The Mask Man In The Woods

38.

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

"Don't move, mom. You're hurting yourself." Drakon said softly, grabbing my hand and lowering it to my lap. I wrinkled my nose and slightly tilted my head to the side.

"The bandage itches." I complained, a shiver going through my back as the itch intensified.

"It's not the bandage; it's the cream that I had put on your wound for it heal. It's one of the signs that it's working so try not to touch it or you'll end up with a scar." Tristian said, sitting next to me on the bed. He lightly lifted the bandage that was wrapped around my head and hummed.

"What is it?" Drakon asked, still holding my hands as it twitched every so often.

"It's almost healed. Should be good as new by tomorrow morning."

"Tomorrow morning?" I moaned, throwing my head back.

"Yes, so don't touch it." Tristian warned. I looked at Drakon who gave me a stern look and I sighed, crossing my arms in defeat.

"Fine." I mumbled, curling my hands into fists as another intense wave of itchiness overcame me.

"How does a cream fix a head wound? I thought my mom needed to go to a hospital for that." Drakon asked as Tristian almost got up to leave. Tristian blinked and lightly shrugged his shoulders.

"I've been teaching myself how to heal people since I could remember. When I was a boy, I've always wanted to be some sort of doctor."

"You never told me that." I said, intrigued. As far as I could remember, he never talked about his childhood.

"Well, there's not much to say. I wasn't able to become what I wanted, but I've learned a few tricks along the way."

"Do you think you could teach me?" Drakon asked, his hands balling up his shirt, "Just in case."

"In case of what, honey?" I asked, running my hands through his hair.

"Well... what happens if Tristian gets hurt and we get hurt? How will he save us?"

"That won't happen," Tristian quickly responded confidently, "But I'll teach you if you'd like."

The corner of Drakon's lips lifted into a smile for a split second before he wiped it off as he caught my eye. Tristian got up, after warning me not to scratch my head and Drakon followed him with Tom right behind them.

"So can you use that cream for any wound?" Drakon asked.

"Well, in a way..." Tristian's voice faded as they went further away from the room.

I leaned back against the headboard of Tristian's bed and pulled the blankets over my lap. I looked around the room, still amazed at how many books Tristian had. Every wall was covered with books from ceiling to floor and throughout his house too. I wondered how he managed to collect all these books if he lived in the woods all by himself.

I yawned and almost reached up to scratch my head when noticed a book hanging off of the self. I was going to ignore it when it fell off the self, the opened book landing faced down. I got off the bed with a sigh and picked it up. I flipped the book over, noticing this wasn't a book, but a journal.

I looked over at the door, holding my breath to hear if anyone was coming. I let out a deep breath when it was all quiet. Curiosity made me flip to the first page and my lips tugged down to a frown as I noticed this wasn't Tristian's handwriting. This handwriting was in script with a more feminine and neat touch whereas Tristian's handwriting was all over the place.

I sat down on the bed as I flipped through the pages, noticing as the time went on, the entries grew frequent to the point where it was only separated by time until it suddenly stopped with the last word being love. What haunted me was that the 'e' was written bigger and trailed off to the top of the page as if someone had moved the hand of the writer.

I got more comfortable in the bed and decided to read the last entry.

There's no way I'm going to make it out alive. I know that now. He is everywhere. There's nowhere I can go, nowhere I can hide to get away from him. He always finds me. There's no safe place I can go even if I go with you. I can hear him in my head, telling me he's coming to get me.

I know you promised me that you'll figure it out, but I cannot live like this anymore. I wake up in fear that he'll one day be on the ceiling and take me away from you. You have no idea how much it hurts, how terrible it is to think that I'm going to die and then relive this pain again in some other life.

And it's because of love

I quickly flipped to the first page of the book, my heart sinking as I realized I wrote this. In one of my past lives, I wrote about it the fear Harry caused to me and successfully took me away from Tristian.

My fingertips gently traced my signature from the first page, my chin wobbling as I thought that I was going to repeat myself all over again. That this was going to go on and on forever. I'm stuck in a never ending loop of fear and death.

And nobody was going to be able to stop it. Not even Tristian. As much as he promised, I could see he made those broken promises before. Just like me, he had no clue how to stop it.

Nobody probably could...

My trail of thoughts trailed off as I remembered Drakon and I weren't the only ones who knew about Tristian's existence. There was someone else.

I scrambled out of the bed, almost falling as the blankets tangled with my legs. I kicked them off and found Drakon and Tristian in the living floor with a bunch of stuff and books around them.

"Belle passed away!" I blurted out loudly, making Tristian and Drakon look up. Tristian's face fell and I took a deep breath.

"I heard she passed away the day Drakon went missing," I continued, "I meant to tell you but it had completely slipped my mind with everything that has happened. Her husband gave me two letters, one of which was for you. I left it at my house and I feel like there is something that could help us in that letter."

-- Author's note--

Hi, hello. So I don't like to do the whole author note thingy just because it feels odd but I feel like I need to add one to express my thankfulness.

Somehow my book got on the top of the hot list on different categories which is surprisingly amazing because I haven't updated as much as I would love to.

So if you have voted on one, several, or every chapter, thank you so, so much! If you have added my book to your reading list or commented or followed me or even just silently read my book, thank you so, so much!

I normally try to personally thank everyone but I kinda lost track lol so I thought maybe thanking everyone all at once in author's note will hopefully suffice.

I'm truly grateful for everyone who has given my book a chance and I hope to start updating more often as I think I finally have a bit more time on my hands.

Again, thank you so much and I hope you're doing well!