My Savior's Secret

Chapter 8

My eyes were closed, but I could tell from the light red and yellow under my lids, the shade of rustling trees at the edge of the glade, and the warmth on my bear arms that the weather was bright today.

Among the soft rustle of leaves in the afternoon breeze, I listened to the voices from my earphones. The man’s voice had a rich baritone, fuzzed by the age of the recording, each word lively. The woman’s voice was like silver bells, yet with a confidence that strengthened those bells, made them unbreakable, made them omnipresent, as if she was always there, everywhere.

I was probably five when grandma had played the videos to me. Most of my childhood which I’d forgotten, my father had read bedtime stories. My mother had sung lullabies. I’d forgotten their voices and faces. I’d kept their voices and faces.

A leaf rolled over my face. The next recording played. 

Over the years, I’d compiled every photo and video my parents had sent me through my grandma from Etheria. I’d opened my laptop and transferred all those files I should’ve destroyed to my phone. The gradual change in quality, the length, the pesky compatibility issues all showed how tangible time could be.

Why did I still have them? Grandma had stashed the photos they’d mailed in a photo album, which appeared more broken together than apart. I kept the digital ones on an ancient desktop and stored them every time I’d updated computers. In all the pictures of us three together, I’d only been a baby. It was as if time stopped right there.

A shadow overtook the light above me, and my eyebrows crumpled. I held my pocket-watch tighter. Hi, little Scar! Look what daddy found. It’s a book! Grandma told me you loved books. This one is about a scary monster disguised as a beautiful angel—

My eyes snapped open. Two blazing emeralds caught my breath, upside-down on a face I could recognize anywhere even if masked, though it was a face I didn’t expect to see when I hadn’t seen the man himself for the past few days. Not like I was hoping to see him.

“Are you stalking me?”

He tilted his head. “Didn’t you leave Etheria yet?”

I gestured to myself. “Clearly not. Were you stalking me?”

He picked a leaf from my hair. “You have no fear.”

“Is that a bad thing?”

“Yes.”

He stood, and his shadow sent chills down the length of my body. I tugged out my earphones and zipped on the sweater I’d cushioned under my head.

“Have you been coming the forest every day?” he said. Well, look who was being a nosy Nancy this time.

“You’re the one who told me about this place,” I said defensively. “You don’t own the forest—wait, do you?”

He turned towards the trees. “Maybe.” Okay, that was a lie. I expected him to become Tarzan once he ambled into the forest, but he was still on two feet. Amazing.

I scrambled up and went inside with him. “Are you still going to pretend you weren’t stalking me?”

“You think too highly of yourself. You happened to come in my view.” He sped up, expertly jumping over the uneven land, holes, and grooves of the forest floor. Had he done long-jumping before? Parkour? He was nearly a blur in the trees until he completely disappeared.

“Aus—” I sucked the word back in time. He’d definitely not like me knowing his name. He dropped right in front of me, appearing twice as big and menacing. I dropped my phone in surprise, and he caught my elbow before I stumbled back. His long-gloved fingers were leathery against my skin. Or were they rubber?

“Why do you fall everywhere?”

“It’s your fault!” I picked up my phone and blew off the dirt. “Damn you.”

“Elliot wishes you well.” My head snapped up, and he began to walk away again. “He said he could get you more of those chrys—whatever those flowers were. But he can’t see you, so don’t get your hopes up.”

“Is he doing okay?” I said. “I heard he’s unwell.”

“Don’t worry about that.” Was he naturally this offhand or plain reticent?

I jogged to catch up but was still a step behind. “My parents worked for him, right? All these years, they abandoned me to work on some project—”

He stopped and I bumped into his back. “Look, I don’t know all this s**t you’re asking me about. I told you what he told me to tell you. We’re done here.”

What got him so grumpy? This mantle dude—no, he didn’t have a mantle this time. A light brown trench coat replaced his usual pitch-black cloak, revealing a slightly defined shape of his body. Wide shoulders, arms, big back, long legs making large strides. It still didn’t quench my satisfaction.

“Did you go to college before?” I asked.

The sable hair at his nape shifted when he looked over his shoulder. “Go home. You don’t want to be seen with me.”

“Oh, please. Who’s gonna see us here?” 

He continued walking. “Why do you care if I went to college?”

I gazed at the never-ending treetops. “I’m wondering how colleges in Etheria are. I left my final year before graduating to come here.” I ducked below a banyan branch. “I have nothing left there now.”

“Your clan can find you a chance to stay,” he said. “Doesn’t mean you should.”

“That’s not my question.”

A wide stream brimming with white wildflowers came to view. Then a distant gush of water.

He hopped over a boulder in the stream and said, “I didn’t go to college. I started training for work right after high school.” His feet bounced from boulder to boulder until he crossed the stream. He watched as I climbed the first one and pulled down his mask. “You’re weird.”

“Look who’s talking.”

“You have other people you can ask these questions. People that are much more willing to answer.”

“So?” I reached my foot to the next boulder. “I have a mouth, so I’ll talk to you if I want to.”

“You won’t gain anything by doing that.”

“I’m not expecting anything.” I spread my arms to balance myself and toed the third boulder. “I ask you these things because you won’t care what I say.”

“Why would I care?”

“Exactly. You shouldn’t. You don’t have an ulterior motive.” I wobbled and tipped forward to plant my foot on the boulder. “You’re like a wall I can talk to. Or a sounding board. Somebody who sometimes answers, sometimes disappears, but you won’t keep anything I say in mind.”

He shifted his foot on one of the boulders, elbow on his knee. “Sounding board, huh?”

I made a 360-degree turn to find the next boulder. “Point is, you’re a stranger who has nothing to do with me. You won’t give me sympathy like the others. I can be free—ah, there it is.” I made a risky jump to the boulder in front of him and balanced on one foot. “Move.”

“What?”

I wavered on my foot and flailed my arm. “You’re stepping on my next boulder.” He removed his foot and I hopped on the boulder.

My foot instantly slipped, and I tumbled into the water with a splash. Ow. I lifted on my elbows, half my body drenched. At that moment, I didn’t even know who to blame except spit out curses.

Then came laughter. The crooked weasel fully dry on the other side was laughing.

He was laughing.

My stomach flipped at the deep, rolling sound from his belly. A new sound that seemed to wake the magical spirits of the forest. His face had brightened with that laugh to a visage ten times more beautiful. Alive. Approachable. Human.

Human? What?

His eyes moved along the stream. He vaulted over several boulders and ducked to grab something floating in the water.

My phone.

My heart stopped. I bolted up and practically tackled him. “My gallery. My photos, my videos…” I collapsed against the boulder in relief. “They’re alright.”

He knelt on the boulder, looking at the phone over my shoulder. “Your parents?”

I flinched at the closeness of his voice. “No. I mean, it’s none of your business. Forget it.” I stomped to the other side of the stream and squeezed the water out of my hair and clothes. Yes, forget it. “This is what I get for trying to start new. College? Give me a break.” There was no progression my whole life.

I stripped off my sweater and wringed it, muttering incessantly as if all my problems reduced to that single moment.

My mouth didn’t--couldn't--stop. “Working like a dog at a bullshit restaurant, going out with dumb boys who dumped me like garbage, dealing with back-stabbing friends, never going to parties. Never even had s*x, never left the city, and not a single soul at home—”

My words ceased in my throat. Except the occasional chirping of birds and rustling leaves, the forest was utterly silent. Ausmane was sitting on the boulder, leaning back on his hands with a hawkish gaze, and I’m sure, with wide open ears.

I hung my sweater over my arm and marched past him. 

Then he spoke, picking out the one thing I'd wished he wouldn't. “You want s*x?”