The Demon Lord And His Hero

Syryn, I have good news and bad news.

[Give me the good news first.]

I've found a way to get into the sealed memories.

[Glad to hear that. What's the bad news?]

You'll have to sleep for a very long time while the process happens.

[How long?]

It's impossible to predict. Imagine boiling a pot of bones when you've never done it before. You only know that it might take days.

[But it won't take more than a week. So what's the sleep equivalent of that?]

I'll give it a year or two.

[A year?!]

Minimum.

[And what if I don't want to sleep?]

Then the memories stay locked. It's your choice.

[Let me first talk to Rowan about it.]

_____

Red had been feeling uneasy about Syryn. The older brother had never been the most normal of people but he was even weirder these days. Syryn was polite, well behaved, and spent long hours just staring at the sky or the forest. He seemed more like Riha than Riha himself. Since Enkansh's arrival, the selkie had been more active in the house, exchanging barbed words with the siren whenever an opportunity presented itself.

Rowan hadn't been home in days since he was dispatched to the opposite end of the kingdom for a retrieval. Syryn was left alone looking lost and empty.

"What's wrong with you?" Red asked the mage after noticing that Syryn had made a cup of tea and hadn't touched it in the last hour that the child had been watching him.

"I've been thinking," Syryn replied. "Every day I become more and more like a ghost."

Even the man himself had noticed it.

"Why is this happening to you?"

Syryn shrugged. "Perhaps a lack of attachment and motivation. I thought that maybe if I came back home, it would revive my spirits. And it did, but I've fallen into the pit again. It has been happening more often these days."

The redhead took the cup of cold tea from Syryn's hand. He poured the tea out of the window, onto a patch of flowers.

"Syryn, I'm sorry that this happened to you," the child said to him in a softer tone.

(Oh no, there's going to be a disaster tonight! Red is being nice! What's going to happen to this world?!)

[Shut up, Luci! You're insufferable.]

(Suck on a-)

[No! Who taught you to say that?!]

"-going to be okay because it's not permanent."

(Peyton's older brother.)

"Peyton-" Red was confused by the dual conversations that were taking place. "I mean yeah, it's not permanent."

(Luci, if Rowan heard you saying that, it'll break his heart.)

[It's fine. Kids my age say worse when their parents aren't listening. Anyway, focus on Syryn.]

"-sleep for a year it seems."

"What? Who?" Red caught the tail end of what Syryn had said but it was the important bit.

"Me," Syryn replied.

"What do you mean you're going to sleep for a year? Seeing you passed out for a week was enough to stress out everyone in the house. Rowan had been losing his mind. Does he know?" Red said it all in a single breath.

"I'll tell him when he comes back."

(Ask him why he's going into another coma!)

"Syryn, this is crazy. You can't-" Red began pacing back and forth. "A year. For your memories? Thats bullshit."

The mage looked back at him apathetically. "It might go on longer than a year."

"No," Red said violently. "This sounds dangerous and I will not have you go through it."

Syryn smiled at the child's bossy attitude. He was going to be like Rowan one day.

"Heat up a teapot for me," Syryn replied, no longer wanting to talk about it.

"No, heat it yourself."

(I'll do it, Red.)

[Stay out of this for a while, Luci. Your big brother is making a stupid decision. Again. At least that hasn't changed.]

"Okay," Syryn replied peacefully.

"Syryn stop, I'll do it. I don't like it alright."

"If you don't like it then I'll heat it myself," Syryn said as he stood up.

"May the gods have mercy on your dumb self, Syryn Nigh'hart," Red angrily told the mage before storming off to the kitchen. Not a moment later, Red stomped back inside and snatched the teapot out of Syryn's hand.

"I was talking about you sleeping for a year, not the tea," he informed the older mage with a frown. "Tell Rowan as soon as he reaches home."

Red was hoping that Rowan would stop Syryn from acting foolishly. He still didn't trust the strange being living inside the mage's mind.

"I will."

_________

When Rowan returned, he had a cut on his lip. Artemus had been shocked to see him injured. When he enquired about it, Rowan had told him not to worry about it. It had been an accident caused by his own carelessness.

Syryn noticed it as soon as the blond reached home. "How did that happen, Rowan?" He asked the anti mage. After having seen him easily cut down enemies from a distance, it was troubling to see the blond injured.

"Just a careless mistake I made," Rowan told the worried mage.

"You don't seem the type to make careless mistakes," Syryn replied softly. "What really happened?"

Rowan had easily completed his objective. Having a week's deadline left, he went on to another kingdom where trouble was brewing. High-level demons were running around pretending to be humans. They had even infiltrated the ranks of the nobility. Growing concerned by the movements of the demons, Rowan had tracked down a slippery one whose power enabled it to reflect damage back to the attacker. In the process of killing the demon, Rowan had received a cut lip. But he wasn't going to tell Syryn about that.

"I was exploring a dark tunnel when a gust of wind blew through and put out my torch. I ended up bumping into the wall and sustained a tiny cut." It wasn't really a lie because this had happened to Rowan before, except he received a bump on the head.

"Oh, alright."

Rowan felt terrible about lying to Syryn but it was necessary.

"Anyway, there is something I need to discuss with you," Syryn told the anti mage.