Chapter 6: Chapter 6

Langrion blinked twice, but the vision of the angel did not fade away. She was still there, holding his left hand while she was fast asleep.

Did he sleep with this woman? How did he end up here? Honestly, he could not remember a thing. He had never been with any other woman before, so how can he not remember if something like this did happen?

The woman stirred a bit and she opened her eyes. Langrion looked back at the set of big brown eyes that he remembered so well from his dreams. They seem to be too lazy to open up, and she eventually fell back into sleep. In a few second however, reality must had sunk in to her, and the woman gasped as she let go of his hand and jumped to the far side of the cave.

Langrion immediately sat up, and as he did, the blanket fell down and revealed his ripped chest. The woman – no, it was more like a girl – despite her tanned skin, blushed into a deep crimson color. Langrion felt his ears getting hotter too.

Before he could speak however, the girl moved closer, and after stealthily drawing a dagger from her boots, she held it against Langrion’s bare neck.

“What were you trying to do?!” she hissed. Her personality at the moment was too far away from the sweet angel of his dreams, but her beauty was so much more dazzling up close.

‘I should be asking you the same question.’ Langrion thought, but he said something far different. “Where are my clothes?” he replied in the icy tone that he had been so accustomed in using when he was trying to intimidate an enemy.

She pointed to the now empty fireplace, and he saw his clothing articles hanging dry. “I saved your life,” the girl replied. “Now we are even.”

The girl smelled faintly of fresh grass and lavender. It smelled so familiar to him, yet he could not quite piece who this girl was or how he ended up with her on this cave. Perhaps if he continued smelling her, he would eventually remember. If she had not been holding a dagger against him, he would have gladly taken in a whiff of her scent to test his theory.

Perhaps sensing the thoughts that were crossing his mind at that moment, the girl drew in closer, and pressed the dagger more firmly to his neck. “You seem better now,” she whispered. “Now, you have to tell me what happened...”

Langrion openly blushed at her words, and his heart began to beat wildly against his chest. ‘So something did happen!’ he thought exasperatedly on himself. But how come he should tell her about it? It was a far too embarrassing of a thing to talk about. Besides, he did not remember any of it all!

Suddenly, Langrion felt an extreme heat quickly rising from his left eye. He cupped his eye and shouted, “Where’s my mask?!”

The girl however was unfazed. She moved in closer to look at his eyes, but Langrion hid his face. “I need my mask!” he demanded with a faint hint of panic in his voice.

The girl cupped his face and raised it towards her with surprisingly gentle hands that were so in contrast to the blaze that was burning in her eyes.

“There’s no need,” she muttered, “I am not affected by your curse...”

His hand fell in shock of what she just said. He then looked up, and thought of how, in any minute now, she would turn into a pillar of dust. But ten more second turned to thirty then into a full minute, and nothing happened except that the heat he felt from his eyes seem to slowly fizzle out the moment she touched his face.

“What on earth -!” Langrion yelled as he realized that she seemed to have some form of control over his curse. The girl though held his face tightly and looked at him square in the eyes.

“That’s right. You cannot use your powers against me. Now, I demand some answers,” she hissed as rage seemed to consume her big brown eyes.

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The confused look in the man’s face was somewhat funny. He looked so innocent and so bewildered that Shia would have immediately laughed it off if it were just a normal circumstance... Except that murdering her family was no laughing matter, and Shia would not hesitate to slice his throat should he refuse to give her the answers she needed.

Suddenly, Shia saw that the man’s face turned into a deep red color, and his heart beat seemed to escalate. Or perhaps it was Shia’s own heart beat? He opened his mouth and stammered a few words.

“M-My lady... I am sorry, b-but w-whatever happened between the two of us yesterday, I’m afraid I do not know... C-can we talk over it with our dresses on?..”

At that point, Shia realized how unclear and misleading her words must have sounded to him. She became all too conscious of the fact that she was staying too close to a man who does not have even his undergarments on, and she too began to blush despite of her building anger. She immediately let go of his face and returned her dagger to its sheath.

She cleared her throat and tried to hide her embarrassment before speaking, but she still faltered. “Your wounds are still fresh, so be careful when you put your clothes on... I-I will wait for you outside.”

Trying too hard not to meet his gaze, Shia exited from the cave to give him his much needed privacy.

As soon as Shia was out of his immediate sight, she covered her face with both palms. How can he misinterpret her words like that? She suddenly remembered how she had undressed him the night before, and how his body looked against the flickering lights of the bonfire. Despite her care, she cannot deny that she did see some things here and there that she was not supposed to see, and she touched him in places that she was not supposed to touch. ‘But it was only to help lower his fever and to treat his wounds,’ Shia said in spite of her conscience. However, she must admit that his muscles were so perfectly chiselled, they felt like a work of art. ‘Do all men’s bodies look like that,’ she thought more sheepishly. Perhaps when she turns eighteen and become wedded someday, she would have a definite answer.

Wedded...The words brought tears into her eyes once more... Ever since she was a young girl, Shia had dreamt of the day that her father would walk her down the aisle towards her lover. She could just picture in her mind how her family would have been so thrilled and happy for her! Her sisters and brother would have enjoyed putting nice dresses on and eating a decent meal for once. Her mother would have wept in joy and pride seeing her turn into a lovely woman...

But all of that would never happen now... Shia had lost them all forever to the winds.

‘That’s right... Shia Hyanessa Aifendel, you must never forget! You survived only because of two reasons – to avenge your family’s murder and to free cursed ones like you. If you must die, you have to die doing either of these things!’ she shouted within herself.

Shia heard a faint foot fall approaching her. Thinking it was the man emerging from the cave, she touched her dagger and turned around to throw it to his direction, but before she did, a heavy set of chains descended upon her, trapping her to the ground with its sheer weight. She screamed. Seven or eight bandits who chased them from yesterday emerged from the trees overlooking the river bank. One of them picked her up from within the metal net and tightened his arms around her neck.

“Hello again, little prick!” he grinned with his toothless smile. “Did you miss us?”

Shia has forgotten that a guiding stone can track down anyone who uses power. She had been too careless with the plants the night before.

“Where’s your friend?” the one holding the guiding staff asked her. Shia recognized him as his former guard, the one who used to beat her whenever she woke up from her nightmares.

“He’s dead!” she hissed. There was no use in telling him where he was or probably had been. If the man had enough wits, he should have fled long ago when he heard her screams.

“What?! You lost the A-grade? Then, you should pay for it!” the guard screamed as he lifted the guiding staff over her head in an attempt to knock her out.

“Let her go!” a voice boomed from behind them. “Let the girl go!” The man walked nearer to them while cupping his left eye in an awkward way.

“Well, well, you came back from the dead, you vile creature!” one of the bandits said.

Shia was disappointed to see the man come back to rescue her, but at the same time, she heaved a sigh of relief. She would have totally understood if he had ran away and saved himself, but seeing that he was here, it meant that she would still get a chance to question him about her family’s death and that he just saved her the benefit of tracking him down again later.

“Let her go! You don’t need her. You need an A-grade, right?” he said, teasing them. He was walking slowly but resolutely towards them, and Shia could see the bandits tensing up. The man holding Shia tightened his grip around her neck.

“You are one brave cursed one! What makes you think that we will listen to you?” the leader said.

“Because you will never make it out of here alive,” the man said in his icy tone that would have cut through stone. “Your guiding stone has no power over me. If I removed my hand here, all of you would die,” he said in the calm but threatening manner.

“Liar!” the leader shouted, and he leapt in the air to knock his head off with a staff.

This was all the distraction that Shia needed. With all her might, Shia bit the arm of his captor. The bandit yelped in pain, and eased his grip on her neck. She then twisted his arms backwards and threw the dagger she had kept towards the leader who was about to knock out the man from the cave with his staff.

Just like she knew it would, the dagger landed straight to his back and knocked the leader down instantly.

“Run!” Shia shouted as she leapt, retrieving her dagger in the process and fending off attacks from left and right. Shia extended her arms towards the man and held tightly to his hand as they tried to run away from the mostly fallen bandits.

The two of them headed straight into the woods away from their pursuers, all the while unaware that somebody – and something else - were following them.