Chapter Five: Arrangements

Yes, there is a difference between ‘were’ and ‘where’. Indeed, I’m not always using it the correct way. Yes, I have to look it up sometimes.

So here it goes:

-Were is a form of ‘be’. It’s a verb.

-Where is about a place.

So, that’s settled then. Here comes the real deal:

“Everyone, this is our new student. Please, make him feel comfortable.”

Alea almost snorted. Yeah right. The ‘new’ kid didn’t fit in already and mister Sellion made it only worse by saying something like that.

She was not surprised that the strange boy took a seat quite close to her. But she had to wait all day before she could get a hold of him. Of course this was around the time she normally left but alright, this one time she was willing to stay.

“What the hell are you doing here?”

Mayth’s beautiful blue eyes locked into hers while he smiled. “I thought I needed some education. Funny to run into each other again like this, right?”

They walked through the hallways till they were outside again, breathing the chilled air.

“They don’t really know what you do, am I correct?”

“And what would that be?” Alea said it bluntly, harsh. This strange boy was getting on her nerves.

“Well, from the looks of it you are a dragonhunter in your spare time.”

“Don’t say that aloud. They’ll make fun of you and you’ll get a hard time trying to blend in already without them thinking you’re insane. Come on.”

Alea waved her hand, making the gesture that he could come along. When he didn’t move she turned around. “What, is there someplace you should be?”

“No, not really actually,” his tone was hesitating like Mayth didn’t want to say that aloud.

After walking some time in silent Alea looked at him and smiled. “No need to worry, there’s nothing to be ashamed about. There are no parents for me either.”

The rest of the day they spend at Alea’s home. Getting to know each other and Alea introduced him to Elden the cat, and they could get along quite well.

The made some dinner together and when the night was slowly washing the sunlight away Alea said that he could stay if he wanted to.

Since Mayth had no parents and no place to go to he gladly accepted her offer. While Alea made him a bed, he collected some more firewood so they wouldn’t get cold this night.

When they were lying and both were still awake Alea whispered: “Why do you want to find a dragon?”

It stayed quiet and for a moment Alea thought Mayth was already asleep when the answer came.

“I don’t know. I just know I have to find them, or one of them.”

Puzzled by this, Alea did not answer but turned on her other side and thought about this till she fell asleep.

A fortnight later

It was a week or so later. Maybe three? Garyl had no idea. She had lost track of time since that moment she’d fled from her home.

Home.

That word seemed strange already. Time meant nothing, yet she was still capable of feeling. Alas, she felt a lot of things. Thirst, hunger, loneliness, anger, pain…

Garyl had no idea what exactly happened to her and how it could come from something in her coffee, but one thing was for sure: she wasn’t human anymore. Strange. She wanted to be something more than human for quite some time and now she was and al Garyl wished for was to go back to normal.

She laughed softly, more a chuckle really. She was far from normal. Whatever ran through her veins, it didn’t make her werewolf nor vampire. She was some strange mixture between those two. The werewolf bite must have been a sort of antidote.

She took another step forward. This was the first time she came near a town and she had no idea what was going to happen. Garyl also didn’t know she was carefully being watched.

Garyl licked her lips and tried to blend in. It was dark, so she didn’t meet a lot people but there were always some dudes out on the streets.

So was her follower.

The Man who had threatened Mech was just a couple of steps behind her, though always hidden in the shadows. He had watched her closely the last couple of days. It was interesting really. She wasn’t like him -more or less immortal- but nothing close to human either. He could use her, right?

Garyl seemed like a girl that liked to play foul games and that was just the thing he was best at.

He smiled grimly. “Keep on struggling, till the nets are too entwined to get out.” His voice deep, dark, but clearly manly.

Just at that moment when the Man whispered, Garyl stood still and turned. She saw a figure in the shadows and for just a couple of seconds they looked at each other.

Garyl’s eyes flaming bright, golden-yellow, wolflike.

The Man’s not visible, but she could feel it.

He would come for her, soon.

Het ontwaken begint

Was het toeval dat ze hem ontmoette? Slechts toeval om haar erop te wijzen dat haar leven helemaal niet zo perfect was als Madelyn altijd had gedacht? Dat kon toch niet?! Maar wat het dan wel was, dat wist ze ook niet.

De eerste keer dat Madelyn de jongen op de zwarte motor zag, was vier dagen terug; donderdag. En nu was het maandag en had ze al precies vier dagen constant aan hem gedacht. Wie was hij? Hoe oud was hij? Wat deed hij hier, in Taletown? Madelyn was er zeker van dat ze hem nog nooit eerder had gezien.
Maar behalve die vragen vroeg ze zich vooral af hoe het kwam dat hij niet uit haar hoofd was te krijgen. Voor Madelyn Evermore was alles altijd perfect geweest en nu leek het alsof dat alles er niet meer toe deed.
Het enige wat nog belangrijk was, was om te zorgen dat hij haar ook zou zien!

Na een lange, voortslepende dag waren de lessen eindelijk voorbij en was het voor Madelyn om afscheid te nemen van haar vriendinnen. Ze had er nogal wat, maar het laatste uur had ze alleen met Nora en Lucy.
Zij waren juist uit het zicht verdwenen met een "Doei" en een "Tot morgen, Maddy!" toen Madelyn de hoek om ging en omver werd gelopen. Ze belandde op de grond, haar boeken en papieren dwarrelden door de lucht om vervolgens eveneens in een wanordelijke staat op de tegels neer te vleien.
Haar  wenkbrauwen vormden een frons en een boze schittering lag in haar donkerblauwe ogen toen ze opkeek. "Kun je niet uitkijken of zo?" snauwde ze, terwijl ze overeind krabbelde. Maddy veegde haar lichtbruine haar uit haar gezicht en keek recht in het gezicht van de jongen waar ze heel de tijd aan had zitten denken.
Hij lachte scheef naar haar en bukte om haar boeken op te rapen. "Zeker kan ik wel uitkijken," zei hij, "maar ik kan niet om hoeken kijken."
Stomverbaasd om hem zomaar te ontmoeten wist Maddy niet wat ze moest zeggen. Zwijgend nam ze de boeken en papieren aan die hij haar gaf. De jongen keek even op het laatste papier: een proefwerk was teruggegeven was.
"Madelyn Evermore, huh?"
Ze knikte.
"Hi, ik ben Ian."
"Eh.. ik zou zeggen, leuk je te ontmoeten, maar dat had vast beter gekund." Ha, daar was ze weer met haar scherpe opmerkingen. En zowaar, hij -Ian dus- moest er om lachen! Ze grijnsde.
"Misschien kan ik het goed maken?"
"Oja?" flirtte Maddy terug.
"Ik kan je een ritje naar huis aanbieden, als je wilt?"
"Daar zeg ik geen nee tegen," zei ze en accepteerde al glimlachend zijn voorstel.

Ver weg, maar dichterbij dan je denkt, glimlachte iemand tevreden en wendde zich van de spiegel af.
"Het ontwaken is begonnen," baste zijn stem. De man bleef staan toen hij een ander naderde, welke niet zo blij keek.
"Dat valt te bezien."
"Nee," zei de eerste weer. "Het is begonnen. Ik heb de juiste prins gestuurd."
De tweede snoof vol verachting. "Wat kan één prins nou helemaal uithalen?"
"Meer dan je denkt," antwoordde hij en draaide zich om naar de spiegel. "Meer dan je denkt."

Too Late

She was about to pick the cups and put them with the rest of the dishes, but never got to do that. As Garyl leant towards the crucial thing that was the centre of changes in her life, the lights went out.

Although she couldn’t move or talk, she was aware. Aware of the pain crossing through her veins, aware of the sounds by the door. Aware of Adras, cursing, getting away, coming back in clothes, screaming..

And when his hot tears fall on her skin, it felt like they would burn a hole. Garyl fluttered her eyelashes, then slowly tried to get up. She got a hand from Adras, though his touch felt not as good as before.

“Aaah,” she moaned. “What happened?”

Adras sat on the table, watching her like an insect in a box, and Garyl gave him an angry look.

“What?!”

“How do you feel?”

“In pain, and your presence doesn’t make it better.”

Surprisingly, he just nodded, as if expecting so.

“Garyl, you’ve just been poisoned.”

His words were so calm and so precise, that it took her a while to totally understand it.

“P-poisoned? How? What? Am I dying?”

“Not really… but, in a way, yes…”

Minutes passed and then Garyl felt what Adras had been trying to say. The pain slowly faded away, and all that remained was… a new Garyl.

Thirst made her fingers scratch the couch, overwhelmed instincts made her hiss at Adras. Then she backed away, jumped from the couch towards the door. Into the city she went.

Her eyes saw everything, her ears caught every noise, all the scents there was to smell, gathered in one big cloud of scents.

It was too much, way too much.

She ran. Ran until the city was a vague memory, until the only thing she heard was the wind and the only thing left to smell was tree and animals, and Garyl ran until her legs begged her to stop.

She understood it now.

If there were werewolves, then there also was the opposite.

Getting Later and Later

Although everything screamed to chase Mech down, Adras ignored his instincts and jumped down on the street. If he changed now, Adras would be a butt-naked man, and although there was no one around, he didn’t feel much for it.

So he struggled with the door in his wolfform, closed it when he finally made it in and then changed back. He didn’t hear the soft cursing sounds he’d been expecting to hear, so something was defiantly wrong.

Without worrying about his appearance anymore, he busted in, only to find nothing.

Adras took a closer look, and then he saw her.

Garyl laid half on the couch, half on the floor. Her dark hair in a fan-like form around her head, with a couple of strands on her cheek.

Although she looked peaceful, it was also unnatural static.

Cursing under his breath he laid her on the floor, trying to remember the first-aid lessons.

Appeased that she was still breathing, there was nothing more to do for waiting till she opened her eyes.

Adras went upstairs, knowing she had some of his clothes in case he would drop by. Dressed in jeans and sweater, he did another check on Garyl.

His eye caught the coffee cups on the table and with a bad feeling he picked up Garyls. With his nose almost in the cup, Adras sniffed.

With a scream so loud it would be noticed two blocks away he trashed the thing to the wall.

“NOOOOOOO!”

His chest went up and down quickly, as he knelt by Garyl yet again. Please, don’t let this be true!  

Still Sundayeve

Although surprised to see Mech, Garyl let him in anyway. Not much later they sat on her couch, sipping mocha coffee, and for a moment no one said anything. Garyl’s thoughts became a whirl in her head. She had to think about Adras, and the whole wolf-thing, yet here she was, drinking coffee with a friend she hadn’t spoken to in a while.

“So… how’s school?”

 Mech lifted a shoulder and dropped it again. “Same as usual, I guess. Not much going on lately and it’s quite boring without having you around.”

“Me? What –why?”

“Well… you always say something to a teacher what can make him explode, or start a debate that in fact ís interesting. Just the way you are… You really are a special girl, Garyl.”

She blushed, thought she felt little for Mech beside friendship. “Why- thank you,” she softly said.

And again silence crept over them, holding them in its grip for as long as it takes.

“Mech,” Garyl began, hesitantly.

“Hm?”

“Can I... I was thinking-..” she sighed. “Can I ask you something? As in... You won’t tell anyone, yet you’ll answer it truly?”

“Of course. What’s on your mind?” With a serious look on his face, Mech bended over.

Garyl played with the ruffles of her shirt a while, before she dared to ask.

“What… what do you think of Adras? Do you think that he really is my brother?”

He released a sigh as he leaned back on the couch. “So that is bothering you? Really? Why?”

“You know that homework piece we had to do about our family? I don’t know… It made me thinking. And of course Adras is nowhere near... So I just made something up. But I can’t get it out of my mind.” Her dark eyes glared at him. He didn’t know that she was telling him some lies, for she had told him many lies before this one. What else could she say? Hello, oh by the way, my brother is a werewolf? Ehr- no will do.

“I don’t know, Garyl. I mean, he didn’t really liked me so we never talked much. He seemed always so protective around you; it gave me the creeps, honestly. He somehow didn’t fit the picture quite well. So, if you’re saying he’s not your brother, yeah, I can believe it... There’s really something weird-isch with that dude, I’m telling ye!”

Whatever Garyl might have expected, the harsh reaction of Mech was not really on her top three.

“The one thing you can do is ask him yourself…”

He said it with such an ease that for a moment Garyl couldn’t believe that they were friends. Could he not see how this whole situation made her feel? Her eyes darkened and she drank the last of her coffee.

“Let me get you some more,” Mech offered and Garyl let him be.

He came back and gave her the cup, yet he waited till she met his gaze. “Garyl... I’m sorry if I... was a bit of an asshole... It’s just... Adras and I... we just can’t get along.”

She nodded. “Yeah,” she responded. “I know, and understand... it’s just harsh, you know?”

They drank some more and talked for a couple of hours, till Garyl was yawning and with a sly smile Mech stood up and left her, wishing her ‘sweet dreams’.

He got out and walked away, but not towards home, he had some business to attend to. In the centre of the city he found the man, just as he had promised Mech.

“Is it done?” the deep, dark voice came towards him, though the man hadn’t looked in his direction yet.

“Yes, I put it in her coffee, just as you asked me to.”

“Good,” the man nodded and pushed himself from the stone wall he was leaning on.

“Wait! You’d promised me…”

The man now turned towards Mech and let out a soft chuckle. “You really thought I would give you your sister back? No... She stays with me; until I’m sure you did what you had to.”

Then he turned again and with two steps he had disappeared in the dark night.

Chapter Four: Astonished

First she just stared at him in astonishment. Was he serious about this? Searching for the dragon together? It was strange even to hear him say ‘dragon’, since she had been living with the thought that she was the only one who knew.

“Eh, yeah, why not?”

Enthusiastically Mayth pointed at the road ahead. “I think we better hurry then, before the traces grow cold.”

Alea, of course, knew this and with a sigh she continued her way up. Mayth had no problem keeping up with her, and followed precisely in her trail. Somehow that annoyed her more than stopping and finding out that there were no more traces. They had just disappeared.

Alea sighed and turned around and started to go back when Mayth -again- came after her.

“Wait! Alea! Where you’re going?!”

“Home. It’s too late, that dragon is gone.” She didn’t wait for him, but she heard him following her downhill a couple of meters behind her.

He seemed to be sobbing about the disappeared traces, but Alea knew that there was a new chance tomorrow. With a bit of luck this dragon came back to this place again, and then she’d be waiting…

She succeeded to get in her little house without Mayth seeing the place. A bit disappointed though, she put her weapons away and started cooking dinner. It was still early, but she was hungry and cooking helped clearing her head. She thought about that strange boy, Mayth -what kind of name was that anyway?- and about school. Would she be in trouble? She didn’t cared much, but still… Mister Sellion wasn’t the most cooperative teacher alive, and Alea somehow felt he was going to make her life a bit harder.

When cooking was done she sat alone at the wooden table, eating fish, potatoes and carrots, while making her homework.

The rest of the evening nothing special happened.

When Alea woke it was still early. Yet she came out immediately, washed her face and body, got dressed, cleaned the house and made herself breakfast. She greeted the cat -which wasn’t hers, but he always came back so Alea named it Elden- and got out. It was quite a walk to school and the last thing she wanted was to arrive late. Most teachers didn’t mind her being absent so much, if she had good grades and schoolwork was done.

This brought her yet again to the topic ‘Sellion’. She had two hours today which he gave –in the morning. She sighed, there was nothing to do about it, and she really wasn’t planning on telling hím that she lived alone and had no parents. Nope, that really wasn’t much of an option. So she stood waiting at the classroom when the rest of her classmates started showing up, and not much later mister Sellion himself strode towards them. He gave her a weird, almost angry look but then something happened.

The hallway was almost empty now, and Alea could clearly see mister Caewan coming closer, and someone was following him, right behind, like he didn’t want to be seen.

Sellion gestured everybody inside and reluctantly so did Alea. She took her seat on the second row in the center of the class. It took some minutes but then Sellion came in and when Alea saw the person who was earlier hiding himself behind mister Caewan, she had to gasp for air...