Bereft: Demise

2 | Of Places Dark and Dead

"Imagine a house comprised of many different rooms. Those rooms are many different shapes and sizes, and are filled with various kinds of furniture. Some of the rooms are connected to one another, and some aren't, while some are exceedingly difficult to reach, others are easily accessible. Some rooms are hidden inside others, and some have fallen into inhabitable disrepair.

"If you can imagine this house as I have described it, then you can conceive the basic model of our universe."

As Darius spoke, the Sin and I alighted from a yellow cab and pushed ourselves into the teeming mess that was Verweald International Airport. No matter the time of day, the traffic was obscene and the crowds were overwhelming. We didn't have tickets or papers, only a single carry-on bag held by the demon, but Darius was able to use the Tongue of the Realm to shove us through security and to bluff our way by the check-in station.

If I hadn't been terrified Balthier would suddenly appear behind a sun-burnt tourist, ready to kill us and everyone in sight, I would have been impressed by Darius's ingenuity.

The Sin continued speaking in a low, guttural voice, distracting himself from the mounting hunger leaching color from his eyes and sharpening his teeth, and my hand clutched his sleeve to keep us from being separated. "Think of each divided room within our theoretical house as a realm. Terrestria is a windowless closet surrounded by an untenable hall. That hall opens onto several other rooms, and many of those rooms—in turn—open onto one another.

"These areas are given delineation by walls. You can't walk through walls, can you?"

"No," I panted, dodging a runaway trolley being pushed by an overweight businessman yammering into his phone. The question was rhetorical, but I nevertheless answered. "I can't, though you seem to manage it well enough."

Darius grunted, unamused. He tugged us from the stream of meandering travelers to stop before a grossly overpriced gift shop. The Sin snatched two postcards from a wire rack and walked on without the clerk being any the wiser.

"Not without a great measure of difficulty, Sara. You see, these metaphoric walls we're discussing are made of something the Sins and most Terrestrians refer to as 'the void.' I believe Valians call it 'the Far Vale,' or something similar, and the Dreaming simply named it 'The Dream.' Regardless, it is all the same entity. The void is a realm unto itself, a place where living things do not and cannot tread, for the most part. Souls leave imprints upon the void, and it is thought they follow these imprints upon death, tracing that path so they can...pass on."

Darius's quiet words were nearly lost to the crush of voices echoing within the cavernous terminal. Soaring windows offered a view of the tarmac bathed in the somber colors of sunset, large jets and airplanes gliding upon the runways as their roaring engines vibrated through the scuffed floors underfoot.

"The void's more of a membrane than a wall, really. In some places it's quite thin, like rice paper, and in others it's very thick, thick as stone. It's not the same as the Realm, which the Sins can pass through fairly easily." Darius was muttering, preoccupied by the cards he was deftly folding between his fingers as we hurried. I didn't know what he was planning on doing with those.

"What does this have to do with Balthier?" I asked—cursing myself for uttering his name aloud. "And loa spirits?" 

"Loa spirits live within the void, Sara. I thought that much would be obvious." Darius handed me one of the postcards. It was folded into a slim rectangle with the white back facing outward. "Hold it like you've a ticket." 

I did as he said, thankful to have something to occupy my hands with. "If they're from a place no one alive can venture, how did Envy capture one?"