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When I finally went away to college, I realized that my fascination with him wasn’t so abnormal. In an environment where I was deprived of TV, the internet, and a robust social life, Bard was the equivalent of my teen idol, the rockstar of my sexual fantasies.
I never really shook my feeling for him, but I think that’s normal too. I mean, my best friend since college, Sunnie, still has an obsession with Liam Hemsworth that started in high school. Sure, she eventually accepted they weren’t going to get married and run away to Spain, but the lust never really died.
Damn, I miss her.What she must be going through. I was supposed to go to her house last Christmas and never showed up.
I run my hands through my hair and whoosh out a breath. “God, what month is it anyway?”
“March, by your calendar.”
A naked man covered in tattoos like mine enters the room. Like the other masterbeasts here, he’s half wolflike creature on the top, human male on the bottom. He’s shaved most of his upper torso but left the long mane and the fur all over his snout.
“Hello, I am the Wall Scholar. How may I be of assistance, my queen?”
I’m surprised by his politeness. “Why do you have those symbols all over your body?”
“We have record takers and record keepers. I am a keeper.”
I point to my arm covered in black geometric symbols. “So I’m not the only one with these?”
“Before we had paper or hide to write on, the creatures with a fascination for learning had to be resourceful. We used our bodies.”
“But you have paper now.”
“Paper can be burned or ruined. When I die, these records will find a new scholar. Just as the vows you keep will find the next ruler.”
So, basically, we’re both living thumb drives. “Okay, well, I want to know about the wall. Specifically, the doorways. How did they get there?”
He closes his eyes, and one of the symbols on his skin starts to glow red. The symbol then expands into a stream of words I can’t read.
“What do they say?” I ask.
“It is our origin story. It tells of a great storm thousands of years ago, and with it brought many creatures.”
“From where?”
“A hole in the sky.”
“So according to your records, the creatures who live here in Monsterland today came from a hole in the sky thousands of years ago?”
“Yes,” he replies.
I’m so confused. It sounds way too similar to the story Alwar told me about my own world, where the monsters crossed through one of the doorways now housed inside the wall, thousands of years ago. They attacked humans, and we somehow ran them out. After that, the wall was built to prevent more monsters from coming over.
The Monsterland origin story and Alwar’s story are eerily similar.
“Where did these creatures from your origin story come from?” I ask. Is there some planet out there filled with monsters that just goes around opening portals and dumping them in different worlds?
“The story does not say.”
“Okay, then who told this story? Who was here to see the hole open up?” Maybe I can find more information.
He closes his eyes, and I watch as more symbols glow red.
“A human.”
I don’t understand. A human was living here in Monsterland first, and then one day, the creatures just showed up? “What human?”
“I do not know. This record comes from a story passed down through many generations before we recorded it. Since then, the records have been passed between many scholars, which means it is quite old.”
