The Brave One

Chapter 8

Chapter 8

William awoke with a start. His eyes took a moment to adjust but as they did, the vision he awoke upon displeased him to the fullest extent. The mysterious girl was holding his mother’s necklace, astonishment written on her ghostly whitened face.

He scrambled to his feet and over took the dumbfounded girl with ease. She was pinned down, his arm on her neck and his hands holding both of her thin wrists in place above and partially tangled in, her disarrayed curls.

“Get off me. Please, let me go,” she pleaded.

“Why did you take this? Why?” William’s grip on her hands tightened. Bittersweet tears were forming in the corner of her clenching eyes. She tried to fight the man off as best she could but the day’s fatigue and her whirlwind emotions were overpowering her fading strength. The best the poor girl could do was struggle underneath his dominating weight. Unwillingly, she let a few sobs free.

“Answer!”

The young woman remained silent for she knew not how to answer. William’s fingernails were digging painfully into her skin and his arm was crushing her.

“No more secrets and lies from you, witch. Why were you really in the woods?” Something was definitely off with this woman, but with what he could not say.

Evera tried to control her emotions. William, her friend from the days before she knew what she was, had the jewel she was to search for. The necklace, which now lay on the ground beside her struggling mass, was no ordinary piece of beautiful jewelry and now she realized why. This necklace was fortified with God’s power to give Fae their stolen wings. She had seen the engraving before. The Raven was a symbol for the Unseelie’s head power in the High Court, Elish. His necklace has been missing for centuries and here all along, the humans had stolen it. More importantly, in the eyes of Unseelie members, William had stolen the Fae wings.

“I did not lie before. I cannot lie.” William loosened his grip in slight with her cooperation. “I was here to hunt, but my prize was not to be animal. Now, release me, I beg of you.”

“Not until I am told what I desire to hear. What were you hunting?”

Evera thought hard in every way to bend the truth. Fae cannot speak falsely, but they can mislead their words.

“I was… on a search to find something for my homeland. Why must you know?”

“I will ask questions, not you.” William saw her struggle to speak properly. “Who are you?”

No… Evera could not lie, and she could not tell him, lest he cares enough to not let her go and follow her to Morag. With the Unseelie’s he would be, in the most formal of terms, quite unwelcome. Evera’s good fortune had run out.

“I am not sure you want to know that answer, and if you have not figured it out already, I will tell you only this.” Evera closed her eyes again to ease the burden of expressing the inevitable. “We have met, only… in another life.” This statement was true to Evera for her days before Morag felt another lifetime ago.

William stared at the young woman. This beauty, this thief, this… unnaturally graceful and elegantly animalistic woman. Had he met her once in the boisterous marketplace? Had she accused him of thievery which he well deserved or had she given him food or money when she passed him lying on the street? It could not be for he surely would have recognized her. She was too contrasting to the women in town.

“Tell me even so. Who are you really?”

“The rose you gave her pricked the finger when she walked home.” Evera could not bear to tell him fully. It was causing too much pain to speak that which she spoke in riddles. Her voice became a barely audible whisper and her eyes vacant as she danced within her words.

“What rose?”

Evera swallowed and thought of her birthday so long ago.

“One morning, a young boy and girl strode into the forest to play. She did not know it was their last adventure, but they had their fun and danced and talked of their future.”

“What are you talking ab--”

“And the boy,” Evera continued. “He cut a rose and gave it to the girl for he thought she deserved even better than a prince. And she placed it in the basket with other flowers meant for her mother.” Evera’s tears stung her eyes and rolled down into her hair. “Then they left for home and before they parted, he stole a kiss upon her cheek.”

William took his hands away from her wrists and sat back on his knees. Evera remained on the ground and finished the story of their adventure.

“She asked the question that was repeated every day. She asked him, ‘William, will I see you tomorrow?’” Evera sat on her knees in front of William. His eyes stared at the ground taking in her story. It was her memory. It was their memory.

Evera wiped her tears and fixed her hair. She drew a long breath before ending the tale.

“And she did see him, like he said he would. He promised every day, and that boy kept his promises.” Evera took his hands into her own as he sat in shock, soaking in the truth.