That night Nyx dreamed of a familiar dream. A familiar memory.

He was small and vulnerable in a forest that stayed red all year. He tried to drift out of the shadows. Bad idea, he should know by now that it was a bad idea.

‘Fuck, I hate this part.’ It burned with the fury of the entire sun and he quickly slunk back into the shadows.

So he took his usual path, sticking to the shadows to avoid being burned again.

Until he saw a figure standing on a rock. Shit, a human? He should run, he should stay hidden.

But then he recognized the human, white hair white skin. Familiar. Perhaps even more familiar than anyone else in the world.

‘I really hate this part.’

Everything seemed to move in slow motion as he stepped off the rock.

He lunged forward, reaching out helplessly with an inky claw.

“STOP-!“

Then he was sitting upright on his bedroll, in a forest of green, looking down at pale, white hands that clutched the makeshift blanket he’d made of his cloak in a white knuckled grip.

Before he could even turn his cringing face towards Sunny, to see if he had woken him up with his outburst, he was already crouched beside him.

“What happened? Did you have a nightmare?” The dragon kin looked down at him with a furrowed brow.

“Yeah,” said Nyx “you could say that.”

***

Nyx was on edge the following day, even more skittish than usual.

Sunny tried to think of how best to support him, but he knew Nyx was secretive and didn’t want to force the issue.

That day, they decided, despite how well foraging went last night, it was probably time to do some actual shopping.

They followed the main road, hoping they would be able to make it to the next town before nightfall, but it just so happened, luck was on their side.

Sunny stretched out an arm, stopping Nyx out of his thoughts. “Look”

There was a carriage making it’s way down the path which Nyx had been too lost in his own head to notice.

The two exchanged glance before Sunny sped towards the cart and Nyx after him.

“Hey, traveler!” Sunny called, though Nyx wished he wouldn’t call so much attention to himself.

“Oh, hello there boys.” the man driving the cart said warmly.

“Would you be interested in trading with us for some food? I have coin.” Sunny asked, matching the warmth effortlessly.

“Hmm.” said the man, “At the moment, I’d be more interested in services than coin. I was just heading north, but I had to turn back. There’s a garden of life monsters who’ve taken root on the road. I’d be much obliged to give you some of the goods I’m carrying if you could clear them out.”

Sunny looked back at Nyx with a huge sharp toothed grin that said ‘this is our chance.’

‘Oh,’ thought Nyx ‘I guess this is it.’ He nodded to Sunny, who turned back to the man.

“We’ll do it, sir!”

***

The merchant led them to the spot he had turned back from, driving his cart slowly beside them, but as they got closer the plantoid blockade he had described wasn't exactly hard to spot.

A patch of flowers, from roses to lilies to mums, blocked the path, standing proudly in an array of colors, each one several feet tall.

“I’ll wait in the cart.” said the merchant. “Not to make you too do all the work, but I’m no mage and I can’t exactly defend myself.”

“That’s perfectly fine, sir, get to safety.” called Sunny as the man scampered back to his cart.

A thought occurred to Sunny after he had left earshot. He whispered, “Should we check to make sure they’re not Fey and that guy was just being racist before we go in and-“ he mimicked the motion of swinging a sword “I can’t tell if they have faces from here.”

Nyx nodded “I'm not sure if Fey grow this big, but yeah, that sounds like a good idea.”

Sunny began to slowly approach the flowers “What ho, fair-“ he was immediately sent flying by a massive vine.

Nyx watched him fly through the air “Ah shit.”

Sunny blew himself back towards Nyx, landing safely beside him.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“So yeah, I’m pretty sure they’re monsters.” Sunny said flatly.

Nyx nodded.

They charged at the monsters, not quite in sync.

Nyx grew his shadow into a wide circle around himself, growing about five arms from it, using two to cross over his face protectively and brace against another vine attack as the other three shot forward to claw gashes into the stems of the closest two flowers.

Sunny took to the air with an updraft and unleashed a flurry of slashes through the air, slicing towards the giant plants. One air blade managed to finish the work that Nyx had started and chopping a flower completely through. It’s shape broke up into floating balls of green light before fading completely.

The remaining flowers paused for a moment before wriggling free of the ground.

The now uprooted blooms now skittered around them on monstrous roots like spiders.

One rushed the now earthbound Sunny, bowing its blossom to unleash a spray of pollen, which he immediately blew back, careful to avoid Nyx. He repaid the attack with more air slashes in the spot Nyx had cut, felling it after the third. It too hit the ground and dissipated as well.

“Watch out, they’ve got pollen!” called Sunny.

He looked over to notice that Nyx was still shielding his face against a vine, which had now grown thorns and whose owner was inching towards him.

Sunny was about to rush over to help when Nyx got fed up and tore the vine off quite violently with another set of claws before stretching his shadow out before him and piercing clean through the stem with an inky spike. It writhed for a moment before fading away like the rest.

“Spirits, that was annoying.” Nyx sighed.

There were still three more flowers.

He spread the shadows cast by the flowers as well as himself and soon, they were all standing over a huge black umbra.

More spikes pierced through each of the remaining flowers, pinning them in place like insects.

“Sunny!” he called.

The message was clear. Nyx was ready to finish this.

As Nyx held still, maintaining his focus, Sunny darted around to the flowers, cutting each one down with more blade-like wind.

The flower closest to Nyx bowed forward releasing a puff of pollen.

Sunny noticed at the last second. “Nyx!” he yelled.

He yanked Nyx towards himself on a gust of wind, Nyx making contact with his chest with an “oof.”

Nyx slowly lifted his head from where it was buried in Sunny’s chest , pale face red.

“Sorry,” said Sunny “I didn’t want to push you away and have you hit the ground. Did you inhale any?”

“I think I did a little bit.” said Nyx, “I’m feeling a little hazy, but not much.”

Sunny looked over, noticing the last remaining flower, struggling on the spike it was impaled on.

“Oh yeah.” he said, slicing it down from afar with his falchion.

“C’mon” Sunny said “Let’s get you back to the merchant, maybe he has something for this.”

Sunny led Nyx, back up the path, supporting him with Nyx’s arm over his shoulder.

The merchant ran out to meet them halfway.

“That was amazing!” he cried. “All that flying around! And I never knew Air magic could be used in such a way.” He turned to Nyx “And you,”

Nyx flinched.

“What you did with fusing the shadows and then with the spikes- you truly are a great hero, I feel the tales may be wrong about your lot, young man.”

“Yeah.” Nyx stood up a bit straighter “I’d say they are.”

“I’d be honored to offer you two gentlemen my goods.” Said the merchant.

“Thank you, sir.” said Sunny. He glanced at Nyx. “May I ask one more favor?”

“What kind?” Asked the merchant.

“Could you…spread the word about who helped you and about what you learned today?” Nyx asked

“Certainly.” said the merchant

***

The merchant had been generous indeed, giving them everything they needed, including an antidote to the pollen Nyx had inhaled.

They walked a bit further and found a nice clearing in the woods to stop and make camp for the night.

They sat down with packs full of fresh meat and vegetables for tonight’s dinner and dried meat, rice and other dried goods for the journey ahead.

Sunny started rifling through his bag for more spices.

“Shit!” he said suddenly.

“What? What happened?” asked Nyx, startled.

“I never took this last night.” Sunny said pulling out a glass vial and what he assumed must be a wrapped syringe.

‘Oh.’ thought Nyx

He eyed Sunny cautiously as he filled the syringe to the correct dose of the shimmering blue potion, not sure if averting his eyes would make it more or less weird.

Sunny caught him looking “What, you think I got these perfectly symmetrical scars from a fight?” he joked.

“Oh! Uh…” Nyx said in surprise. He had suspected the potion might be some kind of medication, not necessarily of the hormonal variety, but that seemed to be the case. “so they’re…you’re...”

Sunny smiled and nodded.

Nyx wasn’t quite sure what to say. But he knew two things, Sunny was allowing him to see something deeply personal out of trust that he wouldn’t judge. He was also letting him in on an aspect of his past that he was not owed knowledge of. What’s more, Sunny had saved him just earlier that day.

Nyx had not exactly been extending the same courtesy to him.

“Sunny…I think...” Nyx took a deep breath “I think there’s something I should tell you.”

“You’re transgender too?” Sunny half joked again.

“I’m not…actually named for my Spirit.” said Nyx

Sunny looked confused.

“I’m…the Shadow Spirit.” he continued, looking away.

“But I heard Nyx doesn’t have a body…” Sunny said slowly.

“He-I mean I…don’t.”

Sunny’s confusion only grew

Nyx took another deep, steadying breath. “Just don’t hate me and please please don’t be scared.”

“About three years ago…”