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Everyone knew that on their tenth birthday, they would get a very special gift.
The name of their soulmate would appear on their wrist — usually the left one. From then on, you knew what person you were destined to be with forever. This person was going to be your everything. They were perfect for you in every way.
Nine-year-old Riz wasn’t sure what he thought about it. It seemed kind of romantic, but it also seemed a little … gross. That was the best word he could use to describe it.
“It’s gross,” Riz told his mom one day. “I don’t wanna kiss anyone!”
He almost felt bad for his soulmate, who would have to be with someone who found it all so gross. But his mom just laughed.
“You’ll grow into it, sweetie,” she said, ruffling his hair. “You don’t have to kiss your soulmate yet, anyway. You can wait ‘till you’re thirty, at least.”
Riz giggled, feeling satisfied with his mom’s answer. She always had the best answers ready any time his ‘busy mind needed soothing’ — like his mom often said.
By the morning of his tenth birthday, Riz wasn’t grossed out by the thought of having a soulmate anymore — it was like getting a new, super awesome best friend, wasn’t it? A best friend who would stick with him forever. Riz liked that thought. Apart from Penny, he didn’t have many friends.
He didn’t have any friends apart from Penny.
So, as he pushed up his sleeve to see who his soulmate was, Riz was even a little excited.
He stared at his wrist. Clean green skin stared back at him. Nothing. Riz pushed up the sleeve covering his right arm — sometimes the soulmarks appeared there.
Nothing.
“What?” Riz whispered, looking at his two bare wrists. Where was his soulmark?
In desperation, Riz took off his entire shirt and ran to the bathroom. He studied himself in the mirror, trying to see if maybe the soulmark was hidden on the back of his elbow or something.
But … there was nothing.
Nothing.
Riz started wailing. Sobs forced themselves out of him violently. His small body shook with the force of his sadness.
His mom burst into the bathroom, a panicked look on her face. She sat down on her knees beside him and tried to pull him into a hug, but he pushed her away.
“What’s wrong, sweetie?”
Riz, his whole body shaking, showed her his wrists. He was crying so much that he couldn’t speak.
Gently, Sklonda took his hands in hers. She looked at Riz’s skin. At the lack of a name.
Riz watched her eyebrows knit together. Was she angry?
“I …” His mom’s mouth slowly fell open. She turned his hands around, looking at his wrists from every angle. Then she rubbed at his skin as if that would magically reveal the words. Riz hoped so badly it would.
It didn’t.
“Mom,” Riz sobbed. “What’s– What’s going on?”
“I … I don’t know, sweetie.” His mom sounded just as confused as he was.
Frozen, Riz stared at her. His mom always had the answers. She always knew what was going on. She always knew what to say to soothe his busy mind.
It was as if Riz’s whole world was crumbling around him. First his dad died. Then he didn’t get his soulmark. Then … then his mom seemed just as lost as he was.
It was terrifying.
His mom pulled him into a hug, a hug so tight he almost couldn’t breathe. She whispered something into his hair. At first, he couldn’t hear it. Then the words slowly became more audible.
“It’s okay, Riz. I promise. It’ll be okay. I’ll figure this out. It’s okay. You’ll be okay.”
Riz relaxed somewhat. His mom, his awesome mom, would figure this out.
He was going to be okay.
—
After her son’s catastrophic tenth birthday, Sklonda poured herself into research.
She read everything she was able to find on soulmates: how the magic worked, different philosophies around it, the history of it. Everything she could find, she read.
She couldn’t get the image of him there in the bathroom out of her head. Riz — her precious son, her everything — crying with an intensity she hadn’t seen from him since Pok had died a little under a year ago. He had shown her his blank wrists, begging for an answer she hadn’t been able to provide.
Riz had been inconsolable since, randomly bursting into tears with seemingly no triggers. Not even Penny could lift his mood. Sklonda needed to find answers for her son, and she needed to find them quickly.
Eventually, she did.
She came across a recent study about people who didn’t have soulmates. All of the participants — of which there were few, but surprisingly many, considering everyone was supposed to have a soulmate — had the exact same experience as Riz. They all looked for their soulmark on their tenth birthday and none of them found it.
Sklonda had hoped that the study would find that these people’s soulmarks appeared later in life, but that wasn’t the case. Very, very few of them had found happy romantic relationships at all. That made sense, Sklonda supposed, but her heart still broke for these poor people.
Although, as she understood after reading the study further, most of these people wanted none of her sympathy.
“I don’t need a soulmate,” said many of them.
“I’m perfectly fine on my own.”
“I have my friends and family and that’s all I need.”
“I have my pets.”
“I have my work.”
“I have my art.”
“I have the whole world to see.”
Sklonda, with intense fascination and growing joy, read these people’s answers and started to understand that maybe, maybe it was okay that Riz didn’t have a soulmate. Maybe her son could still be happy.
Of course he could. Sklonda’s wrists were as bare as Riz’s — the words “Pok Gukgak” had slowly disappeared until there was now nothing left. And Sklonda was happy, wasn’t she? Well … she was getting there, at least.
—
His mom had answers, finally. She wasn’t confused anymore. She didn’t seem lost anymore.
Now it was just Riz who was lost.
His mom seemed happy, actually. She told Riz that he wasn’t the only one in the world like this. Apparently there were other people without soulmates too.
“And they’re happy, Riz!” She told him, her smile bright on her face. “Look!”
She had found a study about this, and she read the whole thing out loud to him. The language was complex, so she had to explain a lot of the words. But they got through it, and Riz understood most of it.
He wasn’t sure how to feel by the end of it. The fact that he wasn’t the only one without a soulmate didn’t really make him feel better. It just kind of made him sad for them too.
But his mom was happy. She seemed to think that this was all Riz had needed, so he thanked her and told her that it made him feel better.
He didn’t like lying to his mom.
His mom started talking about romance and soulmates in a very new way. There was no more, “You’ll grow into it.” Instead, she agreed with a laugh whenever he called kissing gross. She also stopped reading romance stories out loud to him and instead read stories about adventurers doing awesome things — Riz didn’t mind that particular change at all. Whenever someone else mentioned soulmates, like when she was talking to their neighbors, she always mentioned as a ‘fun fact’ that there actually were people who didn’t have soulmates. Every time she did that, Riz blushed furiously and ran away as quickly as he could.
“I need to inform people about this,” she said when he asked her to stop. “Because if people keep being ignorant, then their viewpoints and attitudes are never going to change.” She looked Riz deep in the eyes and sighed. “But I’ll stop if you want me to, sweetie. Of course I will.”
Riz didn’t know what to say. So he just shrugged and let her do what she thought was best.
His mom also started rolling up the sleeves of her shirts, showing off her bare wrists.
Riz, on the other hand, started wearing exclusively long sleeved shirts. Even in the middle of summer. Despite all of his mom’s efforts, Riz didn’t want anyone to find out that he didn’t have a soulmate.
He lay awake many, many nights, wondering why he hadn’t gotten a soulmate. Was he not good enough? Not cool enough? Not nice enough? Did he not work hard enough?
Was there really no one in the entire world who would’ve liked to be with Riz forever?
It was embarrassing. It was heartbreaking. It was so sad Riz could hardly breathe.
So he wore long sleeves and he evaded any and all questions about his soulmate.
“It’s private,” Riz said when Penny asked about it.
She laughed at that, ruffling his hair and saying, “Always so mysterious, aren’t you, Riz?”
She seemed to think that she would get to know eventually. Riz vowed to himself that she never would.
Would she even want to be his friend anymore if she knew that he didn’t have a soulmate?
He wasn’t sure. He wasn’t willing to risk it.
Eventually, after a few years, Riz got more used to not having a soulmate. More resigned to it, at least.
It was just how his life was, and there was nothing he could do about it. He stopped thinking about soulmates and started thinking about detective work instead. He threw himself into case after case, pretending that his work could fill the hole in his heart where his soulmate was supposed to be.
When Penny went missing, Riz felt like he lost a part of himself. His only friend in the world was gone.
He had read a lot of stories about how people would do anything for their soulmates — risk their careers, their social status, even their lives for their soulmates. Most people believed that people only acted this way towards their soulmates. It was widely accepted that the desperation and loss people felt when losing their soulmates could only be compared to losing your own child.
Riz had believed this too for a long time. He’d been jealous — not that he wouldn’t experience that type of grief, but that he wouldn’t experience that type of care and devotion. For a long time, he had believed that he would never be able to care about another person enough to risk his life for them.
Even though he knew he loved his mom and Penny, he had been led to believe that it was not a love that was in any way comparable to the love between soulmates. His love was not nearly as strong as soulmate-level love. That was what he’d thought, anyway.
And then Penny had gone missing.
And Riz had felt as if he lost a part of himself. A part of his soul.
She was his friend. His best friend. His only friend. And she was missing.
Riz poured himself into the search for her. He could barely think about anything else.
All day, everyday, there was a steady repetition of words at the back of his mind. Missing, missing, missing. My best friend is missing. I need to find her. I need to rescue her.
In the stories, this was how a person acted when their soulmate went missing. They became obsessive, doing everything in their power to find their missing soulmate. They became exactly like Riz.
How he’d thought his love for Penny was any lesser than the love between soulmates was something he couldn't quite comprehend now. Of course Riz would risk everything for Penny. Of course. Just because she wasn’t his soulmate didn’t mean that he wouldn’t do anything for her.
She meant the world to him. It wasn’t romantic. They weren’t soulmates. They were something else, something Riz valued much more, especially now that she was gone: they were friends.
When Riz started Aguefort, he made new friends.
He didn’t forget about Penny; of course he didn’t. He would never give up on her, never forget the work he needed to do. He was going to solve the case and rescue his best friend. His first friend.
But he still made new friends. An adventuring party. For the first time in his life, Riz had multiple friends. It was amazing.
His friends asked him about his soulmate. They wanted to know who it was. Riz gave the same response he’d given to Penny all those years ago: “It’s private.”
Gorgug met his soulmate, Zelda Donovan, at school. They talked for a bit and then did what most people did when they met their soulmates: went on dates and got to know each other better. They got along very well and seemed very happy to have found each other.
Riz was very happy for them. He was also extremely jealous.
Kristen had, apparently, thought that the name Tracker was a boy’s name. So when she started realizing that she was a lesbian, she felt extremely guilty that she would have to break this poor man’s heart. The realization that Tracker was a girl — “a very hot, very awesome girl,” as Kristen once described her — was a very pleasant turn of events. Their relationship moved a lot quicker than Gorgug and Zelda’s, which was surprising to no one except for Kristen herself.
Adaine’s soulmate was someone she didn’t know, and she didn’t seem particularly interested in finding them yet. The other Bad Kids often bugged her about it, saying that she should use her huge orb to track them down. But she just waved them off, saying she’d meet her soulmate when she met them, and until then, she wanted to focus on other things.
If Riz had had a soulmate, he was pretty sure he would’ve acted the same way as Adaine. He was glad that he at least wasn’t the only one in the group who wasn't obsessed with romance and soulmates and kissing.
Fig’s soulmate was someone named Ayda Aguefort. Fig joked about it often, saying that they were probably one of Arthur Aguefort’s ‘bastard kids.’ Adaine informed Fig that that was a rude thing to say, but Fig just waved her off.
“It’s a shame he’s dead,” Fig said one day, looking at her wrist. “It would’ve been nice to be able to ask him where his kid is.”
Fabian shrugged. “He might not have known even if you did ask him.”
“Yeah, that’s true.”
Fabian’s soulmate was, just like Adaine’s, some person none of them knew. He didn’t seem too bothered by it, though.
“Fate will bring us together,” he said. “And when I write my name on the face of the world, surely my soulmate will know where to find me.”
Fig and Fabian both did something that made absolutely no sense to Riz: they kissed people who weren’t their soulmates.
To Riz, kissing was something he, if he’d had a soulmate, would’ve had to endure for their sake. It seemed so awful, so gross, so weird. He could not understand why someone would do it willingly, but especially not with people they weren’t destined by fate to be with forever.
It did not make any sense at all. He told Fig and Fabian as much, and they both laughed.
“We do it because it’s fun!” Fig said, grinning.
“I really wish you wouldn't do it,” Adaine said, glaring at Fabian.
“Let me have fun, Adaine,” Fabian protested.
“Yeah, let us have fun!” Fig agreed.
Adaine rolled her eyes. “I don’t have anything against you guys having fun, except for the fact that your idea of fun is making out with either my awful sister or middle-aged men.”
Riz silently agreed with Adaine. Kissing was so weird. He didn’t understand the appeal at all.
But he didn’t have to either. Since he didn’t have a soulmate, Riz was saved from ever having to think about kissing people or … or doing other stuff with them. (Sex and stuff.) That was the only upside to not having a soulmate.
It took a long time — too long — but Riz and his friends finally managed to solve the mystery together. They defeated Kalvaxus and saved Penny and the other girls.
He hugged Penny so, so tightly when he saw her again. It had been so long. Too long. Far too long.
“I missed you so much,” he told her when he eventually stopped crying.
Penny ruffled Riz’s hair. “Thank you for saving me, Riz.”
They didn’t really … They didn’t really hang out a lot after that. Riz had his new friends now, his own adventuring party, and so did Penny. And Riz was so old that he didn’t need a babysitter anymore.
Their paths had diverged. If Riz thought about it, really thought about it, he would feel the pain of it like a hole in his heart. He missed Penny. But he also had new friends, whom he loved just as much as he loved her. Because Riz still loved her. Of course he did.
No matter what happened, she was still his first friend, and he loved her very, very dearly.
Riz and his friends started Sophomore year. Riz kept wearing long-sleeved shirts and dodging every question about his soulmate. His mom kept insisting that it was fine, really, that he would be fine, and he kept not believing her.
His friends helped him. They helped him feel less lonely, less like there was something he was missing. Sometimes, when they were all laughing together, or Fabian lovingly called Riz “The Ball”, or any of the Bad Kids hugged him, Riz completely forgot that soulmates even existed. It didn’t feel important. He had his friends. They were his whole world. His everything. Nothing else really mattered, did it?
But then Riz would see the soulmarks on his friends’ wrists, or he would see the way Gorgug looked at Zelda, or hear the way Kristen talked about Tracker, and it would all come crashing down on him again. He was missing something. He had to be. His bare wrists were physical proof of that.
Eventually the pressure from his friends to reveal who his soulmate was became too much for Riz. Panicked and embarrassed, he said, “Baron! Their name is Baron. They’re from the Baronies. I think. I assume. I don’t know.”
He wasn’t sure if his friends believed him, but they didn’t bother him about it after that.
When Riz was faced with the doll-like Baron in his mirror, he honestly didn’t know what to feel. It was just his luck that some harmless lie would end up physically haunting him.
As they started their spring break quest, Riz watched from the sidelines as even more of his friends got romantically involved with people. Fabian kept chasing after Aelwyn, and it seemed like he might actually get somewhere with it. Fig finally got to meet the mysterious Ayda Aguefort. After a bit of a rocky start — wherein Fig called Ayda a ‘creature’ — the two girls very quickly fell for each other.
And although Kristen and Tracker, as well as Zelda and Gorgug, had their relationship problems, they still stayed together and in love. That was probably why they were soulmates, Riz supposed. They were supposed to be able to get through anything together.
Riz knew it was only a matter of time before Adaine found her soulmate too. And where would that leave Riz?
He would be alone. Alone, alone, alone.
He looked at his wrists sometimes, when there was no one else around. They looked exactly the same as they’d done when he was ten.
Nothing.
When Riz had gotten his tattoos in Leviathan, he’d put a bandage around his left forearm and wrist. He’d been high out of his mind, but he’d still held onto that primal instinct of not letting people know. He’d told the tattoo artist that he’d sustained a permanent injury in his arm. In some ways, Riz supposed that was true.
Sometimes his lack of a soulmark felt like an injury, at least. It felt worse than an injury. It felt like proof that he wasn’t a person.
After getting the tattoos, Riz kept the bandage on at all times. It was easier to hide his bare wrist with the bandage than with long sleeves. He was almost surprised that he hadn’t thought of doing it earlier.
Riz met his dad.
His dad. His awesome, kind, dead dead — who had turned out to just be kind of dead. Well, he was dead, but he wasn’t gone. Not really.
Because he was here, holding Riz in his arms, and it was the best thing Riz had ever experienced.
They talked about a lot of things. So many things. Riz hadn’t talked this much ever before. But he did now. He told his dad everything. Every small, insignificant detail in his life.
It was easier to talk about the insignificant details than the significant ones.
But this was his dad. So Riz talked about the difficult stuff too.
When he admitted that he didn’t want to have sex and stuff, his dad responded amazingly.
Riz had been hiding this so close to his chest for so long. Finally putting words to it felt like finally getting a breath of fresh air after almost drowning.
His dad said a lot of things, a lot of really good things, but he finished the sex talk with, “And I’m sure your soulmate will be completely understanding when you eventually meet them. Hell, maybe they don’t like sex either. Wouldn’t that be neat?”
Riz stared at his dad. His dad, who was so happy to see Riz. His dad, who wanted grandchildren. His dad, who expected Riz to have a soulmate — because of course he did. His dad, who was probably excited to meet Riz’s non-existent soulmate. His dad, who wanted Riz to find his soulmate so he could be happy.
Pain in his legs registered first. Then Riz realized that he’d collapsed to the ground, landing hard on his knees. He watched drops of water fall into the grass in front of him, and he realized that he was crying.
“Riz? What’s wrong, buddy?”
Suddenly, Riz was in the bathroom, crying on his tenth birthday. His mom tried to hug him, but he pushed her away, not being able to handle the burning sensation of someone touching him. But it wasn’t his mom he was pushing away — it was his dead dad. And he wasn’t in the bathroom, he was in literal heaven.
He was in heaven crying like a little kid.
Just like on his tenth birthday, Riz was crying so much that he couldn’t speak. He tore off the bandage on his arm and showed his dad his blank wrist.
Nothing.
His dad exhaled a long breath. Just like Sklonda had done, Pok rubbed at Riz’s skin, as if that would magically reveal the soulmark. Riz knew now that it wouldn’t work.
And it didn’t.
“Oh, Riz…”
It was too much.
When his dad hugged him, Riz wondered how he’d been so lucky. So lucky to have not one but two parents who still wanted to hug him after finding out that he didn’t have a soulmate.
Not having a soulmate made Riz less than a person. It made him unlovable. It made him a monster. A failure. It doomed him to a life of misery and loneliness.
And yet, his parents wanted to hug him.
Wasn’t that something? Wasn’t it everything?
“It’s okay, Riz,” his dad said, so softly it hurt. “You don’t need a soulmate. Hey, look at me.” He pulled away from the hug, grabbing Riz’s face in both hands, holding him gently. “You don’t need a soulmate, you hear me?”
“I …” Riz didn’t like lying. He’d been lying to his mom for so long. He couldn’t lie to his dad too. Not his dead dad. “I don’t believe you.”
Riz watched as Pok’s heart broke — it was clear as day on his face. In the way his eyes watered. In the way his grip on Riz’s face tightened.
“I hope one day you do, Riz,” his dad said eventually, his voice wavering. “Because … son, you’re the best person I know. I’m serious. I know I … I haven’t been around much, but I still know that you’re the best person I have ever known and will ever know.” With his thumb, he wiped away some of Riz’s tears. “You don’t need a soulmate. Not to do any of the amazing things you do and certainly not to be happy.”
Riz shook his head. “That’s not true.”
“What’s not true?”
“I need a soulmate to be happy. I do. I know I do.” Riz didn’t know, but … he felt like he did. Most of the time, he tried to approach issues with logic and analytical thinking, but this was such an emotional topic for him that he couldn’t think clearly about it. He had tried to analyze his own feelings and situation sometimes, but then he had just started crying. That seemed like further proof, honestly, that this would always be a sad thing.
Pok wiped away more of Riz’s tears. “But, Riz … You’re happy now, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” Riz said, immediately. He was happy. He was so fucking happy. But … “But it won’t last.”
“Who says it won’t? And besides, nothing lasts, Riz. Not even things that are supposed to. Me and your mom are proof of that.”
That only made Riz cry harder.
Riz thought of his mom’s bare wrists. Of the way she had started rolling up her sleeves after finding out that Riz also didn’t have a soulmark. Their lack of soulmarks were both tragedies, in their own way.
But his mom kept insisting that he could be happy. That it didn’t have to be a tragedy. Not for him. And now his dad was saying the same thing.
He wanted to believe them so badly.
His parents, who loved him. Who still wanted to hug him. Who insisted that he could be happy. That he was happy, right now. Because he was.
“You have friends, Riz,” his dad reminded him, oh so gently. “You don’t need a name on your wrist to be loved by them. Or by me and your mom.”
Riz could’ve said a thousand more things, could’ve made a thousand more counter-arguments. Instead, he just let his dad hold him until his tears stopped coming and his breaths evened.
Riz let himself be held, hugged, loved. Even though a part of him insisted that he didn’t really deserve it.
Baron came back.
In the Forest of the Nightmare King, when Riz was all alone, so alone and so scared and so desperate and so lonely, Baron came back.
They were the personification of his lacking soulmate. This doll-like creature had been created by Riz’s lies. All because he couldn’t own up to the simple fact that he didn’t have a soulmate. Riz had created one of his own worst enemies.
Baron taunted him. They voiced some of his deepest insecurities, talking as if they’d seen the insides of his brain.
“Why are you so ashamed of not having a soulmate, Riz Gukgak?” They asked at one point.
Riz almost laughed. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
You don’t need a soulmate. Not to do any of the amazing things you do and certainly not to be happy.
Thank you for saving me, Riz.
And they’re happy, Riz! Look!
The Ball, The Ball, The Ball.
“I don’t know, Riz Gukgak. Are you ashamed that you will end up alone?”
Baron showed Riz his friends, all of them in their own romantic relationships — with their soulmates, in most cases. Baron showed Riz his parents.
“You are most unlike your parents, Riz Gukgak.”
And yet they wanted to hug him.
Riz thought of his friends, of the way they loved him. And of the way his parents loved him. He thought of the realization he’d had when Penny went missing. The realization that his love for her was just as strong as soulmate love was supposed to be.
Riz still felt as if he was missing something in his life, something big and important and lovely, but he knew that what he did have was fucking amazing.
“I’m … I’m the little shrimp of this crew.”
Baron disappeared. Riz felt happy. He also felt … a little empty. No matter what he said, he would never have a soulmate.
—
Fabian was worried about The Ball.
About his Ball.
Ever since returning to Elmville, Riz had been acting strange. Or, well, it had started before that too. Fabian wasn’t really sure when it had started. Maybe Riz had always been this way, actually.
But it had become very noticeable now. He seemed distracted. Lost, almost. Fabian couldn't understand why — and Riz certainly wasn’t telling any of them.
Riz did not take off his weird new bandage on his arm, even though both Kristen and Tracker had offered to heal him several times. Whenever he was asked about it, his cheeks turned a deep green and he changed the subject.
He also kept disappearing off somewhere, seemingly at random. One day, Fabian decided to follow him. He was not nearly as stealthy as The Ball, so he had to keep his distance.
The cemetery.
That was where Riz went. Fabian watched him sit down in front of a grave. Likely his dad’s, right? Or perhaps someone else’s. Fabian couldn’t be sure.
Either way, this seemed like a very private thing, and Fabian did not want to intrude. But he was still worried about his Ball. So, he went to see Sklonda Gukgak.
“Fabian! I didn’t expect to see you here today,” Sklonda said with a smile as she opened the door to her and Riz’s apartment. She looked behind Fabian, likely looking for her son. “Is Riz not with you?”
“No, I … uh, I actually wanted to speak to you.”
“Me?”
Fabian nodded. Sklonda looked surprised but let Fabian in. He flopped down on the Gukgak’s sofa, immediately relaxing a little. This place was almost as close to home as Seacaster manor.
Sklonda sat down in a chair across from Fabian. Her shirtsleeves were rolled up, showing off her blank wrists. She was wearing a bracelet around her left wrist. Fabian squinted his eye in an attempt to see it better — he was still getting used to only having one eye to rely on. After a moment, he realized that the bracelets had two pendants. One was engraved with the letters RG, the other with the letters PG. Riz Gukgak and Pok Gukgak, he could only assume.
It was very sweet.
“What did you want to talk about, then?” Sklonda asked, resting her elbows on her knees.
“I’m worried about Riz,” Fabian said plainly.
Sklonda frowned. “Why?”
Fabian shrugged. He didn’t know how to explain it, really. Riz just seemed a little … off. There was a sadness in The Ball that had perhaps been there as long as Fabian had known him, but Fabian had only really started to notice it now. He hated himself for that, a little.
He should’ve been there for his Ball sooner.
“Have you noticed that Riz has been a little … sad? Lately. Or perhaps always. I don’t know.”
Maybe this wasn’t a conversation Fabian should've had with Riz’s mom. Maybe he should’ve gone to the other Bad Kids instead.
Before Sklonda could say anything, Fabian added, “He’s not taking his weird bandage off, for one thing. And … And he lied to us. About who his soulmate was. He told us their name was Baron, but he later said he’d made it all up. It was so strange.”
Fabian truly had no idea what this whole thing with Baron was. But apparently some creature who claimed to be Baron had been the thing who kidnapped Riz, all the way back at the beginning of their spring break. Riz had warned them, then, about not telling lies like that.
But why had Riz lied about it in the first place? Why wouldn’t Riz tell them who his real soulmate was?
Fabian could only assume it was someone embarrassing. Like Kalvaxus or something.
Sklonda pursed her lips and looked down. She didn’t seem very surprised, which honestly did surprise Fabian. Why wouldn’t she be surprised that Riz had lied about the name of his soulmate?
“Riz is … very private about a lot of things,” Sklonda said slowly. She stood up, making her way to the kitchen where she put on the kettle. All the while, she murmured something like, “He keeps telling me he’s fine. That it’s fine. But I know he’s lying; he’s not very good at it.”
Fabian was utterly confused. “What?”
Sklonda looked up at him and seemed just then to realize that she’d said this all out loud. “Oh, nothing.” She sighed. “You really should talk to Riz about this himself, you know. I can’t go around giving out his secrets. Not even to his best friend.”
Fabian nodded, feeling a surprising, happy spark in his chest for being acknowledged as Riz’s best friend. Oh, how far they’d come since they first met. “Yes, all right. I’ll do that.”
As Fabian stood up, Sklonda walked back into the living room. Without any proper warning, she wrapped her arms around him in a hug. Fabian froze in surprise, but he found he didn’t mind the hug. Not at all.
“Thank you for taking care of him,” she whispered.
“Of course.”
Before Fabian had the chance to hug her back, Sklonda pulled away and walked back into the kitchen.
“He takes care of me too,” Fabian added. “Just so you know.”
Sklonda smiled. “That makes me really happy.” She leaned her hip against the counter. “I’m really glad he has all of you. You’re all very important to him. Just so you know.”
Fabian did know.
When he left the apartment not long after, Fabian was so lost in his own thoughts that he didn’t notice Riz until they almost crashed into each other on the staircase. Similarly, Riz also didn’t seem to notice Fabian until they were a mere foot apart.
“Fabian?” Riz asked, confused. “What are you doing here?”
Resisting the urge to make some kind of joke to lighten his own mood, Fabian said, “I, uh, wanted to talk to you.”
“... Okay?”
“Shall we go outside, maybe?”
“Fabian, wha–”
Fabian grabbed Riz’s shoulder and steered him down the steps and out the apartment complex. Outside, the sun shone down on them, making Riz’s flawless hair shine. Fabian studied it for a moment, thinking that Riz’s soulmate — whoever it was — would be lucky to have him.
Just to be clear: Fabian wasn’t thinking this with any hints of jealousy. He certainly didn’t want to be the Ball’s soulmate. The idea of romance between the two of them felt almost absurd, although Fabian wasn’t really sure why. Rather, Fabian was struck by how wonderful Riz was. Someone who got the privilege to stick by his side forever was a lucky person indeed.
“The Ball,” Fabian said seriously. “What’s going on with you?”
Riz frowned. “Huh?”
“You’ve seemed … off. Lately.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re a horrible liar, The Ball.”
Riz huffed and crossed his arms. After a moment, he sat right down on the dirty asphalted ground. Fabian rolled his eyes and sat down with him too.
“What’s going on with you, Riz?” Fabian asked softly.
Riz didn’t answer his question. Instead, with a distant gaze and nervous voice, he asked, “Would … would you still be my friend if I didn’t have a soulmate?”
What?
Fabian almost laughed; it was such an absurd question. “What are you talking about, The Ball? Everyone has a soulmate.”
“I know,” Riz replied quickly. “It’s a hypothetical question. Like the way Fig kept asking us if we’d still love her if she turned into a worm.”
Fabian snorted. “The worm thing could actually happen, though. Unlike your question.”
Riz’s jaw tightened. Fabian couldn’t understand why.
“Yeah,” The Ball said after a moment. “You’re right. It was a stupid question. Sorry.”
The Ball made to stand up, and Fabian immediately understood that he’d fucked up.
“No, wait.” He grabbed The Ball and pulled him back to the ground. “Sorry. I’ll … I’ll answer your strange hypothetical question.”
Riz’s eyes flitted over Fabian’s face for a moment, until he nodded. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome,” Fabian said. Then he chuckled a little, unable to stop himself. “Well, the answer to that is very obvious, isn’t it, The Ball?”
The look of panic and sorrow on Riz’s face told Fabian everything he needed to know.
Fabian gaped. “The Ball…” He took Riz’s hand, squeezing it. “Of course. Of course I’d still be friends with you. We all would. Why … why would you not having a soulmate change anything?”
Riz shrugged uncomfortably, pulling his hand away. But Fabian saw the way his shoulders relaxed and his gaze became more focused. Fabian couldn’t make sense of any of this. It was just a hypothetical question, right?
Right?
“Riz … If you have anything you want to tell me, I’m here,” Fabian settled on saying.
Riz just nodded.
“I love you,” Fabian said. “No matter what. You know that, right?”
Riz blinked rapidly a few times, as if to hold back tears. He nodded again, though this nod looked less convinced.
“I love you too,” Riz said after a pause. “No matter what.” He stood up. “Thank you. I … I’m gonna … go.”
With that, The Ball was gone.
—
Riz considered telling Fabian first. Fabian, his best friend. His best friend who had just told Riz that he could tell him anything. And that he would still be Riz’s friend even if he didn’t have a soulmate.
Then Riz thought about maybe telling Adaine first, who — although she did have a soulmate — was a lot less obsessed with the whole soulmate thing than everyone else. Then he thought about telling Kristen first, who was always so accepting of everyone’s differences. Then he considered Gorgug, who could always be counted on to respond with kindness. He also considered Fig, who joyfully embraced any deviances from the norms of society.
In the end, Riz knew the only way he could do this was if he told them all together.
They were sitting in the living room in Mordred Manor. All of the Bad Kids, plus Ragh, Tracker, Ayda, Zelda, and Aelwyn. Riz would have preferred to just tell the Bad Kids, but it was kind of difficult to get all six of them alone, and he supposed it was at least nice to not have to tell his other friends some other time.
This was hard enough. He didn’t want to have to do it multiple times.
During a lull in the conversation, Riz cleared his throat. Everyone turned to look at him, and he felt his ears and cheeks heat up.
“I, uh, I have something I want to tell you guys.”
Riz was practically sitting on Fabian’s lap, as they were sharing one armchair that perfectly fit Fabian and barely had room for a small goblin to sit on it as well. When Riz spoke, Fabian placed a comforting hand on Riz’s shoulder. As if he knew. Or had some idea, at least.
“What is it?” Kristen asked, leaning her head on Tracker’s shoulder.
“I …” Was he really doing this? Riz bit his lower lip. His chest tightened so much that he almost couldn’t breathe.
Fabian squeezed Riz’s shoulder. It was as if he telepathically told him, I believe in you. Somehow, Riz felt a little more confident.
“I don’t have a soulmate.” Riz said it as plainly and confidently as he could, which wasn’t very much at all.
Beside him, Fabian froze. Several mouths in the room dropped open. A heavy silence filled the air. Riz wanted to melt into the floor and disappear.
When no one said anything, Riz started taking off the bandage on his left arm. All his friends watched him in silence. The bandage fell away, revealing Riz’s blank wrist.
Fig was the first to speak. “What the fuck?”
It was as if a Silence spell had been broken. The whole room erupted in sound.
“Is that even possible?” Tracker asked.
“Maybe your soulmate is dead?” Adaine suggested.
“Maybe they’re not born yet?” Kristen proposed.
“Gross!” Aelwyn said, wrinkling her nose at Kristen’s suggestion. “It’s clearly some mistake that’s happened with the magic.”
“How would that be possible?” Ayda asked. “The magic surrounding soulmates is an ancient truth of the universe. It would be like if the sun suddenly stopped shining.”
On and on it went. Everyone came with their own theories for why Riz was fucked up. Riz shrunk in on himself, feeling fear and grief uncoiling in his chest as he watched his friends try to fix this thing which could not be fixed. Solve this case which could not be solved. Everyone talked and shouted and discussed.
Everyone except for Fabian.
Instead, Fabian carefully grabbed Riz’s wrist and brought it closer so he could look at it. Riz’s best friend looked at the green skin, carefully rubbing a thumb across it.
“Everyone shut up!” He shouted, still looking at Riz’s wrist.
Everyone went quiet and turned their heads towards Riz and Fabian.
Fabian met Riz’s eyes. “The Ball? Have you really never had a soulmate?”
“I didn’t get one when I was ten,” Riz said, remembering the bathroom, the crying, his mom hugging him. “I … I don’t think I’m ever gonna get one.”
“Why didn’t you tell us?”
Riz wasn’t sure.
“Did you really think we weren’t going to want to be your friends if you told us?” Fabian asked, echoing their conversation from earlier that week.
“What?!” Fig, Kristen, Adaine, and Gorgug all exclaimed at the same time. As if it was the most absurd thing they’d ever heard.
Riz shrugged, feeling extremely uncomfortable. “I don’t know…”
“Riz, that’s ridiculous,” Fig said forcefully.
“Yeah, of course we’re gonna be your friends,” Gorgug said. “It doesn’t matter if you have a soulmate or not.”
Both Adaine and Kristen nodded vigorously in agreement. Tracker, Ragh, Ayda, Zelda, and even Aelwyn did the same.
“Fig?” Fabian asked. “Do you still have that marker you used to write on your shoes?”
“Uh, yeah?” Fig fished a black marker out of her back pocket and tossed it to Fabian, who caught it gracefully.
“What are you doing…?” Riz asked, his voice faltering as Fabian started writing something on Riz’s wrist.
Not just something.
Fabian Aramais Seacaster.
In beautiful calligraphy, black marker on green skin, was the name of Riz’s best friend.
Tears threatened to spill out of Riz’s eyes. He swallowed the lump in his throat and managed to choke out, “What?”
“You didn’t get a soulmate from the fucking magic of the universe or whatever,” Fabian said. “So I can be your soulmate instead.”
“I … I don’t…” Riz blinked, and his tears started flowing down his face. “I don’t like romance, I don’t think …”
Fabian rolled his eyes fondly. “It’s not romantic, The Ball. I’m your friend and I’m your soulmate. That’s that.”
Fig clapped her hands together. “Oh, me next!”
She jumped up from the floor where she was sitting beside Ayda and bounced over to Riz. Grabbing the marker and Riz’s wrist, she scrawled her own name right above Fabian’s.
Fig “The Infaethable” Faeth.
When Fig stepped away, Kristen was there, taking the marker from her.
Kristen Applebees.
“I think it’s kinda cool that you don’t have a soulmate, honestly,” she said with a grin before giving the marker to Gorgug.
Gorgug Thislespring.
He smiled softly and patted Riz’s head, before he gave the marker to Adaine.
Adaine Abernant.
“Fuck soulmates anyway,” Adaine said to Riz as she wrote. “Like, I know I’m the Elven Oracle and whatever, but honestly? Screw the idea of fate and destiny and whatever. We make our own destiny with the people we choose to be with. And I choose to be with you all here.”
“Hear! Hear!” Exclaimed Fig and Fabian.
Riz didn’t know what to say. This was better than he could’ve ever dared to hope for.
He looked at the names on his arm. His five best friends. Five of the people he loved most in this world. His adventuring party. His family.
His friends.
His friends who had chosen him. Who kept choosing him over and over again.
Soulmates were a magical truth of the universe — at least they were supposed to be. But the words on Riz’s arm felt more real than any magic had ever felt.
It felt like the realest, loveliest, most important thing in the world.
Overwhelmed with emotion, Riz crushed Fabian in a hug. The other Bad Kids quickly piled on, creating a very awkward, very loving group hug.
Someone was stroking Riz’s back. Someone else was ruffling his hair. Someone else squeezed his hand.
Riz felt so loved.
He was so incredibly, overwhelmingly loved and cared for.
He didn’t need a soulmate to have this. He had never needed a soulmate at all.
When they all pulled away from the hug, Fabian handed Riz the marker and held out his own wrist. His soulmate’s name was written in beautiful calligraphy on his brown skin.
“Huh?” Riz asked.
“Write your name, The Ball,” Fabian said, slightly exasperated.
“Why?”
“Well, if we’re your soulmates, then you kind of have to be our soulmate too, don’t you? Or are you the only one who gets multiple soulmates?”
It took Riz a moment to process this. “You want … But you have a soulmate. I’m not … It’s not the same thing. I can never be as good as that.”
“Bullshit,” Fig said. She held out her wrist to Riz too. “You’re just as important to me as Ayda is.”
“I don’t really care about my soulmate anyway,” Adaine said with a shrug. She held out her wrist too, ready for Riz to write on it. “You’re much more important to me.”
“I agree with Fig,” Gorgug said with a small chuckle. “I don’t rank Zelda above you guys.” He glanced at his soulmate, and she nodded encouragingly. “It’s, like, everyone is as important to me, you know? It’s kinda weird to put relationships in a … uh, hierarchy.”
“Screw hierarchies,” Kristen said, also holding out her wrist.
Riz stared at them all in disbelief.
Fabian nudged his shoulder. “Is it really this surprising that we care about you, The Ball?”
“No,” Riz said weakly. But it was. He didn’t know why, but he had never expected them to react this way. He knew they cared about him. He knew they loved him. But …
He’d been told all his life that soulmates were the most important thing in the world. That every other relationship paled in comparison to the relationship between soulmates. His mom had tried her best to change his mind after she’d found that study, but at that point it was already too late.
It was his mom against the whole world, and she had no way of winning that battle.
But now it wasn’t just his mom telling Riz that he didn’t need a soulmate. Now it was his best friends too.
His best friends were all standing here now, asking if he wanted to be their soulmate. Well, not their literal soulmate, but something like it. Something similar but slightly different. Something just as important.
Riz wanted it more than anything in the world.
Slowly, he wrote his name on his friends’ wrists.
Riz Gukgak.
The smiles on his friends’ faces were the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.
Then Fig grabbed the marker and wrote her name on everyone else’s wrists as well, including on Ragh’s, Tracker’s, Zelda’s and Aelwyn’s. She stopped in front of Ayda and wrote her name on her soulmate’s wrist as well.
“I’d choose you even if you weren’t my soulmate,” Riz heard Fig whisper to Ayda. “I’d choose all of you,” Fig said to the whole room.
They traded the marker around, everyone writing their names on everyone’s wrists. Riz got five more names on his now crowded arm.
Ragh Barcrock.
Tracker O'Shaughnessy.
Zelda Donovan.
Aelwyn Abernant.
Ayda Aguefort.
And he wrote his own name on their wrists as well.
“We should get these tattooed,” Fig said, looking at her own forearm, which was now covered in names.
“Yes!” Kristen exclaimed.
Riz looked at his arm. His cheeks hurt from how much he was smiling. “I guess a few more tattoos wouldn’t hurt.”
When Riz got home that day, he immediately crushed his mom in a hug.
“Hey, sweetie,” she said, sounding a little confused. “What’s going on?”
Riz stepped back and showed her his forearm, covered in names. It seemed to take Sklonda a moment to process what she was seeing. But then her eyes watered, and she pulled Riz into another hug.
“I’m sorry,” Riz whispered.
“What for?”
“I don’t know. For not believing you when you said I didn’t need a soulmate. And for lying to you and telling you that I did believe you.”
“You don’t have to apologize for that,” his mom said soothingly, stroking his hair. “I … I get it. I can’t imagine how hard this must be for you.”
Riz nodded into her shoulder. “It is hard. But … I think I’m closer to accepting it now.”
His mom made a noise halfway between a sob and a cheer. “That’s so great, honey.”
When they eventually pulled away from the hug, Riz looked at his mom’s wrist. The one with the bracelet. With his and his dad’s initials on it.
“Thank you,” he said.
“For what?”
“For …” He gestured to her wrist. “For trying.”
Riz remembered the study she’d read out loud to him when he was only ten. And the way she’d stopped talking as if romance and sex were things he’d grow into. The way she talked about people without soulmates to anyone who would listen.
She’d tried so hard to make Riz see that it was okay to not have a soulmate. He wished now that it hadn’t taken him this long to believe her. He wished it hadn’t taken this much pain and confusion and self-loathing.
“That’s what moms do, sweetie,” she replied. Her smile had a hint of sadness to it. “Hey, you don’t happen to have a marker lying around?”
“Why?”
Her smile widened, losing most of its sadness. “Are your friends the only ones who are allowed to have their names on your arm?”
So Riz found a black marker, and Sklonda wrote her name on his arm, adding a little heart after it. Then she paused for a moment, writing another name.
“He would’ve wanted it,” she said softly.
Riz looked at his arm, at the two new names.
Sklonda Gukgak.
Pok Gukgak.
Then he hugged his mom longer and more fiercely than he’d ever hugged anyone in his entire life.
Later that night, Riz was in his room, fiddling with the black marker in his hands. After a moment, he put the tip to his skin. It felt a little silly, but he wrote the words, “Detective work,” and, “Adventuring.” Because in a way, his passions were his soulmates too.
As he looked at these two new words on his arm, Riz thought that maybe it was kind of nice that he would be able to live his own life and choose his own path, his own companions, completely free from the forces of destiny and fate.
Riz knew the things that were important to him. He knew the people who were important to him. He didn’t need some magic of the universe to tell him that.
He didn’t need some great force of destiny to promise him that the good things in his life would last forever, either.
Riz looked at his arm. These people were important to him. They were so, so important to him. They might not stay with him forever. Or they might. It didn’t really matter. What mattered was that they were with him now.
The promise of forever was not the only thing that mattered.
This mattered. These people.
And he mattered. Riz mattered.
He wrote one last name on his arm:
Riz Gukgak.