Sub Terra: Et Reditus

Thirty, Part Two

Gus

I took advantage of the fear spreading around the village to carry Asa back home in the open. The walk home helped me realize that the life I carried in my arms was now my responsibility. Despite all the loss that had occurred, it was up to me to make sure the most vulnerable didn't become one of them. I felt brave, but only because I had to be.

It was hard. It was a lot to accept. But something reassured me. It was the fact that everything had to keep moving forward. So I did just that.

I had to open the front door carefully, so as to not wake up Asa, who had fallen asleep on the way home. We didn't say a single word to each other on the way to my place, and it was probably for the best. She wasn't in the condition to speak.

As I entered the doorway, I had to choose where to take her. The best place was my room, of course, but because of something I never expected at all, I couldn't go there.

"Who the hell decided to come here this damn early in the morning?" a sleepy voice said from the kitchen. The person it came from was walking towards my position. I couldn't move fast enough, not with Asa in my arms. I hoped that it wasn't the wrong type of person.

"So, it's you, huh?" Nadia asked, probably having detected me using her extrasensory abilities. "Where'd you go off to so..."

Nadia's voice trailed off as she saw the sleeping girl in my arms. Instinctively I held Asa tighter.

"Who is that?" she asked me.

"This is..." I said, struggling with what words I could use to properly explain to her, but it was something that I didn't even understand well myself. "I... rescued her."

"You rescued her? Wh- Where's her family?"

"They're all dead. The demon killed them all."

Nadia's pupils dilated as she heard me. She approached me, and looked at Asa's face, like she was examining it.

"That wasn't a demon, Gus. The Sapphire King killed this girl's family. Let's bring her to my room. I'll tell you everything."

~~~

Nadia and I sat on the floor of her room while Asa continued to doze off, on Nadia's bed.

"Your brother... brought that thing here... and just walked away? Why didn't he think about what it would do to other people..? What kind of guy was he?" I asked Nadia, as the true extent of the situation began to unravel in my head.

"I don't know. I don't know anything about my brother. It's funny, right? I've lived with him for almost all of my life, yet I don't know shit about him. That's just who he was. No one could ever understand him."

"Wait... you said, almost all of your life. You're younger than him, so wouldn't-

"Yeah, I know. I'm not really his sister. I'm his cousin. Our dads were brothers, twins. When I was really little, my actual parents died in an accident. I still don't understand what happened, but after that... my aunt and uncle took me in, so Aries became my brother, and his parents became my parents. We played together, we went to school together, lived under the same roof, we even had some of the same friends, but... I just couldn't feel that connection, you know."

"So that explains why you barely look like him..." I whispered to myself.

"Sorry?" she said.

"Oh, I... you really went through a lot, didn't you?"