You have to either be really lucky, or really, REALLY bad, to have Wraithvine happen to you. In this case, the child was in the bad category. Fortunately, the parents were teachable, and the kid was young. Spoiled, as the single child of wealthy families sometimes are, but still very young. So there was still time to remedy before .... more permanent solutions were considered.
@internutter/challenge-04739-l355-birthday-wish -- Lessons
[AN: Also following on from @internutter/challenge-04783-m034-unconsidered-wish ]
Submitted for your inspection, a child who wants to have their way in everything. Spoiled for far too long and given everything he wanted until throwing a tantrum was the easiest way to get anything done. This child tests the patience of even the immortal. It's time and beyond time for a permanent lesson... from the twilight realm.
People tend to forget that Elves are Faekindred. They have been in the world since the reign of Dragons, so they might as well be part of it. Nimnae is about to learn a very interesting lesson.
For a child, Nimnae had an amazing pattern of escalation.
Wraithvine was prepared for Nimnae trying to be clever. It was a self-centred kind of cleverness. Pinpoint-focussed on himself and what he wanted. Remembering the power he had when he had wished the adults away. Wraithvine could sense what the little brat was going to do, and had a spell ready for the inevitable attempt at a wish. It was a wish that the world would not allow to happen.
It came on Nimnae's ninth birthday. "I wish everyone else was dead."
In a second between the bells, a shadow passed over him, whisking him away into a very special pocket of Nanogh. Which is better known as the Plane of Magic, but very rarely called the twilight realm by those who don't want Faekindred attention.
The child was now in a pocket reality where he was the only being alive within it. Everything else was the same. Wraithvine was present, but invisible... for the moment.
It shouldn't take very long. Nimnae had an hour or two to enjoy his solitude, and then the reality would sink in. There was only him in this world. Nobody to command. Nobody to praise him. No body to do the things he didn't want to do.
Nimnae spent his first hour in his private world eating himself sick on sweets. Literally. It was when he went to his bed and howled for a helper to make him feel better that it all began to sink in.
"Someone look after me," he yelled. "I'm sick! Pamper me!"
Only the echoes of his own voice answered him. Wraithvine added some softly howling wind just to drive it home.
Nimnae cried himself to sleep. Wraithvine did not let him sleep long, using magic to accelerate his time at rest. This was only meant to take a few minutes in the physical plane, and not steal too much of Nimnae's true time.
He woke well-rested and searched the house. Calling names. Begging people to come out of hiding. Eventually calling for anyone to come out. Eventually, as Wraithvine knew he would, Nimnae called for the gods.
It didn't matter that it was, "Gods, what in all the hells is going on?"
Wraithvine appeared, but ze appeared disguised as hir goddess. Ereshkygal, the goddess of death.
"You wished for everyone else to be dead," ze said, borrowing her voice. "And a wish cannot me unmade."
"I didn't mean it," cried Nimnae.
"Oh, you didn't," the tone was casual and flippant, but not when ze added, "What's said is said."
"But I didn't mean it!"
"But you did in the moment. You wished the world away. Now you are alone for a year, with only Death as company. Boy who murdered a world."
"I want my mama!"
"Too bad, you killed her."
"You bring her back! You bring her back right now!" Nimnae stomped his feet. He cried and wailed. He kicked. He screamed himself hoarse. He threw up dust and chucked rocks.
Finally, when he exhausted himself, the guise of Ereshkygal said, "No." Implacable and cold. "Do you think you can bargain with me, you who destroyed my champion? Killer of the world? I am Death and nothing can stop me. Nothing can win a boon from me. Nothing can change my heart."
"Please! I promise I'll never wish like that again!"
"A promise easily forgotten the next time you hear the word 'no'. I shall not relent."
"I promise I'll be good."
"You know not the meaning of the word. All your life, you have only sought what you want, what makes you happy. You have never done a good deed unprompted nor said a kind word unmotivated. I shall not relent."
Three was generally the charm. Wraithvine wondered if Nimnae would get there.
Nimnae ran off to a thorn bush and scratched up his arms. Let his blood fall to the earth. "I, Nimnae Gildpurss, do solemnly vow... I will try to be good, I will do my appointed tasks to the best of my ability, and when I wish... I will try to benefit others with my wishes. This I swear, and may you follow me around and scare me if I slip."
That was heartfelt. And a blood oath like that had ways of making itself insistent.
All the same, Wraithvine let it simmer for a minute. Let Nimnae dread for a bit.
"I shall relent," Ze used the cover of the brief darkness to put Nimnae back, minutes after he's actually left. Of course Wraithvine healed hir scratches, pretending to fret about how they happened.
And for the first time, possibly in his life, Nimnae apologised.
[Photo by Oleksandr Kurchev on Unsplash]
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