The trail I was following was bright and excited. Each spark had the energy of a child on a holiday. If I didn’t know what sort of thing it was leading to, it would almost have been enough to improve my mood. But, as it led us through the dreary town and to a heavy oak door on a too well-maintained home, it only offered anxiety. I didn’t care. I would help whoever I needed to help. I knew what was happening to them, and I knew how to free them. I just had to do it before Luke’s cult realized who I was and what I wanted to do. I took a deep breath, shared a glance with Margaret, and knocked on the door. Each wrap of my knuckles made a deep, baritone noise that must have echoed through the home beyond, summoning thoughts of vast throne rooms or dark dungeons.

  As such, I was surprised when only a moment later, the door opened and an amiable man stood in a small, warm, and welcoming home, offering me a wide smile. “Well, hello, young lady! To what do we owe the pleasure?” The jovial man greeted, scratching his beard awkwardly as he did. I froze for a moment. I wasn’t actually certain how to respond. I had worked myself up enough to confront whatever the issue was inside,

  “Say something, Mars,” Margaret pushed.

  “Hi,” I greeted awkwardly, letting the moment stretch long enough to make everyone involved uncomfortable.

  “... Hello,” the man repeated. “What can I do for you?” I swallowed hard. Saving people from moving corpses was a lot more straightforward, if nothing else. I had no way to tell if this guy was under Luke’s control or not. Other than a smile which didn’t belong anywhere near this town. My mind raced until it tripped on the one name I couldn’t get out of my head. As such, I stumbled into a terrible answer.

  “Elder Luke sent me,” I replied.

  “Mars, what the fuck?” Margaret immediately asked. We were specifically trying to avoid Luke's notice, and I still thought it was possible they were communicating somehow, so saying his name was less than wise. For the moment, however, it seemed to work out. The man lit up like a stage, and he stepped to the side.

  “Well, why didn’t you say so? Come on in!” he invited. I almost grimaced. Margaret’s sister had been very easy to approach as well. I didn’t want to have to argue my way into every life that needed me. I wasn’t confident that would even be okay in every case. But it would be better than too many doors opening too easily. I walked in, feeling gooseflesh crawl across my arms as I did. The house was warm. It was nice. But it wasn’t kind. It was familiar in an indescribable way. I didn’t have to look around to know something was wrong. I could feel it in the familiarity of the air. It reminded me of home. “So what did Luke need me for?” the man asked.

  “Oh, Dad, who is this?” a new voice greeted. It only barely tremored, and I would have missed it had I not suppressed similar sounds in the past. It sounded like fear, but not of me. A fear worn like hair, growing from the voice as if it belonged there. I turned to face the new voice and immediately understood.

  It had been a young man speaking, maybe sixteen or so. Across from him was a dead woman in an apron. She stood in front of the table with a smile frozen on her still face. There were two of them, and they weren’t children. I couldn’t cast my new spell on both of them at once. I had to make a choice.

  “Just some visitors from Elder Luke,” the older man answered cheerfully. “Sorry about that; what did you need from us? Sweetheart, can you get some tea started for our guests?" The woman he spoke to remained still.

  I kept my eyes locked on the younger boy. He was afraid. More so since his father had mentioned Luke. Those under Luke’s control weren’t allowed to express fear. “I’ll do it, Dad, I think Mom is still a bit tired,” he answered. His father groaned.

  “No, I asked your mother. Let her do what she was asked, and you do what you are asked. Do you understand?” he pressed.

  I made my decision. It seemed fairly clear what was happening. As I looked around the home, I saw the signs of neglect in some places but missing from others. Like half the chores were being done. There were no dishes, but dust covered everything. They were wearing clean clothes, but the floors and table were littered with crumbs. I’d seen what I’d needed.

  “It’s nothing serious,” I finally answered. “I’m a mage, sent by Aethon. Elder Luke has me casting a protective ward on all of Aethon’s most loyal followers. To keep whispers of false plagues and lies of this ‘Quiet’ from entering their homes.” I didn’t know if I could really lie to a man who was only behaving in a way some spell forced him to. But I had to try either way.

  “Oh, he found another mage! I am so honored he thought of me! It would be more than a pleasure!” he agreed readily. I took a deep breath and began to chant, aura exploding from me and raining down on the man before me. He wouldn’t move now, or think anything was wrong while I was patching him up. I reached into the loop and tried to find versions of the man who was free from Luke’s control.

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  But there was a problem. Not like I knew I’d run into with Melody. For her, there was no loop where she was both alive and free. But I immediately found countless instances of the man before me, living through echoes of the loop. Under control of his own body in all of them. But his wife was always dead, and his son was always afraid. He’d never been under anyone’s control at all. I was spending so much aura, and doing nothing with it. But I kept pulling. I wasn’t certain I could stop myself—once I’d started this spell. I kept trying to piece together a man whose son had no reason to fear him. But, much like with my grandmother, I couldn’t make it real. There had to be some version of the person who didn’t hurt the people around them, and such a version had never existed.

  I’d been overconfident again. Like I was as a girl. I’d seen two people living with a corpse, and I’d decided it was the same as the girls. In a way, it was. That boy was clearly being forced to behave as if his mother were alive, even as she clearly wasn’t. But it wasn’t some spell doing it. Just a cruel man. As I finally reached the tail end of my spell—no effect taking place—I rapidly started to chant again. I couldn’t solve the problem with a single spell like I hoped, but the sparks suggested I could do something. So I would.

  Instead of piecing him back together with echoes of other loops, I switched to ‘Still World’. I’d learned to localize it—when fighting Margaret—and I only needed to target a small space. I’d used so much aura on my useless spell, and pulling more ached. But I pushed anyway. Chanting and expending magic until a bubble of time surrounded the seemingly kind man in front of me. By the time my aura dissipated, I was sweating, gasping, and gripping my knees. And then the room was silent. I had to maintain the spell, which was harder to do from the outside.

  “W-what was that?” the boy asked. I gasped for breath a few times, then looked up at him.

  “Do you want to leave?” I asked. I didn’t have time to answer his question. Not until I pulled him out of that house. I didn’t know why he wasn’t under Luke’s control. Perhaps he’d lied to his father well enough that it didn’t seem necessary. Margaret approached the quieted corpse with a frown. I could tell she still hated the way it killed, even if she’d abandoned her past solution to it.

  “L–leave?” he asked. “And go where?”

  “I have a few places I can take you. I can’t promise they’ll be very nice. But you won’t be here,” I replied. He looked away from me, staring directly through Margaret at his dead mother. Then he looked at his father and shuddered.

  “Can you keep him like that?” he asked, the trembling in his voice growing stronger. I took a deep breath. Even as he asked, I was spending more aura than I could spare to keep the man frozen in time. I shook my head.

  “Only for an hour at most. It takes a lot of aura to stop time around a specific person, and I won’t be able to maintain it once we get too far away,” I answered. He bit his lip.

  “He’ll find me. He’ll bring me back,” he whispered.

  “You need a more permanent solution, Mars,” Margaret murmured, still looking at the quiet corpse. “And you won’t need to maintain a spell for that.” I shook my head. I didn’t have the stomach for that. It wasn’t even that I thought she was wrong. I just didn’t have the will for it. It didn’t matter how certain I was. It didn’t matter that she was right. I just… After Camilla, I couldn’t sign off on ending someone’s life. Not when I knew I’d been wrong before.

  “You can stay with me,” I promised. “I’ll keep you as safe as I can. I really am a mage. He won’t bring you back while I’m alive.” The boy’s eyes landed on me like a sunbeam.

  “And if you’re not?” he pleaded. I let out a heavy sigh, my aura still draining and making the words harder to form. I pushed to say everything I needed to anyway.

  “I can’t promise anything past that. But I can’t hold him forever either. I’m sorry. I really am. I want to offer more. I want to tell you that everything will be better if you come with me. But I can’t. Please. Come with me anyway,” I replied. He froze almost as still as his father. “As long as you are with me, you will be allowed to grieve,” I pushed. Finally, he nodded.

  “Alright. I’ll come,” he agreed.

  “You need to solve the problem before we go,” Margaret pushed again. I refused. I wouldn’t do it. Not right after meeting the man.

  “Please,” I whispered. “I can’t leave you, and I can’t keep this up forever either.” Still, the boy stared at me, then back at his dead mother, and finally at his father. I didn’t know how the man scared his son so much. How he terrified him into pretending, even without Luke’s baptism. I would ask for his story later. At that moment, I needed him to agree. In future loops, I would wait longer. I would make sure I understood what was happening. But it was too late for all of that. I needed him to come with me.

  “You have to kill him, Mars!” Margaret insisted. I said nothing. I didn’t even look at Margaret. I just locked my eyes onto the kid in the kitchen, begging him not to stay. Begging him to trust me, even if I didn’t deserve trust. Because it was better. It was better to trust a haggard, broken woman with no direction in the world than to stay in a house with the ghost of his mother and a father who made him act like she was alive.

  He clenched his fists and bit his lip, then nodded.

  And we ran.