Assassin

Shock

I froze in my track, and the gang shouted and picked up the armor, ready to fight. My reaction was the complete opposite of the gang. When I saw that mysterious person, I was transfixed and could not move. I was also really, really surprised and shocked.
The person who just jumped down from the tree stood in the middle of the gang, and the gang formed a circle around him, clearly nervous. However, that person in the middle looked calm and took out his two swords from his back slowly.
Yes. It was the assassin I saw the other day. He was still wearing his brown leather boots and the white and grey outfit with brown and red decorations all over, and his face was still well hidden under the hood.
One of the men in the gang shouted something and everyone plunged at the assassin. I stared at them, body frozen with shock.
The assassin fought them gracefully and it was like he was dancing in the crowd. Men after men fell to the floor, and the assassin had not even got his clothes torn yet.
Blood rushed to my cheeks as I watched. I was feeling nervous for him. Seeing him brought the feelings I had for him back, and for a moment I had completely forgotten about John.
Suddenly, an injured man on the floor raised his arm and the assassin tripped on it, and he fell backwards, landing on his back. The last man who was still on his feet threw himself at the assassin, and I almost screamed, looking at the dangerous situation.
The assassin half sat up and withdrew his right arm immediately. I could see a small blade shot out from under the sleeve. He held his arm out towards the airborne man, and the man just got himself stabbed in the stomach by landing on top of the assassin. At that instant, the hood of the assassin fell off his face due to the impact of the stab, revealing a handsome face. Silky smooth blond hair, strands of it falling into the gorgeous green eyes of the owner; his angular jaws and soft plump lips ever so familiar.
It was John.
I had never been this shocked in my life; I watched as John pushed the dead man on top of him away, and killed the man who just tripped him with a quick stab in the heart. He stood up, glancing around to make sure everyone was dead. Then he pulled up his hood again.
I finally got my senses back and forced my legs to carry me away from the scene as quickly as possible. My thoughts were all jumbled together; I could not think straight.
At last I raced back to my home, and ran up the stairs into my room. I locked my door behind me and pushed my back against the door, panting hard. I took a few deep breaths to steady my breathing and slow down my heart rate.
Finally I was feeling better physically, so I sat down on my bed and buried my head in my palms.
So it was John all along? He was the one who saved me at the market, and he was the boy who I had a crush on. It was the same person all along!
This explained why John’s lips and voice were so familiar to me. And why he was staring at me at the market, and approached me out of the blue. And why he stared at my injured ankle and why it was like he knew about my twisted ankle when I had not told him about it. And most important of all, why I was attracted to both of them. Because they were the same person all along.
John was an assassin. An assassin who I liked and who saved me. I could not wrap my head around this idea, and thinking of this made me have difficulties breathing.
It seemed like he was not a bad assassin. Those people he killed looked like the villains, and he even saved Juliet, Anna and me. He could not possibly be a bad person. But an assassin could be dangerous. I could not get close to him again, I kept telling myself, although there was this voice in me that told me I should not care about it as long as I liked him. Love was something that could not be broken, even with the most powerful excuse.
I shook my head, trying to clear my thoughts. I had to think rationally, I told myself.
Later on that day, Anna and Juliet came to visit me, to check if I was better.
“(Yn), you look worse than before,” Anna pointed out, “Haven’t you gone for a walk this morning?”
I nodded, and debated whether to tell them about what I had seen. As they were very trust-worthy friends, I decided it was best to tell them, although it was a really big secret. Maybe they could help me.
They looked well shocked when I told them about the whole incident. Anna covered her mouth with her hands, and Juliet nearly screamed. I told her to be quiet as I did not want to get the maids’ attention.
“Are you sure it was John?” Juliet asked me.
“Yes, I’m very sure,” I told her, and the way his hood fell off replayed in my head again.
“You shouldn’t think about him again,” Anna said, “This time it’s really serious; it’s not like before now. He’s not just an innocent boy who you had a crush on.”
“Yes,” Juliet added, “And it’d be good, as you can also forget about the assassin too. They’re the same person.”
“You should focus on a fresh start,” Anna suggested, “Maybe you should meet someone new.”
I nodded, digesting their words. I knew it would take me a long time to erase John the assassin from my memory, so I decided it would be best if I had met someone new, as if I could focus on him, I could easily forget about John.
That day, my entire mind was filled with images from this morning and the thought of John. It seemed really difficult to lock him up in a box and shove it to the back of my memory. The more I did not want to think about him, the more he popped up in my head.

The next day, I decided to go to the market; hopefully I could meet someone new. I could not forget about John that easily alone.
I put on another new dress I had got, which was a white sleeveless long dress with ribbons.
I walked to the market alone, and I had to say I got a couple of men looking in my way with my appearance today, as I had invested quite a lot of effort into it. I had even fixed my hair nicely.
I just looked around carelessly, trying to see if there were any young gentlemen that I might be interested in. Some of them smiled at me, but I did not feel interested in them at all.
After a while, I spotted one in the distance which made my heart skip a bit and my stomach started to churn – but in a way that was a mixture of good and bad.
He seemed to have spotted me too, and he broke into a huge smile. He started to come towards me.
I started to tremble and I was sure shock and fright was written all across my face, as confusion started to cloud his face. I turned around, walking away from him quickly – he was John.
I increased my speed as I heard him calling my name from not very far away. I jumped a mile as someone tapped my shoulder. I spun around to come face to face with John.
“Hi (Yn),” John smiled, his eyebrows pulled together slightly, “Why did you keep running away from me?”
“Hey John,” I mumbled, trying to come up with an excuse to get away from him, “It’s nice to see you, but I suddenly remembered I have something very important to do.”
“Oh,” he said, and I could not tell from his expression if he believed me or not, “I see.”
“So I guess I’d better get going,” I said, “Hope to see you again soon John.”
I turned around, not giving him a chance to say something as I was scared that he might ask for meeting up again. But suddenly a group of strong and armed men came out from all around us – some even jumped down from the rooftops nearby – and surrounded us. The people around all melted away quickly.
I wanted to run away, but I could tell they came for John, as they had their eyes on him, and they would also come after me if I tried to run away; they knew that I knew him and thought that I was with him.
We were trapped.