C19 To Live Two Lives

Chapter 19. To Live Two Lives

“Ladies and gentlemen! Please! Put your voices together for the mighty wizard!” a voice exploded. The audience roared in appreciation. Across the way was an old man with a long white beard, billowing wizards robes, and a gnarled old staff.

“Kench?” Finnigan said to himself. Everything fell silent and thousands of people snapped their heads and stared at Finnigan. He looked back and felt his stomach drop. None of them had faces! It was all smooth skin where faces should be. Finnigan stepped forward and lined up against the old wizard.

“You must be Finnigan?” the old man asked.

“You must be what Kench wants to become? You look good Kench, work with me, and this can actually happen. I’d rather you use a wand though instead of that staff, less power but much more control. You can do things with a wand you can’t do with a staff.”

“You would think that, but it’s magic, Finnigan,” the old man said. “For example, watch this.” He lifted his staff into the air and crashed it hard onto the ground. The ends of the staff each grew a tiny protuberance that resembled the tip of a wand. “Catch!” the old man yelled. He jumped high into the air, spinning his staff in his hands. It became a blur of motion, and a series of golden spells erupted from both ends, assaulting Finnigan on every side.

Finnigan was quick and launched ripostes as fast as he could muster. This Kench was fast though, too fast. He landed on the ground in front of Finnigan and brought the staff up hard into Finnigan's stomach. Finnigan flew backward across the battle arena floor, which shifted into hard dirt as he soared. He landed hard and doubled over. He didn’t lose to Kench in the real world, he wouldn’t lose to him in this one. He pointed his wand at Kench, who was stalking towards him. He launched a series of spells as rapidly as he could, but Kench’s staff turned into a blur as he spun it. The spells stopped and formed a sphere in front of Kench, undulating slowly. He stopped his staff and held it outstretched in a muscular arm, Finnigan's own magic pulsating, a shade of blue that shone light into the old magicians' eyes.

“You have to know, here, in Kench’s mind, you can’t win,” the old wizard said.

“Ya think?” Finnigan said, “Looks like I’ve got you right where I want you.”

“Ba!” the old Kench barked angrily. “You’re an infection in Kench’s mind. You felt it resist you, you felt it try to keep you out, now you’re here with me; in my realm. You’re the disease, and I’m the immune system.” The old man's mouth opened, it was far too wide for a normal jaw. It was easily big enough to fit Finnigan's head into it. Now that was a reassuring thought: a giant head-eating wizard! The mouth wrapped hungrily around the glowing orb, lips stretching down, engulfing the sphere of hostile energy. The old man's eyes rolled into the back of his head as he ingested Finnigan's magic. Finnigan felt his stomach pull a 360, flooding him with gut-wrenching fear.

“Hey!” a small voice whispered. “Hey, you, Finn!” Finnigan looked to the source of the sound. A tiny boy, wearing only a tattered pair of shorts was beckoning Finnigan to him. The child was crouched behind one of the stands. “Now! While he’s distracted!”

Finnigan rose to his feet, or at least he tried to. He stumbled towards the child and felt himself launch forward at an unnatural speed. He landed hard on the ground beside the child, when something powerful closed in on his ankle.

Finnigan looked back to see the wizard, wide-eyed, mouth still swallowing the magic sphere. He seemed to have spouted an extra arm, which closed the thirty-foot gap between Finnigan and the wizard with a terrifying length. The arm began to retract into the folds of the wizards' attire, dragging Finnigan closer and closer. He resisted the urge to curl into a ball and weep chest heaving sobs of mind-numbing terror. Instead, he rolled onto his stomach and dug his fingernails into the dirt ground. The old wizards' grip twisted on Finnigan's leg, rolling him to his back.

A small cry rang from somewhere, and the little boy landed on Finnigan's chest. The boy brandished a straw, just a single drinking straw. He put the tip of the straw into his mouth and aimed it at the wizard. The boys' cheeks filled with air as he blew with all his might and shot, what appeared to be, a spitball at the wizard. The spitball was pink and grew in size as it flew through the air.

“Gum?” Finnigan asked.

“BUBBLE gum!” the boy exclaimed. The gum, which reached the size of a horse by the time it hit the wizard, enveloped the old man. It encompassed him in a giant pink bubble, then floated slightly above the surface of the arena floor. As the bubble sealed itself, it severed the magician's third arm, falling it with a spray of crimson. Muffled screams of rage and pain sounded from within the gum sphere.

Finnigan reclaimed his wand and pointed it at the Wizard. “Let’s finish him,” he said.

“We can’t!” the boy exclaimed. “He’s too strong, we have to run! Now! Follow me!”

Finnigan looked back at the Wizard, who began to glow brilliantly gold, and could feel an uncomfortable heat on his face. The gum started to burn off of the older Kench. He spun his staff and gum shot out in all directions. Finnigan turned to see the boy disappearing down the tunnel into darkness. He sprinted after the boy, practically flying over the ground as he went. He was at his side in an instant and risked a glance over his shoulder, but saw nothing but a stone wall. He looked forward, and they were back in the cave again. He looked back, and the stone wall was directly behind him. Its proximity made him flinch, but he kept running beside the boy.

After some time, they emerged from the cave onto the path Finnigan had entered previously. He saw the green wall, the point Finnigan had come through had darkened with its hardening and now had a translucent property that was really quite pretty.

“You ruined my wall!” the boy yelled. “He can get out now! I can’t let him take over!” The boy paced back and forth, arms moving up and down rapidly.

Finnigan grabbed the boy by his arms and looked him in the eyes, they were Kench’s eyes. “Kench, calm down. We can fix it,” he said.

“We can’t! If he follows us...if he finds us…” the boy began to breathe rapidly and tremble in Finnigan's grip. Finnigan wrapped his arms around Kench and held him close. The boy wept, the cry of a frightened child. Finnigan remembered back all those years ago, listening to Gulliver weep after their father had...he shuddered, he didn’t want to think about it.

“We can. And we will,” Finnigan said.

“How?” the boy asked. He looked up, eyes welling with tears.

“Magic,” Finnigan said.

“Magic doesn’t work here,” the boy said.

“What?” Finnigan asked.

“It works, it just doesn’t win,” the boy amended, wiping the tears from his eyes. The old wizard uses it, but he doesn’t win with it.

“What could beat magic?” Finnigan asked.

“Imagination,” the boy said. “Thoughts, feelings, fantasy. It doesn’t matter though,” he said, a waver in his voice, tears welling once more in his eyes. “He’s going to come, and when he does, he’ll break through the wall and take over everything!”

“Did you build this wall?” Finnigan asked.

“Yeah,” he responded with a whimper.

“How?” Finnigan asked.

“Magic and imagination,” the child said. A small glimmer in his eyes was followed by a brief smile. “It’s boogers.”

Finnigan couldn’t help but notice the green marks on his suit from when he crawled through the booger wall. A loud rushing sound came on suddenly from behind them, and a wave of unseen force hit him and threw him into the barrier. He felt terror overwhelm him. Anxiety and fear coursed through his veins, threatening to bring him to his knees. He looked over at the young Kench, who was curled into a ball on the ground.

Finnigan rolled over towards the boy and reached out to wrap an arm around him when something wrapped tightly around his boot. Finnigan looked down and saw a clawed hand holding him firmly. He followed the hand up the arm, which was draped in a long wizard’s robe. The arm extended all the way back to the cave, where it disappeared into the darkness.

Finnigan pointed his wand at the hand and bellowed, “Stillabunt!” The hand released Finnigan and retracted quickly into the cave. “Obnubilo!” he shouted again, launching a blackout spell after the hand into the cave.

“You can’t win!” the boy cried from behind. “He’s going to take over!”

“No!” Finnigan roared, rising to his feet. He began to incant quickly, creating a barrier of magic barring the entrance to the cave. “Stay behind me!” he said to the boy. Yelling again at the cave, Finnigan said, “I am the bulwark! You shall not pass!” He had always wanted to say that, ever since he was a kid reading his favorite old books. That particular wizard had been his favorite wizard of all time, and this staff wielding look-alike wasn’t going to get the boy.

At once, dozens of clawed hands shot from the cave, crashing into Finnigan's barrier. They slashed violently against the barrier, cutting their way through Finnigan's magic. He channeled all his power into the shield, but it didn’t slow the attacks. Finally, they broke through and rushed towards them. He summoned another, which the clawed hands made quick work of. Another, again with the same result. They were getting closer, each hand suspended eerily on an elongated arm. He hexed one of them with Kench’s own golden spell. The hand cramped into a tight ball for a moment, before opening itself back up and rejoining the assault on Finnigan's defensive shields.

Finnigan stepped backward, inching closer to the boy. It was moments before the claws burst his last barrier, so he turned and wrapped himself around the child, using his own body as a shield. The hands reached him, shredding his back to pieces with their talon-like claws. He flinched as they tore into his skin, ripping at him. He felt them grab his arms, and with incredible strength they peeled him off of the boy, then lifted him into the air high above young Kench.

“No father!” Kench screamed below. “Please! He’s a friend!” Finnigan looked down to see a hand grab onto the boy and jerk him into the air as well, dislocating the boy's elbow and shoulder with the force. Finnigan was held, arms and legs stretched out, and another hand grabbed his hair and pulled his head back. He couldn’t see what happened next, but he felt it. It was agony, starting under his chin a set of claws dug into his flesh and slowly tore down his neck, and into his chest. It made its way down past his belly button where it stopped. The hand on his hair jerked him forward, where he saw fountains of his own blood spraying from his wounds. The hands shook him violently. If he lost much more blood, wait, he didn’t have blood. He knew he was feeling faint though.

An idea occurred to him, he focused on the mouth of the cave. Stalagmites and stalactites began to grow from the top and bottom of the cave's opening. Finnigan held the image he wanted in his mind, then felt a subtle shift in the air. He opened his eyes, and the maw of the cave had snapped shut, biting hard again and again on the arms. The arms cracked, popped, and ripped open. As they jerked and thrashed, they released Finnigan and the boy. Finnigan willed himself through the air, where he grabbed the child and landed on the ground lightly. Finnigan felt grateful that the laws of physics didn’t apply in this world.

“He’s gone,” the child said. “He went back to the arena. He won’t leave it until he’s healed.”

“How long?” Finnigan asked.

“A couple years. We should have time to fix the hole in the wall, but not much more,” Kench said.

Finnigan nodded and held the child close. “Does the world always spin like this after he leaves?” he asked. The child was covered in blood, Finnigan’s blood. He looked down at the wounds, and Kench’s hand touched them lightly. The injuries began to seal themselves up, blood siphoning itself from the child and ground back into Finnigan's chest.

“Now we saved each other,” Kench said.

“Thanks,” Finnigan said. “I appreciate it.”

The following days passed quickly. Finnigan was surprised to know that it was, quite literally, boogers that made up the barrier. Kench had cleared away the old dried, crusted snot and offered to let Finnigan leave. Finnigan couldn’t bring himself to leave the child alone until they had dealt with the older Kench.

“Finnigan,” Kench asked.

“Yeah?” Finnigan said.

“Why are you here?”

“Well, you’re my apprentice. I have to protect you, kid,” Finnigan said.

“No, I know that,” Kench said. “Why are you here in China?”

“I didn’t realize you knew about the waking Kench,” Finnigan said.

“Yeah, it’s like a movie,” Kench said. “So, why?” Finnigan waited, thinking about it before he answered.

“I guess for my brother,” he said. “Emperor Song warned me that there was a threat in China. I think it’s Yang.” He paused, then decided to tell Kench more. “The only way we can get answers about what happened to our dad, the only way we can find the killer is to finish the investigation. I think Yang did it. Gulliver can’t come here to check things out. I had to come.”

Stolen story; please report.

“I don’t know who any of those people are,” Kench said.

“You don’t need to. I think the general, you know who that is?” Kench nodded, so Finnigan continued. “The general is Yang. I think he is behind Song's abduction.”

“How do you know?” Kench asked.

“Intuition I guess?” Finnigan said. He paused, then sighed. He flipped his wand between his fingers then said, “I should have stayed away. I don’t want to bring this all back. My dad wasn’t good to us. He was at first, but in the end, he had his dreams. While he was awake he had nightmares that he couldn’t tell from reality.” He glanced at Kench who was watching, eyes wide, engrossed in the tale.

“That would be scary,” Kench said.

“I guess from his point of view it would have been. Still, it was scary; he would attack us.” He shuddered and took a deep breath. “I think that’s enough for today.”

“Okay,” Kench said.

“So, the older Kench,” Finnigan said.

“He’s not an older Kench,” the boy said quickly as he scraped away the last of the dried snot. “He’s my father.”

“Your father?” Finnigan asked. “Then why was he after you?”

The boy looked down at his feet and shifted uncomfortably. “I don’t know,” he said after a few moments of hesitation. “He just…” his eyes began to well with tears. “Siblings get to call him dad!” he started to cry, and Finnigan pulled the tiny Kench in close. “I just want to be like them!”

“And yet you’ll never be,” said a deep voice from behind Finnigan. He spun, keeping the tiny Kench behind him. Standing there were two men. One was shorter than Finnigan by a full head, the other met his gaze at eye level. The taller man was laden with muscle and had thick hairy arms that looked more gorilla than human. He carried a large, gnarled staff. The smaller of the men brandished a small stubby wand in equally stubby fingers. Though short, the man was still thick; not fat, but thick, muscular and blocky. Neither of them had any neck that Finnigan could see, and both hairier than anyone Finnigan had met. Well, any human Finnigan had met.

The smaller man was glaring wickedly at Finnigan. He opened his mouth, revealing huge bucked teeth, making him look like an overgrown beaver. His voice came out high and nasally, “You’re the duelist who beat Kench, aren’t you?”

“I am,” Finnigan said. “You must be his brothers?”

“Siblings,” he sneered. “He’s not a brother. He was a mistake.” Kench moved in closer to Finnigan, staying hidden as wholly as he could from the eyes of the two older siblings.

“Come out Kench,” taunted the larger brother. “Don’t make us go through your new friend.”

“You’re not father!” Kench whimpered. “Magic can hurt you, and this is a magician! A real one! Not a fake one like you two!”

The smaller man shot a series of...well they didn’t look like spells. Most spells shoot out in a quick flash of light and look like energy flying through the air. This magic, however, shot out in what appeared to be a series of crimson droplets. Finnigan reacted instinctively and deflected the droplets. He riposted, volleying a quick succession of knockback spells. The large sibling stepped in front and swung his staff. It made a familiar sound as it moved, like a whistling tube toy. It also left a trail of webbing in the air behind it as it went. Finnigan’s spells hit the webbing and exploded into a cascade of sparks that fell impotently to the ground.

“Magic can hurt them?” Finnigan asked Kench. “You’re sure?”

“Yes!” Kench said. “Well…” he trailed off. “If you can hit them with a spell it can hurt them.”

At that, an arc of lightning shot from the end of the giant beavers wand with a deafening crack. It wasn’t aimed at Finnigan, but it was likely to hit him. The lightning reached out, shocking everything in a circle around the magician, sending sparks and explosions of dirt wherever they hit. It spread as it slowly arched out, blinding as it went.

“Stay behind me!” Finnigan roared at Kench. He then turned, and launched a volley of spells at the magician, only to be thwarted by their larger brother and his whirling staff. The larger brother walked through the lightning, bolts bouncing off of him without leaving a mark.

Finnigan looked around desperately and saw a large tree, he pointed his wand at it and yelled, “Facit!” Orange blasted from the end of his wand and sliced through the trunk, severing the tree's connection with the ground. It began to topple over, and Finnigan enchanted it in the air, then sent it hurling towards the gorilla looking brother. The big magician rose his staff high above his head and brought it down hard. A flash of light shot out from his staff and split the trunk down the middle, sending the pieces to either side of him. He grinned a big toothless grin.

The lightning reached further, edging closer and closer to Finnigan and Kench. Finnigan backed up bit by bit. “Got any more bubble gum?” he shouted over the cracks of lightning.

The boy didn’t miss a beat. He produced his straw and shot it at the large brother with a huff. It grew just as before as it soared through the air. The gorilla spun his staff rapidly, and the horse sized gum hit the staff and stopped it dead in its tracks. It proceeded to wrap around and engulf the brother completely. The gorilla struggled, but it appeared to be in vain.

The beaver-faced magician’s eyes widened as he looked at Finnigan. He stopped channeling his lightning and took a step back, raising his wand to a guard position. At least that’s what it looked like to Finnigan. The after images of the lightning still flashed across his vision, making it hard to tell for sure. Finnigan shot a series of spells at the man which he blocked with a crude barrier spell. The spells exploded into a wave of sparks which were accompanied by the usual hollow sound.

“You’re going to lose Bedgel!” Kench yelled from behind. “Brutus is stuck in gum and this is a world class duelist!”

“Shut up Kench!” yelled Bedgel, his voice cracking. He shot a deliberate spell at Finnigan which the duelist easily batted aside. Sweat dripped down Bedgels face and into his eyes. Finnigan sent a quick knockout spell as the spellslinger wiped his eyes with his sleeve. The spell hit him in the chest, and he fell over backward, arm across his face. Finnigan moved cautiously forward, wand still at guard and inspected the downed men. Brutus appeared to be barely able to move, but the gum had created an airhole to his mouth and nose. The man's eyes glared from beneath his thick forehead up at Finnigan. The man had lost, but the fire was still in his eyes.

“Can you take the gum off of Brutus?” Finnigan asked Kench.

“Yeah,” Kench said. “But he has his battle-staff. We’ll need to take it away first. I don’t know how to get it from him.”

“Uncover the staff,” Finnigan said. Kench waved his arm and the gum receded. Runes began to glow on the staff, and it unleashed a wave of energy. Finnigan conjured a barrier and reflected the power back at the staff, making the runes grow brighter and begin to smoke.

“What’s it doing?” Kench asked, peering cautiously around Finnigan.

“Battlestaves are incredibly rare. It takes a certain type of magic and focus to create one. Further, they take a crazy amount of time to get right. You have to channel your will into them, much like when you create a wand. Your brother here spent months with this piece of wood meditating. I’ll teach you more about it later,” Finnigan said. He realized he was rambling and he focused his barrier to reflect more precisely.

“So he has a big staff, and he’s trying to break your spell?” Kench asked.

“He’s trying to overpower it,” Finnigan said. “The more he tries, the more he overloads his staff. They are a lifelong investment, I have one, not this good, but not too shabby either. I prefer the wand. With a wand, you can overload a battle staff. The more Brutus here fights, the more damage he does to his staff. I’m going to destroy it if he doesn’t let go.” Finnigans eyes met the big mans. Brutus glared in defiance and refused to yield. Finnigan narrowed his eyes.

“Will it hurt him?” Kench asked.

“Yes,” Finnigan said.

“Then stop!” Kench cried.

“It won’t kill him,” Finnigan said, not relenting. “Besides, if I let go of the barrier now, it’ll let all the pent up energy hit us. The only way I can stop now is if he does. I won’t die to save his hand.” Finnigan let the fury inside well up. He gathered that emotional energy and channeled it through his wand, then added it to the power being infused into the battle-staff. The runes at either end began to blacken, and the staff threatened to ignite.

The brothers, the father, a family shouldn’t do that to each other. Finnigan had to stop it. He bewitched Brutus’ fingers to clasp hard around the staff. The runes around his fingers lit up, and Finnigan was sure the ones under his grip were now searing into the man's flesh. He looked into Brutus’ eyes again, and the wizard still had that determined look. Finnigan fueled more of his fury into the staff, and the runes could be seen burning through Brutus’ hand. The man tried to let go. He could feel the hand working against his hex. As versatile as a staff was, they were no match for a wands precision.

“Let go, Brutus,” Finnigan said for Kench’s sake. “Kench. Look away. He won’t let go. He’s going to lose his hand.”

“No!” Kench whimpered as he hid his face in Finnigan's chest. Finnigan sucked his power from the battle staff, causing a magical void to be created. The void had to be filled, so just like a vacuum, it sucked magical energy from the path of least resistance. The path of least resistance was Brutus. His own power fueled the cycle, forcing the staff to glow even more. Finnigan channeled energy through the staff. For all intents and purposes, what he was doing was illegal. It was punished in one way. The punishment was capital. He pulled harder on Brutus’s magic, robbing him of more and more.

The runes etched into Finnigan's wand began to glow as he held most of Brutus’ power in it. He felt Brutus’ magical core, he could feel it draining. It wasn’t immense, but it was all being infused into Finnigan's wand. The wand hardened as Finnigan laid layer after layer of magic into it. He imbued his wand with more power than before. All the strength added to Brutus’ staff joined and strengthened Finnigan's wand. It was done, the staff had lost its power. It burnt away at the ends, going black and falling off in chunks of hot ash.

Finnigan recalled his power stone. He channeled his will through it, making it glow a sickly blood red. He pulled even harder, attacking the structure of Brutus’ magical core. He was going to take all the magic he could. Brutus would never recover to hurt Kench again, at least not with magic. Finnigan felt the magic from the core enter his power stone, making it grow almost twice its size. He focused his will harder, pulling massive amounts of energy from the downed mage. His wand began to grow hot from the effort. If he hadn’t used the power of the staff to strengthen it, he wasn’t sure it would have held up to this.

Brutus let out a pained howl. He looked at Finnigan, eyes wide with terror. Finnigan held his gaze, refusing to yield to the giant coward.

“You won’t hurt Kench again,” Finnigan said bitterly. The hand burst into flame, and the sickly smell of burnt hair reached Finnigan's nostrils. After a few moments, the stench faded and was replaced by a scent that reminded Finnigan of pulled pork. The hand turned to blackened ash and fell to the ground where it crumbled utterly. One last pull of magic and Finnigan fell backward. The link was broken. Brutus had no remaining magic.

Finnigan felt a surge of power and channeled it into the power stone, which glowed brightly. The scarlet made Finnigan shield his eyes, and as it dimmed, he saw it split into two even halves. The first half, his original portion, remained firmly attached to his wand. The other half formed a new power stone on the ground. Finnigan lifted the red stone and could feel the power thrumming within it. He placed it in his pocket then looked down at Brutus.

His stomach dropped, and he fell backward. He caught the fleeing contents of his stomach in his mouth and swallowed them back down. Brutus’ corpse looked like the blood had been completely drained. The face was sunken in, frozen in a contorted scream, and the dead, lifeless eyes still had the look of horrified pleading the man had used to beg for his own life moments before.

Finnigan picked up the boy Kench in his arms and ran as fast as he could away from the scene. He found himself in a forest, on the other side of Kench’s mind. “Where is Brutus? Is he okay?” Kench asked.

“He’s fine,” Finnigan lied. His heart and mind raced. He had just killed a man. No! It wasn’t a real man, it was a figment of Kench’s imagination! A phantasm! Nothing more! Then where did the magic in the power stone come from? This place made no sense to Finnigan, but his hands were shaking, stomach threatening to heave. He set Kench down and ran behind a nearby tree and unloaded the contents of his stomach, then heaved some more.

He turned around and saw Kench standing, looking at him. Behind Kench was the old wizard. His robes had several bloody stumps where arms used to be. Finnigan got up to dash forward, but his foot slipped, and he fell hard into the puddle of his own vomit. It splashed onto his face and into his eyes. The stomach acid burnt, blurring Finnigan's vision. He pointed his wand and channeled through the power stone. The wizard grabbed the boy, and held him from behind, forearm choking him. Kench struggled, letting out tiny desperate gasps of air.

“If you hurt him, so help me god I’ll burn this whole fucking place down!” Finnigan snarled.

“You’d kill yourself to kill me?” the wizard said.

“Every time! Now! Put. The. Boy. Down,” he said, venom dripping from every word. He took his rage, his pain, his guilt, every ounce of emotion he could and pushed it into his wand. He amplified it with his power stone, and the tip of his wand began to glow vibrantly.

The old wizard's mouth moved, but no words came out. Finally, he said, “The way I see it, this bastard is the only thing keeping me alive then.”

“Don’t call him that!” Finnigan snarled, wand glowing brighter.

“If you’re willing to die for him, maybe a trade?” the father said.

“What? Brutus is gone, and you can keep Bedgel,” Finnigan snapped back.

“You,” the father said, malevolence in his eyes. “I don’t like this bas…” he stopped and started over, voice strained with effort. “I don’t like this boy, but I never intended to kill him until you came along. Now, he has to die. Unless you take his place. Throw the wand away.” The wizard held his staff out, pointing it at Finnigan. “Now, or the boy dies!” He tightened his grip on Kench, and the gasps stopped altogether.

“Wait! I’ll do it!” Finnigan said, letting his power release. The wand dimmed as he lowered it.

No sooner than it started, the father bellowed, “Vita copulare!” Finnigan's mind was ensnared by the old man's magic. It drew deeply from Finnigan’s will, and he felt the old man going through his memories. He found the old ones. The ones Finnigan kept buried. The sound of Finnigan's own father breathing heavily over him, the sound of Gulliver rushing into the room and pointing his old blasting cone at their father and threatening him. His father turning on Gulliver, striking his older brother, who was still just a boy, down with a closed fist. He remembered the beatings that Gulliver had taken to make sure Finnigan didn't have to take them. Finnigan could even smell the liquor on their fathers' breath as he was forced to relive it all.

He saw a pinprick of light and focused on it. It grew with his focus, and he could see Kench and his father looking down it, seeing everything. “I’ll take them all. Beat me. Kill me. Leave Kench alone.” The wizard grinned wickedly and threw the boy to the side and snatched Finnigan's wand. The spell broke, and Finnigan was in the forest again.

The monster opened one of his clawed hands, and Finnigan was lifted into the air and by forces unseen. Whether imagination or magic, it didn’t matter to Finnigan.

“You’re scarred, inside and out. You can call it mercy when I kill you!” the creature breathed, venom in its voice. The flesh melted away and what was left was nothing more than a grotesque horror. It moved in, teeth changing to sharpened points in the blink of an eye, and said, “You’ll get all the beatings. First everything your father did, then, I’ll get creative. When I bore of your screams, I’ll end it. Don’t think it’ll be brief. I’ve never gotten bored with the sounds of someone screaming in agony.”

“Leave him alone father!” barked the voice of a child. “I won’t let you hurt him.”

“You are nothing child!” the father roared. “You have no power over me.”

“No! I have all the power. His brother saved him, and so can I! You’re a gummy bear!” the boy yelled. Finnigan looked at the wizard, ready to plead for the child, then stopped. The man was a giant gummy bear. He could still move and didn’t seem to notice his own transformation.

“Of course I am!” the man said. “I always have been! Now be silent!”

“You’re only this big!” the boy yelled, holding his arm out, thumb and forefinger barely apart. From his perspective, that must be how big the bear was. He pulled his hand up, and the bear was now between his fingers. Finnigan fell to the ground, grabbing his now discarded wand as he landed. The boy Kench popped the gummy bear into his mouth, chewed it up, then spit the chewed tiny bits all over the forest floor.

“Kench, you did it,” Finnigan panted.

“Yeah, now it’s time for you to go. I don’t know why, but I can feel it.” The boy reached to Finnigan, who reached back. Their fingers touched, and Finnigan felt a powerful jerking around his gut. He was ripped backward, up and out of the forest. He snapped back into his own body and collapsed, fatigued and weeping. He landed on Kench, who held him and wept himself. The two men, now brothers, held each other, having faced their proverbial demons. Finnigan couldn’t help but wish they had faced real demons instead.