Thomlin Greaves

The man woke with his hand pressed against a wall. Blood—dark, tacky—coated his fingertips. Again. He didn’t remember sleeping. He didn’t remember waking. He didn’t remember anything between the last time he blinked and now. But the words smeared across the stone were his. He knew that the way a body knows a scar: DON’T TRUST— The rest was a frantic, jagged line. He sucked in a shaking breath. “Not again.” He didn’t even know his own name anymore. The town had given him one—Thom, or Tomlin, or maybe both—but none of them felt right. His real name had slipped somewhere behind the humming in his skull. He wiped his hands on his shirt, the blood smearing into dull rust, and stepped out from the shadowed alley into Briar’s Rest’s too-bright morning. Lanterns swayed. People smiled. Children played the same game they always played—hopscotch with perfect timing, never too early, never too late. He had been here a long time. He couldn’t remember arriving. He couldn’t remember leaving. He wasn’t sure he ever could. Turning the corner, he nearly collided with two travelers—one man, one woman. The woman’s eyes widened faintly, as though she recognized something about him… but then the expression vanished, replaced by a polite smile. “Sorry,” she said. “I don’t think we’ve met.” Calder, however, paused. Studied him. “You look like hell. Are you hurt?” The long-term resident blinked, suddenly aware of the dried blood on his hands. “I… don’t know. I write things sometimes. Messages. Warnings.” His voice trembled. “But I can’t remember writing them.” Mira frowned with gentle concern. “Do you live here?” “I think so.” He swallowed. “Or maybe I wandered in. Maybe I meant to warn someone. Maybe…” He stared past them, toward the bakery, the inn, the neat streets. “I feel like I’m not supposed to leave.” “What do you mean?” Calder asked softly. But the man simply nodded pleasantly and continued down the street, humming.