"Okay, I can do this. I can do this," Hunter repeated the affirmation over and over again. Darius had gotten him in the habit of saying this when he was nervous or unsure. At first, he'd felt a little stupid, but it was starting to work. He felt a little better about descending the long, crooked staircase into the dark.
"Yeah, we can do this," Luz muttered, pulling out another light glyph when the one she held cupped in her hands started to dim. Darius had also insisted that he not go alone back to the castle. Hunter was glad he had the excuse 'Darius insisted' to hide behind when he asked Luz to come with him.
He didn't want to admit that he wasn't brave enough to face his past- and his predecessors' pasts- alone.
"We can do this, we can do this, we can do this..." they repeated their mantra down, down, down...
Something snapped and Hunter nearly jumped out of his skin. Luz yelped, dropping the light, her fingers digging into his arm.
"The light!" Hunter whispered harshly as they were plunged into complete darkness.
"Shoot! I'm sorry, let me just-" Hunter heard her start to rummage around in her bag. Her elbow stuck out and poked his ribs, and he winced.
"Watch it!"
"I can't fucking see, Hunter, how can I watch anything?"
"Fair."
He tried to move to the side to give her some room and stumbled over what felt like a femur. An alarmed squeak escaped the back of his throat.
"Hunter!" He felt Luz grab at his sleeves as he tipped back, and tried to steady himself.
They both screamed as the crumbling step gave away, and they fell.
Hunter shut his eyes, even though he couldn't see anything in the first place, and braced himself for impact. He felt Luz slap a glyph on his back, and they stopped in midair.
Thud.
"Ow..." Hunter wheezed, pushing Luz off of his chest.
"That was close. Do you know where we are?"
"No, not really. Let's see if this is that... thing King was talking about."
"Okay." Hunter heard more rummaging, and then his surroundings started to brighten. The light from Luz's hands reflected off of the golden masks scattered across the floor.
"Oh."
"Whoa."
Hunter stood up and started walking, making sure not to step on any bones. "This is... a lot."
"Are you okay to handle this? We can always come back another day."
"I'm fine." That might have been a little bit of a lie. "I need to see if I can find out more. Let's keep going." He held out a hand and pulled Luz up.
The kids heard a creak and a clatter from somewhere deep in the darkness. Their heads swiveled towards the noise. Hunter didn't even breathe.
"What is all this ruckus?" a voice asked.
The smallest of squeaks was emitted from Luz. Neither moved. They looked at each other, then back into the dark.
"People?!"
"Don't get your hopes up, it was likely another rat falling off those Titan-forsaken steps. We need to fix those. Just 'cause we're dead doesn't mean we've got to let the place fall into disrepair..."
Three voices?!
A face came into view, and Hunter's hand flew up to his mouth.
It looked like him. Older, longer hair, a scar across his cheek down to his upper lip, which looked as if it had been split and sewn back together.
"Oh my Titan!" the figure said, at the same time Hunter did, in almost the exact same voice.
"Is that a-" Luz began.
"Ghost? Yes, I am, please don't panic," the boy said. He drifted closer, and the kids stumbled back.
"Who are- were you?" Luz stammered.
"Which one? Which guard?"
"Oh," another figure appeared from behind the first, even younger, with buzzed hair. "He's another... and alive!" He reached out, and Hunter flinched away from his cold hand.
"Ember, give them some space," the first said.
"You're all... still down here? Every guard?"
"Oh no, some of us moved along," Ember said, in his soft, melodic voice. "The children found it easiest. Like going right to sleep, all we had to do was hold them."
"How many?"
"Died down here, or remain, like us?" the first boy asked.
Hunter just nodded. "Everything, I want to know everything."
"One hundred and thirty-two," another voice piped up.
"Bernard, you could say it a bit more nicely-"
"What? It's a fact, Abel. There are one hundred and thirty-two of us dead down here, and one of him alive right here."
"Your name starts with an H, doesn't it?" another ghost glided up to Hunter, a small piece of chalk in hand.
"Fitz, that's awful insensitive of you-"
"Shut the fuck up, Dierdre."
"Don't be mean to Dierdre!"
"You can shut the fuck up too-"
As the ghosts descended into an argument (the one called Dierdre, with a small ponytail, crying in the corner) Luz and Hunter exchanged glances, and let go of each other.
"Hey!" Hunter shouted, and the five quieted down. "Can you guys just- maybe start from the beginning and tell me how this all works? Are you all the only ones still down here?"
"Yes, we're the only ones who haven't moved along yet and joined the Titan." The ghost named Bernard shoved Abel aside and began explaining. "This is where Belos disposes of all of his Golden Guards. You see, I hate to break it to you, but you're-"
"A grimwalker, I know. Apparently the hundred thirty-third one." Hunter's voice sounded hollow in his ears.
"Are you okay?" Ember glided closer with a concerned look on his face. "Maybe you should sit down."
"I'm fine, I just- yeah, this is a lot. But I came down here because I want to know. I want to know more about you guys, and us. Are we really just... exact copies of each other?"
One ghost snorted, and suddenly a chorus of laughter echoed off the walls of the cavern. "Oh! Oh no. As much as Belos may have wanted us all to be exactly like Caleb, we're certainly all different people," Ember said.
"Oh. Um... that's good. That's kind of a relief, actually," Hunter said, breathless laughter escaping him.
"What's your name?" Abel asked.
"I'm Hunter."
"See, I told you, an H!" the ghost with the chalk in hand said triumphantly. He glided over to the far wall and wrote something on the stone there. "Our theory is still proving to be correct, Dierdre. Care to admit defeat?"
The other ghost huffed. "No, you and Bernard are wrong. It isn't proof he didn't care, it's- it's- maybe he cared extra!"
"It was a way to keep track of his toys, Dierdre," Bernard rolled his eyes. "The next one will be an I because that's the way it always is. I've been keeping track since Gen 3, there's really no denying it."
"Gen 3? What are you talking about?" Luz asked.
"Make that light bigger so you can see," Bernard said, cracking his knuckles. "It's been so long since I got to tell someone new about this!"
"Hey, I only died seventeen years ago, it hasn't been that long," Fitz pouted.
"It feels more like seven hundred. Anyways, the theory is that we are named in alphabetical order to better keep track of which grimwalker he's at. The first set I decided to call Gen 1. When Belos ran out of letters and looped back to A, that was the beginning of Gen 2."
Luz combined a few light glyphs to create a much bigger light that shone on the rock wall. Carved into it were rows and rows of names, some accompanied by dates.
"Many of the Gen 1s had already moved along by the time I, a Gen 4, came around. So there are some gaps early on. But since I died, I've kept pretty good track of every other Golden Guard to come into existence. If I do say so myself. When Fitz here joined us, he decided to help me. Something weird we noticed is that there are never any Cs. The theory for that is that C is reserved for the original Caleb. Belos couldn't bear to name any of us, non-human as we are, anything too similar to his brother's name. Also, we got the spelling of your name right, right?"
"I... yes." Hunter looked worried all over again. "Which... generation am I part of?"
"You're a Gen 6er, like me," Fitz said proudly, retrieving some carving tools from underneath a mask.
"Represent!" Ember said sarcastically.
"Hey, maybe we shouldn't be telling the kid this much," Abel chimed in. "He has to go back up there and pretend that he doesn't know anything, and the more we tell him, the harder it will be."
"Actually, I don't have to. Belos is kinda dead."
There were several gasps, and then a loud whoop from Bernard. "Hell yeah! The old bastard kicked the bucket!"
Hunter was hoisted onto the shoulders of Fitz. "You're the last! You're the last! Oh, you can go have a normal life! This is great!"
"He can live past forty. Imagine," Ember sighed. "A new record!"
"No! No no no," Dierdre wailed. "We shouldn't be celebrating, he died!"
"He was awful, Di," Abel said. "I understand that you still don't understand that, but don't rain on their parade."
"Wait, how do you still not know?" Luz asked. "And why haven't the rest of you moved on to the afterlife yet if the rest have? What's keeping you here?"
"And what do you all know about Caleb? Did you find anything about him while you were alive?" Hunter asked.
"You kids ask some good questions. We have some answers, but it'll take a while," Bernard said.
"We have time," Luz said.
"And several pens," Hunter added, pulling out his notebook and the colorful pens Darius had given to him on his birthday. He rested the notebook on Fitz's head, and the man didn't seem to mind.
"Well, I can go first," Ember said.
"No, Abel should go. He's the oldest," Bernard said.
"Technically not true," Fitz said.
"You know what I fucking mean. He was a Gen 3. The first Gen 3."
"Yes, I lived a long time ago. I've been down here longer than you four. And I've seen some shit. But my life wasn't really that interesting, I mean, not worth recording or anything."
"Are you kidding?! You were so brave!" Ember exclaimed. "Come on, please?"
"Yeah, please?" Hunter begged. "Anything about you guys is worth knowing. At least to me."
Abel sighed and sat cross-legged in midair. "Alright. I guess I'll tell you what little there is to tell."
He cleared his throat and began.
"It all started centuries ago, too many years to keep track of..."
...I was made Golden Guard very young. The youngest ever, he told me. Freshly fifteen and eager to finally go outside the walls of the castle.
Unfortunately, I wasn't given an assignment that brought me outside. I was assigned to patrol through the Conformitorium. Of course, I was very disappointed, but we all know Uncle. I wasn't about to argue with him.
So I set out trying to prove myself even though the job was pretty much pacing for six hours. I walked with my head high, I pulled double shifts, and I skipped meals on occasion to keep watch on these 'criminals'.
One of the rules was- and may still be- that the guards cannot talk to the prisoners.
Then I met this girl, and a bunch of her friends, one thing led to another, blah blah blah, and the next thing I knew I was dead.
"The end," Abel said.
"What?!" Bernard threw up his hands. "That was awful! You need to tell the whole thing!"
"Please? Who was she, and what was she like? Was she a prisoner?" Hunter fidgeted with his pen.
Abel sighed. "Fine. She was a prisoner, and at first, she wasn't very fond of me..."
A steady stream of profanities was shouted as the wild witch was dragged to her cell.
"They get a little out of control sometimes," one of the Coven Scouts whispered to me as he drew a spell circle. "Best to put them to sleep sometimes."
I just nodded, gripping my staff.
She looked my age.
Part of me wondered how she could possibly be dangerous.
It must be part of her ruse. She gets underestimated, but that makes her even more dangerous.
Well, I won't let my guard down.
Uncle had warned me against conversing with the prisoners. They were not right in the head, nothing they said would make any sense so it wasn't worth worrying about.
Not many of the prisoners ever tried to talk to me. They mostly glared or tossed gravel through the bars.
This girl was different.
"Hey, Golden boy!" she would shout. "Golden boy!"
That was apparently my new nickname. She got the other prisoners in her block to start too, and when I walked past on my rounds, all I heard was "Golden boy, golden boy! Hello? Do you hear us?"
One day I was on my last nerve for reasons entirely unrelated to them, and I asked her, "what's your problem?"
"I'm the one who has a problem?" she leaned against the bars and stared back at me, challengingly.
"I've never met a more insolent, snarky witch."
"That might have to do with the fact that you guys locked me in a cage."
"Oh, I see where this is going!" Luz exclaimed. "The guarded boy meets the daring girl, both from separate worlds, and a forbidden love blossoms!"
"What?" Abel looked thoroughly confused. Fitz laughed so hard that Hunter nearly fell off his shoulders.
"His aroace ass? Nah."
"We didn't fall in love or anything. But she did change me..."
We often bickered. At first, I found it easy to stick to the ideals I'd been spoon-fed my whole life.
"Belos doesn't want to put anyone here. He has to when they're a danger to society, and mixing magic is very dangerous."
"The emperor's coven mixes magic sometimes, don't they? You get the sigils but you aren't restricted."
"We could, but we don't. Those who are chosen for the emperor's coven are highly trustworthy individuals. They wouldn't anger the Titan like that."
"Mixing magic angers the Titan?" the girl raised an eyebrow. "The Titan is dead, he doesn't care!"
"Hey!"
"Like no offense to him or anything, but I think it's hard to care about stuff when you're dead."
These debates started to draw out longer. I found I wasn't as convinced as I used to be.
And of course, I felt so guilty about it. Religious trauma, am I right?
It felt like things were falling apart. I did what made sense and redoubled my efforts to get put on a different job. I snuck out on a mission all my own, to attempt to find a galderstone. I heard Uncle mention them, and thought he might give me more important jobs if I proved I could do them right.
It didn't exactly go as planned. I didn't end up finding any galderstones. My lead took me to the Knee, where I angered some Slitherbeasts and my staff came back irreparable. Uncle was furious that I would be so irresponsible, and he- well...
At this point in the story, Abel tugged his shirt up. A huge, puckered scar stretched from his ribs to his hip bone. Luz let out a quiet gasp.
"So... that's how you died?" Hunter asked in a hushed tone.
Abel's head tilted back and he laughed. "Shockingly, no. I survived that. But it was the final nail in the coffin..."
I was entirely numb at this point. I didn't know what to do. My whole life I had followed someone so cruel. And it had taken him turning the full extent of his cruelty towards me to realize that there wasn't any good in him.
But what could I possibly do?
I limped my way through my shift at the Conformatorium. The snarky witch girl noticed, and her teasing smile that told me she'd had some new nickname ready fell away.
"Oh my Titan, what happened to you?" I was shocked to see genuine concern in her eyes.
"Huh?"
"You're bleeding, idiot, it's all over the floor!"
I looked down. She was right. The blood had soaked through the bandages I'd wrapped around my torso. "Oh no."
"Yeah duh, oh no."
"I'll have to mop that up."
She looked absolutely baffled. "No! Oh no as in you're fucking dying. Get over here, Golden boy. Leif, can we do something about this?"
One of her friends, in the cell next to her, knelt by the bars as I stumbled over to sit. "He'll need to take that cloak and armor off and let me see."
"What about the other guards, guys?" Another prisoner asked.
"Keep watch, tell us when they're coming," the girl said. "We have to help him."
And so they worked to patch me up, arms straining to reach through the bars. Leif was in the plant track when he found a way to use healing magic to strengthen the properties of certain remedies. The magic mixing I had scoffed at was saving my life. I found that they were going to use some of these supplies to escape, and wondered why they would waste them on me.
"You were hurt," they said. "We couldn't just let you die. Your boss or whoever let you walk around like that obviously was going to. But it isn't right."
They were right.
It wasn't right.
So, late that night, I snuck back into the Conformatorium.
"Wait, what are you doing back? You need to be resting," the girl said.
"You helped me. Now I'm going to help you."
I still wasn't sure about wild magic. There was still a whole lot of cognitive dissonance going on in there about all sorts of ideas about how the world should work. But I did know that these people were kind to me even when they didn't need to be, and the way my uncle had treated me my whole life had been wrong.
They somehow cared about me more than my only family did.
So I unlocked their cells.
"Are we sure we can trust him?" Some whispered. "Maybe he's just leading us to our Petrification."
I gave them a moment to think about it. They really didn't have a good reason to trust me. I'd been their enemy for so long. But after all the doors were unlocked, all of them up and down that hall, I started to walk, and they followed. Some of them were in line for tomorrow's Petrification ceremony. This was their last chance, and they had to take it.
So I led the group out, ignoring my lightheadedness. One of the laundry chutes let out into a washroom that was currently unused due to leaks in the roof, and the girl went first down the chute. She called up to her friends that it was safe, and they all went, one by one. They could escape to the woods from there, and hopefully back home.
She called up to me. "Are you coming?"
"I don't know."
"Why don't you?"
I thought about it. It was hard, I was getting dizzy. "Dunno."
"I'd like you to. It seems dangerous there."
"Why do you care? You don't even know my name."
"Maybe I would like to. Maybe you can come with us so you won't get hurt again. You're different from the rest, okay? You don't have to stay."
I didn't respond. I was starting to feel a tad queasy as well. I should be getting back to bed.
"I can tell you my name."
For some reason, I didn't want to know. Maybe somewhere inside, I knew this would be the last time I saw her, the last time I ever spoke to her. It would be harder to let go when having a name to put with a face. A friend that might have been.
And I'm glad I never told her mine. Maybe she never had to grieve for me.
I shut the laundry chute and began to limp back to my room in the castle, feeling extremely sick now.
I didn't check for any signs I might have left. I'm not sure how he found out what I did there that night. Maybe one of the guards saw me and saw their chance to replace me in the coveted position of Golden Guard. Maybe I bled all over the floor on the way back from my reopened wound, like an idiot. Maybe he just knew, from the way I acted now. There may have been some relief in my eyes. Not enough feigned anger when I 'heard' the news. Anyways, I was invited to dine with him. It could have been the drink that was poisoned, the delicious food, or the little dessert cakes that I had only ever had one time before in my life.
As I wondered what I had done to deserve being invited here, my vision grew blurry. It got harder to breathe. I struggled to stand, hoping to redress my wound and check to see what was wrong, but I fell to the floor instead.
"Does it hurt, Abel? To be betrayed?"
I tried to gasp out a question, an apology, anything, but I couldn't.
"It's a shame. You were the best copy until that little scheme you thought you got away with."
The world was starting to fade from view.
"I'll just have to make the next one more obedient."
"That snake!" Luz shouted. "He poisoned you?"
"It was a relatively peaceful way to go, I can't complain." Abel shrugged.
"Are you okay?" Ember asked, noticing Hunter looking slightly shaken.
The living boy blinked and set his jaw. "Yes, I'm fine. Thank you for telling me about this."
"What are you taking notes for anyways?" Bernard asked. "Do we have another historian on our hands?"
"Yes!" Fitz hoisted Hunter off of his shoulders and spun him around in such an older-brotherly way that Luz couldn't help but grin. "You can join the historian club!"
"Kinda..." Hunter admitted bashfully, his ears taking on a familiar shade of pink. "I was considering writing... I dunno, a book or something?"
"Oh, I want to be in the book! I'll go next!" Bernard raised his hand. "I'll tell you about why I was killed. It all started years and years ago..."
I was putting on the pieces of my disguise, the one I'd been using for around a year at that point to sneak out into town.
See, Uncle would spew the same bullshit to me that he told all of you, wild witches were bad and dangerous and you can't interact with them blah blah blah...
But they were also super sexy. Like, super sexy. There was just something so... deliciously forbidden, you know?
"I don't know," Hunter said. "But go on. You were sneaking out?"
"Yes, I was. This witch my age had struck up a conversation with me in the night market the previous night. I fuc- I mean, knew her older brother. The one with the chiseled jawline and the-"
"Back on track, please, Bernard," Ember said and coughed into his sleeve uncomfortably.
"Aw, you guys always make me skip the best parts."
Okay, okay. She wanted to meet up, and I wasn't about to pass this chance up no matter how long I'd been training beforehand. I needed to hurry or I'd be late to the spot we agreed on.
But before I could get out the window, I heard a knock on the door. I quickly stashed my bag with my to- my things under the bed, and pulled off my cloak, wincing as the muscle in my shoulder that I'd pulled earlier spasmed.
"Come in," I called when everything was hidden and I was totally casual.
"Hey," Dally eased the door open. He was the Construction Coven Head during my time. There were a few healing potions in his hands. "I picked these up just now. You got rather..."
"Fucked up?"
"Language," he sighed, gesturing for me to sit on the bed. "But yes."
"I'll be fine, that's not necessary," I tried to shrug, but couldn't hide the wince.
"You're a bad liar. Come here."
I sighed, but I listened. Dally could be stubborn when it came to this stuff. He handed me one to drink, then lifted my shirt to examine the bruise that had very quickly darkened into green and blue.
"You really need to have a little more self-preservation."
"Okay."
"No, I mean it, you- wait, you agreed with me." Dally narrowed his eyes. "What's up?"
"Nothing, nothing is up," I assured him, jumping as cold ointment touched my skin.
"Hm. If you say so. I don't have to stop you from doing anything stupid, do I?"
"No."
"I hope that's true. Remember what happened last time you snuck out." I didn't need to turn to know that he was looking at the scar above my hip.
"I wish I'd been brave enough to sneak out more," Abel muttered.
"For what? You aren't interested in getting any."
"There were these street vendors... I wasn't allowed to get any of the street food though. But it smelled so good."
Dierdre giggled. "Abel's one true love, food!"
"Well, I had a very different true love," Bernard continued, waving his hands. "And when Dally was finally gone after making me promise not to sneak out, she hopped right up onto the window sill."
"What are you doing here?" I asked, shocked.
She laughed. "I got tired of waiting for you, Golden Guard. Besides, you can keep your promise now."
I grinned. "Yeah, he didn't say anything about sneaking people in..."
Anyways, there was some other talking after that, but I'm going to skip to the important part. When she took off her shirt, and-
"Ew, noooo," Dierdre groaned. "Come on, you've told us this story way too many times, skip to the gory part."
"You guys are no fun. Does anyone else here appreciate a nice pair of tits?"
"I do!" Luz raised her hand.
"I don't see what this has to do with your death," Hunter said, his pen still poised above his notebook.
"Fine, fine. I'll skip over the fun parts to the next morning..."
We were woken by someone pounding on my door.
"Quick, back out the window," I whispered.
She started grabbing her clothes. The doorknob rattled.
"Bernard! What have I told you about locking doors?"
"Shit, fuck, it's my uncle!"
"Like, Belos? Your uncle the emperor?"
"Shh, shh, new plan, under the bed."
When she was hidden, I pulled on a pair of pants and opened the door. "Heeeeey, my best and favorite uncle, what's up?"
"I am your only uncle," Belos deadpanned. "And do not play dumb with me. You're two hours late for the Coven Head meeting."
"Oh. I am?" In my defense, that sleep hit different. "I- apologize. I'll ask Sky to give me a run down-"
Slam
Uncle's fingers dug into the stone of the doorway. Green sludge was dripping from under his mask. "This is unacceptable. You have been slacking lately. Something is going on."
"Uncle, I don't-"
"This is how you repay your only family? You would be nothing without me. Even now, you seem determined to reduce yourself to nothing, to squander this opportunity I've given you-" A wheezy cough forced its way out of his lungs.
"Sir!" Dally rounded the corner with a palisman in hand. "Sir, you really don't seem well. I'll talk to the Golden Guard about his negligence, we'll have this sorted by nightfall. You really should sit down-"
"Shut up."
Dally fell silent. I'd never seen him afraid of anyone except the emperor.
"Hey, I'll do better, okay? I'll- I'll do a lot better."
"And how am I to know these aren't empty promises, Bernard- what are those?" His tone changed to complete bewilderment and he pointed behind me. I glanced down and I swear to Titan my heart fucking stopped.
Fitz broke down laughing. "Okay, this is the good part. Make sure when you write your book, you include Bernard, death by panties."
"Shut the fuck up!" Bernard flung a stone at Fitz that passed right through him. "At least I don't have joint problems, old man!"
"Uh, low blow, by bones are a lot older than me. I received them with wear and tear."
"Just shut up and let me finish the story."
"Okay, fine."
Uh, yeah. Like Fitz said. We overlooked one article of clothing. An extremely incriminating article of clothing.
"Those are... mine?"
Dally's face dropped into his palms and he sighed.
"Where is she?"
"Who? Where is who? Where is you, what is where?" I started pacing, trying to think of a way out of this bind. "I just- really like cross-dressing? Is that such a crime?"
Uncle wasn't having any of my bullshit. He flung open the small closet, pushing aside my uniform on its hanger. "Where?"
"Hey, maybe we should take a second to breathe-"
I'll never forgive myself for getting Dally hurt like that. He yelped when the curse sliced into his face. I couldn't even take over trying to de-escalate the situation, I just gaped.
I'd never seen the old man so angry. All this time, I thought he was mostly bark, but now...
As Dally slumped to the floor, a muffled gasp from under the bed caught Belos' attention. I saw Dally's eyes widen.
I leaped for my staff and tossed it under the bed. "Get out before shit hits the fan, get out!"
The curse shot forward and wrapped around the foot of the bed, dragging it to the side. But luckily, in a flash of golden light, she was gone.
And I was in deep shit now.
"Death by panties," one of the ghosts muttered.
"Will you guys shut up-"
"What happened next?" Hunter asked.
Bernard rolled his eyes. "Well, Uncle was not pleased about her being a wild witch. When he heard that, he just- went off. He lost it."
"How dare you?"
"Hey, I'm almost nineteen, it was bound to happen-"
"You're a traitor, Caleb, you betrayed us all."
"I- we used protection! Sweet Titan, what more do you want from me?"
"They'll corrupt you," he didn't look like he knew me anymore. "Their- feminine wiles, their WILD MAGIC. They'll make you abandon all you hold dear, all that should be important- there's no going back."
"Uncle? It's... it's me, Bernard? Your favorite nephew?" I chuckled weakly. The blue glow in his eyes was only growing stronger. "Um, I was joking about... I'm sorry, okay? Next time, she won't be a wild witch, if that makes you feel better? Shouldn't we be getting you a palisman from the reserves-"
"Goodbye, Caleb."
"Then he stabbed me."
"Oh my Titan," Luz looked shocked, even though they had known how the story would end.
"What a weekend, am I right?" Bernard flopped backward onto the stone floor.
"You got killed. For- being with a wild witch?"
"Pretty much. I mean, she wasn't the first wild witch I slept with. She's just the one he found out about. I definitely would have gotten killed faster if he had caught me with her brother."
"You know, I still don't know how Belos managed to stay the only homophobe on the Boiling Isles for like four hundred years," Luz said.
"Cause he's a cunt, that's why. Anyways, Dierdre is next."
"What? I wanted to be next," Ember pouted.
"Too bad, Dierdre is next in the little jingle I made up for us."
"The what?" Abel raised his eyebrows.
"A jingle. It goes disposed, beheaded, died, disposed, beheaded, survived. You being the survivor, obviously," Bernard pointed to Hunter. "And Dierdre is next He died of- whoooo, natural causes!"
"Come on, Dierdre, don't be shy," Abel encouraged.
"Do I have to?"
"Not if you don't want to," Hunter said. "But it would really help."
"Oh. Okay. I guess I can tell some of it then."
Hi, my name is Dierdre. I like firebee honey and the little toffee candies the head of the Bard Coven would sneak me during meetings when my blood sugar got low. My favorite time of day is the very morning because you can always tell what sort of day it's going to be when you wake up.
My favorite color has always been pink, but I liked to tell Uncle it was gold because it made him happy. Another food that I like is potateyes, I think they are very good when you cut them up into little slivers.
"Is he going to get on with the story?" Fitz muttered.
"Sh, let him ease into it," said Ember. "This is hard for him."
I used to be sick all the time. But I never let that stop me from starting Coven Scout training and working to become the Golden Guard. I wanted the cloak and the mask, to be able to help Uncle out the best out of everyone.
So I found some tricks to work around my dizzy spells. And I figured out what potions to take on bad pain days. And they helped me push through. I didn't care how hard it was, I was going to do it.
I... I was shy during the ceremony when I got my staff. But I was also very excited. So it wasn't very bad. I can hardly even remember the crowd, I just remember that Uncle was so proud of me.
That's all I wanted. I was his only family left, so I just had to make him proud. He seemed happy when I succeeded. Not sad, the way he was when he thought about all the family members that wild magic had taken away from us.
I was a really good Golden Guard. I always woke up very early to do my stretches and drink the tea the Potions Coven head suggested for my migraines.
Then one day I started realizing how short of breath I was getting. I figured it was getting to be mold season, so I could stick it out and be better in a few days.
A week passed.
Then two. It was starting to affect my performance. So I told Uncle, and he said if it didn't go away soon then he would take a look at it. Not the Healing Coven, I wasn't allowed to go to them. Uncle is hardly ever wrong, so I trusted him and just kept going. Until, that is, I got to the point where I woke up, and my lungs felt very... heavy.
I went to one of the healers in secret thinking maybe my asthma was acting up, or it was allergies. But no matter what they did, I kept getting sicker and sicker.
Uncle got worried about me.
"Worried you wouldn't finish your mission to retrieve selkidomus scales, more like," Bernard interjected.
Dierdre's bottom lip started trembling, and Ember shushed Bernard with a glare.
"It's okay. Keep going. He was worried, and then what did he do?"
Well, then...
...
I went on my mission.
I kept going.
What else was I supposed to do?
He thought I would be fine. He really did. He didn't know I would get worse.
I felt like I was on fire. I was so cold. I wanted to be held. It was getting harder to breathe and speak.
I was scared.
Eventually, I slumped over, and I woke up in Uncle's laboratory. He was trying to fix me, I'm sure I would've gotten better.
I'm sure. The room was very spinny. I'm not sure if what I saw was real.
I'm sure he was trying.
There were a lot of things in the room that I didn't know what they were. It smelled weird, and there was a light on me. I reached out my arms to him. I didn't want to go away, I was his only family- I thought I was his only family.
I wanted to sleep and get better.
There was a shadow, he was saying things in a very shrill voice that made my ears ringy.
Uncle looked at me. He- I don't know if he knew I was awake but he turned away.
Maybe I only thought I had my arms up.
Maybe I wasn't really awake, maybe I was already dead and dreamed it all.
It was so hard to breathe.
Dierdre's breath hitched, and he buried his face in his hands. Hunter approached the curled-up ghost very slowly and stretched out his arms. Dierdre leaned into his arms, letting himself be held.
"He said he needed a new pair of lungs," Dierdre whispered.
Fitz's ears twitched. "What?"
"My lungs," Dierdre sobbed, gripping the back of Hunter's shirt. "He'd reused them t- too many times and- and they were all used up. They wouldn't work anymore. I was falling apart."
"Oh," Luz crawled over to join the embrace. "I'm so sorry."
The other four ghosts looked on in shock as Dierdre finally yelled.
"Why? Why did he make me if I was just gonna fall apart in the end? I thought he loved me."
"Hey, we all thought that," Bernard's voice took on a soft tone that Hunter hadn't heard from him yet.
Dierdre tried to continue on, but loud sobs choked off any intelligible words and echoed off the stone walls of the chasm. Hunter wasn't sure when he started crying with him, but he didn't let go for one second and neither did Dierdre.