Day Three-Seventy-Eight: Bye Bye Bardy

HOLY SHIT

ED

NO

NOT ANOTHER PERSON

NOT ALREADY

FUCK ME DIARY, FUCK ME

Calm. Calm the hell down, Dragomir. Just… tell… the diary… what happened… deep breaths… stop hyperventilating… oh gods…

Like I said yesterday, we've all been taking turns watching for the sloth through the windows of the Beefiary. We lost track of it around midnight after it disappeared behind a barn, and despite a constant vigil nobody knew where it was when the rest of the pub awoke at daybreak. Some took that news with optimism, praying that the sloth was gone; I was less convinced, and ordered continued watches.

Deprived of his barding, Edmund has been more than frightened this week. He's been bored. Bards usually sing their way through peril, boosting others with song and rhyme, and I've had to sternly tell Ed not to whip out his lute a few times. He always complies, though grumpily.

Unable to minstrelize, Ed was spending a lot of time quietly chatting with other people, notably Grayson. The devil child is happy and cheerful in these trying times, and he took to playing with Edmund whenever possible. I wanted to protest their little friendship, but Grayson didn't seem to be doing Ed any harm… and in the end, he didn't…

They were in the room next to Evangelina's when it happened. I'd been watching them quietly play one of Libby's experimental board games a few minutes prior, and though they weren't guarding the windows as diligently as I might have hoped I decided not to bother them. I limit my interactions with my son, these days. All that was fine and well, and after checking on Evangelina I went downstairs -

- and heard a smash. A scream. No, two screams. Turning back I tripped my way to the second floor, followed by a few brave souls, I wasn't even sure who it was because I was too scared, I knew that weirdly lyrical cry for help, I knew -

- and when I got to the room, I found the glass of the window smashed. Grayson was sitting on one of the beds, his face blanched, staring out at the rising sun beyond the shattered panes. Edmund was not with him.

I ran to the window, heedless of the broken glass on the windowsill, looking frantically for my bard friend. I cut my hands without realizing it, because I was too busy scanning the rooftop, hoping to see Edmund participating in some stupid practical joke, even though he's never once pranked me.

There was no Edmund. Just a long skid mark, carved into the snow and terminating at the edge of the roof, roughly the size of a man being dragged.

"We were just playing a game."

I whirled to stare at Grayson. He blinked, studying the wall, a tiny frown on his pale face.

"We were playing a game… and a claw came through. Busted the window. Grabbed him. It… it happened so fast… daddy, I thought… sloths were slow…?"

Grayson freaks me out. I think of him as a manipulative monster now, if you hadn’t noticed, diary. Yet that tiny frown broke my heart.

I tried to convince people to go searching for Edmund. They would not. Everyone believed him dead. The only thing I accomplished with my frantic story was a mass shushing and a redoubling of the watches. Somebody drew a small picture of Edmund and surrounded it with candles for anyone hoping to pay their respects, setting it on the edge of the bar.

I haven't paid anything yet. I can't… I can't believe that he's gone.

Two. Two good friends. One a brother. Gone in less than a month.

I can't accept that.