Melmarc stared at his father. They were both seated, opposite each other.

He had seen his father and just known that the man was unsure. He didn’t have the foggiest idea of how he’d known it. Maybe he knew his father well enough. Maybe he’d simply assumed that a father would be unsure in his situation. Maybe he assumed his father would be unsure because he was unsure.

In summary of the truth, he didn’t know. And ‘dissonant’ agreed.

They were done shaking hands and his father was staring at the space between them. He’d been doing so since their hands had met. Melmarc wasn’t sure why, but he knew the reason he was looking at his father.

He was doing his best to ignore the notification staring at him.

[You have met your first Oath]

[You have met your Oath of Madness]

For some reason, he wasn’t sure if his interface was telling him that he’d met his first Oath simply because he was meeting his first Oath or if it put it that way to imply his possession of the Oath.

It worried him a little bit. As for his father, there was a very thoughtful expression on his face. A deep one Melmarc hadn’t seen since the attack.

So he allowed him think. He allowed the Oath of Madness arrange his thoughts. As a child he’d learned that his father wasn’t one for physical contact not because he didn’t like it but because he had too much on his mind.

As a child it had simply been, like a law of nature. The way you woke up in the morning and never asked why you wake up in the morning. Or you lived in a house simply because you lived in a house. Or there was electricity simply because there was electricity.

In the Lockwood house, the father always had a lot on his mind simply because he always had a lot on his mind. And Uncle Dorthna was always around when the parents were not because he was always around when the parents were not.

With his father Melmarc knew that everything came with strides. Saxi, Deoti and Lisa knew as well because they hadn’t said anything. Lisa hadn’t even done her usual bit of greeting him as if he was a very hospitable host.

It was a while before his father did anything. He let out a simple sigh that seemed slightly exhausted to Melmarc and said, “Congratulations on your class.”

Melmarc smiled. “Thanks, dad.”

“Was your Uncle Dorthna helpful when you got it?”

Thinking back on it put a different kind of smile on Melmarc’s face. Uncle Dorthna had worked him until he’d experienced mana fatigue. But now that he thought about it, Uncle Dorthna had trained Ark but had simply made him use his skills until he was tired of using them.

If he was being honest, Uncle Dorthna had simply been present.

“Delano was nice enough to help more,” he answered.

“Oh.” His father’s eyes turned down. He was thinking. “And the other one?” He made a gesture, raised a hand up to his ear. “The one that’s almost my height.”

“Eroms?”

His father nodded. “Eroms. Did he help?”

Melmarc thought of it. “He was present. Uncle Dorthna seemed more interested in him, though.”

His father didn’t look surprised. “He has a class, too.”

“He does,” Melmarc confirmed.

“Not surprised. Your uncle has no interest in those without a class.”

Melmarc thought back to it and wasn’t sure he could see it. Uncle Dorthna had always shown interest in all of them. He was free and jovial when he had to be. He took trash from them simply because he could, and rarely ever told them no if it was a request their parents would say yes to.

Melmarc could still remember the conversation he’d had with his uncle the night Ark had gotten his class. The night Melmarc had been sad about it. There had been an odd touch to his voice when he’d told Melmarc that he was sad for himself and not his brother, that he was human.

It had been about a month ago.

Yet it feels like a life time.

“How’s Ark?” Melmarc asked.

“I do not know,” his father answered. “I returned from work and came straight for you. But I know that he is fine. He wrestled… an elephant? I believe that is what your uncle said.”

Melmarc chuckled. “He suplexed a bull.”

“Sounds like something he would do. Try not to tell Ninra. She will worry.” A wisp of a smile touched his father’s lips.

“Try not to tell mum,” Melmarc returned. “She’ll be too excited.”

“She will,” his father agreed. “Always so happy with your brother’s strength. I have always been glad for that. A parent should like their child as their child and as a person.” His eyes took on a distant look. “At least that’s what your uncle always said.”

“Do you know how Uncle D is?” Melmarc asked, moving the conversation on, enjoying the rarity of it. “Is he fine? Do they know?”

“Only your uncle knows. But he’s fine. It takes a lot to bother him. A lot.”

“Oh.” Melmarc looked around, took in the room and its occupants. “Did everyone come?”

His father nodded. “The team is complete. I have the odd feeling that they would not have it any other way.” His eyes moved away from Melmarc for the first time and settled on someone else for only a moment. “Except Saxi. But I cannot say I’m sure.”

Saxi chuckled nervously. “I wouldn’t miss this for the world.”

Dissonant.

His father’s eyes stayed on the Delver a little longer. A second or two longer.

“Sorry, Boss,” Saxi apologized.

Melmarc turned to look at him in time to catch Deoti cuff him behind the head. It was a simple admonishment of a peer from what he could see, and he caught Saxi mutter an apology to her, too.

They seemed at ease.

“He seems fun,” Melmarc said.

“Troublesome,” was his father’s response. “He still makes mistakes but nothing grave. He can be reliable.”

Melmarc raised a brow. “Are complimenting people now, dad?”

“Your mother said good truths motivate people.”

“And bad truths?”

His father shook his head. It was an action of uncertainty. “I still do not understand that one very well. “She says that how you pass it is what matters.”

It was like talking to a man who was doing his best to understand why you put so much interest in trivial matters. Right now, Melmarc felt as if he was watching a father not pretend to be excited about the grasshopper his child had taken an interest in but try to understand why specifically his child had taken an interest in it.

“And how do you pass bad truths?” he asked simply for the sake of asking. Maybe he was enjoying the sight of his father trying a little too much.

His father paused, seemed to give it some thought. Oddly enough, Melmarc knew when thoughts failed his father. He also knew when he tried again.

“Deoti,” his father said.

“Yes, Boss.”

“Melmarc is now a Gifted that has survived for more than a week in a portal. He is not simply a child.”

“Yes, Boss.”

His father’s attention focused on him. “Like that.”

That was all he had. Melmarc wasn’t surprised. Words were his father’s sentences and sentences were his father’s paragraphs. And where people wrote an essay, his father would rather demonstrate.

Melmarc nodded. It was apt enough.

“Is mom fine?” he asked. “Ninra?”

“Your mother was working when I came here,” his father answered, choosing his words simply. “Ninra is experiencing heartbreak. Your Uncle Dorthna keeps tabs on her. I believe she would not want the family to know.”

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That was sad. Melmarc didn’t know a lot about his sister’s love life. But the one thing he knew was that she was the kind to hold onto her feelings for someone until she was sure of them. But when she loved, she loved recklessly. With a love that made the oceans jealous and blotted out stars on a night too bright. At least, that was how Delano had described it.

It was a bit much and biased since it was coming from Delano, but it wasn’t too grand an exaggeration, just too poetic. Ninra wasn’t one to pretend and she loved with everything she had. Melmarc still remembered meeting one of her boyfriends once.

It had been gross to see her all too loving and caring with none of the interspersed violence she reserved for him, Ark and Uncle Dorthna.

Normally, he would say that she would be fine. But that was once upon a time—a time when normally for him was normal for everyone. He didn’t have much of a luxury in that anymore.

So, instead, he said, “Will she be fine?”

“I do not have the slightest idea,” his father answered. “Your mother will answer that better.”

Melmarc could agree with that. For now, he wondered what else they had to talk about. He’d covered the basics about the family.

That can’t be it, right?

He didn’t have a lot of these conversations with his dad, and he hadn’t seen him in a while. Inside a portal that was out to kill them and on a path to potentially steal an orb and kill a Demi-god—which seemed more likely now that his dad was here—it seemed like a childish thing to want to spend more time together.

You’re sixteen, he reminded himself. You’re arguably still a child.

He held onto that and the fact that his mind did not charge him with dissonance and moved forward. Melmarc would use all the time he could find. Childish or not, he wanted this break.

“How’s work?”

His father tilted his head slightly to the side. “You always hated it when your mother and I asked how school was. Your brother said it was because it was a poor attempt at small talk.”

Melmarc shrugged. “It is. So how’s work?”

“Work was fine.”

“Was?”

“There was an altercation.” His father didn’t look bothered. “I had an important place to be and a less important person tried to stand in my way to do it and make me do a thing that was less important to me.”

Melmarc assumed the important place his father had to be was where he was right now. “And how did it lead to an altercation?”

“My colleague would not move. And she would not let me move. So I found a way to move.” His father paused. “I will have to return when we are done here.”

“To work?”

“To conclude my altercation with her.”

That was not a good thing. From what Melmarc knew, his father could be set quite vehemently in his ways. It did not matter if it was going to bed early or eating toast with butter not jam. Or keeping the volume at a set level when everyone was more focused on leaving the house.

At times like that, his mother was often the one to dissuade him. Melmarc had a feeling he would not be able to.

Melmarc thought of what else to talk about. Work, apparently, had ended up being a dead end conversation. His father had kept his words simple and precise. Details about the altercation would be nice, but it seemed this was all he was supposed to get. Prying any further would be… well… prying.

“How was your mentorship program?” His father asked suddenly. “Before this.”

Melmarc couldn’t complain. “Mostly boring. A spent a good deal of time arranging other people’s offices for reasons I still don’t understand.”

“I met Naymond.” He gestured back at the [Sage] who was currently still kneeling and slightly pale. “I’m sure you already know him. He’s eccentric and a little weird. But I think his heart’s in the right place. Sometimes.”

This was normally where Naymond would toss in one quip or the other. He did not. Even an S-rank [Mage] like Deoti hadn’t been able to inspire complete silence from him.

He must really be scared of dad.

“I am aware of him,” his father said simply. “He worked with your mother. He was tasked with the job of a negotiator of sorts in her team. His role was to help her reach… acceptable terms with trying others.”

“Oh.” That explained the negotiating he’d done when Melmarc had wanted Jude punished. “You don’t like him.”

His father made a sound that wasn’t necessarily an agreement or a disagreement.

“Sometimes he plays mediator,” he said simply. “Helping your mother’s team and mine reach an amiable compromise. He is too… dissonant.”

For some reason, the word rang too loudly to Melmarc. Maybe it was [Optimum Existence]. Right now he had an almost complete certainty that he’d gotten the dissonance thing from his father.

But what do lies have to do with madness? It was a question he really wanted to ask but knew that he wasn’t supposed to. Not with Clinton and his team present.

Not lies, he corrected himself. Dissonance.

Lies were intents. If someone said the sky was brown because they believed the sky was brown, it wasn’t a lie. It was wrong, but not a lie. Dissonance was not this. Although, a similar principle would apply.

“I don’t think he’s necessarily a bad person,” Melmarc said gently. “Maybe not trust worthy,” he added, remembering Naymond was a Player, a conversation that would need to be addressed. “But not bad. If you don’t mind me asking, why is he kneeling down?”

“Because he has to.” The words came out as a statement of fact. “It is safer for him… in the long run.”

“Is he being punished?” Melmarc asked. He was trying to fish out what he could. If dissonance was from his father, where was the urge to punish from?

His father shook his head. “I have never been too good at choosing punishments. My hand is too heavy. Your mother was always better at that.”

That didn’t really give Melmarc much to go on. Did that mean that his mother had the overwhelming urge to punish or that she just understood people better and was a better judge of a befitting punishment?

Growing up she had always been the one in charge of punishing them. The times Ark got into fights for good reasons or not. When Ninra had gone through her sneaking out phase. When Melmarc nagged Ark too much and Ark reported. When Ark was a little too daring and got Melmarc roped into it.

That didn’t give Melmarc much to go on. Melmarc didn’t touch the subject, though. He let it be.

“You didn’t tell Saxi that you are his commanding officer,” his father said after a while. “Correct?”

Melmarc nodded. “I didn’t.”

“And you also didn’t tell him that you were not.”

Melmarc nodded. “Is it really important that I say I’m not?”

“Honestly, I don’t know enough about this,” his father admitted. “Your mother was his commanding officer due to certain Gifted reasons. She was the one in charge of him.”

“Is that why Saxi said he needs official permission to change stewardship?” he asked. “Mom has to be around?”

“Not really. Saxi only said that because he didn’t know you had official…” his father paused. “Do you have official permission?”

Melmarc nodded very slowly, unsure of what was going to happen next.

His father suddenly seemed tired. “Do you want to assume stewardship of him?”

Melmarc wasn’t sure. If he was being honest, it sounded like too much responsibility. It wasn’t because of who Naymond was. Personally, he believed that the best way to deal with Naymond was to simply point him in a direction and keep him away from people with simple lives. Besides that, just give him a list of things not to do and accept what comes next.

Now that he thought of it, that also sounded like a heavy responsibility to bear. Regardless, the main reason it felt too big for him was because the responsibility had shown up on his interface. Since entering the portal, he’d been learning things about being Gifted that he’d never heard of before.

His father waited patiently as Melmarc thought about it. In the end, Melmarc decided that it was truly too large a responsibility for him.

“Do I have to make a decision now?” he asked.

“No,” his father answered. “You can ignore it forever. Whatever detriments come from it will be his burden to bear.”

Melmarc wasn’t sure of how he felt about letting Naymond bear the burden after taking a risk on him.

Not a risk. He was simply trying to use you. He was not taking a risk on you. Not like that.

“And what happens if I reject his request?”

“He loses every and all protection he is currently under.”

Melmarc looked back at Naymond. The [Sage] didn’t meet his eyes.

He looked back at his father. “Are they that important?”

His father nodded.

“How important?”

“Without them, he could…” his father paused, frowned. “Lisa, is this proper?”

“Yes, Boss,” she answered from where she was standing.

Melmarc took the opportunity to wave at her. “Hi, aunt Lisa.”

She waved back with a smile. “Hi, Mel. You’re a big boy now. Important, too.”

He returned her smile before returning his attention to his father.

“Without them,” his father resumed, “he could die. There are currently a few people who would actively hunt him down the moment the protections are gone.”

That was… terrifying to think about. But Melmarc understood it. Naymond was a player. As such, he was an enemy, an Intruder. You did not allow the enemy walk about in your territory unsupervised.

“And what if I accept?”

His father shook his head. “I don’t know the full scope of the responsibility you will bear. That was your mother’s purview. What I do know is that you will have to give him quests that he will have to complete.”

“Oh.” Melmarc scratched his jaw. That was definitely responsibility and authority. “And the reward? Does he get rewards?”

“On successful completion within the given criteria. Yes. Punishment for failures as well.”

“And what serves as a reward or a punishment?”

“That I do not know,” his father answered. “We will have to ask your mother. She should still remember.”

“Can we ask her how to do it, too?”

“We can.” His father studied him. “You are considering it, aren’t you?”

Melmarc nodded. “I am.”

A sigh left his father’s lips. “I guess that is one way to expand your influence. I will not advice it, but that is the father speaking.”

“And what is the Delver saying?” Melmarc asked, pleased to be having a conversation that flowed with his father even if it sounded more business than family.

“You can never have too much influence,” his father answered.

Melmarc paused, knowing what he wanted to say but not sure if he should.

His father watched him, paid attention to him. “You are becoming dissonant. It is good to come to decisions so that you do not lose yourself to your own ideas.”

Melmarc took a steadying breath and agreed with his father.

“What,” he asked, “is the Oath saying?”

That got a reaction from Saxi, Lisa, Naymond and Deoti. It was nothing verbal, only physical in the way of the surprise and worry on their expressions. On Naymond it was worry and fear.

Melmarc’s father’s expression did not change or falter. “I see he reason for the dissonance.” He remained silent for a while longer before he finally spoke again. “The Oath will say to spread your influence wisely. Only draw those that suit you within your influence. Your mother once said that you only command those deserving of it.”

There was more to this. Melmarc was sure of it now.

His father simply got up and dusted his hands. “I have a question,” he said.

Melmarc got up, too. “What’s that?”

“Why did you sit down?”

Telling his father that he’d sat down because his father had sat down was a lie that wasn’t going to fly. So this is what it’s like knowing for a fact that your parents can tell when you’re lying.

Melmarc went with the truth. “There was too much on my mind.”

His father nodded as if it made perfect sense even though Melmarc had never done anything like that in his life.

“It’s time to go,” his father said. “We’ve run out of time.”

“Yes, Boss,” Lisa, Saxi and Deoti said in unison.

“We will have to hurry. Naymondeel, you can get up. I will advise that you do not prove yourself to be an inconvenience to my child.”

Everyone moved to action. Naymond got up from his knees and dusted his knees. Melmarc realized that for the duration of the conversation no one had spoken unless when spoken to, directly or indirectly.

He had sat in a room full of people with his father and had an entire conversation in silence. He would be lying if he said it didn’t feel a certain kind of way. It had felt powerful.

Like a king and his son in a throne room.

It was a slippery slope to go down and Melmarc remembered something Naymond had once told him about how he’d expected Melmarc of all people to not be drawn to the allure of power, to not let it get to his head.

As much as he would’ve loved to say he wouldn’t let it, all he could say for certain was that he hoped he wouldn’t let it. Having a trait that called him out on his lies and bullshit forced him to reflect on himself more than he normally would.

“Dad,” he said, remembering something when they were ready to leave the room.

“Yes, son.”

“Deoti cleared out he monsters that were on our way here. Is it possible for us to follow places that haven’t been cleared while we try to clear the portal?”

Everyone else except Naymond looked at him as if he’d lost his mind. His father looked as if he could not be bothered.

“Will it be of help to you?” he asked.

“Yes,” Melmarc answered.

“That makes sense and makes more things make sense,” his father said. “Then we shall. Saxi, plot us an alternate path.”

Saxi stared at the air. “How alternate, Boss?”

“Give us a path with the most resistance.”