Deep Roots (Iris' Atlantis 2)

I skidded to halt just shy of a bramble growing under Rose's front window. I slid off the saddle and then ran downhill back towards the garden, still wearing my helmet. Timothy was still there, trying to get his boots back on. I could only guess why he had taken them off in the first place.

When he saw me jogging down the pathway, he swiftly got up. He had one boot on and one in his left hand.

Then he stood still. A raven cawed from a branch. And the young man stood stock-still. His long dark hair had partially escaped his bun and hung to his shoulders.

My heart thudded. I remembered very vividly his eyes. They had been orange. Bramble hadn't commented when I had asked if they had really fought, as I remembered. And Timothy, with orange eyes and oddly pale face, had won.

He had also somersaulted over a table.

He didn't look like a person who was capable of such movement. And I knew he had been a literature student. He hadn't seemed a student of Atlantean Philology back there in the Gnarled Duck.

I stopped in front of the man.

I had memories. They were not of an elf as I had hoped. But I had seen in Timothy something that couldn't be explained in clear logic. Almost as good as a real elf.

"Hi, Nettle."

"Hi. You are not busy now, are you?" Like you were all these other days...

Timothy shook his head slowly. Then he smiled with real warmth in his eyes.

"I am sorry, Nettle. I was avoiding you. But I feel a bit better now."

Just like that, he admitted it. There were butterflies in my stomach when I asked:

"Because of what happened on Monday?"

"Yes. Because of what happened on Monday."

He started walking back to the house at a slow pace, inviting me to join him.

"So you... mmm... You remember something about Monday?" I asked him.

He glanced at me.

"I remember it all, Nettle. I don't claim to understand all this elven magic going on, but I do remember it."

"So you remember hitting Bramble?"

"No. I remember kicking him. And some other stuff." He grimaced.

"Are you a witch? Like Daisy?"

He stopped.

"What? No! I am not a witch."

We were standing now almost on the front veranda of the house and in the light from the windows I could see his shocked face.

"I didn't mean to..." I started but Timothy had seen my stunned face as well and hurried to add:

"Not that being a witch would be a bad thing. I am just not a witch. I can't do spells."

"But you believe that Daisy is a witch. You believe in witches and elves?"

"And vampires, and alchemy and demons too," he said, apparently seriously.

"Vampires?"

Wasn't that a bit too much?

"Vampires."

He crossed his arms over his chest.

"Now is my turn to ask. What do you remember from the Gnarled Duck?

"I, ermm..." He waited while I blushed. "I... Mmm... You jumped over a table? And had yellow eyes. And kicked Bramble so hard he puked? And... Mmm.. eh... Well, everything I saw was kind of submerged in this smoke. You called it spirits. You asked what I saw, and then you called it spirits."

He shrugged.

"That summarizes it, I suppose. That's the scene as I recall it as well."

"Had you had mapa too?" I asked.

Timothy shook his head. "No. You drank it all. I had just a cup of Daisy's blood." He blushed at saying this but the expression on his face didn't alter.

"I also remember kissing an elf before all this happened."

"You kissed an elf?"

"He kissed me. As a side effect I really thought I was a vampire. Which is why I jumped the table and kicked Bramble."

"You kicked Bramble because you thought you were a vampire?" The color on my face was evening out. "Are you joking with me? Did Bramble set you up?"

He sighed.

"This is why I have been avoiding both of you. You might remember all the weirdness just because a fungus meddled with your brain. And you can conveniently blame everything you saw on your magic powder and continue your life as you see fit. I live every day with my very sober memories of elves and vampires and witches. My true world is colored with spirits and magic."

He was visibly getting angry. A polite smile on a poker mask replaced the color on his cheeks.

"You came to me, to see if I would confirm to you the things you saw while heavily drugged. I told you it is true. But you can't really believe it. That is why you want the mushroom. You want the magic moments. But not the whole reality.

"This is a brain game that will drive me crazy. So, you tell me: Do you want me to talk of the magic I see, or shall I pretend it isn't here? You'll see I am very good at avoiding the subject. But you choose. Which version do you want out of me? I'll give you the one you choose, but I won't become a part of your own inner game.

"Either you respect my truth as I present it, whether you really believe it or not. Or we don't talk of it as a possibility."

Then he waited, his arms still crossed over his chest. A raven came to perch on the porch railing. It studied me with alarmingly red eyes.

I felt as if I had accidentally plummeted into ice water. I hadn't really been prepared for the seriousness of this conversation. I also saw that I had clearly offended him. But I didn't feel quite well myself.

"I didn't mean to upset you," I said.

Timothy stayed quiet. He and the raven looked at me expectantly. If I had truly believed in magic, I would have claimed there was something sinister about that bird.

I gulped.

"Can I... Can I sleep on this?" I asked. My voice was small.

Timothy's face softened to an expression that almost passed for a sympathetic smile.

"Of course."

That was the end of our chat. When I was already on my bike, Timothy put a hand on my arm, drawing my attention back to himself.

"I did some research. The mushrooms, their old name is nemangerpas, shortened pasmanger and then to mapa. The name is from the time French priests tried to civilize Atlantis. According to legend, the Atlantean gave some Christian priests these mushrooms to prove the existence of their own gods. The priests were horror struck by what they saw. They handed amongst themselves drawn descriptions of the toadstool with the warning to not to eat them. Ne manger pas.

"I agree with the priests. There lives a devil in these mushrooms. Don't eat them."

I frowned.

"Where did you get all this information? I've tried finding anything on them so I could pick them myself."

He smiled wryly.

"Depending on your choice, either with a very good Google search, or I asked a friend to get to a very specific section in the university library back in Breasinghae."

"Right."

Timothy let me speed down the road. When I glimpsed the rear view mirror, I saw Timothy's head turned to the side as if he were talking to an invisible bird perched on his shoulder. I only saw it for some short seconds. Then I had to turn with the road.

Maybe he had been stretching.