An Unexpected Guest

Warmness tickled Ryu’s face.

Redness invaded the dark.

Ryu’s eyes fluttered open.

The blindingness of a light overhead forced him to look away.

Now Ryu was facing a light brown wall.

A wall he recognized.

He was lying in a bed he recognized.

In a room he recognized.

Under a light he knew all too well.

Ryu was in his bedroom.

“How did I…?” A whisper as he sat up, cut off by a stabbing pain in his head. “Owwww…”

“A headache. To be expected.” A soft voice came from his desk at the other end of the room. It was a soft voice, filled with a love it shouldn’t have been full of. It belonged to someone who had forsaken his mother in decades past.

“Grandma.” Ryu looked at the old woman with disgust. Her gray, thinning, hair betrayed the age that her lineless face tried to show.

“I’ll let that tone go for now,” His grandmother stood up from the desk, a glass of something in her hand. It was a clear glass, but the liquid inside was murky. “Drink this, it’ll help with the headache.”

Ryu gingerly took the cup from his grandmother’s hands. He looked down into the liquid, sloshing it back and forth in the cup for a few seconds.

“What is it? Paciro Sweat?” The look of the drink reminded Ryu of the popular electrolyte heavy drink that he often grabbed after morning runs.

“No, it’s just water.” His grandmother’s response got a chuckle from Ryu.

“Yea, and I’m the son of the empress,” Ryu pointed at the liquid. “There’s no way something this murky is ‘just water’.”

“You’re right. It’s water with mana mixed in.”

“Mana?” Ryu stared at the old woman with actual disdain as his voice dripped with sarcasm. “I knew you were getting up there in age, old hag, but to think that you are already delusional. You should be the one in the hospital, not mom.”

There was no way that mana existed. Mana could only exist if magic existed. And magic was fantasy. It couldn’t exist. It-

“Oh?” The old woman leaned in next to Ryu and whispered into his ear. “Then what did you do last night?”

Flashes stomped through his mind. The alley. The man with a gun. Ryu lying on the ground. Something warm. Reaching for that warmth.

Blood.

Blood dripping onto him.

Blood gushing onto him.

The man with the gun impaled by a stalagmite that had come from where Ryu’s hand had touched the ground.

Something vile was rising in his chest.

Ryu gagged.

He was going to throw up.

Ryu leaned over the side of his bed, only to find a small trash can already there.

His empty stomach retched up little bile and waste.

“You used mana last night.” His grandmother was still whispering into his ear.

Ryu wanted to scream in denial, but was only met with more retching sounds.

“You reached into the ground and took Jormungandr’s blessing to kill that soldier.”

NO! Ryu shouted in his mind. As he retched, he denied what his grandmother was saying. It had all been fantasy. Something in his mind to explain what he had seen. None of it was his fault. None of it.

“You used our family’s magic to save yourself and your little friend.”

With his body empty of excess bile and waste, Ryu slowly began to stop dry heaving. As he did, his grandmother grabbed him by the chin and tilted his head back. She had grabbed the cup out of his hand at some point while he had been doubled over the trash can and was now pouring the drink into his mouth.

Ryu tried to struggle, but found that his body was significantly heavier than it normally was. His body was tired. Far more tired than he had ever been. The heaviness and headache were symptoms of exhaustion.

As the drink being forced into his mouth slid down Ryu’s throat, both of those symptoms were disappearing. His exhaustion was being reduced by the drink.

Suddenly Ryu gagged. His throat had realized that something was being forcefully put into it. He shook his head free of his grandmother’s grasp and swallowed hard before he threw up anything else.

“What the hell are you talking about?!” His grandmother’s last sentence rang in his ears. The term ‘family magic’ was what he wanted to know about. There was no way that his family was magic.

“Why do you think I disowned your mother?”

Ryu stopped. He had never been told why. His mother had always changed the subject when he had asked.

“What?”

“I disowned your mother because she was magicless. Of all my children, only she was magicless. I don’t know why, nor do I care, but that was why I disowned her. I needed to train my heir,” Ryu’s grandmother stood while she spoke. She began to pace in front of Ryu like a teacher would at the front of a classroom. “But color me surprised when I found out last night that only the disgrace’s son could call upon Jormungandr and wield his strength.”

There was that word again. That name. “Wait, what do you mean when you say Jormungandr? Like, from Norse Mythology?”

“No. The one in Norse Mythology is based on the Jormungandr that our family has made a pact with. Jormungandr is the very Earth we stand upon. The consciousness of this world.”

Ryu shook his head. This was too much for him. Far too much.

As he looked around his room again, his eyes landed on the digital clock he kept near his bed. It was already well into the afternoon. Four in the afternoon to be exact. He had promised his mom that they would visit at three.

“Okay, wait,” Ryu put his hand up to stop his grandmother from speaking. “I’m sure this is fascinating and all, but you’ve got the wrong person, old hag. I’m not magic. So why don’t you go along and talk to one of your other grandchildren about this. Besides, I’m late to go visit my mom, who I actually care about.”

Ryu stood up to get dressed, only to find himself in clean clothes already. He must’ve been changed before being put in the bed. Though who had changed him, Ryu didn’t know. He was scared that it had been his little sister, and even more scared that it had been his grandmother.

His grandmother, for her part, had gone quiet.

The two stared at each other.

“Your mother…” The old woman stayed still for a second before speaking again. “Then why don’t I take you and your sister. I have to talk with your mother anyways. And then we can continue this conversation later.”

Ryu’s right eye twitched.

He wasn’t going to get rid of his grandmother that easily.