Chapter Seven – Taran
Chapter Seven
Taran
I was at the window when the intruder showed up, watching Thea sleep. I’d watched her make her little fire, heat up her soup, eat, then pass out after a long day of braving the woods. She was cute when she slept. Relaxed. She looked a few years younger, almost like a child. My insides stirred again with the overwhelming need to protect her.
The intruder was a tall female, dressed in black, and she was carrying a knife. My first instinct was to stop her before she got into the cabin, but then I remembered why I’d taken this job. I never took human clients. The reason I agreed to act as a bodyguard for Thea was because she was the daughter of Bill Everhart. And that man… That man had taken so much from me. He was the reason my soul broke five years ago, the reason I took a job with Monster Security Agency, just so I’d forget how fucked up my life was, how I would never be the same.
There was a storm of contradictory feelings inside me. On the one hand, I wanted to protect Thea. I felt connected to her in a way that I didn’t understand. I was attracted to her, even though I shouldn’t have been. Leshy and humans didn’t get along. Ever. My species had stayed away from the selfish, entitled, pompous humans for as long as I could remember. They treated nature like it was nothing to them, just a means to an end. And the leshy couldn’t stand that.
On the other hand, this was my chance to take revenge on Bill Everhart. He’d taken something from me, and I was going to let this strange female with a dagger take his daughter from him. She was human, too. It was easy to tell by her scent and the way she looked and moved. What a dreadful species! They killed their own all the time. Seeing how awful they were, did they even deserve to live?
The woman broke down the door and barged in, pointing the knife at Thea, who was wide awake and shaking with fear. She told Thea something about how she wasn’t worthy of her Master, and I wondered who this Master was. The woman wasn’t making much sense. She seemed to be an assassin, sent by others to get rid of Thea, but so far, she was only resorting to threats. Then she attacked Thea, and Thea was forced to break the window and crawl out of the cabin.
My protective instincts kicked in. This was my principal. I’d been tasked with guarding her, and I’d failed. I should’ve been ashamed of myself. Now she was bleeding, running in only her socks, terrified and thinking she was going to die. She was in this situation because I’d hesitated. Because I’d let my dark thoughts take over. As much as I hated Thea’s father, I couldn’t punish him this way. I would be punishing her first, and what did I know about her? Maybe she was nothing like him. Maybe she was good and noble.
I went after her, slowly and deliberately. I made myself grow as I approached her from behind, then I threw myself over her, my roots tripping her in the process. I hoped she wasn’t too hurt. She fell with an “oomph!”, and I slipped my vines and branches underneath her in such a way that when she fell, she fell on soft, rustling leaves.
I was, basically, embracing her. Thea was in my branches. Had I been human, I could’ve said she was in my arms.
She turned on her back, rubbing her face with her hands, pushing her hair out of her eyes. She wasn’t wearing her gloves.
“No… No-no-no-no,” she whispered.
She dug her fingers into the top of her turtleneck and pulled at the stretchy fabric. She was acting as if she couldn’t breathe, or like she had something on her, crawling on her skin, and she was trying to get rid of it.
There was nothing. She was perfectly fine, aside from some tears in her clothes and a little blood here and there, where the glass from the broken window had cut her. Before I could stop myself, my branches reached towards her, and I brushed the side of her face gently. Her reaction was to squeeze her eyes shut and repeat again,
“No-no-no-no… Please, please, please… Don’t touch me… Don’t…”
I retreated instantly. I kept holding her in my embrace, but I moved my branches away from her face and expanded my body, so she’d have more space in the little cave I’d made for her. She was breathing heavily, almost hyperventilating, and I didn’t know what to do to make it better. I cursed myself mentally for not stepping in and stopping the intruder at the door. This was all because of me and my own selfish reasons. Yes, I’d lost a lot because of Thea’s father, but that wasn’t Thea’s fault, and she shouldn’t have had to suffer because of it.
I was such an idiot.
There were footsteps approaching. The assassin was back. I wasn’t going to let her get to Thea this time. But she stopped a few feet away from where I was holding Thea in my protective embrace, and at first, I thought she didn’t know where her victim was. But then she spoke.
“That’s right, little worm. You should be hiding from me. Smart move. This time, I went easy on you. Next time, my knife and your throat will have a proper introduction. Take our encounter tonight as a warning. A friendly one, at that. Turn back, and you’ll never see me again.”
Thea was staring in the darkness, eyes wide. She was staring right at me, in fact, but she didn’t know that. I found that I could lose myself in her green eyes. They were as green as the fresh grass that sprouted in spring, after a nurturing winter.
She didn’t say a word. She lay completely still and silent, until we both heard the woman walk away. Thea didn’t move for a long time. Maybe half an hour. Then she started stirring slowly, and I realized she wanted out. She was studying my branches, looking around for an opening, but she didn’t dare touch me. She didn’t dare reach out her hands and try to push my vines away.
I had to move gently, so she wouldn’t figure out I was not just a random tree, and I was alive. An inch here, a few more there, until Thea could see the starlit sky above. She sat up and inhaled the fresh night air.
“Okay,” she whispered. She flexed her fingers a few times, then placed her hands on two of my branches and pushed. “I can do this. It’s not so bad… Not too bad… Clean. This is a clean tree. No insects in it.”
Well, that was offensive! Of course I was a clean tree. I wasn’t a tree at all, I was a leshy. And I didn’t have insects crawling all over me, because the insects and critters of the forest knew what I was and knew to stay away.
I let Thea out. Now that she’d offended me, I didn’t think as highly of her as before. And even if I didn’t have insects and other trees had them, what was wrong with insects? Most of them were perfectly harmless and a blessing to the environment. I was starting to think I was once again wrong about Thea, and even if she wasn’t evil like her father, she was at least as entitled as he was.
What was wrong with a little dirt and a few ants?
She checked her surroundings, making sure the assassin wasn’t waiting in the dark, then made her way back to the cabin. I followed her and watched her through the broken window as she gathered her things and stuffed them in her backpack. She put on her boots and walked outside, using the flashlight to inspect the trees.
I wondered what she was going to do next. Had the threat worked? Was Thea going to turn back and forget all about this weird quest? I had a feeling this could be a good excuse for her. It was obvious she didn’t want to do it, anyway.
If her journey ended here, then my job would end, too. It would be for the best.