5️

Thirst.

It was a torment to understand how badly I wanted to douse myself in water when I had almost drowned the last time I was awake.

I was thirsty.

My throat is parched, as if I had accidentally swallowed on a fistful of sand. But it's where the relativity ends, I can't seem to put my fingers on where I was and what I was deemed to do?

Other than feel the thirst.

So I stared at the canopy of our familiar tent, my head pounds with each lapse of time and event that I kept picking up. The rememberings hurt the same. Then I sat up, my limbs cry with the inches of movements it endured. I wheezed with silent inhales when Dorin came, he was beside me as soon as he entered the tent.

Next to him was Castle, their injuries sustained were sickly visibly. A gash of claws on the limbs and neck of Dorin. Bruised temple on Castles porcelain face. In my state of dizziness, I look down at my own hands, aided with bandages my wrist and forearms looked like a work of sloppy medic who had put me together in hurry.

Patting at my shirt I sniff my pain in, drinking in the water that Dorin provides me with relief. Then the room grows quiet. It swarms like a disturbing flock of bees. They don't say or do more than stare at me. Dorin with worry clouded gaze and Castle with unreadable one.

Then in slow realization, I look to my right, at a steelware that reclined. The one Castle employs to style her hair. But now, the round spear reflected me. It was me, my entirety. It had been so long since I let my feature stray free in completion that it took me a minute to savor in the girl that stare back.

Dark midnight hair reached inches past my shoulder, they were thick and glowed with the flickers from the fire. It made the green of my eyes gleam in accordance with the shine of a birth emerald. My skin hadn't been healthier and lips never so pink. They were all most red.

The history doesn't lie.

Women of Helios were born beauty.

Still would be if given a choice than be called a curse.

"What happened?" I ask compelling my gaze away from admiring the kind of face that won't get me anywhere.

Dorin scrutinizes me as if testing the fumes before dipping himself in.

"We were defending ourselves when you left, we were losing, the wolves had us cornered. But-

A wrinkle pinches his forehead.

-but then there was this whistle, a wolves call. Probably the one from their leader as we have read. When it reached them, they stopped. They ceased ambushing us and before we knew what was happening they were gone"

He runs a hand through his face, I tensed when words of darkness in the sea whispered into me in my thoughts. Or the mystery of how I was alive even after floating beneath the surface for so long. Or how we were all spared.

I don't tell them that. I cannot when I don't know what it meant. What it was and why were we spared without a fight.

The question looms. But I push them aside and listen to what Dorin narrates.

"We found you by the river, you were unconscious by a bank of debris" Castle continues, this wise I had to follow her. Be it only the gestures of her hands to understand what she has to say.

"Someone had to change you, you were running out of blood and heat by the time we could detect you" then he smiles in guilt and shyness "You didn't precisely look like Timo when we found you, it's odd how you look similar yet not at the same time"

It subtly dawns on me, it is also the first for Dorin to see me this way. Not just Castle. "I had to tell her" he scratches his head as if looking at me longer brought him discomfort.

Dropping my head in a grateful bow at Castle I smile "Thanks for your hospitality"

She holds on tight with pride, her brow rises as if anticipating something. I sigh.

"Fine. I am sorry for not telling you earlier. But its you at fault too- you seldom made effort to be seen as trustworthy"

She squints at me in a prospect of disbelief. Then she goes out only to bring in Atticus, the eleven month old boy looked smaller than his age in Castles arms than when he is alone on the ground. She gently lays the boy by my chest and runs a hand over his short curly hair.

I go stunned for a second, then I melt into an embrace of the child as he hugs me. As if he was happy to see me well and functioning. And as for Castle-

This was her answer.

She trusted us with themselves. Her and her brother.

And there should have been no room for doubt after that.

It shouldn't be this easy to develop a bond with people, for years I knew the ones I leave Ivyaki will always be at the risk of getting hurt or killed by the stampede of fate. Yet here I sat crumbling under the charm of emotional dependence.

"Have the differences been mended, don't you think or feel that you haven't noticed something else on the row Timo Kasper?" with mockery Dorin throws a hideous smile and steps out through the open slit. Clutching my ailing side I blindly wave my arm for Castle, she whirls her cold eyes at me and walks out with waddling Atticus on tow.

It has it that forgiveness doesn't come easy. I hadn't just fooled her with my disguise, but may I be of mercy if her feelings towards her errand boy Timo were morally real. I might have gained a bratty enemy for a long way. Smug even.

Grunting I carry out, the moment my arm tears through the material, a gasp settles at the dept of my chest. It was bright, the sun, the sky, the whispering winds, and the humidity in the air. It was a smashing change to what I have been accustomed to. I mince a piece of my beige shirt to make sense of it. It was one single layer. And it was enough.

Resisting the need to double over in pain, I ran to where Castle and Dorin stood, by the edge of a cliff staring into a space that I can't see. But soon I did.

And did I see the heaven I reckoned in, land of Forrest, acres, and acres down there, lay below the mountain? The canopy of blues met the greens of trees into a plush blend. Verdant. The shade of my eyes. Though my eyes saw the magnificent display of nature and its act for the first time. It still made efforts to deny its beauty.

Because when you find something that you have been craving for longer than your memories, it scares you with the impossibility of it.

"How?"

I ask backing up with tears stinging at the back of my vision.

"We didn't stop, you have been unconscious for three days. We carried you in a made-up cot. Didn't peg you to be that hefty" he receives a hit of snowball when he turns instead of heroic musings. It's when he laughs, with me. With the same toast of tears and nuisance as we kept throwing snow at each other. Though Castle doesn't join us - here gleeful smile sat too big on her face.

Ice and snow were bane in our lives, and for the initial wise we held it with a sense of farce and joke. Only had we known that ice had been merciful to us when it wasn't the crown of a man's heart.

And I was walking right into his kingdom.

***

It descends.

The atmosphere I was born and brought up into changes with each hour, from flakes to damp earth, from uncultivable soil to sprouting grass, from patch to pave, it covered the land with its lush green hues. The whistles of birds greets us, the flow of rivers teases our ears and lips curves into passion with every new fruit we tried or the sweet stream of water we devoured.

We were a bunch of kids running laughing and sighing at the sights, it was the birth of our eyes who saw such beauty years after attempting to imagine it.

For the rest of the week I healed in a lazy process, I was keenly made aware of Castles annoyance when I decided to wear my disguise on. We had a story for when we reach the nearest village of Ledras , and a girl with the bruised body wasn't a segment that adds up. Moreover, a hardworking lad without an education might just snag a job that a girl cannot. Though it's not sexist, with the lack of skills in our bag there wasn't much to toss in other than a male physique dominance card on the table. Though I bet the men out there working as a farmer and wheelers might twist my bones like a snap of a twig.

With the furs and coats packed and discarded, I had to use a thick roll of cloth to conceal my bust. I frowned at my reflection in disappointment at how effortless and quick it was for them to disappear beneath.

With a sleeveless leather vest on top of a full-sleeved white shirt, I looked more of a bard or a rhapsodist than a boy in search of a job. Or the one bracing himself through a mile-long stroll across the forest. Gliding my thumb over a line of sweat above my brow I used the stream of water to wash my face and arms. The one I also took an hour-long bath in.

It's what I do, swim when others are asleep. Look at the stars and moon that seem different from down here. Much farther and pleasant when embraced with the scent of wet leaves and fluttering grass. I play with my hair, combing it with my fingers and letting the breeze weave through it.

Then I get smacked by my wig.

"You do this the instant I start to believe you matured" I comment stretching the cap, glancing at castle who stood with her ankle deep in stream, anticipating a reaction from me after having thrown my guise. She fares to remind me what part of me she dislikes.

I wear the hairpiece with mock smile.

"Strange it is, I desired you when you were a boy. I envy you when you are a girl" she arcs her brow, tipping herself further. She has the luxury of owing cleansing oils that she flaunts while we make do with the jagged scrub we have. With cold, a story left behind miles she has her feminity embraced unlike me who was willing to dig my nails into the dirt.

She wears her treasured attires, thick leather pants, and suit dresses that were apt for travel. Not surprising since Castle was frequent with the only seamstress in Ivyaki.

"And how is your overwhelming emotions my problem?" Pointing out I look at Dorin who shrugs, slightly blushing away at the sight of an underdressed Castle. She was only in her slip dress - if one thing we learned about her so far was her commitment to not give a dime about what others thought of her.

She was as transparent with her emotions as the water she rinsed with. And she looked pretty proud of it.

"I never had a competition before" in her dramatics she flicks droplets of water at me. I snort at her honesty. Then I look at Dorin, watching him play with Atticus. His ears perked at our conversation though gaze stolen.

His attention at us was the reason he got hit first, startled at the stills of how Dorin fell to the side my arm reaches for the knife tucked in my boots. I duck before a man crawls out of the bush and inspects the surrounding. Castle was already beside me, her eyes picking up the movements as we press our bodies by the rock.

A bearded man, lanky in muscle and age in skin crouched next to an unconscious Dorin. He was still breathing, the rise and fall of his chest was an indication. Peeking cautiously I bring my arm back aiming for the man. The knife light in between my fingers.

But before I could dart it in the direction a hand grips my wrist and twists it behind my back, I let out a furious wince, I only get to see a girl with ash grey hair and a boy with copper rimmed lenses staring down at me. I tilt to check on Castle, but all I saw were shadows of guilt and her free hands.

Then I heard a shot go off,

And a burn spreads in my shoulder.

Working on next chapter. Will be out soon/:)