“Spare!” I woke up shouting my teacher’s name. Not thinking, not talking to him, but just yelling his name aloud.

The previous day, after witnessing the exile of my captors, we went to have a bite. I explained my experience with the locked door and its enigmatic formation, refraining from showing them the drawings although I was itching to do it. That had to wait until we finished and went back to the north exit, where no one would see us.

The formation by itself wasn’t a secret; they had obviously already seen it, but being able to study it up-close, without anyone interfering or suspecting of your intentions, was new. Makka examined its lines, trying to determine its nature, but in his own words, it would take at least two or three weeks to decipher some of that and maybe triple that time to have a bare minimum understanding of what it did as a whole. It wasn’t a lost cause, especially having the copy to work with, but there was a reason it was used to protect the private library.

After that, I would have gone to the Compendium to finish the book that got us all together, but Yaira insisted on not letting me do so. She was worried that after three whole days of being passed out, focusing on unknown glyphs might not have done any favour to my health. And she was probably right, which is why I followed them to Makka’s cell.

We spent the rest of the day chit-chatting, talking about Makka’s vicissitudes in the army. It was nice to clear my mind for a day, forgetting about all responsibilities, theories, and conspiracies—just an excellent laughing session with the closest I have ever had to a friend. We shared our days, talked about our past, and laughed; they even taught me to play cards. Unlike Spare, who was a mentor figure, our relationship was becoming more intimate and personal.

Which brings me to the events of that particular midnight. I had stayed at Makka’s cell, in a make-do bed on the floor, made from a thin layer of fabrics; it wasn’t the best, but I had slept in worse. I woke up to a vivid dream, one of those you could write down and remember for all eternity; every single detail was as clear as day.

In the dream, I was walking on a green prairie, turning from time to time to observe a huge mansion standing isolated in the middle of a forest. I wasn’t running, yet my hasty steps reinforced the feeling of being late to an appointment. I walked for ten minutes until I entered the jungle of trees that spanned on my right.

I kept walking, zig-zagging from time to time, going back and forth on the path on occasions. I was hiding from someone, making sure nobody would have followed me. If they did, I couldn’t see them. Eventually, after I lost track of how many turns I had already made, I saw a cloaked figure standing next to a tree a few hundred meters from where I was. She was who I had to meet; I knew that much.

I saw her weirdly familiar profile, yet I couldn’t quite place it. I slid one hand to her shoulder, tightening it just enough to offer comfort. She was heartbroken, tears fell from her eyes without stop, yet she kept a collected appearance, not shaking nor sobbing. It was a kind of despair so deep and rooted inside that not even weeping could take it away.

“You must promise, Spare,” she said in a thin voice, firmly locking her eyes on mine. “If anything ever happens to me, you must look after him.”

Her voice wasn’t begging; it was more of a plea to an old friend, the last favor one asked their soulmate right before death. It wasn’t an order, but it was neither a question. She knew I would accept; she just needed confirmation, she needed to hear the words coming out of my mouth.

“Don’t worry, I will look after Tarar. I’ll teach him everything I know.” My index finger moved to my shoulder, making the Drak’gath salute. “You have my word.”

Right at that moment, precisely the instant she fell to her knees, I woke up from the dream. I woke up shouting Spare’s name because I knew that what I had just seen was not a dream but an actual memory. He was talking to my mother, he knew her! I was bustling with ire, about to explode. Why! You knew about me, about my past, my Inkpot, and my mother!? I couldn’t help but think of when we had the conversation when I reaffirmed I belonged to the House of Nul.

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It felt like an eternity had passed since I woke up and shouted his name. I looked around, checking if I had awoken Makka, but he was peacefully sleeping on his bed. I took a deep breath, which, far from helping, only reignited the fire inside me.

Spare! I infused the thought with all my pent-up fury. Spare! I repeated for the third time. Yet his answer didn’t arrive.

Speak to me! I was lashing out, reasonably, I thought, not holding back anything at all. Spare!

“Our memories are starting to merge…” His neutral voice said.

I’m-What!? That’s all you are going to say? You knew, personally, my mother! You lied to me! You hid the truth from me! I was outraged; if Spare had been standing before me, I’m sure I would have hit him. Not to hurt him, just to let go of some of my frustration, just to let him know how aggravated I was.

“I did what I thought was best for you.” He remained calm, slowly explaining his motives. “Your mother had just died; you wouldn’t have understood why I didn’t save her.”

I wouldn’t, and I don’t! I finally said, admitting what I had been thinking the whole time. You let her die? You almost let me die!

“I told you once, there are things that not even power, Baril’s name, or Ink, can protect you from. I would have t-”

Bullshit! I cut him, blowing up. You were a Drak’ga! You could have called for their help, fight the royal houses, hell, you could-I don’t know, fight at least!

There was a tense silence; neither of us spoke. I could have said many things, but none of them would have been constructive. Maybe, prisoner of my own rage, I would have called him names, said things I would have forever regretted. I chose to be quiet and wait for him to explain himself.

“First of all, for what it’s worth, I’m sorry it wasn’t me who got to tell you.” His voice, for the first time in the conversation, acquired a sorrowful tone. I could feel his desolate thoughts; he was still mourning my mother’s death. “The Drak’ga don’t work like that. We are not united under the same flag. The Drak’oora are figures to maintain the order, not to rule us.”

But still!

“Listen to me,” he said before I couldn’t say anything else. “My knowledge of the Drak’ga, the true ones, the old runes, and even the Empire’s reach is way beyond what I knew.“* The revelation came as a surprise, momentarily making me forget what we were initially discussing. Spare was not the all-knowing figure I had thought of. “What I know about communion is a lie! There is something more than that, far greater. Something I will never experience. True communion and the old ways must be one and the same.”

“I… I don’t know,” he paused. “Listen, Tarar… It’s only fair that you know the truth.”

I quietly listened as he told me everything about my past. Qars, my father, was also a Baril. He fell in love with my mother, a commoner, and lured her to his mansion. Theirs was actually a happy union at the start; Spare would usually engrave my father’s gifts on her.

When everything turned away, it was Spare who covertly helped her escape. It was also Spare who had tattooed that red-blood Inkpot on my ankle. He had known about it.

What I saw was actually the last time Spare had talked with my mother. I could feel the emotion in his words as he related the ending I didn’t get to see, how he parted with her, knowing that the only other time they would see each other would be when she was dead. He cared for him from the bottom of his heart.

Sorry… What I said earlier, I… I muttered, trying to show I regretted lashing out.

“No, it’s me who must apologize for not telling you earlier and for being quiet this whole time. There were many memories I had to go over, too many unconnected thoughts that suddenly clicked together.”

We will go to the end of it, I said, making clear I had no intention of abandoning halfway.

“We will,” he repeated with exactly the same certainty I had used.

I doze off, returning to the true realm of dreams.

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Resting the fountain pen on the table, I reflected on those days.

That dream hid more than I realized at the time. It was a sign of everything that was wrong with this world, but also a sign of what was wrong in me.

It was not even about my mother. I had made peace with that. The fact that he knew her, changed nothing; and I knew it. He couldn’t oppose a whole noble house. He was under the Empire’s control.

Even attempting to offer some help would have gotten him killed. And then, I would have been alone. Dead on my first night alone. I had not been fair. And I had not asked the right questions.

My days with the Drak’ga signified exponential growth for me. And during that growth, I lost precious things to me. Would I do the same if I relived that time? No. There were many things that I would now change. But right then and there, I lacked the knowledge, and the power, to do it.

“Spare, if you had the knowledge I now have, what would you have done?”

It’s time to go back to writing.

But not you, yet. Soon, I said, looking at the Drak’gath calligraphic pen.