The cave mouth loomed like the maw of a great beast, its stony teeth poised to claim us.

I had seen this in the vision—the Remembering Place.

A group of phantoms stood before us, their eyes desperate and their faces pale from blood loss.

No! They had died, I had made certain!

William collapsed, broken sobs tearing themselves free of him as he curled in on himself.

“I’m sorry!” he wept. “I didn’t want to! I had no choice!”

The man’s screams broke me from my own trance, and I snapped at Joshua, “help me grab him. We are leaving!”

Together, we dragged him, and the phantoms followed.

~<>~<>~

After the Wraiths, we entered The Paths—a section of the Pass completely overgrown with trees.

The trail split in the trees, and if you weren’t careful, you could end up wandering forever.

This was one of the reasons we couldn’t bring too many into the Pass. The more people in your group, the more the trail split.

Even with just two, I was worried.

It took some time, especially with how cautious I was being, but we eventually made it through.

Since we had decided to push ahead earlier, we had to keep going until we reached the next rest stop.

After The Paths, I relaxed.

Well, mostly. Part of me was still having a panic attack about Blair knowing I was a Telss.

With how I dealt with ghosts, there was always a risk of someone connecting the dots, but I usually helped vanilla humans or spooks that weren’t with a major faction. So that risk was low.

I didn’t think Blair would sell me out, but just the idea that a living person knew was alien to me.

I looked around. Large rocks had begun to crop up, dark grey things that were slick with moss and rain.

I saw things moving between some of the larger boulders, but I ignored them.

I glanced at Blair. “We hit the jackpot today; we get a non-murderous region. The way through here is the simplest so far. Just tell him to screw off.”

“Him?”

“Him,” I said, pointing straight ahead.

The path was blocked by the largest boulder yet. It was double my height, and unlike the others, there wasn’t a speck of moss or moisture anywhere in sight.

Sitting on the boulder, his arms crossed and bushy white eyebrows scrunched into a frown, was a gnome.

He wore the classic get-up and everything, long red hat, blue overalls, long white beard—the works.

In a nasally, grandiose voice, he called out, “Answer me these questions three!”

Blair looked at me, her eyebrows raised.

“Oh, yeah. He’s serious.”

Despite the boulder, I didn’t slow down.

“What can pass through the green glass door! An egg can pass through, but a chicken can not!”

“Piss off, Clearance.”

His frown deepened, and he turned to Blair, a glint of hope in his beady blue eyes.

She hesitated and looked a little guilty but still told him to “Shove off.”

He sighed and walked to the side of the boulder. He gave it a kick, and it rolled out of the way with a deep rumble.

I stopped on the other side and turned to face the dejected gnome.

“It’s alright, man, we’re just pressed for time, is all. We can talk riddles later.”

He hung his head. “You said that last time.”

“I was fighting off a curse last time!”

His wrinkled face scrunched up.

Blair spoke up, her voice surprisingly gentle. “A tree can pass through the green glass door. But a plant cannot.”

Clarence beamed. “You know the answer!”

“I’ll give you a riddle on our way back,” she said with a smile.

I eyed the werewolf.

“What?”

I shook my head. “Nothing just surprised me, is all. Let’s go. Don’t want to be hiking the Pass in the dark.”

We waved to Clarence and kept going.

~<>~<>~

Our brief stint of luck immediately ran out.

This section of the Pass switched between three different region. One was a little troubling, one was wholesome, and the last one—the one we got— was sadistic.

I slowed to a stop as I saw glimpses of a cave through the trees.

“We’re out of luck.”

Blair glanced at me and adjusted her pack.

“This region is…predatory. In a psychic sense, specifically.”

“…which means?”

It’s going to bring up illusions of your past. Traumatic parts of your past. They’ll walk up from that cave and start giving you shit. It wants a reaction, some strong emotion. If you give it that, it will keep coming until you either get a grip or go catatonic.”

Blair was looking more alarmed by the word, which was fair.

“So, here’s what we do. Face the illusion for several seconds and don’t give a strong reaction. then we turn and start walking.”

“Whatever lives in that cave doesn’t have a lot of time to troll your thoughts, so the trauma it brings up doesn’t always land. Sometimes it pulls something that you moved past years ago.”

I rubbed a hand across my face, and some dirt came off. When did that get there? I shook my head and went on.

“The idea is that we convince it that whatever it’s pulled up is a dud, which is why we can’t move too fast. If it thinks we’re running, it will hound us with illusions in some extremely…unpleasant ways. Clear?”

Blair had put her mask back up and was staring at the cave with cold determination.

“Yeah. Keep control, don’t give it anything to work with.”

“This is another reason we can’t take too many people. This thing gets stronger the larger the group. Don’t know if it feeds off all those minds or what, but it summons another illusion for each person in the group. So, we get two each.”

“Can we see each other’s illusions?”

I nodded.

Blair eyed the cave, something dark passing over her mask.

“Alright. Anything else?”

I paused. It would be safer if I covered her in my aura since it would help her keep a cool head. But that came with risks of its own.

“But I saw signs of Roamer before the Straits, so it should be safe,” I muttered.

“What?”

“Huh?” I glanced up at Blair. “Right, werewolf. I’m debating if I should unveil my aura to help you through. It would definitely help…”

“But?”

“But there are risks to unavailing my aura in the Pass.”

“Roamer?”

I nodded. “Yeah. He’s big, dark, and he, well, he roams. And he desperately wants to eat me.”

Blair stiffened.

“He’s not here, though!” I added. “I saw a few signs of his passing in the Straits, and he is confined to certain sections of the Pass. All of the rest stops serve as barriers to him. He can only get past them when the regions shift around.”

Blair eyed me. “And you’re certain he can’t cross and chase you?”

I shrugged. “It hasn’t happened yet. And…”

Images of those flashing teeth, the glowing white eyes, and the desperate, starving look sprang to my mind.

“He would cross if he could. He really wants to eat me.”

She scowled. “Alright. But, hypothetically, if he could cross, is he something I could fight?”

I looked Blair up and down. “How old are you?”

She wasn’t phased by the question at all. “Twenty-four. But my Bond is closer to a hundred and twenty-year-olds in strength.”

I blinked. Holy shit. She wasn’t exaggerating when she said she was born with a strong bond.

“I’ll be honest, my knowledge on werewolf strength kinda caps out at around a hundred. But from what I understand, no. You can’t take him. Just by the pressure he gives my magical senses… if he did somehow make it here, which he won’t, we run.”

Blair paused but eventually nodded. “And how old are you?” Well, that was fair, I had just asked her. “Twenty three.”

And with that, we walked towards the cave.

“Do you know what Old Tom called this region? The remembering place. It’s kind of a quaint name for such a shit region. Guess the old man was losing his good naming sense by then.”

“It’s less cliche than naming it the ‘The Cave Of Despair’ or something like that.”

I gave a nervous chuckle as we broke the tree line. “I suppose there’s a bright side to everything, eh?”

We came to a stop twenty feet from the cave mouth and stared into the black pit, waiting.

Dank, cold air blew over us, rustling our clothes and setting the trees to shaking.

I took a deep breath and unveiled my aura. I still kept it contained, extending it to barely cover Blair.

Another deep breath. You can do this. It’s hardly the first time.

Breathe. But you’ve never taken the Pass right after fighting a ghost.

Shut up me! You’re not helping.

The air sucked back towards the cave mouth, and then there were four people standing in front of us.

In front of Blair stood a teenager, probably 14 or 15 at the oldest. He had close-cut dark hair and a handsome face… or at least, it probably had been, before it was brutalized.

The kid had been beat to hell, both eyes were swollen, and his face was lumpy with bruises weeping wounds.

One arm was dangling limp, the four-arm bent, and a pale bone sticking through. And his mouth moved in silent whimpers as he shook.

The other was a tall, striking woman that looked very similar to Blair. She had a thinner face—white-blond hair and ice-blue eyes that held all the warmth of compassion of the arctic in December.

On my side stood Ronald. The thing really did pluck them straight from your memory since this Ronald hadn’t aged a day since last I saw him. He was his same stocky, beer-bellied, red-nosed self that he had been all those years ago.

His narrowed green eyes took me in with a sneer on his face, and I could see his balding head redden in anger.

The detail really was incredible, but unfortunately for them, I had moved past Roland years ago. Seeing him now only filled me with mild contempt, nothing more. He wasn’t worth anything more.

The following illusion was— my mind stuttered to a stop. Master Bram stared at me, his eyes wet and full of grief.

Not that look again. I couldn’t face it twice.

Memories started to rise, and my breathing hitched. Something in the cave stirred, and a dark, insatiable intent settled over me.

I desperately tried to still my thoughts, but the bubbling memories threatened to overwhelm me.

It hadn’t ever pulled from the ghost memories before. Why now? What had changed? Was I slipping? Were the memories gaining a hold over me? What—

Blair placed a hand on my shoulder, snapping me out of the spiral.

Breathe. I closed my eyes and imagined my graveyard, but there was a pile of large bricks instead of the small iron gate.

The thing in the cave was still leaning over my mind, practically drooling at the shock I had let through.

I walked over to the pile and lifted the first brick. I imagined the course feeling against my hands, the weight of it as I lifted.

I imagined up as much detail as I could, pouring every ounce of focus I had into the task, leaving nothing for fear or panic.

I laid the brick down then marched for the next.

I repeated that, over and over, adding detail as I went. I pictured the ache in my back, the sting in my palms, the relief as each brick was laid—the smell of the dirt and grass, everything.

By the time I felt the thing back off, I had laid down thirteen bricks. Not a bad start for a wall.

I slowly opened my eyes and saw that the illusions had vanished.

Blair was looking at me, her face blank.

I nodded to her. “Thanks. If the illusions are gone, we’re good to go.”

She slowly removed her hand, and I realized I hadn’t reacted to the touch, which immediately made me react to the touch. I held in a shudder as the warmth lingered.

“Goodby, you bastard. I hope you choke on the memories.”

We marched away from the gaping cave, the both of us struggling not to run.