18.2

“I’m back,” young John announced as he arrived at an isolated house that was far removed from the town and roads he had traveled from since the incident by the mansion.

 

Ephinelyth, curious to what happened between the beastkin girl and John, followed him back.

She had seen people who bore guilt and shame the size of the sky—her father, Kharston was just a prime example of this—to see a boy who was around her age already have such a burden cast on him was something that baffled her.

The beastkin girl, Serene did not blame him for her own mother’s death. Yet the young boy seemed to have felt responsible for it despite having no involvement in it.

 

As he went back to what Ephinelyth presumed to be his home, she kept a keen eye on him as she watched from the skies with detection magic.

 

John pushed past the main door, closing it as he quickly slid out from his shoes before he threw his book filled bag aside by the doorstep.

 

Tap, tap, tap.

 

His quick footsteps could be loudly heard in this lonely house.

“Kahnira?” his boyish voice could be heard echoing in the lonely halls of the bungalow house he was assigned to. His footsteps slowed when he realized that there was no reply to his voice.

“She’s still in the markets…” a lonely remark left his lips. “I should have stopped there on the way back earlier.”

Whisking his loneliness, his mind imagined a silly scenario of meeting up with the maid of his residence in the markets, whereby he would help her carry the groceries on their way back together.

“I should do something,” John went to where the study room was, pausing before the room and stopped himself. “I’ve finish reading ‘Unfounded Ancient Myths’ in class, that’s enough reading for today. School work can suck an egg…so…”

 

His thoughts suddenly went back to what happened with Serene earlier, as soon a deep frown appeared on his face, he quickly exited the house and ran into the open yard.

He halted when he reached the end of the well-maintained meadow of grass, squatted and focused his eyes on the various plants that the yard was filled with.

 

What is he doing? On moment his emotions are here, the next he just…decides to watch grass?!

Since she was high up above, Ephinelyth could only hear and feel John’s general movement with her magic, but when he suddenly squatted for seemingly no reason, she too had suddenly taken an interest in what young John was seeing.

She could read deeper his mind if she pried, but there was no telling what harm would come to him if she decided to do so in her human form. As she herself could barely control her powers, she was not about to risk hurting an innocent boy like him for her selfish desires to uncover John and Serene’s history that was in his deeper conscious.

For all intent and purposes, she wanted to observe this boy as much as she could without interfering with his daily life.

Her flight altitude gradually lowered as she quietly moved

 

“Hah… it’s not here today…” John whispered slowly as his hands moved about where he was looking at. “What a pity…”

 

What is not?

 

Ephinelyth inched closer to him, reducing their distance until she was floating about only an inch away from his broad shoulders.

Still, the Elder Dragon could not see what John was looking at nor detect a single thought from John that hinted at the thing he was referring to.

 

It was at that moment, his mind went blank. All his surface thoughts had completely vanished from her telepathic detection.

 

Decided that she had enough of wondering what the boy was focused on Ephinelyth placed her body against the ground and mimicked John.

Following his actions to uncover the mysterious item that he was so keenly obsessed over.

Finally, she got a clear view of what John was looking at.

 

On the skirts of the garden, laid a patch of freshly dug soil…

 

That was it.

 

A fresh patch of soil that had neither plants nor insects and the like in it. A needlessly boring patch of fresh fertile soil that held no meaning nor visual interest to anyone.

 

It was what John threw all his attention to.

 

“What—” ridiculed by what John’s fascination with a patch of fresh soil Ephinelyth accidentally let out her voice in frustration, almost berating at the boy for finding amusement in such mundane matters.

 

A curve formed on John’s lips the moment Ephinelyth let out her dainty voice.

“I knew it!” John exclaimed in his mind as his head turned towards Ephinelyth’s general direction, moving his gaze frantically as he turned to locate the source of her voice he heard earlier. “Hello, is someone here?”

 

!!!

 

With her presence at the verge of discovery, Ephinelyth’s eyes widened, she thought of to fly away with her magic but remained deadly still as John tried locating her presence.

 

He tricked me!? How did he sense I am here!?

 

“Hello?” John took a few steps about where he was squatting at, doing his upmost to find out who was with him, face lit with boyish curiosity. “Someone is there, right?”

 

…

 

…

 

…

 

Ephinelyth remained still, keeping her breath—to which she is able to do so for 10 minutes with ease. Keeping her brilliant blue eyes on John, watchful of his actions as she waited for his next course of action.

With each second that passed, his boyish grin abated.

A heavy emotion that inflated his heart in no time.

A scorn adorned his face, his thick eyebrows squinted as his fists clenched. His was still looking around the viscinity of the garden, but his goal had changed.

 

“A tool… I need something…”

All of a sudden, visions of John wielding a garden spade dripped in flesh and blood surged into Ephinelyth’s mind.

“An intruder is here, they are going to get me and Kahnira, I’ll have to—”

 

“Wait!!!” Ephinelyth’s voice halted John’s thoughts, ceasing the horrible the visions that appeared in his mind. “I-I…am not an intruder.”

 

Reminded by what happened back at her cave with her mother, Ephinelyth removed the invisible magic that she had on herself, raising her two arms into the air as she revealed her presence to him.

“I am here…” Ephinelyth muttered. “So, please calm down…”

She understood his intentions of defending what is deemed to be home. Like herself, she understood John’s innate desire to defend what was precious to him.

In John’s case it was a person named Kahnira.

Hence, even if she were much more powerful than he was, the fact remained that she had followed him from earlier all the way back to his abode.

In that sense, she was certainly in the wrong.

 

“Woah…” John’s mouth made a circle, his eyes crinkled at the sight of the dainty girl with silver hair, “...ahaha...ha, t-this…”

His hands pointed from his own forehead and gestured towards Ephinelyth repeatedly who had her head lowered in shame.

“W-what… H-how...did you get so close without me noticing…” his head shook, “No, I-I…I…”

John’s tongue was tied up into a knot.

Who is this person? What’s up with her silver hair? Are they made of metal?

 

Ephinelyth was frozen, all she could do now was to avert her eyes away from the boy as he observed her like a mad researcher.

 

Thud.

 

Falling to the ground with fist pounding against the ground John howled, “Ahahahaha!!! W-what is someone like you doing here?”

Ephinelyth could only cock her head as to observe the frantic behavior of this curious boy. One moment he thought of her as an intruder, the next he found her to be a silly girl that trespassed his property.

“Oh my, ahahaha, I thought someone was out to get me!!! Turns out it is just a pretty girl like you, hahaha!!!”

His infectious laugh was enough to undo her state of shock, drawing a smile to Ephinelyth herself.

Even she herself can’t stop the jubilant emotions that the boy stirred up in her.

“Ufufu, you are a silly person,” Ephinelyth giggled, speaking directly to John as she got closer to where John had fallen to, sitting opposite of him as John quickly composed himself.

“I-I am not!” John denied as he dusted the dirt that he had gotten on his clothes. “I was just glad its just a harmless girl instead of…”

“...nefarious people.” John thought the rest of the sentence to himself before quickly turning his gaze back to the girl.

A cheeky grin found his face as he spoke, “If anyone is silly, it’s the girl with the silver hair who was stalking me!!!” finger pointing at Ephinelyth as he made his witty remark.

“I was not! I was merely curious and followed you back—”

“Ha!!! That’s exactly what a creepy person would do!” John said triumphantly. “Sheesh, you’re just one hardcore stalker!”

“Not that I think you’re any bad. A cute girl like you should be harmless.”

Ephinelyth drew her lips, trying her best to suppress her smile from hearing John’s inner thoughts.

“Anyhow, how long have you been stalking me?” still maintaining his jesty voice, John changed the topic, a subtle sharpness carried in his words. “Is there any reason you’ve ended up where I live?”

“But I still need to know why you are here, lady. If you are here to hurt my Kahnira...”

Ephinelyth made a frown when John’s mental image shifted.

Somehow, her heart tinged at his words, she knew that if John had seen her earlier this morning with the person named Celian Agnes, he would have labeled her as an immediate threat.

“State your business here, stalker.”

John’s internal voice was solemn, though his face wore a bright smile, his hidden thoughts caused Ephinelyth to clench her body in fear, in fear that she might after all be in the wrong for what she did earlier today.

 

“I…” Ephinelyth struggled to get her voice out, she felt though her heart would jump the more she heard John’s internal voice.

 

The boy standing before her asking the simple question of why she was here caused the Ephinelyth to reevaluate her actions up until so far.

The realization that she might have after all been unjustly rude to Celian Agnes caused her to clam up.

That she, despite her being a jury that judges others for their faults and nonchalantly wiped their minds as she please, Ephinelyth in fact was the one who was needed to be judged the most.

Her parents had allocated a cave a distance away from where the other dragons lived to alleviate her from being flooded by the constant stream of thoughts of other people.

While she happily accepted her cave as her new abode, she never once realized the consequences upon those whose mind she had wiped.

She intellectually understood their lives would be uprooted, but when John’s extreme caution towards her did Ephinelyth understand why she her mother had insisted on her controlling her powers, to reprimand her for having attacked Celian Agnes without forethought.

Had her mother not been there to undo her wrongs, how many more mistakes would Ephinelyth commit before realizing that she, in the end, was the one responsible for each of her thoughts and actions.

Like how she attacked Celian Agnes, she also followed John back to his abode, and in his words, was a ‘stalker’.

 

“I don’t know…” a sad croak came out of Ephinelyth. “I too am very confused, I don’t mean to threaten or harm you… I apologize if I”

 

“Ah… I must have said something unnecessary.” Seeing Ephinelyth’s change in emotion John lowered his head. “My bad, I didn’t mean to—”

 

“You have no need to apologize, I was the one who followed you back.”

“Being a stalker, you mean…” John jammed yet another cheeky remark, but this time, he intended to cheer her up.

Ephinelyth rolled her eyes with a wry smile, “Can you stop that?”

John shrugged his shoulders and pretended to be none the wiser, “What do you mean by that, my stalker? I am only trying to find out what is the ‘stalking’ purpose of my stalker who ‘stalked’ me back home like the creepy ‘stalker’ she is.”

 

Unable to get John to stop using the word, ‘stalk’ to remind her of what she did, Ephinelyth gave a defeated smile, “I’m not ‘stalker’, I have a name I was given. Ephinelyth is my name.”

 

“Ephi… what? Sorry, I didn’t quite get you, never heard anything like it.”

“Ephinelyth.”

“Ephinelyth? That’s quite a long name. E-ph-ine-leeth, E-fie-lyth… Huh…it’s hard to pronounce,” John made a frown.

“What are you implying? That is my given name.”

John shook his head, “No, no, no, it’s weird to call you Ephinelyth. It’s a bit too long. What do your friends call you in place of it?”

“Friends…?” Ephinelyth raised a brow, it was not as she was oblivious to the understanding of the word itself, rather, she saw no point in it.

She was fine as a solitude creature as she was born to be, having companionship was not exactly her purpose.

To be exact, she was born without one.

 

“Aha!!! I got it, I’ll call you Evie.” John slammed a fist on his hand as though the decision from him was final.

 

“That is not right,” Ephinelyth interjected, turning John’s bright smile upside down.

“So you want me to call you Effy?” John raised a brow, “That’s the other name I come up with, but it sounds childish, so I scraped that idea.”

“Ephinelyth, just call me Ephinelyth. That is my birth name.”

“But that’s far too long for me to pronounce,” John grumbled like the boy he was. “I promise, I’ll just be the one to call you Evie, Ephinelyth, please?” John flapped his eyelids as though he was trying to gain her sympathy in a part of his jest.

“It is what’s given to me!” Ephinelyth insisted stubbornly, almost shouting in attempts to argue with John. “I am not—”

Ephinelyth stopped when she saw John recoil and bobbed his head reluctantly, his facial expression was the same as before, but the haughty glint in his eyes abated.

It was as if Ephinelyth had just extinguished this young boy’s hopes and dreams by denying him as insignificant as that.

 

“And here I thought Evie was a cute name for someone like her. Oh well, if Ephinelyth doesn’t like it, there is no point.”

 

Ephinelyth eyes widened in shock at John’s mental voice, “Enough of your flattery, why do you keep saying things like that!” face redden as embarrassment was added to the mix of her bowl of emotions.

John, who absolutely did nothing—at least outwardly—simply stared at Ephinelyth as if she had gone insane.

“I wasn’t speaking…”

 

“Is she that angry at me for wanting to call her Evie? I should stop talking, better stop or she starts to hate me like everyone else.”

 

“Hate you? W-what lead you to such conclusions?” Ephinelyth was completely engrossed with speaking to John’s internal thoughts rather than the boy who spoke not a thing from his mouth. “Why do your thoughts formulate as though there is something out there to get you? It was the same earlier with the beastkin girl, and even now.”

“Earlier with...beastkin... Serene!?” John’s jump backwards, “So you’ve been spying on me since this morning!!!”

Alarmed at what Ephinelyth was speaking, John’s body trembled, his eyes darted around the garden to look for the spade that he had initially wanted to use to defend himself.

 

“That means, someone did send her after me!!! She said my thoughts are—” John’s heart skipped a beat, “She must have been reading my mind, that’s the only explanation.”

 

John bolted. Without thinking, without hesitation, he ran. Since he could not find the spade that he had been looking for, he might as well run towards the kitchen and—

Ephinelyth appeared before his path before he could step foot inside of his own house.

“John, calm down. I mean you no harm.”

“How’d you know my name!? You must have read my mind, didn’t you!?” John took a few steps backwards cursing himself for being unathletic, fists balled as he was ready to defend himself. “What else have you extracted from my mind, telepath!!!”

 

A child amidst a room, surrounded by unknown faces.

Under normal circumstances any child of his age would wail and cry from the unusual circumstance, the boy remained calm as he kept his gaze on a familiar face that he recognized.

The very face of his own mother that watched over him in the distance.

Her face bore no love, no kindness, nor a shred of care.

At this moment, all she cared was to extract information from him.

From her own child that she held no love for.

The vision changed.

The next moment, the same beastkin woman that she saw from Serene and John’s mind appeared to her.

And like the previous iterations of the memories the received, this one was just the same.

A stale, lifeless and bloodied body laid on the ground.

 

John’s heart was pounding, even Ephinelyth who was suddenly surged by the heavy memories that John held in his heart could hear him.

“If they sent you...here, that means they must suspect my act…” John’s face grim. At the palm of his hands, hints of dark energy converged.”

“No!” Ephinelyth announced loudly to John in his head. “Stop jumping to conclusions, I am just a young girl as you are!”

“Young girl? A young telepath? Are you joking? I know I appear an idiot to you, but no human telepath can move that fast!!!”

 

“I am not human!!!”

 

Ephinelyth announced as her dragon wings sprouted from her back, small horns appeared on her head and a slender white tail appeared from her behind, taking flight into the skies as she looked at John who stared at her from below.

 

“I am an Elder Dragon. A young girl who happened to be cursed with mind reading abilities.”

 

Her demonstration calmed John down, the scrunched brows on his face faded, the tense parts of his body loosened. Despite what he may have thought, the fact was, Ephinelyth could clearly speak to him in his mind.

“Elder Dragon…no wonder your name is unusually long…” John thought to himself. “Ahhhh, I am an idiot for assuming all of that earlier.”

“Not exactly. I understand why you thought so, you simply wished to protect what you cared about,”

Ephinelyth slowly descended from the skies and came back to the ground.

 

“I am the same, John.”

 

“C-can you still l-listen to my thoughts?” John spoke aloud.

Ephinelyth’s eyes avoided his, “Maybe…”

“Maybe? What maybe? This means all this time, everything I thought of…you heard them?”

“I-I am still learning to control them. I can’t help it. I still cannot stop reading other people’s thoughts.”

John froze for a moment, his face looked at Ephinelyth as though all of his deepest secrets were revealed to her at once.

 

“E-even...the reason I tried to nickname you Evie?”

 

Face reddened, John could only voice out his thoughts in his head knowing that Ephinelyth could hear him clearly.

“You said it was because it was a cute name.” Ephinelyth face blushed as she played with her silver hair, “I admit that was…” Ephinelyth stopped when all she saw was a John covering his head as though he was forcing himself to contain something from within.

 

“Evie is very pretty.”

“I wonder what she likes.”

“Does she like me?”

“Shit, shit, shit, she knows now!”

“I’ve never seen silver hair like that.”

“I think she is somewhat like Kahnira.”

“I can look into her eyes for a long time.”

“John stop, stop, stop. Don’t, she’ll hear your thoughts.”

“Elder Dragon, aren’t they only in legends!?”

“I wonder if she will teach me how to fly.”

“Her horn is very small, I want to touch them.”

“Even her tail…”

“Please don’t read my mind.”

 

“Ufufu…” Ephinelyth let out a voice as John’s true thoughts finally surfaced.

Part of her was flattered, and the other part of her was amazed that suddenly all of John’s inside thoughts could be understood by her.

Her mind reading abilities gave her unwanted insight into the minds of others often causing Ephinelyth distress and agony from the sheer shock and unpleasant thought processes that accompanied them.

But when John’s boyish thoughts flowed to her, it was though she was invited to his mind instead. Ephinelyth felt as if she fell into the embrace of a soft warm bed that cushioned her in the chill of winter.

Something inside of her clicked.

That missing piece of her finally became one when his boyish mind merged with her own thoughts.

Despite the cynical view John had on the world, deep inside he was just a clueless, yet curious boy.

Perhaps, like him, underneath her mundane existence, Ephinelyth was a girl who was just as precious as he was.

 

“You sure have a lot going on inside your head,” gently prying John’s hands away from his head, her sweet gaze met his.

 

“She’s touching me.”

“Don’t touch me.”

“What are you doing?”

 

“It’s alright.” Ephinelyth assured him. “I really mean you no harm.”

 

“I already know that.”

“Then why are you here?”

“Dragons are not even supposed to appear in human form.”

“Wait no, maybe because she is an Elder Dragon.”

“Ahhhhh, stop thinking, she can read me like an open book!!!”

“Ephinelyth, please leave me alone with my shame, please.”

 

Placing her hands on his cheeks Ephinelyth looked at him in the eye.

 

“It’s embarassing to be the only one to read your thoughts so…”

 

Ephinelyth placed her forehead against his.

And like a broken dam, she allowed John inside her own mind…

 

“Who is this Kahnira I keep hearing in your head?”

“I am not scary, am I?”

“Why do you keep looking at me with intense expressions earlier?”

“I think it was very smart of you to help the beastkin girl earlier.”

“Hey, can you be my friend? I never wanted one, but you can be my friend."

“Other people I know have bad thoughts.”

“I think I want to talk to you a lot more.”

“I am an Elder Dragon, but please treat me like a normal girl.”

“I feel you have a lot going on.”

“Want to talk with me?”

“Your teasing is adorable.”

“Maybe we can go on a journey together sometime?”

“I can make an exception...you can call me Evie.”

“Promise you will be with me?”

 

Ephinelyth’s thoughts surged into John’s mind in the similar fashion as his to hers, causing John to stare at the space before him with a dumbfounded look.

 

“What is your response?”

 

The both of them communicated far too much in their heads. Ephinelyth who was able to gain a her composure asked with a fully blushed face.

He had given all of his mind to her.

In return, she gave all of her to him.

“I…”

John turned his head away, eyes blinking rapidly as though he committed something far more than his prepubescent self could ever understand.

“S-sure thing, E-Evie.”

Not that the two of them did not understand romance.

At this stage of their life, the concept remains to be an unknown territory to them, all they knew were if a female and male loved each other, they would be with the other for the rest of their lives.

But somehow, through that brief exchange of minds, it was as if they had done far more than just traditional romance.

With young John’s answer, Ephinelyth quickly flapped her wings as she prepared for departure.

“I-I’ll have to g-get back… Mother would be worried about me.”

John tried to open his mouth, but Evie already knew what he wanted to say.

 

“Yes, we’ll see each other again, John. I will return to you.”