Infernal Investigations

I looked at the gaping void once again.

I'd left the Xang along with the others still upstairs in the facsimile of my shop. A quick inquiry into whether they could accompany me at all had ended with a firm no from all involved. Well, a choked one from the Thief.

So now I was back here, staring briefly into the void I'd tumbled through before landing in the graveyard.

I dismissed it a second later, continuing on down the tunnel. Maybe taking a different approach would have helped get through that. Maybe it wouldn't have. Either way, best not to try breaking things around here anymore. Trust in my mind, take the path laid out, and maybe things would be easier this way than another one.

By the time I reached the end of the tunnel, I wish I had gone to the graveyard instead.

I stepped onto the courtyard of the Xang's, a wary eye around me. Overhead, a sun shone down through sparse clouds on a strangely empty courtyard. In my memories, even at the most barren of times, it had been filled. At a bare minimum, the massive Gingko tree that grandfather had brought here with him should be filling this space.

Instead, in its place was the exit of the tunnel I emerged from, floating in mid-air. Eyebrow raised, I moved to the other side, only to find nothing in the open space. Poking a finger in the space where that tunnel should be found, nothing but empty air.

"This is all rather surreal," I muttered. "Could I not think of something a little more straightforward than this?"

No answer, not that I expected one from my subconscious. Still infuriating as I walked around, seeing the floating empty tunnel exit come into view.

Messing around with this was likely not the correct path forward, but I didn't particularly want to venture inside. I'd spent enough time reliving painful memories, as that stint in the graveyard had only reinforced. I'd rather be devoured by a host of zombies while fully aware than relive some of the more painful moments with my family.

The tunnel entrance suddenly vanished, disappearing into the air with not even a sound.

"Point taken," I said, crossing my arms as the clouds above grew in quantity. The sky could no longer be considered to have sparse coverage, and it was quickly shifting towards overcast. While I could see how long I could stand the sure-to-arrive downpour, getting into a pissing contest with my own mind seemed a particularly futile idea.

Besides, I'd convinced myself I would try, hadn't I?

I had, in return for pleasant words and a calm conversation that felt a lot more distant now. This place shouldn't raise my hackles this much. I was far removed from what had happened inside its walls now. Still, my mouth felt full of ash as I stepped hesitantly towards the door most familiar to me.

Southern door, southern house. The part that traditionally received the least amount of sun. Usually reserved for servants. I'd gone through my early years unaware of the insult until a cousin had finally clued me in on what it meant.

Through the gate first, which I pushed open, then continued down a few steps, making my way to the opposite house, pausing halfway there. It felt strange walking in here again. The crunch of a gravel road, which usually the Quarter meant dust, mud, and the occasional actual street. The storm clouds above continued to gather, and I pulled my coat tighter. Frowning, I glared at the brighter threads slowly infiltrating my coat, black, white, and silver strands infiltrating it, while I could feel the fabric of my clothes shifting.

"None of that," I snapped, and they stopped.

I didn't care what memories this place brought back; I wasn't wearing their clothes. Liar, I thought to myself, remembering the Montagues' party. What a bundle of mistakes and disasters that had been.

Much like my time here had been. Not that I really had any choice in this matter. There'd been a time when I pored through my memories, trying to think what the one thing I could have done differently to make it so we could stay. The thing about me I could fix that would have made my family not hate me.

I'd given up once I realized that there was no way to cut the Infernal out. And nothing else would suffice.

Sighing, I reluctantly continued down the path, taking in the details of the southernmost house. The broken window on the end, never fixed while I'd lived there. The faded red on the pillars that mother and I had tried to fix, but could never get right.

Wait. If this were my youth, perhaps it meant-I was running now, down to the door. It was one of two on the house, thin enough in places you could almost see through it. My hands grasping as I forced it open, hoping beyond hope she'd be inside as I slid the door open.

Everything was laid out exactly as I remembered, all as it had been for years. A small kitchen to the left, and even a smaller place for us to eat, then to the right, where we had lived and slept, all of it the same. The same slightly crooked little table, places to sit on old pillows, almost torn after years of use. Chipped cups and teaset were waiting on the shelves of one cabinet, faded red and green. Sparse furniture, sparse comforts, exactly as I remembered. Except for one crucial missing detail.

I went to where she and I had lain, sitting down on the bed, hand brushing the covers. They felt warm, like someone had just lain here.

"Why would she be here?" I said, chiding myself lightly. If she had shown up, a good chance she would have been sleeping, much like she was stuck eternally doing in real life. No singing while combing my hair before we went to sleep. No stories of tricking and tempting spirits hiding in the mist.

Sighing, I looked around the room. Hmm, most of our personal effects were missing as well. What, was this how I'd imagined this place after we had gone?

I didn't remember stealing the tree when we left.

Giggling at that, I sighed, then left, heading back to the center area. There was the tree, towering high, and I eyed it. If I cut it down, would the tunnel out be somewhere inside it?

Despite my desire to get out of this place, I wasn't quite at the point of chopping down an innocent tree I used to play in the branches of. Even if this wasn't the real one.

Instead, I moved towards the northernmost house, ignoring the ones belonging to my aunts and uncles. Above, thunder rang out as the clouds had finished gathering, and I felt a wet, fat raindrop smack into the scales of my cheek as I made for the main dwelling. The one belonging to my grandfather, as I forced open the door.

Doing this in my youth would have had me yelled at. In fairness, any of my cousins would also be rebuked for entering Grandfather's house without permission. Even some of the youngest of his children, or any who were out of favor.

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I stepped forward, hesitated, then immediately chided myself for hesitating. There was no one here, and even if there was, why should I hold back in anything regarding the Xangs?

Laying my hand on the door, I clicked my tongue in annoyance. Those infiltrating threads were back, spreading through my brown jacket once again, but with a roll of my eyes, I stopped paying them any mind. No one was around to see, so stop worrying about it.

I stepped inside, and immediately wrinkled my nose as a wave of dust tried to make me sneeze. Inside the house, a layer of dust coated the ground, which I looked over. He hadn't tolerated anything like this, so a strange addition for my mind to make. The entrance room was the same as it had been in my mind; not a single part of it looked Anglean in style. It felt a little nostalgic, being in a place like this as opposed to what I'd been immersed in since leaving.

Nostalgia tinged with spite.

Grandfather has insisted it be built like this, when his dear friend, the Queen, had given him empty property to stay in. Long exiled from his homeland, he had done his best to bring it here instead, along with the small community he'd brought with him.

Foolishly, I thought now, years later. Oh, there was something beautiful about this, but not to the point of waging war on the encroaching influence of foreign places. Foreign defined as anything outside the house that didn't originate from thousands of miles away. Mother claimed he had never made peace with his exile, and she doubted he ever would.

I had been in his presence a few times. It had felt welcoming, for a time, then increasingly less as time went on. As his exile wore on him. As I became not just a relative but the only one of his grandchildren to have been sired in part by a foreigner.

I snorted. Only here would the fact that the devil who'd contributed to me being Anglean have mattered in the slightest.

I poked around a little more, opening a door to the side room. Displays of armor and weapons, a few trophies from my grandfather's career before and after exile to Anglea, including the head of a dragon quite different from the Anglean breed. The hunt that had gotten him exiled to begin with.

I suppose irritating draconics must run in the blood.

In his defense, as he had often stated, only demanding tribute in terms of ruinous costs in coin was only slightly better than blood, death, or the unmarried daughters of merchants trying to cross the strait.

Then again, the only word I had on that was my grandfather's. Maybe one day, if I ever ended up there, I'd find the dragon had been the provincial tax collector and the head-chopping over my grandfather's annoyance with it. There'd been quite a few rants about Anglean tax collectors, and their eternal quest to rob him blind.

In fairness, he had helped the current Queen reclaim her throne. A tax lien was perhaps expected. Or at least not a hounding.

I walked down the empty trophy room, eyes lingering on pieces. Mostly armor and weapons, or trophies. The family had been in the monster-hunting business since the first one, and I looked at the three-eyed head of the demon. Claimed to have terrorized eighteen villages, stealing the skin of villagers for its woven disguises, til meeting its end at a single brave peasant fisherwoman's spear.

I wasn't sure how many generations stood between me and her, but it was oddly perfect; the family had started killing creatures of the infernal. That weighed on the scales regarding me as well.

Not just from the old country was everything displayed here. There was the armor that one of my uncles had died in helping fight Jonesey the Cutter before I was even born. And next to that, the preserved head of Jonesey, expression frozen in the sheer shock I'd heard had overtaken him when a dead man's blade had separated head from neck. It was the expression his face always went back to when not screaming curses at us for his death.

There'd been a necromantic binding on his soul he'd put in to try and keep him alive. Grandfather had either not known when he asked for his head as a trophy, or didn't care. Either way, I'd had quite a few conversations with Avernon's most prolific serial killer in my youth. Mostly bad ones, but there were a few good ones mixed in as well as threats to carve me up when I got older.

I'd once stuck a lit firecracker in his mouth. That had been worth getting lectured for potential damage to everything but the head. As well as Jonesey swearing undying vengeance for robbing him of his jaw.

There was the axe some great-aunt had used to slay the sea serpent of Zanzhou Bay. My cousin Zhi and I had once tried stealing it to kill the ghost we were sure lived in the eastern house. After almost cutting off Aunt Diwei's leg, we'd been banished from the trophy room for six weeks time.

So many stories. So much history, both back there and over here.

So much history in here. History, I'd been denied. The Xang's words had struck true. How could things have turned out? If they hadn't thrown me out?

I paused at some of the weapons, touching the handles lightly. They were loose enough that I could pull them free. If I wanted a weapon inside here. I put a finger on the hilt, then winced, shoulders scrunching in as deep inside myself as I anticipated a scolding.

None. Nothing. Stop worrying Malvia.

I still left the blades as I continued through. Was I unworthy of them, or were they unworthy of me? Either way, I wasn't touching them.

Nothing else really worth noting. I avoided his bedroom. If I could find anything in there, I doubted it would be pleasant.

Checking the other rooms brought nothing but memories, good and bad, and the former clawed at me just as badly as the latter had.

Another crack of thunder. I could hear the sound of rain pouring down outside, although not as keenly as I should have. This place had not stopped messing with my hearing. Or was biosculpting just not allowed in my own mind?

You could biosculpt the mind. It just came with a horrendous cost, and honestly, trying to look into making myself permanently cheerful had been a moronic thought to have anyway.

Going back outside rain poured down, sheets of it coming down and splattering across the dirt and gravel of the courtyard. The towering Gingko tree swayed in the wind, water thrown with every movement. Above, the sky was nothing but dark clouds, unleashing their fury with the wind, rain, and lightning on those of us down below.

Or just simple climate science, aided by magic. Out in the real world the Queen occasionally ordered the mages in charge of maintaining Avernon's weather to let in storms like this as well as the blizzard. To not mess with the natural patterns of weather and worsen the weather that might someday come. Also to refill the city's reservoir.

Magical theory backed her. I still thought she ordered it when she got pissed and had to make her citizens share in her bad mood.

I sighed, trying to peer through the falling sheets before I tried venturing out in them. Sure, this was in my head, but I didn't doubt feeling wet and miserable wouldn't happen. Sadly, with all that was pouring down, I could only barely make out the eastern and western houses, much less anything else. Until somehow I spotted something else in the rain, something I shouldn't have been able to see.

Among the rain, a butterfly struggled, having fallen to the ground. Wings wet, it struggled to leave the ground, failing before making even an inch. I stared at its failed takeoff in disbelief.

"This?" I asked the open air. "This is what I'm confronted with?"

No response, and I cursed my own foolishness for expecting one. The only aspects of my subconscious I'd be talking to were fey spirits wearing them, and they had all stayed playing cards and drinking.

In many ways, they had the right idea.

I crossed my arms, determined not to fall for whatever my mind thought I needed to learn, trying to replay the conversations that had led to this in my head. Is that all that had sparked this? Uncle Liu bringing it up in conversation? I could still remember that time, finding it on the ground, picking it up with tears in my eyes and trying to find someone who could help it.

Carefully, I reached down, using a nearby leaf to gingerly pick it up.

"My mind must be having a fit," I muttered. "This is what it came up with? Suggestions from our once dearest Uncle?"

Maybe still dearest. I couldn't think of any others that would be as polite as he was around me. Then again, I'd barely seen any of them. What would their opinions be of me?

Probably established by the newspapers. Considering they were accusing me of cannibalism, probably not well.

I used the leaf to gently move the butterfly to my hand.

"This is foolish," I confessed to it.

It fluttered weakly, and I felt even greater a fool for having said anything. Malvia Harrow, whisperer to butterflies.

"Well, if it is to be foolishness, it will be foolishness under a dry roof," I said, standing up.

Something howled, a thunderous roar louder than even the storm's thunder. The wooden walls of the house shuddered, roofing tiles coming loose, then again as two more howls joined the first. They tapered off, replaced by snarls and the sounds of heavy paws on wood.

I let out a tired, angry sigh, then gave the butterfly a stern look.

"This is your fault," I said seriously. "Yours and the Xang's."

It fluttered weakly in response. Clearly an attempted protestation of innocence. I cupped my hands around it, knowing that what was to come would mean moving fast. I made for the southern door once again.