5
I looked around at the prisoners. They stood in stunned silence at first, but as their freedom became obvious, they started running.
I turned back toward Kara when she didn’t respond. She had fallen to the ground, obviously exhausted from the massive amount of energy she had just expended. I reached down to help her when I realized that I had no arms to reach with. My body was gone.
Kara slowly stood. Her sky blue eyes looked at me, tears growing behind them.
“I'm so sorry, Elin. I didn’t know that could happen. Why did you touch me?” Her tone followed her emotions from apologetic to angry and back again as she stared at what was left of me. “You could have been killed.” Then she gasped and clapped her hands excitedly. “You are a soul, Elin. If you weren’t a soul, I would have killed you. This proves it. You just need your own body.”
I looked away as Kara posed triumphantly. I didn’t have to actually look anywhere in this form; with no body, I only had to focus on a direction to be aware of it. However, being in a human body for so long had ingrained some habits into me.
Nonetheless, I was looking in the right spot when a trio of wizards appeared behind us. I recognized them immediately. They were the ones sent into the dungeons to chase us. Apparently, Kara's wild magic had not taken us far enough away from our enemies to keep them from following us. I tried to gesture and shout, but I couldn’t catch Kara's attention. I frantically flew around her, hoping that she would see them coming behind me.
Kara did as I’d hoped, but it wasn’t going to do her any good. Two of the wizards approached. The third fell behind, exhausted from bringing them all here. I watched Kara, but I knew she didn’t have a chance. She had pressed herself past the point of exhaustion, and I could sense the toll it had taken on her.
I wanted her to run. I tried to scream it with all my might. I knew it was futile, but I tried it anyway.
Kara didn’t scream or cry. She would face this challenge with the same courage with which she had faced an army. She was willing to die, but she refused to be weak. She slowly knelt down and picked up the large ceremonial blade, all that was left of my previous form. The blade was too large for her, dull, and completely useless against the two approaching wizards. They had left her alone this long only to extend her misery.
I continued my silent pleas, begging every false god I could think of to come to her rescue. There would be no returning to get her in a few days. Kara would be dead in minutes, and she would never come back. I felt something tear inside of me. I had never felt pain like this. A small part of my mind noted that I had been saying that a lot recently. If Kara died, I would never feel any of this again. I knew that as a fact.
The thought of false gods set off something in the back of my mind. Didn’t Abomination say that he took care of his children? Where was he now?
My senses suddenly ranged out as far as I could manage, searching mile after mile for any sign of the errant god. He swore to protect her. He left our people to create this race of humans; he wouldn’t leave her now. He told me that he would help her.
And then it finally clicked in my head. Abomination had a body. It wasn’t stolen or built for him. It was his body.
Kara wasn’t a child of Abomination.
I was.
“I love you, Elin.” I heard her say the words as something grabbed her from the inside, pulling her body unnaturally. She doubled over, screaming in pain. Her legs gave way, but the torturous force kept her from falling to the ground.
I screamed with her, shouted into the void, and pulled at the world around me. I don’t know how I did it. I just knew that I needed a body. I needed my body, and that was the way to do it. I felt the world coming apart around me. The ground, the grass, the wind in the sky pulled toward me, creating an ever-growing crater barren of any usable energy. The air around us grew colder as the energy that had warmed it fused into me. I put it all to use.
I dropped, crouching, one fist pressed into the dirt. The rough grit was uncomfortable and real in a whole new way. The energy I couldn’t use hovered around me, arcing randomly from me to the ground. I released it back into the world; it fled away from me with a clap like thunder. My body felt real and natural, even more than the bodies that I had worn at home. It was truly mine, in the same way that my feelings for Kara were mine. I had handcrafted muscle, bone, and sinew. The mystical power of magic was caringly entwined into my being, like gilded thread carefully wrapped around even the smallest piece of me. What seemed like a lifetime of careful construction had taken no more time than a ragged breath.
I looked up, lightning flashing through my sky-blue eyes, a defense mechanism against the overflow of power inside me.
The wizards who were attacking Kara caught my attention first. When I looked at those three men, I saw everything that was wrong with this world. They were a symptom of the blight, and they needed to be removed. Luckily, I had the tools for that job.
I didn’t fight them. I saw their souls shining in their bodies, and I snuffed them as easily as I would blow out a candle. With little more than a thought, the souls were gone. Their bodies fell limp and lifeless to the ground.
I heard coughing and immediately turned to see Kara pulling herself up from the ground. Her body radiated pain and exhaustion, but her soul shone as brightly as ever. I took two steps and scooped her into my arms. She immediately wrapped her arms around me, and I smiled down at her.
“I told you so.”
Those were the first words I heard with my own ears, and I swore right then to make sure Kara never lived that down. The thought made me think how long we might live together now, and my smile grew until I was sure I looked like an idiot.
“Yes, you told me so. Let’s get you out of here,” I whispered.
“Good,” she sighed tiredly as she looked up at me. The color of her eyes could have been reflecting a clear sky, and I could have stood there all day, lost in them. A look of pain twisted her face as she pulled herself up and kissed me gently on the lips. “I want to go home.”
My smile slipped a little bit at the thought of home. I could never go home.
I heard his voice then, soft enough that I sometimes wonder if it was just my imagination. “No, son. You’ve just now come home.”
A sense of comfort covered me like a warm blanket, and I hugged Kara closer as I turned and tried to figure out which way was home. When I found it, I gathered the energy to ride the wind and carry us back to whatever remained of Kara’s army.
“This would be a lot less awkward if you weren’t completely naked,” Kara giggled.
###
If you’ve made it this far, I hope you’ve enjoyed the story. This is my first published work, and I plan to follow it up with many more. Next on my plate is to flesh out Elin’s story a bit more. I plan to write about how he his world, and then continue this story until it becomes my first novel. Please take the time to write a review for me wherever you purchased this ebook. I want to write stories that others enjoy, and that requires knowing what it is that you like.
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Thanks,
Mark Daniel III
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