The Wizard

Chapter 20

"Remember that, from the conduct of each one, depends the destiny of all."

Alexander the great.

In the small building, which shone in various colors, Eduarda waited sitting on a simple chair and nothing in the Universe could take the girl out of that place. Her eyes, swollen and red, were loaded with sadness, apathetic, showing the fatigue of a long vigil, but no tears because there were none left to shed. She had spent days crying and now only emptiness remained.

She got up and approached the balcony, contemplating the waterfall that she could almost touch with her hands. That world was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen in her dreams, even before meeting her groom, but now everything had a very different connotation and she could not appreciate anything, no beauty; nothing could console her. She remained so absorbed in her thoughts or perhaps just in her pain that she only realized the visitor when she touched her shoulder.

She turned to see a beautiful and delicate girl, with hair as black as coal and eyes of great sweetness. The young woman was accompanied by Valdo and both had a look of concern for the witch.

"Eduarda, exhaustion will not help you at all," she said, speaking with candor and in Portuguese with a slight accent. "Go rest and I'll keep watch."

"I can't, Caroline," she replied, trembling. "I know I need to, but I can't. I don't even know what to do with my life without him."

Valdo took a step forward and hugged her.

"Calm down, Dudinha, don't rush." He squeezed her more and continued. "I know it's bad, but you need to rest. You haven't slept for five days!"

"I don't want to rest," she said, almost crying again, even after deciding that enough of tears. "I just—"

A voice, just a murmur, interrupted what the girl was going to say and maybe no one would ever know what it would be, not even her:

"Eduarda, my beloved, I swear I thought I would never see or hear you again and that was what made me sad above all."

"Igor!" Her scream echoed throughout the place, as she threw herself into his arms, sometimes crying sometimes laughing. "You bastard, you almost killed me with sadness and despair."

"Did you think I was going to leave you that easy?" He smiled, hugging her, still very weak. "Did you forget that I need to fulfill a certain promise and I never break them?"

Caroline appeared in his angle of vision and he extended his hand, touching her. As he felt the contact with the friend he loved so much, Igor said:

"I'm sorry for what I let happen, Carol." He pulled her until she also hugged him and continued. "I should never have let you go without me to protect you. I cried a lot for your death, but I notice that we managed to reverse everything."

With tears in her eyes, the English sorceress kissed his dearest childhood friend.

"It wasn't your fault, Igor, and if it weren't for you, we would still be trapped in that horrible nightmare."

"And my parents?" he asked, anxious. "Did they make it?"

"They are all safe. All the wizards survived." Caroline reassured him. "Your parents went to sleep a few hours ago because they were exhausted from the wait."

"What wait?" the young man asked, curious. "Come on, how long was I unconscious?"

"My love," Eduarda said, without letting him go. "You were dead, dead as a doornail, but the dragons brought you back. Only they were only four and not twelve, which would be necessary to heal you. That's why you were in a coma for ten days and they feared it could be irreversible."