Part 3

As soon as he realized that he wouldn't be able to help the dead Bowers, Hogg dashed out of the house, throwing up a blizzard of visible eyes into the air. Once they were high enough in the air and out of sight, he started yelling. "Attack! Vampire attack in the city! Call the Watch!"

Brin followed him out, tugging on Hogg's coat. "I don't think it was a vampire."

"Shut up!" Hogg hissed.

“I really think–”

“I know what you think! But we have to consider that the most likely answer is the correct one. Maybe there really is some kind of monster following you around. If there is, then vampire is the most likely, so that’s what we’re going with. Now quiet, we don’t know who might be listening.” Hogg continued shouting about a vampire attack, and Brin kept his mouth shut.

Lights came on in windows across the street, and Brin saw the movement of the Watch's light against the buildings suddenly move faster. Very fast, like a speeding car.

He saw a team of the Watch turn the corner and dash down the street with Skill-enhanced speed. If they'd been this fast while chasing Brin and his friends they would've caught them easily. Either the [Watch] didn't want to use that Skill on a crowded street for fear of trampling people, or they hadn't thought it was worth it to catch a few teenagers involved in minor mischief.

Whatever the case, they seemed like an entirely different sort of group now. A heavily armored man strode up to Hogg, unfazed by his rapid dash here. "Speak!"

Another held up a rod, some sort of artifact that didn't respond to [Inspect].

"While we were talking, [Mind Healer] Bowers suddenly grew tired and then collapsed, dead as soon as he hit the floor. Neither me nor my ward had anything to do with the attack and no reason to believe it was coming," said Hogg.

"Truth," said the Watchman with the artifact.

"Stay here," said the leader, and then ordered his men to spread out and search the area. Brin had no hope that they were going to find anything. The real answer to this search was going to come the next time he found himself a bed, and he was more than ready for that. This day had been full of ups and downs and now all he wanted was to lay down and go to sleep.

He noticed the telltale feeling of sound magic as Hogg put a silencing spell around them. "You do one, too. Find it," Hogg said without moving his lips.

Brin shook his head. "There's nothing to find. I think--"

"Not now. Just do it."

Brin started his spell for Invisible Eye. He was interrupted halfway through when he heard the Watch shouting that they'd found something in the sky. One look at Hogg's clenched jaw told Brin that they'd found one of his Visible Eyes, meaning he'd have to dismiss them so that they wouldn't keep looking in the wrong direction.

That was enough to break Brin out of his Invisible Eye, so he started over, chanting the words in his mind along with the stored memory from his ring. When he finished it, he didn't have any great idea of where to look, or even what he was looking for. He started in the room with the body and then made a spiral moving around and around in an ever expanding loop. He completely ignored things like walls and doors and simply moved in his pattern, looking for any sign of monsters. He found many people sleeping in their beds, and the Watch moving through the streets, but nothing resembling any kind of monster.

He had to dismiss the Invisible eye when the Watch ordered the both of them to come back to the station. Lumina's ring proved its worth again, because the Watch captain brought them to an office instead of a cell and questioned them both together.

Brin felt numb and disconnected during the interrogation, preferring to let Hogg speak whenever possible. A man had died right in front of him and he was… fine. Maybe it was because of the way Bowers had died; it hadn’t been violent and there wasn’t any blood. Maybe his lizard brain still thought that the man had just laid down and went to sleep. Or maybe Brin was just numb. He’d seen a lot of people die during the Battle of Hammon’s Bog, people he’d known and liked. Maybe he didn’t have it in him to feel bad about one random guy he hardly knew. Guiltily, he realized that he honestly felt a little relieved that he’d gotten his answer without actually having to do therapy.

This wasn’t a Scarred One thing. The Scarred One raged and ranted against every minor slight. This was the Glasser’s dark side, and he didn’t like it. Sure, the Scarred One had been psychotic, but at least he’d cared. If the alternative was to be someone this callous, he’d rather have the Scarred One back. The thought made him sick to his stomach.

If the Watch Captain noticed Brin’s inner turmoil, he didn’t mention it. He kept his questions direct and on point, and didn't press when Hogg refused to talk about his Class or his business in the town. He kept to the details of the case, going over the conversation with Bowers, writing down every detail that Brin remembered, and trying to jog his memory for any small details he might have overlooked.

After an hour of questioning with the Watch captain and an [Interrogator], an aide burst into the office where Brin and Hogg were being held. "We found it!"

"Wait, really?" Brin asked.

"Show me," said Hogg.

The Watch marched them back, towards the same neighborhood where the [Mind Healer] had been killed, only a few blocks away. There was a large crowd of Watch members as well as a few [Hunters] that had probably been hired on later. They parted for the captain, giving Brin a good look.

On the ground was a strange batlike creature. It was about four feet long, completely furless, with a long, pointy nose. An arrow still pierced it straight through.

"[Hunter] Tomil here snagged it out of the air. We wouldn't have seen it if we hadn't already been searching the sky," said one of the Watch.

Brin used [Inspect].

Sleeper Dustling. Level 21. Deceased.

"Can these things make people fall asleep?" Brin asked.

"The two of you are free to go," said the Watch captain. "We'll fill you in when we have more information."

Eager to take the chance for freedom, Brin and Hogg walked away without another word.

As they walked down the city streets, Brin felt stunned. There had actually been a monster? He'd sort of thought... Well, he hadn't known what to think, but he'd never have guessed that the simplest explanation was the right one. It was too neat. It wrapped everything up too nicely.

"Could that monster have actually killed him?"

"It's got 'Sleeper' right there in the name," said Hogg. "It's a little low-level to be able to both put someone to sleep and kill them, but Bowers wasn't exactly a high-level individual. Maybe he had some other kind of condition that made him weak to this type of thing."

"Something about this isn't right. If the Sleeper Dustling even was the culprit, I think it's more likely that something was empowering it somehow," said Brin.

"I agree," said Hogg. "We have to examine the possibility that Pio is working against you."

"Pio? It's hard to believe. He seems like the kind of guy who would use his fists if he has a problem with someone," said Brin.

"That's my impression, too. But too many things are adding up against him at this point. If we just assume that he's a really good actor, then everything slides into place. He and Zerif are only pretending to be at odds, when in reality they're both doing the same thing. Causing chaos to weaken Frenaria. All the monster attacks, and then this one. Its purpose had to have been to stop you from figuring out how they're getting to you. Maybe I was wrong about Zerif being a spy for Prinnash. Maybe he's a spy for Arcaena."

That thought gave Brin a chill. "Before he died, Bowers said that I'm under attack." said Brin.

"That all but confirms it," said Hogg.

"Do you think the Baron is in on it, too?" asked Brin.

"I think he's what he seems. He decided to look the other way with Zerif's antics because he knew the kingdom wouldn't like the way it would look if he hired a small army to hunt them down." Hogg frowned. "But if I was wrong about Pio I could be wrong about anyone. Whatever the case, I don't think he'll move against us."

"So what are we going to do now? Should we find a different caravan to take us to Blackcliff?"

Hogg smiled. "Why? If they really are spies, then the last thing they'll want is us to come along and keep killing all their monsters and ruining all their plans. Nah, let's make them sweat a little. Plan is the same as always."

Brin laughed. "I think I must be tired because that didn't sound as stupid as it should. I think we both must be tired."

Back at their inn, they found Zilly outside, curled up on the front step fast asleep. She leapt to her feet when he touched her shoulder to wake her. "Huh? Wha--?" Her eyes focused on Brin. "Are we in trouble? You were gone so long, and then the Watch started going crazy running around! I thought you might've been trying to bust loose!"

Right, the last they'd seen her was before they'd gone to meet the Baron. "No, no it's fine. Neves was pretty cool about it and we talked it out." He wasn’t ready to talk about Bowers yet.

"Really? That's great but... oh wow, it's almost morning. He must have been quite a talker."

"What were you doing on the front step?" asked Brin.

"They wouldn't let me wait inside."

"Well, come on in. You can crash on our couch for tonight."

Hogg moved between Zilly and Brin, grabbing them both by the shoulder. "No, I have a better idea. Brin is going to sleep, and you're going to stay up. I could use your [Rogue] senses. We're trying to catch the monster that's been giving Brin nightmares. Something snuck up and killed Brin’s [Mind Healer] while they were talking, with me sitting right outside. We need someone to keep an eye out."

“What will you be doing?" Zilly asked Hogg. She still thought he was a [Rogue], so his senses should've been better than hers.

"Same thing, but from outside." More likely, he’d be sending a cloud of Visible Eyes out to scour the area.

Zilly shrugged. "That's fine. Whatever you need."

She yawned, which gave Brin a spike of panic, but he shot it down. He couldn't spend his entire life thinking that people were under attack from a sleep monster every time they got tired.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

They went inside. Zilly marveled at the luxurious rooms, but Brin was too tired to really engage. He quickly slipped into pajamas and went to bed.

He was asleep in seconds. And ten hours of dreamless sleep later, he woke up again.

“It didn’t work,” he said. Why? He was so sure that whatever had been tormenting his dreams the past few months would show up again, but nothing had happened.

His months of nightmares weren’t so far in the past that he could say he was over it. Every time he got a full night’s rest, it still felt luxurious, like he was reclining on one of those old chaise longue chairs while one servant fed him grapes and another fanned him with a palm frond. Needlessly indulgent.

It was also somewhat disappointing. He’d been ready for a fight, and nothing had happened.

He padded his way into the common room and sat down at the table. “I don’t get it. Why didn’t that work?”

Hogg wasn’t around, and Zilly was passed out on the couch, but Marksi was up and excited to see him moving around, so Brin talked to him. “I think they must have enchantments on the bed to help you sleep. Maybe it’s also blocking whatever has been messing with my dreams?”

Marksi nodded to say that must be it.

“I wonder if there’s a general Skill that I could use to let me sniff out magic. I can’t sense it very well unless it’s using light, sound, or glass,” said Brin.

Marksi looked down at him condescendingly.

“That’s right. Your magic sense is pretty good. Can you tell if the bed is enchanted?”

Marksi twitched his tail for yes.

Brin walked back to his room and used [Inspect] on the bed.

Here at Fortune and Bent’s House for Distinguished Travelers, we pride ourselves on offering the very best service money can buy. Our beds are made of only the finest materials and use patented and first-rate enchantments to provide a comfortable, restful, and private sleeping experience.

Did everyone have custom messages now? He was living in the world of high-level crafters, and he wasn’t sure he liked it. It was true that the average level here in Oud’s Bog was much lower than the average in Hammon’s Bog, but the upper limit was much higher.

The bed was definitely enchanted, though. He’d have to sleep somewhere else if he wanted to figure out what was going on with his dreams.

Soon after, Zilly woke up and stumbled her way to the restroom. When she came out she went straight back to the sofa and laid down again and closed her eyes. “This place is insane! I could get used to running water, I think.”

“It’s a game-changer,” Brin agreed.

“Oh, hey, looks like Myra’s here. Which is good, because it’s been like two days. I was just about to start looking for her. The boys, too.”

“How do you know?” asked Brin. “And where’s Hogg?”

“I can hear them.” She put a pillow on her face and hugged it. “Sleeping sucks as a [Rogue]. I can hear every burp and fart in a three block radius.”

“Ouch.”

“Go get them already! If I leave the room I don’t think they’ll let me back in,” said Zilly.

Brin walked down to the lobby, and sure enough, found his friends and brought them back to his suite.

Myra strode through into the room with a huge grin on her face. “I’ve been busy! You’re never going to guess what I’ve been up to.”

Davi made himself at home and sat next to Brin at the table, biting into an apple from a fruit bowl. Sion stood in the doorway awkwardly, as if unsure what the etiquette was here.

Zilly tossed her pillow and sat up with a groan, rubbing her temples. “We’ve been up to some crazy stuff, too.”

“Well, I bet my story is better,” said Myra.

Zilly snorted. “Doubt it. But you go first.”

“I finished all that spidersilk and then Sion here helped me sell it,” Myra said proudly.

“For a very profitable percentage,” Sion added.

“For a tiny percentage. I don’t think one percent was enough,” Myra said.

“Any is too much, when you should be able to expect the [Merchants] to give you a fair price in the first place,” said Sion.

“Get this. I got eighty-six gold for it.”

Zilly whistled.

Brin looked at Sion. “You’re good.”

“I’m good,” said Myra. “I’m rich! You know Hogg offered to lend me money to get a business started, but I don’t even need it anymore. I could start up anywhere. Ok, now you guys go. What have you been up to?”

Brin made eye-contact with Davi, Sion, and Zilly, and none of them were eager to speak up first. He wanted to let Myra bask in her victory a little longer. It really was a remarkable achievement. He also didn’t quite know how to start with all the craziness.

“Brin made up a new song,” Davi started slowly.

“Really?”

“Yes, They Call Me Kukubaru,” said Sion.

Myra’s eyes went wide. “I heard that one! That was you?”

“But he played it too loud so we got chased across town by the Watch,” said Zilly. “We got away though.”

“Until the Baron was waiting for me back in my room,” said Brin.

“Right, so then Brin went to dinner with the Baron,” said Davi.

“You’re kidding,” said Myra.

“Nope! And the Baron said he was crazy and he needed to see a [Mind Healer],” said Zilly.

“That tracks,” said Myra.

“And I may have gotten proposed to, a little bit. He tried to set me up with his daughter,” said Brin.

Myra froze, eyes wide in shocks.

“What? You didn’t tell me that part!” said Zilly.

“I said no.” Brin said, to which all four sighed in relief. He rushed to continue. “Then I went to the [Mind Healer] and he said there was nothing wrong with me and then fell over dead. That about cover it?”

Davi and Sion gasped in shock, not having heard that part of the story yet. Myra crossed the room and sat down on the couch next to Zilly. She leaned forward and put her head to her knees and groaned. “I left you guys alone for two days! Not even two whole days!”

The group told Myra the story again, this time in more detail. After that Brin got the chance to congratulate her on her recent sale. Eventually the conversation dwindled, and Davi started making noises about going back to the [Bards’] Terrace to see what kind of music was playing there now. No one had any objections, so they set off.

On their way out the door, Sion pulled Brin aside. “And how are you doing?” the older boy asked, a look of real concern in his eyes.

“Fine?” Brin asked, a little confused.

“You saw a man die. That couldn’t have been easy.”

Brin smiled weakly. “I think it’s going to take some time for my emotions to catch up. Right now it still doesn’t feel real.” If only he could pretend it wasn’t. [Know What’s Real] was merciless.

“If you’re sure,” said Sion.

“I think what I need right now is to get out of here. Get my mind on something else.”

Sion smiled. “I see. Then let us be off! Adventure awaits!”

Only, Brin didn’t get very far. Ten steps out of his hotel he was stopped by a member of the Watch.

“Excuse me, sir. I was wondering if you might decide to stay close at hand, at your inn perhaps, for the contingency that in the course of our ongoing investigation we find the need to ask you for assistance.”

Brin looked at the Watchman. The man had an excellent blond mustache, and his helmet didn’t have an eyeguard, which meant that Brin could see the way that he wasn’t quite meeting his eyes when he spoke.

“Are you saying I can’t leave?”

“You are by no means under arrest. I was ordered to pass along this request from the captain of the Watch.”

“So I can go?”

“It would be better if you decided to stay. At present you are by no means under arrest.” The man still didn’t meet his eyes.

“Will I be under arrest if I try to leave?”

“It is impossible for me to speculate at the present moment.”

“Let’s be clear then. Am I a suspect in Mr. Bowers’ death?”

“Absolutely not at present, no,” said the Watchman.

Brin looked at his friends. He probably wouldn’t get arrested if he just walked away, no matter what this guy was trying to imply. But he’d been pushing his luck quite a bit in this town, and decided that maybe it was time to rein it in.

“You guys go on without me.”

He stayed cooped up in the inn for the rest of the day, reading the newspapers, and then a few novels that the staff brought in for him. The next day wasn’t any different, and he spent the entire time cooped up inside.

He lost patience for reading and turned to training instead. He wasn’t in the mood for push-ups and didn’t want to sour the fabulous hotel rooms with the stench of sweat, so he turned to illusions. [Directed Meditation] gave him succor for his useless, wandering thoughts and he put all his energy into perfecting his spells. Mirror Image was especially under-utilized. There was nothing wrong with the spell, but he needed more practice with it if he was ever going to use it for more than a brief distraction.

Eventually he even got sick of that and had to stop, despite [Directed Meditation] helping him stay focused. Hogg told him that he’d help Brin sneak off if he really had to, but the reluctance in his voice told Brin that the situation outside was still sticky. They’d found a monster who could’ve killed Bowers, but the Watch obviously didn’t think that was all there was to the story any more than Brin and Hogg did. They didn’t want Brin moving around until they ruled him out.

He spent three days like that, stuck inside, going out of his mind in boredom. His friends came by a few times to regale him with stories of what they got up to without him, but it was all normal stuff. Shopping, listening to music, hanging out in bars, and seeing the sights. No run-ins with the Watch and no monsters when Brin wasn’t around. He was starting to wonder if he was the problem.

Hogg came and went as he pleased. He snuck out any time of day or night, leaving behind a Mirror Image to keep the Watch and the inn’s staff fooled.

The Watch came by a few times to ask follow-up questions about the monster, but Brin honestly couldn’t tell them any more than he already had. They seemed content to let the matter lay how it was. On his last day in town, Brin saw an article about it, on the fourth page of the newspaper. There was a short story about a random monster that snuck into town and killed an elderly man, only to be eliminated immediately by the Watch.

He didn’t hear from the Baron again, or from Iola. Brin got the feeling that if he’d reached out, the Baron would’ve been more than happy to make the entire thing go away, but then he really would have owed the man a favor.

That night, Hogg told him to sleep on the floor in the common room.

“Only the bedrooms are warded for privacy. If you really have something attacking your dreams, there shouldn’t be any barriers preventing them from getting to you on the floor there. If we’re really going to test this out, then we should do it now before we start traveling with the caravan again.”

“Are you ready with your Visible Eyes?” asked Brin.

“I’ve got this area locked down as well as I can, and I hired a few associates to keep an eye on the outside. If there’s a monster in the area, we’ll know.”

“Right. Then I guess it’s now or never.”

For whatever reason, Brin couldn’t fall asleep right away. It could be because he was dealing with cabin fever from a week stuck in his rooms, but it could also be the knowledge that he might be fighting some unknown threat in his dreams.

Whatever the case, he stared at the ceiling for an entire hour, waiting for sleep that didn’t come. It was hard to even close his eyes.

Tired of waiting, he asked Hogg for a sleeping potion, but he refused. “What happens if you do get attacked by a nightmare monster? You’ll need to be able to wake yourself up.”

So Brin turned around and did push-ups. If the reason he couldn’t sleep was because he wasn’t tired, then that was a fixable problem. Of course, push-ups did nothing to wear him out now, but that was a fixable problem, too.

Hogg pushed down on him with heavy bars of hard light, canceling out his high Strength and letting him feel the burn. At ninety push-ups that way, he felt like he couldn’t keep going, but he pushed himself before knocking out the last ten, up to an even hundred.

This time when he lay down on his back on the hard floor, it felt a lot more welcome. After his breathing regulated and his pulse went down, it wasn’t so hard to keep his eyes closed.

Eventually, he drifted off to sleep.

The dream was strange. He knew he was dreaming immediately, but there was nothing there. No sound or images, just an awareness that he was asleep and that he was dreaming.

It wasn’t a darkness, or a plain white room; it was nothing. The lack of any image at all, but there was something else. A feeling. The dream felt… hesitant. Nervous?

He pictured himself back in his room at the inn, and the dream filled in the details. His bed, dresser, closet, the door. And now he could feel it. There was something behind the door.

Well, he’d had his suspicions… No, not even that. Just a gut instinct.

“Aberfa?” he called. “Is that you?”

The door opened, and a woman stepped out. She wore a purple button-down shirt tucked into trousers with a silver belt. Her hair was long and black, like Tawna and Myra’s, and her face was familiar. He knew it, even though he’d never seen it before.

“You’re Aberfa, right? You’re the one who’s been in my dreams all this time.” This was the one who had been torturing his dreams all this time. His mouth was dry with fear and horrid expectation, but his voice was strong and even. “It’s always been you. Aberfa.”

“No. Not for you. Never for you.” She crossed the room in an instant, pulling him into a warm hug. She was gentle, and surprisingly soft, and she was the answer to a longing that his soul had never known but his body hadn’t quite forgotten. “My boy. My poor, sweet Aberthol. I am never Aberfa to you. You must call me mother.”