Foul-tasting herbs

Nyell flopped on his bed, exhausted. Every day felt tiresome, either physically or mentally, since the White Moon tribe showed up. And today was probably the worst day yet. 

The funeral had just ended, and it was the middle of the night. The fire was slowly dying outside, and the crackling flames illuminated the village, casting an orange hue inside the hut through the window. Despite the elders' protests, they didn't cause trouble once the ceremony started, though they did mumble about how much of a waste it was to use sacred wood for a werewolf from another tribe. Nyell did his best to ignore them and not cause an uproar. They had gathered to pay respect to Hersyl, not settle old grudges. 

Closing his eyes, Nyell sighed. The last funeral his tribe had held before this one had been for his mother. He couldn't help but think of her, especially after encountering her soul today. It had only been a remnant of herself, but still.

He missed her. 

Knocks on the door snapped him out of his depressing thoughts. He lazily glanced at it, not bothering to sit, and stayed sprawled on his bed. 

"Come in."

The door opened, and Corriel, followed by Lapis, entered his hut. Lapis looked as exhausted as him, and Nyell felt a bit, and just a bit, of sympathy for the man. Presiding over a funeral as a shaman was never easy, even more so when the said funeral was held for a friend. 

"Couldn't you at least sit to greet us?" His father nagged. "You look like a salted fish."

"Oh? Then, I'm a salted fish starting from now on."

"Is that so?" Corriel raised an eyebrow, not caring much about his son's nonsense. "Anyway, salted fish or not, we need to prepare for the trance. We brought calming herbs to help us fall asleep. You want some?"

Nyell nodded. He was exhausted, but he wasn't sure he could fall asleep on his own. Too many thoughts were swirling in his head. The night was only this long, and they had so much to do, so calming herbs it was.

Taking over the herbs his father was handing him, Nyell frowned, his mouth twitching. Yes, this peculiar herb was very effective, knocking out people in less than a minute, but it tasted like hell and numbed the tongue until it felt like it had fallen off. And after waking up from the slumber this thing put you in, the mouth was so dry it felt like it'd been stuffed with sand and cotton. The unpleasing feeling often lasted until the middle of the afternoon. People frequently joked that you fell asleep not because of the herb's calming properties but because you fainted from the terrible taste. 

"Don't look at me like that," Corriel sighed at the wronged face his son pulled. "Except these, we couldn't find any other calming herbs in the surroundings."

The tribe's stock of herbs was stored in the shaman's hut, and before fleeing, the shaman had brought with her the rare herbs and destroyed the others, rendering them useless. With the herbs gone, Corriel had no choice but to ransack through the surroundings to find some. Because he didn't have the time to venture far into the jungle and stayed in an area close to the tribe, people had already searched through it ages ago, and not much was left. Only the not-so-good ones, such as this herb, were still available. 

"Did you bring water, at least…?" Nyell grumped.

"What are you, a kid? Stop whining and just chew it."

Wrinkling his nose in disgust, Nyell glared at the herbs in his hands. The dark-brown color and fussy texture made them look like mud. Still, he did as he was told and threw the herbs in his mouth. At the same time, he peeked at Lapis, whose face had contorted into a grimace. The poor lad had never taken this herb before since it wasn't readily available in his tribe, and the face he pulled made Nyell grin. 

It felt good to know he wasn't the only one suffering.

But before Nyell could tease him, the calming proprieties of the herbs kicked in, and his eyes grew tired. He barely managed to drag his body near Lapis to hold his hand. He hadn't forgotten that they needed to physically touch for a shaman to act as a proxy to bring another person into someone's dream. 

As his eyelids started to close, Nyell caught a glimpse of his father's grin, and he felt the urge to roll his eyes. Corriel had developed a certain resistance to sleeping herbs because he had been taking them nonstop these past few months after his mate's death, and he seemed to be mocking his son, who had quickly fallen prey to the sleeping herbs and needed to crawl on the floor to get near Lapis. Meanwhile, he could still walk on his two feet and gracefully sit beside the shaman. 

Seriously, his father could be so childish at times.

***

When Nyell opened his eyes again, he saw a desolate place. The realm looked almost identical to what he had seen in the previous elder's dream. It made him frown. They had chosen a different elder this time, so how come the scenery was as dreary as the last time? The dead trees, ruined houses, and mountains of corpses were still very much present. And again, the nauseous stench of rotten flesh floated in the air while a gray sky loomed over his head. 

"Charming."

Nyell heard his father's voice and turned his head toward him. Beside Corriel stood Lapis, whose face had turned livid at the gruesome sight. 

"Right?" Nyell sneered. "Are you sure we're in Burg's dream? It looks awfully like Tuppel's."

"Then I guess their dreams take roots from a shared memory," Corriel speculated, a smile that wasn't quite a smile stretching his lips. "And it doesn't seem to be a very joyful memory."

Nyell nodded before squinting his eyes, searching around the place. Last time, he had found Tuppel kneeling and bawling his eyes out just outside the forest. He wondered if it would be the same with Burg, but when he saw the man, he was standing a few meters away from them, coldly surveying the area. Unlike Tuppel, guilt didn't seem to be ravaging him. He appeared oddly calm.

Soon enough, their eyes met, and Burg, who looked a good twenty years younger, cocked an eyebrow. Nyell felt a shiver run down his spine when a grin appeared on the man's face, soon followed by a chuckle. Burg didn't seem to notice the two men beside Nyell, for his attention was latched onto him. He glanced at the forest filled with corpses once more before stepping toward Nyell. 

"Oh my, I never thought Hulien would fail to end you," he admitted, his voice strangely soft. "And since she hasn't come back with you, I presume you killed her in your madness."

Nyell didn't know what to say. He usually had a big mouth, but he was unsure how to respond in this situation. Or it'd be more accurate to say that the anger was shutting him up. Why? Why did this man look so delighted at the idea of him killing Hulien? 

"Isn't it funny how Hulien so readily cast aside her feelings for you the moment you lost your mind? Just so you know, we didn't entice her to kill you. She decided to do it herself, claiming that you were her responsibility and that she should be the one to put an end to all of this as an older sister. Now, it seems she has perished at your very own hands. How laughable!"

"...I didn't kill her," Nyell managed to spit through gritted teeth.

Burg was taken aback, his eyes opening wide. 

"You can form coherent sentences…? Don't tell me, have you regained your senses? But that should be impossible."

"Sorry to break it to you, but I like to do the impossible."

"And you're still sane after all you've done?" Burg's smile grew sinister. "Or have you forgotten how many died because of you?"

"What if I have? Will you help me remember?"

"..."

Playing along with the man's bullshit was somewhat nervewracking, as Nyell had to be careful not to arouse his suspicion. Though it was a dream, if Burg were to grow wary of him, the realm would collapse like last time. One problem, though: he had no idea what his uncle's personality was like. All Nyell knew was that they looked alike, so much that the elders mistook him for Dangu in their dreams. 

"Even after all this, your darn insolence hasn't changed," Burg clicked his tongue. "Always so annoying."

"Well, I was born this way." 

Thank goodness, looks like our personalities are similar, too. 

"You want me to help you remember? Sure, I can do that."

Burg walked to the Nyell, swiftly grabbing him by the arm. Nyell resisted the urge to free himself and followed along as the man dragged him toward the forest. Crows were perched on the naked branches of the tall trees, peeking at him with their dead-like eyes. An uneasy feeling grew in the pit of his stomach.

"Let's reenact what happened a few hours ago, shall we?"

A crazy light flashed across Burg's eyes. Although he had hinted that Dangu had been drowning in madness earlier, right now, he seemed to be the one to have gone mad. He was dragging Nyell through the forest, not bothered by the bodies littering the path. He stepped on them like they didn't exist, as if he didn't hear the squeaking sound the flesh below his feet made. 

Nyell felt his stomach churn. He was about to throw up, but he knew he had to play his part if he wanted to learn about his uncle's past, so he sucked it up. He looked behind him, making sure Corriel and Lapis were following along. 

Though they were, Lapis seemed about to faint. He had to give it to him for not giving in. But… for how much longer would he be able to endure it? If the shaman, who maintained the link between them and Burg's dream, were to lose consciousness, would Nyell and his father be expelled from the dream? Or would they be stuck in it? Nyell didn't know, and he would rather not find out. 

Sadly, he had underestimated just how gruesome the event that had transpired here had been. Even he, who had strong willpower, felt like fainting when he learned of what had been done to his uncle. Maybe it was a blessing that everything concerning Dangu had been forgotten until now.