Chapter 12 - Malia
CHAPTER TWELVE
MALIA
Ihad nothing to defend myself with, except to scream. “Help! Alaric!” He was probably long gone, a feeling that hurt more than the wound inflicted on me. He would forever be in my heart.
I’d never forget that kiss.
But now…
Crimson coated my right shoulder and collarbone, where the stinging sensation told me the wound was more than just a cut.
Poison.
Two tall teenagers stood before me, daggers in hand.
“How did you get away?” the girl asked, her face pale, her fingers tight around the hilt of her dagger. She was so much older than the last time we met, a testament of how much time had passed.
How long I’ve been hiding.
They were children when they came to my home, and now they were teenagers. I clung to my knees, at the mercy of these children… again. Last time they’d trapped me in the furnace and this time they trapped me in the alleyway. I shook like a leaf, panic washing over me.
“I got out,” I managed to say, my hair falling all around me.
“Let’s just finish her,” said Niko. “In case she gets away again.”
Lilo hesitated though.
“Remember what she did,” he reminded her, but she shook her head.
“Niko, she was so kind to us…”
“She poisoned Sereth,” Niko said and I quickly shot back.
“She tricked me into making the apple. You have to believe me–I would never hurt you.”
Lilo still hesitated, and I could see the conflict in her eyes. Niko was set though, manipulated by Snow White. They served Sereth, and loved Sereth. She wooed them, just as she wooed everyone.
Just as she wooed Alaric too. I wasn’t ignorant to the fact that his reputation was built because he saved Sereth’s life…
Everything seemed to revolve around her, the “fairest of them all.” And now I was going to die because everyone believed her lies. Was this how I really wanted it to end? What if the world knew the truth about her?
But I can’t… Nobody had ever believed me.
They always believed her… ever since we were younger…
I swallowed hard. Now was not the time to think of this. Now I had reached the end. I squeezed my eyes shut, hoping it wouldn’t hurt to die.
Instead, I tried to hold onto the romantic exchange just moments before. The first time in my life I actually felt loved and valued. Yes, Alaric had left and walked away, but he left me with a gift I would treasure before death.
Before I closed my eyes, I noticed that Lilo’s dark eyes were tired, like she was tired of this. Niko, meanwhile, looked hungry for revenge. Revenge for what though? I’d done nothing but care for them.
Perhaps, after all this time, his heart had been hardened, rather than softened.
I felt sorry for him.
For both of them.
“I’m sorry it has to end this way,” I said, scooting back against the wall and covering my face as they both stepped forward, their shadows falling on me. “I loved you both,” I said, and that undid Lilo.
She took a step back, turned to Niko to finish the job.
“I’m sorry too,” she said, avoiding eye contact.
Niko stepped forward, dagger glinting in the moonlight. My breath hitched and I kept my eyes closed.
Then… footsteps came dashing up the street. Before any of us could react, the whaler shoved Niko to the ground.
Lilo screamed. “You!”
“Don’t touch her!” Alaric’s large frame and build were enough to scare off any predator. Niko tried to attack with his dagger, but the whaler was quicker. He knocked the dagger out of Niko’s hand and grabbed his shirt.
“I can snap your twiggy neck right now,” Alaric threatened.
“No! Let him go!” Lilo grabbed Alaric’s arm, but it did nothing. His eyes flashed towards me, and, upon seeing me cornered and wounded like a fish caught in a net, he snatched Lilo’s wrist. “Who are you both really? What did you do?”
Fear coated Lilo’s voice as she quickly said, “She’s going to die, Captain Alaric. She’s been poisoned and if you don’t help her within the hour, it’ll kill her…” Almost as if she were trying to help.
That’s when he let them go, rushing to me. “Malia.” He scooped me into his arms, as if I didn’t weigh a thing. “Malia…”
“Hurry!” Lilo grabbed Niko’s coat and scrambled away into the darkness of the streets before the whaler ran after them.
“No, don’t carry me… your wound,” I said, trying to stand, but I suddenly felt very sick. Feverish. Shaky.
“I’m carrying you.” Alaric’s voice was breathy. “They hurt you…” He cursed and looked after the twins as he said, “I should’ve never left you.”
I wrapped my arms around his neck and buried my face in his warm chest, the whalebone necklace right in front of me, as if reminding me of the reality of our situation.
“You came back,” I whispered, tears streaming down my cheeks.
He pressed his forehead against mine, as if searching for words but not knowing what to say. He was conflicted, and it put a wedge even deeper into my heart.
“There’s medicine,” I said quietly. “At my cottage.”
His lips suddenly caught mine and his few light kisses set my world on fire.
“Hang in there, witch.” A small smile formed on my face, and I allowed myself to be carried by him, worried as I was about his wound and his strength.
But it didn’t take long for us to return to the cottage, and I was amazed that he remembered the path so well.
When we got inside, he placed me on the settee and I gave him directions on where to find the salve. I could smell the poison, knowing exactly what it was, but my mind was growing delirious.
Alaric sat behind me on the settee, gently moving my hair to one side.
“Can you take this off? At least so I can clean this up?” he asked, and self consciousness flooded me.
I slipped the right sleeve off my shoulder, holding the front of my dress for modesty.
I knew I needed to change, my dress soiled from the blood and poison, but having to remove my clothing–if only partially–felt much too intimate.
I closed my eyes and tried to get rid of that thought.
Alaric was only tending to me, as I had once tended to him. An exhale escaped sharply as he ran a damp cloth over my bare shoulder.
“Does it hurt?” he asked, his voice lower than usual.
“Not really.” In fact, the entire area felt numb. Once he cleaned the wound and applied the salve, I let out a sigh of relief.
“I’ll be alright,” I said, my cheeks still hot, and not just from the fever.
It was him. His touch. His kiss. I had fallen in love, and I was angry at myself for it. I shouldn’t have… After Alaric bandaged up my wound, he didn’t move away. Instead, he cleaned the rest of the blood that had stained my back and neck.
I sat still as a statue.
Alaric…
I wanted him, there was no doubt in my mind about it.
We don’t belong together. Then why did it feel like I’d lose so much of me once he walked out the door?
I went into my bedroom and changed into clean clothes, then returned to the settee and clumsily began braiding my hair. It was getting caught on the bandage on my shoulder, and that annoyed me.
“Here, let me do it.” Alaric didn’t even hesitate to braid, and it was such a sweet thing, such a tender thing to do, I melted inside.
“You’re hiding something,” he said, and I didn’t flinch. Instead, I traced the burns on my arms.
“Everyone hides something.”
He waited, just as he always did, and it caused more forbidden feelings in my heart.
“It happened five years ago when they came to my home,” I said. “They were starving, lost, unwanted. So I fed and took care of them as my own.” My vision grew blurry again.
“They tried to kill you?”
“They did kill me.” My fingers tightened as I now looked at the flames in the fireplace. I don’t know how Alaric started it so quickly. “At least, the person I was before.”
Alaric studied me for a long time. Then he placed his arm behind me and gently scooted me closer to him, so my head rested on his chest. I could stay like this forever.
“You’re not a monster, Malia.”
“To others I am. I am that witch, Alaric. The one they say who eats children…”
“It’s the reason Sereth started the witch hunt…” Alaric eyed me. “And that’s why you’ve been hiding here in Corallure?”
“Prince Elias knows the truth about me,” I confirmed, and the whaler visibly tensed at the mention of Elias.
“It’s not like that,” I said, then drew closer to Alaric, shivering even though he and the fire were warm. I clutched his shirt and he rubbed my arm. My eyes fluttered as the poison’s effects were so intense, I wondered if I might pass out.
“Stay with me, Malia.”
Stay with me, Alaric… I begged to say it, but I couldn’t ask that of him.
“They say you put the boy in a cage and felt his finger to see if he was fattening up,” Alaric said, the distaste in his tone obvious. “And when you reached into the cage, he put out a bone for you to feel. What actually happened?”
For some reason, my heart was racing. Nobody had ever asked me what happened. Ever! Would he believe me?
“I put a makeshift gate so they couldn’t get out of their room until I was awake.
Niko would get very upset about little things.
I think it was because of their parents abandoning them.
He didn’t trust me. He didn’t trust anyone, and I didn’t blame him.
But he kept running away into the woods and, at the time, there were a lot of ruffians in the woods.
I didn’t want him to get kidnapped. Lilo helped me around the house while I sometimes put Niko behind the gate because he was getting too out of hand.
” I sighed. “I felt so bad, but I was terrified he’d end up in the hands of the ruffians. ”
“Sereth took care of those ruffians as best as she could,” Alaric said. “But I took care of them for good. Took them all and changed them into whalers.”
I closed my eyes, knowing this was true. Alaric had single-handedly cleaned up the kingdom more so than Sereth. In fact, he seemed to have cleaned up both kingdoms in the land.
It was why he was so well known. He took orphans and all the unwanted. He took the homeless and the outcasts and made them into something. People adored him, admired him, even honored him. His whaling empire had truly become even more powerful than Sereth the queen and her rule.
“I couldn’t see them–” I hesitated. “I can’t see anything, really.
So I’d ask them if they were eating enough.
They were both so skinny–they still are.
” My heart saddened for them. They were obviously still serving Sereth as witch hunters, which is what they became after they fled from me and ran to her.
But did she feed them? Care for them? They looked exhausted.
“They handed me twigs just because they wanted more food. I would’ve given them all the food in the world.... I was so sad for them.”
“Why did they try to kill you?”
I hesitated, now knowing he wasn’t aware of the apple, the poison, and her… I swallowed hard.
“They thought I was a bad witch, so…” I swallowed hard.
“They threw me in the furnace. I managed to open the door and get out. I was burned. My house burned to the ground, but… I survived. Their father tracked me down. He was ashamed for abandoning them in the woods. He thanked me for taking care of them, and then I escaped. I hid until Prince Elias left Sereth and that’s when I spoke to him.
He granted me full citizenship in this kingdom. ”
Alaric’s fingers rubbed my shoulder and I wished we could stay like this forever. I clutched his shirt even more tightly and drew closer to him, smelling his sandalwood and fresh sea scent.
“You’re the best kind of witch,” he said, almost playfully, and I was glad he believed me. A moment of silence passed before he asked, “Have your eyes always been like that?”
“Ever since I was younger.” More tears welled up in my eyes.
“It seems hardest for you to see at night, is that right?” he asked.
I nodded. “Any kind of dark spaces… I can’t see anything.
” And that was when the memory resurfaced.
“My sister locked me in a root cellar once,” I said.
I had never shared it with anyone, but somehow I just wanted someone to understand.
To know what it felt like to not be able to see, and to have compassion on the little girl who was so terrified.
Who is still terrified. I shivered.
“Your sister?”
“My stepsister,” I corrected. “I was always shy, slow to speak, and had difficulty reading or catching visual cues because of… this.” I motioned to my eyes. “I was always small. Invisible, even in my own home.”
“Even to your mother?”
“Especially to my mother. I think the reason she remarried is because the man had a beautiful daughter. She was perfect.” A lump formed in my throat.
“Meanwhile, my eyes began to fail me more severely. I struggled to keep up with my studies. I failed in dance lessons. I often fumbled or dropped things. And one day, when we were playing hide-and-seek, my sister locked me in the root cellar.” I shuddered.
“I was terrified, disoriented. I couldn’t see anything.
I hurt myself trying to escape and no one believed me when I said my sister did it on purpose. ”
Alaric’s arm slipped away and he rested his elbows on his knees so he could face me, his gaze intent. Serious. Maybe even… angry?
“That’s when I learned…” I shook my head, knowing it sounded silly when said out loud. “Hiding is safer, and when one tries to speak up, it does no good. People will never believe me.”
“I believe you.” Alaric took my hands in his and kissed my knuckles. I wished he would kiss me again, but I knew he was holding himself back. He already said goodbye once, and he was only here because I was injured.
He sat back again and placed his arm around me. We were both quiet for a long time, but his words played over and over in my mind. I believe you. When did anyone ever believe me?
He gently spoke after a while. “Want to hear some tales of the sea?”
I nodded, eager to know more about him.
After sharing my own past, I felt vulnerable.
And that’s when I rested my face on his chest, distracted by his husky voice, his warmth, his genuineness.
His stories took me away from my own pain–the present and the past. He told stories of the sea, his childhood, his regrets.
The moment was so cozy, like warm tea steeped with wild lemongrass and honey.
I fell asleep listening to him, wishing we could do this every night.