A Bored Lich-Chapter 83 - No Longer Human. No Longer Lich.

Doevm sat on the other side of the low fire pit. Frey didn't even look at him, but at some hidden dimension where he kept his thoughts. It seemed as if he would be content here, if not for the look in his eyes. The night wasn't cold, but he was shaking a little. Every now and again, he blinked, closing his eyes in defeat and drooping them open in an attempt to stay awake. 𝙛𝚛𝙚ewe𝗯𝓃𝗼ѵ𝚎Ɩ.𝒄ｏ𝐦

"I don't know what to say," Doevm said.

"Then shut your mouth," Frey mumbled. He suppressed a yawn. Each breath was slow and shaky, like he was still in the forest, stuck in that half-dead state and buried in the dirt. "Can you just leave me for a second?"

"No," Doevm responded. He made sure to stare at Frey, but it was like he was looking at the sun. Every second staring hurt his eyes, yet he remained seated. "The fire is dying; do you want me to get more wood?"

"No," Frey narrowed his eyes, as if trying to block out Doevm yet still be alert. The last embers were slowly fading out into blackness. Crickets chirped around them. Fire bugs roamed around the surroundings. It was noisy and bright, but on the inside of camp, time had stopped. Doevm waited with the patience and time of the Undead, yet it seemed Frey would never move.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Doevm kept searching for the proper words to say, but even he didn't understand what he was feeling. Frey responded with a very slight shake of his head, almost like he was shoving Doevm's words away. The stars were slowly covered up by more clouds.

"Do you want to go back and fix everything?" Doevm asked.

For the first time of the night, Frey's eyes left the ashes of the campfire: "What's that supposed to mean? Of course I want to redo it." He seemed to regain all his energy and sit up straight again. His hand curled into a ball.

"It's the same with me," Doevm said. "I would rather have saved Hopi if I knew it was going to turn out like this. He's so stupid, trying to sacrifice himself." He laughed: "Like seriously, what are you going to do with your life, mope?" He stood up and brought some wood out of his spatial ring and tossed into the embers.

The twigs, however, didn't catch fire. They even crushed a few of the remaining embers. Frey's face darkened with the dying fire: "Doevm, go away." He shook, biting his lip and looking away from Doevm.

"No," Doevm said. "I have to keep watch and, you know, contribute to the group. Hopi would have understood." Before he could continue, Frey stood up.

He stared at Doevm with a gaze more intense than when he looked at the fire, seemingly deciding on a course of action. His eye twitched. Each of his steps around the fire was a year in Doevm's mind. Frey got so close that Doevm could smell depravity: "Got something to say?"

"Yeah," Doevm said as he shoved Frey back. "What's floating around in your head so much that you have to stare at the embers so much? Are you doing something productive there? Are you resting your body, trying to figure stuff out, or are you trying to figure out how you can blame yourself more for Hopi's death?"

"I'm…" Frey stretched his hands out and shoved Doevm back. "I'm thinking about it. I just want to be left alone." They stood, staring at each other for a few seconds. The crickets went silent, as if trying to overhear. "Not that you'd understand," Frey sneered. "Everything just goes right for you. I bet if it wasn't for me getting in your way, Hopi would be alive right now, wouldn't he?"

"I'm sure if I was a slave to your master plan, everything would be great. I'm sorry I can't comprehend your great knowledge and secrets, but I know what I do have: people who care about me!" Frey grabbed Doevm by the collar and smiled. "I have my sister. You may have Jameson but he'll just abandon you again like my parents did to me."

Doevm's feet were dangling off the ground, yet he still grabbed Frey's mouth, digging his fingers into the cheekbones. His humanity melted away, replaced by a deep void in his eyes and a wide smile. He raised a single arm, enhanced by a thin coat of blue life essence and placed it atop Frey's shoulder. "You can hate yourself all you want, even if you try to take it out on me. Just remember that I-"

A hand wrapped around Doevm's wrist. When he turned, he saw Wade, looking both disappointed, and angrier than the both of them. "That's enough you two. Let go." He forced the two to separate. "Hopi is dead. We are each mourning in our own ways. Let's just make it back to the mansion. Frey, go to sleep. Doevm, stay here, we need to talk." Doevm and Wade waited for Frey to storm off and go in his tent. They walked far enough so he wouldn't hear. "What was that?" Wade asked.

"I was trying to get him to open up," Doevm said. "Then he started fighting back so I pushed harder. Then he wanted to get in a fight by provoking me. I was about to end it and prove that I-"

"Not from my point of view," Wade said. "It seemed to me like you were just as angry as him. You're not like this. You're usually calm, collected, and respectable. What were you going to prove by beating him down? How is he supposed to understand that?"

Doevm blinked, feeling his anger fade away and clarity come back. "It happened again…" he mumbled.

"What was that?" Wade asked. He took a step closer to Doevm as if the boy would run away from him.

Doevm shook his head: "Nothing, I understand what I did wrong."

He turned and left the man, who shook his head: "No you don't." As he watched Doevm hop back into his tent, he thought: 'I thought of him as a genius, but he's just a fourteen-year-old. He can't understand his own emotions, let alone others.' He facepalmed himself and walked around the camp, taking his second shift of the patrol.

He found more firewood and rekindled the fire, taking his time to ensure the flames crept along the twigs and blowing on them when needed. He looked out into the dark night, back at the cloud of smoke dispersing over the forest. When he was sure the others were asleep, he cried.