The Last Guardian || KTH

19

A daunting silence bristled the room Zeila was now in.

It felt dead—the magic around was nowhere to be seen or felt. When she peered to look outside the window, nothing moved. The trees that extended its branches when the wind gushed through it ceased all movements. The people who walked around as tiny dots stopped in their path. Only the sky above swirled in shades of blue, reaching for the people below. But Zeila was too drowsy to notice that.

Zeila rubbed her eyes. Before she could look at it again, Taehyung was beside her. "Hey Zee," he said.

Zee? Why would Taehyung call her Zee.

She scrutinized his face. The violet in his hair was now a brick brown, curled all the way below like it used to be. His eyes curved the same way they would when he saw her, a more affectionate gaze she remembered.

"Class was fun today," he said.

But Taehyung couldn't be taking classes without her. She frowned. She wanted to ask what class he went to but her voice never came out. She couldn't even open her mouth.

Then the realization slowly crawled inside her when she felt her smile being stretched, without her wanting to smile. Taehyung walked up to her, pecking a kiss on her forehead.

He shouldn't have kissed her. What was he thinking? He wasn't Taehyung

He took her hand and pulled her out of the bed. And she went into his embrace, voluntarily. Or so her body moved.

Her chest became heavy. She was moving in an orchestered manner. Taehyung pulling her with a smile so genuine, so lovely she wondered why it seemed so malicious and scary. This wasn't Taehyung the knight.

This was her Taehyung.

She knew it from the way his touch sparked something in her. The way his eyes looked into hers like everything about her was exquisite. Even if the distance between them as they—no he, pulled her to him close enough for their breaths to fall onto the other, she felt like she was the only girl in the world.

Yet her heart that was beating for him didn't wish to move under his command. Even if looking at him gave her the warmth she yearned for, there was something else that bugged her.

He led her out to the door. "Come, there's a world for you." He said.

But she didn't want move. Zeila clung hard to the ground, yanking her hand away from him with enough strength to leave him tumbling down.

Yet none of that happened. She followed him, hopping beside him like she used to a year ago.

Like a puppet she moved with him, even her eyes fixed to the path he created. He opened the door, the dark musky scent of the room giving way to the cloying smell of roses that wandered about.

There were people around them. The sky had fallen into a deep slumber. The moon clawing against it like a scythe in search of harvest. Her head moved itself from above to the ground then to Taehyung who gripped her hand and shelled it within his.

"Should I show you a surprise?" He smiled.

No. She screamed. But she smiled, instead. Her lips being pulled as though they were attached to strings, until they were wide enough to show all her teeth.

"Remember how I died?" He laughed.

"I do," Zeila replied, joining in the symphony of his laughter. Dread coiled her belly. Fear lumped her throat.

"Do you want to see it?" He asked, still not letting go of his melodious titter. It was like an enchantment that lured her into his command.

Zeila didn't need to nod for him to continue. Within the blink of an eye and the next, she was on the road—the people who crowded the streets, apparently no more and Taehyung too, he was nowhere to be seen. She wondered if the silhouette of the figure hiding under the shadow of the tree would be him.