After the Fright Night

Stories, continued and interrupted, of beings from wherever the sky calls to the dreamers, the wind whispers to the wanderers, and the road calls to the determined.

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Mist Gul
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After the Fright Night

Post by Mist Gul »

Mist winced over his ribs as he pulled himself out of bed, and spent several minutes just breathing until the pain subsided. Silently. If he made a peep, his master would return and whip the hell out of him again and...

Shuddering, Mist wiped his hands over his face. That was long ago, an entire other life. This was now.

"Betsy? Are you still here?" he called hoarsely.

"Of course I am still here, someone's got to look after your kid and cats," Betsy replied smartly as she pushed her way into his bedroom. All three of Mist's cats were following her around, the winged one on her shoulders.

"I thought you hated cats," Mist noted.

"Cannot stand them," Betsy assured him as she rubbed the flitter's ears and kissed its nose.

"Where's Amaris?" he asked.

"Sleeping like a little rock. She's almost all healed up, bless her. Unlike you. Look at me. You gave me a turn, all your runes bleeding like that. They're back to glowing again."

"It takes chunks out of my soul energy to cast those spells," Mist explained, "But it repairs itself."

"Lovely. Alright, hold still..." Betsy muttered, frowning as she carefully touched the rune over his eye, then pulled him forward to trace one on his back, then one on his side.

"What are you doing?" Mist inquired with a choke of laughter. He paused, surprised to find a rush of energy running through him.

"You told me one of your runes keeps you alive, and that there were a few that could be activated by outside help. So I studied on them and found that sequence, it'll accelerate your healing for a while," Betsy replied, tilting back to get a look at him.

"I didn't know there was any information on them here," he assured her, surprised.

"Oh, honey, there's information on everything if you know where to look. In your case, I just went to the university's magic library, paid the librarian a few bucks, and got some helpful tips and pointers on these."

"When were you going to tell me about that?" Mist asked with a laugh, slowly pushing to his feet.

"I wasn't, I need to keep my reputation of being able to keep you on your feet. Now why are you getting up?" Betsy demanded, eying him imperiously.

"I need to check on Amaris, I need a shower, I need to go to the bathroom, and I'm hungry," he explained, reaching for his robe. Betsy scoffed, but helped him with it.

"What the hell happened last night, anyhow?" Betsy asked some time later, frowning as she poured coffee for them both. Mist gratefully took a cup, and held it in his hands, simply leeching the warmth from the mug. Everything seemed so cold since... whatever it was tried to touch him.

"I'm not certain. Something infernal was trying to break into our reality. I shape shifted to a unicorn, thinking I could carry Amaris a safe distance away and then return to help, but she saw something that pushed her into her were-wolf form, and after that, I couldn't let her hit it alone. But. A quadruped's form is bad when the damn brute was able to chuck me against a post or something."

"...I can't decide if you're creative or crazy, but that's pretty typical," Betsy responded with a nod.

"Amaranthe was giving us a hand. She is so beautiful and sweet. And deadly with a bow," Mist added with a laugh, flushing pink. He lifted the cup to drink, and to try and hide the blush. Betsy cackled at him.

"You going to ask her out?"

"No, she probably thinks I'm brain damaged at this point," Mist laughed, "You know how smooth I am around women."

"Oh, you don't give yourself enough credit," Betsy chuckled, "Then what?"

"Well, I realized it was a gate trying to open. So. To close those sorts of gates properly, ideally, you've got to get all the bleed from the dimension that it's opening back into it, then seal it. I cast Shattering Song, and that seemed to blast a lot of them back inside, and got the control of the gate into friendly hands. So they could close it. And then Mallory returned, and... Oh. Crap. Michelle. She was lost into the dimension."

"What are you doing? You cannot go strapping on your adventure boots and..." Betsy scolded as Mist rose from the kitchen table.

"Not going to. I'll be fine, I just need to make a locator."

"Okay, is that something that's going to lay you back out?" she demanded, narrowing her eyes, "Because I do need to get back home soon."

"It will not lay me out," Mist promised, walking to his work table. It was set under one of the cave's front windows, taking advantage of the morning sun.

Mist had been doing a lot of work for Michelle, mainly seeking for the cause and hopefully cure of a strange wasting disease which had taken hold of her husband. With a terribly small pool of comparison to draw from, Mist had resorted to taking DNA samples from the family to study.

One of those samples was Michelle's hair. He withdrew the sample from a wooden case, carefully removing two strands with a pair of tweezers. He lay them onto a tile of marble set into the table's surface.

Mist absently snipped one of his own hairs. He pulled a magnifying lens and light on a goose neck downwards to clearly watch his work. He braided the strands together tightly.

"I give you strength, you will need it," he murmured as he worked. Betsy watched over his shoulder. A few moments later, Amaris joined her, yawning, but peering curiously at Mist's forging of the charm. As he worked, ghostly tendrils of energy followed his fingers in pale blue streamers.

He picked a silver hoop from a chest on the work table, large enough to slip a finger into, and pried it open. After tying the braided hairs to it with a cat's paw knot, he closed the ring, sealing it with a small cantrip, as if it had never been apart.

"I give you a solid hand hold, that you may not be cast away further from us."

Several small beads were picked out of a another drawer, a clear quartz, a dusty blue bead, and a bright lime green bead.

"What are those beads?" Amaris whispered, wide eyed.

"Shh," Mist replied, threading each onto the braid of hairs, "Here is light in the quartz, here is calm in the seastone, here is vlitavin to enhance our bonds."

Mist picked out an opaque spire of mottled pink and green, then thin silver wire, no thicker than the hairs. He wound the spire tightly with the wire, creating a bail for it.

"Here are the bonds that bind us, your friends, your family, which may never be broken," he murmured. He held the spire and pendant wire between his palms, fusing the silver to itself and the stone.

"Here is the unikite, which will lead us to you," he added, carefully fastening the hair to the spire, neatly finishing it with a kreh loop knot. He pressed the charm between his palms, flickering a slight smile when Amaris put her hand onto his.

"Will this bring her home?" the girl asked somberly.

"It will lead us to her," Mist replied, kissing her hand lightly. He gripped the charm. "Now we need to get this to Mallory."

"I'll take it, Dad," Amaris assured him, a determined glint to her eyes. He smiled and nodded, wrapping the charm in brown paper before giving it to her.

"She'll probably be at the Lyceum," Mist told her, hugging her gently before moving away and thumping to the sofa. Amaris giggled soft and then, she was off and running.
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