Elmer found his head whirling in a tumultuous sea of chaotic thoughts. Not a single thing had a reasonable explanation. Not a single one.
Was the person who his mind had enigmatically forgotten about weeks ago the messenger?
It seemed more likely to be them. They had been the one to hand him the expensive artifact that he was now in possession of after all, and for just a mint note.
It was also plausible for them to have moved from Andhera to Ur right after they had placed the letter at the doorstep of Craig Wiley. That would explain how they had known of a way for Craig to sneak out of Andhera. If that wasn't a big enough evidence to make them the messenger, then what else could be?
But how sure was he?
Those didn't explain how the messenger had known what he would do before he'd done it—what steps he would take before he'd taken it. The only way that would be possible was if everyone he'd met were involved with this messenger. Though still, that had a fault.
He'd made his decisions on his own, every single one, how could they have been certain that he would make those decisions and have planned ahead for it? And most of all, how could they have known that he would join the Pathway of Souls? It was humanly impossible to know that he would be chosen by a specific pathway. Even he, the one who apparently had the characteristics required for it, had not expected such a repulsive outcome ever. How could anyone else?
Knowing that nothing was a hundred percent certain was infuriating to Elmer. No matter how much he tried to piece things together, one would always have something that would render his conclusion false, or close to false.
Elmer clenched his chin, frustration plunging straight into his heart like the sharpened head of a spear.
Who was the—
He instinctively tapped into what he had been avoiding for weeks, and with that action came its consequences.
A sharp headache hit him at once like a sneak attack from a club to the back of his head. But determined not to show any pain before Craig Wiley, he held it back with a soft grunt, following it up with an exhale.
This was that moment, he knew. The moment that he would be unable to find any answers to his questions. It was completely pointless, and at the same time, hopeless.
Craig Wiley seemed to have never met this messenger as their only interaction came from a letter he had received, so there was no way the half-insane man could answer the questions he was having.
He had told himself earlier to just focus on thinking up a way to successfully take The Warlock's Torch from Craig, but that was easier said than done with how many crazy questions he wanted answers to.
If only there was a way to—
Elmer's thoughts halted for a brief moment as an idea swept into his head along with a disconcerting sensation.
The letter…! Elmer bellowed inwardly. I should be able to use the letter Craig had received to perform a divination on the location of this messenger, since it's an item they were in possession of…
But I don't have any description of them, wouldn't it be risky to perform a divination without one of the core elements needed…? No… What am I even thinking…? I have to do it no matter the risk involved… I can't have myself remaining ignorant of someone who knows about me somewhere in the world… I'll get the letter from Craig and perform that divination…
Elmer decided.
"Alright," Elmer said shortly after with a soothing sigh to calm himself as he lowered his revolver. If things were to work out perfectly then he had to stop threatening Craig and let the man trust him—hopefully his insanity shouldn't make that impossible. "What exactly did the messenger say I am to help you with?" Elmer queried in a way that would mask his ignorance in case the letter had made it clear that he would know what to do.
Although, luckily, taking into account this situation, Craig had long lost most of his logical reasoning, and the sheer prospect of him getting his wish should be enough to have him not think about such things that Elmer worried about.
"Ah!" Confirming Elmer's deduction, Craig beamed, at least as much as a face with half of it riddled with maggots could. "You… You are to…" Craig tried to speak but he trailed off constantly. He eventually puts down the lantern he had been holding and dashed into the space he had taken for his hiding spot before Elmer's appearance.
A few minutes later, he returned with a paper bag cradled in his left arm, and a medium sized, portable log of cedar in his other, one which was of countless tiny scars, and had been carved in the likeness of something of an ancient castle torch, as well as crowned by an intricately made sconce of iron coated black.
Everything about it brought Elmer to the notion that it was not something of this era—that it was not even something of hundreds of years ago. It looked older. It had the same ambience as Col Fitzroy's journal, a piece of work that dated back thousands of years ago, and it seemed likely for it to be the same.
Also, since his revolver had been classified as a high grade artifact, then what exactly would be the grade of this ancient art?
What did the fact that his employer had such a great fear of losing it to the Church, and that Ms. Edna had not even heard about it before despite her vast insight on the world of the supernatural, mean?
Was it a very special artifact that was being kept hidden from the knowledge of the world? An artifact that the Church does not even want Ascenders to know about?
The Warlock's Torch…
In contrast to his question-filled thoughts, Elmer's posture relaxed to a greater degree, his lips almost parting noticeably as the hair on his arms and nape stood erect from longing.
It did not matter what the origins of The Warlock's Torch were at this moment. It did not matter what its classification was. It did not matter if the Church knew about it or not. All that mattered was that what he'd wanted the most for the past few weeks was right before his eyes—almost for the taking. And it would have felt like a dream if only his whole purpose for wanting it had not been a nightmare that had been haunting him for forever.
Craig dropped the paper bag and the artifact on a rectangular box of crate which had nothing piled upon it. The half-insane man seemed to have singled that one out long beforehand in preparation.
For an altar? To use The Warlock's Torch a ritual had to be performed just like doing a divination? Elmer had a deduction.
And if that was truly the case, how would he have found out all these if he had come about The Warlock's Torch in some other way? He would have been left hanging even though he would have had his most wanted piece of possession in his hands, knowing that there would have been no one to guide him on what to do.
Is that why the messenger sent Craig…? Is Craig a pawn in all this…? Someone who had been unknowingly sent to bring The Warlock's Torch to me and at the same time grant me the knowledge to use it…? Elmer's mind, once again, fell into a whirlpool of thoughts. Is this messenger really an ally…?
"Craig," Elmer called all of a sudden, his voice somewhat in between a whisper and a boom.
"Huh?" The half-insane man turned to his savior, seemingly unbothered by the sudden call and his forced halt of the altar he had been setting up—or maybe already done setting up.
Elmer glimpsed The Warlock's Torch neatly laid in the middle of three red candles arranged in a pyramid shape, the paper bag empty on the floor in return.
Is that all there is to the altar…?
"What… What is it?" Craig asked, his tone low with dwindled excitement. "You called?"
Elmer cleared his throat. "Yes, I did." He uncocked the hammer of his revolver and took his finger off its trigger. He had not the fancy for misfiring and sending a bullet into his foot. "The letter," he said, causing the humane part of Craig's face to squeeze in confusion. "The messenger's letter, may I have it?"
Craig jerked his head backward and smiled in a manner that would have repulsed any other person that wasn't Elmer. It almost gave the man a look that he had gone completely mad.
"Yes, of course! I… I don't even know why I was keeping it, but now… Now you're going to save me, so I don't need it anymore. I'm… I'm going back to Rose and Ella."
Elmer's heart sort of pinched at those words for some reason. Maybe because he had released the tension he had filled himself with right from the moment he had entered into this warehouse, and now came to the realization that this man, Craig Wiley, was also a person who had a family he wanted to return to.
But the sad reality was that only one of them would be able to use The Warlock's Torch tonight—only one person would get their wish granted—and Elmer wanted that person to be himself.
And now he understood why his heart had pinched at Craig's words.
What was going to happen to the man? He wondered.
Craig did not want to be given up to the Church—to be tagged as a corrupted one—but that was the only alternative if he did not use the artifact for himself.
Elmer, for a moment, thought about convincing Craig to hand over the artifact by bringing up the option of having Ms. Edna getting the Church of Time to take him in and find a way to cure his corruption, seeing as he was only half-insane. But he knew how stupid that was at once.
Ms. Edna was of the Lower Echelon, there was no way she would have such a power with her tongue. The Church would hand Craig over to Andhera in an instant, putting the family man in the hands of the Church of Souls and their ruthlessness that feared them both.
And all that was considering Craig agreed. But Elmer knew that the man wouldn't—anyone with their wits intact would see that.
Even trying to talk Craig into handing over the artifact would straight up result in Elmer's imminent death. The man would lose all his remaining reasoning and end Elmer's life before he came back to whatever little senses he might have had left.
And since there were no plans that could bear fruition in this regard, there was only one thing left that Elmer could do to guarantee The Warlock's Torch was his.
No…!
Elmer instantly tried to reject that option as he felt a sinking feeling in his stomach. He couldn't do it. There was no way he could. Right?
But… Do I even have any other choice…? There's no way for me to convince Craig to let go of The Warlock's Torch… He never will… And if push comes to shove, he's the stronger of us two, a single glance and he can end my life in seconds…
Elmer's chest tightened so much that he had to harden his grip on his revolver's base with a grunt to lessen its effects on his heartbeats.
What should I do, Mabel…?
Craig dipped his hand into his inner coat and brought out a medium sized rolled up paper, stretching it at Elmer.
"Here," the man said, his half-smile somewhat losing its creepiness to Elmer now. "This… It's the letter." He chuckled. "I don't need it anymore."
Elmer delayed for a moment, his expression pensive, before he finally took a step forward, and another, and another, until he arrived at an arm's length from Craig Wiley.
A tall man, Craig was. To Elmer, it seemed like he was standing before a lamppost, just somewhat shorter in height. In contrast to the heavy footsteps the man always had whenever he walked, his body was of a lean shape, and his only eye left was of a deep brown, though, inside it caved a deep purity.
If not for the maggots that made up the other half of his face, Craig Wiley would have had the look of a man that everyone would love to become a friend of. And looking at him up close now made Elmer's body heavy, but not because of any mythical presence or the sort, it was because of the decision he would have to make soon.
Elmer rigidly took the letter from the man while saying, "And what am I to help you with?"
"Ah!" Craig exclaimed. "I… I don't know if I can say it clearly. But… it's in the letter. Read it. Read it. You'll understand better." He was like a child that was excited at the prospect of getting a new toy, and Elmer had begun to see himself as the mean adult who would rip that toy away for his own selfishness.
Prodigy…?
Elmer scoffed indiscernibly as he remembered the word Ms. Edna had termed him with on the day he had returned to the bureau with the certification form bearing an illegally done Church of Time's seal.
Sure, on the outside it looked like things were going well for him. He became an Ascender in just a week after moving into Ur, and to everyone else, he was of the Pathway of Time, the pathway of the city he had wandered into.
Magical!
And even though he had gone about things illegally, the Church of Time had given him their seal of approval in under two weeks when for others of his kind it took months.
At least that was what people who didn't know what he did would think.
Taking all that and more into consideration, he was very well a prodigy to the outside eyes.
But weren't prodigies those who excelled in every single deed they partook in? Weren't prodigies highly talented people who had only a little bit of luck and every accomplishment was of their own doing?
He was none of those. He was a leech.
From the start he had been leeching off of people. Not a single thing that he had accomplished had been of his own talent.
And now, The Warlock's Torch had been brought to him at the expense of another man's life—at the expense of another man's joy.
The messenger, whoever they were, whatever their aim, they were not an ally. They were just another person he was leeching off of.
But if that was the only way he could bring Mabel back, then he would remain a leech for as long as possible.
Leeches filled their bellies with the blood of others without a care in the world about what would happen to their prey after they were done.
They were selfish creatures, just like the Gods and those in the Upper Echelon of their pathways…
Elmer felt his body take on a dropping sensation as he rolled open the messenger's letter while he stole a silent peek at the man towering before him.
…And if Craig Wiley had been brought to him as a pawn—a prey—then so be it.
It did not matter what methods he had to take—if his actions would be the one that Mabel would hate him for if she could see him take it. All that mattered was that he was taking every step for her, to bring her back.
She could hate him all she wanted when she'd woken up. As long as she was awake, he did not care. And to do all that, then he would act like the prodigy that he wasn't. Take the glories that didn't come from his own talents or achievements, just as long as they favored him.
He would put on a cloak sewn with thick black threads of lies.
To the world he would be a prodigy—a fake prodigy.