Chapter Four- Beloved

I turned, enraged. 

Why was it so impossible to let my anger out?

It was so bottled up. I didn't have anyone to air it to. I had to be physical. It was simply how I felt, how I let it go.

I looked up, straight into his face. Fear raced up and down my spine as I recognized the figure to be the same man I saw in the clearing.

The Human Snake.

My naiveté never quite satisfied, I stood, scowling at him.

"Perhaps..." he began in the same dangerously attracting voice as before, "There IS no meaning to life."

I froze. 

He knew.

He knew EVERYTHING.

He knew that THAT was the conclusion I had come to, knew I was so unsettled by that possibility I might've ended my life out of misery.

Again he showed me my place in the world.

"But..." he continued, not noticing my slight shiver (Or did he? Seeing as though he knew everything), "You might find some interesting things by continuing to live. Like how you found that flower..." He smiled, and his voice became more seductive. "How I found you..." before my mind could contemplate his words, he reached to me and cupped my cheek. 

The sudden cool, silky touch once again sent my spine flaring. My eyebrows shot up in alarm and color flooded my cheeks.

"Now, come with me."

I came.

I floated.

I found a feeling bloom in my chest like my beloved clematis flower- a feeling that I understood as what a son would feel for his father. This confused me, for I had never felt this way toward my real father- but, I realized, that wasn't the kind of relationship I just bonded. It was the relationship of a general and his soldier- a relationship of a dictator and his army. I could never truly find a reason to call my own father 'Dad'.

Now, I realized, I felt free and lifted- somebody to listen to me, to protect me, and to protect in turn. Yes, I confirmed in my mind. I would protect him, at the cost of my life. My world now spun around him. A very quick decision, many would say, and naive. To accept a stranger into your life so quickly was very daft. Ah, but those people don't understand. It was like finding my soulfather- the father I always needed, always wanted but never addressed the thought in my mind. Ah, they don't understand the strange way my mind works.

They don't understand the feeling of finding your Beloved.

---

I grew.

From that day, I began to grow, grow in the ways that revolved around becoming stronger. I trained to the point I bled out of every element of my face, and then I trained until I couldn't see. I slept for four hours then got up to train again, not close to revived from the previous day's strain. I did this all on my own- to learn, if I ever needed to, to fend off anyone wishing to harm my Beloved. The way I trained- merciless to my body, to the sting that shot and leaked out from my bones and my bones alone- was with my will.

With, and strangely, against my will.