Chapter 3 – Key
She tilted her head in confusion then her eyes lit up in shock and she stuttered out, “You... you really don't know?”
I shook my head. She smiled and stroked my cheek, I leaned into the warmth and closed my eyes.
She said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, “I am your Key.”
I opened my eyes and shrugged in confusion. She blinked in genuine surprise and confusion and asked, “Didn't your parents tell you?”
I shook my head and admitted in a small voice, “I don't know much about the curse. I got my first Calling the day I turned eighteen. My father told me a little about our curse, our sin, as I changed. We both went on the hunt that night, but only I returned.”
She placed both hands on my cheeks and lifted my head so our eyes could meet again. How was it possible that she seemed even more beautiful each time I looked upon her? It made no sense. I have never felt attraction so strongly for someone before. I just wanted to please this woman, but I felt ashamed that I didn't know what she wanted me to know.
She read this in my eyes and comforted me again, then looked at the ceiling like she could see through the entire building to the blue skies above. She spoke like she was teaching an ancient history class, “Every Scythe has the chance for redemption, to be released from the punishment which all of their bloodline must suffer for siding with the disciples of Satan.”
My heart skipped a beat at that. Redemption. I truly could get free of my demon? Father said that much, but not how.
He was going to tell me all after our first hunt, but they were waiting for us. The demons. They thought to take out a young Scythe, but my father's demon proved to be too much for their ambush, he died protecting me, before my demon could break free from the chains I had restrained it with to finish off the last of them.
She spoke like her thoughts were miles away, and she was grasping at them like they were an elusive mist trying to slip between her fingers, “When a Scythe is on the fringe of redemption, when the good they have done, dispatching evil from this realm, balances the debt of their tainted soul. Their Key will finally be allowed to find them. On the day your debt is paid, your Key can then unlock the shackles on your soul, break the chains that bind and set you free.”
Now my heart was threatening to beat right out of my chest. I blinked tears out of my eyes and looked at this wondrous woman. Trying to comprehend what she was saying. She released one of my cheeks, and I missed the contact almost immediately. She pulled up her shirt sleeve and there, burned into her skin, flaring with her bluish white soul fire was the number ninety-nine.
She smiled and explained, “When your chain of sin is reduced below one hundred links, your Key will finally complete their lifelong search for you. We witness and chronicle your last battles with other demons as you banish them back to the underworld.”
Then her face dropped, painted with profound sadness, and I wanted to do something, anything, to see that smile again. She said in a haunted tone, “It usually takes a lifetime to erase the debt, and most of your line die long before it can happen. Before redemption. The very few that have accomplished it near the ends of their lives, were finally able to live the last days of those lives in peace. Hand in hand with their Key.”
Then her face transformed, as that sadness was replaced by a fierce pride. “However, my Scythe has battled almost every day for years, following the Calling, no matter how faint. Diminishing her debt faster than any Fonteneau in recorded history. I searched for you endlessly as my brand counted down, but the curse would not allow me to find you until the proper time. I have dreamed of you all my life. Watched you from afar in the waning moments between sleep and waking.”
I blinked. That was it. Why it seemed like I have known her my entire life. Why I had such an attraction to Japanese American women. I have dreamed of Kimoura my entire life as well, but the dreams were fleeting. I could never hold onto them for more than a few seconds after waking. Now I saw them all clear as day. It had always been her, burning in the glory of her soul fire, her wings fluttering behind her like an avenging angel ready to take me home.
She closed her eyes and whispered, “I was so frightened when the number stopped counting down on my brand. For months there was nothing, and I had feared the worst. I thought my beautiful Scythe had been lost in battle and lost to me forever.”
She opened her eyes, and a happy tear flowed down her cheek as she shared, “Then a goddess walked into my office this morning. I couldn't believe my eyes, it had to be you. Then I saw the brand on your arm and just knew it. You were even more beautiful than in my dreams.”
She chuckled. “I didn't understand how I had found you when my brand was still at one hundred. But the moment you ran from the group, I felt the tingle on my shoulder, and the number changed before my very eyes, and I was suddenly... aware of you, and where you were. I felt the dark place in which you hid in your mind, as you did what was required of you in your other beautiful form.”
Then she grinned and said with that touch of mirth in her voice, “I had to come to you to watch you do battle. Terrible plan by the way.”
I couldn't stop a surprised giggle at that. That just put a huge smile on her gorgeous face, her dark eyes sparkling. I finally spoke, trying to come to terms with what I thought she was saying to me, “You... you're my... Key? I can finally be rid of this God forsaken curse one day.”
She nodded, tears welling in her eyes. She said hopefully, “If you will have me.”
I blinked, and she shook her head in exasperation and almost growled, “You are way too shy. I'll have to break you of that. But now, I'd really like to do what I have longed to for my entire life as I have searched endlessly.”
She stroked my black, sweaty, matted, and human hair back and looked at me like nobody had ever looked at me before. Like there was nobody else in the world but the two of us. I knew she was seeing my soul, and she leaned down, and I instinctively leaned up. Our lips met in the gentlest whispering kiss, which felt like a promise to me. I swear my soul was crying as we pulled apart slightly.
Then she winked at me with a flush face, her eyes sparkling with playfulness and mischief as she said through a cute crooked smile while she ran her fingers through my hair, “So ummm... what say you about finding some clothes? You're kind of naked here and it is reeeeealy distracting me. In a good way of course, but still distracting.”
I chuckled and nodded, my eyes wide in adoration of her. Just ninety-nine more times. Less than a hundred times, becoming that evil to fight evil. If she was my prize. I could do that. If she would have me. My heart beat strongly, I had loved this woman in my dreams my whole life and not even known it. And now, I would love her with whatever time I had left in this world.
Then I blinked myself out of my thoughts and blushed. But first, I need clothes.
The End
The Hollow Page 8