by a scruffy beard and his long hair a wild tangle.
In sleep, the tension that Molly had noticed in Caleb before was gone; his forehead was smooth and carefree, and gentle breaths escaped his slightly open mouth like steam from a dragon’s maw. Colour or not, Caleb was interesting and almost beautiful, like an unsuspecting hero out of a fairy story. Molly watched as Caleb’s fingers curled and uncurled around a lump under his jacket. Curious, the Shade angled for a better glimpse, but found none and, unable to enact physical force on anything, was left to wonder until the morning what might be hiding there.
Despite the fact that his fortunes had changed utterly, that his surroundings were different, that the monotony had been broken, it was simultaneously the longest and loneliest of his life. And whatever it was he was meant to be, Molly knew it was anything but lonely.
The next morning’s dawn broke to a mostly cloudy sky. Molly waited eagerly for his new companion to wake, and found that it wasn’t long before Caleb stretched a bit and sat up, blinking owlishly. He looked around, scratched his head and snapped his fingers. Out of thin air, shocking Mollymauk, Frumpkin appeared in Caleb’s arms.
“Guten Morgen, süße, wie geht’s, eh? Schalf gut?” In response the little cat bumped his nose up against Caleb’s and then batted a paw gentle at his face before meowing and hopping lithely out of his Master’s arms and over to Molly, who perked immediately at the attention.
“Oh yes, I suppose, right,” Caleb muttered, throwing a glance in the direction of Molly’s body. He turned back towards Frumpkin and then, blinked, his eyes glowing with the strange faint light that Molly had noticed the day before.
“Good morning, Mr. Caleb,” He said.
“Ah yes and a good one to you as well, Mr. Mollymauk. I trust the night was uneventful?”
“Completely,” he replied breezily, facing the cat. It was a strange arrangement to be sure, but options were limited. “Not even the hoot of an owl. Did you sleep well then?” He asked.
“Yes thank you.” Frumpkin turned from Molly at the same time as Caleb’s body turned towards the remains of the fire, smoldering low. Reaching out a hand, Caleb closed his fist and the fire ceased utterly.
“That’s pretty amazing, what you can do.”
The sound Caleb made was truly awful. A laugh, if it could be called that, broke the silent morning.
“Have I said something?” Molly asked, alarmed.
“Ah, no. No, don’t worry about it. It’s only that you sound like my friend, Nott. It is her whom we are going to meet.”
It was obvious to Molly that Caleb was omitting something, but he didn’t push it. The atmosphere of the day prior had been pleasant enough, both of them, it seemed, happy for the companionship and change of pace, even if Caleb was an awkward conversationalist. Molly had no room to talk, he couldn’t even be heard by normal people, and even Caleb could only hear him with Frumpkin’s special senses. It was Molly’s turn to laugh. When he did, Frumpkin’s ears twitched and half a beat later Caleb’s head turned towards Molly, which made him laugh a bit louder.
“Dare I ask?”
“Oh, I was just thinking that if anyone passed us by on the road, they’d think you were mad, having half a conversation with someone who isn’t visibly talking back,” He gestured at his body where it was still lying unmoving on the ground. “And then, after I laughed, I noticed, well, I know that you can only hear me through Frumpkin, that you’re not actually hearing me with your own ears, but, when I laughed, you caught it first with Frumpkin’s ears and then adjusted your own body to correspond half a moment later. Did you know?”
“Erm, well-“
“It’s rather cute. Say, would you mind, because I’ve been wondering. What colours are you made of?”
“Excuse me?”
“You’re all grey and I know things had colour once. Don’t tell me how, but I just do. So I know you’re not all grey, really. I’m just curious you know, but you don’t have to tell me. I can imagine it.” Though imagining wasn’t the same, but Molly didn’t say that aloud.
“I am pale. I suppose that is not too hard to have figured out. And I have red hair.”
“And your eyes? Right now they’re all glowy, because you’re doing that thing, but when you’re not, they’re clear.”
“Blue, ja.”
“And…” he paused, suddenly unsure. “What colours am I?”
The right side of Caleb’s mouth twitched up in a tiny smile. “You are a riot of colour, Mr. Mollymauk. You are very, extremely purple. Your skin and your hair. Very purple. And your pants too are many coloured.”
Molly smiled wide at that. “I remember purple.”
“Soon you will see it for real.” Caleb replied before kicking apart the small circle of stones that had served as his fire pit.
“Why are you helping me?” Molly asked. “There’s nothing really in this for you at all, you could just have walked away. Not that I’m saying you should have,” he put up his hands, palms out. “I just… don’t get it.”
“You know what?” Caleb looked up at him in belated response. “Usually, I would be asking myself that question. What’s in this for me? I have not had the luxury in life to be helpful without reason, without recompense. You are curious and I wish to figure you out. And that is enough.”
“Ah.” Molly nodded his head. “I see. An academic who’s finally getting to do some field work, am I right?”
“Of a sort.”
The conversation paused and Molly took a moment to think about Caleb’s words, to feel just the slightest thread of disappointment stab through him. A curiosity. Well, beggars couldn’t be choosers, and he was certainly beholden to his strange Zemnian benefactor.
“I will be back in a moment.” Caleb announced, drawing Molly back into the moment just in time to watch the light in Caleb’s eye diffuse. In his natural state, Caleb moved much more fluidly about the camp. Briefly, he pulled off his coat and Molly finally caught a glimpse of the curious shape beneath it. A leather holster was slung about Caleb’s shoulders and back, two beautifully linen bound books strapped in securely. He took the opportunity to appraise the rest of Caleb; his form now revealed, Molly found that he was rail thin. The coat and books made up much of his apparent bulk. Against his chest a pendant swung, thumping gently against a sliver of bare skin where the collar of his shirt parted as he leaned forward to brush the coat off a little, a few stray sticks coming loose.
Dreamily, Molly blinked before shaking himself from his haze. Yes, Caleb was a beautiful if unconventional human. And probably a bit dirty, but that was hard to tell, and Molly didn’t mind so much. He was intangible after all and –
He breathed in heavily and let it out, exasperated. “Really Mollymauk?” He berated himself, yet feeling whimsical at using his own name. “He’s only helping you because he’s curious and you’re dead right now. Don’t even start.”
“Don’t start what?”
“Oh, erm, nothing. Talking to Frumpkin is all. He was giving me that come pet me look and it’s unfair to try and indulge him when I can’t touch him to do it.”
“Sure.” Caleb didn’t look convinced, and Molly thought he must have been recalling the time Molly had pet the cat earlier, but Caleb didn’t press the issue, much to Molly’s relief. While he’d been daydreaming, it was apparent that Caleb had finished what he needed to do; his coat was replaced and Molly’s body was standing, swaying a bit as it waited for further instruction.
“So. Are we pressing on?”
“Ja, I figured I’d eat a little something as we walked. No point in wasting time. It is already 7:10 and we have a long ways yet to go.”
He snapped his fingers, bringing Frumpkin to his shoulders and started forward, beckoning the corpse to walk beside him. Molly made his way over, keeping pace between them once more. “How do you do that?”
“What?”
“Tell exactly what time it is? Is it magic?”
“I just have a sense for it, I suppose.”
“Huh. You know, as curious as you seem to think I am, you’re a pretty curious person yourself.”
“How so?”
“Well not everybody just knows the exact time of day and can call fire from his hands and talk to Shades. Not to mention reanimating a corpse.”
“There are more people out there like me than you know, Mr. Mollymauk,” Caleb replied.
“Perhaps so, but you’re special, I can tell.”
This time, a real laugh left Caleb. It was a beautiful sound when not overlaid with what Molly was beginning to wonder might be self-loathing.
“Now I know that Nott will like you.” A smile, sunny if hesitant, painted Caleb’s features into something happier than Molly was used to and he smiled too, even though he knew Caleb couldn’t see it, as he had Frumpkin focused on the very important job of helping him to walk unhindered.
“This Nott you’re always talking about. Tell me about her?”
“She is like my little sister, but she doesn’t think so herself. Very mothering. She is, eh… um, well she is a Goblin actually.” Caleb seemed hesitant, but Molly only shrugged, before remembering that Caleb wasn’t watching him.
“A Goblin. They’re little right? So it’s usually you, a tiny little Goblin girl and Frumpkin? What a sight, I imagine. And how did she become your sister then?” Caleb stuttered a bit, and Molly took a closer glance at his face. “You don’t have to tell me, darling, but who am I ever going to say something to? Your cat?”
“Someday there might be a great many people you could speak to.” Caleb’s tone was cautious.
“Well then forget I said anything. But even if someday I’m able to mingle with the commoners,” he exaggerated his accent a bit, hoping to provoke a response. “I wouldn’t speak a word of it. On my ghostly honour, Mr. Caleb.”
A faint tensing of the other man’s jaw was all Mollymauk could perceive, but it was something at least.
“We met, erm, in a prison.”
Picking up that it was a sensitive topic, Molly pushed forward. “Ah, now see, that’s an interesting story just waiting to be told. I’d share one with you, would that I could, but I’m afraid I haven’t got any just yet.”
“Yet?” Caleb actually turn his head then, as if forgetting he couldn’t see with his own eyes.
“Well, you’re far more knowledgeable than I am, so what’s your opinion on this – I think that I might get some of my memories back when I’m back in my body. It’s obvious I’ve got the potential for it, maybe all I need is the… push?”
“I have been considering that and-“ Mollymauk was focused so much on Caleb’s forthcoming theory and Caleb so concerned with watching where he was walking that neither of them noticed the darkly clothed person creep out of the grass, sword pointed at them menacingly.
“Halt!”
Caleb stumbled and Molly saw the light in his eyes fade. Frumpkin growled but the reanimated corpse kept walking on.
“Scheiße! Stop!” Caleb called out in command to the body, which came to a halt jerkily in tracks but it was too late. The man started forward, pulling a dagger from behind as he did, honing in on the corpse. “Scheiße,” Caleb muttered again. “Look, that thing can do nothing to you. It’s dead. A corpse. If you move the scarf you will see,” he pleaded, his other hand moving behind his back, fingers tensing, obviously ready to perform some manner of magic.
From Molly’s vantage point, he could see the bandit’s grasp tighten around the handle of the dagger, preparing to do something. But what, Molly could not say.
“A corpse? Walking? But you was talking to it, I ‘eard you.”
“Ja, well, I’m a crazy motherfucker,” Caleb replied with a shrug and let his hand move forward, the spell flying out from his palms. Three balls of flame shot off towards the man who just barely dodged the first two and was skimmed across the upper arm by the last, his sleeve disintegrating with ease. He roared forward at Caleb, who, unprepared, stumbled again, this time full on tripping, and the highwayman was looming above him and-
Molly felt a surge within him, something that reminded him of muscle memory, but other, and he put out a hand, pointing a finger, brow tensing.
“Oi! Fuck, what the bloody fucking ‘ell-“ The man stepped back, dropping the sword and the dagger both, putting his hands to his eyes, now blackened, a liquid Molly could only assume to be blood streaming from them. He blinked in confusion, rubbing at them but it was enough. Caleb put out his hand once more sending a fireball straight into him. The bandit sunk to the ground, smoking, unconscious.
“I don’t know what you did, but thank you. Let’s get out of here, fast, but first,” Caleb leaned over the fallen highwayman and rifled through his pockets, eventually lifting a small leather pouch off his belt. “Okay. Now we can go.” He pointed at Molly’s body, and gave it a strange look, confusing the Shade before uttering the command to “keep up.” Hurriedly they made their way further down the road. Caleb did not re-enter his veil-pierced state, and so there was no conversation as they went, only time for contemplation.
The image of the man’s eyes bleeding profusely would not leave Mollymauk. He’d done that, somehow, managed to blind the man, but he didn’t know how. And the way that Caleb had looked at his body, like something about it was suddenly peculiar. He moved farther up so he could watch his body as it followed Caleb’s progress in haste, down his neck, a trickle of blood streamed from one dark spot, the eye of a peacock feather tattooed there. Confused and more than a bit frightened, he turned back in the direction they were heading and tried to think of anything else.
They kept moving at a fast pace, even when Molly was relatively certain that they’d gotten far enough away to be a little less concerned. Caleb, who did actually need to eat, Molly reminded himself, had not had anything in the rush of that morning’s less than stellar beginning, and it did not appear that he was about to any time soon, but there was nothing Molly could do to get his attention.
He hated the feeling; helplessness was detestable, he decided. Absolutely unacceptable. But there was little he could do about it beside rely on Caleb. And he hadn’t been helpless earlier. He’d done something with his blood magic as Caleb had called it before. A connection apparently remained between his spirit and his body. So Caleb would help him and he would help Caleb when he could. He’d protect him, because, while it appeared that Caleb was capable of doing some serious damage, he remembered the pale skin, the thin chest, and figured that ‘squishy’ wasn’t that far off an accurate descriptor of his new companion.
Midday was on its way into early evening and it was clear that Caleb was tiring, but the look in his eyes belied no intention to stop and Molly had had quite enough.
“Frumpkin you sweet thing, look over here please?” The little cat peered over at him from his comfortable spot around Caleb’s shoulders and blinked. “Your Master is going to burn himself out like this, and that’s no good for either of us. Can you get his attention please?”
Immediately, Frumpkin dug his claws into Caleb’s shoulder, a little harder than the usual comfort kneading he’d seen the cat do, and the wizard started. “Ow, you little beast, what is it?” Frumpkin meowed and batted at him and understanding seemed to pass through him because Caleb’s eyes suddenly shown with that strange, otherworldly light. “Do you want something?”
“Yes. You need to cast reanimate again soon, if I’m not mistaken, and you haven’t eaten anything all day. You’re going to run yourself ragged if we don’t stop. You can camp a ways off from the road and I promise I’ll keep a good watch. Really, darling, I get that earlier was… a lot… believe you me, but you need the rest.” Molly’s voice held more concern than he’d anticipated, but it was meant sincerely, the fact that he desperately wanted to talk about everything that had happened notwithstanding.
Caleb stilled fully, running his hands through his hair, his face a mask. “Ja. Okay, you’re right. Can you look for a spot while I recast the spell? We have about a hour left until it’s really necessary, but I might as well.”
“Of course,” Molly replied and made his way off the road as Caleb withdrew. The surrounding lands were dotted here and there with scrubby shrubs and a few meagre trees; the sea of tall grass still dominated the area, but there was a dip just a few hundred feet farther up the road to the right where Molly felt relatively sure they could stop for the night with a little bit of extra security against anyone who might want to prey on what would appear to be two sleeping men and one small cat. When he returned, Frumpkin mewed loudly at Caleb, who was sucking on the wound at the tip of his thumb. He blinked, removed his finger, blood dripping to the ground languidly and spoke.
“Did you find someplace?”
“I think so. I’ll show you. Follow me.” Before returning to suck at the wound, Caleb directed his cat to his shoulder and the corpse to follow and they set off, still in silence. Another thing Molly detested. He’d spent too long silenced before.
“It’s at least a little bit protected, and the light from any fire you decide to make shouldn’t be as obvious from the direction we came.”
Molly watched Caleb with rapt attention as he surveyed the spot before performing the same routine he had the night before. When the fire was complete, he sat down on the ground and pulled some dried meats from a small package he’d kept in one of his many pockets.
“About earlier-“ Molly began, but Caleb cut him off.
“Blood Magic. I have been thinking, and I know what you are going to ask. Remember when I first tried to see if I could send you back to your body, and it did not work? But the blood glowed, and I wonder if perhaps it has strengthened your body’s tether to this world, and your control along with it. That blood makes you stronger. Or perhaps it was simply because the fight provided a catalyst for abilities you could not have tapped into otherwise. Either way, I find, I must say thank you.” Caleb purposefully raised his head, as if to look Molly in the eyes, even though he was only seeing with Frumpkin’s. His gaze was slightly too far to the right and it left Molly feeling something akin to bemusement but somehow fonder.
“Well I wasn’t going to let him hurt such a beautiful man as yourself, now was I? And helpful to boot.” He added, smiling jauntily. Again a tightness rippled across Caleb’s jaw in response, and Molly wished desperately to be able to really, really see, with colour and light and everything that what he could see wasn’t.
“I am glad to know I am so highly valued.” Caleb chewed thoughtfully for a few moments during which there was a comfortable silence. Molly felt himself relaxing, a good sort of calm falling over their shared moments, a companionship that felt more significant, if only for a moment, than mutually beneficial obligation. It warmed him through, startling him. Warm was a concept he could only vaguely remember, and he’d been sure it was just physical, but he felt it all the same, even if he couldn’t feel much of anything else. And for the first time in as long as he could remember, Mollymauk had real hope.
A while later, his meagre dinner finished, Caleb stroked a single finger gently over his beard and took in a breath. “I have also been considering the discussion we started. About your memory. It is not what you are wanting to hear, I am sure, but I think the only answer to that may be your friend, Yasha. She wrote that this had happened before. If we manage to find her while in Trostenwald, if we have not already managed to return you to your body, she might be able to shed some light on that.” While his eyes could not pierce Molly’s literal soul while he looked on through Frumpkin’s body, Caleb’s voice did a good enough job as a stand in, as he adopted a serious tone, leaning in towards the fire almost conspiratorially. “This thing she claims you can do, that is more than just unusual, you know. It is unnatural. To be dead and suddenly spring oneself back to life? Unheard of.”
“I sense concern.” All levity had vanished from his tone, and fear prickled against the hope.
“You were very obviously murdered, Mr. Mollymauk,” Caleb replied, matter of fact. “You have enemies, and without your memories, that may prove to be a bigger problem than either of us are equipped to handle.”
“Fair enough,” Molly sat back and rubbed a hand over his mouth and chin, thinking. “Well you said that she wrote in the note that she’d be there. But she didn’t leave a description or anything. If I was memoryless the last time, don’t you think she’d have left a description of herself, or does she expect me to go around to every tavern asking for a Yasha? There could be many Yashas, I wouldn’t know. What if I found the wrong one?”
“We can’t know anything for sure. We will have to play this by ear. And until then…” He gestured pointedly at Molly’s body. “You, em, are quite the peacock, Mollymauk. You are a hard man to miss, with your tattoos and your bangles. But we may just have the advantage. Anyone seeking to do you harm will not know that you are not where they expect you to be, if you know what I mean. If we are to get you back where you belong, we cannot afford for your body to be damaged in any way. That could jeopardize any future attempts to reunite you.”
“Well we certainly don’t want that, now do we?” Molly sighed heavily. “The world’s a mighty strange place, isn’t it?”
“That it is, that it is.” He replied. There were deep dark bags under Caleb’s eyes and Molly frowned, considering.
“Get some rest, Caleb,” he said. “You look like you’re about to pass out. Frumpkin will wake you if anything happens, I’ll make sure of it.”
“Thank you. Guten Nacht, Mollymauk.”
“Goodnight Caleb.”
With that, Molly was once again left alone in the dark, Caleb finishing his evening routine by extinguishing the fire which only the night before he’d let burn. Paranoia, it seemed, was stronger than the desire to be warm.
Molly stayed sitting where he was, and after a few moments, he could hear gentle snores emanating from where Caleb lay curled up in his coat, the collar pulled up around his head to maximize warmth. A soft meow directed Molly’s gaze to Frumpkin, who was sitting by his side, as if waiting to be petted. He wasn’t sure if his lie to Caleb early in the day had been based in truth or not, for the fae cat seemed to enjoy his phantom scritches and pats as much as the real ones he received from Caleb.
“You should go to him, you know. He hasn’t got the fire to keep him warm tonight. He will need you, my little friend.”
Frumpkin purred against him but trotted off to Caleb anyways, curling up over his free arm, tight up against his chest. It was an endearing sight. Frumpkin left one glowing eye open, intently focused on watching Molly back. He chuckled at the implication.
“Yes, alright, you’ve caught me. But I haven’t got anyone else to talk to at the moment, so if you’d indulge me, I’d be forever in your debt.” He turned his gaze out towards the road attentively. “Or maybe this is you paying me back. After all, I did save Mr. Caleb today. First thing I’ve actually managed to do that really matters. I’ve been thinking about that, you know, what I’ll do with my second chance. That is, if I get it. I used to spend a lot of time thinking about all thing things I wanted to experience. Sunlight, real actual sunlight, and water! My gods, water must be fantastic. I want to know what it feels like to dance in a rain shower, and stick my nose in a flower and actually smell it! And you! I know you’re soft, but I can’t feel it. And to touch another person…” he trailed off, risked a glance at the sleeping form of his companion. “Just a hand on a shoulder would be enough.”
He looked away, Frumpkin’s blank stare suddenly feeling judgmental, but that was crazy, because he was a cat (maybe sort of) and all he was doing was ascribing his own internal worries onto the cat. Or maybe he was really being judged. It didn’t matter.
“I think about Yasha, and there’s nothing there, not even a hint of memory. When Caleb read my name, I just knew, but I can’t even begin to fathom who Yasha might be. I feel like she’s important. She obviously cares about me, and I can feel that I care about her too. It’s strange, you know, to care about someone without any understanding as to why. But I know that it feels right to care. And even if Caleb wasn’t helping me out, I’d have stopped that man from killing him. If he’d been attacked by my grave and hadn’t known I was there at all, I’d still have helped him. That’s the kind of person I want to be, when I’m alive. That’s the kind of person I think I must have been before. I want to leave things better than I found them. I want to make a difference.”
Mollymauk fell silent, feeling drained, and listened to the lively sounds of night, allowing them to fall over him like a blanket as he tirelessly watched the road until morning.
The next day began much as the first, with Caleb greeting him despite the fact that the wizard couldn’t be certain that Molly was even still there. It was endearing to be sure, and Molly allowed a smile to spread widely across his face as he observed the man perform a similar routine. He cleared away the small circle of stones, shook out his coat, ate a morsel of dried meat, and took a quick swig from his waterskin, all within the short span of a few moments.
Molly turned away a moment to watch the road again, overly cautious, when Caleb finally spoke.
“I am ready to be off now, if you are. I trust we had no difficulty in the night?” When Molly glanced back, Caleb was standing ready, Frumpkin about his neck, eyes glowing eerily and his body standing half a step back and to the left.
“I’m ready. It was as calm a night as most. Did you manage to sleep well?” It seemed inevitable that Caleb would have dark circles beneath his eyes. “You look tired.”
“I never sleep particularly well, for a myriad of reasons. It can’t be helped, but thank you for your concern.” Caleb started off and Molly took his usual position beside him.
“What is it that you do for a living Mr. Caleb? You obviously don’t go around digging up graves and raising the dead.”
“I am a scholar, when I have the resources to be. Research is my primary objective.”
What that research was, it didn’t appear Caleb would be sharing anytime soon. Molly could take a hint. “That what your books are for? Clever holster you’ve got there.”
“Oh, yes, um thank you. They are my prized possessions. Everything I have ever learned I have copied into those books.” He put a hand almost reverently over his coat where one was presumably resting against his chest.
“I, um, I had a prized possession once.” Molly passed a hand through his wispy, floating curls, streaming like smoke behind him. “Sort of.” Caleb said nothing, so Molly continued. “A coat. It was hanging on that post you saw by my grave. That’s why I don’t have it in this form, I think. Because it wasn’t on me in the grave. I don’t know. The mechanics of this state are strange.”
“What happened to it?”
“Stolen.” He shrugged, attempting to pass it off. “I’ll look for it someday.”
“It must have been a very special coat.”
“It was.”
The rest of the trip passed amicably, with bouts of conversation and some of comfortable silence. While it was clear that Caleb liked him well enough, if only because he was a curiosity, it was also obvious that he was not overly fond of mindless chatter, which Molly, so long isolated, had quickly become an expert in. Though he expected and received no answering word to much of his commentary, Caleb took it all in stride, listening despite his apparent aversion.
“I can stop if you like,” Molly paused his ongoing stream of remarks, looking to Caleb. “I haven’t had anyone to listen to me in… ever. That’s all.”
Surprisingly, Caleb turned to him with a small smile. “No. It is nice to hear your thoughts. That and, you don’t expect me to reply, so that’s nice. If I wanted silence, I would simply return to my own body.”
The forthright statement left Molly wanting to laugh aloud, but he restrained himself, smirking at the ground. “I quite like you Mr. Caleb Widogast. You say exactly what’s on your mind and you don’t apologize for it.”
“You are the same way, you know.” Coming from Caleb, it didn’t sound like an accusation, merely an observation. “I suspect that is the result of your amnesia.”
“And is it a good quality to have, Mr. Caleb? Or not?”
“Oh, I am sure it will get you into a lot of amusing trouble. You seem like you would be good at that, Mr. Mollymauk.”
“Me? A troublemaker?” Molly flashed a sharp grin. “Never! I’ll have you know that I’ve not once spooked the horse of an unsuspecting ruffian or two, leading to them fall off their mounts in a heap of dust on the ground. Not once.”
Caleb arched a brow at Molly. “Oh, I am very convinced. You are extremely trustworthy and not at all a shameless rapscallion who, as soon as he is bonded once more with his body, will make off with all my worldly goods and probably my ungrateful beast of a cat to boot.”
“Tell me what you really think then!” Molly let his head lift in laughter. “You don’t pull your punches, verbal or physical, do you?”
“That is assuming I can actually hit anything I swing at with my fist in the first place.”
Molly was warm again and it didn’t make sense, to be so fond so soon of the strange, likely dirty, Zemnian wizard, but he was. The sensation blossomed in his stomach up through his chest and he looked everywhere but at Caleb.
After a lengthy pause, Caleb added, “If you were wondering, that was meant to be a joke, though I also mean it literally.”
“I know, Mr. Caleb. I know.” When he’d recovered himself, Mollymauk looked up. “What’s that?”
The shapes before them in the distance were partially obscured by fog, as the weather had grown increasingly less pleasant the further south the traveled, not that Molly could really tell or be affected by it. But the clouds from the day prior had never really gone away, that much was clear.
“That would be the town. We will reach our destination by sunset, I think, but before then, I would like to recast that spell on your body, just in case.”
The next two hours dissolved into a quiet blur, as Mollymauk found himself entranced by the prospect of entering an actual town. They were about a league out, and the distance didn’t seem so drastic as the environment continued to change around them, the fields of tall grass giving way to marshier lands, the grasses shorter, bushes fuller, and the ground less dusty until the path evened out into a tightly packed dirt road, numerous wagon ruts criss crossing each other through the mud.
Buildings loomed above him, and Mollymauk looked up in awe.
“Welcome, Mr. Mollymauk, to Trostenwald.”