by Martha Woods
“We need to talk,” he said gravely. I took a hard swallow.
“Okay...” I said.
“Here. Sit,” he said, gesturing to the bed. I'd already had a feeling that, whatever he wanted to talk about, it was going to end up being serious. But this was almost too much for me. I hesitated, looking from him to the bed and back again. Then finally I sat down as he asked me to, and he took a seat beside me, not meeting my eyes for a moment.
“What's up?” I asked, trying to sound innocent, and diffuse the tension just a little bit.
“Alicia,” he said, again with the utmost gravity. “I love you. I think I've been trying not to tell you that, because of everything that's been happening. In case– in case something should happen... I was afraid it would be too painful. Too hard for either of us to bear. But it's true. I love you, Alicia. With so much of my heart that it hurts to even think about. You've given my life new meaning. You've made me feel alive. You've given me hope. I love you. I truly, deeply love you...”
I felt the tears welling up in my eyes.
“I love you too, Nol,” I said, the words tasting sweet as they passed from my lips. “So much!”
He looked like he was trying not to cry– indeed, not to let himself have a reaction to this at all.
“But it's because I love you,” he said, the light quickly dimming in his eyes, “that I have to let you go...”
I blinked at him, and my jaw hung slack for a moment.
“Wh-what?”
“If I didn't love you,” he said calmly, “We wouldn't need to be having this conversation. We could just keep on pretending everything would be alright. Keep on fooling ourselves, until something bad happened. Until it was too late. But I do love you. And I can't do that to you, Alicia. You and I both know that there's no way that the two of us can ever be together. Not now. Not ever. I messed everything up, and now the Dark Ones won't rest until they have my head on a platter. I'm not going to let you be collateral damage to my own idiotic mistakes...”
“No,” I said desperately, shaking my head. “No, we don't know that... Nothing is set in stone! There's always a way!”
“I don't think there is this time, Alicia...”
“And what do you mean, you won't let me be collateral damage?!” I demanded, my tears of joy having turned to a mix of sorrow and rage, the clear rivulets streaming down my face. “Don't I get a say in any of this?!”
Nol sighed. “Don't make this any harder than it has to be. You and I both know that you can't stay here. It's amazing that you've survived with me for as long as you have without them finding us. But I can't keep risking your safety like I have been. We need to get you out of here. Take you somewhere far away, where they'll never find you...”
“Oh, God!” I snapped, unable to believe what I was hearing. “Who the hell are you to accuse me of making this harder than it has to be? What do you plan to do, stay here and let them find you? Let them kill you?!”
“I plan to stay and fight,” he said stubbornly, puffing out his chest in a way that might normally have aroused me, but which in that moment made me want to crane my head back and laugh.
“So yeah, stay here and let them kill you, then...” He gave me a dirty look, and I threw up my hands. “What?! You've told me yourself! There's no way you can face the Dark Ones on your own! There are way too many of them, and only one of you!”
“Just what do you propose I do, then?” he demanded, though I knew he would refute whatever answer I gave him.
“Run away with me,” I pleaded with him. “Like you just said! We'll go off somewhere together. Somewhere they can never find us... Just me and you. And Fri, if he wants to come.”
Nol looked thoroughly disgusted at this idea.
“And what would that make me?” he demanded. “What kind of man would I be, if I let them get away with this? If I ran away with my tail between my legs?”
“The kind who stays alive!” I spat back. “What kind of woman would I be if I let you go through with this? Let you get yourself killed over some pointless squabble? A battle that even you know you can't win?!”
“Damn it, Alicia!” he roared, yelling at me for the first time, storming up from the bed and standing with his fists clenched. “Those evil fucks– those sons of bitches the Dark Ones took everything from me! Every fucking thing! They took away my home! My family! My land! Everything! And I'm just supposed to lie down and take it, like I have for the past twenty years?! You don't have any idea what that feels like!”
I had had it. I stared up at him, my eyes welling over. My lips pursed into the thinnest of lines.
“Yeah. Yeah, I fucking do, actually...”
He blinked at me. “What?”
I sniffed, trying to collect myself, and rubbed a sleeve across my eyes. “I said I know what it's like to lose everything!” I reiterated, in a hoarse, weak voice. “Because I did lose everything once. Back when I was a little girl. I lost my parents, both of them. They both died in a car crash, hit by a drunk driver.”
An uncomfortable silence hung in the air. Nol was still panting like an animal about to attack, trying to cool back down from his outburst, and process what I was telling him. Slowly he sat back down on the bed beside me, the springs creaking as he settled into place.
“I– I'm sorry,” he said, staring out into space. “I didn't know that.”
I sniffed. My throat burned. I forced myself, all the same, to continue speaking.
“I was five years old when it happened. I was in the car with them. It was the scariest thing that ever happened to me. Watching them die... It was like it all happened in slow motion. And the guy who did it... He just walked away from it. Walked away like it was nothing. Spent some time in jail. Then went back to his life, like it was just a minor setback in his story. I've been trying for years to start again. To figure out what my life really means. But it's a luxury I've never really had.”
I felt like I was rambling. I folded my hands in my lap, looking down at my palms. I could feel him looking at me. Studying me. I didn't know whether my words would have any effect on him. They probably wouldn't. But I at least needed to try.
“You spend so much time,” I continued, “trying to get back what can never be yours again. Trying to hold onto things that you know aren't good for you, just because you're afraid of losing everything, all over again. I know what that feels like, Nol. I seriously do. Because I've lived that every day since I was a little girl. Always afraid to take chances. Always afraid to reach for what I really wanted, because I was too afraid of losing what I already had. Even if that really didn't amount to anything. Even if it was just me pretending that I was leading any kind of a normal life.”
I could hear his breath slowing down. Could feel his gaze settling deeper and deeper onto me. Seeing straight through me like an x-ray.
At last I looked up at him. Staring into those amber eyes, as bad as it hurt me to do so. I needed him to understand. I needed him to know what he meant to me. How badly the prospect of losing him again was hurting me.
“As crazy as this whole thing has been, you're the first person who's ever made my life make any sense again. The first person who's ever made me feel complete. And I can't lose that Nol. I just can't. You might think you're helping me, with what you're trying to do. But I swear to God... What you're saying– it would destroy me, Nol. Absolutely destroy me. I just can't keep going in this world on my own anymore. I just can't do it. I need you.”
The words felt like they might nearly kill me, but there they were. I let my head fall once they were out. Staring into his lap. Waiting for his verdict. Certain, even with his consideration, that he would be unlikely to change his mind.
The silence stretched on for a long, long time.
And then he reached out.
He placed a hand very gently to the side of my face. The tips of his fingers were like little electrical currents against my skin. I looked up at him, not really sure what to expect.
Hi
s eyes were blank, but deeply focused. He cradled my cheek in his hand, and simply stared into me. Peering deep into my soul. I stared right back at him, refusing to blink. Refusing to look away until I got an answer from him.
I could tell that one was forming by the corners of his lips. They pushed slightly upward, like he was about to say something. He rubbed his thumb slowly across my cheek, and a teardrop rolled beneath it. Then one spilled over in his own eyes as well. He opened his mouth.
And then, before he could say a word, a stampede of footsteps tore through the silence.
My heart froze.
We jerked up, staring out into the hallway.
The sound of Fri's voice rang out, and at once I knew that, whatever decision Nol had been about to arrive at, it had suddenly just become entirely meaningless, one way or another.
“Nol! You better get down here! I think we have company...”
7
Nol
We ran out the front door and into the clearing outside the cabin. Myself, Fri, as well as, in spite of my insistence to the contrary, Alicia. We stared off into the distance with bated breath, and watched the trio of shadows emerging from the sunset. The light was rapidly thinning, but there was no mistaking the identities of the men surging rapidly toward us through the trees.
Dark Ones.
Jet black hair. Glowing red eyes. The two men flanking the central figure had bodies that were almost coated solid in inky black tattoos. Whereas the one in the center had his arms covered in snakelike sleeves of ink, and a single serpent's skull emblazoned on his chest, wearing a bejeweled crown.
Madro. Brother of Ryl, the King of the Dark Ones.
“Get back inside Alicia,” I muttered over my shoulder. As I feared after our previous conversation, Alicia seemed hesitant to listen to me. She stared at me, her jaw trembling, and I began to grow impatient. “I said get inside! Now!”
She did as I asked of her, and hurried back through the door. I turned back to face the Dark Ones, who had stopped halfway across the clearing, and were staring down Fri and myself.
“There he is!” snarled Madro, his crimson eyes standing out eerily against the encroaching shadows. “The golden boy himself! The piece of shit Wrecker who killed one of our best men in cold blood, then thought he could get away without us tracking him down!”
“That idiot had it coming!” I couldn't help but roar back at him. “You and I both know that! He was always picking fights with humans, killing innocent people that didn't deserve it! Honestly, you think a single flight in the middle of the night is a risk to our secrecy? If anything it was that madman who ran the risk of giving us away with his insatiable thirst for violence! He who lives by the sword...”
“Nol!” Fri hissed at me, clearly not wanting me to make the situation worse. I gave him a reproachful look, however. It really didn't matter at this point– they were going to do what they were going to do, and what I said wasn't going to make a lick of difference.
“I would say that the greater risk to our secrecy,” countered Madro, “would be some lunatic Wrecker flying miles through the air in the middle of the night, then burning down an entire goddamn forest when he was caught! Do you have any idea the damage control the King has had to do to keep those idiot humans from finding out who was responsible?”
“Yrsur started that fight!” I boomed at him, the honest truth, but I knew that Madro didn't care.
“And I intend to finish it!” he barked, moving forward again, along with his men.
I became further and further on edge, but held my ground, not moving a muscle as Madro came nearer and nearer.
“Step aside, Fri! We have no beef with you– or the girl, for that matter. We know you lied to us, but we understand it was to protect your own flesh and blood. I might have done the same thing in your position. Still, we figured that you must be holding out on us, and that sooner or later you would be stupid enough to lead our head scout right to Nol's front doorstep. In the end, you made up for your crimes, even if you didn't know you were doing it. So no harm done! As long as you step aside right now. And don't make this any worse for Nol than it already is...”
I looked over at Fri. He looked horrified– positively aghast that he had been the one to lead the Dark Ones to this place, even if it had been by accident. He gave me an apologetic glance, and I held my breath.
I had a bad feeling about what was going to happen next...
For Alicia's sake, and for Fri's, I was almost willing to come quietly, and face my punishment– thought it may have been going too far to assume they'd stay true to their word, and spare either one of them a similar fate. If Fri stood by my side, however, and refused to surrender me to them, I had a bad feeling that Alicia would be swept up in the bargain as well.
I could tell before he even spoke, just from the look in his eyes, exactly which way this was going to go.
“You can go rot in hell, Madro!” Fri shouted. “You and your entire putrid kingdom!”
I felt a momentary surge of pride, very briefly stunned by my brother's resolute loyalty, after he'd spent so much of his life balancing precariously along the fence. Any joy I might have felt quickly turned to a feeling of ice in my stomach, as a gross, twisted smile spread itself slowly across Madro's ugly face.
“I was kind of hoping you would say that...” he sneered.
And then, all at once, he leapt forward.
His muscles exploded, rippling into solid black flesh. His neck lengthened. Spikes shot out all over him, and he swung his lethal tail through the air, beating his wings as he charged toward us. The goons on either side of him followed suit, transforming into similar beasts of a slightly smaller stature.
I gave Fri a single glance, half afraid that he might have forgotten how to shift, given how long it must have been since he'd last done so.
But he hadn't forgotten. Not by a long shot.
Fri tore through his clothes, and quintupled in size, his hide the same scaly gold as my own, and his frame slightly larger than mine. I quickly followed suit, shifting just in time as Madro thundered down onto me, slamming into me with the full force of his weight.
The battle was on.
We tumbled several yards back through the air, Madro's momentum making him difficult to slow down. I swung my tail at his belly and set him on edge just enough to back away, and be able to gain my bearing for an instant. I looked over and saw Fri in a tangled mess with the two goons, the three of them biting and tearing and slashing at one another. I feared he might not last long against them on his own, but found myself with no time to intervene.
Madro came charging at me again, wasting no time as the sizzling green fire welled up in his throat, preparing to envelop me in a molten hot blast. I opened my mouth just in time, and blew gold flames right back at him, the charges colliding in midair, and sparks flying through the deepening sky as the two of us circled around in midair.
Madro's fire breath made Yrsur's feel like child's play. The pressure was intense, and I could feel spurts of emerald flame overpowering my own fire, blowing back at me, singeing my scales around the edges. Fortunately, it seemed, the force it took to sustain such a flame appeared to be too much for him. Quickly he tapered off his blast, and zipped out of the way before my fire could hit him.
He charged forward in my direction, his jaws open, his tail swinging violently through the air. I surged back at him, and managed to hurl my tail up at him before his blow could reach me. With a sickening THWACK I pummeled the underside of his chin, knocking his head back, and causing blood to spill along the immense course of his neck. I jerked my tail down, hoping the spikes might sever something vital as they tore through the thick hide of his throat and belly. No sooner had I torn the head of my tail away from him, however, then his own, far spikier tail came crashing through the air. A blinding surge of pain went shooting through the side of my face, and I let out a desperate roar of pain.
No sooner had I recovered from the blow and managed to see s
traight again than he was on me, tackling me to the ground, pinning me beneath his weight. He kept flapping his wings, sustaining a low hover that was just far enough out of reach for him to continue assaulting me, but too far for me to be able to get any blows in myself.
On and on the attacks came, his claws ripping through my scales. His teeth sinking into my gut, into my neck. Drawing more blood than I thought I could stand to lose.
I needed to get him off me, and fast– at this rate I would fall victim to his attacks before the fight had even begin.
Not wholly sure that I could do what I needed to, but too desperate not to try, I took a deep, swelling breath. I howled, and sent the flames shuddering up from my belly once again. This time, however, they surged wildly through the cuts in my throat, burning like hell as they tumbled through my neck in excruciating red sparks. Still I managed to sustain the blast, however, and through the pain I pushed the golden fireball out through my teeth, and up into Madro's face.
Madro's vermillion eyes widened, and he jerked back in time to have his entire face being burned off. Though still not ideal, this proved to be the distraction I'd been hoping for. I sprang up from the ground, pushing off with my wings, and raced up to where Madro hovered, before he had a chance to orient himself.
I sank my teeth down hard into his neck. Hard.
I tasted the flow of his blood down my fangs and along my tongue. Madro roared in pain and in fury, thrashing to try and free himself, but I refused to relinquish my grip.
I pulled on him, jerking him upward, in a direction he clearly didn't want to go. The pain of resisting, however, was entirely too much for him, and I drew him further and further up, high into the sky. I could feel his weight getting heavier and heavier, the strength draining from his body, and I began to wonder what the chances were of his decapitating himself in my jaws, the moment his strength drained away entirely.
Thinking I didn't have the time to wait around and take that chance, I settled instead on throwing my weight into him, tackling him from the sky, and hurling us both to the ground.