The Look: Alpha Male, Feisty Female Romance (41 page)

“I am. Does that bother you?”

“No, I guess not. But that means your brother is one too.”

“Yes, but I'm different from him. I'm not like him.”

“He's evil, right? My father used to tell me stories about the Forbidden Forest, but I never believed they were true. Is that where you come from?”

“Yes, all magical beings are created in the Forbidden Forest.” Elsa looked down hard at the floor, concentrating on something her father told her a long time ago. “What's wrong?”

“My father always told us never to go into the Forbidden Forest, because we would lose our sense of right and wrong and become corrupted. Were you ever a normal person, like me?” Theo didn't answer for a while. “Well?” Elsa asked. He looked at her, caressing her cheek.

“I was.”

“Your poor family. Are they still alive? They must miss you so much. You should go to your parents and tell them everything that has happened. Maybe they can help your brother, make him whole again.”

“Nothing will make my brother whole again.” Elsa sat up, frustrated, placing her hand on Theo's face so he would look at her.

“How did you ever end up there?”

Theo didn't seem to want to tell her. His face indicated the memory was too painful.

“It's okay,” Elsa told him. “You can tell me.”

Theo took a breath. “My brother was always the one who did everything first, because he was older. He learned to walk first. He learned to sled in the snow on Christmas morning, as my parents and I watched from the porch, too. I remember wanting to join him so bad, but I couldn't. My parents told me it was too cold and I was not big enough. He was the first to go to school and make friends. I remember he was embarrassed of me when his friends came over, because I was little and tagged along everywhere he went. I was literally his shadow,” he laughed. “That's what they called me, too. Shadow.” Theo grew very sad.

“My brother was always the braver one, the one who was never afraid. Our parents told us about the Forbidden Forest as children. When I heard the stories, I got scared and had nightmares. But my brother, the stories excited him. He used to stand an inch away from the Forest behind our house, get as close as he could without moving. He would make me time him, even though I told him we were doing wrong. But he didn't listen.

“One day, I woke up in the middle of the night and saw that his bed was empty. I got very scared that someone came into our house and took him. I got up out of bed and started to get my parents but I saw a faint light out my window. Someone into a white gown carrying a lamp walked toward our house, from the direction of the woods. As he got closer, I realized it was my brother. He crawled back in the window, and I asked him where he'd been. He told me he'd actually gone into the Forest! I was terrified and started crying, remember I was so young. It embarrassed me that I wasn't as brave as he was or as strong.”

“You are strong, Theo. Your strength is just different, more complicated.” Elsa took his hand.

“He told me he was going back and that I should stay there.”

“What did he see in the woods?”

“He wouldn't tell me. He just said he had to show me. But I was so afraid, because I just knew what we were doing was wrong. And our parents would be so mad.”

“Did you go with him?”

“I told him I wasn't going no matter what, then he got mad and started for the Forest again, by himself. I hated that he was always the first to do things, and as frightened as I was, I just couldn't let him go alone, especially if there was something dangerous. I was just a small boy and wanted to protect him, even though he was so much bigger than me.”

“Did you go then?”

“Yes I went. I had to. I was his shadow, remember?” Theo asked her. Elsa nodded. “I thought the moment I stepped through the tree line, I would feel different or something. But nothing happened, except the woods got really quiet, like the animals knew I was there when I shouldn't be. Dorien just kept running through the woods faster and faster, laughing, and I couldn't get him to slow down. My little legs only went so fast, so eventually he slowed down and took my hand, because I was so afraid. I was shaking really hard. We kept walking for a few minutes and came upon this small cottage, it looked like a witch's cottage. Dorien told me to watch who came out, so we waited, and eventually this old, frail woman came out, to water her garden. She looked up real fast, because she saw us and I screamed. It was almost like she was reading our minds. Dorien pinched me, he was so mad. She asked us to join her for tea or something but I just got up and ran back the way we came, Dorien chasing after. We got lost in the woods, but eventually he found a way back home. Only--” He stopped.

“Only what?”

“When we got back I crawled through the window to our cabin and he followed after, but the whole room had been re-arranged. Dorien and I walked around the house, screaming for our parents, but they were gone. There was an old man who came through the front door, as he had been fishing all night and it was early morning. I screamed and cried when I saw him, afraid he would kidnap us, but Dorien put his hand over my mouth and dragged me out of the house. Later Dorien told me that we had spent much longer in the Forest than we thought. To us, from our perspective, it felt like a couple hours. But over 10 years had passed. We were just children, didn't know better. And we didn't know how to find our parents, either. So we just went back into the forest, to raise ourselves.

“The longer Dorien and I stayed there, the more we changed. We became hard and mean, more like animals and less like children. Eventually we actually became animals too.

“I became a lion.

“He became a dragon.

“The Forest brought the worst in us, gave us a physical animal form for our worst traits, I guess. It destroyed our innocence, all the love we had for each other, made us fight and hate everything we remembered about our old life. There's really nothing I would not give to get back what we lost. We could have been good people, normal people, led normal lives.”

“You are a good person, Theo. You know that, right?”

“No you don't understand. The Forest made us evil. Permanently bad. We messed up big time that night when we went into the woods, Elsa. I should never have followed my brother, but--I couldn't just let him go.” Theo grunted and punched the frame of the bed, drooping his head. Elsa put her hand on the back of his head, feeling his soft blond hair.

“If the Forbidden Forest made you so evil,” Elsa said, “then why did you leave?”

Theo looked up. “I saw how it was changing us for the worse, how the changes kept coming without end, knowing there was nothing I could do about it. Then I just decided if I was doomed, there was nothing I could lose by not giving one last fight, even if I couldn't undo the damage that had been done, even if I couldn't change back to my old self.”

“Oh honey,” Elsa said. She thought about all the suffering Theo had been through with his brother, losing his family, then it occurred to her that if two hours spent in the woods were actually 10 years, how old exactly were Theo and his brother? “Theo,” Elsa started, “just how old are you?”

“Ha, you don't want to know.”

“I do. Tell me.”

“Centuries old. At least six hundred years old.”

“Oh my,” Elsa said, covering her mouth. “That means your family--”

“Gone. Dead. Buried.”

“Why did your brother place a hex on you?”

“He didn't want me to leave the Forbidden Forest. When we first got there, he told me it was useless to leave. But as time went on, and we changed into our animal forms, he started telling me that this is who we were and it wasn't something to be ashamed of. Leaving the forest meant betraying ourselves, he thought. But I just couldn't take it anymore. I had to do something. I couldn't continue on down the same path of death and destruction. Maybe I will never be the same, but maybe I can get some of my old self back.”

“You can. I'm going to help you.”

There was a moment of silence before a loud knock shook the front door of Theo's cabin. Elsa stole a glance at her lover, whose eyes were glowing with the golden spirit of a lion. Theo opened the door of Elsa's cabin, shirtless but with pants on. The yellow glow from the fire created a sheen on his dark hair and tanned skin. But the blue cold from outside drowned half his image in shadow. He stood by the door, tall against the chill east wind. From Elsa's perspective, she could see only a few feet outside her cabin onto the porch. There was nothing but silence, a pregnant pause someone might experience before a volcano explodes or tornado strikes. Scanning the snowy area before the tree line, Theo smelled the air for signs of his brother but came up with nothing.

“Theo, is there something the matter?”

And he stood there, motionless, staring into the snowy forest like a lion sniffing the air for the scent of an intruder. An invisible presence emerged from outside her cabin, terrifying Elsa, even more than the defensive amber glow of Theo's eyes.

“Is it him?”

“He's near. I know it.” The last thing Elsa remembered in her mind's eye was that she looked up and saw Theo standing at the open door. Then a white, two-headed serpent with ruby eyes slithered into the cabin, extinguishing the fire, and blowing a miniature tornado throughout the whole cabin. Elsa could feel the entire structure of the building rocking to and fro, as if the place wanted to spin around and over and up into the air. Plates, windows, kitchen tables, and cast irons flew through the air, loud and angry through the walls, shattering into millions of pieces. The last image Elsa remembers seeing was the striking him multiple times on his body--his arm, his face, his inner thigh. She was certain he was dead.

She woke up to her cabin and its possessions completely destroyed. She ran over to Theo's lifeless body. “Theo!” Elsa held his hand tight, feeling his soft, thick, and manly neck for a pulse. “Oh thank God, you're alive.” She kissed him on his lips, but he wouldn't wake up. She rubbed his cheek. “Theo please wake up. What's wrong? Tell me what happened!” He didn't respond. In fact, as she watched him in silence, knowing next to nothing about wizardry or witchcraft, she sank into despair, almost certain he had been cast into a spell. “Theo--wake up. I don't know what to do. You can't leave me! I don't know what to do!” Tears flowed down the corners of her cheeks, embarrassed for herself even though she was alone. She watched her lover lay there on the floor, silent. Another cold gust of wind swept through the innards of her cabin, disintegrating Theo into a pile of sand. Elsa's heart sank, as her one true love literally melted to dust and disappeared back into the forest from where he came. For a brief moment she had moments of happiness, and now some mysterious force ejected her from that dream--and plopped her right back into reality where she started. She lay in the floor weeping.

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“I am in love.”

Elsa stared straight ahead, at the wall, in Father O'Grady's office. After this grave and serious admission, Father O'Grady leaned back in his wooden chair, the weight of his tiny body making the only sound in the room. He rubbed his face, serious for a moment, in attempt to process the information.

“And does he return these feelings?” O'Grady asked.

“He does, and he told me so,” she said, ashamed she let out such a private moment in front of the minister, whom Elsa trusted but nevertheless felt naked and exposed by sharing the information, which was hers and hers alone to share. And she had no one else to turn to.

“Where is he?”

“He's gone. As I said, he did not commit the arson you speak of. His brother did, and I believe his brother took him away from me,” she said.

“If he's gone, are we not safe again?” he asked. “Does that not mean he's returned from whence he came? We should speak of this no more, then. Our problem has solved itself.”

“Father, his brother is angry, and he'll return.”

“What are we to do then?”

Elsa took a deep breath, before dropping the news of her plans to get Theo back. “I need your help in crossing over to the Forbidden Forest.”

“Elsa, you will do no such thing. The forest is deadly and you will suffer greatly in your injured state,” he said, leaning forward, emphasizing the severity of the situation by staring at Elsa with his little olive eyes.

“If you will not help me, I will go alone, if I need to.”

“Please think about what you're doing. We have an opportunity here, to resume our way of life. We have Lili and Ennis back. Things could be good again. Don't mess this up for everyone else, Elsa.”

“I must go, I will go after him. There is no other way,” she said, refusing to give into Father O'Grady's demands. “What must you think of my feelings? My soul?”

“My dearest Elsie, we already lost someone before and we are so lucky to have her back. Don't make yourself the second great tragedy our community has faced in the past month. We love and care about you, but there is nothing we can do to get that man back for you. The Forest will consume every last person who enters its borders. I can't risk that. What's more--if his brother, a dragon as you say, follows him wherever he goes, that means the man's return will come with much destruction,” O'Grady said, looking sad and tired, his beetle brows hunkered over his eyelids like curious caterpillars.