The moment stretched out before him, an endless plane of curious absence.

Where did I go?

The question, the thought, echoed through the void - a thought spoken without voice.

Am I dead? Is this what death is like?

With his being dissolved, the nothing penetrated his mind. He gave himself to it, welcomed it in, opened all his mental and emotional doors to the sweet emptiness. He felt his worries bleed away...his needs...his fears.

All gone.

Running from Dalen. The soldiers in Elbin. His friendship with Aidux. His desire for more. For a family. For meaning. For love. The nothing accepted it all, consumed it readily, dispersed it out into the infinite.

Devoid of his being, stripped of his trauma, free of his emotions and baggage, all that remained of Nevin was a single undulating pinprick of prismatic light, shining at the heart of the void with all the brilliance of a thousand suns.

No more running. No more pain. No more worry. No more regret. Just simple, unburdened being.

For the first time in his life, Nevin was at peace.

The link...is established.

The voice, feminine and soothing, called out from the nothing. It existed apart from him, from somewhere beyond, but as the words washed over what little was left of him, Nevin experienced a strange familiarity. He recognized the voice somehow. An old friend, perhaps, from a past life, a repressed memory, a faded dream...forgotten, but still part of him.

There was something else too, some other presence, hidden out there in the dark. Smaller, but somehow more real, more substantial. He could sense it, out there in the distance, faint but growing more distinct with each passing moment.

Approaching.

We each are connected. Can you feel us?

“Yes...I think I can,” he answered back, even before he realized he could speak. “Who are you?”

I am the Arbiter. I execute that which has been initiated.

“I don't understand.”

You have initiated the process. As such, I have established the proper links. This is my duty.

Nevin paused to think. What did she mean he 'initiated the process?' The last thing he remembered was searching Ishen's study, finding that strange book and digging around inside the hidden compartment. He remembered the cold encompassing his hand, of touching something hard and frozen and having all trace of warmth ripped from his body. What could do that? Had he stumbled on something he shouldn't have?

Could he have possibly fallen victim to some sort of magical effect?

That's impossible, he thought, quietly this time. Ishen detested magic, refusing to even speak on the subject. Every time it came up during a lesson, the older man would grumble to himself, running his bony fingers up and through his tangled salt-and-pepper beard as he shifted to a new topic. Nevin had grown increasingly curious over the years, but the more he pushed, the more evasive his old mentor had grown.

“Magic is not a solution,” Ishen had told him the last and final time Nevin had pressed. “It masquerades as an all-powerful force capable of rewriting reality and overcoming any obstacle, but don't believe the stories. It's a tool, no different than a sword or shovel.

“But where the effects of a sword are immediate and obvious, the effects of magic are often nuanced and invisible, and rarely without cost. Some things in this world create more problems than they solve.

“Be grateful you live in a part of the world where the practice of magic is strictly forbidden. You have no need of it, you're better off without it, and if you're lucky, you'll never encounter it, so let's just agree to leave the subject be.”

No, it was far more likely he'd slipped into the hole and knocked himself out again. “I'm dreaming,” he thought outloud. “This is just some terrible head injury hallucination. It has to be. I'm not even here.”

A few seconds passed before the voice responded. I find your confusion...unexpected. Allow me to alleviate it.

Breath rushed into Nevin's lungs, unbidden but welcome. His eyes fluttered open, coming into focus as the nothing withdrew, leaving him standing alone in a shimmering circle of white light. His bare toes curled against an unidentifiable coarse white stone beneath them. He flexed his fingers, rotated his shoulders, wiggled his jaw. Nothing hurt. All his aches had vanished, his strained shoulder displaying none of the tightness and tenderness he was worried would persist for weeks. He felt new, reborn free of a body wracked by a life of hard labor and painful lessons. He even wore a new outfit: a simple linen shirt and pant ensemble, both light and comfortable.

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

He thought he should be more surprised, more confused by these events, but all his emotions seemed trapped beneath the frozen surface of his mind - tiny bubbles breaking against an unyielding sheet of ice, visible but just out of reach. '

“I have to admit, this all feels so real. All of my injuries-”

I have discarded them. They are not necessary.

He nodded unconsciously, not really understanding but grateful none-the-less. “And the rest of me? My...feelings? Were they discarded, too?”

Your emotions will return once you return. Unlike your physical maladies, they are an integral part of your being, and cannot be discarded.

“Then why are they gone? I mean, not having a body may have freaked me out, but was it really necessary to block me from feeling altogether?”

They have only been temporarily dampened for your protection, though you should be feeling their return now that we are approaching the final steps of the process.

The voice wasn't lying. During the last few moments, Nevin could sense a spiderweb of narrow cracks forming in the frozen barrier between his consciousness and the impatient emotions churning below. He didn't understand why he would need protection from them, but he wasn't going to object to the brief reprieve.

He shook his head. Strangest dream ever.

Out in the darkness, a rhythmic plodding echoed quietly all around him. Footsteps, moving ever closer.

Nevin folded his arms across his chest. “Look, I don't know what's really going or what you're doing to me, or if this is even actually happening-”

It is.

He held up a hand. “Okay, but, let's say I believed what you're saying-”

Your belief is unnecessary to the process.

Had his emotions not been dampened, Nevin suspected he would have been exceedingly annoyed at the woman's constant need to interrupt each and every one of his thoughts.

He took a deep breath before continuing. “What exactly is necessary then? Can you at least tell me that?”

You are not an active participant in the process. Though you are a subject, it is I that executes and completes the changes necessary to prepare you for dilation. Once the process has been initiated, all that is required of subjects is to endure.

“But I didn't agree to whatever you're doing to me.”

That statement is factually incorrect.

The plodding echoed through the cavernous space, growing louder and more distinct with each passing moment.

The voice continued. Regardless, any form of continued agreement is, ultimately, unnecessary. The process cannot be safely interrupted once phase-locking of the souls has begun. Attempting to do so has a chance of generating an inverse pattern, an event which would likely end in the complete cancellation of all spiritual entities involved, and possibly even, in a worst case scenario, the creation of one or more verdant husks.

“I don't...” Nevin slumped forward. “I don't have even the slightest idea what you're talking about.”

Your understanding-

“-Is unnecessary, yes, I believe you've mentioned that.”

To ensure your safety, the dilation process will be performed incrementally, over an extended period of time. To ensure the safety of others, it is imperative that you stay within five meters of the Sharasil for the duration of the dilation process.

Dilation process? Phase-locking? Sharasil? Nevin couldn't tell if the voice was pretending to be obtuse, or if she simply didn't understand his overwhelming confusion.

He shook his head. “You say this isn't a dream, but here I am, standing in the middle of nothing, listening to an invisible woman spouting what sounds like nonsense and telling me nothing I say or think matters. I get enough of that from Dalen, thank you. If not for the fact that you 'discarded' my wounds, temporarily or not, I'd say this was feeling more and more like a nightmare.”

With a final clap of wooden sole on coarse stone, the footsteps stopped, somewhere just beyond the tattered edge of the circle of light.

“Is that you, walking around out there in the dark?” Nevin looked around, searching the darkness at all sides. “Come out and show yourself.”

Regretfully, our next meeting is not scheduled to take place until the hour of your death.

All around him, the shimmering circle of light wavered and shrank, his tiny island in the sea of blackness losing integrity as emotion flooded his thoughts. The shadows crept forward, inching and stuttering as they consumed the steadily weakening light. With the darkness came a stinging cold, one he couldn't have noticed before, when he didn't have a body.

He hugged his chest and stepped back from the encroaching darkness. “Wait! I still have questions!”

“Questions? And here I thought you were just dreaming, Nevin.”

Nevin flinched in surprise and took another step back, the edge of the circle of light right on his heel. The voice that responded wasn't female, and it didn't come from all around him. The voice that answered was just outside of reach, mere steps ahead of him, out somewhere in that blackness, and spoke with a hint of amusement in its words.

But strangest of all...the voice sounded exactly like him.

The ice shattered beneath his feet, and emotion overwhelmed him. He could feel everything again. His heart pounding on the walls of his chest. Blood screaming through his ears. The dryness in his throat. The tears welling up in the corners of his eyes. The terrible, inescapable fear.

He felt it all, all at once, and it was too much.

May you go forth with both wisdom and temperance.

The circle of light vanished, and darkness enveloped him.