Brela - Rot (2)

Dio was exactly the kind of person she had hoped for. He spoke thoughtfully, was gentle, and even wanted to go into the forest with her—together. She hadn’t felt that happy in a long time. Yet the moment he agreed, an ugly thought crept in:

If he goes into the forest, he won’t stay…

Dread had taken root in her heart and consumed it—the fear of being alone again. Yet with Dio and the Sun came clarity to Daw. The Sky Circle seemed to inspire them all to richer thoughts than Brela’s meager flowers had ever managed, and she was glad for everyone. Now, her laughter was always honest and her jokes truly funny. She was finally with them…

…and no longer sat alone on her tree trunk.

They went into the forest, just as she had suggested. It became the most wonderful day she’d known since her arrival. Not only was there someone beside her who opened new paths through his thoughts, but someone who truly listened—who cared about her favorite places, who was really there and not already dreaming elsewhere.

When the strange insect attacked Dio, something deep inside her quivered. Nausea rose, dulling all thought. His convulsions on the ground, that distant look in his eyes where a splinter of something otherworldly flickered—all of it finally sent her into blind panic.

You can’t go. Please, don’t leave me alone!

Without hesitation, Brela pulled out her pouch.

Please, I don’t want to be alone again… You have to recover, please! You have to get better!

Tingling flooded through her arms, and he did; the paste worked. Yet she realized she could never take him into the forest again. What if he was attacked once more? What if he left her behind, waking and…?

Still, Brela was finally able to enjoy her time in Daw with her friends. Des was now more grounded in the present, and Dio constantly spoke of new theories, ideas, and questions about the Dream—questions Brela had never thought to ask. His enthusiasm was almost contagious, and she always smiled at his awkward silence whenever he thought he had said or asked too much.

Yet something about Dio remained beyond her grasp, and that made her uneasy. It wasn’t fear; she had long since welcomed him into herself as warmth, just as she had the others in Daw. But Dio’s warmth was different—stronger, brighter. Since the Radiant Circle had entered her mind, a garden had begun to bloom within her, its flowers thriving on the light of her friends until they shone in quiet splendor: tulpis nourished by Des’s presence, a graceful lotus unfolding from Dio’s enthusiasm, arcids swaying in delight at Lot’s steady diligence...

Still, something about Dio made her pause—something she could not define. At times, a few of his words echoed in her mind, leading her to entirely new realizations. And soon she began to suspect that it wasn’t only the Sun that had brought progress to Daw—perhaps her best friend had as well. Yet in his words, there was sometimes something that seemed to warn of danger.

Brela knew that he was aware of it too, at least to some extent. He had never again tried to uncover the laws of the Dream on his own after that day she had found him beneath a tree with a few wooden spheres—the day when an abyssal glimmer suddenly flashed in his eyes.

She had felt him flicker somewhere nearby, like a candle catching in the wind. For a moment she told herself it was nothing, only her imagination, but the unease would not fade. What if Dio was in trouble?

Brela slipped from her tree tent and ran toward the forest, her bare feet brushing through moss and roots still wet with morning dew. The air was cool beneath the canopy, filled with the sweet scent of sap and soil. Then she saw him beneath an old tree. There were two trenches near him, and he invited her to a game—to predict which of his spheres would win the race.

At first he had seemed full of elation, happy. She had enjoyed the little challenge, had felt her heart skip a beat when she imagined her ball winning, had cheered when it did… and then Dio had another thought.

That was the moment when strangeness came to them—between them, around them. It was intangible, yet Dio seemed distant, farther away than ever before, and loneliness returned. Even in her inner garden, the lotus that was usually nourished by his warmth had begun to fold its leaves and withdraw from her.

In despair, she had shaken him—too hard. She had grabbed him and held on too tightly, but…

I can’t let you go. I just can’t. What if it becomes like before? I can’t go through that again, the thought raced through her mind.

Yet when she heard his cry, she released him, trembling in shock. There were bruises on his wrist where her hands had been.

What do I do? What am I supposed to do? Did I hurt him? I forget how strong I can be sometimes… Damn it, no!

Her thoughts spun out of control. Brela looked into his bewildered eyes, which still seemed to stare partly into a bottomless distance.

“Dio, what was that?! You… you were completely gone! You looked almost mad, your eyes… I… I…” Brela stopped, trying to steer herself away from the darkness in her mind.

Disgust over her own actions twisted in her stomach. Desperately, she tried to explain herself.

“Shit, I was scared. Scared of you… Oh no, wait—did I hurt you?”

For a moment, Brela feared he could tell that she was only making excuses, that she was trying to distract both him and herself from what truly lingered inside her: the feeling of loneliness, fed by the emptiness that had been with them—the emptiness into which Dio had, for a brief moment, left her behind.

Hurriedly, she searched for the paste at her belt once more and spread it over his wrists with trembling hands, as gently as she could.

Stay here. Heal, so that you remain healthy and full of life, here with us… with me.

For a moment she felt better, almost ready to sigh in relief, but then the strangeness returned. Once again, she felt the lotus in her inner garden closing its leaves, just after it had shown its wonderful bloom. Something was seeping out of the flower, something that had been there all along…

And suddenly, it was truly there in Dio—the very thing she feared.

“Dio!” she screamed.

He flinched but quickly composed himself, visibly uncomfortable. Still, Brela couldn’t bear to see that glimmer in his eyes again. She didn’t want to feel the part of Dio in her inner garden close itself off from her once more.

All at once, she understood what it meant. It reminded her that he might one day leave. That he might one day be gone, wandering through the Dream to search for Ray.

He would eventually realize that his promise had no real meaning if they were connected, because then Ray would always find him, no matter where he was. He didn’t have to stay.

One dark evening, Brela could no longer ignore it. Lying in bed, she turned over every thought about Dio, every trace of fear she held. She tried to smother the panic of loneliness that she knew would one day wrap itself around her again—the day when she would lose her best friend.

All the time they’d spent together, all the evenings… would then be nothing but memories.

Nausea rose within her once more. She turned onto her side, clutching her warm blanket tightly against her chest. But even then, she already felt alone.

Six hundred seventy-four days… days in which she had not been alone.

Yes, she had told Dio and Des about her fear that Dio might leave. He hadn’t denied it, but he had promised to return. She believed him, yet the panic remained—the fear that Ray and Dio would disappear, and that she would never see them again. It was baseless and foolish, but it lingered all the same.

Sweat-soaked, she tossed beneath her blanket, feeling loneliness lurking at the edges of her mind.

Suddenly she remembered Lao, and what Dio had said earlier that evening:

When you stop growing, you’re bound to wither eventually…

Wither…

It was a word she had forgotten in the Dream, but Dio had reminded her. His voice echoed through her thoughts. The word fit so much of what she had felt since her arrival.

It was what loneliness had done to her, across unthinkable stretches of time before the Sun came. She had withered slowly inside, rotting in her solitude.

Brela’s breathing grew difficult, and she began to force air from her lungs in quick bursts. Her body trembled.

The garden! The garden!

She closed her eyes and sank inward. There it was—her garden. Beautiful as always, its flowers blooming as usual. Her connections soothing, radiant, and divine.

And then she saw it, just at the edge of her vision. She had felt it for a long time but had always ignored it: the corner she didn’t want to enter, didn’t want to acknowledge. So impure, so ugly. Inside her, leading to somewhere distant. The part she had never wished to see—that a piece of her garden was withering.

And when she saw the path trampled by some foreign, cruel presence, she was pulled into it—into the rotting trees, the wilting flowers, the reeking shrubs, and the stinking carcasses of animals she did not know.

She screamed and screamed… and suddenly found herself in Dio’s house.

It was humiliating. She didn’t know what to do.

But when Avee and Lot left that same day with Lao, their departure felt like a dark premonition. To her surprise, it was Dio who lost control and tried to stop them from leaving—and it was she who had let them go.

It had taken all her strength to act cheerful as always, to keep them from worrying. But perhaps, at the same time, she had already given in, had slowly accepted the fact that loneliness would always find a way to return.

Brela couldn’t bring herself to make Lot and Avee feel guilty, to be a burden on them. They were her friends, and she wanted the best for them… didn’t she? Yet in the end, she felt the same as she had so long ago, when all her efforts to find companionship had amounted to nothing, evaporating like drops in a fire.

She understood now that even the most beautiful garden would eventually rot with time, no matter how carefully it was tended.

When you stop growing, you’re bound to wither eventually…

Once more she heard Dio’s voice inside her. But he wasn’t entirely right, was he? It didn’t matter whether one kept growing or not. Wouldn’t one always wither in the end?