“What kind of game?” Karon asked, his spear still pointed towards the woman.

The woman placed the tip of her right index finger on her chin, and thoughtfully tapped it while her head turned up towards the ceiling. She hummed to herself as she did, the melody following the music of the violin that came drifting from the left hallway, slow and with the notes drawn out as if in horrible agony.

“I am terribly sorry, but I don't know. It has been such a long time since we last had to entertain guests. I'm afraid I am not quite the social butterfly I once was,” the woman admitted in a wistful tone.

“Apology accepted,” Karon said, and gave Trixie a quick glance that told her to stay quiet and not do anything. “And we would never dream of intruding on your company, and since you are not fit to receive guests, I think it would be best if my companion and I left,” Karon said and tried to make it sound as polite as possible.

“Don't be ridiculous, dear. I am confident we will find a way to entertain ourselves. Now come, let me introduce you to the other residents. They will be very happy to meet the two of you,” the woman said and spun around. She walked down the left hallway without looking back while both Karon and Trixie remained where they stood.

“Okay, I guess she is kinda creepy, but if we really want to leave, why aren't we just blowing a hole in the wall?” Trixie turned to Karon and asked.

“Trix, I know you're not the best with sensing stuff, but there is no way you didn't sense the power of that … thing,” he replied and swallowed loudly.

“All I got was a feeling of hunger,” she said and pushed the arm Karon was still holding out in front of her away.

“Well I guess that pretty much sums it up,” he muttered under his breath. “Allow me to expand a little on that, though: the woman is a soul eater, which means that she can devour and absorb not only free-flowing energy or through digesting matter, she can rip it out of anything it is bound or connected to, and it doesn't matter what kind of energy. She can eat any kind that exists in our plane of reality regardless of the form or frequency and integrate it into her own being while tearing apart what it was shaped into before. That means she can devour everything you are: Your spirit, your mind, your soul and everything else stored within.”

“Like memories...”

“Not if I set her on fire first,” Trixie told him nonchalantly.

“Trix, you don't get it. All she eats, she keeps, and she can make use of it. I have no idea how old she is or how long she has been a soul eater, but ... being what she is and doing what she does translates into power. Serious power.”

“I still don't see why this makes her that dangerous compared to everything else we've faced. Besides, she hasn't been slobbering while staring at us like she wanted to eat us. She's been kinda nice to us so far, although a bit weird too.”

“That's what worries me the most,” Karon muttered, glancing towards the hallway the woman had disappeared down.

“So what do we do, then?” Trixie asked, not sounding overly concerned despite Karon's explanation.

“If we try and bust out of here, then bad shit is going to happen fast. I don't know just how much power this woman's got, so I can't tell what our chances of making it out alive are. If we play along, that might buy us time to find a way out of this ... and if nothing else, die outside of her reach.”

“Uhh, what was that?” Trixie asked and leaned closer to his face with a look of disbelief on her own.

“You heard me. We've been in danger of dying so many times, I can't remember all of them, Trix; but I would rather kill you here myself than let that creature even come close to devouring your soul. We're both mortal Trix, but our souls aren't; I'm not letting you lose that on account of one brief life that is just a tiny fraction of your existence,” Karon told her in an emotionless, but completely determined voice.

Trixie stared at Karon, and for the first time since they had met all those years ago there was something in her eyes Karon wished he would never have had to see when she looked at him. Fear.

“Is that what you think of me? Of us? 'Brief lives that is just a tiny fraction of our existence'?” she asked in a hurt voice.

Karon turned his entire body to face Trixie, and he let Promise fall clattering to the floor as he placed his arms around the woman he loved and pulled her in close. Her arms hung limp at her side for the first few heartbeats, but when Karon didn't let go her arms came up and she curled her fingers around his old and tattered robe, gripping it tight and pressed her face into his chest.

“I love you Trix, with all my heart I love you. But who we are now will not always be, we will inevitably change. I can't say how, when or into what, but change will happen. Hell, I've only been Karon for the last six years. Before that, I was stuck as a nobody, trapped in a transition period where I refused to accept a new future and destiny because I was still clinging to the one I was born with.”

“I don't care about that, I care about you! And I'm not leaving you or letting go of you no matter what changes happen,” Trixie told him sharply, her voice muffled by his robe and what he suspected was held-back tears.

Karon started stroking her head with his right hand. On the floor, Promise was glowing with a harsh light, and Karon could feel the spirit inside shouting in confusion and for him to pick it back up. Instead he continued calmly stroking Trixie's head while involuntary shudders went through her as she fought with her emotions.

“Trix, I will be with you all the way. I don't ever want to lose you. What I am saying though is that I will not let those creatures touch that inside of you that is beyond death. That which is part of eternity. You can die, Trix, and you will still remain; but if your soul is threatened...” he said to her in a soothing voice.

“I understand, and I'm not going to let anything happen to you, either,” she muttered softly, and pulled back her head far enough for her to tip-toe up and kiss him.

Karon could taste the desperation, the need on her lips. It was as if all the pain and loneliness of the years before their paths had intertwined came rushing back up to mix together with the joy and fierce freedom she had found with him.

When they parted, a tingling warmth lingered on Karon's lips together with a burning ache that had settled in his chest. He had always thought that loving someone so much it hurt was just a figure of speech.

“Apparently not.”

Slowly, Karon stepped away from Trixie with reluctance written plainly on his face. But as it always does, reality soon exerted itself, and he remembered where they were.

“Trix, I know playing mind games isn't your strong suit, so simply stay close to me and be prepared. This is my area of expertise, but it could escalate to blowing stuff up pretty fast,” he told her once he thought his voice would hold steady.

“How will I know it's time for that?” she asked, her words much like his own carrying traces of suppressed emotions.

“If I suddenly shout 'Kill them Trix, kill them!' then that will be a sign to start blasting them,” he said with a crooked smile.

Trixie's mouth twitched until it shaped itself into a grin. “Sounds simple enough that even someone like me might understand it,” she replied dryly, lazily propping a hand on her hip.

“I try my best,” Karon replied and tilted his head, his own smile turning into his usual devil-may-care grin.

On the floor, Promise was practically vibrating with the panicked signals it was sending out alongside great waves of fear, anger and doubt. Karon quickly bent down and grabbed hold of the spear, and it instantly calmed down.

“Master! Please tell me what is happening. I ... there is so much here, and it screams. I can't make out what is happening outside this vessel anymore, there is too much outside.”

“Shh, calm down Promise. Right now we're inside a manor located within the forest. We were greeted by a woman, a soul eater. She wants to play the game of guest and host for the moment, but I'm not sure how long that will last or what she plans for us.”

“I will destroy her! Use me, master!”

“Promise, you are in a vulnerable state right now, and drawing from you to fuel my own magic would be dangerous and could unbalance you in … bad ways. And she's a soul eater, she would just eat you like an appetizer since you can't do anything outside of your spear by yourself.”

The frustration and anger that rolled off Promise hit Karon like an ocean wave, and just the sheer intensity of it was enough to give him a momentary pause. However, the spirit didn't attack him or go insane, the emotions he could feel roaring inside the spirit more directed towards the circumstances they found themselves within, not him.

“Promise, I know what's going on isn't easy for you. But we'll get through it one way or another. Just try and keep focused and be ready if I should call upon you.”

“Of course master, I am always ready to serve!”

The flood of confusing and fractured thoughts and emotions the spirit was going through seemed to find a single point of stability around the overwhelming need to serve Karon in any way he needed. And as Karon separated his mind from that of the spear, a dry voice surfaced from the back of his skull.

“Throwing platitudes at it won't work for much longer, you know.”

“One problem at a time. Promise's identity crisis will have to wait until we actually have time for it.”

“Careful, you're blinding yourself if you only stare at things from one perspective too long.”

Karon ignored the voice, and instead focused on Trixie and prepared for whatever twisted game a soul eater might find entertaining. What he had just told Trixie might have shaken her up a bit, but she had grown tough over the years, and if she felt any doubt or fear, she didn't show it.

“Ready to go see what tonight's entertainment will be?” Karon asked in as carefree a voice as he could manage.

“Sure, just try and not bore me too much,” she replied and threw back her hair with a flick of her head, her voice all confidence once again.

Karon chuckled and offered his arm to her, which she gracefully accepted, and the two of them walked together down the left hallway, the music of a violin filling their air together with the loud thump of Promise hitting the wooden floor with each step they took.

The hallway was filled with paintings of all kinds of creatures, some of them beast-like and others humanoid or altogether human. The one thing they all had in common, though, was that they were all being tortured. The sickening images were framed in by embossed gold trim of exquisite beauty, lending the paintings a feeling of being cherished as something wonderful.

A knot coiled and twisted tighter in Karon's stomach the further down the hallway he walked, as the images became more and more creative and the faces the creatures made all the more expressive. What was worse, there were lingering echoes of screams in the paintings, and the only way Karon could imagine that was possible was if they paintings hadn't been drawn from someone's twisted mind, but had captured a very real scene.

Eventually, the freakishly long hallway ended at a sharp turn to the right, where a glass door stood ajar leading into a room washed in bright golden light. It was huge, with rows of bookshelves covering most of the walls, and where they weren't, there were either paintings of scenes just as macabre as the ones in the hallway or there were implements of torture hung up as decoration.

The knot in Karon's stomach did a triple flip when he noticed that there was dried blood visible on more than a few of those instruments.

In the center of the room laid four couches with dark green upholstery and golden frames. They stood around a table upon which several smaller items were scattered, things like cards, dice and stacks of paper.

On one of the couches, the woman with the dark mask was leaning back in a lounging position, one leg dangling over one end of the couch and lightly wagging back and forth. When Karon and Trixie walked out into the room she perked up a little, and giggled happily.

“There you are, I was starting to think you might have gotten lost. I want to make introductions,” the woman said and got up from her seated position.

Besides the woman, there were four others present as far as Karon could see. One was an old man with long gray hair and a short beard, dressed in a simple brown robe that might possibly just have been a big burlap sack with a string tied around it. He sat at the far end of the room in a chair and with a book open on his lap. He didn't turn his head up or even acknowledge that there was anyone else in the room, but Karon could feel his presence all the same, like a yawning black hole ready to devour anything within its reach. Karon also noted that besides himself and Trixie, the man was the only one not wearing a mask.

Standing to the left of the entrance against the wall were two identical silver-masked men just like the one that had invited in Karon and Trixie, one of them standing in silent attention while the other was the one responsible for the music. He didn't move besides the absolute minimum required to play the violin, and despite the haunting music that seemed to be infused with heartbreak and sadness, there was a certain dead quality to his movements.

The final one present was a man sitting in the couch to the left of the woman, leaning back and with both his arms thrown to his sides and resting on the spine of the couch. He was wearing a robe the color of red wine, or blood, and his hands were covered in long black gloves. The robe itself immediately attracted Karon's attention, and he was forced to admit that it was a very nice-looking one. It ended just below the man’s knees, and the edges were slightly frayed and uneven, continuing downwards towards his back in an angular fashion rather than as an even circle around him. He was wearing pants of the same dark golden color as the mask on his face, and the shoes he wore looked to be made of nothing but black cloth tied around his feet with a golden rope. The mask itself was shaped like a snake or some other reptile, and when Karon gently reached out with his senses towards the man, a cold slithering feeling answered him.

Karon took all of it in as he and Trixie walked over towards the table, and stopped when they reached the couch closest to them. The woman waited until they had stopped, then hurried forward to them with almost fluid grace that made it seem like she flowed rather than walked.

It took her just a brief instant to reach them, and Karon had to force himself not to move or start waving Promise around in an attempt to get her as far away as possible. So he swallowed the need to scream and run away, and simply inched himself closer to Trixie.

The woman reached out her right index finger and ran it gently upwards from Karon's stomach, all the way to his throat. All the while a burning, almost tearing sensation followed it, as if the sound of nails on a chalkboard had been made into a feeling. The woman's head was tilted slightly to the right, and even though the mask hid her face the smile beneath it was implied with every movement she made.

Karon knew it was just a test, that his life – and soul – was not being threatened. He knew from the feeling as the woman's black painted nail came to a halt at his throat that she was just tasting him, observing his reactions and making out what kind of creature he was.

In other words, she was playing with him.

“It has been such a long time since we've had guests, and even longer since I last had the fortune to run into a trickster,” the woman sighed with a shudder of pleasure. She pulled back her hand and took a few steps away from Karon, her head turning momentarily to look Trixie up and down, then turning back to Karon.

“They always makes the games last so long, and their lives are always so tragic and misunderstood. They understand pain so well, and it is so fun teaching them new things about something they thought they knew everything about,” she said, her voice distant like she was reminiscing about days long gone.

“Are you going to be chit-chatting with it much longer?” the golden-masked man asked, his voice bored and with an arrogant note to it.

“Don't interrupt dear, you can't rush protocol and we must be on our best behavior when we have guests!” the woman snapped at him. She cleared her throat, and her voice returned to her usual sultry tone. “Now, would you please give me your name?” she asked.

Karon did not want to give her his name. However, there was little choice at the moment, unless he wanted to insult his hosts. He could lie and simply give them a false name, but as soon as that name left his lips any average practitioner would be able to feel that it didn't correspond with him. A real name is a reflection of who you are, where you've been and where you're going. And much like the person it has layers of meaning. How much of those layers one will be able to sense depends on the skill of the practitioner, and Karon suspected the woman hiding behind that dark, raven mask was very, very talented.

“Karon,” he answered truthfully, and a shiver went through him.

“Karon,” the woman repeated, tasting the name and arching her back like a lover was caressing it.

“That's my name,” Karon told her, forcing his voice to come out steady and without the tremor of fear that threatened to slip in.

“You are quite marvelous,” the woman said, and she brushed a knuckled fist against her lips underneath the beak of her mask. “I taste ash in your name, something that's been burned. You have walked far, and I can feel the presence of angels in your wake, and where you're going.”

The golden-masked man sitting on the couch jerked his head when he heard the word 'angels', and the stare he gave Karon burned right through his mask with a terrible focus.

“My, oh my,” the woman breathed, her right hand gently tracing circles on her chest. “So much behind you, so much ahead of you. You, my dear are ... interesting.”

“Uhrm, and my name is Trixie,” Trixie announced after clearing her throat loudly.

The woman turned her bird mask towards Trixie and held her attention there for a few seconds, then turned back to Karon and said, “Yes you are, and everything interesting about you comes from him.”

Karon's eyes doubled in size as he turned to stare at Trixie, fully expecting her to respond with a flaming fist of 'fuck you bitch'. Instead his hot-headed companion reacted with a surprisingly calm expression, and she only gave the woman a lop-sided smile of vague amusement.

Karon reached out his left hand and placed it on Trixie's shoulder, begging her with his eyes not to start anything that might potentially end with their souls being chewed on. Trixie met his pleading gaze, and acknowledged it with a calm nod that Karon did not trust for one second. So he reached out with his senses, and inside Trixie's mind, beneath the calm facade, all he heard was screaming.

“I'm gonna kill her! I'm gonna kill her! I'm gonna kill her! I'm gonna kill her! I'm gonna kill her! I'm gonna kill her! I'm gonna kill her! I'm gonna--”

Karon cut the connection and squeezed her shoulder a little harder, giving her a meaningful look. For all he knew the soul eater could be just as skilled at sensing energy like he was, and if so reading Trixie's aura would be absolutely trivial. If they were going to play a game with them, Karon could not allow them to show weakness.

“Trix, why don't you go and take a seat,” Karon said, and directed her towards the couch on the right, opposite against where the golden-masked man sat.

“How rude of me! I should have offered you to sit already, please seat yourselves while I introduce the rest of us,” the bird-masked woman said, and ushered Karon to the couch closest to the entrance, so that he would have Trixie to his right and the golden-masked man to his left, and the woman in front of him.

Karon allowed himself to be guided to his seat, and he placed Promise against the armrest to his left, within quick and easy reach. The golden-masked man was still staring hard at Karon, and the pure focus of his stare was enough to make Karon squirm inside. But he couldn't let that show, so he tilted his head and asked, “Do I have something between my teeth?” while peeling back his lips and grinning towards the man.

He snorted derisively in response, and turned his face away from Karon with a languid motion that said Karon was no longer worth his attention. At that moment Karon decided that even though he really liked his robe, he didn't like the man.

The darkly-dressed woman walked back to her seat opposite Karon, her hips swaying invitingly the entire way, and fell onto the couch gracefully. “Now, allow me to introduce ourselves. My name is Dolor, and I am the lady of the manor. The man beside me here is named Timor, and is an adopted sibling of mine. We live here together with our father - his name is Maeror, but he doesn't talk much nowadays, I'm afraid, so you'll have to excuse him if he doesn't act as a proper host should.”

“I understand,” Karon said between gritted teeth, the power and meaning of the names crashing down upon him like a flood of pain, fear and sorrow.

“Well, now that we are all introduced I think it is time to play some games. You see we have all been staying here for such a long time, and visitors are very rare, so we try and make the most out of it when it happens, to make sure we get to have fun together for as long as possible before it is all over.”

Trixie continued to smile falsely towards the woman, and Karon decided that it wasn't that bad of a strategy, and so he smiled as well and spoke in as polite a tone as he could muster. “I understand, though I must say I didn't expect someone to live all the way out here. If I may ask, what was it that made you decide to settle here?”

“It was a decision of pragmatism I'm sad to say,” the woman explained with a sigh, and she turned her head to give the old man a look of disappointment. “When myself and my father first arrived here, it was a place of sunlight and green life. You see, this forest isn't an ordinary forest as I think you might suspect. Rather, this forest is some kind of smaller version of the world trees. The secret is in their roots. You see, where the roots of most ordinary trees seek their nourishment from the ground, the trees of this forest extend much further. They stretch into worlds, countless worlds, and they take nourishment from them. Dreams, emotions, thoughts, events, destinies, entire lives are being drawn from. Not in any way that disrupts them, but rather pick up echoes of it, and then transfers this into the forest at large.”

Trixie was listening with a somewhat interested look on her face, but Karon was going through every word she spoke with utmost attention, and the more he heard the darker his expression got. He already suspected what she was going to say, and what they had done.

“Personally I didn't think much of it, just another curiosity to pass by in search of more interesting … company. However, father decided that with a little work it might be a good place to settle down. So we worked very hard for a long time, until we finally had enchanted the entire forest with a web that allowed us access to it and complete control. When we did, father decided to ... enhance the magic of the trees. And instead of simply distributing the energy the trees harnessed, we forced the trees to keep all that they absorbed inside themselves. Now of course, the trees would have died within hours from that, but father had connected the lives of the trees to us, so as long as we live, they cannot die unless the magic is disrupted. And we can draw from the trees and all they keep within. Millions upon millions of moments in time strong enough for the roots to draw from, moments so intense that the ones that experience them didn't just put their hearts and minds into it, but also small pieces of their soul.”

Trixie turned away from the woman, who spoke of it all with a joyful, almost exhilarated voice. She turned her eyes to Karon instead, and together they shared a sickened look of dread.

“It is quite brilliant, but I wouldn't expect less of my father of course. We now have more to eat then we ever could have found in one single place,” the woman's voice turned a little sad as she continued, “but unfortunately, that means we don't have any need to seek out living beings anymore, and it can get so dreadfully boring in here.”

“I am very sorry to hear that,” Karon said to her.

“Such a good boy, but you shouldn't apologize. This is not your fault, and we do get visitors sometimes. Like Timor here, he was a visitor once and decided to play a few games. He lost, and so I was allowed to keep and teach him. He did much better than the other four that came visiting,” Dolor said, and nodded her head towards the two identically dressed silver-masked men standing at attention. “They weren't interesting, and there wasn't much left of them after we played our games.”

“And what kind of games do you play?” Karon tried to ask innocently.

He couldn't see it, but Karon had no problem feeling the hungry grin behind Dolor's mask. “Well, it is always a little different. I haven't played against a trickster for such a long time, and I think we should try something completely new, something that requires wit.”

“That sounds very intriguing,” Karon said.

“Yes, but a game of wit alone does get dreary very soon. I think it would be most entertaining if we mixed it with, say ... a game of pure chance,” she said and giggled.

Karon felt his heart skip at the thought of playing a game of chance with something that coveted his soul.

“But then again, it would be the easiest kind of game for us to cheat at.”

“Well you have me hooked. What kind of game shall this be then?” Karon asked and leaned forward as if he was eager to get started.

“For the game of wit, I think ... riddles or questions. And for the game of chance ... simple dice. The one that gets the lowest in the game of dice loses, and has to pick between answering a riddle or question. If that person can't give the right answer the other player wins a point, if they can they win a point. The first to ... let's say five, wins the game.”

“And what are we betting?” Karon asked in a somber tone, already knowing the answer.

“Hmmm, I think that if I win then I will get to keep you,” she said and gently dragged a nail across her throat.

“Keep me?” Karon asked, and forced an eyebrow up as if he found the possibility curious rather than terrifying.

“Yes, you are very interesting, and I think I would have fun teaching you, and you might learn even better than Timor here,” she gestured with her hand towards the gold-faced man.

“And what would happen to my companion then? And the spirit inside the spear?” Karon asked.

“We would keep them safe and sound until I've finished training you,” the woman said slowly,  “and then, you will eat them.”

Trixie hissed angrily and her hands balled into fists. She looked ready to try and tear the mask of Dolor and claw her eyes out, so Karon asked quickly, “and if I win?”

The woman moved her head back and forth and hummed to herself like she was thinking about it. After a while she turned back to the gold-masked man and said to him, “What about giving them a ten minute head start if they win?”

Timor was silent for a few seconds, then shrugged and said, “It would make my game a little more entertaining. I'm not expecting much from them, anyway.”

Karon decided that he didn't just not like Timor, but that he actually hated him a little.

“Am I missing something, or will I be playing multiple games?” He asked, tilting his head slightly.

“Well, of course. I like to play more sociable games, but if I lose then my game is over and it will be Timor's turn to entertain our guests. Of course, Timor isn't like me. He likes to hunt things, and so if you win then he will hunt you all in the forest. But you shouldn't worry, if you do win you will have a ten minute head start,” Dolor said and waved her hand like that settled it.

“And what happens if we would win in the hunt as well?” Karon asked suspiciously.

“Then it will be father's time to play, even if he doesn't like it.”

“And what happens if we win against him?”

“I don't know, father never loses,” Dolor answered.

Silence reigned for a couple of heartbeats as Karon digested the information. To his left Trixie was watching him intently, waiting for any sign telling her it was time to unleash hell. Instead Karon held out both his hands with palms up and simply said, “I accept. Let's play.”

Dolor squealed excitedly and clapped her hands with glee. She leaned forward and swept the table clean of everything on it, except for a set of dice, white with black dots and completely nondescript in any way.

“Who will start?” Karon asked politely and cleared his throat.

“You are the guest, so it is only fair you should start,” Dolor answered, and tossed the die so they came scrambling over the table and stopped just in front of him.

Karon reached out and picked them up gingerly. As soon as he touched them his entire mind focused on sensing if there was anything magical about them, but as far as he could detect it was just an ordinary pair of dice.

“Which just makes this harder. If they had been enchanted I could have tried to twist the magic into my favor, now Dolor will notice if I do anything with them to help me cheat.”

“Only if you leave any lasting magic. Maybe if we use something that is only temporary, so weak it will last only for a second, maybe that will work.”

“It will have to be at just the right second.”

“What's life without a challenge every now and then?”

Karon started to shake his right hand with the dice inside, making them rattle like he was about to throw them. Unfortunately, when he tried to come up with something extremely clever, his mind came up blank. The longer he simply sat there, the more it became apparent to everyone else that he was stalling for time.

Eventually he was left with no choice but to toss the dice. They went skittering across the table, and as they went Karon reached out with his senses and utilized something he rarely used - pure raw force. Just as the dice were coming to a halt, he applied a little pressure, and made them land on a six and five.

The hair on his arms stood on end as he waited for Dolor or Timor to call him on his cheating - even Trixie should have been able to sense that he had done something. However, they didn't. Instead Dolor reached out her hand and gathered up the dice, gently shaking them for a few seconds before holding her hand out above the table and letting them fall.

The dice clattered for a few seconds, then stopped at two sixes. Dolor leaned back in her couch, but the feeling she emitted wasn't smug victory, instead she appeared bored. That wasn't what Karon had picked up on though, instead he was wrapping his head around the fact that Dolor had used the exact same way of cheating as he had, but she had done it so overtly that there was no chance anyone with the tiniest hint of magical talent couldn't have detected it.

Was she demonstrating she knew what he had done? Or was there something else going on?

Karon cleared his throat again and brought his hands together, bumping his knuckles together before saying “It just occurred to me that we never went over the rules of this game.”

Dolor tilted her head at an amused angle, and said, “Rules? The rules are simple, try and win. We have already established how to gain points.”

“Oh, that should make things interesting.”

“So it's a 'whatever goes' game.”

“Yeah, though I think we should be careful though. If we start doing things without any hint of subtlety she will grow bored, and things will get ugly.”

“Very well, let's play the game like a trickster should.”

“Looks like I win, now you get to pick a question or a riddle,” Dolor purred in a tone of eager anticipation.

Karon opened his mouth about to answer, when Dolor held up a hand and waved one of the silver-masked men forward. The one that wasn't busy playing the violin must have received a mental command of some kind, because without any other perceivable instructions he turned to the left and went over to one of the bookshelves, and retrieved something from it. Then he turned around and walked over to the table, a great white crystal almost as big as his skull resting in his hands.

He placed it on the table, then silently retreated back to his old position right next to his violin-playing counterpart. Dolor waited until he had returned to his place before she motioned towards the crystal with her left hand and explained, “This is a wonderful toy I picked up when we were still traveling. It will help us in our game. If one of us will ask a question or tell a riddle we do not actually know the answer to truly, it will glow yellow. And if that happens, that person instantly loses.”

“Excellent, this should help make the game fair,” Karon said while cursing inwardly.

“Now, did you want a question or a riddle?” she asked.

“A question,” Karon answered after a brief moment of consideration.

“What is the best excuse in the world?” Dolor asked chirpily.

“Which world?” Timor asked in a bored tone.

“All of them,” Dolor said to him irritably, not sounding the least happy at being interrupted.

Karon didn't listen to them, his mind racing with the possible answers, all of them seemingly more unlikely than the previous. Love, hate, hope, money, fear, destiny, to find a home, to run away, to leave the past, because my dog ate my homework. There were infinite answers that were possible, but there was one that held true. At least to Dolor, and unless she was lying about the crystal, that answer was something that existed as a truth beyond doubt, at the very least as far as she knew.

None of the answers Karon could think of seemed like the sort of thing that would fit. So he forced the thousands of answers out of his mind, and he shut down his racing thoughts. Instead he breathed, and after a calm had settled where only the question hung in suspension, did Karon not try and figure out the answer, but instead tried to sense it. He listened to his instincts, the instincts of a trickster, and waited for an answer to show up.

Karon snorted, then turned his eyes to Dolor with a wry smile on his lips. “To join the party,” he answered.

Dolor squealed happily and held her hands up to her mouth hidden behind the beak of the mask. “Such a clever, clever boy. Oh, you and I will have so much fun together! I think it might be even more interesting than when I was teaching Timor.”

The golden-masked man in question scoffed at the suggestion like it was ridiculous, but Karon saw how his grip on the couch tightened.

“One point for me then,” Karon said, allowing some smugness to creep into his voice.

“Indeed it is, our dear guest is taking the lead,” Dolor said without a hint of worry in her voice. “Now, since you won, you can toss the dice first again.”

Karon reached over and gathered the dice, then shook his hand and tossed them forward just like before. However, when he reached out to flip the dice to his advantage, he instead encountered a pressure, a barrier that pressed against his focused energy and diverted it. Karon turned his eyes from the rolling die and glared at Dolor, suspecting that underneath that mask hid a smirk.

The dice came up at a one and three.

“Tsk, tsk,” Dolor clicked her tongue chidingly and reached across the table to gather the dice in her right hand, giving it a few shakes and dropping them in the middle of the table on the way back. Karon immediately started to try and control the movements of the die, but Dolor was simply too powerful, and swatted his attempts aside with almost laughable ease. They came up at four and five.

“Looks like I win again. Now do you want a question, or a riddle?” she asked innocently.

“What are the odds that we'll manage to get it right twice?”

“Very small.”

“I'll take another question,” Karon sighed.

“What can change the nature of a man?” Dolor asked sweetly.

“Whatever you believe can change it, can. That's an old one,” Karon answered while his heart skipped a beat.

Dolor sighed, “Yes I know, but I once met an old hag who just wouldn't shut up about it and it stuck with me.”

“So now I have two points,” Karon said and tried to make it sound casual.

“So you do, and I think it is your turn again since you won,” Dolor told him, her tone of voice still without a hint of worry.

Karon frowned at her seemingly lack of concern for him taking the lead in their game, but he didn't make any further comments, and instead grabbed the dice and toyed with them between his fingers. Brute force wasn't going well for him, he had lost the game of dice twice now. And even though he had managed to get the right answer for the questions, there was no way he would manage to push his luck for a third time. The universe simply didn't like him that much.

“Play at our strengths.”

Dice were simple, and since there was no point in trying to actually hide that he was cheating, the rules of the game were simply to cheat better than the other. In all fairness Karon should have won any such game just by default of being a trickster. Unfortunately though, he was up against an opponent that he couldn't measure against in terms of raw power, and who obviously had more than a little experience toying with her opponents.

“So, how do you battle against such a creature?”

“You mix it up.”

Karon clenched his fist around the die, and then threw them high up into the air above the table. Three sets of eyes followed the die into the air, however when the die reached the apex of their trajectory, they simply vanished.

Both Trixie and Timor kept staring upwards, trying to spot the die. However as soon as the die disappeared Dolor's head snapped downwards towards the table, where she saw a pair of die right in front of Karon, both of them a six. Trixie and Timor caught on after a few seconds of fruitlessly looking through the air, and the entire room seemed to hold its breath as it waited for Dolor to say something.

Instead she laughed. A laugh filled with the mirth of someone that had been pleasantly surprised, yet to Karon's ears it still managed to sound completely void of any real happiness.

“Aren't you lucky, and now it's my turn,” she said after the last trickling remnants of laughter had died away.

She took the die and shook them a few times before dropping them on the table. Strangely enough, Karon couldn't feel her doing anything to guard against him manipulating them, and so it took him little effort in pushing them to come up at a one and two.

“And so you won. I think I will take ... a question. Since you've already had two, I think it's only fair,” she said and leaned back in the couch, the curves of her body moving invitingly as she did.

“Best take a hard one that we are sure of the answer for.”

“What is the greatest illusion of all?” Karon asked, keeping his eye on the crystal.

It didn't react, and his eyes narrowed slightly from the seeming lack of cheating or double standard towards him. Instead it remained uncreative towards a question he did know the true answer to, and seemed to confirm that it did indeed only react against untruthfulness. At least so far.

“Tricky, tricky,” Dolor said and tapped the tip of the mask's beak.

Karon sat patiently waiting for an answer, occasionally looking over at Trixie, who made no attempt at hiding her boredom through overly explicit yawns while giving Karon looks of impatience. In response he merely shook his head, and ignored her annoyed sigh.

“Divinity,” Dolor eventually said, though the answer was made in a tone that said she wasn't entirely sure.

“Wrong,” Karon announced with noticeable relief.

“That's three, we're winning!”

Dolor smacked her lips and hissed irritably, but the crystal on the table showed clearly that Karon wasn't lying and that she had indeed answered wrong. The tapping of her foot told Karon that the soul eater wasn't in control quite to the degree she wanted him to think, and he had to make use of a lot of willpower to keep himself from grinning smugly at her.

“It appears like it is my turn with the dice again,” he said and picked them up.

He cradled them in his right hand and held it still for a few heartbeats, waiting until everyone was focusing entirely on his hand and waiting for him to throw them. He did, and the die came flying out of his hand and bouncing forward on the table.

Her earlier loss must have upset her more than she had shown, because the wave of energy that struck against the table was far more powerful than anything she had thrown at him so far. And it immediately dispelled the two illusionary die that had come clattering on the table, and instead revealed the two invisible ones Karon had focused on trying to manipulate.

She struck against them like a thunderclap of silent and invisible energy, and brushed Karon aside like he was nothing. The two die abruptly stopped with two ones up, and Karon rubbed his head absently. A small ache was crawling up to his skull from the strain of keeping such small amounts of energy so completely focused. Illusions he could keep up for hours, but physically manipulating objects with just the exact amount of energy to guide their movements instead of outright grabbing them was not something he did often.

“Poor dear, luck is a fickle thing,” Dolor said to him and grabbed the die. She gave them a few shakes then threw them on the table before Karon could think of anything clever to do with them. They came up at a three and six.

“So what will it be dear, riddle or question?” she asked sweetly and leaned forward, giving him a view of her ample chest through the generous cleavage.

“Too many questions already, if we pick that again she's gonna start losing interest in the game.”

“Riddle,” Karon told her.

“Oh what marvelous fun this is going to be. Let me just … hmmm...” she spoke and made a show of thinking about it.

“Maybe we should consider letting Trixie throw a ball of fire at her then run.”

“We have no exit strategy, and we are kinda outnumbered.”

“Details.”

“Oh, I know!” Dolor exclaimed then gently cleared her throat.

"Can be cold as ice and hot as fire

May bestow a curse or bless a soul

Calm as peace or burning with desire

For life or death, to break or make whole

Join one as two, says both good bye

And I love you."

“Oh come on, that could be a million different things!”

“I think that's the point.”

“Come on, we can do this.”

“If it can be cold as ice and hot as fire that would point at it being something determined either by context or something you transfer.”

“'Says both good bye and I love you' means it is something being transferred, something that is being expressed.”

“So it is something you do that can be both hot and cold, says good bye and I love you, and a lot of other things.”

“And it connects two as one.”

“I can think of two things that fits the description; either sex, or...”

“A kiss,” Karon answered.

Dolor remained silent for more than a minute, until eventually she smacked her lips and flicked her left hand like it meant nothing, “Correct.”

Karon didn't manage to suppress a smile this time, and next to him Trixie snorted derisively. Dolor didn't show any signs of noticing, and remained silent as Karon grabbed the die and shook his hand a few times before dropping them down on the table. As before, Dolor's will struck the die and tried to brush Karon's attempt at controlling them aside.

But he was ready for it, and he held out against the pressure of her power with every ounce of willpower he could focus. The die themselves jumped around the table as if they were caught in a whirlwind, and every time they looked to settle another wave of force sent the two of them scattering across the table again.

Eventually the focused energy between Karon and Dolor found some kind of harmony, and both the dice landed on a corner and spun around without showing any sign of tipping over.

Karon clenched his jaw, and tiny droplets of sweat appeared on his forehead as the strain of channeling as much energy as possible, yet only exactly so much that it didn't just break the dice, tore at his concentration. It was like holding a giant can of water over your head, yet only allowing the flow from it to come out in drops.

The stalemate held for what could have been weeks in Karon's mind, until Trixie grunted with impatience and kicked the table. For a second the die were thrown around as if they were in their final death throws, and then landed on a one and two.

Opposite the table Dolor giggled to herself as Karon turned to stare at Trixie with a look that asked if she wanted him to lose. In response she merely shrugged and returned his look with one that said she was bored and wanted to set Dolor on fire.

“You know, it is quite worrisome we have grown to know each other so well we can read that just from each other’s expressions.”

Dolor reached over and grabbed the die and dropped them on the table before Karon had the time to recover, and ended up with a four and two.  

“So what will it be this time? Question or riddle?” Dolor asked.

“Make it another question,” Karon said and tried not to sound too eager. He had four points now, one more and he would have won the game. Though that would lead to him having to participate in Timor's hunt, but for whatever reason, the mostly silent golden-masked man scared him a lot less than the polite seductress that probably could have taught Marquis de Sade a thing or two about causing pain.

“Very well. What about making this one a little more interesting though?” Dolor asked sweetly, the subtle undertones in her voice promising she could find many ways of making things 'interesting' for him.

“How?” Karon said with no small measure of suspicion in his own voice.

“I will let you have three tries, but I will win a point for every try you fail,” she said.

“Why would I want to agree to such a thing when I clearly have the upper hand and are about to win?” Karon asked with his eyebrows raised.

“Because of the question of course, silly,” Dolor answered him.

“Which is?”

“What is it that fate has planned for you, and that the angels and many other forces are leading you towards?” she purred, and a chill went up Karon's spine when he looked at the crystal and saw that it didn't react to her words.

“And you know the answer to that?” he asked with a suddenly dry throat.

“I do,” she said, “I could taste it in your name.”

Karon swallowed slowly, and his mind raced with the possibilities. Metatron had taken a particular interest in him, and there were a lot of forces that had at one time or another cast a curious glance his way, with eyes and spoken words that said they knew something he didn't.

“Come on, it's obviously a bluff!”

“What if it isn't. Dolor is exactly the kind of powerful being that could read where I am going in my name.”

“So what? You're about to win and she's just trying to distract you. You’re letting her mess with your head!”

“She's a soul eater that likes to cause pain and play with her potential victims, throwing a lie out just to stop us from winning would be petty and desperate. Now waiting until the last second of when an opponent thinks he's about to win, then dangle a truth in front of him to keep him from going all the way...”

“Would be sadistically clever and delicious.”

“She knows something at the very least.”

“Blue is actually red,” Karon said out loud, and instantly the crystal on the table shone yellow in a reproachful light.

“Damn it, it actually detects lies.”

“So it's true, she can determine at the very least part of our destiny in our name.”

“It's worth the try.”

“If we lose all three attempts things will have turned in her favor very quickly.”

“It's still worth the try.”

“Fine, go ahead. We still got Trixie eager to set things on fire if all else should fail.”

Karon turned his eyes and rested them on Trixie, who was furiously shaking her head and mouthing 'no, don't you dare' over and over. In answer Karon sighed, then turned his gaze to Dolor and said, “I accept.”

Trixie let out a sound of pure frustration and fell back on her couch with a hand draped over her eyes. Karon ignored her and considered the options before him.

“You know we could answer in the most general terms possible. Like 'they want me to do something important for them'. It would be technically correct and give us the last point we need to win.”

“It would, but it would leave us without a real answer. And I'm not letting this opportunity slip us by.”

“Fine... so what do you think our destiny actually is?”

“My destiny is to aid one or several angels in a task relating to something messing around with the divine order of things,” Karon said carefully, taking a small pause between each word like he was being very careful about how he worded the answer.

“Wrong, one point for me,” Dolor said gleefully.

Karon wrung his hands and licked his lips, taking his time before he opened his mouth again, “My destiny is to cheat or trick something, and it will upset the balance of things to the point the divine will take an interest in it to make sure things aren't pushed out of their fated course.”

“Wrong again, another point for me,” Dolor said, tapping a finger to the table in eager anticipation of his last attempt.

“Told you we should have just taken the easy way out.”

“Still have one attempt left.”

“Yeah and if we fail that it'll be three-four to us, and we'll be dangerously close to ending up in some torture dungeon with Ms. Leather-and-whip here tormenting us for who knows how long.”

“Trix will have set her on fire way before that happens.”

“How much you wanna bet that would only inconvenience Dolor?”

A drop of sweat was slowly making its way down Karon's back, and even though he could force his face to remain impassive, he could do nothing about his sweaty palms or the slight tingling in his feet. The feeling was much the same as if he had been standing on the edge of a cliff and tipping forward excruciatingly slowly.

He licked his lips and thought hard about all the conversations he had had with Metatron, and what hints to his destiny could be found. After several minutes he had gotten nowhere further than before - the angel simply had an interest in him for whatever reason, and one guess wasn't likely to get it right. Even so, he could use a mistake to determine what course his destiny would NOT take, and so determine what was more likely. Assuming he made it out of the soul eater's home alive.

“My destiny is to follow the path of a trickster and overthrow a dominant force oppressing others somewhere at the behest of the angels?” Karon said it like a question rather than an answer, and when Dolor started squealing and clapping her hand delightfully he didn't show any surprise.

“Wrong! So close, yet so far away from the truth. That makes three points for me and four for you! Ohh, what a nail biter this game turned out to be. Now since I won, it's my turn to roll the dice,” Dolor said joyfully and grabbed the die and quickly rolled them, brushing aside Karon's halfhearted attempt to control the outcome.

They landed on a five and six, and Dolor made a sound very similar to a moan of pleasure as they did. Karon remained silent as he reached over and grabbed the dice, shaking them hastily and dropping them straight down on the table. Dolor's will struck against them hard, however as she did one of the die vanished, and instead another appeared which Karon had been focused completely on, which landed on a six. The other landed however on a two, and on the opposite side of the table Dolor chuckled pleasantly at the deception, even though it had turned out to be for naught.

“So, what do you want this time? A question or a riddle?” she asked sweetly.

“A question,” Karon replied.

“What is the most horrible feeling in the world?” she asked him slowly, drawing out each word in a sensual tone.

“Pain,” Karon responded immediately, his heart racing.

“Wrong!” Dolor laughed and clapped her hands. “It is four and four now, the one who wins the next turn wins the game! You and I are going to have so much fun together!” she told him while her laughter turned more and more like the cackling of a madwoman.

“Karon...” Trixie said quietly and leaned towards him, the look she gave saying she was more than ready to start something violent.

Karon shook his head in response and furrowed his eyebrows as Dolor pushed the die over the table to him. He grabbed them and his face turned thoughtful as he slowly shook his closed fist.

“This game has been going exactly as Dolor wanted it to.”

“Yeah ... she was just letting me think I was getting ahead, she's been dominating us since the start.”

“She likes to play with us. Letting us take the lead then baiting us with the question about our destiny.”

“But do you know what the really sadistic thing would be?”

“Yeah, letting the other player think he was going to take the last deciding shot and turn his own trickery against him when he tries a final way to cheat.”

The thoughtful look on Karon's face crumbled and left only stark terror in its place, his eyes turned misty with held-back tears and his hands both shook visibly, even the right hand he was shaking the dice within trembled noticeably in fear. On the other side of the table, Karon could feel Dolor's pleasure at the display, and from her throat came a sound much like the purring of a cat.

Karon forced his right hand still, and he took a quick breath before sending a bit of energy flowing into the die, shaping it on one side of both the die so that it would be heavier than the rest. He couldn't fight Dolor toe-to-toe in a match of will, but with gravity on his side things might work in his favor.

He held his breath and tossed the die forward, then watched with eyes widening in horror as Dolor swiftly reached forward and grabbed the die in the air, “Tsk, tsk, tsk. How silly of me to forget, I won and so it is I that should be tossing the die first. I am so sorry about confusing you, dear,” she spoke with malicious glee.

Karon stared open-mouthed as she shook the die, and eventually dropped them down on the table, not stopping to revert or undo the magic he had placed on the die, but using it against him. It was apparent to anyone looking at him that he was in too much of a shock to try and manipulate the die, and Dolor herself did absolutely nothing as well.

The die rolled over the table, until it eventually came to a stop. At two ones.

Karon's look of horror disappeared in the blink of an eye and turned into smug self-satisfaction as he chuckled. All the other three around the table were leaning forward, and all of them wore looks of pure disbelief on their faces. Or at least so Karon assumed, since Trixie's face was the only one visible.

“How...?” Dolor asked weakly.

“Trickster,” was all Karon said with a wide grin while his heart raced. “So what will it be this time, question or riddle?”

In less than a minute Dolor's control had been ripped right out of her hands, and it was obvious she wasn't dealing with it well. She was wringing her hands and letting out tiny hisses of frustration, until she eventually spat out, “A riddle.”

“You better make this one good.”

“Yeah, so a riddle that she has no way of actually solving sounds good, don't you think?”

“Can't do that, it has to have a true answer or the crystal might think of it as cheating and we lose by default.”

“So ... how about a riddle with an answer she doesn't dare to answer even if she knows it, because if it is right it means it is the truth.”

“What do you... ohhh... that's pretty clever.”

Karon kept on smiling as his eyes darted from side to side, until he eventually opened his mouth and the riddle flowed out in a confident voice.

"It is something gone wrong,

Fractured, pained and diseased,

With no place where to belong,

And with not destiny to seize.

It is something hurt and cracked,

Where up is down and left is right,

And screaming pain follow every act,

Where all of life is eternal blight,

Finds only joy in sharing pain,

Has no other way to stay sane."

The room fell eerily silent after Karon had spoken the riddle; even the silver-masked servant had stopped playing the violin. All of them remained still while the meaning of the riddle sank in, and the meaning of it and who it was directed at was pretty clear.

Dolor was fuming. He couldn't see her expression, but the scarlet rage in her aura was something she didn't even try and hide, and she slowly dragged her nails across the table in a clawing motion.

“Something very powerful,” she answered in a dangerous hiss.

“Wrong,” Karon told her with a relived sigh, and his left hand quickly darted over and grabbed Promise.

But he didn't need to. Dolor didn't lash out in anger, instead she just remained where she was, staring out into empty space while the rest of them waited with bated breath for her to react. After an indeterminate amount of time, she shook her head and said, “No, no it can't be wrong. What's the real answer, then!?”

“Something broken,” Karon replied sadly, and Dolor winced at the answer as the crystal showed no sign of it being anything less than the truth.

“No, no, no; don't you see, he'll ruin you!” she wailed and pointed to Timor, who was lounging in his couch with an air of satisfaction about him. “He'll take you and he won't touch you or train you, he'll just ruin you! I never get to play with new toys!” she went on, and her voice turned into quiet sobs.

Karon opened his mouth to speak, but Dolor held up a hand and made a shooing motion towards him. “Just … go. Go and be ruined.”

“Since you won her game, you have a ten minute head start. Which begins … now.” Timor said, his tone all eagerness for the hunt.

Karon didn't waste a second, and grabbed Trixie's left hand and dragged her with him as he ran back the way they came. When they reached the end of the hallway the door they had entered the manor through was back and standing wide open - neither Karon nor Trixie stopped but continued running right through it and out into the open field. Above them the stars burned distantly, and soon disappeared behind the thick branches as the forest swallowed them up.

“Karon, why are we running!?” Trixie shouted to him and tore her hand free of his grip and stumbled a bit, her movements gangly and uncoordinated.

“Because a fucking soul eater is going to be chasing us soon who wants to eat us!” he screamed back, holding Promise up high with the runes glowing to guide their way.

The sound of Trixie's feet slapping the earth as she ran stopped, and when Karon turned around he saw she had come to a half with her arms crossed. “I mean, why are we running when we could be fighting?” she went on.

“This again? Trix, he's a soul eater, I'm not letting him near you.”

“I've been sitting right next to him and another soul eater at a table for half an hour,” she said and gave him a pointed look.

“You know what I mean! I'm not gonna risk fighting him if there is even the slightest chance of us losing, and there's more than a slight chance for that at the moment so we RUN!” he finished with a roar and set off again. A few seconds later he could hear the sound of Trixie running up behind him again, and a brief look of relief flickered across his face, until it settled back into one of grim determination.

They ran farther and farther into the deep forest, the orange glow of Promise reflecting off the black ichor covering the trees. The run was frantic, and it was obvious Trixie was having difficulty keeping up. As time went on every stride she took looked more unbalanced, and more than once her legs almost tangled themselves up and she was forced to slow down.

The trees rose from the ground without any hint of symmetry towards one another, and where once the great branches might have stretched into the sky they were now twisted and bent. Karon and Trixie dodged around the trunks, leapt over gnarled roots, and ducked beneath the sharp ends of the lowest branches reaching out for them as if pleading for mercy.

Eventually Karon slowed down until he stopped completely, his head twitching from side to side like he was trying to spot an exit that was nowhere in sight. Next to him Trixie turned to look behind them and asked, “How long has it been now? Because I think our ten minutes are up.”

“Yeah, definitely. So what is he waiting for?” Karon asked and took a deep breath, holding it for a moment before letting it out slowly.

“Maybe he's like Dolor and he likes to play around?” Trixie suggested and absently stroked the hilt of the dagger at her belt.

“Maybe, as long as it gives us time to get out of here I don't really care.”

“Speaking of which, do you have any idea where we're supposed to run towards?” Trixie turned to him and asked.

“No, I was just trying to put some distance between us and that place,” Karon admitted and shifted his grip on Promise, resting it against his shoulder.

“So how are we supposed to get out of here?”

“Give me a minute,” Karon said to her and kneeled down on the ground while placing Promise beside him.

Trixie walked over to stand at his back, her right hand firmly on the daggers hilt and her left held out slightly and glowing with charged energies ready to be unleashed at the first sign of their enemy. Behind her, Karon's head was twitching, and his face gradually turned into a scowl, until his eyes snapped open and he rose from the ground quickly, grabbing Promise on the way up.

“Well that plan went to hell fast,” he remarked acidly, and the runes on Promise started to burn even brighter.

“What's wrong?” Trixie asked calmly while her eyes still ran across the shadows around them, looking for movement.

“I guess Timor is making use of their control over the trees because the forest mind is in disarray; I can't make out any sense of direction. The trees themselves don't know at the moment.

“Great, so we have no way out. At least this means we get to fight now, right?” Trixie asked him eagerly, pulling out her dagger and twirling it between her fingers playfully.

“Looks that way. Fucking soul eaters, they didn't need to do this to the entire forest, they would have gotten by just fine using only a few trees instead... of...”

“Supercharging the entire forest with enough soul-infused energy to power several stars.”

“Holy shit, we might actually make it out of this alive and uneaten.”

“Trix, I got an idea,” Karon said hesitantly.

“Why did you make it sound like this idea might be even worse than us just standing here and waiting for the soul eater to show up?” she asked him back with a crooked smile.

“Because it involves tinkering with something that might end up exploding with so much force it will punch a hole in this dimension. Or a number of other things,” he answered innocently.

“Sounds awesome. I'm in,” she replied as her face split into a grin.

“Why am I not surprised? Here's the thing, the trees around us contain enough energy to ... do some serious damage. The soul eaters might use it to feed themselves and gain power, and even though we can't do that, we can still just use the energy to fuel our magic,” Karon said while walking to the tree closest to him.

“So, what? We just try and plug into the trees and charge from them?”

“Yeah basically, but the soul eaters still have the forest under their control so you will have to break through their hold over them,” Karon told her while reaching out with his left hand and placing it on the tree, closing his eyes while his mind reached inside of it.

Trixie shrugged then turned and headed over to the tree closest to her, standing in the opposite direction of the one Karon was busy connecting to. She walked over to it with eager steps and shoved her dagger back into its sheath before slapping both her hands on the sleek trunk.

After a few seconds Karon frowned, and he raised his voice with a note of nervousness in it. “Trix be careful, the trees seem to be more than just channels, they look to be a network of mini-portals; if you don't take it easy, somethin-”

Karon didn't have time to finish his sentence before a pressure wave hit him in the back and slammed his entire body into the tree before him. Promise went flying away from him, and just as he fell back and hit the ground, a sound like that of a thousand voices all screaming in agony at the same time hit him a moment later. Instinctively, he covered his ears and curled into a ball, trying desperately to fight against the terrible screeching, but it did not take long before he could feel blood running out of his ears and drenching his hands.

The screaming gradually faded away, but left a ringing in Karon's ear that blotted out every other sound. Dizzily he raised his head and looked over to where Trixie was standing, a spiral of white light rising around her, and only a small stump left of the tree she had been touching. Strands of energy in every color possible lashed out from the spiral as if they were trying to escape, but died away as soon as they were free.

Trixie didn't move, she just stood there; and after a moment Karon could see that she was not only bathed in the bright white light, but she was also glowing with it. She stared back at him, her eyes filled with terror. He saw her form his name with her lips, but he could hear no other sound over the ringing in his ears. Stumbling to his feet, Karon stretched out his hands towards her, and he saw her calling his name again.

Then a blinding light struck and Karon brought up an arm to shield his eyes. When the light vanished and he let it fall to his side, Trixie was gone.

Karon stared without comprehending at the spot she had been standing on just a few heartbeats ago, and as his hearing slowly returned to normal he walked over towards the burned-out stump of the tree, pieces of the wood scattered around it. The shock on his face only lasted until he came to stand right before it, then he snarled and reached out with both his hands and shoved them into the air in front of him like he was clawing at it.

He thrust his mind into the echoes of the magic of the tree and the energy it had unleashed upon its death. He tore through the layers of impressions, screaming at him with their focused power, all of them a life, a dream, a hope. But he couldn't find any trace of her, he couldn't find any trace of Trixie. She had been caught in a maelstrom of energy, all drawn from thousands of different worlds, and within the chaos of it all it was not possible to sense her.

Thousands of different worlds, even more. All of them had been drawn from, a tiny connection that had been unleashed and freed when the tree died as Trixie had carelessly just tried to force her way into it, as she always did. Thousands of worlds, thousands of gateways, thousands of moments. Trixie had been caught by one, but he didn't know which.

He couldn't sense her. She could be in the past, the present or the future. She could be in the same galaxy or in another reality. He didn't know; it was beyond his abilities.

“If you do not wish to lose something of yours, don't let it fall out of your reach.”

The voice of the bartender rang clearly through his mind, and Karon screamed as he fell to his knees and slammed his fists into the ground. He had been warned, the old man had warned them about the forest. They hadn't listened, Karon hadn't listened - he had just wanted to make Trixie happy. She couldn't resist when danger beckoned.

He had lost her. And as tears began streaming down his face, another voice echoed in his mind, a sweet and sultry voice filled with malicious glee.

“What is the most horrible feeling in the world?”

Karon started laughing, the sound hollow and distant to his damaged ears as the answer came to him.

Helplessness.

Next Chapter: Dark Roots (Part 3) Estimated time remaining: 8 Hours, 26 Minutes