10

The child’s strange interruption however brief answered one question while bringing many more.

On the one hand, being surrounded by an immense unseeable sea of people was immensely disconcerting. The shivers born of countless imagined gazes didn’t help her feel one bit. Yet it was comforting facing people rather than unfathomable monsters. Even if they were strange shades and crying children, so she chose to believe in the latter.

Mensha hadn’t found the same comfort and his gaze shifted ceaselessly between wary and distant.

“Why do you think they’re ignoring us.” She whispered to the worried man as they neared one of the spears. The conversation didn’t sever any points but experience told her it would help.

His eyes focused in contemplation. “I don’t know but I think, most of them are intangible and that might have something to with it.” He threw an empty snack wrapper that promptly melted into the dark.

“How so,”

“Well, with a sample size of one tangible shade doing stuff and what we presume is a crowd of intangible ones surrounding us.”

“Then maybe only the physical ones can interact with us, or they have to become physical to interact with us or something.” She gazed at the dark’s secrets; it revealed nothing. “We’re not pulling from much.”

“Never have truer words been said.” He bent to pick up the trash he’d thrown as it entered their bubble.

She pursed her lip. “Though if this is a crowd should you be throwing that at them?”

He paused “No, probably not.” He said and returned it to his bag.

The silence was quite amusing.

They stepped free of the crowd into the bubble of free space surrounding the glowing pillar and the corpse it nailed.

It wasn’t the first they’d seen yet she found it uncanny how their light was visible through the dark yet their surroundings were only unveiled as they entered its radius. It was like a streetlight that lit nothing until you walked into its light.

With a relieved sigh, she sat as close to the pillar and corpse as she was willing – pulled by the light’s safety and repulsed by the smell.

She unslung her pack and turned to her partner who sat beside her facing the dark while she looked at the pillar, “How are you holding up,” she stretched her shoulders, if she was feeling it with her magical constitution, she worried for him.

“Quite well actually,” he turned to her with a slight smile, “I figured out how to turn off my pain receptors,” he said, his brown eyes shining with excitement.

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His cheer raised her mood before a passing thought brought a frown to her face, “Wait, are you hurt,”

He rolled his eyes though his smile didn’t falter, “Yes, but no more than one would expect,” he raised a finger staying her retort “and, I can actively heal it with magic.”

She sighed– she’d been doing a lot of that recently and returned her gaze to the pillar “Fine, but tell me if you need a break, haste makes waste as you love to remind me.”

He kissed her cheek and she grumbled though any attempt at maintaining her annoyance failed when his hand found hers, “Thanks for worry Summer, and I will,” she sighed mourning her inability to stay upset at him, she just hoped their kids wouldn’t have the same power.

She leaned into him and let the fantasy run through her over the course of a few wonderful minutes.

“Summer,” a knock on her shoulder pulled her to reality. “Summer look,”

She whipped her head around to nothing; no. A pair of black feet were slowly approaching them. She stood and saw the silhouette of a waist against the floor. The shade wasn’t further than two meters away.

“Stop!” to her surprise they did. She exchanged a cautious glance with her now-standing partner. She shook her head when he gesture to his makeshift sheath.

She turned back to the person - mostly invisible against the dark background. “Can you understand,”

A glance at their shifting feet indicated some response.

“Can you stand against the pillar? We can’t see you,”

They did the two groups circling until they’d swapped positions, Mensha shifted uncomfortably and kept his attention on the darkness to their back with only a glance at the silhouette by the pillar.

Summer struggled to tell where her clothes began and she ended but against a bright background, the shape of a short lithe happily swaying woman was evident, dressed in what looked like a long dress.

Her curtsey cleared that doubt.

“Hello?”, God she sounded confused to her own ears. Sliding through her prorates Summer decided to treat this like a meeting. “Can you understand me?”

The shadow’s head rapidly bobbed.

“Can you please.” she hesitated “turn your head?”

She did and Summer’s tension evaporated as the silhouette of a grown woman excitedly nodded to the side like an excited puppy.

Summer suppressed the grin threatening to split her face and schooled it into a thin line. It didn’t hide her shaking shoulders. Mensha snorted to her side.

“Miss. . .”

The shadow stared at her judgingly.

“Can you write your name,” she finished, embarrassed despite the situation.

The shadow shaking their head was much clearer.

“Is there a reason you’re here?”

She bounced happily in what Summer gathered was a yes.

“And that is,”

She spun her skirt flaring as she twirled closer, motion both hiding and accentuating her humanity as Summer lost track of her different parts. She came to a stop her outstretched in invitation.

She wasn’t sure what that meant. “Do you want me to dance, with you?”

Her hand answered with a grabby motion.

“Well before that,” she pushed their hand away. The figure stood up with slumped shoulders and a bowed head, “Can you answer some questions for us?” an idea came to her she hid a smile.

The shadow nodded sadly.

“If you do, I’ll dance with you,”

The dancer jolted into perfect straightness then horridly nodded their head – though it looked like bobbing to her.

“So have you seen any people,” her words filled with fragile hope?

She nodded to the side enthusiastically and Summer wiped the tears that suddenly threatened to overwhelm her, “In the future bounce once for yes and twice for no,” Mensha said his relief no less if not as evident.

“Can you take us to them? If you do he’ll dance with you too.” She continued a hint of mischief in her voice.

The shade bounced happily.

She spun to her partner and hoisted them in a hug. Lifting him with strength born of her joyful shine as she twirled in time with shade. Laughing all the while, her love smiled ruefully at her.