I sat before the fire until all that remained was ember and ash.

  Sat… and thought.

  Who was I, really?

  I reached up to touch the patch over where my eye used to be, then turned my gaze to the wooden leg sat beside the chair.

  In the dimness, it was almost like it wasn’t there. The ache in my knee spoke differently.

  “I can do something about it,” Vaarg had said.

  Did I want him to?

  So then, what was it that made me Beeg?

  And more importantly, when had I become him?

  Was it the moment I chose the name?

  That… didn’t seem right. And it didn’t seem right that it was the trauma he had endured, either.

  So then… what?

  I grunted and re-attached my leg, hobbling to the door. Normally I would be more graceful, but tonight?

  I was tired.

  The outside of the office, it was dark. Vaarg must have followed through on closing the store for the night.

  Curious.

  The darkness was absolute, not one candle lit.

  Silent too, the conversational creaks noticeably absent.

  That was good. The store had worked hard today — it deserved a rest.

  But it was also lonely.

  “Vaarg?” I called. “Stupid, It?”

  Only darkness responded. I sighed and resigned myself to navigating by feel, running my hands along the shelves.

  The store groaned softly and grew a gently burning candle from one of its shelves.

  I stared at it for a moment.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “Thanks buddy,” I murmured, taking the candle and patting the shelf.

  But the store had already fallen back asleep.

  I slowly made my way through the store, enjoying the moment of solitude within my nimbus of light while the clicks from my leg echoed beyond.

  A jar quietly sobbed next to me. I stopped to look.

  Why wasn’t I more disturbed?

  I should be.

  Perhaps it was because I knew Vaarg better now.

  If the jar was cursed, it deserved it in some way.

  I yawned, the exhaustion from the day finally catching up, and walked on from the still sobbing jar.

  I looked up, realizing I had made my way to Aisle 6. Which I now knew was some kind of portal between the store and his brother.

  Whatever that meant.

  So much I had learned, and the questions just kept getting bigger.

  I could visit the library again.

  Maybe I should.

  The first visit had given me so much hope. The second… I still didn’t know how to feel about it.

  And every time I tried, something catastrophic happened.

  I just wanted to learn magic. I just wanted to cast a spell.

  … I just wanted to matter.

  Maybe that was what made me Beeg?

  I continued my meandering path to the front of the store.

  “That’s quite terrifying, you know?” a voice drawled from the dark.

  I squinted. I hadn’t heard that voice in a long time.

  “Ugly?”

  “The one and only.”

  I waited. “Mind stepping into the light?”

  “I’m comfortable here, thanks.”

  I exhaled in exasperation, which ended up becoming a mouth stretching yawn.

  “I haven’t seen you in forever,” I said, resuming my shuffle to the front.

  “I’m here, just watching,” his voice drifted from the shadows next to me.

  I wasn’t sure if that was comforting or alarming.

  “What did you mean, ‘terrifying’?”

  Ugly scoffed.

  “The hooded warlock slowly makes his way through the darkness, a single candle held aloft with only the sound of a wooden leg to announce his arrival.”

  “Not you too,” I rolled my eye. “I’m not a warlock, and it’s dark — I needed light.”

  I wasn’t sure how, but I felt him nod next to me.

  “First off, yes you are. Secondly, are you what you believe yourself to be, or are you what the world sees?”

  I paused.

  “What does that even mean?”

  But Ugly had gone and only silence and cobwebs greeted my question.

  I slowly turned the handle to leave the store.

  Was Beeg what I was, rather than who I was?

  I tugged on the handle and the door crashed open, flung aside by the winter wind and snow seeking entrance.

  My candle died.

  I pulled my cloak tight and stepped through.

  To head… to where I lay my head.

  Because at that moment? The store felt more like home.

  ____

  I shivered as the cold invaded my cloak.

  It was a light snow, the kind that felt more like powder and floated rather than fell. The light from the cobblestones softly peeked through the inches that covered the ground.

  The wind softened as I made my way back until finally it was nonexistent, leaving the snow to drift uninterrupted.

  I didn’t often have time to stop and think, and my mind felt a stranger this night.

  I found myself wishing Stupid was with me.

  Elara.

  Perhaps I, too, had been unfair. I had thought of goblins as less.

  Not anymore of course, but in the past I had.

  How foolish of me.

  They were the only ones to give me a home.