Calaistas

Day Sixteen

Leandrios was running. He didn't know why he was running, but everything was dark, and he was running. He needed to be somewhere. He needed to save someone.

Suddenly, he saw C somewhere in the distance, up in a tree. She was sitting in the branches, her feet dangling in the air, and she was smiling. And... singing. He stopped as he heard it, a rich, beautiful music.

"Leandrios!"

He turned, startled as he heard his name, and he saw Metiana waiting for him on the path under his feet. She waved and jumped up and down, excited and cheerful. He looked down at his feet. He stood where there was a fork, the path winding in two different directions. C was on the left. Metiana was on the right. He didn't know where to direct his next step. His foot was ready to move, but he couldn't tell it what to do. He didn't know.

A group of rabbits abruptly ran past him towards the girl, and he heard an engine go roaring by his other side, laughter spewing from the Gremlin driving the hovercraft.

Something grabbed at his throat, making it hard to breathe, pressing down on his lungs and making the space in his chest feel like a cold, dark cavern. He started to sweat. The salt slid down his temples, suspended in a drop right above his upper lip, rolled off his palms.

What was he supposed to do? There was something he was supposed to do. If he could remember, he would know where his next step was supposed to go. Left or right? Left or right?

Suddenly, there was a scream, and he couldn't see anything anymore. Not C, not Metiana, not the path. Everything fell into darkness with the scream, and he heard it explode in his ears and everywhere else, an echo drowning out everything.

Leandrios was too late. He was too late, wasn't he?

With a jolt, like he felt himself falling, he woke up. His neck hurt. Slowly, he raised his head from his arms, taking in the reality. He was sitting on the floor, leaning against the cot. C was lying in a fleecy blanket, eyes closed shut like butterfly wings, the rise and fall of her steady breathing evident in her chest. The light was dim, glowing, and his stomach felt like a bottomless pit. He didn't know the day. He didn't know the time. But C was alive.

Groggily, Leandrios struggled to his feet, stumbling to the pantry. He didn't taste any of the food as he scarfed it down, feeling exhaustion eating away at his own core. When he felt a little better, he looked back at C. She was sleeping. Or something like sleeping. There was just a blank look to her face, no activity. Leandrios looked away with a sigh, brushing his hands through his hair. There wasn't anything he could do. She was breathing. That's all he knew.

He started looking around at the other objects in the room. The cabinet was full of bottles and pills and sharp, metal instruments, but what about that dresser? He walked over to it, looking at the dusty film on the top. There was a picture lying on its face, and he picked it up, blowing cobwebs away. In the frame was a face. It was striking, a pale, pale, almost blue face, with fierce and glowing eyes. Joyfully bright. Dark hair surrounded the face, sprouting around two blue horns in the head. There was no mistake she was Agatean.

Who was she? What was her picture doing here? Leandrios stared as if staring could make the answer clearer. It didn't make sense. C, he had already decided, was wealthy. Wealth and Agate had ceased to be friends years and years ago. How was this picture in C's possession? Or was this place not C's at all?

Shaking his head, he put the picture back. More mysteries. Of course. Without bothering to think what or who he might disturb, he began opening the drawers. Inside the dresser, in every drawer, were clothes. High quality clothes. There were all kinds, all colors, meant for all occasions. Leandrios closed the last drawer, puzzled. He turned to the table where a box lay. By now he didn't care if he was "snooping." He was fed up with the secrecy. C might die, and he would be left with no chance to find the answers to any of her thousand secrets.