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Description

[Warm Welcome]

The next month passed by without incident, the drudgery of work bleeding one day into the next, but, without fail they eventually arrived at their destination, the floating nation of Knott. Collecting their personal items, along with what remained of their supplies, the pair of them departed from the ship and stepped onto the docks where they took a moment to consider their next move. Belix suggested buying a room for the night, but, Clyde insisted on simply going to his mother’s house and staying there. She was noticeably uncomfortable with the idea, but, it would save them some money and that was enough to get her to agree.

She went to secure a carriage ride out to Charlotte’s estate, but Clyde split off, wanting to look in on and touch base with his girlfriend. Belix huffed when he told her his intentions, but gave no comment besides, they agreed on a meeting spot and Clyde split off from her to go check in on the Spa where his girlfriend, Maggie, worked. Along the way he was struck by how different things had become around the area, different, but also very similar, some shops had gone under and been replaced, but, most new shops were just overtaking old buildings and putting out new signs on their fronts. He actually found himself smiling when he noticed the Spa standing in front of him, remaining unchanged in any way he could see.

He boldly strode inside, expecting to see Maggie behind the counter like always, instead it was Tawny, another old friend from the orphanage. She instantly perked up at seeing him, her eyes wide with shock and then drawn with an explainable sorrow. Still, Tawny gave him a kind smile as he walked up to her workstation.

“Hi,” she told him warmly, “It’s been a while.”

“Less than a year,” Clyde commented.

“Yeah, that’s a while,” she scoffed, “You know, me and some of the others were holding a betting pool, wondering if you’d died out there.”

“Right…” he nodded his head awkwardly, “So… is this one of Maggie’s days off?”

Tawny looked at him, her eyes sad once again, from then on she refused to meet his gaze.

“She, um, she got promoted actually, doesn’t come around much any more.”

“She’s at her apartment then?”

“Um… no… she’s at the mansion,” she reached out and squeezed one of the hands he had rested on the counter top, “You should hear it from her.”

“Um… alright,” Clyde pulled back awkwardly, “Thank you.”

He walked out of the Spa, more confused than when he had gone in and feeling all of their eyes on him as he left. Shaking his head, Clyde tried to put it out of his mind and headed back to where Belix was waiting for him.

“That was quick,” Belix commented, smiling as she saw him approach, “That a good thing or a bad thing?”

“I’m not really sure…” Clyde admitted, then looked to see that she wasn’t carrying their bags around anymore, “Did you find a ride?”

“Yep, just waitin’ on you,” Belix grabbed him by the arm and pulled him along.

They were on their way before he could even fully process what was happening, worry starting to cloud his mind, slowing his perception and reasoning. Belix started to pick up on how distraught he seemed to be and did what she could to pry it out of him, but he remained silent for most of the ride, only really bothering to comment on how they had improved the road since he was last there. She latched onto that, trying to get him to talk it over and explain his statement, it worked, somewhat, but all he would do is mention how the path had felt much rougher in the past. In no time they arrived at the mansion and Clyde helped to pull their luggage from the cart, but, Belix hanged back, offering the driver a few silver pieces to not leave just yet.

Clyde passed through the gate, suitcase in hand and wandered down the path to the door like he was floating, equally tantalized and terrified as to what he might find beyond it. Taking one last deep breath to steady his nerves, he raised his fist and knocked on the door.

From deep within there was a shuffling of feet and a man opened the door, his expression at first indignant, then smugly satisfied.

“Ah,” the strange man smirked in Clyde’s face, “The Sperm Donor.”

“I beg your pardon?” Clyde managed to respond calmly.

“Oh beg away,” the man told him off handedly, looking over Clyde’s shoulder to where Belix was standing, “I suppose you’ve been busy, off on some grand adventure.”

“Where is Lady Charlotte?” Clyde demanded.

“In the ground,” the strange man sneered, “She died some weeks ago, didn’t anyone tell you?”

Clyde’s left hand twitched, almost drawing a blade on the man, but he managed to keep himself still.

“And what are you doing in her house?” he asked as non-threateningly as he could.

“No, you’re mistaken,” the strange man practically crowed, “It’s my house now.”

“Alto?” a woman’s voice that he recognized called out before Clyde could respond, “What’s taking you so long?”

She appeared at the other end of the hall, wearing a fantastic blue gown, and gilded jewelry. Recognizing him immediately, she came to a sudden halt and stared at him with a look of horror. Clyde couldn’t think of anything to say, so they stared at each other for a while, and her man, Alto, took the initiative.

“I was just getting rid of him,” he told Maggie, already trying to push the door closed.

Both Maggie and Clyde moved at the same time, him to hold the door open and her to rush forward and prevent a conflict.

“Stop!” she ordered and a look of disappointment washed over Alto’s face, “It’s his house too.”

“If you say so…” Alto backed away, allowing Clyde to step inside, “Will your friend be joining us?”

He added that last part with an obvious sneer in his voice, and Clyde glared at him.

“Yes,” Clyde insisted, “If you don’t mind.”

Belix was not too far behind, pushing the door open wider as she stepped over the threshold to join the others. Maggie took one look at her and let out a baffled scoff, she glared at Clyde for a moment and then grabbed his arm.

“Let’s talk in private,” she commanded him, pulling Clyde down the hall and into the back garden.

He followed her, noticing how she was clutching at his sleeve but refusing to take his hand in hers. He honestly couldn’t tell if she was worried or angry with him.

“So…” she asked, when she felt they were far enough away from the house to be out of earshot, “What have you heard?”

“That Charlotte is dead,” Clyde told her bluntly, “And that you should tell me.”

“...right…” Maggie nodded, letting go of his arm and wandering away while anxiously wringing her hands together, “You want to know how it happened?”

“...yes,” Clyde responded.

“Okay,” Maggie nodded, gathering her thoughts, “Well, she was old, and, well, Deja don’t age, but they do die when they get old enough, so… yeah, that’s how it happened.”

“That’s it?”

“All there is to it,” Maggie insisted.

“Right…” Clyde kept his thoughts to himself, “So who the Hell is Alto?”

“You’re really about to judge me when you brought that Trollop into my house!?”

“Was that what Charlotte put in her will?” Clyde wondered, “She gave us the house?”

“… don’t change the subject,” Maggie snapped, “I’m not about to let you sit there and judge me just because…”

“I’m not judging you, I’m just asking, and if it’s my house too, I think I’ve got a right to know.”

“And that’s it?” Maggie glared at him, a tear leaking from the corner of her eye, “You don’t like his company? It’s not about what I’m doing? The Company I keep?”

“Just tell me already,” Clyde whispered.

“Like I owe you a favor…”

“No,” Clyde admitted, “But you’re already saying it, so… so just tell me already.”

“… he’s my fiance,” she responded softly, “After you left… we met, and then… are you really here to torture me like this?”

“… no,” Clyde looked at the ground.

“Do you even care?!” she demanded.

“… can I have my old room then?” Clyde asked, “Just until I find another place.”

“Sure,” she sighed in frustration, “Fine.”

“And Belix,” Clyde mentioned, still staring pointedly at the dirt, “Can she stay in the guest room, or is that where he is now?”

“It’s not,” Maggie told him harshly, “So, yeah, put her where ever you want.”

“Thank you,” Clyde nodded and then turned away.

He walked back into the house and tossed his suitcase onto his bed, then he collected Belix who was standing awkwardly in the foyer, leering back at Alto as he stared back at her.

“Your room is this way,” Clyde whispered in her ear, leading her down the hall.

“Oh? So you’re staying I take it?” Alto called after them and they both ignored him, “Why don’t you cook me some dinner!”

Belix spun around, taking a run at him only for Clyde to grab her by the scruff of her neck and drag her away.

“He was talking to me,” Clyde insisted.

“I know!” Belix snapped, flipping him off before leaving him flabbergasted in the foyer, “Prick, so who the Hell is he?”

“The new man of the house,” Clyde shrugged, “I suppose.”

“No shit?” Belix blinked at him in shock, “How… I mean, are you okay?”

“I’m processing it…”

“Wait, wait, wait, stop,” she grabbed his shoulder, “I thought this was your mom’s house, what happened?”

“… someone killed her,” Clyde replied bluntly, he opened the door to let her into her room and stepped back, out the corner of his eye he saw Maggie approaching and chewed his lower lip to keep himself from saying something stupid, “We’ll talk about this later.”

He closed the door on Belix and tried to walk away only for Maggie to block his path.

“Can we please…” she whispered, “I lied to you alright, we’re not getting married, but, but we have been dating, for a few months now.”

“Thank you for clarifying,” Clyde tried to push past her, but she grabbed hold of his shirt, burying her face into his chest.

She wept, he didn’t know what to do, so he waited for her to stop, but she didn’t. Still crying, she grabbed hold of Clyde’s hand, and pulled him out of the house.

“You’re evicting me already?” Clyde asked.

“I… I need… just let me show you something,” Maggie told him, wiping away her tears.

The spot she wanted to show him was not too far from where they had talked, a simple paddock overgrown with weeds but for a single small patch of dirt. Atop the mound was a stone with a single word etched into it, a name: Julia. It took several seconds of staring before the full weight of what she was showing him fully crashed down on his head. It was all he could do just to keep standing upright.

“Sperm donor,” he muttered, remembering what Alto had called him, “But… but, it hasn’t been that long… and we…”

“No protection is One-Hundred percent,” Maggie shrugged, “And, um, well, Hey, good news, I don’t think you’re diseased anymore.”

Clyde could only turn and stare as Maggie withered, not able to keep up the facade of joy as she looked away.

“The bad news is...is that I don’t know what you are anymore, I,” she glanced over at the grave, “I don’t know what that… what She was,” Maggie insisted, wiping away a tear, “It was… She was born, was born broken, the doctor… he thought I had been drinking, or doing some drugs or something, I wasn’t… you weren’t there.”

“I see,” Clyde nodded, still numbed to his core, “I… um…”

He stepped back from her, and wandered to the other side of the garden.

“Do you have any idea what it was like?” Maggie demanded tearfully, “Do you even understand what I went through?”

“No,” Clyde admitted, pulling some wild flowers from the overgrowth and winding them together in a ring.

“It wasn’t normal, it hurt you know, I was sick more than I wasn’t, I was vomiting and bleeding, and I…” she screamed, “Just say something you bastard!”

She saw the ring in his hand as his hands dropped limply to his side and her knees gave way. Maggie fell to the dirt a sobbing mess while Clyde stepped back towards the grave of his daughter and placed the floral ring around the stone. A tear leaked down his cheek and he wiped it away with his palm.

“Please…” she whimpered, “Please, just say something.”

“I’m… sorry,” was all he could manage, in desperation he changed the subject, “Is Charlotte here too?”

“What?”

“Where did you bury my mother?” he asked, “Or did you scatter her ashes?”

“That’s really all you’re going to…”

“I don’t know what to say,” Clyde muttered, staring at the ground, “Please, let me go and pay my respects to my mother.”

Wordlessly, she stood up and walked him to a nearby hill, a fresh mound could be seen beneath an old sycamore tree, one sitting next to another that had long ago overgrown. Clyde stood over it, his hands folded, he let his body calm down, allowed his mind to process the situation, all aspects of it.

“She wanted to be buried next to him,” Maggie explained, “That was in her will…”

“I know,” Clyde nodded, “And she left you the house.”

“She left it to us,” Maggie responded softly, “Didn’t get a chance to update it before…”

“Casket or urn?” Clyde wondered, staring down at the recently turned dirt.

“Excuse me?”

“Did you cremate her?” Clyde asked, finally looking back at her.

“No…” she leered back at him, incredulously, “This is what you want details about?”

“Yes,” Clyde responded, walking away, “Would you like me to make something for dinner?”

“...I’ll leave,” Maggie told him, “If you want me to, I’ll sign the house over to you and…”

“She wanted you to have it,” Clyde told her, his brow furrowed as he stared pointedly forward, “She wanted something else for me.”

He met up with Belix and explained his plan. For the rest of the day, they kept their heads down, avoiding Alto’s instigating statements during the nightly meal and then retiring to their rooms around sunset. They waited until well after midnight, when all of the noises made by the living finally died away, becoming the soft, steady gust of slumber. They gathered a lantern and a shovel from the tool shed, then they headed out to that hill. They took turns, switching off every twenty minutes or so, one would dig and the other would hold the lantern. Eventually, Belix decided to break the silence between them.

“So…” she asked as he was knee deep in the grave and already shovling another clot of dirt onto the nearby pile, “Anything you want to talk about?”

“Not particularly,” Clyde responded, not even pausing in his work.

“Oh… anything you Should be talking about?”

He stopped, staring at the ground, he took a deep breath and he got back to work.

“Yes,” he admitted, but Belix let the matter drop, she just wanted him to know that he could talk to her about it.

“Alright, would you mind telling me why we’re digging up your dead mother’s body?”

“Because it’s not her body,” Clyde told her flatly.

“And how would you know?”

“Charlotte was Deja, when they die, their bodies turn to dust, and their souls return to their source.”

“To the worm-thing?”

“It’s known as The Hideous One,” Clyde told her, finally halting in his work, jammed his shovel in the ground and rested against it, “You know the legend?”

“An elf queen fucked a demon,” Belix shrugged, “Didn’t like the way it looked and dropped it in the desert.”

“...yeah…” Clyde muttered, his eyes drifting over to the small clearing hidden behind the weeds, then he got back to work, “And it wasn’t a ‘queen’ it was a Goddess, supposedly the progenitor of the elves, Leliana, she was pursued by the Dark God Typhon, the father of monsters, who wanted her to bare him a son.”

“Well, he got what he wanted.”

“No,” Clyde shook his head, “He wanted a human heir, assumed Leliana would counterbalance his… influence.”

“It didn’t work,” Belix surmised, “So they ditched the kid.”

“He ‘ditched’ his wife,” Clyde corrected her, “He murdered his own son, and threw the body into the s-sand…” he paused, feeling an unbidden tear rolling down his cheek, “Goddamn it…”

“Are you okay?” Belix asked, concerned.

“Fine,” he lied, then did what he could to press on, “Thing is, his son didn’t die, he couldn’t move, but he couldn’t die either, so he sank into the desert, lost and miserable, but, in his loneliness, he discovered a way to free himself.”

“And he created the Deja,” Belix nodded, still looking worried, “So, what’s the deal? He can see through their eyes, feel what they feel?”

“That’s the rumor,” Clyde admitted, his shovel finally cracking against something solid, “And, when they die, he simply births them again.”

Belix joined him in the grave, helping him to clear and lift the coffin lid.

“An endless cycle,” Belix commented, “Still doesn’t explain why we’re doing this.”

“Deja only live for about one-hundred and thirty years,” Clyde glanced at her and retrieved the lantern to better examine the body, “Charlotte was only one-hundred and nineteen, and Maggie thinks she died of old age.”

“Do they still dust when they’re killed?”

“Yeah,” Clyde leaned closer to the corpse, “So what the Hell is this thing still doing here?”

“Maybe it’s a body double,” Belix suggested, reaching down and feeling the corpse’s neck, “Skin feels real…”

“No decay,” Clyde commented, running his thumb over the body’s face and stretching the skin until it tore, revealing wooden plate beneath the facade, “A false body.”

“So, what? She faked her death,” Belix asked.

“Looks that way,” Clyde admitted, folding his hands

“Okay, so…” Belix shook her head, “Wait, why would she leave this behind? I mean, she had to know what people would expect, This would just be a huge red flag.”

“No,” Clyde shook his head, “It’s a message, I just have to figure out how to read it.”

He continued to study the body, wracking his brain to try to figure out where the message might be. He flipped through and searched her jewelry before dropping the bobbles back into the casket. He ran his fingers over the skin of the body searching for blemishes, or hidden messages left in brail, and came back with nothing. He was busy searching her mouth, a last resort to tearing off the face of the false body when Belix reached out to grab his wrist.

“I know this is unpleasant, but…”

“No, shut up,” Belix pushed his hand away and grabbed the lantern for herself as she searched the mouth of the body, “Did she always have a gold tooth?”

The body had its mouth wired shut, Clyde sliced them open with a knife and saw it there, plain as day, one of her back molars had been replaced with a gilded facsimile. Utterly disturbed, but not willing to show it, Clyde stabbed the body and pried the tooth loose to examine it in the lantern light. He smiled after seeing a small hinge built into its edge and pocketed it.

“Good eye,” he commented, nodding appreciatively at Belix as he closed the coffin lid, “Now, let’s fill it back up.”

Description

[Warm Welcome]

The next month passed by without incident, the drudgery of work bleeding one day into the next, but, without fail they eventually arrived at their destination, the floating nation of Knott. Collecting their personal items, along with what remained of their supplies, the pair of them departed from the ship and stepped onto the docks where they took a moment to consider their next move. Belix suggested buying a room for the night, but, Clyde insisted on simply going to his mother’s house and staying there. She was noticeably uncomfortable with the idea, but, it would save them some money and that was enough to get her to agree.

She went to secure a carriage ride out to Charlotte’s estate, but Clyde split off, wanting to look in on and touch base with his girlfriend. Belix huffed when he told her his intentions, but gave no comment besides, they agreed on a meeting spot and Clyde split off from her to go check in on the Spa where his girlfriend, Maggie, worked. Along the way he was struck by how different things had become around the area, different, but also very similar, some shops had gone under and been replaced, but, most new shops were just overtaking old buildings and putting out new signs on their fronts. He actually found himself smiling when he noticed the Spa standing in front of him, remaining unchanged in any way he could see.

He boldly strode inside, expecting to see Maggie behind the counter like always, instead it was Tawny, another old friend from the orphanage. She instantly perked up at seeing him, her eyes wide with shock and then drawn with an explainable sorrow. Still, Tawny gave him a kind smile as he walked up to her workstation.

“Hi,” she told him warmly, “It’s been a while.”

“Less than a year,” Clyde commented.

“Yeah, that’s a while,” she scoffed, “You know, me and some of the others were holding a betting pool, wondering if you’d died out there.”

“Right…” he nodded his head awkwardly, “So… is this one of Maggie’s days off?”

Tawny looked at him, her eyes sad once again, from then on she refused to meet his gaze.

“She, um, she got promoted actually, doesn’t come around much any more.”

“She’s at her apartment then?”

“Um… no… she’s at the mansion,” she reached out and squeezed one of the hands he had rested on the counter top, “You should hear it from her.”

“Um… alright,” Clyde pulled back awkwardly, “Thank you.”

He walked out of the Spa, more confused than when he had gone in and feeling all of their eyes on him as he left. Shaking his head, Clyde tried to put it out of his mind and headed back to where Belix was waiting for him.

“That was quick,” Belix commented, smiling as she saw him approach, “That a good thing or a bad thing?”

“I’m not really sure…” Clyde admitted, then looked to see that she wasn’t carrying their bags around anymore, “Did you find a ride?”

“Yep, just waitin’ on you,” Belix grabbed him by the arm and pulled him along.

They were on their way before he could even fully process what was happening, worry starting to cloud his mind, slowing his perception and reasoning. Belix started to pick up on how distraught he seemed to be and did what she could to pry it out of him, but he remained silent for most of the ride, only really bothering to comment on how they had improved the road since he was last there. She latched onto that, trying to get him to talk it over and explain his statement, it worked, somewhat, but all he would do is mention how the path had felt much rougher in the past. In no time they arrived at the mansion and Clyde helped to pull their luggage from the cart, but, Belix hanged back, offering the driver a few silver pieces to not leave just yet.

Clyde passed through the gate, suitcase in hand and wandered down the path to the door like he was floating, equally tantalized and terrified as to what he might find beyond it. Taking one last deep breath to steady his nerves, he raised his fist and knocked on the door.

From deep within there was a shuffling of feet and a man opened the door, his expression at first indignant, then smugly satisfied.

“Ah,” the strange man smirked in Clyde’s face, “The Sperm Donor.”

“I beg your pardon?” Clyde managed to respond calmly.

“Oh beg away,” the man told him off handedly, looking over Clyde’s shoulder to where Belix was standing, “I suppose you’ve been busy, off on some grand adventure.”

“Where is Lady Charlotte?” Clyde demanded.

“In the ground,” the strange man sneered, “She died some weeks ago, didn’t anyone tell you?”

Clyde’s left hand twitched, almost drawing a blade on the man, but he managed to keep himself still.

“And what are you doing in her house?” he asked as non-threateningly as he could.

“No, you’re mistaken,” the strange man practically crowed, “It’s my house now.”

“Alto?” a woman’s voice that he recognized called out before Clyde could respond, “What’s taking you so long?”

She appeared at the other end of the hall, wearing a fantastic blue gown, and gilded jewelry. Recognizing him immediately, she came to a sudden halt and stared at him with a look of horror. Clyde couldn’t think of anything to say, so they stared at each other for a while, and her man, Alto, took the initiative.

“I was just getting rid of him,” he told Maggie, already trying to push the door closed.

Both Maggie and Clyde moved at the same time, him to hold the door open and her to rush forward and prevent a conflict.

“Stop!” she ordered and a look of disappointment washed over Alto’s face, “It’s his house too.”

“If you say so…” Alto backed away, allowing Clyde to step inside, “Will your friend be joining us?”

He added that last part with an obvious sneer in his voice, and Clyde glared at him.

“Yes,” Clyde insisted, “If you don’t mind.”

Belix was not too far behind, pushing the door open wider as she stepped over the threshold to join the others. Maggie took one look at her and let out a baffled scoff, she glared at Clyde for a moment and then grabbed his arm.

“Let’s talk in private,” she commanded him, pulling Clyde down the hall and into the back garden.

He followed her, noticing how she was clutching at his sleeve but refusing to take his hand in hers. He honestly couldn’t tell if she was worried or angry with him.

“So…” she asked, when she felt they were far enough away from the house to be out of earshot, “What have you heard?”

“That Charlotte is dead,” Clyde told her bluntly, “And that you should tell me.”

“...right…” Maggie nodded, letting go of his arm and wandering away while anxiously wringing her hands together, “You want to know how it happened?”

“...yes,” Clyde responded.

“Okay,” Maggie nodded, gathering her thoughts, “Well, she was old, and, well, Deja don’t age, but they do die when they get old enough, so… yeah, that’s how it happened.”

“That’s it?”

“All there is to it,” Maggie insisted.

“Right…” Clyde kept his thoughts to himself, “So who the Hell is Alto?”

“You’re really about to judge me when you brought that Trollop into my house!?”

“Was that what Charlotte put in her will?” Clyde wondered, “She gave us the house?”

“… don’t change the subject,” Maggie snapped, “I’m not about to let you sit there and judge me just because…”

“I’m not judging you, I’m just asking, and if it’s my house too, I think I’ve got a right to know.”

“And that’s it?” Maggie glared at him, a tear leaking from the corner of her eye, “You don’t like his company? It’s not about what I’m doing? The Company I keep?”

“Just tell me already,” Clyde whispered.

“Like I owe you a favor…”

“No,” Clyde admitted, “But you’re already saying it, so… so just tell me already.”

“… he’s my fiance,” she responded softly, “After you left… we met, and then… are you really here to torture me like this?”

“… no,” Clyde looked at the ground.

“Do you even care?!” she demanded.

“… can I have my old room then?” Clyde asked, “Just until I find another place.”

“Sure,” she sighed in frustration, “Fine.”

“And Belix,” Clyde mentioned, still staring pointedly at the dirt, “Can she stay in the guest room, or is that where he is now?”

“It’s not,” Maggie told him harshly, “So, yeah, put her where ever you want.”

“Thank you,” Clyde nodded and then turned away.

He walked back into the house and tossed his suitcase onto his bed, then he collected Belix who was standing awkwardly in the foyer, leering back at Alto as he stared back at her.

“Your room is this way,” Clyde whispered in her ear, leading her down the hall.

“Oh? So you’re staying I take it?” Alto called after them and they both ignored him, “Why don’t you cook me some dinner!”

Belix spun around, taking a run at him only for Clyde to grab her by the scruff of her neck and drag her away.

“He was talking to me,” Clyde insisted.

“I know!” Belix snapped, flipping him off before leaving him flabbergasted in the foyer, “Prick, so who the Hell is he?”

“The new man of the house,” Clyde shrugged, “I suppose.”

“No shit?” Belix blinked at him in shock, “How… I mean, are you okay?”

“I’m processing it…”

“Wait, wait, wait, stop,” she grabbed his shoulder, “I thought this was your mom’s house, what happened?”

“… someone killed her,” Clyde replied bluntly, he opened the door to let her into her room and stepped back, out the corner of his eye he saw Maggie approaching and chewed his lower lip to keep himself from saying something stupid, “We’ll talk about this later.”

He closed the door on Belix and tried to walk away only for Maggie to block his path.

“Can we please…” she whispered, “I lied to you alright, we’re not getting married, but, but we have been dating, for a few months now.”

“Thank you for clarifying,” Clyde tried to push past her, but she grabbed hold of his shirt, burying her face into his chest.

She wept, he didn’t know what to do, so he waited for her to stop, but she didn’t. Still crying, she grabbed hold of Clyde’s hand, and pulled him out of the house.

“You’re evicting me already?” Clyde asked.

“I… I need… just let me show you something,” Maggie told him, wiping away her tears.

The spot she wanted to show him was not too far from where they had talked, a simple paddock overgrown with weeds but for a single small patch of dirt. Atop the mound was a stone with a single word etched into it, a name: Julia. It took several seconds of staring before the full weight of what she was showing him fully crashed down on his head. It was all he could do just to keep standing upright.

“Sperm donor,” he muttered, remembering what Alto had called him, “But… but, it hasn’t been that long… and we…”

“No protection is One-Hundred percent,” Maggie shrugged, “And, um, well, Hey, good news, I don’t think you’re diseased anymore.”

Clyde could only turn and stare as Maggie withered, not able to keep up the facade of joy as she looked away.

“The bad news is...is that I don’t know what you are anymore, I,” she glanced over at the grave, “I don’t know what that… what She was,” Maggie insisted, wiping away a tear, “It was… She was born, was born broken, the doctor… he thought I had been drinking, or doing some drugs or something, I wasn’t… you weren’t there.”

“I see,” Clyde nodded, still numbed to his core, “I… um…”

He stepped back from her, and wandered to the other side of the garden.

“Do you have any idea what it was like?” Maggie demanded tearfully, “Do you even understand what I went through?”

“No,” Clyde admitted, pulling some wild flowers from the overgrowth and winding them together in a ring.

“It wasn’t normal, it hurt you know, I was sick more than I wasn’t, I was vomiting and bleeding, and I…” she screamed, “Just say something you bastard!”

She saw the ring in his hand as his hands dropped limply to his side and her knees gave way. Maggie fell to the dirt a sobbing mess while Clyde stepped back towards the grave of his daughter and placed the floral ring around the stone. A tear leaked down his cheek and he wiped it away with his palm.

“Please…” she whimpered, “Please, just say something.”

“I’m… sorry,” was all he could manage, in desperation he changed the subject, “Is Charlotte here too?”

“What?”

“Where did you bury my mother?” he asked, “Or did you scatter her ashes?”

“That’s really all you’re going to…”

“I don’t know what to say,” Clyde muttered, staring at the ground, “Please, let me go and pay my respects to my mother.”

Wordlessly, she stood up and walked him to a nearby hill, a fresh mound could be seen beneath an old sycamore tree, one sitting next to another that had long ago overgrown. Clyde stood over it, his hands folded, he let his body calm down, allowed his mind to process the situation, all aspects of it.

“She wanted to be buried next to him,” Maggie explained, “That was in her will…”

“I know,” Clyde nodded, “And she left you the house.”

“She left it to us,” Maggie responded softly, “Didn’t get a chance to update it before…”

“Casket or urn?” Clyde wondered, staring down at the recently turned dirt.

“Excuse me?”

“Did you cremate her?” Clyde asked, finally looking back at her.

“No…” she leered back at him, incredulously, “This is what you want details about?”

“Yes,” Clyde responded, walking away, “Would you like me to make something for dinner?”

“...I’ll leave,” Maggie told him, “If you want me to, I’ll sign the house over to you and…”

“She wanted you to have it,” Clyde told her, his brow furrowed as he stared pointedly forward, “She wanted something else for me.”

He met up with Belix and explained his plan. For the rest of the day, they kept their heads down, avoiding Alto’s instigating statements during the nightly meal and then retiring to their rooms around sunset. They waited until well after midnight, when all of the noises made by the living finally died away, becoming the soft, steady gust of slumber. They gathered a lantern and a shovel from the tool shed, then they headed out to that hill. They took turns, switching off every twenty minutes or so, one would dig and the other would hold the lantern. Eventually, Belix decided to break the silence between them.

“So…” she asked as he was knee deep in the grave and already shovling another clot of dirt onto the nearby pile, “Anything you want to talk about?”

“Not particularly,” Clyde responded, not even pausing in his work.

“Oh… anything you Should be talking about?”

He stopped, staring at the ground, he took a deep breath and he got back to work.

“Yes,” he admitted, but Belix let the matter drop, she just wanted him to know that he could talk to her about it.

“Alright, would you mind telling me why we’re digging up your dead mother’s body?”

“Because it’s not her body,” Clyde told her flatly.

“And how would you know?”

“Charlotte was Deja, when they die, their bodies turn to dust, and their souls return to their source.”

“To the worm-thing?”

“It’s known as The Hideous One,” Clyde told her, finally halting in his work, jammed his shovel in the ground and rested against it, “You know the legend?”

“An elf queen fucked a demon,” Belix shrugged, “Didn’t like the way it looked and dropped it in the desert.”

“...yeah…” Clyde muttered, his eyes drifting over to the small clearing hidden behind the weeds, then he got back to work, “And it wasn’t a ‘queen’ it was a Goddess, supposedly the progenitor of the elves, Leliana, she was pursued by the Dark God Typhon, the father of monsters, who wanted her to bare him a son.”

“Well, he got what he wanted.”

“No,” Clyde shook his head, “He wanted a human heir, assumed Leliana would counterbalance his… influence.”

“It didn’t work,” Belix surmised, “So they ditched the kid.”

“He ‘ditched’ his wife,” Clyde corrected her, “He murdered his own son, and threw the body into the s-sand…” he paused, feeling an unbidden tear rolling down his cheek, “Goddamn it…”

“Are you okay?” Belix asked, concerned.

“Fine,” he lied, then did what he could to press on, “Thing is, his son didn’t die, he couldn’t move, but he couldn’t die either, so he sank into the desert, lost and miserable, but, in his loneliness, he discovered a way to free himself.”

“And he created the Deja,” Belix nodded, still looking worried, “So, what’s the deal? He can see through their eyes, feel what they feel?”

“That’s the rumor,” Clyde admitted, his shovel finally cracking against something solid, “And, when they die, he simply births them again.”

Belix joined him in the grave, helping him to clear and lift the coffin lid.

“An endless cycle,” Belix commented, “Still doesn’t explain why we’re doing this.”

“Deja only live for about one-hundred and thirty years,” Clyde glanced at her and retrieved the lantern to better examine the body, “Charlotte was only one-hundred and nineteen, and Maggie thinks she died of old age.”

“Do they still dust when they’re killed?”

“Yeah,” Clyde leaned closer to the corpse, “So what the Hell is this thing still doing here?”

“Maybe it’s a body double,” Belix suggested, reaching down and feeling the corpse’s neck, “Skin feels real…”

“No decay,” Clyde commented, running his thumb over the body’s face and stretching the skin until it tore, revealing wooden plate beneath the facade, “A false body.”

“So, what? She faked her death,” Belix asked.

“Looks that way,” Clyde admitted, folding his hands

“Okay, so…” Belix shook her head, “Wait, why would she leave this behind? I mean, she had to know what people would expect, This would just be a huge red flag.”

“No,” Clyde shook his head, “It’s a message, I just have to figure out how to read it.”

He continued to study the body, wracking his brain to try to figure out where the message might be. He flipped through and searched her jewelry before dropping the bobbles back into the casket. He ran his fingers over the skin of the body searching for blemishes, or hidden messages left in brail, and came back with nothing. He was busy searching her mouth, a last resort to tearing off the face of the false body when Belix reached out to grab his wrist.

“I know this is unpleasant, but…”

“No, shut up,” Belix pushed his hand away and grabbed the lantern for herself as she searched the mouth of the body, “Did she always have a gold tooth?”

The body had its mouth wired shut, Clyde sliced them open with a knife and saw it there, plain as day, one of her back molars had been replaced with a gilded facsimile. Utterly disturbed, but not willing to show it, Clyde stabbed the body and pried the tooth loose to examine it in the lantern light. He smiled after seeing a small hinge built into its edge and pocketed it.

“Good eye,” he commented, nodding appreciatively at Belix as he closed the coffin lid, “Now, let’s fill it back up.”