Chapter 44 - Listening with the Heart

Still feeling light-headed from drinking in the sight of the most beautiful girl Skyle could have ever imagined, the bewildered boy found himself unwilling to break eye contact. Let alone the fact that Birdy’s considerable mass was still pining him to the ground, Skyle hardly even noticed the pins and prickles of tiny branches biting into his skin.

The girl, however, did notice. She shook her head at Birdy and drew its weight off by simply nudging one side of its head. Birdy obligingly skipped off and Skyle found that he could finally breathe again - not that he had missed it much, really. He had been too busy to notice, after all.

His lungs, however, did not agree and as they automatically drew a deep, convulsive breath Skyle began to cough violently. When he finally stopped, Skyle saw long, delicate fingers hovering in front of his face. Without thinking about it, Skyle reached out and took the offered hand, and only then did he realize whose hand it was.

A furious blush climbed to his face, his heart beating madly and threatening to jump into his throat. Holding a girl’s hand was nothing new to Skyle. In fact, he was often forced to hold Kass’ hand all night when she snuck into his bed whenever the cute little rascal was too scared to sleep alone. Yet, this was completely different. This simple gesture had never felt so intimate, nor had the skin of another person felt so soft. It was an altogether wondrous feeling, and though he now did not dare to move so much as a single muscle, still he ached to stroke his fingers over the hand that rested so calmly in his grip. To compensate for what felt like the most awkward moment in Skyle’s young life, his mind raced to find a proper way to address his rescuer and at the same time improve this poor first impression.

Perhaps start with his name? No, that wouldn’t make sense, what kind of pretentious fool starts off by declaring his own name as though crying out for recognition?

Then perhaps ask the girl for hers? Of course not! Such blatant disregard for the privacy of others, he wouldn’t dream of it! Skyle could hardly believe he had been this close to offending the girl.

Maybe he could start by saying hello? Nothing wrong with that casual greeting, used by people of all walks of life to start off a meeting with any stranger. Woefully unoriginal and so very dull, Skyle bemoaned in his head. What kind of dullard will she think I am?

Oh, surely there must be something he could say, but for the life of him Skyle could not figure it out.

“S.. sorry,” The flustered boy finally managed out, then promptly realized it was the worst option he could have picked and dejectedly hung his head down, avoiding her gaze. Why was he apologizing? Could it be that he had neither the guts nor the brain to come up with anything better than “S.. Sorry?” Black despair rained in Skyle’s inner world until puddles of it drowned out the last vestiges of his crumbling self-respect.

A reassuring squeeze could be felt from the hand in his grasp, and this more than anything finally pulled Skyle’s brain out of the morass it had been stuck in, like a ray of sunshine piercing straight and true through a murky, overcast afternoon. Instantly taking hold of this opportunity, Skyle rallied and took another shot at a first impression.

“I’m not, I’m not usually this dull, I swear. Or clumsy. Or foolish. I’m not any of those things. Not meaning ever, of course. I’m dull and clumsy and foolish sometimes. A lot of times. Who isn’t, right? But this is not me at my best, not nearly. I hope you understand that. Not that you must, please don’t feel obliged, but it’s just not how I would have imagined meeting you. Not that I’ve spent my whole life hoping to meet you, that just sounds creepy and kind of sad, really. I wouldn’t do that. Why would I do that? Well, unless you wanted me to, maybe?”

From there, it continued to go from bad to worse, with Skyle growing increasingly horrified at the unstoppable barrage of sheer idiocy that continued to spill from his mouth. It was a disjointed experience, with one side of his brain heedlessly running off with his mouth while the other was frantically chasing from behind with a butcher’s knife and foaming mouth. At least both sides of his brain shared a commonality: they were both begging ever more fervently for the mother bird to finally show up so it could pick him up and drop him off the edge of the nest, finally putting him out of his misery.

Even Birdy seemed completely bamboozled by this pathetic display of stupidity. Its disbelieving stare seemed to be asking how it could have ever allowed such a simpleton to ration off its precious supply of crystal candies. Finally, it was Birdy that came to the rescue, as it lightly pecked on Skyle’s hand.

It wasn’t painful, barely more than a nudge. However, it was then that Skyle realized that he had been holding the girl’s hand this entire time. Even worse, he could feel that he’d begun to sweat profusely and his grip felt clammy and sticky. Absolutely mortified, Skyle let go of the girl’s hand with a startled cry, jumping back so vigorously that another flash of pain shot up his leg and down he went for another tumble in the weeds.

Wishing the branches could just rise up and swallow him whole, Skyle tried to roll over to his feet right away but a gentle grip on his arm stopped him. The confused boy looked up to see the girl kneeling down beside him, her eyes serene and her smile reassuring. Skyle instantly froze, hardly daring to breathe although his heart kept jumping madly about within his chest. An unfamiliar scent drifted in the wind in the wake of her hair as she turned her regard toward his wounded leg. Involuntarily closing his eyes as he took in this scent, Skyle was instantly reminded of his favorite place deep in the secluded woods, though he couldn’t place his finger on the reason. It wasn’t the earthy smell of regrowth, nor the sweet scent of wildflowers in bloom. It was subtler, more neutral but all the more recognizable for it. If he had to put a word to it, it would be spring. Like a river, like a brook, like waters in motion and life reaching towards the sun. It was clean, it was clear and it was refreshing like nothing else he had ever smelled.

Skyle opened his eyes to find the girl’s face hovering inches from his, her own eyes closed as she hummed in that hauntingly beautiful voice. The melody was simple as ever, but Skyle found that he couldn’t follow its notes. It was all he could do to remain motionless as he let the music trickle in through his skin, feeling warmth filtering through it as though lying before the fireplace back at home.

Again, the small boy lost track of time as he let himself be carried by the mysterious song. When he finally opened his eyes, the girl was kneeling at his side, a faint smile of satisfaction on her face.

Feeling warmer and more energetic than he had ever felt in the past couple days, Skyle quickly rose to a sitting position while adjusting his wounded leg to stay out of his way, afraid that it might lead to another embarrassing episode. When he did shift that limb, however, Skyle found to his shock that it did not pain him. In fact, there was no hint of any discomfort at all.

Skyle cautiously peeled back the bandages around his leg, and was confronted with nothing but unblemished skin. The faint greenish tinge of the healing salve still layered the area where it had been applied, but of the torn flesh and bone, there was not so much as a hint, let alone a scar.

Gaping in utter stupefaction, Skyle slowly raised his eyes to meet the dancing green eyes of the girl’s openly amused gaze. Doing a double take, Skyle gazed down in dumb disbelief before looking up, then down again. Only after several more iterations did Skyle finally believe his wound had actually been healed this easily and this quickly.

“Who are you?” Skyle breathed, awe palpable in his tone.

The girl’s only response was another smile, one that waved away both the question and the unvoiced thanks that would have been Skyle’s follow up line. With a slow shake of her head, the girl stood up and lightly brushed errant spots of dust from her pristine white dress. Watching this, Skyle frowned as he tried to remember if she had been wearing such a dress when she had been perched upon the rock. For some odd reason, he could not for the life of him remember. What Skyle did distinctly remember, now that his brain finally began to collect some semblance of coherent thought, was that her eyes had been silver, reflecting the color of the moon. Not green.

“Not blue, for that matter”, Skyle thought to himself in mute astonishment as he watched the color of the girl’s eyes swiftly fade from their brilliant sparkle of green to match the shades of an endless azure sky.

What was going on? How was this girl doing the things she did? How had she healed his leg in a bare instant? Skyle looked down to his leg once more, this time activating the True Sight in an almost instinctive fashion, and completely froze.

His mesmerized senses struggled for a moment to process the sheer amount of detail they were taking in, with intricate patterns of elemental essence crisscrossing the area around his leg in a spectacular array of color and depth. Never had Skyle seen such complexity, product of skill and technique that simply beggared his imagination. If it weren’t so unfamiliar, Skyle would have been tempted to assume that they were simply part of his leg, as the only thing he had seen that was nearly so complex were the structures of living organisms. These patterns ringing his leg were still moving, still working as they weaved in and out of the texture of elemental essence in his own flesh as easily and naturally as if they had always been meant to be there.

“This.. is impossible,” Skyle mumbled, his lips trembling with wonder as he turned his gaze towards the girl.

That was a mistake.

In his astonishment, Skyle did not retract the True Sight, this ever revolving tapestry rich with all the vibrant colors of elemental essence weaving and intertwining to form the underpinnings of every last bit of matter around him. His leg had already been quite the shock, making his eyes bulge as his breath grew ragged with the sheer complexity of the artistry involved in the power that had been at work there.

That was child’s play compared to awaited him next.

As Skyle turned his head, he could see streams of pulsing energy rapidly condensing in the air all around him. They grew in number exponentially as he turned his head, blazing into life and pulsing like an exquisitely intricate spiderweb of essence streams that flared into incandescent life as they all converged upon a single focal point.

The sight hit him like a physical blow. It drove all the breath from his lungs as though he had been gutpunched. He jerked backwards even as his eyes widened as far as they could go. His mind felt like it had caught on fire, the lid about to explode like a cauldron that had been left boiling for too long. A great roaring filled his ears as his consciousness began to flicker in and out, like a campfire being blown by a terrifying storm.

It was too powerful an experience, for which he could not have possibly been prepared. Just the faint memory of it blazed a fire so fierce within his mind that Skyle screamed in agony, even as he reveled in the glory of it. It was a great vortex of energy so intense that he wondered at the fact that it didn’t just burn a hole through the core fabric of the world, all centered around the most amazing tapestry of patterns and colors Skyle had ever dreamed was possible, let alone witnessed converging upon one single point.

This point was the girl. Her features blurred into non-existence under the awesome maelstrom of essence that revolved around her. Conduits of energy more intense than anything Skyle had seen lay tangled in a mad cluster of hundreds, thousands of pulsing veins, all feeding directly into one single point of light that blazed so intensely under the True Sight, it nearly seared his mind clean off.

Skyle didn’t get a chance to gaze directly upon this point of light, even had he been willing to brave the attempt. As soon as his gaze barely grazed the smallest, most insignificant corner of this wondrous core, his consciousness completely fractured into a cascade of chaotic lights, after which they all converged into a line, a fissure that ran the length of his mind. This crack instantly widened into an abyss, from which emerged a gigantic maw of darkness that rose up before him, promising utter obliteration.

It was then that a small light, oddly familiar now with its gentle flickering, fluttered lightly in the breeze before daintily settling upon the dark abyss. With a deep groan of protest, the darkness receded, being drawn back into the fracture line until it disappeared altogether, along with the last vestiges of Skyle’s conscious mind.

The last things Skyle remembered were the smell, of spring and sparkling waters, and a smile, the most beautiful he had ever seen.

***

“No!” Skyle cried out, his hands outstretched over his head as he jumped up from where lay on the floor.

All the response he got was a baleful glare from Birdy as it briefly opened its eyes. It made discontent clicking noises with its beak as it shook its wings in displeasure before closing his eyes and promptly drifting back to sleep.

For once, Skyle could not have cared less for the bird’s displeasure. His skin felt clammy and sweat ran in rivulets down his face in spite of the chilling wind still howling in his ears. Gazing up, Skyle could see the glimmers of dawn on the far horizon, but it was still dark enough that he had to squint as his eyes immediately sought out the rock raised up high in the middle of the nest.

The spot was empty, the mother bird gone. More to his dismay, there was no girl, no hint that she had been there whatsoever. Skyle pulled himself away from under Birdy’s wings, coming to his feet in a daze as his eyes wandered desperately around the nest.

“Hello?” Skyle called out, trying to prevent the sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach from leaking into his voice. “Is anyone there?”

As expected, there was no answer except for the renewed howling of the wind in his ears. His hair fluttered in the wind as Skyle breathed in ragged pants, closing his eyes in a vain attempt to get ahold of his roiling emotions.

He felt lost and lonely, but even more so, he felt devastated. He knew it had been a dream, yet it had felt so real he could have willingly spent an entire lifetime to turn it into reality. The girl, Skyle realized, may have been a dream but his emotions, they had been as real as they come.

His sense of wonder at her beauty; his thrill at her touch upon his skin; the wild beating of his heart when her gaze rested upon him. They were all memories that burned so intensely in his mind that it was no wonder he had a fever, with sweat still trickling down his skin.

Never had Skyle thought he would turn into a lovesick fool, but that was exactly what he was now. Not only that, but the most tragic and pathetic part of it all was that he had fallen for a dream, a mere fantasy. A shard of his imagination had cut away a piece of his soul, and even now, for perhaps forever after, he would gaze upon a world that lay gray and desolate, woefully inadequate and hopelessly incomplete.

Maybe the most maddening thing, adding insult to injury, was the fact that Skyle had not even asked for her name.

“Hi, my name is Skyle,” the small boy whispered to nobody, his back slumping down in abject defeat. The kind that comes only when you’ve lost the fight before you ever had the chance to even try. Why couldn’t he say this simple line when he had the chance?

“What’s your name?” he finished miserably, his legs finally collapsing under him as he slowly sank down.

“.. R..a..”

Startled, Skyle’s head immediately perked up as his eyes began to search frantically through the darkness.

“What?” he called out, his voice cracking with emotion as he struggled to keep the drumming of his heartbeat down in his own ears so he could hear the response.

“Ria.”

The words were barely audible, so faint that he began to wonder if he had imagined it. Such faint words, how could he have heard them over the howling of the wind all around him? It was impossible, his mind playing petty tricks on him again.

“Skyle, I’m Ria.”

The words were distinct and unmistakable this time, and though for some reason his confused mind couldn’t tell whether this voice was high or low, husky or sharp, all he knew was that this was the most beautiful voice he had heard in his whole life.

“Ria,” Skyle finally said, slowly, tentatively.

“Ria.” In this second repetition he took his time, almost as though savoring each letter and begrudging every sound as if he might accidentally wear it down.

“Ria,” Skyle whispered a third time, and though his lips barely moved and not even his ears could hear the echo of his voice, he was somehow convinced she could hear him. Because even in the vast emptiness of the night, he could hear her voice loud and clear, whispering to his heart. “Will I see you again?”

Laughter, that tinkling sound of bells and crystals singing in a gentle breeze washed over him, sparking a smile of his own.

It was the only answer he received, yet it was enough.