You Can Never Let Go

"He was but a young child, far too foolish, far too clumsy, he fell." The old man was crying, the story too painful, too real. "He fell and wouldn't wake up, he just wouldn't wake up, so I did what any parent would do I made a deal with someone who I should not have and this, this is what happened." I still wasn't exactly sure how someone could take a comatose child and make it into the monster we saw, but magic is weird and those who make deals even weirder.

"So you want us to not kill him?"

"No I can't do it, I tried, I know he's a monster, he's ruined these lands and he'll do worse, I just," He wept again, "I just can't, he's my son." I understood though I had no children of my own I'd seen the way my father had always had to make hard choices when it came to sending me to do anything. It was in his eyes, the eyes of "anyone but you." Just seeing the poor man crying killed me, I wanted to slay a big creature, but the real monster was in front of me, grief in all its forms was the real killer.

"Nidget remove him please." Nidget understood, he lead the old man out. I approached the heart and I could see the small boy in there. He looked like he was dreaming among the roots and branches coming off him. I didn't want to kill him, I didn't want to destroy this monster because it felt monstrous even though I knew it was right for the world. I felt myself unable to do it.

"Harder than it looks isn't it." Of course Trezlan showed up, I'm sure he has no issue killing children and anything else.

"He's a little boy."

"Thankfully not real." He snapped his fingers and we were in darkness. Just a black nothing.

"This was a test."

"Everything is a test, some things more than others, this is a real thing I did once, I can't remember why or how, but I ran across that old man and his son, at first I thought I could just do it, I mean I'd killed hundreds of things over the years, but a small boy who's only issue was being clumsy? Seemed cruel even if he was now a monster. So I used magic, a lot of it, lots of it was bad, awful things, but I saved the child's life and ended the monstrous creature."

"So you ultimately did good."

"No, no I did not, the boy grew up, became a man, and did terrible terrible things, nothing that I knew would happen mind you, nor would his father. But all the same, by interfering in how things should go I got more people killed than I thought was possible."

"Says the person who said you sent us to the past and things would just work out."

"They did for the most part." He winked at me and then I was back in my timeline, Nidget was still there looking just as confused.

"What happened?"

"Trezlan was an asshole as usual."

"Oh so its a day that ends in Y."