3)

Nemida slept. As his already significantly altered body entered into an even more relaxed state, what few signs of life he had faded. His breathing, no longer consciously controlled, faded away entirely. Despite having all outward appearances of a corpse, Llewellis continued to softly stroke the pale hair. She looked down at the motionless figure on her lap, pity in her eyes. "What happened to you, Nesh?"

Though outwardly, Nemida showed no signs of life, as he slept, he was troubled by dreams. Dreams are often built solely upon a recombination of the memories of the preceding period of wakefulness. Occasionally, something new and unexpected comes through. Other times, worries, obsessions, and other traits surface to plague the sleeper. Nemida, with no memory to speak of, did not have much to draw upon to fill the land he entered, the land of dreams, though he tried to make do with what he had.

Nemida once again sat at the table inside the peasant house. His father was once again urging him to eat. A queer, tinny echo fluctuated back and forth through his father's voice, as if he were using something other than human vocal chords to speak. Nemida picked up the spoon that lay beside his plate. He looked down at what he was about to scoop into his mouth. The plate was full of splintered wood and rusted nails. The remnants of his coffin. Nemida tried to stop, tried not to eat the charnel meal before him. He couldn't, his hand moved relentlessly towards the plate. A single tear of pain coursed down the side of Nemida's face as the spoon entered his mouth. His jaw worked furiously up and down. The splinters jabbed viciously into his tongue, his gums. Crooked, jagged nails ripped easily through his cheeks and lips. Blood flowed copiously from the wounds, pooling on the half-emptied plate. Nemida looked down again, half involuntarily, and saw that it was not wholly blood, but blood mixed with ash, forming a viscous, grayish paste. Nemida tried to scream, but he had already swallowed a mouthful of splinters, and his throat was now as ravaged as his mouth. Nemida wondered if he would choke, then remembered that he did not need to breath.

Nemida looked at his father, and noticed once again the waxen, doll-like nature of his face. The eyes stared at him sightlessly, with all the lustre and life of a pair of glass beads. Nemida now saw that his father's hands, feet, and throat were all pierced. Extending from them were knotted cords. His father was nothing more than a giant marionette, his strings being pulled from the shadows. Nemida followed the cords, and found they ended at the doorway to the other room. Standing in the doorway was a darker shadow. The shadow had the shape of the one of claimed to be his elder brother, Mihotyt. From deep within the shaded face burned two fiery orbs. Mihotyt's eyes burned with an undefined lust. Nemida found himself falling into those eyes, becoming incinerated by the inferno of…jealousy? Burning within.

A sudden chill cut through the burning. An unseasonable coldness crept into the house. Nemida tore himself away from the conflagration of his brother's eyes and saw that frost was creeping inward from the corners of the house. The frost had a detestable, greasy tinge to it. Nemida could literally feel the presence of something creeping about outside the house. Something which brought the unclean cold of winter with it. Something that wanted to get in, wanted Nemida. Nemida tried to flee, but was unable to move. Looking down, Nemida saw that splinters of wood and coffin-nails bound his flesh to the wooden chair. Something struck the door of the house, cracking the lintel. It struck again. A sickly-bluish, icy liquid began to seep from underneath the door. It was about to come in.

It didn't.

The liquid and door had gone. The marionette patrifaux was no more. The enigmatic brother had vanished. The nails, splinters, chairs, table, and wounds had left. Nemida, too, was no longer there. There was nothing, simply the unplumbed depths of possibility. The vast, empty space where Nemida's memory used to be. Seeking some sort of somnambular comfort during this unnatural, death-like state of rest, Nemida's mind probed deeper into itself.

It found something.

Llewellis' voice echoed through the void, it issued a warning, "It is yours. It has some of your memories buried within it. You should know that, because the memories long to be re-united with their owner."

An object appeared in the emptiness. A staff composed of a darkness that was greater than the absence of light. A staff with memories locked inside, memories that arced from the staff to their true owner when he touched it. Memories that had since then lay deep within his subconscious, waiting until a moment such as this to awaken. The staff seemed to invert itself, so that the staff became the empty void, and the void became the staff. Then, the memories that were locked inside the staff painted the void, leaving behind them a scene from Nemida's past, with the staff there.

The staff was held in a pair of slim, dusky hands. The hands belonged to a woman. She had the dark olive skin-tone of those from the south. With that coloured skin came a pair of exotic, oriental eyes. The eyes were currently focused on Nemida. It wasn't the Nemida who lay sleeping on Llewellis' lap, though. The eyes were focused on a different Nemida. A Nemida with dark brown, almost black hair. A Nemida with bright green eyes, and a skin that, though pale, was flush with lifeblood. She was clad in what appeared to be a long, thin strip of black silk. It wrapped around her body, starting at her knees, and ending at her neck, revealing much of the dusky skin, yet leaving much hidden. The eyes, framed in charcoal liner, blinked their long, heavy lashes. "This is the Staff of the Indigo Void," She said, giving it to him.

"So…you must go?" The Nemida replied, though he only looked a year younger, at most, physically, he looked an eternity younger spiritually and emotionally.

"The short-sighted scum here call my healing 'witchcraft'. They'd happily burn anyone who lets me aid them. My skills are of no use here."

"You're of use to me, Krusany, your presence gives me untold amounts of comfort."

"It will also get you a noose around your neck, you buffoon," Krusany replied, "being my friend only makes you an easier target for the baneful ignorance of these puling lackwits. No, I must journey south, to a land not populated with such ignorant blockheads."

"Feh, pox on them, I'd happily give up my life to be with you," Nemida said, "But I can't abide seeing you unhappy. I only wish I could journey with you."

"You're needed here, and I'm needed south," Krusany said, "Don't fret too much, though."

"Why not?"

"That staff, it will aid you. It acts as a connection between the one who gives it, and the one who receives it. If I'm ever in danger for my life, you will know it, the staff will tell you with a sign. Also, though I don't see what use it could be, the staff acts as a receptacle of memory. So long as you have the staff, you are guaranteed to never forget me, no matter what may transpire."

"Like I'd need the staff to remember you," Nemida replied, "But I swear upon everything I've ever held as meaningful, should the staff send me the sign, I will devote every ounce of energy within me to finding and protecting you."

"A lofty promise," Krusany scoffed, "But knowing you, you're just arrogant and stubborn enough to hold to it." She turned a blazing stare on Nemida, who quite helplessly wilted beneath it, "Oh…and Nemida?..."

Nemida had trouble finding his tongue for a second, perhaps because his mouth had suddenly gone rather dry, "Er…yes?"

Krusany's hand darted forward, grabbing Nemida's shirt and yanking him forward. Nemida found himself locked in a kiss with her. The kiss was much like her other actions, aggressive, without remorse, and yet alluring and rejuvenating. As she slowly drew away, she bit his lower lip, a quick nip, yet still hard enough to draw blood. Still holding his shirt in a vice-like grip, she leaned down and hissed in his ear, "If you forget about me, you will pay, boy."

With that, she released him, turned, and spurred her horse away, her ponytail fanning out behind her. The rest of her head, shaved bald, glinted in the sunlight. The dream shattered, falling to pieces as Nemida drifted into a deeper sleep. Upon Llewellis' lap, his lips moved, mouthing the word 'Krusany'.

It was several hours later when Nemida awoke. The first thing he noticed was the last fading rays of sunlight coming in through the open door, painting the wall behind it a sinister red. The next thing he noticed was the warmness of the lap his head rested upon. Llewellis hadn't left him for the whole day. Nemida looked up, and saw that Llewellis was gazing right back down at him, her beautifully pale face framed by a cascade of violet hair. Seeing that he had woken up, Llewellis smiled and innocent smile, and promptly dumped his head off her lap, cracking it on the floor, "Alright, time to get up!"

Nemida groaned slightly, massaging the lump on his head. Llewellis had already sprung to her feet and was playfully searching about the room for something to eat. Nemida figured she must have spent the last eight or so hours doing nothing but providing a spot for his head to lie, yet she still seemed so full of energy. Nemida smiled despite himself. Llewellis' search appeared to come up empty, for the carefree smile on her face was gradually replaced with a petulant pout. Nemida pushed himself up to his feet, though in the process, he inadvertently stuck his hand in the last of the daylight streaming through the doorway. Nemida yanked his hand back, a hiss escaping from his lips as his fingers quickly began to char.

Nemida almost fell over in shock. It wasn't so much the burn that surprised him, he had learned to expect that kind of reaction from sunlight by now. It was the sound he had made afterward. It wasn't a human sound. It didn't even pass as an animalistic sound. It was the sound of a pure, unrepentant aversion to the light. It was a sub-bestial hiss dragged from something that inhabited fetid depths forever cloaked in night. It frightened him. Llewellis must have sensed the fear, for she immediately turned and cradled Nemida's burned hands in her own, "Don't worry, pretty," she reassured, "the burn will go away quick enough, see? It's already fading!"

"It's not that," Nemida said, "What the hell have I become? …am I…one of those things…a wamphyri?"

Llewellis looked at him, pinning him down quite unexpectedly with her seriousness, "You aren't a wamphyri."

Nemida was so taken aback at the sudden change in her tone that he simply believed her, "Then…what am I? I don't breathe, I can't eat, I don't remember anything, and the light of day sears me."

Llewellis' serious glare continued for a second longer before her expression softened. She gave him a smile so warm that Nemida felt guilty for what he had said, "You're Nemida. You may have a different way of surviving now, but inside, you are the same person you always were. Why should you care if you breathe or not? It's when you start thinking that you should get scared."

Llewellis held his gaze for a few moments more. Then, with a giggle, she poked him on the nose with an outstretched finger and twirled around, grabbing the single stale loaf of bread from the pantry. "Hmmpf, you're a whole lot of help. I bet there would be a lot more to eat here if you had been helping out around the house instead of lying in the ground all the time! Okay, time to go now!"

Nemida was still trying to get used to her method of speaking. It was much like her physical actions, full of energy, with new ideas crowding in often before the current ones even had time to fully express themselves. It took him a few seconds to realize that she had moved off the topic of food, "Er, go now?"

"Of course, silly," she said, then, fixing him with a steely gaze that dropped all pretense of light-heartedness, "It's not safe here."

Nemida accepted this on the basis that he was rather confused by everything that had been happening, and figured that letting himself be taken by the flow would be less tiresome than fighting against something whose purpose he did not know, for reasons he was not aware of, to ends that he could not comprehend. "So...what should we take with us?"

"Oh, whatever you can carry and run with at the same time," Llewellis replied, once again slipping back into her, well, Nemida could only assume it was normal, self, "So scissors would be a bad idea."

"What?" Nemida said, but that only made her giggle harder.

Carefully avoiding the last ruddy rays of sunlight, Nemida made his way into the back room of the house. The dim horror of his situation once again rose as Nemida realized that, despite the dusty, pressing darkness of the window-less room, he was having no trouble finding his way through the disorganized piles left by Llewellis' earlier search. Near the back, Nemida noticed a crude chest that looked as though it had clothing in it. Trying his best to ignore the fact that it was too dark in here for him to be seeing as well as he was, he picked his way over to the chest. A brief search revealed a reasonably whole shirt of a dull gray-ish colour, and black britches with relatively few holes that looked like they would fit him. It was at this point that Nemida realized he was still clad in the rather flimsy, torn, and dirt-stained pale funereal garments he had presumably been buried in. Casting a quick glance back to the open doorway, and being reassured by the decidedly busy sounds of Llewellis in the other room, Nemida decided to take a risk and change.

No sooner had he removed the death-shroud that Nemida heard a deceptively innocent sounding titter come from the doorway. Before he realized what he was doing, Nate had turned towards the source of the sound, and saw Llewellis standing in the doorway, framed in the very last of the sun's light. She had her hand over her mouth, as if trying to hold back a great mirth, and was looking at Nemida. It was then that he realized he had no clothes on at the moment. If his blood had still flowed with the vigor of most humans', Nemida would have blushed. As it was, he mumbled incoherently as he hurriedly put on the britches. He was keenly aware of the fact that Llewellis was staring at him intently during the whole process of dressing. With the added speed of embarrassment, Nemida rapidly and efficiently slipped on the shirt…the wrong way around. After such minor wardrobe errors were corrected, he turned, almost sheepishly, back to Llewellis, giving her an inquiring look, as if non-verbally asking whether or not this would do.

As if reading his mind, she replied, "No no, it's very pretty, but it's not complete. I think…this would look good over it."

Nemida's vision went black as Llewellis pegged him in the face with a balled up, hooded black cloak. He managed to get the cloth out of his eyes just in time to see the iron buckle of the leather belt that Llewellis threw right after the cloak strike him soundly between the eyes.

"Oopsie! Sorry!" She squeeked, "I was hoping the cloak would still be on your head to catch that, it's a little softer than your skull."

Massaging the red welt, Nemida quickly, and a little painfully, put on the belt and the cloak.