Kindred Folk - Velvet Wings

Quote:

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This takes place chronologically after an as-of-yet-not-finished solo called “Black As Her Heart”!
...I like to remember when everything takes place.

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”Recollect to me the snare of snow; first chill, then stupor, then letting go.”

Fenn floated. Amid speckled lavender clouds, he drifted, his feet just barely skimming over silver waters.

A part of him itched to fly. A more rational part wondered why he was floating in the first place, and pondered the rationale that he shouldn’t be able to fly if he hadn’t wings to fly with. That he was pondering rationality in the first place (in a dream of all places) was due to her presence.

By “her”, he meant Regent Banrion of the Icepeak Court. She could be no other.

The elder fae lounged in the air, embracing the skewed physics of Fenn’s dream with the ease of which one might breathe air. She was a strange sight, to be sure. Two snakish heads rose from her shoulders, pierced by carmine eyes and framed by a mane of black feathers. Scaly blue hands twiddled their thumbs in slow deliberation. Her robes dripped, wine-red, into the waters below. There were no ripples from the fabric’s touch. She was too calm.

“I thank you for your help in ridding me of Morrighna’s blight,” his elder told him, offhandedly rolling an empty vial around in the palm of her hand. “In the weeks thus far, none have challenged my ascension. None suspect — or else, say that they suspect — our foul play. Now then! I have my Court under control for once and all. There is much that I have resolved to teach you. You need learn more of your heritage, of the realm of dreams, of how to conduct yourself and earn other’s respect… other’s fear too, if needed.” A glance down at their reflections followed. A flicker of consideration to his; perhaps, a thought was spared to his distinct inability to strike awe or fright into any onlooker. It wasn’t a new realization to Fenn, but before meeting Banri (and other jarring events) he’d never thought that needed remedy. The Regent made a thoughtful pair of noises in the back of her throats. “Please, visit again soon so I can make good on those promises. Agreed?”

<Agreed,> he replied. He spoke cheerfully, hiding the weight im his chest with a bob of his shoulders. A part of him quivered ever so slightly at the staring vial. The palpitations were ignored.

Banri beamed. “Then make haste to Sidhe. I await your return.”

Fenn followed her gaze downward, into the lake below.

There were numerous ways in and out of the fae’s land. Numerous portals that shifted open and closed, by season or other natural circumstance. In the reflecting waters shone a circle of dewy mushroom and dark grass, vivid against a backdrop of a shattered house, comfortably encompassing a stone gateway. The boy nodded. He knew where to go.

Trees sulked under the weight of the wind, withered needles and curls of whitening bark flaking off to plaster the ground underfoot.

Fighting against the gales, arms braced headlong against the brunt of the wicked weather, was a figure most small and pale. His feet sank into sticky lemon-colored clay. He had to keep moving; his anxiousness generated a frost at his extremities, his toes white with an icy sheen. He had to keep moving if he didn’t want to freeze to the riverbank. The nearby waters, like his cloak and loose hair, raged against the onslaught of winds. Lightning filled the distant sky. It was midday, but it was dark. It was midday, but it was getting darker.

The shrieking wilds were most unwelcome today. There was a feeling whirling about in the fae’s ribcage. One of change, one of destruction. He assumed it was simply the makings on an oncoming tornado.

Thaynes, he hoped that was all it was.

Against the backdrop of the lashing trees with their deranged and rippling mosses, amid the grey of young light and charged air, Fenn struggled against two itches plaguing his physical form.

His arms were flexible enough to feel his upper back. He knew what was back there; knew but did not know. There was a wrong there. Two lumps, soft and painful underneath the surface, a grinding-up-against his shoulder blades. They had showed up slowly over the last two weeks. It was an uncomfortable feeling, that itching-beneath-the-surface. As if... almost, there was something under there, something moving and quivering and wanting to slide its way out. The fae withdrew his hand and shuddered yet again as he bolstered himself against the weather. This had been going on too long. What was it? He wasn’t sure. He didn’t know. He didn’t really want to know. Maybe he needed a physician or a healer; Nevin was an alchemist. Was that close enough to a physician? Maybe the little fae needed to pop in for a visit…

But he was supposed to be visiting Banri now. The alchemist was far, far away. Back in Corone, back on another continent. Not in Raiaera. He didn’t trust many others to be so helpful. Perhaps, the little fae thought as he braced himself against a fir, it’d be best to simply quash his urge to scratch the wrongness; like how one deal with mosquito bites, simply ignoring the itching until it faded away of its own accord.

There was something else that he wanted to scratch too. A mind-itch, for lack of better words. An urge to crawl into a dark, dry space.

That, too, he was uneasy about scratching.

But he supposed it was going to be scratched anyway. Some shelter was sorely needed; soon. Soon. Before the wind picked him off and carried him away...

Up above the trees, Fenn spotted the toothed brow of a castle.

Bent against the winds, he stopped. He squinted. Somehow, the looming shapes seemed familiar to him. He was fairly certain these were close to the faerie-ring Banrion had shown him in his dream; that they had been in the background of the glimpse of forest he had caught, within the confines of the silver pool. Certainly, they looked a sturdy place to rest himself while the tornado passed. Silently chortling to himself, Fenn trudged through the wavering winds toward its lonely shadow. It was a struggle to keep on his feet. The weather was picking up, now tearing small branches off of trees, causing him to stumble and slide through the mud and needles. In the first instant that he hit the rugged rock path leading up to the fortification, he took off. Coarse rocks made better purchase for his hoary toes.

The air’s resistance against him diminished as he found his way into the castle’s vast entryway. It was a bit of a grand entrance, but in heavy disrepair.

Chunks of stone crumbled off of the elaborate engravings etched into the stone frame of the doors. Fenn would have had a great deal of difficulty forcing them open, but for a section where the nails had rusted out of their thick planks. With a weary shove, they were foist from their holdings, falling inward with a crack and a plume of dust. Panting, Fenn squeezed inside. What he found was a vast and empty hall. There was little in the way of furniture, and everything in the way of cracked columns. The boy’s dragging steps vibrated in the dead stone. There was, in fact, one aspect of the place that was not bare rock. The old-fashioned windows were veiled by heavy grey drapes, their greasy silks keeping the pine-rot out but not the boring of white moths. Glancing outside, through one of the insect-eaten holes, Fenn observed the castle’s courtyard from his position of relative safety. Outside the glass was a garden that might have once been primly trimmed. Now, it was a sea of rippling ivy, and wildflowers being shredded by hungry gales.

This was an abandoned place. A hesitance filled the fae as he glanced back into his temporary, impersonal shelter, prickly snowflakes popping into existence around him. He wouldn’t expect to find anyone else here.

Yet, that suited some deep, darkened piece of him just fine. The inside-itch, the one that was quietly begging for him to go deeper into the castle, wanted him to be alone. Alone was safe — supposedly. He didn’t know why, though. He just felt vulnerable.

His mind wandered back to someone who would be safe to be alone with.

Staring back through the door into the seething, cloudy turmoil and wondered if Daugi was alright. He slowly moved to poke his head out his makeshift entrance, wincing at the twigs and dirt that blew into his eyes. A shaky breath left him. They’d been separated — just for bit — while she had investigated the darker corners of the forest for enough prey to sate her hunger. She was a large beast. Large beasts needed large meals, and Fenn was normally perfectly happy to let her have the alone time she needed to feed herself. But the threat of that tornado had come rolling in, and now…

The little fae shivered, and pulled a brass whistle from his bag. Fweeeeeee! it shrilled. The sound echoed out of the narrow confines of the castle entryway, fading into a lonely sigh.

Holding his breath, Fenn waited. He waited. And waited. No howl answered his call.

Eventually, the fae had to shake his head and retreat into the building, no longer able to take the winds yanking at his neck. She was strong, he reassured himself. She was smarter than he like to give her credit for too. Wherever she was, Daugi was going to take care of herself.

A bout of dizziness had grabbed him by the back of his head. The mind-itching was a throb now. A need. To the dark. To a dark, deep corner now. To somewhere hidden and hollow. Somewhere to not be found. Gripping his skull, Fenn started down the castle’s hallways. Maybe the weather had worn him down. All he knew was that he wanted a place to sleep. He wanted to just forget the hell of gales outside; forget it until it went away and his wolf came back.

No. No. Too spacious. Too open, too bright. What he looked for eluded him, and yet, he kept marching on. Through dark halls, through dank rooms, through his wobbly-kneed state and incrementally increasing fatigue. He breathed in dust that must have been centuries undisturbed and rubbed his watering eyes against that which he’d stirred up with lurching strides. His earlier struggles through the weather had left him terribly off-balance, and it was taking a long time to right his senses again. An uncomfortably long time.

Finally, he came across one that felt right to the itchings.

It was a bedroom. A child’s bedroom, judging by the moth-eaten stuffed animals scattered about, and the cheery white and blue color scheme of anything painted or fabric’d. Make no mistake though, this room was in no better shape than the rest of the house. The colors were darkened by deep shadows. There were no windows to shed their light; only dead lanterns and half-used candles. The fae wandered in. His eyes drew upward to a hanging mobile of cotton-sewn clouds. A part of him wished he had something to start fires on him, so that he could explore the room in greater detail. But the itching part of him had no protests. This was small, cozy, dry. This would do.

Do for what? Why?

The itchings gave him no answer that he could hear.

There were other things that weren’t forthcoming with their stories either. Fenn wandered over a lumpy rug to part the canopy of the bed. He ran his hand along the faded duvet, staring blankly at the dust the accumulated on his fingers, and intricate wispy patterns underneath the settlings. This place really hadn’t been inhabited in ages, had it? Though, perhaps this state of emptiness wasn’t that long to an elf, was it? This was Raiaera after all. Letting out a held breath, the sprite wiped his hands off on his cloak. It occurred to him that he’d probably never know the circumstances behind this castle’s ruin, or who once lived here. He’d only know what little he could through what had been left behind. The physical building, the furniture that had been forgotten… he could only speculate.

Perhaps natural disaster.

Perhaps a coup. Perhaps fright caused by the distant machinations of the long-dead Corpse War. Perhaps, a chain reaction of people heading out for greener pastures.

Perhaps, nothing he knew of at…

Mid-speculation, Fenn felt his legs give. There was no warning. Only the sudden realization that the floor was swooping up to his face, and the split-second panic of grabbing the bed by one of its canopy poles. Clinging to the frame, breathing heavily, he made a pair of split-second observations. There was no frost on his hands, nor the pole. And he shouldn’t be this exhausted.

This didn’t

feel

right.

Fenn’s head snapped up, eyes widened. Despite being out in a breezy abandoned castle in the middle of an autumn tornado, he realized that he didn’t feel the cold anymore. Even if he was immune to the harsh bite of it, normally, he still had a sense of the temperature around him. So why did air slowly grow hotter and hotter around him, pressing much too heavy and dry on his skin? And what heat was this within him? Explanations raced through his mind as he let go of the bed and eased himself into a sitting position. Did he have a fever? Had he come down with something awful? Was there some odd magic in the air?

Maybe he just needed to lay down for a bit.

When he touched a hand to his forehead, he found a thin sheen of cool-but-unfrozen sweat. Fenn stared at the clear liquid on his fingers. Fever, he decided. Definitely fever. Sighing, he stretched. His bag was slipped off his shoulder. Casting it aside, he set about peeling his icy cloak off of him, and then attempted to do the same with his shirt. With his uncomfortable warmth, he couldn’t stand to wear them any longer. For a moment, the boy simply shivered in his threadbare sweater and stared at the pile of green cloth on the dark carpeting and wondered if he was coming down with anything deadly serious. His heartbeat fluttered warily. His back crawled with an itchiness that shook him all the way down to his nails. Eventually, the sweater was wrestled off as well and pushed aside.

At least, Fenn thought as he lowered his head, the musty rug wasn’t much different than sleeping on loose soil. Here he was, sick and shivery in the middle of nowhere. “Fuck,” the fae mouthed. He was not used to being ill. It did not happen often. He did not like it.

The mobile above was still. There were no frosty breezes to disturb it from its place.

As his eyes fluttered shut, the young puck reached out into the empty air, faintly wishing that his fingers would meet dark, coarse fur; he wished that Daugi was here. Having her to hold onto would have been a Thaynesend at that moment. Fenn didn’t have anyone to admit it to, but he was a little frightened. A bit fearful. Afraid that, in the rain and the aloneness of these suffocating stone walls, he would die. But perhaps he was just being overly dramatic. He was good at that… he was very good…

Heaving a sigh too warm and too dry, Fenn’s eyelids slid closed.

The forest was large, luminous, and rich. Just enough light filtered down for disorderly ferns to grow amid the leaves and twigs dusting the earth’s skin. Silent branches waved from every tree, and vines of blossoming morning glories, which grew dispersed and sparingly, clashed with the otherwise green view. A cacophony of wild sounds resonated through the air. Most belonged to insects, their thrumming muffling the occasional calls of birds of prey gliding unseen in over the forest.

There was frost on the ground. It crunched under the weight of him as he stood up. Fenn breathed in the crisp air and stretched, toes squishing the icy dirt.

There was frost on the ground, and the air was warm.

The puck glanced about, frowning. Fenn’s recent experiences delving into dreams had taught him to recognize when he was in one, but this one felt off to him in some unexplainable way. There was a strength to its edges. He closed his eyes, feeling warm sunlight on his face. When he mentally reached out to figure out where Banrion was within the dream — she was usually present in the lucid ones — he ran into a wall. A hard, inescapable edge. The only one here was him.

Him, and him.

The fluttering sight of the other-him, perched in the tangle of branches above like a bird about to take flight, caused Fenn to flinch in surprise. It was him, but it was not him. It was him, but with nicked ears and heavy eyes, and deep dark bags under those eyes. It was him with rosy skin and raven-dark hair. It was him, but with black shackles and chains dripping off his wrists and ankles. It was him with black blood trailing off his hands in a steady stream. The thick ooze glopped to the leaf litter below with nary a sound.

“Don’t be scared,” the other him said, smiling only slightly as he squinted against the sunlight. His voice was recognizably like Fenn’s inner voice... but older. More like a young adult than a child. “I’m just you.”

Fenn took a step back, ears flat to his skull. <Are you?>

“Yep. A very different part of you. Minds are complicated places. Most people have multiple faces inside themselves, you know. You could call me an accumulative form of your darkest experiences, your harder half, your sense for survival, or a manifestation of more Mortal Concerns, if you’d like?” The other Fenn shook his head and stared downward into the grass, dark bangs drifting in front of his eyes. “If things go how I hope they might, then you’ll forget about me anyway. We have a lot to discuss and nearly no time to make some really important choices.”

Fenn (his main self?) hesitated, and crossed his arms.

Mortality — that was what the not-him-him was to be called that for now — sighed, sensing his unease. “Just cooperate with me here? Things are going to get really weird if you don’t. Like usual, we’re breaking a few rules-“

<What rules are we breaking here?> Fenn asked as he took a cross-legged seat in the dirt. It was an inquiry he couldn’t quite hold back. The lack of context for all of this vexed him.

The other-him shrugged. “Mmm. Let's see. I can’t tell you the specifics — that might fuck things up? But I guess I can vaguely say that they’re ones of causality and psychology. It’s probably not a good idea to for a person to split themself up this strongly. In our case though… I’m mostly subconscious shit anyway? And this is supposed to be Big Fuckin’ Change Time anyway. So we should be fine…” Mortality trailed off, and the chains around his wrists clacked as he crossed his arms together, leaning back against his tree’s trunk. “You know what? That’s all the questions we have time for from you today. I ask things now. First; am I a part of you that you really want to keep around? Am I even a part of you that you particularly need? Would I be missed if I was shoved back into the deepest corners of our mind?”

Sharp canines clicked together in Fenn’s mouth as he ground the nonsensical questions around his head. <What? How’m I supposed to- I don’t know- augh! I need to know what do you do. In my head. If you’re a part of me. And, why are you asking me this?>

“Reasons. Look at me. Look at how battered I am.” Mortality’s chains rattled as he lifted his cuffs skyward. A spray of blood landed not two inches away from Fenn, and he winced. “What do you think my job is? I keep a looot of scary shit under lock and key. And I need you to- to agree to kind of…”

The dream was quiet a moment. The breeze, the birds, and even the bugs had vanished. Fenn leaned in toward Mortality’s tree with his head in his hands, frowning. <To kind of..?>

“Kill me.”

A soupy storm of white whipped through the forest, cracking wood and withering lush leaves with its intensity. At its center were the two Fenns.

Well, specifically, one of the two Fenns.

Seething incoherently, Fenn — his main sense of self — paced, harsh patterns of frost trailing after his every step. It was difficult to articulate just what he was feeling; there was a lot going on at once. His chest was tight with a stammer of panic, his eyes narrow with anger. Confusion stirred him into frantic motion. Kill? The other him? How? Why? What was even going on here?

Just as placid as before, Mortality watched him rage. “I wondered if this would happen. Maybe I should have phrased that better.”

<Well fucking duh!> Fenn screeched, whirling around to face his other self. His projected voice shook the fabric of the dream. Massive crystals of ice shot up from the ground around him, tearing apart several trees; probably his fault. He was too caught up in his flurry to even turn and stare. <You can’t meet me all of a sudden for the first time out of nowhere and tell me I gotta kill you. Can’t say that you wanna die and act like that’s not a big thing! That’s not okay! That’s really not okay if you’re also kind of a part of me! That’s weird, and creepy, and it freaks me->

“Aaand I’m going to stop you right there. Calm yourself. Before you start off on some tangent about how we should be all perfectly fine — fuck, we’re good at tangents — don’t try to rationalize me off as needing to be some happy, useful bit of your brain. You’re the happy (mostly) useful part of the brain. I’m the bit we quash down because you can’t seem to deal with shit in healthy ways. You can’t deal with the couple of times you’ve almost lost Daugi, you can’t deal with the fucked up monsters you’ve met, you can’t deal with helping Banrion kill Morrighna in cold blood, and you can’t deal with Amari’s betrayal. Right?” Mortality chimed.

<Yeah, but, I wouldn’t’ve guessed a part of me was suicidal though,> he whispered back between agitated hiccoughing. <That’s pretty depressing.>

“I am depressing! That’s why I’m asking for this.” The other him groaned and slumped back, covering his face with his hands. “Everything I’m squashing back — it just keeps coming back to the surface! It’s starting to get unhealthy. Not just for me. For you you. You’re on the edge of a nervous breakdown. Hell, we’re in the middle of one right now. You were musing about loneliness and death not two minutes from passing out!”

Fenn took a deep breath, hands clenched into fists at his side. The storm about him tightened. <But I didn’t want to die. See? I was just sad and sick and all by myself, so I worried about dying! Different.>

Mortality only shook his head.

“That is still not normal for us. Normal for us used to be pretending we weren’t ill so we could go be an idiot and climb the castle’s turrets mid-tornado to see the storm for ourselves. Or something equally ridiculous, just because we could. Do you remember that? I do. It’s my job to remember things.”

What was he supposed to say to that? There wasn’t an easy answer. Still gasping back sobs of panic, Fenn lowered his hands, forcing them to unclench. The blizzard’s breath, the snowflakes and hail chinks raining down around them lightened into nothingness. The entire forest was as pale as a fresh sheet of paper. Slowly, Mortality eased himself off of his branch and fell to the ground — slowly, as if he were sinking through molasses. When he touched down on the frozen earth his feet were muted by the snow. He held out his hand, a gesture made ponderous under the weight of his chains.

“Come on. Come with me. I want a change of scenery. A better place to conclude our business. A better place to help you understand what we need.”

A moment passed.

<Fine,> Fenn eventually replied. <But, fuck you?>

“Ghesundteit.”

Uneasily, with a sense of foreboding, Fenn took the hand.

Mortality’s glazed gaze lit up. Silvery winds swirled about them, howling like banshees. As soon as the brief storm whooshed into nothingness, the other him’s hand retreated under his cloak.

The forest in its entirety had vanished. They now stood within a ballroom-like space, decked out in shelf after oaky shelf of vivid books, centered by a table of tea-party implements. Icicle dripped from the vast ceiling to shed silver light down on them. Meanwhile, a glassy ice formed the floor. Fenn tapped it with one shy foot. Frost spun out from his touch, as he willed it, giving the shimmery surface a bit of traction. He grinned, quivering with a wordless chuckle. His seething irritation and confusion wasn’t gone, but it was dampened by wonder. For now.

<This is->

“A library from a dream we had with Banrion, yes,” interrupted Mortality. He skidded across the floor, and grabbed ahold of the tea table with one hand, bringing himself to a sudden stop. His eyes were on a pile of books laid out on the table. They were dusted with stray cubes of sugar and dark spills. “We liked that dream. Didn’t we? So, I took this place for my own. It’s sort of… where I live? Exist? Visualize myself being? I can’t find the words for it. Subconscious things don’t translate well to the conscious. Anyway, it’s a convenient place to visually represent stored knowledge and you should find it comfortable here,” he murmured, easing himself onto the maroon cushion atop one of the several mismatched chairs.

Fenn slowly stamped his way across the ice, leaving a trail of hoar behind. This place did give him a sense of familiarity, at least compared with the forest. But it was still missing one crucial detail. <Can we invite Banri into our dream? I’d feel better with her around,> he admitted as he took a chair for himself.

“No. We’re locked inside of ourselves right now. She is completely incapable of visiting us.”

<Oh.> His ears drooped. <Are there any other mes in here?> So I don’t have to be alone with you, Fenn neglected to mention aloud.

“None that we’re aware of.” Mortality stretched and took a swig out of one of the many teacups scattered about. Once it was empty, he stared at it, then took a bite out of the porcelain. Fenn flinched. It was startling, but… technically allowed? Weird shit and dreams went hand in hand. Yeah, he wasn’t sure how much he liked this steely-eyed other him.

Quietly — out of a need for distraction — he reached for one of the books on the table. It was battered of cover, with little dragonflies embroidered into its leather.

Mortality’s instantly shot out to grab him by the wrist. “Don’t touch that. That’s some snarl of… really early memories. I can’t parse them, they’re so faded.” The mind-figment sighed as Fenn yanked his hand back. “All I’ve figured out is that it’s as far back as those first ten years we spent being a clueless wild thing in the forest, and it ties to our Glamour somehow. Maybe it has to do with learning it in the first place? Or, it could be something else. I don’t know. It’s probably not worth the effort to recover.”

Grumbling as Mortality retreated back into poised normalcy, dragging chains leaving streaks of actual blood on the table’s top, Fenn glanced aside to the tea implements. A cup caught his eye. Green, decorated with lacy patterns and a singular snowflake.

He remembered that cup!

Eagerly, the fae grabbed for it and took a sip of the dark brew. Just as quickly, he spat it out, squeaking and grimacing.

The taste of fae blood lingered in his mouth even as he wiped his tongue on his sleeve. How could he have forgotten that tiny detail? Fenn stared at the black liquid pooling on the table, his heart jerking in his chest. His thoughts flashed back to grey eyes, lifeless as marbles, and a table table of tea-things tipped over. He thought of clawed hands grasping for his throat-

Suddenly, amid a clatter of chains, the teacup was whisked from his hand, and a book was slammed down on top of the spill. Fenn hazily glanced up to meet the gaze of one very squinched-cheeked, irked-eyed Mortality.

“Whatever you do, don’t panic, dumbfuck. We’re in a pretty delicate state right now. Our physical body is… well, it’s doing some things. You have a big freak out again before accepting my deal, and I can’t say how or if it’ll affect us.”

<We sleepwalking?>

Mortality flipped idly through the pages of a random book, not even glancing at it. His eyes were on Fenn. “No. We’re not even moving. It’s a good thing. Trust me. Now, enough of me babysitting you. I think you’ve had enough time to simmer down. Ready for me to tell you what needs to happen?”

Muffling his urge to reply with something distractingly rude in turn — babysitting? — Fenn nodded.

“What we need is for you to make a pact with me. With yourself, really. We’re fae. We can pull shit like this if we want.” Mortality glanced at the book he slammed down on the tea spill. It was a Salvarian tale; The Snow Queen. “While we’re in this state of flux, we can mess around with things. Mess around with our mind. When I said I need you to kill me, I meant it metaphorically. I don’t need you to stab me or anything. Just need you to verbally and clearly agree to… put me to sleep, as it will. To thrust me so far back into our mind that the word ‘consciousness’ is meaningless echo of reality. And, to let me take some of our baggage with me, while leaving behind all the practical knowledge I’ve been sorting out of said baggage.” He sighed, shuddering. “Like all barters, this comes at a price. And no. I’m not at liberty to say it.”

<Oh. That’s... all? So you’re telling me,> Fenn rephrased, head in his hands, <that if I take this offer, I can go back to being dumb and happy? Forget all the bad things that give me nightmares?>

“That’s the deal.”

<Yes,> the puck replied instantly.

Something bright, like the glint off of a silver coin, filled his other self’s eyes. He made an expression that was akin to a smile. Perhaps, in the same way that Mortality himself was akin to Fenn. “Re-articulate your ‘yes’.”

It was a very Banrion thing of him to say; and the puck knew exactly what his other-self meant by that.

<I, Fennik Glenwey,> he telegraphed firmy, <promise to shove you and your weird baggage so far away into the back of my mind that darkness will be your new sunlight, so that maybe I won’t be so dreary so much in the waking world, because apparently all this mopeyness is your fault or something. Or at least, I’m gonna say it is, because you refuse to tell me jack shit.>

A prickly shrug rose out of Mortality’s thin shoulders. “You know what? Close enough. Brace yourself now; what’s coming won’t be easy. Not for you, anyway.”

Winds thick with snow rushed past the bookshelves, ruffling the pages of open tomes as they gathered closely around Fenn and his counterpart. The table and chair vanished under their touch. There was nothing underneath him now but frigid, blizzardy air.

It was dark.

It was dark, when the white winds died down again, dark but for a pinprick of light in the distance.

“Goodbye now. Hopefully, we never meet again.” Mortality, silhouetted by the light, glanced over Fenn’s shoulder with his dull, dull eyes and a sense of deliberation.

What was there? The fae whirled around, but found nothing but black. He scoffed. Of course, he thought, glancing back over to frown into the distant prick of light. Now, the other him was gone too. What else would he expect from himself?

Fenn paused, hearing the gentle shhhhfff of wings on papery wings.

<...Mortality?>

There was movement in the dark.

Memories brushed past him like the gossamer wings of a swarm of insects, fluttering toward the light far away. Vague impressions fluttered over him; silver hair and flowery perfume. The tang of dried blood and a disgruntled glance his way. A boney hug. Thick, strong hands gingerly petting a black wolf on the head. Eyes, green like his, reflecting him back from under straw-blonde hair. The movement of a cart and the promise to visit again. Laughter, a man’s, and many shiny piercings glittering in the sun. A mane of feathers falling over him, two courteous voices speaking of the same mind, blue scales. Being held tall atop mountainous shoulders. “Good night, my little dragonfly,” whispered a hazy blur of gossamer wings, delicate hands brushing a lock of black hair back from his eyes…

The impressions were attached to faces. To names, sometimes. To people. To places and times.

They were shadows in the dark, movements out of the corner of his eye. It was difficult to quantify their exact appearance when looking directly at them — when just touching them — gave him thoughts of times past. Fenn watched them float away. It struck him somehow that he could, if he desired, reach out to catch them. Maybe call them back to him. Where were they going? But he found himself afraid.

<Mortality! Come back!>

He was afraid because among the flickers of soft remembrances he felt sharp-winged forms shedding pain like dustings of scales. They were many. Reptilian eyes, ice-white teeth tinged pink and grey with blood, the stench of rotting meat. A child, looking much like him, face-down in the snow. Decay and fungus blooming in the dark, a voice that spoke in colors, a harsh cracking against his skull. Red hair and even redder eyes, black cracks over pale-white skin and a raw-bleeding eye held in one hand. A flash of heat around his wrists. Eyes spinning around him, a blizzard of cold faces, beastly and beautiful. Thick blue drinks in clear crystal. Clammy flesh hidden under bones and skeins of algae, not quite smelling of the sea, but drowning all the same. Tea black as blood, black as poison. A girl with a wolf’s face, a wolf who was not a friend. A girl in a wolf’s guise, screaming, screaming at him. A ghost in a wolf’s guise, screaming empty promises to haunt his dreams.

Fenn drew back.

The winged creatures trickled and whirled past him, borne on a breeze he could not feel. Toward a destination he could not identify. The pinprick of light called to them. Like sand, he felt them vanish, felt their presence lighten. One by one by one. As a memory cut up against him — one that emanated a weight of time and the heat of cold iron — he felt the urge to scream. He was silent. The phantasm passed.

All the angry things that whispered to him in the non-voice of his inner survivalist — Mortality? — streaked away. Many of the things that made him the gleeful thief screamed off with them.

What was going to be left?

Panic pulsed through him as emptiness crashed down on him. Belatedly, he reached out to grab something, anything that didn’t cut him.

It emenated the essence of red yarn, a sweater heavy and damp with bathwater. The wings— they were soapy— they were slick and soaked through with a thickness that he wasn’t sure was water—! It slipped through his grasp. Gasping, he reached out into the dark again, into the void. Deft hands struck the next — the last — memory to brush against him. Whatever he’d grabbed, whatever he now held, he didn’t let go. The impression of frost spiraling out from a cold touch fluttered up his hands through wings as delicate as fresh snow.

So did the essence of a name. A face. Blank green eyes reflected in the puddle of a dark city street. Silent laughter.

<Fennik Glenwey,> he whispered to himself as the whirling wings took their leave of him. Trembling, he clutched his name to his chest. Dusty membranes still fluttered against his hands. <I’m still Fenn. Even if…>

Even if…

He couldn’t remember.

“Fennik Glenwey. Still here,” a small fae felt himself mouth as he returned to himself. “Fenn.” To his waking, breathing body. To…

What was this?

There was a liquid covering him, a gummy slime of sorts. It tacked his eyes closed. Yet… he could breathe through it. At least he wasn’t frozen. Frozen? Something instinctively insisted yes, frozen. You can do that. Though, his back was numb and entirely without feeling. Fenn shifted onto his side. A sore stiffness tacked his limbs together at the joints, as if he hadn’t moved them for weeks, or months. What… where was he? What had happened? He had fallen asleep and… well. What happened after that? More frighteningly, what had happened before that? What at all? With a groggy squeak, he reached into slime around him. After a certain point, the goo became something else, solidified into tacky, silky threads. He stretched, uncurling his leaden legs. His feet, too, met with more thread. It was almost like a blanket swaddling him all around. A really gooey, wet blanket.

Uncertain, Fenn pressed his palms harder into the threads. They had some give to them, but a few broke under his touch. Beyond the initial layer of gunky buildup, they met his hands with a feeling not unlike like dried-out spiderwebbing.

What was this?

With a grunt of effort, he tore through it, making a gash just big enough for him to stick a hand (and an eye) out of. Oxygen wheezed into the narrow space. Ooze sloshed out. A sneeze jolted him and he felt guck slide of of his nose. Yuck. Stale air slid into his lungs, sharp yet lukewarm, forcing him to hack out more gunk. Wiping the rest of it from his eyes, he peered out.

His vision was blurry. Maybe from the guck, maybe from not using it for a while, maybe just because the world around was murky-dim with dark. Hesitantly, he felt the floor outside with his palm. It met coarse and eroding fabric. This swampy mess of threads enveloping him — cocoon? — was on a rug, on the floor of what seemed to be a quaint stone bedroom. Fenn blinked. He felt as if he should recognize this room. Perhaps not intimately, but still, recognize. He did not recognize this room. He still did not remember how he got into this room. This room, filled with fuzzes of faded sky-blue and cloudy decorations. Dust and cobwebs draped from the canopy bed beside him. A wavering mobile above spun about in a chilly breeze. He knew enough to know that this place wasn't his.

The gaping emptiness, his lacking past, both burned in the cage of his chest.

Something stirred elsewhere in the castle. The wump of heavy paws and click of clawed nails echoed in through the gap in his cocoon, and pricked his ears up to alertness. He wasn’t alone.

Barely daring to breathe, Fenn withdrew his hand back into slimy safety.

The first instinct that came to mind was running — to flee whatever it was that lumbered its way toward him, to escape the wretched confines of his cocoon. But no, that wasn’t viable. When he tried to move his legs as he had before, he only got a tingle of numbness and the faintest twitching sensation. He was stuck where he lay for now. Letting out a deep breath, the boy pondered whether or not the cocoon was an acceptable hiding place. Judging by the growing intensity of the unknown creature’s gait, it was not. When a sneeze welled up in his chest — from the dust he’d stirred with his hand — he stifled it. Briefly.

-choo!

His hazy vision caught a sweep of black fur and a flash of burning red just outside. The crimson tang of iron-tainted blood cut through the souring seepage of the threads bound around him, striking fear into his small, sluggishly-restarting heart.

An open muzzle, huffing hot air and dripping pinkish drool, asserted itself into the gap in his cocoon.

Fenn balked from the yellowed teeth that swam before him. A little frightened part of him reminded himself of the frozen thing he could do. There was an ethereal tickling in his hand. Instinctively, he pressed his palm to the nose of the intruding predator. White ice spread from his touch, abrupt and sharp, hissing cold fog against the tepid air.

Howling rocked the room as Fenn jerked his hand back. The owner of the muzzle yanked itself out of the cocoon’s hole, smacking Fenn upside the head in its haste. Yelping, the creature retreated back into the dimness. The boy’s heart pounded as he heard it gallop off. Soon, its thudding clitter-clatter echoed off into nothingness; the boy didn’t particularly celebrate ots departure, however. It was a little hard to react at all, actually. His head rung with hollow confusion. He panted, feeling strains of frost run up his arms and cheeks, only to fizzle out into a thin dew. This… contextless confrontation... had left him exhausted. Merely peering out of the cocoon had left him short of breath and weak. And accidentally expressing this strange magic of his — kicking it back into wakefulness — had been even harder on him. Resigned, the boy lay quietly and let rest take him again.

Fenn was in a dream, and knew he was in a dream. He wasn’t sure how he knew. He just… did.

The environment around him was a tasteless tangle of grey webbing. It stuck to his feet as he wandered, aimless, making ugly sucking sounds each time he lifted up his foot. Gobs of guck were strung up beneath the high ceiling and the floor, pulsing slightly. There was no real light. No real darkness. Just the empty, endless stretch of dirty grey and the schlorp of his feet. At the least, he mused mutedly as he hugged his arms around himself, there was no slime here. Probably, his mind had drawn this from whatever anxieties his cocoon-swaddled wakeup had stirred within him.

But hey, what did he know about dreams?

Maybe a lot, even with his short-circuiting memory. He just wasn’t sure where it all came from. What he was sure about, was that the prickling of the hairs the back of his neck meant that someone else was here. Here and behind him.

With an uneasy downturn to his ears, the fae turned over his shoulder. Standing radiant among the gloom and webbing was a feminine figure he instantly identified as a fellow fae. Why, he wasn’t sure — but certainly, she was no human. Azure scales coated her from head to toe, and her two long necks were crowned with serpentine heads and a mane of black feathers that fell to her knees. Most concerning were her eyes. Her carmine gaze was aglow with pure, unbridled rage. “FENNIK GLENWEY,” the being boomed in two matronly voices that echoed in upon themselves (and caused him to reel back in fear), “IF YOU DARE SHROUD YOURSELF FROM ME FOR MONTHS WITHOUT EXPLANATION EVER AGAIN, SO HELP ME, I WILL CRAM A SENSE OF RESPONSIBILITY SO FAR DOWN YOUR THROAT THAT YOU WILL BE TASTING THE UPWASH OF UNPAID TAVERN TABS FOR WEEKS.”

After that outburst, she glared with a full weight of righteous anger, and a shocking silence. The being gathered herself up with an adjustment of her wooden breastplate and wine-dark robes. She seemed to expect him to have something to say.

<Sorry,> he replied when he finally gathered up his voice, voice thin and shaking. <Not sure what you’re talking about.>

All off the puffery and glowering whooshed out of the snakish fae with a perplexed drop of her jaws. Something uneasy showing in how she tugged at her sleeves. “Pigwidgeon, you promised you would visit me… and you did not. Oath-breaking is a grave offense to me; you know this. Yet, you have not even spoken to me for months. Why?”

<I… I don’t know?>

“Curious. Let me check on your physical form, then.” The fae closed her eyes a moment, a look of concentration on her (surprisingly expressive) faces. Her manes went limp with shock as her lids lifted again. “Oh, by the love of Mab, you’ve had an early metamorphosis. Of course.” A sharp and impenetrable glance was thrown his way. “And by the guise of it, you went and fuddled about with your mind while you were at it. I understand the temptation — many creatures are burdened by worries of imperfection — but it is a most dangerous thing to do.”

Fuddled about his brain? Dangerous? Groaning, he plopped down on the sticky threads floored beneath him. <Don’t remember muddling with it,> he admitted quietly.

“From the confusion etched into your features, you don’t appear to recall much of anything, my Pigwidgeon. Which means that you did something to your memories. Perhaps accidentally. Perhaps, with the weight of intention,” the lady said, politely taking a seat after him. It was odd, seeing someone that formal cross-legged on dingy webbing.

<Do you think I meant to?>

She nodded, though one of her shoulders lifted up in a way that was almost a shrug. Her gaze suddenly did not meet his. “From what little I know of you, I would say it was intentional.” Nonetheless, she heaved a deep breath, as if relieved. Relieved, and yet, not particularly surprised. Excited, even, the way her eyes lit up on flicking back up to him. “Regardless, let me iterate how worried I have been. It’s been months since I’ve last been able to contact you. I’ve felt the thread of your life spasm through the last few weeks.” She shuddered, dragging her hands through her matted manes in relief. “But no. It was neither death, nor snub. It was a chance to start anew. To think, I was so fussed about why I was unable to contact you for so long! About why you never showed up in Sidhe. Let me reintroduce myself to you; I am Banrion, Regent of the Icepeak Court.”

<Fennik Glenwey,> he mentally murmured back. A hand was offered to the elder fae. She clasped it in a grip that was delicate, but necessarily so, for there was a terrifying strength behind it. The icy quality of her scales reassured him somehow. He wondered what she thought of his own small grip.

“Welcome back, little herald.”

Chunks of silk shriveled up and loosened, peeling away from the ceiling with papery crackles. “We need a change of scenery,” Banrion had told him, and it sparked within him some sense of repetition he couldn’t explain. Before he knew it, the cocoon-environment had crumbled to her will, bringing them into a forest of softly lit mushrooms and slushy snow. Fenn squeaked stumbled aside as a lanky white one popped up from the cracked silk of the ground right next to him. A squat blue pushed up to his right. Some grew as tall as trees; swirling purple sky was visible from under all the caps. Banrion stood with tall confidence against the flurry of growth around them.

It felt much cleaner than the cocoon had, once everything settled down. With a sigh of relief, the little sank into the right of the pillowy fungi. Good seating.

Banrion, on the other hand, had begun to pace. Slowly. With a sense of deliberation he was becoming sure was some common characteristic of hers. “As your Regent, friend, and higher authority, it is my duty to ensure that your transition is as painless as possible. I know your past-self was used to the idea of your body as stable and immutable. Before this, you likely had never experienced any natural major growth or changes to yourself. But I assure you, what you’ll find upon waking is normal. You will grow used to this form too. It will be somewhat different than your previous body, which imitated that of a human child most remarkably in many ways, but you will learn how it works.” The elder fae tapped her left chin, frowning. “Though, achieving transformation at the age of thirty? That does make you an early bloomer.”

<Should that mean anything to me?> he mumbled, absently inspecting the glittery spores leaking out of his mushroom. Ooo, shiny.

“Likely not. One doubts you even consciously realized you were supposed to go through one in the first place. Your knowledge of fae and being fae was rather limited. Perhaps I should have thought to warn you… but then, I expected it would be years before it occurred.”

Fenn shrugged, and his mushroom bobbled. <It’s okay. Whatever happened, happened. Guess I just wonder why I fucked up my memory along the way. And also, what I made myself forget.>

When she next turned around, there was a curious look in all four of Banrion’s eyes. It was something knowing. “Perhaps you have more insight to these things than you believe you do. Why not test the boundaries of your knowledge? Please, will you articulate what all you remember?” she asked, lips curled into slight smiles.

How does one articulate something as vast and frightening as what, in the entirety of their memory, exists? He balked a moment before plunging in. Best to begin with the basics. <Don’t know. Know that I am fae and icy; know my name, and lot of… abstract world things? Ask me what Corone’s capital is, and I know its Radasanth. Know that the big water place in Dheathain is the Bantu Basin, and there’s cool snakes there. Orcs live mainly in Berevar. Have the impression that- that a lock has tumblers, and pressing on them opens it, and that's how keys and picklocks work, but…> Fenn stopped. Suddenly, exactly what wasn’t there clicked. <But, I don’t remember being anywhere. There’s no memory of you. Of any people. Anyone who I used to know is gone.>

”I see. That is a disappointment. But, this does not have to break the friendship we have forged. Nor, perhaps, some of your past friendships.” The Regent sighed, facing him head-on. “Your past self trusted me. Confided in me, even, after a while. In turn, I confided back. I would like to continue this honesty. Does that please your present self, Fenn?”

She seemed so self-assured. So certain and collected. Well, aside from her shouty, anger-panic entrance. Note to self; never ignore her. But otherwise… Well, the boy nodded. <Think it does.>

“Good. By the by, I should let you know, that I do have rough mental copies of some memories of yours. Some that you allowed me to glimpse at. Several of them are… sensitive, and perhaps not something you should remember at all. I’ll give the more banal of them back to you at a later date. The others, we will discuss. For now, you are weak. You are vulnerable. You need a clear mind and time to recover from this ordeal. Yes?”

<Er, probably,> he stammered.

A cloud of luminous spores floated past. The faintest impression of a ring of mushrooms wavered in it. After a staring hesitation, Banrion dashed it, shaking her head. “Then we are at an agreement. Your visit to Sidhe should be postponed a few years, until you have yourself back in order and are ready to study under me as I planned. Do not worry about me; I possess patience so long as I understand why I am kept waiting. I would recommend you rummage about your belongings in the present moment.”

<Why do that?>

“See what your old self collected; sew your new self together from its patchwork. Don’t mourn what you cannot recall. Move forward.”

As she said this, dark cracks began to spread across the ground. Fenn uneasily lifted his feet up, only to realize with pale unease, that they had begun to crawl up the mushrooms. The sky too became blighted by the black webbing. Squeak.

The — his — Regent sagged sadly at the sight. “Ahhh. Do not be alarmed. Your slumber is merely being disturbed. Well, there are a few more things you need to know before you wake. I’ll tell you them quickly,” she promised, her two voices tripping over each other in their haste. “The wolf you’ll meet is yours. Her name is Daugi, and you have no reason to fear her. The stone wound around your neck is how I contact you. Keep it on your person. Avoid iron, for it burns us like nothing else. Avoid fighting; you are no good at it. And above all, be wary of red-haired women; one of them is not your friend. I shall see you in your next dream.”

<See you.>

The cracks shattered across his vision — across Banrion. What reality remained in the space between them winked away. Brief darkness followed.

When Fenn’s eyes peeled back open, he found himself just where he had left off in his sticky, silky, slimy enclosure. More or less. The cocoon’s insides were starting to dry now that they were exposed to air. With a shudder, he pushed himself to a sitting position, pushing the roof of his enclosure up and peeling a thin layer of rubbery ooze off of himself. Frost danced into life across his fingertips and across the goop shrivelings. He felt rested enough now to really register his disgust. On one hand, excellent! He liked not feeling like something dropped on death’s door. On the other hand… ew?

Overwhelmingly, the urge of disgust swallowed the other, more complex worries that nipped at his mind. Out! It was time to pry himself out of this guck!

Small sounds of effort smothered in the back of his throat as he rolled over to face the hole in the cocoon; without thinking, he pulled at its edges. Drying silk cracked under his frosty touch. Fueled by the faint annoyance at all the ick, and his resolve to extract himself from it, the fae grabbed the carpet outside and pulled himself out. Flaking silks clung to him. His first thought upon being out in the open was to begin wiping it and dried goo off his arms. His next thought was perhaps to stand, but his legs buzzed with sparks of numbness. Instead, he merely propped himself into a sitting position and stretched, working the kinks out of his back. It was also a little numb. He hoped this all was normal for this whole weird metamorphosis proces-

Wait. The boy’s gaze jerked up. Again, he realized he was not alone. He froze.

In the corner of the room, on a pile of clothes faded by time, lay a dark, furry creature; a roughly wolf-shaped animal. And yet, too large to be an ordinary breed. Direwolf, his brain helpfully supplied. One red eye started up at him. Only one. Its other soccket was sunken in and scarred over, as if the organ had been gouged out at some point in time.

It half-stood up on sight of him — then balked. The creature did not approach him this time. It didn’t run from him either, though. “Au-ooo?” it mourned from its corner, tail lashing out anxiously.

“The wolf is yours,” a matronly voice echoed in his mind. “She is Daugi.”

Fenn stiffened as it clicked together. That was why it was snuffling up to his cocoon earlier. That was why it wouldn’t leave him alone. And he’d responded by icing it. Her. Fuck. One side of her muzzle was still wet from where he’d done it. His ears pulled back anxiously. There was a limited not-language in the back of his mind. His hands moved instinctively. Pointing to himself, and then, a plea.

“Am sorry.”

The wolf snapped her maw shut and cocked her head. Indecision rippled her. One could see it in the continued whap of her tail against the floor, the wavering of her ears.

“Very sorry for hurt. Friend?”

The last word stripped away the defensive nature of her stance. She straightened up, single eye wide with hopeful consideration. Over crumbling stone, on disbelieving paws, Daugi padded up to him. An instinctual fear rose up in him at the approach of the hefty predator — rose, and then fell. It was smothered by some stronger feeling. Safety, familiarity.

Fenn grabbed ahold of that feeling.

He didn’t recall another time meeting her, he didn’t know how she had lost an eye, and he wasn’t sure what about him warranted the excited flick of her ears. But he knew he could trust her. This was a nice predator, somehow.

It took a little effort not to draw back from the yellowed teeth and meaty breath. He grinned weakly as the direwolf snuffled his neck, wet nose sneezing at the slick layer of greyish goo, her one eye furrowed in puzzlement. It was as if she didn’t quite recognize him by sight alone, and needed to confirm her suspicions. An uncomfortable sinking feeling dug into his gut as he gave her a cautious (and only slightly frosty) pat, as if he’d swallowed a bunch of rocks. He didn’t recognize her either. Not really. There was a lot he wasn’t going to recognize now that he was out and about, in a world he didn’t quite remember his wanderings of. The fae winced at the thought, and his wings fluttered anxiously.

Wings?

Fenn glanced over his shoulder.

Draped across him were brown wings, as soft as velvet.

They were prickling with numbness, limp and soggy with cocoon sludge, but they were there. They were a thing. For a moment, the fae forgot to breathe. His an- oh fuck, he had antennae. Twitching, wriggling antennae. They felt unfamiliar to him. His hands slowly rose to touch them. Though they were soaked and droopy, they were soft too, and just starting to get some feeling into them. It was as if… hell if he knew. They seemed to almost taste the air, like a pair of extra tongues growing out his head, or an excess, unwanted noses. The air tasted of dry stone and molding fabric.

Fenn did not properly breathe for a few minutes. Hesitantly, he began to gently work gobs of cocoon guck out of their frills. It felt like the right thing to do. A concerned whine building in the back of her throat, Daugi leaned in to contribute to the clean-up with a careful (though slobbery) tongue. Afterward, he glanced back at the cocoon. It had collapsed inward in his absence. Now, it was but an ashen husk, cracked with cold and oozing tarry grey.

The fae scooted his way across the floor, the curious black wolf shadowing him. His wolf.

There was a murky puddle on the ground, a bit of water which dribbled from a sunken hole in the roof. He crawled toward it, intending to give himself a good splash in the face. That was… that was what people did to wake themselves up, right? But the second he touched the cool liquid, white crystals of frost laced across its surface, and before he could think “what in Mab’s mad mess?” it was solid ice.

Hastily, he yanked his hand away, a sigh seeping out of him. Oh, right. Duh. His magic. He wasn’t… sure how to control it.

Oh well.

Though it wasn’t any good for splashing around in anymore, the glossy ice still worked as a competent mirror. Fenn froze and stared at his reflection. Brown wings, brown antennae, all in greater detail that he was used to seeing in. The green that was once just his pupils and iris had broken out taken over his sclera too. His his skin was papery, and his blonde locks were now an off-white. They still dripped with the odd, unfreezing goo. The hair on his chest dripped too. It clung like a collar around Fenn’s neck, the sort of ruff of fluff found on a moth.

He had the faintest sense that this was not all how he used to look. Yes — he had looked differently while speaking with Banrion, he was sure of it. A manifestation of his past self. Without the insect bits. Puffs of nervous snow poofed into the air around him.

“Wuff?” his wolf inquired over his shoulder, sticking her snout into the crook of his neck, as if checking to see that he was all there. The boy startled at the wet touch of her nose. Yeek! A huffy-cheeked look of annoyance was given back to her — some bit of muscle-memory he might have thought twice about doing around a large wolf if it hadn’t been such an automatic action — and he realized that her own ears were pulled back in concern. Perhaps she didn’t know what was up with him either. Or maybe she was just sad that he was sad. He wasn’t sure how smart she was.

With a deep breath, he scooted back from the reflection. Everything was a bit confusing right now. But he’d figure it out. Or he’d try to, anyway.

In due time, Fenn’s ability to feel his legs recovered, much as the tingling numbness had sept out of his wings. Wobbly steps were had. Walking, he realize, became an easier task when one didn’t think so much about where they were putting their legs. Which he liked; instinct came easily to him. More easily than connecting thoughts together with manual mentalwork. The bag, sweater, and cloak off to the side were his, he knew, not merely by process of deduction, but a recognition of his hands. He liked the way they felt. They smelled better than the cold and dusty room. Cinnamon, dirt, honey, and something distinctively deciduous stuck to the battered fabrics.

It took him a vexing amount of effort to figure out how the clothes fit around his wings.

There was a green pendant around his neck too; it had been there when he was in the cocoon, come to think of it. The lash of it was silvery chain and not cord, thankfully meaning that the goop was easily scraped off of it. Banrion had told him not to take it off… and he wasn’t planning on it. He was trusting her for now.

As he set about struggling to figure out the configuration required to have both clothes on his person and free range of his new and terrifyingly unfamiliar insect limbs, Daugi made up her mind to more closely investigate his cocoon. She prodded into the crusty silks with a bold snuffle of her muzzle. A snort burst out of him as the remaining structure collapsed inward, shocking the beast into jumping back a few feet, ears swiveling warily. Silly creature. Maybe she was having a rough time puzzling out why the odd thing smelled strongly of him — of his blood, now that he thought of it. It registered faintly to him that fae blood had a sour smell and taste. There was something else there too. A hollow feeling that there was more attached to that bit of knowledge, but- well, it wasn’t there now, so what could he do about that?

…come to think of it, where had he picked up a direwolf?

Furthermore, where had he picked up that shiny, white satchel ? It happened to be a very nice satchel…

Standing in the middle of the room, fiddling with the knot of the heavy fabric making up the cloak (and ignoring how the draping felt under his twitchy flittery wings), he couldn’t help but glance aside at the bag lumped haphazardly on the floor against the bed’s draping sheets. Something in him wanted to rush over and yank it open. An instinct that said, “if this isn’t mine yet, it really should be,” ready to take it and run off with it at the drop of a hat.

With shaky, shy steps, Fenn gave into the instinct. It seemed like such a harmless impulse.

The bag’s clasp undid almost effortlessly to him. He knew how it opened. Sticking an arm in, the boy rooted around for- oh shit! This thing had no bottom! Or, none that he could feel, anyway. Curiously, Fenn lifted his hand out and stuck his head in.

It was dark in there — but the green stone around his neck shed a little light if he pulled it out of the bulk of his neckfluff! It did seem to have a bottom after all. So much in here! Gleefully, the puck began pulling out item after item and inspecting them.

Sharp, excitable frost flickered over everything he couldn’t keep his hands off of. There were bits of shiny jewelry in there, and maps, and a few books, and then some snail shells, and also bobby pins, and a direwolf lantern (awesome), and a stray rattling of coins… A pair of shorts significantly less gucky than the ones he’d been wearing in the cocoon were swapped out with his current ones — and the current ones were cast away. Trying to wash all that grey slime out seemed too daunting a task to him. Besides, he didn’t want to contaminate this strange and fascinating hoard he had! As he pulled out bits and bobs, he realized that some types of item appeared with alarming regularity.

Wallets. Lots of wallets. Very empty ones. None were his, exactly, despite being in his bag. No, they didn’t resonate quite right. They belonged to other people.

Fenn stopped and stared hard at a leather pouch. All these odd, shiny trinkets… they were stolen, weren’t they? Why? How? What ever got him into this habit? Not that he was complaining. Something about having piles and piles of neat things and money appealed to a skittery bit of his soul; yes, yes. They were his. He just… didn’t know the context behind them becoming his. The boy frowned, then, slowly began pushing things back inside the satchel’s sifan mouth.

It occurred to him that he’d probably never know the circumstances behind the relieved wolf at his side, or what he had once been. He’d only know what little he could glean through what had been left behind. The bag and clothes, the habits ingrained in his body… he could only speculate.

Banrion was right. He was, to some odd extent, building himself anew on the scraps of his past.

Outside the winding halls of the stoney castle, a small winged fae and a dark direwolf wandered through a misty forest.

Fenn didn’t mind the dewy quality of the air. It was fascinating to watch flecks of mist drift too close to him, and fall to the pine needles as the tiniest specks of ice. The fresh air was a sharp boon after the castle’s stuffy atmosphere. The only thing that bothered him was all the wreckage he picked his way around; fallen walls, uprooted trees and shrubs, and broken glass from shattered windows all littered the world outside it. At least, the glass and stone vanished as he and this wolf delved into the pines. This area must have been through quite a storm in recent times.

The damage didn’t phaze Daugi so much. However, every so often, she would lift her muzzle and snuffle at his hair and fluttering wings, as if still checking to see that he was who she thought him to be.

He wasn’t entirely sure that he was.

Whoever he was now though was alive. Alive and breathing under dark, cloud-laden skies. There was no rain. No wind. Instead, a seething turmoil of thunder and lightning ravaged the heavens. A downpour promised itself in the darkness of the clouds.

Fen didn’t know where he was headed. Not yet. He knew where he was; he knew that these were Raiaeran trees. He knew that when the stars flickered into view at night, he’d be able to pinpoint his place in the universe more distinctly than just what nation he was in. But he didn’t know where he was supposed to be heading from. That scared him a little. And he found that alright; adventures were not supposed to be easy. Especially not adventures of finding oneself.

For all he knew, he was bound for the edge of the world.

~ § ~ § ~ § ~

Quote:

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Welcome to PUBERTY Fenn!

A fun fact you didn’t want to know; when caterpillars go into their chrysalises, they turn to a fine goop before reforming as a butterfly. And somehow, their brain survives the process just fine! Canonically speaking, Fenn spent a month or two as a terrifying person-mush. Isn’t nature grand?

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Kindred Folk - Velvet Wings
Participant: FennWenn

Rewards:

FennWenn receives:
2500 exp
240 gold

Quote:

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“Conner raised an eyebrow. 'Who told you that?'
'Well,' she said, not knowing how to describe what she experienced. 'Um . . . a moth did.'
Conner squinted at her and his mouth fell open. He was expecting a much better answer than that. 'A moth told you?'
'Yes -- but it wasn't a regular moth, it was more like an angel.'"
- Chris Colfer

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All rewards have been added.

Inclusive of Fenn Ability