Chapter 130: Chapter 128: You and I together have four letters

As a child, his, their, mother, a human who had been living in the deep forests of the south, was murdered by a clan of fearful elves. The elves were afraid of a foreboding sign brought to them through sages and starlight, a sign that told of the chaotic, horrific destruction that the woman’s children would cause. This was the case because they were gifted with very unusual magic for the south, ash.

 

The elf who murdered their mother then took him as an offering to the owl-god of the time. However, at the last minute, she had a change of heart and instead fled the south, fled the forest, and took the baby that would later become Hineni with her to the north.

 

Nekyia, his sister by blood, had, after her failed attempt to rescue him and her following mutilation, become a thing used by the smaller, weaker creatures of the forest to resist the owl-god and so she became the frog-god, the big frog.

 

Hineni spent his early childhood growing up in the north. The elven woman who kidnapped him, his step-mother, cut her own ears to hide her identity and eventually met a man, his step-father. The two of them would go on to raise him, at least until the day came when Hineni killed them both.

 

Why he did this is still uncertain. He has no recollection of the incident.

 

All the while, Nekyia remained in the south, amongst the frogs. After the death of the owl-god and its mate and the flight of Obscura, also to the north, the frog-god remained in the forest and grew amongst the frogs. Her power rose, and the other gods of the region slowly bowed their heads in order to avoid the fate of being consumed.

 

She looked everywhere that she could over the span of those years. But how does one find an unmarked baby in a world as large as this? How does one find a single elven woman with no name in a world as full and thriving as this one? Even for a god, this is hard to do.

 

But what is not hard to do is to watch the offspring of the owl-god, Obscura. Even weakened and far away, the progeny of a god releases potent, powerful magics from itself that are almost impossible to hide.

 

So what an odd twist of fate it was that this very creature would land in the same place as he had, the north.

 

The frogs found him through her.

 

That’s why they had always insisted on specifically kidnapping him, rather than hurting him. It was never about the feud between the owl-god and the frogs. That was just something on the side, an annoyance. For the frogs, the guild in the northern city was a small outpost, far, far away from home. But the main quarter of the frog’s power is in the southern region of the world.

 

Whereas Obscura has always been obsessed with her hunt for the big-frog, the big-frog couldn’t care less about Obscura. Her real interest, her real ambition, has always been Hineni.

 

— Hineni pushes open the door, walking out of the house into the forest.

 

His eyes wander around the forest, as they had done several times before now. This isn’t his first attempt at leaving the cabin, and he’s sure it won’t be his last.

 

“I can’t let you leave,” says a voice from behind him. “I wish you’d stop.”

 

Hineni waves the big-frog off and slams the door. “Tough shit,” he replies.

 

The man wanders off into the forest, walking through the underbrush.

 

---

 

A moment later, he arrives right back where he started. Despite the impossibility of the matter, Hineni finds himself standing back inside the little house. Every attempt he makes to leave somehow has him end up right back where he started.

 

“We can be normal here together, Nini~” says Nekyia. “You and me, where nobody can judge us.”

 

He looks back at her. “I’m pretty normal already. You might be a bit out there though, yeah,” he replies. “Anyways, who cares what other people think?”

 

He opens the door again, stepping out into the forest.

 

“— You do,” she replies. Hineni looks back at Nekyia, sitting on the edge of the bed. “Otherwise you wouldn’t be so obsessed about leaving.”

 

Hineni slams the door again and walks off into the forest.

 

---

 

A minute later, he arrives back inside the house, despite his best efforts to leave it. “There’s a difference between caring about what people think and caring about people,” says Hineni. “You wouldn’t get it,” he says. “I don’t have time to waste my life with you, because there are people who I actually care about out there.”

 

“Do you?” asks Nekyia, lifting her hand to spin a finger through her hair to play with it. “Or do you just think you do because you’ve been brainwashed by the owl?”

 

Hineni slams the door again. “Take off that ridiculous wig,” says the man, waving a hand over his shoulder.

 

He walks through the forest.

 

---

 

A minute later, he arrives back at the house.

 

Hineni looks over his shoulder. Nekyia is sitting there. Her wig is in her hands and her head is held down somewhat lower, as if she were ashamed. “Do you like me better this way?”

 

“I don’t like you at all,” replies Hineni. “But that’s because you’re a crazy, obsessive monstrosity with no sense of personal boundaries,” he explains, lifting an eyebrow. “You can’t get over the past, so you’ve gone off the deep end in every way imaginable.”

 

“Should I take off my dress next?”

 

Hineni walks out of the door, slamming it shut.

 

Damn frogs. Or… uh… frog, singular.

 

He rolls his eyes, snapping his fingers in the hopes that he’ll set the house on fire with his ash-magic. But nothing happens. He’s still out of soul-points. How the hell is he going to get out of here? He has no way of breaking the big-frog’s magic by himself. Will the others even notice he’s gone? They did last time.

 

He can count on them. They’re his people. Obscura, Rhine, Sockel, Eilig — wherever she is, they won’t let him vanish. They’ve proven that already.

 

---

 

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Hineni steps back into the house, despite just being in the forest a second ago.

 

“I know what you’re thinking,” says Nekyia. Hineni grabs the door again to open it once more. “You’re thinking that you just have to wait it out, because your friends are going to come for you.”

 

“They’re not my friends, they’re my family,” says Hineni, opening the door.

 

“– You’re ugly,” says the voice from behind him. “Ribbit~”

 

Hineni stops. “…What?” he asks, looking back at her. Nekyia sits there with a lowered head.

 

“I’m sorry,” says Nekyia, looking up at him. “But you are. So am I,” says the frog-god. “Ugly people don’t get to have friends and family like the other people do.”

 

“Wow. What the hell am I even supposed to say to that?” asks Hineni. He shakes his head. “I just told you, I have a family.” He turns to walk toward the door again.

 

“Do you?” asks Nekyia. “Or do you just feel like you have one because the owl manipulated them to be around you, just like she’s manipulating you to get back at me?”

 

Hineni steps out of the door and walks out into the forest.

 

---

 

He arrives back at the house.

 

“Do you think that she doesn’t know?” asks Nekyia. She tosses her wig across the room at him, and Hineni instinctively catches it. It smells like frogs. “Or do you think that she can’t smell it on you? That she can’t see it in your eyes?” asks the big-frog. “Our connection? How could the owl-god, renowned for seeing and noticing things that nobody else can, miss that you and I are connected by blood? She didn’t. It’s impossible.”

 

“I have nothing to do with you,” replies Hineni. “You’re sick and damaged, and I hope you can find the place in life you need to be at to get better.” He slams the door and walks out into the forest.

 

He looks down at his hands, noticing that he’s still holding the wig. He tosses it up over a tree and then keeps walking.

 

---

 

Sure enough, he arrives back inside the house.

 

“Let me ask you something,” says the big-frog. Hineni stands there, staring at the door. “Just imagine, for a second, a life in which you never met the owl. A life in which she never took any influence over you,” says Nekyia. “Do you think that, even if you crossed paths with Rhine, with Sockel, or with any of your other ‘family’, they would want anything to do with you?” she asks. “Or would you just be a creature they see from the corners of their eyes and pity?”

 

“Of course they’d still be with me,” replies Hineni without skipping a beat. “Rhine’s a good man. The best one I know, and I could say similar things about all of the others. I’d die for them.” He looks at her. “Which ones of your followers would die for you?” he asks.

 

“All of them,” replies Nekyia immediately. “Because that is my power as a god. I hold sway and influence over their minds and hearts,” she explains. “It is the nature of my presence.” She takes off a glove, pointing at him with her two remaining fingers on that hand. “And just like you are now, they’re too enamored to see the spell for what it really is.” She takes off her other glove, looking down at her remaining fingers. “I’m your family, Hineni. I’m the only one who really spent a lifetime looking for you, because it’s what I wanted in my heart, not because of any magic.”

 

Hineni opens the door.

 

“- Do you think they’d look as long?” she asks. “Do you think that in decades from now, they’ll still be looking for you?” Nekyia gets up. “Because that’s how long I looked for you,” she says. “I never stopped.” She walks towards him. “Or do you think that, in a little while, once the magic of the owl-god wears off of them and you fade from their memories, that you’ll just… be forgotten?” she asks. “That the memory of you will be written off by them as a curiosity of life.” She stands behind him, holding him from behind. “That your image in their head,” she stands on her toes. “— Will be blown away like a puff of ash?” she asks, blowing into his ear from behind. “Ribbit~”

 

Hineni sighs and turns his head around. “How long are you going to do this?” he asks.

 

“As long as it takes.”

 

“You know that I can’t kill you, even if I want to,” he says.

 

She nods. “Would you like to hit me more?” asks Nekyia. “You can. I want you to. It makes me happy. You can do whatever you want.”

 

“— Aaaand I’m stopping you there,” interrupts Hineni. “To get back to my point, I can’t kill you and you’re not planning on killing me, so what the hell is this?” he asks. “Are we really just going to sit here in this stupid cabin and… what? I’m just going to keep walking out of the door, and you’re going to keep preaching your spiel until the sun goes down?” The big-frog croaks, her throat stretching a little. “- All the while, my people are looking for me, and they’ll inevitably find me, and your fourth and last attempt will be done with. The game will be over. So what the hell is this?” he asks.

 

“Oh, Hineni, you’re always so silly,” says the big-frog. “We’re not going to stay here forever,” she says. “We’ve just come here to the forest, far, far away from where anyone can bother us,” starts Nekyia, tapping against his nose. “To get all of that nasty owl-magic out of your system,” she says. “There’s nothing that the great outdoors can’t do,” she says. “Ribbit~”

 

“Great, and then?” he asks. “I’m still going to love Obscura and I’m still going to think you’re a creep. I’m still going to cherish the people I care about, who aren’t you, and the sun will rise and the moon will fall and then that’s Tuesday.”

 

“We’ll see about that,” says Nekyia. Hineni sighs and rolls his eyes, pulling the door open. “The thing is,” she says. “I’m not going to keep you here forever,” explains Nekyia. “Just for a little while, until her magic wears off.”

 

“And then?”

 

“And then… I’m going to let you go back by yourself.”

 

Hineni raises an eyebrow. “Just like that, huh?”

 

“Just like that,” replies Nekyia. “And you know what I think?” she asks.

 

He shakes his head. “I really, really, really don’t,” says Hineni.

 

The big-frog frog-hops onto his back, wrapping her legs and arm around him. He stumbles forward, balancing himself to not fall over. “I think,” she says, whispering into his ear. “That when you see what it's really like there, in that life that you think you like so much that you’ll come hop-hop-hop-hopping back to me,” says Nekyia. “On your hands and knees, Hi~ ne~ ni~ hi~”

 

“That’s dumb,” he says. “We already lived together before, remember?”

 

“That was my miscalculation,” says Nekyia. “In that state, your spirit was with me, but your body remained with them,” she explains. “The owl still had power over you. But out here, Nini~,” says the big-frog. “It’s just you and me, for real. Forever,” she whispers into his ear. “Or, well, four days.” Nekyia shrugs. “You know.”

 

Hineni sighs and slams the door shut again, trying to sake the creature off of himself.

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