Including art by yours truly.

This didn't really go anywhere in the campaign (aside from the ensuing fetchquest that lasted four episodes), but it occupied a lot of headspace, so of course I wrote about it.

xXx

Mumford knocked on Pelair's door as he opened it. "Hey, sport, whatcha-- oh."

The floor was covered in papers. The bedsheets and pillows were on the floor. The nightstand was knocked over. There was at least one new hole in the wall. A spear was embedded in the wall just below the ceiling. And in the middle of it all was Pelair, sitting cross-legged with his eyes closed.

"Pelair, what happened?" Mumford asked, trying to process the mess that his son had most likely made.

Pelair didn't respond.

"Pelair?" He came closer, stepping over what looked like old newspapers on the floor. "You okay, buddy?"

As he reached out to touch Pelair's shoulder, Pelair's eyes opened, and Pelair inhaled sharply as his stiff muscles relaxed. He turned to face Mumford and immediately shrank back.

"Sorry, sorry, I didn't think you'd come so soon. I was going to clean up before someone saw anything," he sputtered as he got to his feet and started fumbling with papers.

"What's wrong?" Mumford asked. "This is kind of... a lot."

"I just-- it's just something I'm--" He dropped his hands into his lap, still holding a stack of papers. "I can't remember what Branch looked like."

Mumford hesitated thoughtfully. "That's just something that happens with time--"

"No, no, you don't get it. When Cloveer or whatever his face is decided you would forget his name even though we didn't know who he was, he-- he decided to make me forget what Branch looked like. Apparently he didn't have enough fun killing my dad and figured--"

"What do you mean he killed your dad? I thought we found the guy who did that?"

"No, we didn't. I mean, we found the guy who actually did it, but this guy is the one who actually said, 'Hey, you see that guy over there with his kid? Why don't you just take him out?' He said he's been manipulating everything from the very beginning, and either he's really good at changing memories, or he really is the reason that my dad--" He wiped his nose and resumed scooping up newspaper clippings.

"So... what's this for?" Mumford craned his neck, and he managed to make out part of an obituary page before Pelair picked it up.

"I was hoping one of the newspapers had a picture of him. He wasn't much of a picture guy, and what I had got burned up the night he... you know." He set the stack of newspapers on his bed and put the nightstand upright. "Maybe someone got a picture when they wrote an article about him doing something heroic... or something."

Mumford glanced up at the spear near the ceiling. "I'm guessing that didn't go well...?"

"No, it didn't." He picked up the newspapers, looked around, and set them on the nightstand. He picked up the blankets off the floor and started making the bed.

"Why didn't you tell anyone?" Mumford asked.

Pelair fumbled with the sheets, trying to find a corner. "It never came up," he answered hesitantly.

"You can just mention stuff like this to us. It doesn't have to come up."

He managed to track down the edge of a sheet and tossed it on the bed, tucking in some of the corners. "Yeah."

"Pelair, I want you to know you can talk to me."

The blankets got tangled in his arms as he wrestled with them, trying to find which one to put on next. He glanced around the room. "Where did the pillows go?" he asked.

Mumford found one on the other side of the room and placed it on the bed. "It's important that you're okay. I don't want you to pretend everything is fine just for us. If you tell us, we can work something out so you can take some time off or something."

Pelair stopped, leaning over the bed to tuck in the corners. "So now you tell me."

"How long have you been wanting to talk to me?" Mumford asked.

"I never did!" Pelair snapped, turning to glare at him. "I mean-- I guess I-- I don't know, it's just..."

"Are you okay?" Mumford asked finally. He took a step forward to get closer to his boy, holding out an open hand to try to bridge the distance between them.

Pelair stared at the floor. "What do you want me to say?"

"I want you to tell me the truth."

Pelair met his eyes, curling his lip. "Do you?"

Mumford sighed desperately. "I want you to know you can be honest with me, Pelair. That's important to me. You're important to me."

"Running around the world trying to solve everyone's problems seems to be more important to you lately."

"Oh, Pelair." Mumford closed the remaining distance between them and hugged him tightly. "You're the most important thing in the world to me. You come before anything else." He pulled away just enough to look at him. "But I need you to talk to me so I can help you. You didn't tell me about Branch, and I'll admit that I didn't ask, but I want to make sure you're okay. It's hard to help you when I don't know what you're dealing with."

"And I can't tell you what I'm dealing with if I don't even know what's going on half the time!" Pelair sighed and pulled away, turning back to the bed. "Can you explain anything that's happened lately? Any of it?" He stuffed the edge of a blanket under the mattress. "I don't get what's happening to us. I just don't understand. I'm trying to, and for a while I almost had a grip on it. Now, though, there's just more and more and more all at once, and it's just so much, and I don't even get why we're the ones who this is happening to. What did we do to deserve all this?"

Mumford had an insightful moment. This felt very personal to Pelair, but he didn't want to admit that. "I don't know why Cloveer has it out for you or any of us, but I know we'll figure it out together, as a family. I swear."

Pelair jumped up and grabbed the spear from the wall. "Thanks." He dropped it next to his closet door.

"I mean it," Mumford continued. "Whatever it takes--"

"I get it," Pelair laughed, though it was forced. "We had a moment. You want me to talk to you more. Will do. I'm just trying to wrap this up really quick, and it's kind of hard to do that and talk at the same time."

"Oh, right." Mumford shuffled his feet awkwardly. "Right. I'll, uh--" He pointed at the door.

"I'll talk to you later," Pelair said pointedly.

"Talk to you later," Mumford agreed. Then he left.

Pelair flopped on his bed, staring at the ceiling. He still didn't want to talk about anything, but he could see why Mumford felt so strongly about stepping in. It was just something that the two of them would have to work out between them. Painfully. And awkwardly.

There was a knock at the door. "Hey Pelair, are you in there?"

He recognized the voice of Samuel. "Yeah, come on in."

Samuel opened the door and immediately noticed the spear and the other items still littering the floor. "That bad, huh?"

"Nah," Pelair answered, sitting up as Samuel sat beside him. "Well, the conversation wasn't bad, anyway. I got a little irritated earlier, but it worked out, more or less."

"Are you sure?" Samuel turned his body toward Pelair meaningfully, and their eyes locked.

"I'm good now," Pelair reassured him. "I'm positive."

"Cool." Samuel leaned back comfortably on his hands. "Anything else happen lately?"

"I mean, we already told you about the whole Cloveer thing and his... weirdness." He snapped his fingers. "Oh yeah! You remember that guy named Nardniw?"

"The guy who called a hit on me forever ago and it was weird?"

"Yeah, uh... Nardniw backwards is Windran."

"Oh. Ooohhhhh. That makes sense now."

"Yeah, I've been meaning to tell you, but it never came up, and I kept forgetting. My memory has been kind of..." He trailed off.

"Foggy," Samuel finished.

"Yeah." Pelair quickly wiped his cheek.

Samuel frowned. "What's wrong?" he asked.

"There's just a lot of... things with memory lately." He turned away, the end of his tail twitching.

Samuel hugged him. "I hope everything's okay."

"I'll figure it out," Pelair answered weakly. He sniffed.

He flinched as he noticed a man in a fine suit with sunglasses and a large mustache beside him.

"Hello, son of Mumford," the man greeted him. "You do not know who I am, but I know you."

Pelair turned on the bed to face him. "Uh... could you elaborate on that?"

The man took off his glasses, revealing dark spaces filled with speckles of light like tiny galaxies behind them. "I've seen your fate. Unfortunately, your father has paid a great toll."

"Um, who are you?" Pelair asked. "With all due respect," he added hastily.

The man reached into the inner pocket of his coat and pulled out a deck of cards. He fanned them out, and Pelair watched in confusion as the stranger held them toward him. "Take a card," he said.

Pelair slowly reached for a card and pulled it from the man's hand. Glancing distrustfully at the man one last time, he flipped it over to look at what he got.

It was pure black. There was nothing on it but a dark nothing.

He collapsed. Samuel barely caught him before he hit the bed.

"Pelair?" He held his friend's face in his hand. "Pelair!" He looked up to glare at the man who'd handed them the card, but he was nowhere to be seen. What had he done? Pelair was breathing, but nothing else seemed like a good sign. "Help! Someone help!" he screamed. "Pelair, wake up!"

Mumford got there first. "What happened?" he asked as Valkaryn and Faradel slid to a stop beside him.

"I don't know!" Samuel said. "Some guy had him draw a card from a deck and now he's--" He cut himself off with a sob.

Mumford crouched beside Pelair and placed two fingers on his neck. "He's still alive," he said uncertainly. "Does he need a healer?"

"He didn't get hurt, though," Samuel said. "He just... dropped."

"Let's get the archmage. He might know something," Valkaryn suggested.

"You're gonna be okay, Pelair," Samuel whispered, holding him tightly. "We've got you."

xXx

"Sam?" Pelair called. "Sam? Sam!" No response. "Dad!"

The darkness was immense. He'd been in the dark as much of his life as he could manage, and he'd seen magical darkness more than a handful of times. This wasn't darkness, this was just... a void. He couldn't see anything except himself, and he wasn't even sure how he could see that much. There wasn't any source of light as far as the eye could see.

As his initial panic subsided, he realized where he'd felt something like this before: in the other planes he'd visited, however briefly. The card he drew must have been a wild magic surge or something similar. Soon, he'd reappear back into the normal plane and it would be fine. Or maybe he'd get another inside look at the prison system of Kinsland. That could be an educational experience.

He waited. Nothing happened.

"Hello!" he called. "Is there anyone there?" He'd take a monstrous creature hiding out in the darkness over this suffocating silence any day.

No one answered.

He swallowed down the growing lump in his throat. He would be fine. He just needed to stay calm. Someone would come for him soon.

Right?

"HEY!" he shouted. "LET ME OUT! I'VE GOT STUFF TO DO!"

The silence mocked him.

He didn't want this. He just wanted to be home with Mumford and Samuel and Valkaryn and Miloš and maybe even Faradel. He didn't ask for any of this. He didn't want to fight the world, he wanted to be safe and loved.

He screamed into the void.

The void stared unfalteringly back.