It had been an interesting few days, but Veeyel was glad to be home. Everyone else had managed to make it back in time, they were just waiting for him. There was confetti and everything. Someone had even baked a cake.
“Did you all really miss me that much?” Veeyel asked as the door swung open. Kayel immediately wrapped his arms around him, holding Veeyel a little too tightly.
“Yes…” Kayel was almost crying. “I was scared I got you killed… Everyone else got back pretty quickly… But you… What if you’d been on your own, unable to walk?”
Veeyel squirmed. Kayel realised he was being too clingy and let go.
“I’m so sorry. So so sorry. I didn’t know about the teleport. Nothing told me about it…” Kayel kept on blurting out various apologies. There was something wrong with him. Had he really been sweating and worrying for the last week or so?
All Veeyel could do was shrug. “It’s fine. I’m alive. I can walk again. Was a bit worried since I was stuck in Hertany but this nice Rethan called Vel helped me out and gave me money to get back here. I would have made it back eventually, he just gave me a hand… er, you’re crying…”
Kayel wiped tears from his eyes. “I was so worried. B-but you’re… obviously fine. Maybe I’m overreacting or something…”
“You’re totally overreacting!” Ksiel tutted. “He’s been like this since it all happened. Took Psivee-En and I ages to convince Kayel to stay here, since this was where we all said we’d meet up anyway. But we’re fine. We’re all fine. We’re all doing better than ever. Look at us, we’re all fucking amazing!”
Veeyel glanced at his feet then nodded in agreement. He’d almost forgotten what it was like to be unable to walk. And on top of his legs being all fine and dandy, he now had a wonderful pair of wings which he needed to learn how to use.
“We can’t complain,” Zitel smiled. “The voices in my head are gone. I can think clearer better than ever. Kayel performed a miracle.”
“Hey, give the rest of us some credit!” Ksiel tutted. “We did a lot of the leg work and stuff!”
“What is most amazing though,” Psivee-En interrupted, “is that we can now access the Umbric Realm.”
Ksiel rolled his eyes. “You keep on mentioning that!” he snapped. “It’s a stupid dark place. What’s so fucking special about it?”
“What’s so… what’s… DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT THE UMBRIC REALM IS?” Psivee-En didn’t mean to shout, but he felt incredibly insulted by everyone else’s attitudes. This was a place that Psivee-En dreamed of visiting, a place only the most powerful Trehavok had only briefly visited. They all had the ability to go to the Land of Shadows and they simply did not understand. “This is a place we could make into our own!”
Veeyel shrugged. “Clearly I’ve missed something. What is the Umbric Realm?”
“It’s like a pocket dimension, dark place accessible via shadows and stuff,” Kayel tried to explain. “Mostly untouched since apparently it’s hard to access.”
“Which means we could claim it as our own!” Psivee-En exclaimed. “We could turn it into a home for our kind. Build the society we always wanted. No more being branded as lunatics and monsters. No more being considered less than everyone else!”
“We don’t have to go to a place of darkness to do that though,” Ksiel tutted.
“Really?” Psivee-En growled. “The Thraki were already uneasy with us. Goodness knows how they will be now that we’re a new species.”
The other beings all sighed.
“We have more important things to worry about first…” Kayel finally muttered. “Like how to reliably access the Umbric Realm for starters. We need to discover what we are capable of, what we need to eat and drink, how powerful we are. And some of us here need to learn how to fly.”
“He’s right,” Zitel smiled. “I nearly broke my leg trying to fly. Ksiel nearly brained himself too. Buuuut, after we’ve worked shit out, we should give this shadow place a try.”
“That sounds reasonable to me,” Ksiel shrugged.
Psivee-En wasn’t pleased, but he wasn’t going to win this argument. “Fine. Let’s get on with it all then…”