Denholm found himself feeling an odd sense of phantom familiarity. The three male adventurers were all clustered on one side of the fire, the two younger ones shooting him and Echo dangerous glances. Denholm was seated only barely close enough to feel the warmth of the fire, and Echo had opted to stay a small distance behind him in an attempt to quell any worries. Judging from the way Jezra and the other young man were acting, it was not working very well.
The old man and Nuzumi were the only exceptions. In the cook’s case, despite being wedged in between the two younger men, their worry had not the slightest chance of rubbing off on his utterly calm demeanor, though the fact that his gaze never wandered from the cooking pot in front of him was beginning to unnerve Denholm somewhat. Nuzumi, on the other hand, had opted to scoot over until she was easily the closest to Denholm. Denholm hoped it was for the purpose of a symbolic showing of trust, but he was beginning to think it perhaps just as much a means to ward Jezra from making some kind of move on him.
Denholm delicately cleared his throat, though it was hardly necessary as most attentions were already on him and Echo. “Can I ask a question, Jezra. That’s your name, right?”
“It is. Ask,” he said simply, never taking his eyes from Echo.
“Why am I still alive?”
For the briefest of moments, Denholm thought he might have spotted a flicker of amusement on his face, but if it had been there at all, it was paved over just as quickly with his usual standoffish demeanor. “You are alive, for now, because you and your… companion have not tried anything stupid. Yet.”
Nuzumi’s sigh could have blown down a forest, though that was as much to do with its forcefulness as the fact that Denholm couldn’t imagine anything alive managing to stay upright in the face of a sound like that.
Denholm nodded sheepishly. “We won’t do anything to you. But I was more talking about your sword. It passed right through me. So–”
“Why are you still in one piece?”
“Exactly,” Denholm confirmed.
Jezra reluctantly set his bowl of toad soup aside for the moment. “All of us here have taken part of a Wanderer’s power using a key taken from a Trickster. I assume you know this, whether you want us to believe you so ignorant or not. No one survives out here for long without a Mark.” Without rising from his seat, he drew his sword and hefted it in front of him. “My stolen power is one that lets me cease interacting with the physical world around me at will. It is how I jumped so far to reach you in the air. Right after leaping, I turned off my interaction with the world, allowing myself to float towards you, unperturbed by gravity. Once I was within striking range, I became one with the world again. But just before I struck, I felt that something was off since you weren’t defending yourself, so I didn’t. I can also control objects I touch in a similar way. This is how, though you saw my sword pass through you, it did not in fact ever even touch you, nor could it have touched anything at all for that matter.” To illustrate it, he passed the blade of his sword through his own neck, which of course did nothing at all. “We call this kind of stolen power a Mark.”
Denholm blinked. Once, he would have been dumbstruck for minutes upon seeing such a thing. Now? His awe lasted all of a few seconds until his mind caught up to what the man had said. “A Mark. Stolen power from a Wanderer. That’s what you meant when you asked me if I was Marked when you first saw me?”
“Yes,” he confirmed as he re-sheathed his blade. “Like I said, don’t expect me to believe you don’t already know this, but the keys Tricksters give out which grant the ability to steal part of a Wanderer's power always have the words ‘marked for passage’ engraved upon them. So we call ourselves the Marked, in remembrance of the keys we claimed that got us our powers.”
All of them were Marked. Now that was something Denholm never could have guessed. Then again… he really should have, what with the house-sized toad whose corpse lay not twenty steps away with such a massive and gaping hole in it one could only assume an explosion had gone off inside it.
Denholm only just remembered to stop himself before his fingers could find their way to his pocket and the familiar piece of metal inside it. He had already revealed enough. This was a secret he felt worth keeping for now. Besides, he was never going to use it, so what would showing them that he was in possession of one matter? The only thing that might get him is forced into explaining how he had gotten it. That, Denholm knew, he did not want to do for a very long time. Perhaps never. Echo was one thing. Other humans, especially ones he didn’t want to hate him, were a whole other matter.
Denholm glanced around at all four faces of the adventurers he had followed for so long as nothing but echoes. Jezra, of course, had already shown what his power was. That left the axe wielder, who met him with a scowl that told him not to even bother asking, and since it felt rude to divert the old man’s attention from the soup he was vigilantly tending, Denholm turned to Nuzumi. “What is your Mark? Is your power the reason your eyes and hair are like that?” He really wanted to say something else, but ‘like that’ was the safer option when considering the shaky ground he already stood on with these strangers.
She smiled, glancing sideways at him. “Yes, though mine is a Mark of nothing so flashy.” Without removing her hands from cupping around the bowl she held, one of her fingers separated from the others and pointed upwards. First, there was only a tiny fleck of green that suddenly appeared on the tip of her finger, but soon it had grown into a small stem, and within only a minute, a small purple petalled flower stood there.
Denholm’s bowl slipped from his fingers. Thankfully, when it fell, it hit his lap instead of the ground, and he managed to grab it again with only a minimal amount of broth managing to slosh free.
A gleeful giggle drew his eyes back up, and there, he found Nuzumi had stretched out her hand towards him with one finger extended, flower still upon it. “Mine is the Mark of change. I can alter my body or anything it touches into whatever I desire, so long as I can clearly imagine what it is I want to alter the existing material into. Before you go asking me to create the girl of your dreams, I’m afraid you should know this power has plenty of limitations, but I’d hate to bore you with all those little details.”
It took longer than it should have for Denholm to realize she meant for him to take it. Sheepishly nodding, he gently plucked the plant from her flesh. Thankfully, it came free with hardly any force. He was worried there would be roots inside her skin or something of the sort, but when he pulled it away, there was only pale, clean flesh.
Denholm stared at the flower for a long time in silence before he came all the way back to his senses. Eventually, he looked up. “Are there any other people surviving out here? Others with powers like you four?” Denholm asked, addressing all of the adventurers.
“There’s occasional straggler like yourself,” the axe wielder’s stoney voice answered, “but much rarer to find one that has claimed a key and managed to use it. Most of the few we have met out here were already driven insane by this place. Sometimes, the best mercy you can do for them is–”
“Baise!” Nuzumi snapped at the axe wielder whose name he finally now knew. “He’s just a kid. Stop scaring him.”
The much larger man shied away and covered his mouth mockingly, shrugging and rolling his eyes. Denholm, on the other hand, was doing everything he could to pretend Nuzimi continually referring to him that way wasn’t making him wish she would use her powers of change to make him older. He wasn’t that much younger than them. She only barely looked old enough to be called an adult herself. Denholm frowned as he thought about it. What if she really could make him grow up with her power? She did say she could use it on a living body, and her unnaturally colored hair and eyes told him that she had at least once. Why not again?
“Point is,” Baise continued, “we Marked stay alive by sticking together and being very weary of outsiders.” He pointedly left that sentiment hanging in the air so there would be no mistaking its meaning.
“It’s alright,” Denholm said. “I’m not asking to join you if that’s what you’re worried about. I know I would just be a burden since I don’t have a Mark myself. I can survive out here alone just fine anyways,” Denholm lied.
Nuzumi abruptly set her soup down, turning and leaning over slightly towards Denholm. “Speaking of which, how have you been surviving out here all alone without a Mark? How long ago did you escape from your oasis?”
Escape? She sounded a whole lot like Denholm used to. Denholm shrugged his shoulders sheepishly. “Actually, I misspoke. I didn’t mean to say that I could do it all alone.” Denholm gestured at his floating green companion. “Echo does everything for me, and even then, we struggle sometimes.” Denholm shot her an apologetic look. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to be ungrateful but–”
“But stealing squirrel food is getting a bit old?” Echo said, finishing the thought for him, a quiet tone of amusement underlying her words.
Denholm averted his eyes and chuckled, a breathy and awkward sound. Now that it was all said out loud, he realized just how useless of a first impression of himself he was making. Well, Denholm supposed that came with the territory. If there was one thing he had learned, it was that he was, if anything, even more useless out here than he had been in the Glade.
“Yet, still far better than starving alone,” the gray-haired cook said, addressing Denholm for the first time. Denholm immediately got the impression the man wasn’t a big talker, but when he did, he meant what he said.
Denholm nodded even though the cook wasn’t looking at him to see it. “No one has ever been so kind to me. I didn’t even know someone could be this kind.” Denholm shot Echo a glance, suddenly aware that he perhaps should have been more vocal about his gratitude more than a few times before this point. Denholm noticed a short-lived but nonetheless noticeable smile crease Nuzumi’s lips.
“You trust her too much. That much is certain,” Jezra said. “And because of that, we cannot trust you. Even if you are as innocent as you present yourself,” he pointed at Echo, “she could have any number of different hidden motives.”
Denholm frowned. “If someone saved your life multiple times without asking for anything in return, would you trust them?”
He froze briefly, mouth ajar since he had been somewhat over-enthralled in chewing before Denholm's words had taken him by surprise. The curious moment didn't last longer than a second, though, and he resumed chewing as if nothing had happened. “Someone? Yes, maybe. A wanderer? No.”
“Why not?” Denholm asked.
Jezra huffed. “If you meet a hundred badgers, and the first ninety-nine of them bite you, what should you expect the hundredth to do?”
Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
Denholm stayed quiet while he digested that. “Are most Wanderers really that bad?” he asked eventually.
Jezra opened his mouth to reply, but it was Echo’s voice that filled the void first. “Yes,” she said simply.
“See, even she agrees with me,” Jezra said in between bites of stew. He even had a slight measure less antagonism bleeding into his voice than the last time he referenced Echo in the conversation. Progress. Slow, but progress nonetheless.
“So you all survive out here without any help? Besides your Mark abilities, I mean,” Denholm asked.
Baise grumbled something incoherent, then seemed to realize he needed to speak up to be heard. “Considering we were seven up until a year ago, and now we are four, ‘surviving’ wouldn’t be an entirely accurate way to put it. But we,” he gestured at the other three, “are here. I can say that much.”
“Oh.”
After that, they all ate in silence until every last drop of the remarkably tasty toad stew was finished. “So,” Nuzumi abruptly said as she set down her bowl, “shall we take a vote?”
“A vote on wha–oh no. Don’t tell me we’re really considering taking the kid, are we?” Baise asked.
“It’s been so long since we last met someone new. I forgot this is even how we do it,” Jezra said, brushing his hands together. “But yes, Nuzumi is right. We should take a vote.”
“That we should,” Nuzumi reaffirmed. “I hope the two of you vote with more heart than you speak. Otherwise, I might change you into a tree while you sleep.”
As they went back and forth, Denholm felt he should probably say something to aid his case. Problem was, there wasn’t anything he could do for them that they likely couldn’t already do for themselves. He couldn’t bring himself to say anything good about himself at all. In fact, he found himself doing just the opposite. “You shouldn’t.”
“We shouldn’t what? Vote? Afraid this is just how we do things,” Jezra said.
“You shouldn’t take me. I’m no use to you, I know that.” Denholm found himself looking off at the destroyed corpse of the massive toad. “I could never do that. I don’t even know if Echo could. I’d just be dead weight.”
All three of them opened their mouths at once to respond with presumably very different sentiments towards Denholm’s admission. However, meek and quiet as the words were, no one dared cut off the old man when they noticed that he had begun to speak before anyone else. “And yet, you do want to stay with us,” he said, not the slightest inflection in his voice to suggest it had been anything besides an abject statement of fact.
“I… do,” Denholm admitted. “Me and Echo have been tracking you for weeks now. Well, you and the toad. But it was you we were hoping to find.”
“Why?” the cook asked.
“Because we were lonely,” Echo said from behind him.
Jezra snorted. “Aren’t we all.”
Denholm found his eyes wandering to his feet. What Echo said was right, for her as much as for him. Denholm was tempted to ask Echo to show off what her power could do before the vote, because he knew if they had seen what he had, they’d know just how powerful she was when she wanted to be. But things continued forward before he could decide if that was an idea worth bringing up.
“So, no more preamble,” Nuzumi said. “All hands rise who wish to include both… oh, that’s right, we know the Wanderer’s name, but you haven’t mentioned yours yet.”
“Denholm.”
“Denholm,” she repeated. “For those who want Denholm and Echo to join us, hands up.” Her own hand was already up, of course, though Denholm’s stomach fell as no others immediately went up.
“It’s nothing personal,” Jezra said. “The truth is that if you didn’t already have a capable protector, I might have voted yes. As is, though, if you join us, it doesn’t take a mystic to see a future filled with Nuzumi turning the two of you into an endless project. If there is one thing she does not need, it is more reasons to dote and drag her heels.”
“And you would very much hate to share any of that doting with others,” Baise said grumpily. “I vote no as well, though I have no excuses to give, especially not ones as transparent of my own repressed feelings. My reasons are simple. I do not trust a Wanderer, even one that helped an innocent boy.”
During their respective explanations, Denholm had been so caught up in self-pity that he hadn’t managed to get himself to look up. So what was spoken next surprised him more than he would have liked to admit.
“I vote in favor,” the old cook said.
Denholm’s eyes immediately snapped up to see the cook’s hand raised.
“My name is Oiro, by the way. It is nice to meet you, and you too, Echo.” Oiro’s smile, framed by long grey hair on either side, suddenly reminded Denholm of the old masters from back in the Glade.
Denholm smiled back at him. “Nice to meet you as well, and you really are an amazing cook. Thanks for the stew.”
“Well, unlike back when we had seven and, more recently five members, now we have an even number. Which, unfortunately, leaves us with this,” Jezra said. “We have two votes in favor and two against. How do we split it?”
“Ah, that we do,” Oiro said with the faintest hint of a smile, “but since my vote counts for more than the rest of you, it seems our group has just gained a new member.”
“Two new members,” Baise corrected, with a scowl directed at Echo. “Fantastic.”
Jezra’s descent first began with a thoughtful frown, then a soft shaking of his head, and eventually, there was no keeping it in any longer. “No,” he said. “No, I will not sleep while a Wanderer lurks nearby. This is not a sane course of action.”
Nuzumi rolled her eyes. “Sane?” She gestured in general at everything around them. “Sane?”
“Point taken. However, when we are constantly exposed to so much risk, why invite another into our bed?”
“Too late,” Nuzumi said. “The agreement is made.”
“No.” Of all voices, Denholm had not expected it to be Oiro. “His worries are not unfounded. Because of this, I propose a probationary period of one month. During this time, Denholm and Echo will travel with us during the day, but Echo must remain either in sight or on Denholm in the form of a cloak she was when we first found them. During the night, the two of them will sleep separate from us, far enough away that whoever is on watch that night would have time to wake the others should any sign of danger make itself known.”
Baise shrugged. Nuzumi seemed mildly agitated but overall resigned to the outcome, shooting Denholm and Echo the occasional welcoming look. Jezra was the last to come to terms with it, as he sat and mulled it over, eyebrows working so furiously they could have been mistaken for two caterpillars doing their best to massage his worries away. “Fine,” Jezra eventually said. “It’s going to be cold tonight. We should get a stack of firewood going.”
“So we should build two fires, then?” Nuzumi asked. “We can’t leave our new friends to the cold after welcoming them in, now, can we?”
Jezra let loose a pained groan. “I told you all this would happen. You all wanted to be charitable, not me. So you build the fire.”
Nuzumi was already halfway to her feet, appearing as if she intended to do just that. Denholm shared a look with Echo and she nodded. “You don’t need to make another fire. Echo can keep me warm with her powers.” It was a close enough explanation, and slightly less embarrassing than the truth. “We only need a fire if it gets cold enough to start snowing again.”
***
Hunched against the trunk of a tree some twenty paces away from the fire the other four Marked were huddled around, Denholm let his head fall backwards until he was looking straight up. The sky was clear tonight, looking something like a pool of oil strewn with thousands of glowing bits of glass dust floating atop it. He was comfortable, more so than he had been in weeks, thanks to Nuzumi using her powers to grow a bed of grass for him.
But comfortable as he was, he somehow still felt a bit lonely.
“How can Jezra’s power be so weird?” Denholm asked, though he was sure to keep his voice lower than the other adventurers could hear. “I thought Wanderers’ powers were tied to concepts. Nuzumi’s makes sense because change is change. But what concept makes it so you can stop yourself from interacting with reality entirely?”
“Concepts are up from interpretation,” Echo’s voice whispered from next to his ear. “An echo can be a sound, a memory, a ripple on the lake, or many other things, depending on the eye of the beholder. So you see, even my concept could be interpreted many ways.”
“So what determines what powers you actually get?”
“We do. The Wanderer was the one who anchored themself to that concept, and in doing that, they chose an interpretation of it. My choice was to tie myself to echoes of real things that happened in the past or future. Another Echo might control sounds, or memories, or things I could not even think of. I do believe there is meaning in our choice, but when I first fell here, it wasn’t something I really tried to do deliberately. More, it was a way to cope with the overwhelming uncertainty of the new land I was placed into. My identity sort of just… meshed well with the idea of remembering events of the past, and bringing them back to grace the world again.”
“You know, the more you tell me about gods, the more they sound like people. Just… more weird.”
“Really? In what way do you find us similar? I am genuinely curious.”
Denholm shrugged. “They're just as vulnerable to things they can’t control as we are.”
The soft padding of footsteps approaching brought Denholm’s gaze back down to earth. And there, striding over, silhouette dimly lit by the firelight, was Nuzumi. Jezra’s eyes were locked on her as she walked away, and there was something dangerous in them. Nuzumi’s expression could not have been more placid as she stopped in front of the grassy bed she crafted and stooped down.
“You’ll have to forgive my friends. They can be a little skittish. We’ve seen things out here that, to be honest, make it hard to blame them for it.”
“But… they are right, aren’t they?” Denholm said. “You should be scared of most gods.”
“I’m not afraid,” she said with a kind smile. “Actually, I was hoping to ask a certain god a question that has always plagued me with curiosity.”
Echo peeled away from Denholm, only to shimmer into being in her more human-appearing form. “I am happy to oblige, though I think you might be disappointed in how much is just as unknown to me as it is you.”
Nuzumi smiled at her. “Good, it would be boring if you knew everything. Do you mind if I sit?”
Denholm scooted aside, giving her room to sit on the grass and use the big tree trunk as a backrest like he was.
She plopped down beside him with a sigh. Echo floated on the other side of Denholm, keeping herself just far enough away that it could not be mistaken for anything nefarious. “What would you like to know?”
Nuzumi tossed her head to the side so she was facing Echo, giving Denholm a very close view of her side profile. “I actually have more than just one question, if you’re willing to indulge.”
“I think you will find my time is not nearly as valuable to me as yours is to you.”
“You might be surprised,” Nuzumi said with a devious smile. “If you spent all your days with that lot for your only company,” she gestured towards the fire, “you might not be that attached to continuing your time in this world at all.”
Denholm’s mind was not being very cooperative. He knew it was stupid. He knew she saw him as nothing but a little kid, and yet…
And yet if his heart beat any harder, someone might begin to notice it bulging out of his chest.
“So,” Nuzumi said, her beautiful voice so close it felt all-consuming. “What do you know about the origin of Tricksters, Echo?”
Even in its frenzy, Denholm’s heart managed to skip a beat.
This was going to be a long night, wasn’t it?
