Everything in the room was just as he remembered.

  The same game posters sat faded against the cream-colored wall, their edges frayed by time. His corner bookshelf still overflowed with fantasy novels, manga, and comics. And the black square of his TV stood in the corner, a well-worn office chair empty beside it. Even the coffee mug he used the day before his final visit to the hospital was on his bedside table, placed there like he’d never left.

  “Darian?” his mother said, the thick door muffling her soft voice.

  He tossed his blanket off and rolled out of bed, his feet warm against the sunlit carpet. He approached with gentle steps, not sure what to expect if he opened the door.

  “Mom,” Darian mumbled, his hand halfway toward the knob. “What day is it?”

  There was a pause, the sound of birds outside filling the silence.

  “Thursday,” she eventually said, a hint of concern in her voice.

  Thursday. Darian let his hand drop. He’d been admitted to the hospital late on a Wednesday afternoon. A visit he would never return from.

  “It’s August, right?” he asked.

  “Honey, is something wrong?” His mother tested the knob, the lock keeping the room sealed.

  “Please,” he put his forehead against the door, his eyes closed. “Answer the question.”

  Another long pause.

  “Yes. It’s August,” she said. “Now will you please let me in?”

  He looked over his shoulder, and the bed glared back at him.

  Ten years. That’s how long he spent chained to it, his days spent full of false hopes. Then the night finally came where he left this place for good. Or at least that’s what I thought. He wasn’t sure of the exact date, but it had been a Wednesday in late August when he coughed up blood. If it was Thursday now, then it was like it never happened. Like it was nothing but a dream.

  He reached for the knob, his hand trembling. But he had to see if she was real. To see if that forest, if all those deaths, if it had been a blood-soaked nightmare all along.

  She stood just outside the door, a shaft of morning sun splitting her freckled cheek. Then she smiled, and all of Darian’s fear melted.

  “Oh my,” she mumbled through a grin as Darian wrapped her in a tight embrace. “What did I do to deserve such an honor.”

  He pulled away and studied her face, a thin sheet of wet blurring his vision. There was a bit more grey in her hair than he remembered, but it was her. It was his mother. The woman who always did her best, who always came to his side when he needed her, and who always pushed him to keep fighting. She was here, and she was real.

  “Darian, are you alright? The way you’re looking at me, it’s like you expected to see someone else.”

  “I did,” he admitted. “Or I thought maybe you’d be…something else.” He hugged her again, the smell of bacon filling his nose.

  “Your father made breakfast,” his mother said, noting the twitch of his nostrils. “And yes, there are waffles.”

  “Waffles,” he mumbled, chewing on the word like it was in a foreign tongue.

  She squeezed his hand, then led him down the long hall to their right. Pictures of his family watched him as he walked, each smiling face a relic of a life he’d left behind. And as they passed into the kitchen, his thoughts became heavy. What was I doing again? He had been somewhere just moments ago, hadn’t he? But the harder he tried to remember, the more fragmented the memories became.

  Darian’s father was standing over the kitchen table, a pan in one hand and a spatula in the other. He was smaller than Darian remembered. I guess seeing Gorm and Yaz makes everyone look smaller. He stopped as he reached his chair. Who? The image of a towering man pierced the fog, but who he’d been, Darian couldn’t recall.

  “Feeling alright champ?” his father asked. “You’re a little pale.”

  “I’m fine.” Darian slid his chair out. “And ready to eat.”

  His father smiled at that, then slapped down a pair of waffles onto a plate. “Guess that means the new treatment is working.”

  Darian placed his hands on the wooden table, each groove, scratch, and divot familiar to him. Even when he was too sick to eat, they still used the table for family game night. His father was particularly fond of Monopoly, but his mother preferred card games. Darian usually didn’t mind what game they played. Being awake and with them was enough.

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  As he observed each storied blemish, his father slid a steaming plate his way. There was a pile of scrambled eggs, three strips of bacon, and two slightly burnt waffles.

  Just the way he liked it.

  “Randal,” his mother said. “That might be a little much.”

  “Boy’s hungry,” his father replied. “And he knows he doesn’t have to finish it.”

  “You guys don’t have to talk about me like I’m not here.” Darian’s stomach grumbled and he snatched up a nearby fork.

  But he couldn’t bring himself to eat it.

  The food smelled great, and he was hungrier than ever. But he couldn’t shake the feeling this was somehow wrong. Like he was craving something else, but he couldn’t put his finger on what that thing was.

  “What do we have to drink?” he asked, his throat dry. Maybe some liquid would loosen up his appetite.

  His father retrieved a cup and started for the fridge. “Want anything in particular?”

  “Water is fine.” He touched his throat, a prickling pain welling beneath his skin. It was like all the moisture had been sucked from his body.

  “You sure?” his father asked, reaching into the fridge. “Because I think we both know what you really want.”

  Darian was about to ask what he meant when he saw the knife.

  “Dad,” he said, a tremor in his voice. “What are you doing?”

  “It’s fine honey.” His mother gave his shoulder a tight squeeze. “It’s like your father said, a boy’s got to eat.”

  She walked away and Darian reached for her, but it was like his body was filled with lead. His arm fell to the table with a thunk, and he watched as she approached his father, smiling.

  “Don’t worry Darian.” His father pressed the knife into her neck. “I won’t miss a drop.” Then he slid the blade across her throat, his other hand rising, the cup placed just under the blood pouring out.

  His mother never stopped smiling.

  “Stop!” he yelled. He jerked to the side, but he couldn’t move. His arms and legs were too weak, too heavy to do anything but strain in useless protest. He cried out, screaming until all the air was choked out of him.

  “Just a little more.” His father placed the knife on the table. “And there it is.”

  His mother stumbled, then fell to the floor, her eyes blankly staring at the ceiling.

  “Please Mom,” Darian said through his tears.

  “She can’t hear you anymore.” His father turned away from her, his smile widening. “But look what I have!” He brought the cup of blood up to his cheek and shook it.

  “I don’t want that!” But even as Darian spoke the words, he knew them for lies.

  Dark blood pooled around his mother’s head, a stark contrast to her paling skin. But the smell, it was sweet like honey.

  “You want to grow up big and strong, don’t you?” His father looked into the cup and frowned. “Oh I see, this isn’t enough.” He snatched the knife up. “Let me fix that.”

  “No, no what are you doing?” Darian gritted his teeth and tried his hardest to get up, to do anything. But all he could do was stare.

  The knife split his father’s throat like an axe through tender wood. Blood spurted from the wound, almost all of it missing the cup. Then he walked closer, fresh life flowing down his torn flesh. He smashed the cup down right in front of Darian before he slid to the side, then tumbled to the ground.

  “Drink up,” he said from the floor, blood staining his teeth red. Then the light faded from his eyes.

  “Dad?” he blinked away the wet in his eyes. “Mom?”

  Silence.

  He screamed, the sound cut off by a hundred whispering voices.

  Drink it. They said. Drink it.

  His hand moved to the cup, the edge warm to the touch.

  “No, I won’t.” He pushed the cup away, but his fingers remained glued to it.

  Drink. Drink. Drink.

  The voices grew louder, piercing him like a hot blade.

  DRINK. DRINK. DRINK.

  He squirmed and dug the nails of his free hand into his arm.

  “I can’t. Not from them.”

  They died for you. A powerful voice said. They poured all their love into that cup. Would you deny them?

  “This isn’t right.” He pulled his fingers away from the crimson temptation. “Where am I? Who are you?”

  You’re home. We’re your family.

  “No.” The smell of the blood, it tugged loose his fogged memories. “My family is somewhere else. The world I came from.”

  We’re here, honey. You just can’t see us. The voice belonged to his mother. Drink the blood and we can be together forever. Just like you always wanted.

  The more she spoke, the more enshrouded his thoughts became. He focused on the scent of blood, its pull on his soul dragging his mind from the haze. And the longer he focused on it, the clearer this illusion became.

  Memory returned to him, the fragments forming, solidifying until he a clear picture formed.

  The Soul of Damnation.

  His fingers and Calhaven’s had touched the gem at the same time. And these voices were the same ones he heard before cutting the artifact from the necromancer’s staff.

  “You are not my mother.” He looked around the room, the illusion fading, the walls pulsing in and out of existence. “None of this is real.”

  “Oh, but we are very real,” A deep voice said from behind. “Now drink.”

  A hand made of shadow gripped his chin, another pulling the glass to his lips.

  “That’s it,” the shadow said, turning the cup, blood sliding toward Darian’s mouth. “Drink and become one with the damned.”

  He jerked his head to the side and bit down, his fangs sinking into the shadow’s flesh. It shrieked and dropped the cup. And as the glass shattered against the table, the weight on Darian’s body vanished.

  “You should not have done that.” The shadow faded into mist, then the whole room began to shake.