“Would you like a cup of tea?” Neera asked from the kitchen. Theo had asked her if he could go into each room of the house to ‘ensure its safety’, although she had no idea what that meant. Did he think the person that had attacked them by the tracks would come look for her? How would they even find her among the couple of hundreds of thousands of inhabitants in Trieste?
“No, thank you, I’m almost done” was his reply coming from the utility room.
Neera made a cup of tea for herself and went to her bedroom to get changed, her clothes uncomfortable after the long day. She slipped into her nightwear, put on a dressing gown and sat on the bed sipping tea, going over the events of the evening in her head.
On the tenth anniversary of her break up with Theo, she meets him again in the very same spot; they get attacked by a cloaked figure that screeches inhumanly; Theo faces them by himself and tells her to seek refuge at Andrea’s, who is obviously also involved somehow; Theo makes it out of the fight unscathed and takes her home, searching every room to make sure it is ‘safe’? None of this made any sense to her. She lifted her hand up to massage her temple, feeling a headache popping up.
After a dozen minutes, there was a soft knock on her door. “Come in, Theo,” she called out, marvelling at hearing herself saying those words after all this time.
Theo came in, looking a bit uncomfortable and... apologetic? She could not be sure.
“I think I should explain a couple of things,” he started.
Without a word, Neera nodded at the armchair in front of the bed. He sat in silence for a few minutes, looking out the window while recollecting his thoughts. Then he began.
“Neera, I’m sorry. It's my fault you were in danger tonight.” A pause. Neera was confused: how could it be his fault? Why does he look so worried anyway, we don’t mean anything to each other anymore, right?...
“It’s my fault. Nyr, there are some things that I kept from you. Things that perhaps I should have told you over ten years ago, but couldn’t bring myself to... I was a coward, still am. I’m still afraid to tell you the truth because I’m afraid you will look at me differently." He let out a soft chuckle. “But perhaps you hate me already so it shouldn’t make a difference. Plus, you are entitled to the truth, since it concerns you as well.” Worry clouded his features, and she tensed in anticipation, clutching the cup in her lap.
“I don’t know where to start.” He sighed. “What you see, Nyr, is not all there is,” he settled on, cryptically. She looked at him confused, so he continued, “There is a side to the world that normal humans cannot see. We call it the Veil. It’s actually a different world altogether. The Veil is populated by all sorts of creatures with... magical powers, if you will. These creatures used to leave in peace, but, one day, a dark force possessed a powerful mage, who turned evil: the Dark King. One of his powers is that to create soldiers at his service, the pawns, restless spirits that only know hunger, and hunt for the living. They have no material body in our world... they look something like smoke cladded in dark cloaks.”
“That thing that attacked us by the tracks... you think that was a 'pawn’?”
He nodded. “They don’t usually cross over from the Veil. The Dark King keeps them by his side in there, to help maintain his reign of terror. But when there is an unstable source of magic in our world, they manage to filter through.”
Shaking her head to make sense of all these absurdities, she murmured, “Theo, nothing you are saying is believable in the slightest. Are you sure you haven’t knocked your head in the scuffle?”
“I’m afraid I’m telling you the truth, Neera. It is your choice to believe it or not.”
“Okay, let’s say, for the sake of argument, that the Veil and the pawns exist,” she said sceptically. He looked at her patiently, waiting for her to continue. “Why would any of this be your fault?”
His head dropped in shame. Choosing his words very carefully, he finally answered. “I could have told you all this ten years ago, but decided against it.” He lifted his gaze and looked her in the eye. “I should have told you, so that you would have been able to make your own choice. Instead, I presumptuously made the choice for you.”
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