Boelik, Page 3

  “So, do you know where he might be?” Helena asked, going over to a shelf filled with the vials, lifting and turning some to better inspect their contents.

  “No, I lost the trail some while back.”

  “Well, then I have just the thing,” Helena said, bringing over a golden liquid in a small gourd-shaped vial. “Hold this, please.”

  “Okay,” Olea said, carefully taking the bottle between her hands.

  Helena grabbed a long, twisted stick from where it leaned against a workbench.

  “Why are you bringing a stick?”

  “Staff,” Helena corrected. “I’m a white witch, dear.” She walked over to Olea’s side and held her around the waist. “Now, drink the vial and imagine your Bo on his given path. We should appear a few strides ahead of him, so be prepared to step aside.”

  Olea looked over at her and nodded, uncorking the vial and downing it. She closed her eyes and envisioned Bo. A breeze churned around her and there was a bout of nausea for a moment, and then both were gone. Opening her eyes, she and Helena instantly parted as Bo ran through them, skidding to a stop.

  “Olea?” he exclaimed, breathless, whipping around.

  “Bo!” she cried, throwing her arms around him. He started at her touch.

  “What are you doing here?” he asked as he refrained from returning the embrace.

  “Helping you. This is Helena; she helped me find you.”

  Helena did a little wave as Bo peered over at her. “Hello. Now, I believe we have a prince to throw off?” Bo and Olea separated and nodded. “All right then. Now, hide behind those bushes, both of you,” she commanded, pointing to some bushes next to a broad tree. “I’ll be up in the branches of this tree. Don’t come out until I tell you to, and then seem as threatening as you can.”

  “What are you going to do?” Bo asked.

  “I’m going to shake a powder from my staff that I mixed to scare off troublemakers. It makes a person see anything as its most horrifying possibility. For example, I would seem a horrid black witch,” Helena said with a mischievous smirk.

  Bo nodded. “I understand. You don’t want us to fear one another.”

  “Right. Naturally, the effects wear off after some time, but by then you may have damaged the way you see one another.” In a moment, the trio heard crashing coming from the surrounding forest and heading straight for them. “Hurry!” Helena hissed, sprinting to the tree and rushing upward.

  The three got into their spots and hid, keeping even their breaths to a minimum. Soon Mar and his paladins were in earshot, and the horses had come to a halt. “Where is it?” Mar yelled. Bo tensed beside Olea, who sidled closer to him and stifled a whimper. The leaves almost completely blocked the pair’s view. “Where did the creature go?”

  “I don’t know, sir. The tracks seem to end here.”

  “Then it must be—” Mar was interrupted by a bout of coughing, and his men soon joined him. Even the horses began to sneeze.

  “Now!” Helena’s voice came. Bo and Olea jumped up and jerked around, trying to look as frightening as possible. Bo even made animalistic noises that alone would have scared Olea. The men and horses screamed, immediately bolting in the other direction.

  Once sure that the hunters were gone, the trio regrouped on the ground, the stars winking into existence in the dusk. Crickets surrounded the group, their chirping filling the air.

  “We did it,” Olea sighed.

  “Barely,” Bo said. Helena smacked him on the shoulder with her staff. “Ow! What was that for?” he growled, shooting her a glare.

  “What do you say to the lady?” Helena pressed, unperturbed by Bo’s cranky face.

  Bo looked at Olea, the irritation already gone from his gaze. “Thank you for the assistance.”

  “You’re welcome,” she replied, coming over and leaning against his left side, putting his clawed arm over her shoulder.

  “I’m glad you aren’t afraid of me,” he mumbled. He pressed his face to the top of her head and closed his eyes as he breathed her scent.

  “Why would I be afraid of the man I love?” she said softly, burying her face in his fur in turn.

  Helena gazed upon them quietly, a small smile on her face. She came over to Bo and whispered a proposal in his other ear. He looked at her and nodded, a sparkle in his hazel eyes. He turned his eyes back to the exhausted Olea beside him and gave a soft smile.

  Bo whispered back to the witch, “We will do it by my creek,” and gave her directions. “Olea?” Bo asked then, turning to his friend.

  “Yes, Bo?” she said, her voice muffled through his fur. She turned her face so that one of her warm brown eyes was visible.

  “Would you like to stay with me, at least for the night?”

  Olea nodded. Then, “Bo?”

  “Yes?”

  “Your things are about where you entered the forest in the chase.”

  “All right.”

  Olea stifled a yawn as she glanced over to Helena. “Thank you.”

  Helena nodded once, a smile on her face.

  “Let’s get you home,” Bo said, sweeping Olea off of her feet, startling her to full wakefulness.

  “I can walk,” she protested. “And what about Helena?”

  “Already home,” Helena said, disappearing before them in an instant, only an echo of her voice remaining to vouch for her existence.

  “All right,” Olea relented.

  As Bo carried her to his home, he hummed a lullaby to her to put her to sleep. He was careful not to jostle her too much as he walked. Her hair cascaded over his arm as he cradled her head, and he found that for the first time in a long time, he felt like he belonged where he was.

  When Bo finally put her in his bed, she was deeply asleep. He smiled and went to fetch his things from where Olea said they were, returning quickly and putting the wolf fur over her as a blanket. He pulled a separate deer hide from the shed and put it on the floor to sleep on that beside her.

  In the morning, Bo was up at dawn and found the wolf fur draped over him and Olea sitting up in bed. “Up so early? You seemed exhausted,” he yawned.

  “I was. But light shone onto my face from a crack.”

  “Oh, that’s right. I’m sorry; I usually use that to rouse me so I can make the most of the day.” Bo sat up and stretched from the hide. Looking out toward the leaks of sun from the walls, he asked, “Would you like to come with me on a walk?”

  “Yes,” Olea replied. The two got up, and Bo put on his cloak with the fox clasp over his left arm as usual. Olea stared at him, one eyebrow raised. He looked himself up and down before giving her a quizzical scowl in return. She rolled her eyes and adjusted the navy cloak so that it was even on both sides.

  Outside, the two walked to the creek, where Olea took a seat and Bo sat next to her. She was on his left. “Would you marry me?” he asked, his heart full of unfounded fear.

  “Of course,” Olea replied, leaning against him without the slightest hesitation.

  He grinned, his heart now lighter than air, and shouted to the woods as he wrapped his arms around her. “She said she would!”

  “Bo!” she laughed. Suddenly, Helena appeared before them, emerging from behind a large oak. “Helena!”

  “Hello, dear. So, you said yes, did you?”

  Olea grinned at Bo, who beamed back. “I did.”

  “Well, would you like to take your vows?”

  “Oh, yes, please!” Olea said.

  The pair stood and took their vows with Helena as their priestess, the birds singing in the branches as the light of the sun cascaded through the trees. They kissed to tie their bonds, and as Olea leaned back, she grinned with sparkling eyes as she looked into Bo’s. “And they lived…”

  Bo grinned. “…happily ever after.”

  ***

  Olea sat at the table Bo had crafted for the new cottage he built in the first year of their union, her hand on her growing belly as she stared at the hearth. Bo sat on the other side, sharpe
ning his knife. The only sounds in the cabin were the crackling of the fire and the sound of Bo’s knife as he struck it against the whet stone in a practiced rhythm.

  “Bo, I know you won’t age like me,” she said without warning. Bo looked up at her from the other side of the table, his eyes wide with surprise, his carving knife poised for another strike against the stone. Olea only gazed down at her belly with loving eyes. “In only five years I can see that.”

  “Yes?”

  “So, how much older are you than I?” Olea asked.

  Bo sighed and put his blade and stone on the table. “You are of five and twenty years, correct?” Olea nodded, eyes shining with curiosity. “I am only about ten years ahead of you.”

  “Ten! You look no further than three.”

  Bo shrugged. “That’s when I stopped seeming to age.”

  “Well, then, will you outlive me?”

  “Surely.”

  “Our child?”

  Bo nodded.

  “And further?”

  Bo finally looked away, his hazel eyes dark. “I will live for a very, very long time if it is only age that tries to take me.”

  “But you don’t want to?”

  Bo met her gaze, his hazel eyes level with her brown ones. “If I were to die, and our child after comparatively few years, would you want to continue to live?”

  Olea broke eye contact this time, giving another motherly glance at her belly. “I suppose not. No; I know I would not.” Bo sat back in his chair with a sigh and put a hand through his long hair. “But Bo, you could watch over our children,” Olea suggested. He tilted his head, and she laughed at how he looked like a wondering puppy.

  “What do you mean, Olea?”

  “I mean, you can watch our children after I am gone. And their children after them. You can be a family protector,” she insisted. Bo leaned forward and put his elbow on the table, his human hand holding his chin as he thought.

  “It would be a long time before you saw me again.”

  “I would wait. I am patient. And I could watch over you.”

  “I’d miss you,” Bo admitted after a moment, an apologetic smirk on his face.

  “And I would miss you,” Olea agreed. “But you’d see us both in every child, if you looked. So you could always see me, whenever you wanted to.” Bo’s mouth twitched into a smile.

  “How did I end up with such a lovely woman?” he asked.

  “You asked,” Olea replied with a grin.

  Bo stood and leaned over the small table to give her a peck on the forehead. “And I received. I’ll be back in time for dinner,” he said as he stood back and donned his two cloaks.

  “Going hunting?”

  “Of course. How do you feel about rabbit for tomorrow?”

  “I feel like it would go wonderfully with some fresh vegetables if they’d grow quickly enough.”

  “We’ve only just finished planting the seeds. It might be a while before we get anything worth eating.”

  “I know. But you did ask how I felt about rabbit.” Her eyes sparkled playfully in the light of the candle that sat on the table.

  Bo grinned. “I’ll be back soon.” And he opened the door to head out.

  True to his word, Bo was back by dinnertime. His silver hand carried two rabbits as he walked back into his grove. He put the prey in the little shed, glancing over at his old house. It was tiny, with hardly enough room to stretch. It was also quite pitiful in appearance, with a barrier of branches as a door and cracks everywhere.

  Inside he’d had a small place for his pelt-bed, a place to pace, and a chair to sit on while he carved whatever he needed along with the little figures that he crafted to talk to from time to time. He’d taken the chair to the new home. The little figures were long burned—often the night they were made—though Bo had made a few for Olea now.

  He turned away to look over at his new home. It was a stark contrast to the little hovel he’d built. This home was far larger: with room enough for a bed of hide, an area to cook indoors, a place to sit and eat, and room enough to dance on Olea’s whim.

  It held a stew pot and fireplace, and Bo had made a table and another chair. Any cracks in the walls were filled with clay, the door was a real door, and Bo could at last stretch his arms indoors.

  Bo walked inside and saw Olea tending the stew. He was thankful that she’d returned to the village and gotten supplies from her parents. Of course, Mar hadn’t come back through the village after he was scared off, so it was easy enough to convince the villagers that he’d killed Bo and given up on her as a wife. Then she managed to convince them that she’d married a farmer not far from the village, and Bo had bartered for a calf with the wolf pelt, and he traded the calf for Olea.

  Of course, Bo being ‘dead’ meant that he had had to have Olea remake his deals with the skinner and tanner in his place, and that she had to act as though he were a sickly sort of man. This was the only way the people would not question her coming alone every time she came into the village. But it still gave her pleasure to visit her family on those trips, and it was that alone that kept Bo from moving again.

  Olea turned from the fire with a smile as Bo entered, her lithe form broken by the lump in her belly. Her golden hair was lit up by the fire behind, which was now the only light in the house, and Bo smiled at her while he replaced the door behind him. She glanced down at his hand and her smile disappeared, replaced with a raised, speculating eyebrow and a hand on her hip. Bo looked at his now-crimson-furred hand, covered in rabbit’s blood.

  “Boelik?”

  “Yes?” he replied sheepishly, avoiding her eyes.

  “Wash yourself before you eat, please.”

  “Right,” Bo said, an abashed smile on his face. He moved over to the little urn of water beside the table and dipped his hand in, rubbing the other over it for a minute before pulling it out relatively clean. He looked over at Olea quizzically and held it up to show her. She nodded.

  “Now we can eat,” she said. She ladled some stew into a bowl and handed it to Bo. He set it at Olea’s place at the table and then came back to get the second bowl, which he sat down with. Olea came soon after and they ate in patient silence for a while.

  “The sun will set soon. Do you want to go out and see it?” Bo asked near the end of the meal.

  Olea swallowed the mouthful of stew she had before answering. “I think that would be wonderful.” Bo nodded.

  After another few moments of silence, Olea asked, “Was the hunting good today?”

  “Oh, yes. I’m sorry about the blood from earlier as well. I’ll change the water tomorrow.”

  “Speaking of tomorrow, could we go to the apple orchard? I think that they should be ripe enough about now.”

  “Of course. But remember that a basket does not make a good weapon.” Bo’s eyes glinted playfully at Olea in the dim light from across the table.

  “You cruel man,” Olea squeaked, indignant, though a grin was breaking out over her face. “That is five years past!”

  Bo laughed. “But I clearly remember. That basket was certainly quite durable for the situation.”

  “Well, now I have you, I don’t need to worry about that, do I?”

  “Not anymore.”

  It wasn’t long before dinner was finished. In fact, it was just in time for the two to take the path out of the forest and sit on the hill at the edge of the forest as the sun set. Olea rested her head on Bo’s shoulder as they basked in the light of the blazing sky. A breeze made the trees whisper behind them and made the grass ahead appear as though it crashed in waves like a great, fiery ocean.

  “You realize I wouldn’t trade a day of this life for anything, don’t you?” Olea whispered.

  “I know,” Bo replied, putting his arm around her and pulling her close. He gently laid his other hand on her belly. He couldn’t help worrying if he would be a good father, or if his child would be twisted like himself.

  And Olea was very good at picking out his doubts
. “You’ll be just fine,” she said. She put her own hand over Bo’s. He sighed. “She’s almost here, you know.”

  “She?” Bo asked, blinking at her. Olea was still gazing out at the sunset but nodded against his shoulder.

  “Maybe a he, too.”

  “Two?”

  “Yes, Bo. Two. Twins.”

  “How long?” Bo was getting excited, and Olea could hear it. She laughed.

  “Around a fortnight, perhaps? I don’t know exactly; they’ll come when they’re ready, whether or not we are.”

  “Then I suppose I should do this now,” he grinned, standing and bringing her to her feet with him.

  “Bo?”

  “May I have this dance with you?” Bo asked, pulling her close.

  “I’m not sure. Can you keep up?” Olea challenged, brown eyes sparkling. The two separated and wound around each other, Bo’s voice humming a melody for their steps. They moved lightly as birds as they danced, Olea’s laugh rising in the air. The wind wound around them, leading them in their joy.

  As the sun disappeared completely, Bo pulled his tired wife to him. He kissed her, showing his love as she’d taught him how. “You realize,” she said, pulling away from him, “you weren’t this good when we got married.”

  “Well, that was my first kiss.”

  ***

  It was a week later when Bo went hunting again. He sensed that ground animals were becoming something of a mindless tedium at dinner, so he decided he’d go find some nesting quail for both fowl and eggs. He headed out to the fields where he and his wife would watch the sunset to search. The sun was beginning to set, and still Bo had not found his quarry. He wandered further still, out to the plains where he was sure he would find some of his prize. The trees groaned from the woods as a howling wind began to stir, and thunder cracked overhead. Determined to find something, he continued a bit further.

  Sheets of rain began to fall before Bo decided that the hunt was off for today. Thunder cracked again, and he thought he heard something else in the rumble. He paused for a moment, letting himself get soaked as he listened under the wind and rain. The sound came again and sent him into a sprint for home.