A Fairy Out of Her Tale - Dear Neno - 5. 04 - Your Mother and I, Alone in a Dark Room

Mind control is an art of subtlety, so I’m glad neither you nor your siblings have an affinity to it. All the time that Zhofie was technically in control of my mind… it didn’t feel like it. I didn’t hear voices telling me to do this or that, urging me to make bad choices. I genuinely believed whatever I was about to do had been my own decision.

I don’t remember much of it now, though, and not only because it’s been 23 years since. It’s part of the spell’s nature to forget whatever the caster doesn’t want you to remember. That said, I’m actually glad I don’t have those memories. I don’t want to know how I got inside Zhofie’s house, past the guard dogs from hell and the pool of red boiling water. I don’t want to remember what it was like to be alone in a dark basement, cold and hungry and thirsty and desperate for any form of company.

All I remember is that suddenly someone was calling my name, urging me to answer. It was like being pulled from a dream. The world came back to focus and I was staring at Kris’s face. His frown of intense concentration gave way to a wide smile when he realised I was back, and he hugged me so tightly my ribs screamed in pain.

‘Nessa! You here!’ I knew even then he wanted to say so much more, but he didn’t have the words. He kept touching every part of me he could reach, pinching my arms to make sure I was real. Having just woken up from a trance, I was more confused than anything else, but Kris was smiling and he was cute and that was reassuring enough on its own.

‘Where is here?’ I asked after he calmed down. Kris sat in front of me. The room around us was completely dark, save for a faint glow that only just let me make out his face. We hadn’t realised the faint glow was actually the cursed diary, using its magic to make its way back to me now that my mind was my own again. Kris was too happy to care that he suddenly could see me, and I didn’t know we were supposed to be in the dark in the first place.

‘From Zhofie. House. Down.’ Thanks to a series of hand gestures I eventually understood that Kris meant “here” was the basement of Zhofie’s house. He smiled even more then (I didn’t think it was possible, but your mother keeps proving there’s no such thing as “impossible” even to this day) and almost hugged me before he realised I wasn’t really the person he wanted to hug and kiss and celebrate with. His body shrunk and his smile disappeared.

‘What’s wrong? Are you ok?’ I reached out to him, but he moved away.

‘No. Wrong. Bad people.’ He shook his head. I tried my best, but back then I didn’t know enough about Kris to understand what he was talking about. And no amount of gesturing would’ve been able to explain to me that the reason he had been so happy was because getting me out of mind control reminded him of the other time he managed to break that spell.

‘What will happen to us?’ My second question was as successful as the first. Kris didn’t understand, and he was no longer willing to try. I eventually got tired of being ignored, and that was when I noticed the diary.

Lydia had been writing on it since my disappearance. Thanks to her, I learned that I had been gone for five days, and that in another three Lóránt would be put on trial for child endangerment and lose their job. Lydia was already making plans to rescue me, but nobody had any idea where we were.

Kris noticed the diary when I opened it and the faint light emanating from it doubled in scope (meaning I could see down to his chest when he was in front of me instead of just his face). He pointed at it and said ‘demon. Bad.’

No need for gestures with this one.

‘No, it’s my diary. My friend.’

‘Bad.’

‘No, friend.’

That dialogue continued this way for longer than I cared to admit. It reminded me of how you Uncle Oraci would try my patience with exactly this kind of disagreement (though noways I think more of your siblings trying to claim the first slice of cake), and how good I was at frustrating him instead.

Kris didn’t last as long as my brother did, probably because he wasn’t an eight-year-old child with nothing better to do with his life. He turned his back to me with a scowl, making his message clear even without exaggerated gestures: “don’t talk to me until you believe me”.

But even that resolve didn’t last long. Kris noticed I was writing in the diary (answering Lydia’s messages with renewed energy and excitement) and loomed over my shoulder. I tried not to mind him reading my conversation with my girlfriend. He couldn’t understand any of it. I wasn’t writing any secrets. But it was still unnerving.

‘Do you want anything?’

I guess the meaning of my question was obvious enough, because he pointed at the pen I was using and made a writing gesture with his left hand.

‘Yes, I am writing to my girlfriend. What about it?’

He pointed to himself and made the writing gesture again.

‘Do you want to write to Lydia too?’ I couldn’t think what he would have to say to my girlfriend. Kris wasn’t in particular good terms with any of our housemates. He was the cool, aloof lone wolf of the group (as opposed to Unn, who didn’t have many friends because of her general unpleasantness), so I didn’t see why he would have socialising needs.

‘House.’

If I was a demon, I would have mind-reading powers. Kris’s one-word answer was enough for me to understand he wanted to tell my girlfriend where we were and how to find us. How had I not thought of it?

I let Kris take over my diary. He made a strange face when his pen touched the diary, like it gave him an electric shock, but he continued to write as if nothing was wrong. We didn’t know that the diary belonged to his father and was likely sending some kind of signal to its true owner once it recognised Kris’s presence.

We thought we were crafting the perfect escape plan right under Zhofie’s nose, but all we were doing was making it easier for Hereweald to find us.

I tried to be hopeful, to think that our friends were on their way to us and we would soon be free. I tried to think positive, to remember the sunshine and what it was like to have its rays gracing my skin. But the long wait for Lydia’s answer was too long. I came close to losing my mind in that dark cell in the evil basement.

Your mother held my hand every time he felt me shake with fear and cold. He hugged me, rubbed my shoulders, even though I wasn’t the friend he missed. He told me everything would be ok, that Lóránt was coming (his exact words were “all good. Lóránt is won”. It only made sense once I realised he was mispronouncing words and destroying verb tenses), that he would keep me safe (that one didn’t need words, just one firm hug and a tender kiss to my forehead).

I cried and babbled on for ours about Lydia’s lack of answer. I couldn’t take the wait. I feared Lydia would never reply. Kris heard it all, held me through it all, and reassured me it would be all right in the end. It was such a nice, comforting thing coming from someone so scary (and a demon, no less) that I didn’ t even care that it must have been easy for him to remain calm and collected through my sobbing spectacle because he didn’t understand what I was saying.

At some point I fell asleep in his arms, tired from all the crying and the helplessness. I dreamed I was with my mother again, safe and loved at home. When I opened my eyes, I realised the feelings weren’t coming from the dream, but from Kris.

I didn’t have time to wonder whether Kris was somehow in love with me, though.

‘Alana…’

He said her name in his own dreams, and I realised those feelings were meant for someone else.