"It's dead." It's the first thing I hear when I gain my consciousness back. My eyelids are heavy and my body feels numb. The first thing I see is black luscious leather which has some wrinkles here and there signaling it's an aged one. By the brightness of the light I can tell it's about sunset. The temperature dropped, getting colder and I wonder for how long I have passed out.
"What should we do?"
I raise my head and I figure out I was placed in the backseat of another car. I look out of the window and I see a figure beside Zagan. His back is facing me and he's occupied with touching some parts of our car's engine.
"We leave it here." His voice is soft and sweet compared to Zagan's. They tried to understand why the car stopped working, but they failed and couldn't fix it, so they want to abandon it in the middle of the woods.
"We can't leave it here." I voice out opening the door dragging my body to stand up. When my legs hit the ground, I hiss griping the car door for stability and I straighten my back hoping I'll survive the process. Both young men divert their attention to me.
He has dirty blond hair and light brown eyes. He got a beautiful tan and I also spot a tattoo on his right cheek. He has three horizontal lines. One shorter than the other and the tattoo is relatively small but at the same time extremely obvious. I wonder what he wanted to express by staining his skin with black ink and enduring the pain just for three simple lines. It must have a deep meaning, a beautiful memory he doesn't want to forget or a sad one, a reminder of something, maybe somebody. Whatever it is, he deeply treasure it.
"How are you feeling?" He smiles looking at me and I can't help but smile back.
Maybe sometime, in the future, I'll have him open up to me and satisfy my curiosity about the meaning behind his tree lines tattoo.
"If you became deaf now, I'll just call that wolf to finish his business." Zagan mocks me and I look at him titling my head to the side.
"I'm not deaf." I spat.
"Then I have no excuse to get rid of you." I open my mouth and closed it right after having nothing to say. My mind couldn't process a good comeback for his words. In exchange I puff and the boy interrupt us.
"My name is Dakho." He walks up extending his hand for me to shake it.
"Isla." I respond raising my hand. His smile drops and he pulls his hand back quickly turning his head to look the other side. My hand remains extended in the air towards him for a couple more seconds and I let it drop by my side hesitantly. I glance towards Zagan and I see he became tense while watching the scene. He's ready to start a fight with him any moment now.
When he takes a step forward I shake my head to let him know that everything is alright and he shouldn't do anything. He stares at me with a sour expression on his face as he retreats, refraining whatever he wanted to do.
"We shouldn't leave the car in the middle of the woods." Dakho turns his gaze my way looking somehow surprised. He must have been deeply lost in the thoughts I might have woken up from, some memories he wasn't expected to confront with today.
"I can't fix it and it's getting dark. The woods are not safe for us to stay in any longer." He says coldly backing away from me. No trace of the kind smile he had seconds ago visible on his features. I flinch at his tone and close my eyes for a second, opening them in time to catch Zagan marching fast past me. I react quickly grabbing his wrist pulling his body towards mine with all the force I had left.
Stumbling I grip his waist with my other hand quickly trying to balance myself.
"Don't." I say loud enough only for him to hear. He has a blank expression on and stares at Dakho, watching eagerly his every move.
I cup his cheeks making him look at me. Beautiful bright blue eyes bored immediately into mine, his gaze softening the next moment. A small smile takes over my face. I learned along the years about the effect I have on him, the fact that I can relax and comfort him just by looking in his eyes. It makes my inner self beaming with happiness every time that happens.
Whenever he got in fights nobody could have stop him. Not his teachers, not his friends, not his father. Nobody but me. That's why we spent many of the afternoons in detention after school. The teachers would drag me along to be there to stop Zagan if he decides to throw a tantrum and lose it again.
He sighs putting a hand on the back of my neck bringing our bodies closer to each other. I look up at him through my lashes letting my hands fall on his chest.
His fingers curl in my hair and he lean toward me placing a soft kiss on my forehead. I close my eyes enjoying his warmth and I feel his hands sneaking around my waist pulling me in his chest tightening his grip around me. He sighs again as I put my hands around his waist stroking his back.
"Let's just go." I whisper in the nape of his neck and I feel him nodding in my hair right after leaning his chin on my head. His mood swings don't fail to amaze me every time.
One second he acts like one of the most dangerous criminals his gaze leaving holes in your soul and his fists leaving marks all over your body, but everything changes the following moment when he's acting all soft and childlike waking up the need of protectiveness towards him.
His impulsivity is reckless and if someone or something provokes him in any way, he'll lose it and become aggressive.
He's the kind of man you'll both want to let him take over you, do whatever he wants with you and at the same time you'll try to defeat him, try to go against him. The man you'll both love and hate passionately at the same time. The one you'll scream about how much you hate the fact you love him right in his face, the one that'll be the end of you.
I giggle and he smiles breaking the hug and pushing a few strands of my hair back from my face. His eyes searching mine for a hint to give away the fact that Dakho's behaviour hurt me, so he can punch some sense and manners into him. I smile wider and gesture him to get in the car.
"Next time I won't let it pass." He beams earning a roll eyes from me and gets in the backseat of the car dragging me right after him.
-
Along the ride I occasionally caught Dakho glancing at me and averting his gaze immediately after we would make eye contact. In the car was a tense silence. All we heard were Zagan's puffs and huffs every time the car would shake because of the road. It was no secret all of us felt uncomfortable.
"I'm sorry." Dakho voices out and I turn my head to watch him through the rear view mirror. "I don't know why I reacted like that." He says softly and I was very close to not hear it.
"I don't blame you at all for your reaction." I understand him, I really do. He didn't expect me to come here, I think he didn't expect to ever meet me so his reaction was understandable and I had it worse, much worse.
"I do." Zagan scoffs and I glare at him shutting him down before he could make another comment. Rolling his eyes he turns to look outside the window and I glace at Dakho one more time only to see him being more comfortable with the situation than before.
We pass by a cemetery which has orange flowers all over the place. People placed them on every grave, and I see some elderly people switching the old and wilted flowers with new ones. I have never seen something like this. In all the cemeteries I went before people would bring different types of flowers for the loved ones. They wanted the place to be as colourful as it could possibly get.
But this looked just beautiful.
"They are Tiger flowers." He probably saw me being mesmerized by them, by their color, by the exquisite sky. It started to look like a Tiger flower, both orange and pink colors blending each other perfectly, by the view, by absolutely everything.
"Is there any meaning to them?" Zagan asks very intrigued by the flower.
"There is a story." He said and I hum. "The story is about a young couple. They loved each other so much that they wanted to get married. When they told people about their relationship and plans everyone was against them to be together."
"Why?" I furrow my eyebrows in confusion.
"Because she was a werewolf and he was a witch." I whine, I already can tell I don't like the story. "They were thinking that their love was strong enough but when her soulmate showed up, she choose her soulmate over him without any hesitation. She got married to the wolf instead and the witch killed himself." Dakho explained.
I gulp. My stomach turned upside down and I feel my head start spinning again.
"She found him the next morning in her garden. Apparently that place had some meaning for them." I take a deep breath and close my eyes for a second. That was too much to take in at once.
It's risky for witches to fall in love with wolves because even if they swear to love them one day, the following one their soulmate shows up and they forget all the love they promised the other person, just like they have never felt it, like it was never there.
It's their wolf instinct and they can't suppress it. It is said that the most happiest moment for a wolf is when they meet their soulmate. It is said that their soulmated becomes everything for them right the second they meet.
"He was stupid." Zagan scoffs breaking into my thoughts.
"He was in love." I defended him.
"Even if the soulmated hasn't showed up than, he would have died anyway."
"You can't know that." I spat. I am sensitive about these subjects, about people getting hurt to the point where love hurt them so bad that they end up hurting themselves. I have never blamed them, but I didn't understand them either. How can one end up thinking their life means nothing without their partner? That they have no future and their life isn't worth it after their partner leaves.
"Wolves are possessive, love, you know that. If they fall in love, then they want that person to be claimed as theirs so nobody will touch them." He tells me softly, placing his hand on my right knee rubbing slow circles on it.
"That's right. It's risky for a witch and a wolf to have sex. Plus the wolf will suffer to love their partner without being able to mark them." Dakho continue. "And a witch will die if the wolf attempts the marking." He sighs sadly.
"They will always choose the wolf." I sigh. I knew that but the story pulled some strings in me and it makes me angry and sad at the same time. The fact that someone can forget so easily about the person they said they love with all their hearts the next moment when someone else appears is just disgusting.
"It's just how it is." I nod at what Zagan says and I look out the window again.
"She put Tiger flowers on his grave. They were his favourite flowers." I look back at the orange color of the flowers in the distance. The view which was fascinating me a couple seconds ago makes my heart ache now. "We started to think of them as a symbol of love." I feel Zagan applying pressure on my knee.
"Love, you shouldn't worry. There's no way you'll fall for one of those heinous creatures."