“Same to you, sir. I hope I will see you upon my return tonight.”
9
Nathaniel felt a cool breeze tickle his skin as he walked from the inn to Amara’s home. Despite the heightened senses that came with his burgeoning Great One abilities, he was often ignorant of the sensations that the world had to offer. Now, it was is if he had come alive for the first time, and he felt in touch with the world around him as well as his own lightened spirit.
His positive mood took a turn as he heard the sounds of arguing from within the house.
“It is unacceptable!” Eli said.
“Why?” Amara asked. “What have I done that is so terrible?”
“I expect that dinner will be prepared when I arrive, and not a moment later! You must learn now if you are to be a proper wife!”
Nathaniel rushed to the door. Eli held Amara by her dress with both clenched fists.
“You!” Eli exclaimed when he saw Nathaniel. “You dare to come here?”
“I was invited,” Nathaniel said. “Perhaps you should let Amara go.”
“This is none of your business,” Eli said. “My betrothed should not be speaking with another man, much less inviting him to dinner…again!”
“You can’t control who I talk to!” Amara yelled.
Eli reared back and slapped her across the face. A week earlier, Nathaniel could have been between them the second his eye caught sight of the man’s hand preparing to strike. Now he was helpless to react in time.
Amara cried out in pain and anger. Nathaniel charged at Eli and tackled him into the wall. He had only begun to consider his next move when Eli drove a knee into his gut, pushing the air from his lungs. Eli punched him once as he fell, then twice more as he writhed on the ground, until Amara grabbed his arm.
“Please! Stop!” she cried.
Eli pushed her off. “You disgust me.” He stomped out of the house.
Amara sniffled back her anguish as she knelt by Nathaniel’s head. “Are you okay? Don’t move!”
He sat up, then fell back to the ground as his vision swam. “I…I will be fine. Are you all right?”
She nodded, though her cheek was still a fiery red where Eli had struck her. She helped Nathaniel to his feet, and he noticed for the first time that his nose was bleeding. He put a hand to it and felt the blood pool in his palm.
“I am sorry I could not protect you in time,” he said. “Sorry that I am so slow.”
“This is not your fault,” she said, grabbing a towel for his nose. “Here. Sit down and tilt your head back. Keep this pressed to your nose.”
He did as she instructed, cursing himself all the while. “Does this happen often?” he asked.
“Nay, not often,” she said. “It is but the nature of things. Eli expects certain things of a wife. All men do. And his expectations are higher because of his station and what he offers as the son of an Authority leader.”
“He has no right to speak to you in such a manner,” Nathaniel said.
“In a different world I would say you are right,” she said sadly. “This is how it is. My family needs the money and the Authority connections.”
Just then Jophima arrived home with the last of the food needed for that evening’s dinner. “By the Prophet! What happened here?”
“It is nothing, mother. There was a small incident with Eli. It was my fault entirely.”
“With Eli? Where is he? What did you do?”
“It is nothing,” Amara repeated.
Jophima looked at Nathaniel with disgust, then turned back to her daughter with panic in her eyes. “You bring this boy into our lives, and disrupt everything. Everything we have built! Your father works day and night to provide a livelihood for this family. If you offend Eli and his parents, you risk ruining everything we have!”
“Forgive me,” Nathaniel said. “It was not my intent to create any controversy. I am sure Eli will come around.”
Jophima wheeled around to face Nathaniel again. “You. Do not think to involve yourself anymore in our family’s business! There is a reason the Authority exists, and it is to keep Great Ones like you in your place. Leave us be!”
Nathaniel looked at Amara, whose head was bowed. Tears fell down her cheeks. He thought of saying more, but simply nodded and turned to leave. He walked down the street in the direction of the inn, wondering if he would be evicted once word got back to Tyrus. The experiment of the exile was proving frustrating and complicated, even just a few days in. He thought of his friends—Patrick was doubtless up to his neck in women, while Maxwell was relaxing in the wilderness. In their own ways, they had made better choices.
He touched a hand to his swollen cheek. His nose hurt, and a headache was setting in. His body was weak in its mortal state, and he had been foolish to attempt to face Eli. Maybe more foolish to have made the connection with Amara in the first place. It was as Jophima had said. He did not belong in the world of the normals. And Amara had a life that had been set in motion well before he got involved.
He felt a hand on his shoulder and spun around, anticipating another attack. It was Amara. Fresh tears dampened her cheeks, but there was a resolve in her eyes he had not yet seen.
“Amara…why are you here?”
“I…I did not want you to leave.”
“You belong in your home. With your family. Your betrothed.”
“I hate him,” she said. “I hate him and his family and their arrogance. All he cares about is putting me in my place and reminding me how his family can ruin mine. You see what that’s done to my mother!” She began to cry again. “I cannot stand this life, Nathaniel. I was hopeless before I met you. Hopeless.”
In spite of his reservations, he embraced her, pulling her close. “It will be okay,” he whispered into her hair. “This will all work out.”
She pulled back and looked deep into his eyes. Then, without another word, she kissed him.
Nathaniel walked the rest of the way home to the inn that night feeling as though he had been given wings. He seemed to skip above the surface of the ground, and his heart swelled with thoughts of Amara.
The kiss had been brief, but it had been a moment he knew would stay with him forever. She had blushed after their lips separated, and he had nodded to her with a smile on his bruised face. They had said goodnight and gone their own ways, leaving him with a cavalcade of confusing thoughts and feelings.
He returned to his room at the inn and flopped on the bed, staring up at the ceiling as if he could will Amara’s face to appear there. He had no idea what his next move should be. He did not want to continue to interfere with Amara’s life, not with the end of his time in exile drawing rapidly closer. She needed to return to the world she knew. But what of the things she had told him? That she had been hopeless before he came along.
The thought made him terribly sad, and angry for what she had been forced to endure to help her family. Her parents put such unfair pressure on her. She should be able to be free to find her own happiness, not a forced scenario that seemed to provide opportunity but really provided nothing but shackles.
But there was more to the thoughts, if he allowed himself to admit as much. He did not want her to have just any happy life. He wanted her to have a happy life with him. He wanted to be the one to save her, to spare her from her fate. And had she not already begun to save him? She had opened his eyes to what it meant to be normal. She had showed him a glimmer of a life he had never truly known existed outside the confines of the palace and the Central Enclave.
He wanted more. He wanted her, and her smile and her laugh. He wanted more of the conversations they shared walking along the dusty paths of the enclave. He wanted to know everything about her.
Stupid, he thought. You cannot have a life with a normal girl. But, then, who was to decree such things? There had been incidences throughout history of mingling between the worlds, and the time they now lived in was unlike any other. There was to be no continuation of the Great Ones. The remainin
g population might last millennia more, or maybe not. But there would be nobody else. Something had broken their population. Was he doomed to wander the world alone for eternity? Or until the great decline came for him? The thought was pure agony.
Nathaniel tossed and turned all night long, sleeping only when his exhausted body could fight off sleep no longer. Even then, his dreams were of Amara and her plight. How he could proceed, how he should proceed, took precedence in his mind.
Come morning, he rolled out of bed with a groan. There was work to do around the inn, and his exhaustion was going to make the entire day a challenge. He knew not how he would be able to see Amara again, and wondered if she would be allowed near the inn.
“Nate,” Tyrus called as Nathaniel walked into the lobby, “I need to speak with you.”
Nathaniel walked over to the giant man. “Aye, here I am.”
“Mmhmm. I heard about the events of last night.”
“I understand, sir.”
“Twas some bullshit that occurred for certain between my daughter and her betrothed.”
“I suppose.”
The man leaned down until his face was almost level with Nathaniel’s. “Eli is not a very good man. Not in the sense of what I want for my daughter. But he can provide a good, safe life for her. For all of us. And she can be happy with him. I have seen the way she looks at you, and the way you look at her.”
“Sir, I know not—”
“I do not wish to go round and round about this, Nate. You know that marriage between a Great One and a normal is not possible. I like you, son. Really, I do. You are polite, honest, and hardworking. But your very nature makes you not right for my daughter. Please, as a father I am asking you to do the right thing and stay away from her. Let her forget you even before you return to your palace. Let her go back to her life and make the most of it, rather than forever wishing for something that simply cannot be.”
10
The next two days, Nathaniel steered clear of Amara and her family. His wanderings through town during his non-working hours were directed to the far ends of the enclave, a good distance from the little house. The bruises from Eli’s attack were still visible on his face, though they no longer hurt much to the touch. Still, seeing them in his reflection fired up a bitter anger toward Eli and, if he was being honest, toward himself.
He did not think he had given Tyrus his word, not technically. Still, his honor meant a great deal to him and he wanted to respect the family’s wishes. And yet…he could feel the memory of Amara’s lips on his. That ghostly sensation stayed with him all day, and haunted him at night.
He wanted an answer. He wanted some kind of strategy, or solution, or path that would guide him toward saving Amara from her fate without complicating her life further. He knew that there was nothing he could do to truly merge their destinies. The end of his exile was drawing near, and then it would be back to palace life and his friends and the pointlessness of an eternity as a Great One.
Amara, on the other hand, faced her own pointless future as the wife of an arrogant representative of the Authority. He felt much more strongly for her plight than his own. If only there were some way…but he could think of nothing.
The morning before the end of the exile, he had finished his chores and was walking down the main street of the enclave when he heard a voice.
“Nathaniel! Nate!”
He turned and saw a disheveled mess of a young man shuffling toward him, arms outstretched. Only when the man drew within feet of him did he recognize his friend. “Max!” Nathaniel said. “What happened to you?”
Max grinned, yellow teeth visible through his patchy facial hair. His face was literally clumped with dirt. “I had my time, Nate. I had my time.”
“I see the wilderness did not fully consume you, though I reckon it came close.”
“Nate, it was brilliant out there. Removed from the sights and sounds of our world…I did not understand just how much noise there is around us all the time until I stood in the moonlight and listened to absolutely nothing.”
“That is good. I am pleased for you, Max. But I wonder, if it went so well, why have you returned to civilization so early?”
Maxwell frowned. “Fuck of a thing, truly, but I was unable to eat very much out in the forest. Needed to come back and beg for scraps. Such a terrible, humbling experience.”
Nathaniel nodded. “Perhaps that is one of the lessons we are supposed to be learning. And you are okay now? Satiated?”
“Aye. Some normals took pity on me. I am weakened, Nate, but I will survive through the end of exile. I dare say I will be racing toward the palace’s lower level to restore my abilities.”
“I thought you liked being in nature?”
Max scratched at his muddy tangle of hair. “I do. Aye. But that life is not sustainable for a normal. Perhaps when I have grown into my status of Great One, I shall take trips to the woods.”
“Good that you have a plan.”
“Indeed. And you, Nate? You seem rested.”
“Aye. I am.”
“But your face is damaged.”
“Aye.”
“What have you been doing with yourself these past days?”
“I work in an inn here in this enclave.”
Max raised an eyebrow. “Fascinating. You must meet some interesting characters.”
Nathaniel nodded.
“Something on your mind?” Maxwell asked.
“I met someone,” Nathaniel said.
“You…met someone? What does that mean?”
“A woman. A young normal woman. There is something between us.”
Max laughed. It was a genuine laugh, with no real malice in it. “By the Prophet! I’m guessing that has something to do with your battered face. Listen, there can’t be something between you and a mortal woman, Nate.”
“Aye. I understand this. And yet…”
“And yet what? Nathaniel, we are to return to the palace in a day’s time. You will likely never see that girl again.”
“I understand. But she is betrothed to a son of the Authority, and she is destined for an unhappy existence.”
“And you want to save her?” Maxwell slapped his forehead with his palm, releasing a small cloud of dust. “Patrick would be all over you about this. You know that. You’re lucky you decided to pour your heart out to me instead.”
“Aye. Patrick would laugh. And perhaps he would be right. I have just never felt like this before.”
Maxwell put a dirty hand on Nathaniel’s back. “Nate, you and Patrick are the closest thing I have to brothers. I care about you deeply. And so I must tell you that your feelings are not real. You were excited because this normal is the first woman you have been able to interact with in your entire life. Your feelings and confused emotions are totally understandable. But understand this—she is no different than whatever women of the night Patrick has been lying with this week. Normals who inspire feelings that can never be acted upon.”
Nathaniel pulled away. “Amara is not a ‘woman of the night.’”
“You misunderstand me, Nate. I am not trying to offend you…or the lady’s good name, for that matter. I am simply stating the reality of the situation. Is there a certain hopelessness to our lives? Yes. We are Great Ones with no true way to continue our line. But say there was…do you believe that your pairing with another of our kind would come down to anything having to do with your feelings? It would not. It would be a match of mutual convenience for both families. Love is a notion held only by the normals, and even then only those with the good fortune to be able to pursue it at the expense of all common sense.”
“I do hear what you say,” Nathaniel said.
“But are you truly listening?” Maxwell asked.
“Forget it. I thought you would understand.”
“Nate, for the last time, I do understand. But you are not seeing clearly. And it is going to lead you down a terrible path.”
“Speak all the doomsday pro
phecy you want.”
“I don’t want. I simply am looking out for my friend. I must leave you be, Nathaniel. We are not supposed to rely on each other during this time. But I will be seeing you again soon enough, and I hope you will have done the hard work of putting this experience and your wandering thoughts behind you.”
Nathaniel nodded, and Maxwell bowed his head in a solemn sign of respect that released another dust cloud. They parted ways, and Nathaniel watched his friend walk up the road. He had heard Max’s words. How could he not? They simply repeated those which were already in his mind.
The last night of the exile was a long one. Nathaniel tossed and turned, owing as much to the persistent feeling of a body slowly dying as to the haunting thoughts of Amara’s face and Max’s words.
By the darkest hours, he was wide awake, staring at a ceiling that had become so familiar he could draw its pattern of plaster from memory. He was startled by a soft knock at the door, one so faint he probably would not have heard it at all had there been any other sound in the room.
As it was, he waited in stillness, wondering what in hellfire Barney could want from him at such an hour. He thought perhaps his mind was playing tricks on him. Such things were not altogether uncommon for Great Ones, and he had experienced a wide range of new and often troubling sensations since becoming mortal.
Then, suddenly, he heard the sound again. A gentle tapping at the door. Nathaniel swung his legs over and stood up from the bed. “Who goes there?” he called. There was no response. He proceeded to the door with caution. He had not forgotten the altercation with Eli and his clumsy, painful botching of the whole deal. If someone was out to do him harm, he may have no true defense. Death during exile was always a risk, and surviving such an ordeal would depend on the nature of his murder and if he could have his abilities restored in time.
Thinking those morbid thoughts, Nathaniel reached out and opened the door. On the other side was Amara. She wore a long coat, thicker and warmer than someone ought to wear in the warmer seasons, over her nightgown. She smiled nervously.
The Lost Enclave Page 8
