Bleeding In Love

Ch 2

  Mar had been walking for about an hour in town, searching for a good scarf since his had ripped yesterday.
  Any scarf he found before that point had been too itchy or too expensive. He sighed, utterly sick of searching for a decent scarf.
  He decided to turn around and call it a day, maybe he'd go back in town the next day. He walked in the direction he had come from when something caught his eye, glowing in his personal space. Not that he had much personal space in the crowd, but he lifted his right hand to check it out anyway.
  There it was, a soulmate's mark. On his hand! Mar had been waiting for his soulmate to show up for most of his life and was about ready to give up, but there it was, finally, a glow on his hand.
  He beamed, spinning in all directions to see who else had a glowing hand, and who else was searching frantically for their partner.
  Mar was disappointed when his hand stopped glowing and he couldn't find anyone with a glowing star on their hand.
Wait, a star? he thought, confused for a second, I thought it was supposed to be a heart. Unless... Royalty! My soulmate is a royal. Wow, I'm lucky!
  Mar desperately scanned the crowd for anyone who resembled royalty, running in all directions to no avail. He wouldn't give up that easily, but he needed a better plan.
  Begrudgingly, he started back to his house, knowing he was lucky but feeling quite unlucky, as if he had broken a mirror standing under a ladder while petting a black cat. He got back quickly, walking into his house and saying "hi mom" knowing he wouldn't get a response.
  His mother was constantly working, taking home anything she hadn't finished at work, which was basically everything because she had the habit of starting a whole bunch of different things instead of finishing one thing and moving on to the next.
  Mar went into the kitchen, hoping to practice his healing skills on himself again, but realizing he should probably do his homework.
  He took out his "Soulmates: What You Should Know" textbook, because he found it most interesting out of all the subjects, and flipped to the index.
  Finding what he wanted, "Soulmates and Royalty," he started to read.
Anyone who has a royal soulmate or is royal and finds their soulmate will get a glowing star on their hand instead of a heart.
  He flipped the page, hoping there was more on this subject but finding nothing.
  He flipped another page and found that it was relevant to him: "Things Only Healers Should/Can Do With Their Soulmates."
As you read in the previous chapter, after you see the glow on your hand, you are linked to your soulmate. This means that when you get hurt, so does your soulmate, and when your soulmate gets hurt, so do you. Being a healer in these times is very helpful, because when you heal yourself you're also healing your soulmate, whether you got hurt or they did.
  It also means that in dire situations you have another way to communicate with your soulmate. This is not recommended, but if you really wanted you could cut words onto yourself and your soulmate would get your message. ONLY DO IF YOU OR YOUR SOULMATE IS A HEALER. After sending the message you can heal yourself and your soulmate, leaving no trace that you hurt yourself or them.
  Mar stopped reading, knowing all that he needed to. He went back to the kitchen and pulled a knife from the drawer.
  He sliced his arm, deep enough to let it bleed, to make sure his soulmate would get his message.
  "Were you looking for me too?" he carved, hoping for a response.
  "No" showed up after his question. He healed his arm, and also his soulmate's.
  Mar was confused, wondering why his soulmate hadn't looked for him when she(or maybe he?) saw the star glow on her/his hand.
  "I'm your soulmate" he cut, thinking maybe whoever it is on the other line is confused.
  "I KNOW" showed up under his statement.
  He healed his arm again to start the process over.
  "Well, if you didn't look for me, what did you do when you saw your hand glow?" he asked.
  It took a while for his soulmate to respond, the wound stinging a bit from the air and trying to heal without help. His soulmate carved a butterfly while thinking, crimson red from the blood on his arm.
  The response was simple. "I ran away."
  Mar thought about it for a second, maybe his soulmate was scared right now, not ready for him yet. He healed their arms again, then scratched "Okay. My name is Mar, by the way."
  The response was "I need to get a washcloth and wash all this blood off my arm. Please leave me alone, I don't want to have anything to do with you."
  Mar reread that message three times before he healed it, upset that his soulmate didn't want to have anything to do with him.
  "That hurts" he cut, harming his arm once more.
  "Oh yeah? Well so does cutting my arm!"
  "Ok I'll let you be, feel free to cut me whenever you want, I don't mind. Soulmate, you can message me anytime."
  He left it at that for a minute and then healed it up, heading to the bathroom to clean the blood off his arm.
  "Why is having a soulmate so hard to do, Bree?" he asked the cat, knowing it was more likely to respond than his mom.
  Bree just purred and rubbed on his legs.
  He went back to doing his homework, not getting much done while he tried to imagine what his soulmate was up to, what they looked like, and where they were. He didn't have much to work with, just royalty with pretty handwriting.
  He realized another thing, as a healer. He could no longer practice on himself, for it would also hurt his soulmate, and it could make his soulmate unable to do whatever they were normally doing in the day. You see, in class, student healers practice on the teachers, who are experienced and know how to stop their soulmates from getting hurt whenever they do. At home, the only person Mar had ever had to practice on was himself. Someday Mar would learn the teachers' trick, but he wasn't even old enough to be able to. That thought gave Mar another question.
  He opened his soulmate book again, turning to the page on death.
When one soulmate dies, the other does not necessarily. You have two hands, so you have two soulmates. This sometimes forms soulmate triangles, where A's soulmates are B and C, B's are A and C, and C's are A and B. This is rare, but it can lead to three people being happy together. Anyway, if death occurs to one of your soulmates you will not die or feel the pain of dying, your heart or star on your hand will just turn black. If both of your soulmates die, which doesn't happen often, you will die as well. If your soulmate lost their other soulmate then you better not die!
  Mar looked at those words once again, somewhat confused about soulmate triangles, but sure it didn't really matter.
He only wanted to know one more thing before he started on his homework.
He looked through the table of contents. He looked through the index. He started looking at the pages individually, knowing it would take forever, but it might be worth it.
Flip, nope, flip, nope. This went on for about an hour, Mar scanning pages and flipping them to get the answer to his question.
He finally gave up on the book and turned to his best friend Jeff.
"Hey Jeff," he said into the phone.
"What up Mar?" Jeff asked.
"I was just wondering something about soulmates- I know you found both of yours," Mar explained his reason to call.
"Anything dude."
"Well, you're soulmates with two girls, does that make them soulmates to each other?" Mar asked.
"Nah, not really bro. Sometimes they fight over me, sometimes they're friends. I told them that when one of them finds their other soulmate I'll stay behind with who's left until we get the whole dominant-hand-better-soulmate thing figured out. Hey, I gotta run, but nice talkin' to ya dude!"
Jeff hung up.
Dominant hand better soulmate thing? I should look this up, Mar thought instantly. He found the page in his book.
While some believe it to be myth, studies show that your dominant hand soulmate is a better fit for you. Typically dominant hand soulmates work very well together, especially if one is right and the other is left handed.
Another thing to know: if you're right handed and your soulmate is left handed or vice versa, then when you're hurt on your right they will be hurt on their left and so on. If you're both right or both left handed it will be the same for both of you. If one of you is ambidextrous, then when the r/l gets hurt, the ambidextrous will get twice the damage, hurt on both sides when the r/l handed will have it on one side- but it mimics if the ambidextrous gets hurt. If you're both ambidextrous then it mimics like two righties or two lefties. You may want to reread this paragraph, it's a little confusing for most people.
Mar reread the paragraph.
  Huh, that's so interesting.
Mar's thoughts were wondering what handed his soulmate was now, and what hand had the matching star.