Release

by Naomi E Lloyd

  “I can make my own fires now. I don’t need to listen to this nonsense. You’re the one who rains down on everyone’s fires…everyone’s chance of pursuing a dream!” she screamed at him.

  But Atla just laughed. He leaned down to her ear and whispered ever so softly,

  “Look in the mirror, one more time Tiegal!”

  She looked in the mirror, and then she saw herself, her midsection and hands covered in blood. And then she screamed.

  “Tiegal! Stop! Calm down.”

  She could hear Johannes’ voice, trying to wake her, but she just kept kicking, willing herself to stay in the dream for just a few more moments so that she could alter the vision and override the reflection of painful lies Atla had shown her in the mirror.

  It was only when Johannes’ hold on her wrists became painful enough to jolt her into reality again that she opened her eyes, now aware that he was lying on top of her, pinning her down.

  “There!” He hushed her. “Are you going to stay with me? Or am I going to have to keep lying on top of you like this? Because you know that could lead to other things…and the way you have just woken up… I’m not sure that’s a safe thing to do.”

  Tiegal squeezed her eyes shut to clear away the tears. That was the worst nightmare so far. It was too real!

  “Hey, why are you crying? You just had a bad dream that’s all.” He rolled off her body, positioning himself at her side. “I can’t lie on you like that for too long!” He explained with his side-slanted smile that always made her want to inhale him even more.

  “How do you always smell so good?” She leaned into the space under his ear, where she could pick up his scent the most easily, and breathed him in.

  “You know that tickles.”

  “You know you love it!” she replied.

  “And, you know that I can tell when you are trying to distract me from what just happened!” He raised his left eyebrow.

  “Hey, how do you do that Johannes?”

  Doing her best to mimic his control over one eyebrow, she wriggled her forehead up and down, knowing full well it would make him laugh – and distract him further. At least, that was her intention.

  “Tiegal! What happened in your dream this time?” he tried again.

  “It’s nothing to worry about. Just strange memories of a life I lived before, that’s all. No different than you dreaming about your mother,” she tried, instantly regretting mentioning the person she knew he still missed so badly. His nightmares were hard to ignore. They moaned of his pain and his loss. At least, they had done when they first started sleeping together. Recently, she sensed they were becoming more peaceful. Particularly the ones where his mother held him and talked to him about the roots of trees. Those dreams always brought him a more settled sleep.

  “And the Elna dreams you still sometimes have,” she added, surprising herself. It was a naughty ruse. She knew her night terrors had disturbed him more than normal this time. Raising Elna’s memory was the only way she could think of diverting his attention from it. But it still didn’t make it right. Johannes shook his head at her.

  “No way! I am not falling for that trick again. You can’t keep using her name to send a conversation where you want it to. I don’t even know why you would want to keep bringing her up either. We have moved beyond that now. Haven’t we?”

  She nodded. “Sorry.”

  “Are you going to tell me why you woke up trying to beat me up? I’ve got to go soon you know. It’s almost sunrise and Annarita needs me back at the farm. So, come on now, tell me what bothered you so much or I am going to worry about you all day. I don’t want you to leave you here feeling all lonely.”

  You will die, alone…

  Atla’s words repeated over and over in her head, mocking her with their truth.

  “I will always be alone here, won’t I?”

  Johannes’ looked startled at her words, as though she had hit him once more, this time with her breath and her thoughts.

  “I will never leave you Tiegal. You are my everything. I just need to get the farm through this next harvest with Annarita and Frederick and then we can start making plans, for you and me, to be together properly.”

  She sighed heavily. This was not the first time he had promised a future of idyllic togetherness. It was all he thought about. That, and how and when, they could risk taking their physical connection even further.

  “Johannes, my love, you do know that just because we want something really badly doesn’t mean we can have it,” she dared, whilst pinching at the skin around her fingernails, not feeling quite daring enough to look him in the eye.

  “Tiegal! That’s not like you. What happened to your light? And how I make you reflect it more brilliantly? Didn’t we agree that something much bigger than us connected us?” His voice quavered along with his shaking hands that were still trying to settle her, rubbing up and down her arm as they faced each other.

  “I know what we said Johannes but…”

  “But your dreams don’t predict we can stay together?” he interrupted, rubbing his eyes to clear the sleep. And then, with his big calloused hand, covering up his mouth as he yawned.

  “Don’t be mad, please! It’s not that my dreams have told me anything like that, it’s just that I can’t see through this fog that exists between us sometimes. I mean, you have responsibilities to other people, your sister for example, and the rest of the farm workers. And I can’t do anything helpful here, hiding out in this cabin all day. I don’t have any purpose.”

  Johannes made a loud groan.

  “We will sort that out Tiegal. I told you, the diamond Erasmus found - the day you re-appeared again - has created a huge stir among the people here in Hopetown. It’s like a big rush has started and more and more people from all over are moving to the area to see if there are more diamonds. There could be some real opportunities for us further afield, beyond the farm. I have already spoken to Annarita and I’ve told her I plan to search for some diamond opportunities, and she agrees with me. She thinks she can keep the farm going with her husband and the rest of the neighbours joining together. It’s all going to work, I promise!”

  There was something so intoxicating about the smell he emanated when he spoke of his dreams and their future together. His excitement seeped out of him. It was even sweeter than normal. She breathed it in again, willing it to override the darker scent of danger that still lingered in her nostrils from her dreams.

  “You found the diamond first, Johannes, remember, you and Elna!”

  The words left her mouth before she had time to think of the implications, that she could break something that would not be so easy to fix.

  “Why do you keep bringing it up?” He growled, edging his body away from hers.

  It was too late for her to take it back. She may as well have placed a mirror in front of him and then expected him to un-see what she had finally shown him: that she was the one who had interrupted his fortune. It was their connection that had interfered with his journey for a normal married life with Elna, and the diamond.

  “I’m so sorry, my love, I think I was the one to burst your bubble…not the other way around!”

  It hurt to say it out loud. Her throat constricted in sympathy. But it was the truth. And now she had to set him free!

  21. Blood

  He awoke just in time. There were only a few minutes left before the sun would rise and he wanted to be in the right spot to see it. He threw the bed covers away from him and pulled on his trousers and shirt as quickly as he could, careful not to make too much noise and risk alerting his sister to his movements. Annarita’s impatience towards his regular disappearances was growing by the day.

  He tiptoed down the stairs of his family farmhouse covering his mouth to avoid breathing in the relentless dust that Kagiso struggled to rid, on a daily basis, and broke out of the front door in a fast run. He knew exactly where he wanted to position himself and he was already pushed for time.

  La
st night he had come to a decision: to make the next sunrise his Release Day – his decision day.

  It pained him to think of Tiegal all on her own, also rising to watch the dawn of a new day – a Tandro habit she had yet to break - but he needed to see this one on his own.

  They couldn’t keep having the same conversations. They were hurting each other with their fears. Tiegal had been the first to admit this.

  “We are not exchanging our energies in balance anymore. We are in a battle for power, which is never good,” she’d said.

  It was probably why she was losing her light too. Neither of them had vocalized the recent changes to her optical features. How her diamond pupils no longer pulsated radiant light or how the dark hollows had become light grey. There was even a hint of a green colour in the centre. There was no doubt about it. She was starting to appear more human, just as he had prayed for. A way to bring her out into the light of Earth, so that he could share her beauty and his love for her with others. There was nothing more wrenching than having to leave her for so many hours on her own.

  The nights had become colder in the last few weeks and although he had worked hard to adapt the old cabin into something more sustainable for Tiegal to keep warm in, he knew it was not enough to keep her radiating her light in the way she deserved. She was like a hidden gem. One that only he was getting the momentary pleasure of seeing.

  It made him feel guilty – and wrong. This couldn’t be what the stars, or dare he even consider…God…could have intended, by bringing them together like this?

  He just knew they were missing something about their connection, and he couldn’t let his desire for her blind him to the message he knew he needed to see.

  Yes, there was a part of him that got excited when he thought of the potential her transformation into being more human could mean. They could perhaps be together in every way possible, without the fear of her being taken away to her other world. Yet, he also feared this change would mean the end of what made her who she was: so special, unique, and just so unbelievably radiant.

  She must have been tuning into his thoughts too. For it was Tiegal who had suggested they spend a couple of days apart, “I think we need to seek wholeness within ourselves again Johannes. We can come back together soon, when we are complete individuals again, with more clarity. Go spend some time with your sister and the farm people. I will be fine here. You have given me plenty of food supplies, which is far more than I survived on when I was alone like this before. Remember, I told you how I spent a year in a tiny cabin before I came here? This is a luxurious palace compared to that! I can get some sleep, and who knows, I may even dream a dream to help us understand what is planned ahead of us?”

  There had been no point reasoning with her. He may not be able to read her thoughts, but he was attuned to her enough to know she meant what she said: she really did want some time to gather herself.

  Even so, he hated leaving her on her own. She may appear more human to him now, but to anyone else she was still an extraordinary sight. What if someone found her? They could react. Hurt her in some way, out of fear. It was unthinkable.

  Two days was too long, too much of a risk. It wouldn’t take long for him to find the answer he sought and then he would go back to her and tell her what they needed to do.

  Tiegal had come to his world. She was a stranger and it was his job to make sure that she could find a way to live here happily – or, as strangling as this idea was, to go back to where she came from.

  Even the thought of suggesting she return to Tandro made him shudder. It was not what she would want – the opposite of what he wanted too – but if it was the right thing for her, and her life, then he would hurt himself to make sure it happened.

  There! You see, you can make a decision!

  He told himself, as he reached his destination: his favourite tree on the riverbank.

  Wriggling his bottom into the dry, hard ground, he closed his eyes and began counting slowly, inside his head, allowing his breathing to regulate as Tiegal had taught him to.

  As he paid attention to how his chest raised and lowered, he felt himself relax. Before long, his mind shifted to an image of Tiegal doing the same thing as he was now; sitting legs crossed, as she always did, on the dry grass in the clearing near her cabin, waiting for the dawn of a new day.

  “Grrr!” he growled, shaking his head to clear his mind. It was important that he focus on what he had come here to do.

  In less than a minute, he felt a welcoming shift in temperature. It compelled him to open his eyes; to witness the stunning glow of orange and pinks as they emerged from the horizon ahead. Aware that the farm workers would soon be heading this way, he glanced around to check his surroundings were clear and then he spoke the words he had practiced for this very moment.

  “I am fire. I am light. No one can douse my fire. No one can dim my light.”

  He deliberately left out the part about no one entering his island. He knew how much Tiegal despised that part of the chant from her old life. And he felt he owed it to her to respect this much of her experience. But the rest of the Tandro morning mantra, he chanted in a quiet but determined voice, enjoying the spectacular movement of the rising sun ahead of him as he did.

  A long, peaceful, but uneventful minute passed – he counted it in his head – and then nothing. No answers. Not a single sign, or feeling, that he could grasp onto.

  “What was I thinking? Stupid, stupid idea.” He berated himself, with only the orange glow of the sun-filled landscape before him. Frustrated, he dug his fingernails into the dry mud at the side of him.

  “What am I going to do? I thought being here would give me the answers. It did the last time I was here...” He stopped, mid-sentence, re-playing his last words.

  The last time…when Tiegal appeared before me!

  There was the answer!

  “Eureka!” he whispered.

  And now he could make his decision.

  Both the clearing and the cabin were silent. There was no sign of her anywhere. The bed had been made and her shoes – the ones he had found for her at the church shelter – were lined up neatly by the door. His rapid breathing disturbed the soundless room. It added to the eeriness, exacerbated by how wrong this space suddenly seemed. It still smelled of her, but something told him, just by the way things had been positioned, that it was a scene she had created, that it was meant to signal her goodbye.

  Clenching his fists tight in order to steady himself, he lowered himself down to the floor. He needed to check the box underneath the bed. Tiegal had done her best to convince him that she had buried her Derado neckpiece deep down under the mud near the trees outside, but he knew she had kept it closer at hand. He remembered – despite being in a delirious state at the time – how she had worn it when he was sick and needed warming from the spell of hypothermia he had brought upon himself.

  It had always concerned him that the powerful neckpiece was so close to her, but something had prevented him from raising it to her; aware that they needed to respect at least some of the private parts of their worlds from each other – just as he had kept her from Annarita and the rest of the neighbours here.

  “Tiegal! No!” he groaned, as he pulled open the box. The diamond collared neckpiece had gone, which had to mean so had she.

  Even though he was already kneeling, he felt himself sink further into the floor, rolling on to his side in a ball, still holding on to the lid of the box. This was his fault. Her Derado was the only link to her previous life. Who was he to demand that she bury it, the way he had hidden her? And what stupid arrogance had led him to think he could storm out on her and leave her for more than twenty-four hours, on her own, with no reason or belief that there was anything worth staying here for?

  He knew she was scared of what would await her if she were to return to Tandro. She had never verbalised the things that had disturbed her there, but her nightmares had demonstrated the lingering hurts she still suffered from.
>
  Perhaps that was why he had so foolishly believed he could contain her here, with him, living this secret life, devoid of all purpose, other than to love him. Because he knew there was nothing worth returning to on the other side.

  He squeezed his eyes shut, fighting back the tears that threatened to flood from the well of despair inside him. After his mother died, he had sworn he would never let himself cry again. Enough tears had been shed in one man’s lifetime. But this was different. Tiegal was part of a thousand lifetimes and possibilities – and he had let her go.

  “Fool! Idiot! Complete, arrogant, imbecile,” he scolded himself, banging his fist on his knee.

  A screeching noise sounded out from outside the cabin, making him jump up to his feet. He let the box fall to the floor and ran in the direction of the tormented screams that he knew belonged to her. The sounds were coming from somewhere near the river - the spot where he knew she sometimes bathed in the morning twilight – and it was getting louder by the second.

  “Tiegal! I’m coming! Wait for me! I’m coming for you,” he shouted in a repetitive roar, bashing and beating the branches of the trees in his way, determined to reach her before she disappeared, whether from this life, or the one belonging to another world!

  As he swiftly navigated around obstructions in the bush, he clocked the broken tree house ahead, the one he had made with his sister as a child, and knew he was near. Tiegal loved to hide in there. She said it made her feel more connected to him and his human playfulness. But her terrified screams where coming from further afield.

  “Johannes! Help me! I’m bleeding.”

  Her reference to the word ‘blood’ urged him to pick up his pace. He slowed only to make an awkward jump over a fallen swing, one from his youth that no one had bothered to mend. He could hardly breathe, due to both exhaustion and fear, as he darted through the space between two thorn trees, scrambling to get to the small pool of water from where her desperate cries resounded.