Young Writers Society

James didn’t look up, but he was still aware that the man was next to him.

Gods, this was a mess. He couldn’t remember how it all started anymore either. His head kept throbbing, and he couldn’t seem to retain a single thought. Where was he again?

He racked his mind trying to remember something -anything that had happened in the last day.

All that came to mind was a freakishly large flower… that talked?

That couldn’t be right.

He looked up, scanning the space around him and his eyes quickly landed on a lean dark-haired man with pale skin. He felt the urge to run, but couldn’t place why. Was this man a bounty hunter? But he wasn’t bound. He just hurt a lot.

“…Who are you?” he asked.

The concussion's effects were back in full force.

Viktor didn't answer. He glanced out into the woods Evie and Felix had gone into earlier, hoping that they were about to return with the potion ingredients. As if the thought had summoned them, there was a crunching of fallen twigs and leaves as the two emerged from the depths of the forest.

"We're back," Evie said. She held up a glass bottle she must have made while they were looking for ingredients. It was filled with a pale, red liquid that looked—and smelled—like one of their regular potions despite the presumably slightly different ingredients.

"I made the potion while we were walking," Evie said. Viktor got to his feet to take it from her. Felix, back in a form that looked like Viktor used to watched Tiberius warily.

"Good timing," Viktor said, grabbing the potion. He didn't specify why, instead turning back to Tiberius.

"Can you drink this?" Viktor asked. He held up the bottle. "It can take care of your concussion and other pains."

James’s confusion only amplified as a woman approached with a man who looked like the other man’s twin, just with light hair. He didn’t know what the potion was supposed to be, but when the man offered it to him, James eyed it with suspicion.

“Yeah, right,” he said. “I’m smarter than that.”

Viktor sighed. Evie just gave Viktor a concerned look.

"If I wanted to poison you," Viktor said. "I already could have. You drank the water I gave you earlier and you're fine now. I wasn't asking if you wanted to drink it—I was asking if you needed my help holding the bottle up."

James blinked.

He’d drank water earlier? How much earlier? He couldn’t remember anything with this blinding headache.

The sun felt so bright as he looked up at the others, and the potion extended out to him. He was squinting.

The man’s questions confused him, and he stared at him for what was probably longer than he felt he was, trying to figure out his string of questions.

“What is that?” he asked, looking at the bottle with the vibrantly red liquid.

"A potion," Viktor said. After a moment where he realized this world might not have those, he added, "It's medicine."

“‘Medicine’ for what?” James asked, narrowing his eyes with suspicion.

"Your concussion," Viktor said, desperately wishing they had decided to go after a different bounty. Without waiting for Tiberius's permission, he put the potion bottle up to Tiberius's lips. He didn't want to force him to drink it—Tiberius could choke.

But he was tired of trying to talk through the concussion.

"Drink it," he said.

James scrunched up his lips in stubborn disgust, turning his face away despite a small part of him wished it was actual medicine. He just didn’t believe it was.

Who were they anyway? Frustration bubbled up in his chest as his head throbbed violently, and he closed his eyes shut, overstimulated by the light and the dizziness.

Viktor groaned.

This was as bad as Bennett and his neverending bad luck. He was so close to just forcing Tiberius to drink the potion.

"You'll be able to think straight and remember everything we talked about if you drink this," he said.

Evie stared at them with a furrowed brow and a worried frown on her lips. "He's having memory problems?"

"It's a side effect of the concussion," Viktor explained. "Falling from a tree probably didn't help. I don't know the specifics of how it works."

He just remembered his own experiences with concussions. None had been pleasant, but the worst had, unsurprisingly, been when he had knocked around by automatons. Evie being the one to give Tiberius memory issues was strangely fitting.

He looked back at Tiberius, thought about how poorly this could possibly go, and decided to end both of their suffering by sticking the bottle right into his mouth. He'd fight it, but the potion's effects would kick in quick enough for him to realize it was actually helping.

Suddenly the bottle was shoved into his mouth. Instinctively James’s arms flailed out to try to scramble away and get it out, but the thick, warm liquid was already flooding his throat. It tasted both bitter and sweet at the same time, and it burned just a little, like alcohol.

He coughed, practically choking it down, too late to spit it out.

He thought that was the end of it. Whatever poison or drug this was, there was no fighting it now. But instead of feeling woozy or sickly, a strange sensation washed over him.

He was starting to feel… better.

He gulped again, not fighting it as much as the last of the bottle emptied into his mouth. But he did pull away as he started to immediately feel the effects of the medicine, or potion, or whatever it was.

His memories came back with a flood of clarity, and as they rushed back his head stopped hurting. His whole body stopped hurting, actually. The aches, the bruises, the scratches from falling out of the tree.

He remembered that now. Stupidly jumping out of a tree to try to get away. But he also rememebered who these three were. They were bounty hunters, and they were mages, and… he’d started to convince Viktor to let him go.

He’d said after he gave him the potion they’d leave him alone.

Slowly, he got to his feet.

There was an odd mix of embarassment for his own behavior and anger at them capturing him in the first place and starting all this trouble.

“…Thanks,” he said stiffly. “For the… medicine.”

"You're welcome," Viktor replied, almost as stiffly as Tiberius. He had been so caught up in dealing with Tiberius being stubborn that not arguing with him felt off now. He followed Tiberius's lead and stood up as well.

Evie let out a quiet sigh of relief.

"I'm glad the potion worked," she said.

Viktor raised an eyebrow. "Why wouldn't it have?"

"I had to replace some of the ingredients," Evie admitted. When Viktor's eyes widened in concern, she quickly added, "I made sure to analyze them so they had all the same properties, but I was a little worried it wouldn't be as effective."

Viktor let out a quiet sigh of relief of his own.

To say that James felt awkward didn't do his current emotions justice. With everything flooding back to him, he didn't quite know what to do with it. Looking back, he realized he never really had the full picture because his mind wasn't fully functioning since he'd been caught. That, and he'd made a fool of himself - but hey, he'd been desperate. And why should he care about what a few mages thought of him?

He backed away from the three of them with a long step, watching them warily.

There were a lot of things he didn't know how to explain.

The "potion" that instantly healed him. The flower speaking in Felix's voice. The ice magic steps. The woman's incredible strength. Altogether, they were a very odd trio.

And Felix called himself, a what? A whoppleflower?

"So..." he said, clearing his throat, landing his eyes on Viktor. "I don't suppose you'd be willing to give me back my necklace now, would you?"

Viktor blinked.

After everything that had happened, he had forgotten about the necklace he had stolen to capture Tiberius. It hadn't been the most pressing wrong he needed to right before now.

He reached his hand into his pocket.

But when he felt around in the pocket he knew he had put the necklace in, he couldn't feel anything.

Viktor tried his other pocket.

"It should be in my pockets," he said. He frowned. Where could it be?

"Maybe it fell out?" Evie suggested. "We could trace our steps to find it. It might take some time, but..."

Evie, Viktor realized, didn't know about the conversation he had with Tiberius while she was gone. Even without outright discussing it with Viktor, it seemed like she understood that they had to let him go.

Evie gave a tiny, apologetic smile. "It's better than nothing-"

Felix suddenly darted over to Tiberius's side with a burst of ice at his feet. He dangled the necklace in front of Tiberius's face.

James watched as Felix burst towards him, again with ice formed at his feet. Warily, but quickly, he snatched the necklace from Felix's hands and put it back around his neck.

Wordlessly, he bowed his head in gratitude, though the bow was admittedly not fully sincere, since they'd stolen the necklace from him in the first place.