"Welcome home."

Home was such an unusual little concept.

It lacked the concrete objectivity of dwelling, or shelter, or hold. Those were structures— shields raised of stone and wood and hay and plaster for little creatures to hide beneath, like insects beneath a rock. They were words that gave you exactly what they said.

It didn’t quite have the same meaning as lodging, house, abode, or residence— just places that people held up in for extended periods of time. Places usually filled with a hundred useless little things, photographs or paintings of long-gone times, faded letters from friends you no longer see, stuffed animals riddled with holes held in the backs of closets, worn-out toys with pockmarked edges and fading paint.

Things that turned them into homes— places where we stored the things closest to our hearts. No— houses and shelters were holdings for objects and people respectively, homes held hearts— they held emotion.

The estate I’d grown up in was not a home, it hadn’t been for about an entire decade. I’d gotten rid of everything that could’ve evoked some kind of reaction. I’d stripped the paintings off the walls and sold them as soon as I could, moved out of my childhood bedroom, replaced every storybook that’d once been in my room with primers on magic and research journals by long-dead mages, stole away the old reminders: the yellowed practice books, the music sheets, the painting oils, everything— everything that I’d once loved, I’d thrown in a box, and shoved it as far as I could into a dark and distant room I put under lock and key.

Every time I’d returned, there’d been no lights in the windows, no drifting scent of food through its halls, no shifting fabric as servants went about their work, no one to to say, welcome back, I’m happy you’re here. The companions that greeted me was the sound of shifting dust, and the cold and empty dark, where distending memories played insulting pantomime in the corners of my vision. My estate played home to no one but the faded memories of years past.

Arthur had tugged me along, shouting, “Let’s go home!” in that wonderfully joyful voice he always had. It dulled the stinging in my knee, a bubbling sensation in my chest. I still remember myself wishing it to be true—

“I should head home, then.” I sighed, my voice quiet and dead as snow. I turned, walking away. “You should too, Arthur.”

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I trudged through the dark, dragging my boots through snow, the hem of my dress whispering in the breeze, no warm hand in mine, tugging me along to a brightly-lit home. There was no scrape on my knee, no warm fluttering in my heart that gifted me a smile— just a dark, cold pit gnawing away at anything it could get to.

I staggered through the dark, feeling like a drifting boat. I wasn’t quite certain where I was headed— the vague notion of going back seemed nebulous at best. Habit droned away in its corner of my mind, unhindered as ever by my emotional state. It designated the goal to be going home, the reasons so I didn’t die from exposure, and so I could completely and utterly break down. It split the two reasons into smaller goals— raise my body temperature, go to sleep, and—

Where can I cry more?

Rationale easily broke that down too— crying: done in isolation, without others around. Potential locations: house, Belfaust, some random alley. Belfaust and the random alley were ruled out— the former because it was too far, the latter because it— in all probability— invalidated the first clause: don’t die from exposure. It examined the first option more: alone, empty, servants, but they won’t be around until morning.

And so, habit decided that my estate was the only option, and numbly puppeteered my body through the street. Detached, a decade of standardized introspection whirred and whined within me, absently whittling away at its fruitless, age-old checklist once more: Could I feel my hands? It queried. No, it affirmed, a heartbeat later. Bad, it duly noted. Did I feel the cold right now? No— bad. Does breathing seem to make you colder? No— bad. Am I sleepy? No— good. Do you feel tired? No— Can you feel your legs, your feet, walking? No— bad.

It reallocated energy from my thoughts, shifting them to my legs, forcing me to ignore how each step sent a dull, numb thud into my foot as my boot sunk into snow and onto cobble. It stole my attention away from the buildings I passed— gull gray and as uninspiring as slushed snow— droning: One step. Two steps. Three steps. Four. Five. Turn along the road’s curve. Six. Seven. A couple thousand more.

On and on, comforting orders ushered me ever closer to the place I once called home, each passed streetlight reinforcing the cold staining my bones. The numb only truly released me when I slipped past the ice-crusted gate of my estate, walked up the steps to my door, and tugged open my front door.

Finally home. I staggered over the threshold, letting the door click behind me. The chill barely receded from my bones, and I struggled to pull off my boots before shuffling deeper into the dark hallway. My eyes slowly adjusted, passively staring at the dim foyer. I ignored both sets of stairs, turning off to the left, towards my library.

My mind fixed to another, single goal: Comfort. Lie down— space to think.

I passed the door to my library, slipping into my room down the hall instead. I stepped carefully over the mess of books lying on the ground— even in a daze I didn’t want to damage them— and dragged the blanket off my bed. I wrapped it around myself as I walked back to my library. My eyes dully roamed the room, skipping past the shelves that stretched into the dark above, past the darkened windows on the second floor, past the tables filled with an assortment of experimental junk, and onto a spot with a rug and a dead hearth, tucked away from anything flammable.

I dragged myself over, and curled up on the rug in front of a hearth that reignited itself. It didn’t feel right for me to sleep in my bed tonight. I twisted around, tucking my arm beneath my head like a pillow. Wrapped like a cocoon with waves of amber warmth washing over me, surrounded by walls I couldn’t see, the hollow apathy that had opened a pit in my chest receded, filled ever-so-slightly by an odd sense of comfort. It felt as if I were being cradled by something larger— embraced by something boundless— something that wasn’t the cramped prison of my closet.

I twisted again, turning to face the ceiling I couldn’t see. Glints of star-splattered ivory dotted an empty expanse of inky shadow, like moonlight cresting the waves of an ocean caught at dusk, or the star-filled veneer of the midnight sky. Too bad it was an illusion— one that I’d weaved together through— admittedly— clever usage of perspective and the light-imitation spells. It wasn’t anything proper— in the sense that what lay above me was a properly anchored, properly cast and maintained illusion spell. The false sky that occupied the higher floors of my library was nothing but a stage magician’s sleight of hand—a foolish trick that paled in comparison to the real thing.

I sighed, letting my whole body slowly unwind, and with it, let my thoughts slowly settle like forgotten pages. I didn’t move or focus to pick them up, to catalog or organize them within my mind. I let myself drift, thinking of things inconsequential, letting the pull of whatever memory or idea sweep me away. My eyes fell shut.

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My face is snuggled in my mother’s chest. She smells of soft cinnamon and bread. Warmth radiates through me from all around me. It is quiet, the fire is crackling, and her hand rubs soft circles on my back. It is warm in a way I haven’t felt in ages. It is home—

A sigh drags its way from my throat. My eyes cracked open to stare at the fire in front of me. Funny, mused a small Shade-like voice, how we keep ending up back here, time and time again.

No home, though. I swallowed, taking a slow breath. The tightness in my chest loosened, distributing itself everywhere else in my body. My arms and legs didn’t want to move. My eyelids wanted to close. My eyes wanted to rest. Instead, I took a deep breath, shifting so that I laid flat on my back, takin in my fake night sky ceiling. A chill crept into the side farthest from the fire, it slightly staved off the exhaustion.

“No home,” I whispered into the night again, as if saying it aloud would ever make me properly come to terms with it.

Though, that wasn’t really true, was it?

Time and time again, I’d found myself back in this situation, at the end of my rope, having bawled my eyes out, exhaustion and fraying and exhausted, not knowing what to do, playing memories in my head over and over for clues or information I hadn’t already picked from it years ago.

Rather, reexamining old memories for ways I messed up, telling myself I’d fix my mistakes next time, was just the excuse I’d always used. In reality, I got nothing from it. Thinking about those memories hurt, but I told myself it’d be okay if I could learn from my failures. I never did learn, just bled all over the memories until I couldn’t remember anything concrete but pain and tears.

It was… punishment, then. Repenting. Atoning. Penance. Self-flagellation. A coping mechanism disguised as productivity and a promise to do better. An excuse just to hurt myself, to trick myself into thinking I deserved better when all I deserved was what my actions gave me. And then when I did get what I wanted? Get everything I craved? I lash out. It was paradoxical, the way I craved comfort but felt as if comfort were some kind of attack— as if admittance of not being alright was something to be ashamed of.

In a way, my estate had become something similar. It housed nothing but bad memories and cold comforts, but I still found myself comforted by it— the familiarity of it all. In a way, it felt like the darkness of my childhood closet, beckoning, welcoming me back into its lonely embrace. The darkness was fuzzy beyond the firelight, the windows closed gateways of ice, the door to the library drenched in barred shadows. With the money I’d brought in, I could’ve moved wherever I wanted. But I never did. I’d told myself some excuse like “there’s a lot of space here to perform magic” or “where would you take the books?”

I knew it hurt me, I knew— logically— I should take steps to mitigate it, but I just did it again and again.

A deep sigh wormed it’s way out of my throat.

This place, these emotions… had become home, somber and sober, all alone on a cold night with nothing but the friend I abandoned to nurse my shattered and splintering heart. There would be no surprise visits, no sudden check-ins to see how I was holding up— I’d pushed the only person willing to deal with me, the only person who could’ve comforted me away with my rotten character.

Maybe— maybe tomorrow he’d—

No, after tonight, he’s tired of trying with you. Exhaustion tugged at my eyes, and I sighed again. If I were Arthur I would be tired of me too.

No, not would be, I already was tired of myself.

Too tired to care to change, too tired to dig myself out of the mud I let myself sink into. The numb hollow in my chest sparked with pain. I sniffed, and my cheeks felt wet again.

Habit tugged at my attention, rattling its query like a broken record: What next? What next? What next?

Again and again, I resolved myself, only to back out at the last second. I never had anything to show for it. Just kept running away, in the end. No one’s fault but my own.

“What does that make me,” I gently echoed, “if not a fraud, or a liar, or a failure?”

I stared wordlessly up at the fake stars dotting my ceiling for some time, the hearth slowly crackling away. It didn’t dim, it had little need for continued wood to burn. I felt… empty— not in the sense that there was a hollow pain in my chest that gnawed like hunger— no, just… empty, as if I’d just cleared off my desk after a long stint of research. Seeing it clean after months of accumulating clutter.

Logically, I knew that I’d fully run out of energy to cry, to do much other than truly drift. Logically, I knew that I’d have to deal with whatever I’d just shoved to the side.

So, I wordlessly stared at the ceiling, halfway between falling asleep, halfway awake, thinking about things I wouldn’t remember in the morning. I let the time flow past me like sand between my fingers, wasted, if only I were to close my hand and rally my resolve. If only I could muster the energy to move.

I should’ve been working, right around now, the endless pleaser within me urged. After the talk with the Warden, I should have been changed into something more comfortable, sat at one of my library’s desk, scrawling away a hundred little notes pursuing a goal that I might’ve never reached. I should have been working, doing anything and everything I could to put more effort into crossing the boundaries between worlds, but I wasn’t.

Simply languishing across the floor. Sleep sang its soft lullaby, lulling me closer and closer to my blissful dream.

I blinked, something like clarity snapping like ice across the sleepy puddle of my mind. If I fall asleep, my Shade would drag me into a dream. To berate me. I wouldn’t even be able to deny her. I… Nausea roiled in my stomach, and I frowned. I don’t want to go.

After a deep breath, I swallowed the lump in my throat, sitting up to yawn and stretch and blink the sleep from my eyes. I slowly let myself uncurl from my makeshift-blanket cocoon, feeling each individual bristle on the rug beneath me as I did. The windows were still dark, and achingly, with slow, deliberate movements and a thought that only focused on standing up and moving around, I dragged myself to my feet.

I pulled myself up and took a long, deep breath, before padding silently into the dark of my library, away from the hearth’s warmth. I dragged myself through the dark, letting instinct and habit guide me until I saw it: a soft amber light sparking to life at my approach, illuminating a tabletop of old mugs and stacks of journals and books. I settled softly into the chair, flipping to the most recent page of notes, picked up a quill, and stared.

And stared and stared and stared. Nothing was coming to me, my eyes skimmed the blocks of words I’d left scrawled in the margins and along diagrams of ritual circles— but nothing was coming to me. Nothing that I’d not already noted down, no additional note or idea about what to change or fix next— not even another experimental ritual circle design.

I let out a small sigh, too tired to truly be distraught over it. I’d knew the outcome since I’d stood up and dragged myself over to the desk— I knew my headspace was the furthest from conducive for both casting and experimentation— but I’d did it anyway, if not just to stave off sleep for a little longer. The token effort made it easier to say that I at least tried— the platitude still holding some degree of power over me no matter how hard I tried to tell myself that only the results mattered.

I gently shut the journal, slowly passed my eyes over the old mugs, found one that looked relatively recently that still had some coffee at the bottom. A soft roil of disgust sparked and died within the same moment— it had no fuel to grow into anything larger— and I drank the cold coffee. It tasted weird, and gritty, mostly just like cold water. It’d lost the bitterness after sitting out for… my tired mind didn’t want to think about it.

I staggered back to my original spot in front of the heart, then settled back down, relishing in the slow waves of heat that warmed me. I sat, and let myself tilt until I was laying on the floor again, still wrapped in my blanket. The stars above me looks nice, even if they didn’t seem to move or make any tangible constellation.

I don’t want to talk to my Shade. Acceptance drained the very last of my energy. Exhaustion and warmth finished seeping into my bones like molasses, sedating my thoughts in a wave of peaceful relaxation. But she’ll get you eventually.

There was little I could do to stop my eyes from shutting, and my mind from drifting to sleep.