"There. What do you think?"

Thenio's eyes lit up at the sight of the little wooden figures that Brel placed on the ground in front of him. "Tiny people! Are they going to live in the city you made?"

"That's right. These are people from the world we used to live in."

"Real people? People you knew there?"

"Some of them, yes." A shadow passed over the Forest Man's face. "Making carvings of the people I knew helps me remember them...."

They were sitting on the mossy ground, surrounded by large tree roots. Bits of sunlight danced here and there as the green and gold leaves over their heads swayed gently in the breeze.

Thenio looked up from the little carvings. "Are you sad that you left? Are you sorry that you came here to live with us?"

Brel smiled. "No, of course not. This is a much better world than the one we left. I'm sorry that some of my friends didn't want to come with us. But I'm not sorry that we came." He reached out and tousled Thenio's hair affectionately. "After all, I wouldn't have met you if we'd stayed in our old world."

"I'm glad you came, too! I'm glad I get to see all the amazing things you make! I want to learn to carve wood like you do someday!" Thenio said, beaming up at him.

...up at him? Come to think of it, had Brel always been taller than he was? That seemed a little wrong somehow....

"Don't worry, I promise I'll teach you when you're older. Your mother's going to pull my tail off and turn it into a scarf if I let you play around with knives right now...." Brel looped his striped tail around his own neck to demonstrate.

Thenio giggled. "Your tail would make a good scarf! It's really soft and warm."

"No! Go get your own scarf!" Brel clutched his tail in mock horror. "I need this tail! How am I supposed to get up to my house without it?"

"Fly?"

"Not all of us can fly, kiddo.... Tell you what—you can have my tail if you give me your wings. Deal?"

Thenio blinked. His...wings? He had wings?

He twisted his head around, trying to look at his own back. He caught a glimpse of something white and fluffy, and as he tried to get a better look at it, his instinct kicked in, and he flexed muscles he didn't even realize were there.

Two feathered wings stretched out on either side of him.

Thenio stared at them, open-mouthed. The wings were small and downy, like a baby bird's. They didn't look like they could hold him in the air for more than a short glide. And the white and blue coloring on the feathers formed a blotchy, irregular pattern that wasn't exactly pretty.

But still...they were wings. They were his wings.

Finally...he'd been waiting such a long time to get them back....

Thenio reached out a small, trembling hand to stroke the feathers on his right-hand wing. But as soon as he touched it, both wings shattered. Feathers swirled around him, obscuring Brel, the mossy ground, and the enormous tree from view. Then it all faded away....

And he was falling...falling into darkness once again....

----------------------------------------

Thenio could hear voices and recognized that there were people in the room with him, but it took him a while to wake up enough to understand what they were saying.

"Is it okay to make the joints that loose?"

"It's fine. He'll hold them up with his magic. He normally lives in a skeleton, doesn't he? Those have even looser joints once the connective tissue is gone."

"Oh, I guess you're right. I've always just thought about making golems. I never made a puppet for a revenant before."

That voice was definitely Kleyo's.

Thenio opened his eyes a little. His vision was a bit blurry, but he could make out the walls and ceiling of an unfamiliar room.

Where was this place? Why were he and Kleyo here?

"Oh, are you awake?" said a gentle, familiar voice close by.

Thenio turned his head and saw Eteon sitting next to the bed he was lying on.

"You're at the Stability Center," Eteon said, apparently noticing Thenio's confusion. "The Magic Corps brought you here after they rescued you and Grandmaster Sephior. You're still under pretty strong magic suppression, so you probably can't remember it very well right now."

Magic Corps? Oh...that's right. He'd ridden on a tiger and seen a man sleeping in a ball of tree roots...then they'd brought him to the hospital, and Eteon had been waiting with a Forest Person....

His memories were rather hazy, and their contents were strange enough that he would have assumed they were just a crazy dream if he'd woken up in his bed at home. But Eteon was here, talking about the Magic Corps and being rescued. And this definitely wasn't his bedroom at Ariom's house. So all those strange things had really happened? Probably?

"Here, I'll help you sit up." Eteon slid his arm under Thenio's shoulders and helped him into a sitting position, then arranged the pillows behind him to prop him up. "I'm sure you're still feeling groggy, but you should at least drink some water and say hello to your brothers before you fall back asleep."

Brothers? Was Lem here, too?

While Eteon poured him a glass of water from a pitcher on the nightstand, Thenio looked past him in the direction he'd heard Kleyo's voice coming from earlier.

"Thenio! You're awake!" Kleyo waved enthusiastically.

He was on the other side of the room, sitting next to the table in what looked like a dark brown wicker chair. Brel was sitting in a similar chair next to him. The two of them seemed to be making something together. There were carving tools and pieces of wood scattered across the table.

Thenio's gaze was drawn to the long, striped tail draped over the back of Brel's chair.

He'd been having a dream just before he woke up that he couldn't remember very well. But hadn't there been something in it about trying to make a Forest Person's tail into a scarf...?

Weird.

Thenio tried briefly to remember what the rest of the dream had been about, but it gave him an uncomfortable feeling, as though the memory were painful.

He pushed his thoughts about the dream aside and focused instead on the large red and black dog that was lying on the floor next to Kleyo's chair with his head resting on his front paws. "Kino? What are you doing here?"

The storm hound raised his head a little and looked in Thenio's direction when he heard his name, but then he lowered it again and closed his eyes without saying anything.

He looked very tired.

"He and the Royal Guard vice-captain brought us over here to visit you," Kleyo said, bending down to pat the dog's shaggy head. "The vice-captain is in the other room talking to Mom and Dad. And Ariom and his uncle. And your doctor. But Kino makes Mom nervous—she said he reminds her of Umbra. So he and Humerus came in here with us."

Humerus? Thenio looked around the room but didn't see the revenant anywhere.

"He's in there." Lem, who was sitting on the sofa, pointed at the seat next to his. There was a rectangular, dark red shape there that Thenio recognized as Humerus' carry bag. "He can't make himself look like a normal dragon right now, and Ariom's uncle didn't want him to upset Mom and Dad, so he's staying in here while everyone's talking. But he thinks Eteon is scary for some reason. So he's hiding in his bag."

Thenio expected an angry retort from Humerus at that, denying that he was afraid. But there was no sound from the carry bag. Did that mean he really was frightened?

That was strange. He hadn't been that bothered by Eteon the previous times they'd met. Why would he be so scared of him now?

"Ariom's uncle said that Humerus got hurt a little bit last night," Kleyo said. "That's why he can't put on skin. So Brel and I are making him a puppet to help him feel better!"

Kleyo seemed legitimately concerned about Humerus, but he was also clearly excited about the opportunity to help make a revenant puppet.

He'd found out Humerus was a revenant that time they'd all gone to the house so Thenio could pick up more of his clothes and things. And as expected, Kleyo, the golem fanatic, had been fascinated by Humerus' puppetry magic, which the revenant had been more than happy to show off for him. It hadn't been easy separating the two of them when it was time to go back to Ariom's house.

Thenio had made Kleyo promise not to tell their parents about Humerus' real identity, since it would definitely make them feel uncomfortable around him and Bero. But Kleyo had been sure that Lem wouldn't mind being around a revenant, and it looked like he was right.

Lem definitely wouldn't have been that calm if Thenio were the one sitting next to him on the sofa right now....

Thenio shook his head a little and distracted himself from that depressing thought by focusing on the glass of water that Eteon offered him. His limbs felt heavy and weak, so he couldn't hold the glass very well by himself, but Eteon helped him drink from it.

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

The cool sensation of the water in his mouth and throat made him feel a bit more awake, and when Eteon set the glass back down on the nightstand, Thenio looked around the room again and noticed a rather conspicuous absence.

"Where's Iggy? He'd normally want to be in here with the other familiars."

"He said he wanted to stay with Ariom," Eteon said. "He seems to be in quite a clingy mood today.... Well, he had to stay behind with Bero while Ariom went on the raid with the Magic Corps last night. I think that worried him a lot."

Thenio frowned, remembering how frantic Iggy had been after the golem exploded and how the dragon had inadvertently attacked him in his desperation to get to Ariom in the recovery room. And after all that, the poor little guy had to stay behind while Ariom went off to help rescue Thenio and Grandmaster Sephior....

Thenio didn't know yet exactly what that rescue had involved. But Brel had said something about Ariom almost going blind. And that 'Old One' guy seemed to be even stronger than Grandmaster Sephior, one of the most powerful life mages in Kafron.

The Magic Corps had also sent top-tier battlemages like Ice Queen and Red. And that tiger...Copycat had a mist tiger as her familiar, didn't she? She was also on the first squad. So the rest of the team members were probably high-level battlemages as well. Thenio didn't remember hearing the name 'Darkbolt' before, but those two men in the matching black and silver combat suits...they might have been the Iron-Silver Twins. They were almost as famous as Namyis was.

Thenio bit his lip. He still didn't entirely understand what had happened, but it looked like Ariom had done something pretty dangerous. No wonder Iggy was upset and wanted to stay close to him.

And it was because of Thenio. That weird puppet guy had specifically said he kidnapped them because he wanted to examine a chaos morph. So didn't that mean it was all his fault...?

"Do you think you can eat a little bit?" Eteon asked, temporarily distracting Thenio from his feelings of guilt. "You've been sleeping most of the day. You must be hungry by now."

Thenio didn't actually feel that hungry, and he really wanted to go back to sleep. But he knew that going without food would only make him feel worse later, so he nodded.

"Good." Eteon patted his arm encouragingly and then looked over at the red carry bag. "Humerus, would you ask Bero if he'd mind bringing Thenio something from the kitchen?"

There was a pause.

"I told him," Humerus' voice said in an unusually subdued tone. "He says he'll be here in a minute."

Thenio raised an eyebrow. Humerus really was acting weird....

It was enough that even Kleyo noticed. "Are you okay, Humerus?" he asked, standing up to look over the table. "Eteon's not going to hurt you, you know? He's really nice. You don't need to be scared."

"I know that," Humerus said with a trace of annoyance. "I just...want to stay in my bag right now...."

What was up with him? Kleyo had said he'd gotten hurt. Was he acting like this just because he wasn't feeling well?

"Ah...I think it's because I threatened him a bit earlier," Eteon said with an apologetic smile. "Since he was injured, he can't control his magic quite as well as usual, so I was worried about him being too close to Thenio. And...well, you have to be firm with revenants to be sure they take you seriously. Maybe I overdid it a little."

There was an irritated sniff from the carry bag, but otherwise Humerus stayed quiet.

Thenio gave Eteon a sideways glance. What exactly had he threatened to do...?

"Maybe he'll feel better once his new puppet is done. Thenio, look at this!" Kleyo picked up something from the table and came over to the bed, being careful to step around the dozing Kino.

"Uh...what is this, exactly?" Thenio asked, staring down at the object Kleyo pushed into his hands.

Multiple objects, really. It was a series of interlocking wooden pieces that fit together in a long, tapered strand that resembled a headless snake.

"It's an octopus leg," Kleyo replied, as though that were obvious. "Don't you see the suckers on the bottom?"

Thenio looked more closely and saw that there were indeed small, raised circles on one side of the pieces. Not that he would have recognized an isolated octopus tentacle just from that....

"Brel's really good at carving!" Kleyo continued happily. "He just took a piece of wood and carved it into a chain like that. The sections don't even come apart. It's good, huh?"

Thenio bent the wooden tentacle around, examining the joints. Like Kleyo had said, the pieces were all hooked together like a chain. There was what looked like a ball joint on one end, which was presumably how Brel was planning to fasten the tentacle onto the octopus' body.

It was a pretty impressive bit of woodcarving.

But why an octopus, of all things...? Humerus definitely had strange tastes.

Kleyo was continuing his enthusiastic chatter. "Brel has been showing me a lot of things about making wooden joints. He's really good at making carvings that move. Even better than Eteon! But Eteon's maybe better at making carvings that don't move? I'm not sure...."

"Eteon is better at recreating real-world things in wood than I am," Brel said with a peaceable smile. "But yes, I'm probably a bit better at functional carvings than he is. I've been working with wood longer than he has, so there are some aspects of it that I understand better. Well, I'm contracted with an actual tree, after all. It would be strange if I didn't understand wood better than most people, wouldn't it?"

"Yes. It wood." Humerus' voice said from inside the carry bag.

Kleyo laughed. "That was really funny, Humerus!"

"No, you should say it's humorous...."

"Oh! Right! Humorous Humerus!" Kleyo said, giggling. "Humerus is humorous!"

"You and Iggy really are a lot alike. You even both like Humerus' jokes," said Bero's voice. Thenio looked toward the door and saw him entering the room, carrying a tray with several dishes of food on it. "But don't encourage him too much. He'll be throwing out puns for hours once he gets going."

"You don't like his jokes?" Kleyo asked, tilting his head.

"I'd like them better if I hadn't been hearing them regularly for the past forty-five years..." Bero said dryly. He walked over to the table and set a large plate filled with assorted snacks down on a bare spot in front of Lem. "Here, it's getting pretty late, so you two are probably feeling hungry. Your parents are almost done talking, so you'll be able to go home and have dinner before too much longer. But this will help tide you over until then."

"Thanks!" Kleyo said happily, going back over to the table and taking an apple slice from the plate.

"Thank you," Lem said in a low voice. But he didn't immediately take anything from the plate. He simply sat and eyed it uneasily.

"Is there something wrong?" Bero asked. "I can get you something else if you don't like any of those things."

"Huh? No...no, this is fine. I just...it's fine. Thank you," Lem stammered awkwardly. He hurriedly took a small biscuit from the plate and shoved it into his mouth, avoiding Bero's gaze. Thenio could see his face distorting a little as he chewed, as though it tasted bitter.

"Lem really likes to cook, so he always studies new foods before he eats them," Kleyo explained, reaching for a second apple slice.

"Ah...I understand. Sorry to make you feel rushed. Go ahead and study it all you want." Bero gave Lem an apologetic smile.

Lem nodded silently, still staring down at the table.

Bero turned toward the bed. "Here's yours, Thenio. I wasn't sure what you'd feel like eating, so I brought a few different things. Don't worry if you can't eat them all right now." He looked at Eteon. "Do you want me to help him eat? You've been looking after him all day—you must be getting a bit tired by now."

Eteon hesitated briefly, glancing at Thenio. "Yes...that's probably better. Thank you."

He stood up and moved over to the sofa, allowing Bero to take his seat next to the bed. Lem glanced up as he approached and slid over to make room for him to sit down.

Humerus must have also wanted to make room—or maybe he just wanted to stay as far away from Eteon as he could—because the red carry bag floated up into the air a couple of inches and moved to the very end of the sofa before settling back down.

Eteon smiled wryly at the sight and then sat down, reaching out to pat Lem's shoulder in thanks. Surprisingly, Lem didn't shy away from his touch, like he did with other people. He even looked a little bit relieved.

Strange.... Could Eteon somehow use dream magic to help Lem feel more relaxed? Amisi could do that to people using mental magic, so it seemed reasonable that dream magic would be able to do something similar. And it would explain how Eteon had managed to get Lem to open up to him.

Would Thenio be able to do that eventually, too? He didn't know how much dream magic he would actually be able to learn. Probably not as much as Eteon. But he hoped he'd at least be able to pull off that particular trick someday....

He pulled his gaze away from Lem and looked down at the tray Bero was placing in his lap. The dishes on it held some of the same easy-to-eat foods he'd been given the last time he'd been under heavy suppression: fruit and vegetables cut into bite-sized pieces, cubes of meat and cheese, some small biscuits, and a cup of what looked like beef broth.

As he finished arranging the tray, Bero bent close to Thenio and said very quietly, "The Royal Guard's official story is that Focilo was kidnapped by the Order and that you were dragged into it because you were with him at the time. They thought placing the focus on you might put you in more danger. That version of events is what they told your family, too. But if you want to tell them something different...well, that's up to you."

Thenio's eyes widened in surprise. The Royal Guard was lying about the kidnapping? To protect him?

He stared down at his food tray for a moment, trying to wrap his tired mind around the idea.

It made sense that telling people the Order of the Ravener had kidnapped a teenage boy would make them wonder what was so special about him, which might lead to other groups trying to abduct him. Ariom had already warned him about the possibility of something like that happening even before they started this job for the Royal Guard.

But why wouldn't they tell his family the truth? It wasn't like his own parents were going to kidnap him. If anything, it would make them want to stay as far away from him as they—

Oh. Was that the reason?

Thenio glanced uneasily over at his brothers. What would they think if they knew he was the real kidnapping target? Would they still have wanted to come visit him? Would his parents? Or would they think being close to him was dangerous?

Was it dangerous? Was it wrong not to tell them the truth...even if it made them want to stay away...?

Bero seemed to notice his troubled expression. He patted him on the shoulder and said in a gentle tone, "Don't worry too much about it right now. We'll talk about it in a day or two when you can think more clearly. For now, just try to eat a little bit, all right?"

Thenio nodded. Then he picked up one of the biscuits and took a bite out of it. It looked the same as the ones over on the table, and it tasted fine, so he didn't know what Lem's strange expression had been about.

"Oh, there's another thing I should tell you," Bero went on. "The Royal Guard is planning to give you a compensation payment, as an apology for not adequately protecting you while you were working for them."

"Compensation payment?" Thenio repeated, looking at him blankly. "You mean...money?"

"Yes. What happened to you wasn't entirely their fault, but it's their policy to give contracted workers an additional payment if they're exposed to unexpected danger while they're working. I'm not sure what the exact amount will be, but it should be quite a lot of money for a sixteen-year-old boy. They'd normally give it to your parents to keep for you until you're older, but considering your circumstances.... Well, they're going to talk to you about it before they decide how to handle it. I'm just mentioning it so that it doesn't come as too much of a surprise."

"Oh...right. Uh...thanks for telling me."

Thenio stared down at the half-eaten biscuit in his hand. He was grateful to have some warning. Conversations with his parents about money tended to be...difficult. Maybe Bero had realized that.

He wasn't sure how to feel about the news, though. A few months ago, he would have been excited about the idea of getting a large amount of money. But now.... Was it because of the magic suppression that he felt so apathetic? Or was it because he'd already gotten used to a more luxurious lifestyle due to having the Magic Corps and a grandmaster enchanter taking care of him?

Or...was it because he knew he probably wouldn't live much longer, so having a lot of money wasn't going to do him any good anyway...?

Thenio put the rest of the biscuit into his mouth and chewed it slowly. What to do with the money from the Royal Guard wasn't such a hard decision. He actually already had an idea of how he wanted to deal with it.

But it made him think.... If Ariom and the Magic Corps hadn't come to save him when they did, he probably would have died in that cell without even waking up again. And even without extra help from crazy kidnappers, his own magic was perfectly capable of killing him at any time. There was no way to know how long he had left.

So maybe it was about time to face a few of the things he'd been running away from up until now....