Through the Fire and the Flames (The Ember Chronicles Book 1)

Chapter 5- Soal

"Y-you're what now?” I ask, stunned at the sudden information.

"Look, I didn't want to tell you right away because I predicted you would react horribly to finding out you had a brother, but I screwed up that plan pretty bad so.... Walk with me. I want to show you the place I'm talking about." I Follow him out of the cafe and walk with him to the park.

"What're we doing here?" I ask

"You'll see," is all I get in response. 

He leads me to a secluded area of the park and I start to get nervous. When we start walking through woods, my nerves are almost unbearable. Where is he taking me? Is going to kill me? Or..... No I will not think about that. 

Noah notices my panic and takes my hand.

"Don't worry. I won't hurt you. I can't hurt you."

We walk for a few more moments before coming to a clearing in the trees. 

I can't help but feel like I recognize this place. The leaves surround it, making it impossible to find unless you knew it was there. There are three stumps in the center, making a decent table with seats. 

"Recognize something?" Noah asks.

I shake my head.

"I feel like I should but I just don't."

He sighs.

"Okay. Look over here." He leads me over to the table like stump and sits me down.

"See this? We wrote this when we were kids. Remember?"

Sure enough, the names Soal and Noah were engraved into the wood.

Once again I shake my head no.

"I have something else to show you." He leads me over to a large tree on the edge of the clearing.

"This was our tree," he says smiling. "We would always climb it together. I remember that one time you climbed it without me and fell. I had to rush to catch you. Do you remember that?" He asks, desperation dripping from his voice.

Once again, I shake my head no.

"Alright. I got nothing." He slumps to the ground in defeat. 

I sink next to him. How about a message of some sort we left to each other? Something of great significance we did."

"Uh... I don't think...... WAIT! I GOT ONE! He runs over to the back of the tree and starts looking for something.

"This is the last thing we write to each other before we were separated. I think we wrote it the day before. Ah. Here it is. Look"

He stares at me in desperation as I read the text engraved in the tree.

I read: 'siblings by force, best friends by choice'

I was beginning to shake my head no when it hit me. 

Noah and I laughing at the pool all those years ago.

The two of us running through the park. 

Us enjoying a movie day with large bowls of popcorn.

Him protecting me from the kids at school when they tried to beat me up for being different.

My thirteenth birthday party (just me and him) at which we had a cake fight

All these memories and more emerge from my mind, almost as if someone's taking the sheets off of old paintings.

"Soal? Are you there? Earth to Soal."

I snap back to reality and stare at Noah before attacking him in a huge hug.

"I remember."