NIGEL

CHAPTER 11: N.

My body shook nervously, and I tried to smile at the terrifying creature standing before me so as not to seem threatening. "Hello there." I said trying to sound cheery. "What can my companions and I do for you sir?"
            The centaur sneered at me, his pack of friends behind him seeming equally as unpleasant. "Can I interest you in a cup of tea?" I asked, trying to ease some of the tension. A moment later, all of them took up their spears and pointed them directly at me. My eyes widened. "No to the tea then?"
            "Loot!" cried the centaur, gesturing to our cart full of supplies. "Oh no." I said to myself, knowing what this meant. They were seriously robbing us! We were being totally robbed by a band of centaurs and it didn't look like there was much we could do about it! I didn't say anything, but continued to stand perfectly still, glancing nervously at Lily and Kieran who didn't appear as though they knew what to do either. I glanced over to the cart and in a flash, our poor mule was gutted by one of the centaurs. I heard him cry as he fell to the ground bleeding. "NO!" cried Lily, her eyes tearful. My heart did go out to the poor thing, but I was more concerned about my own life at the moment.
            All of us looked desperately at our cart being towed away and our poor dead mule, Mumps lying in the dirt. Suddenly, we all noticed Evie, the little cat jump up onto the cart with a quiet "meow." The centaur dragging our cart turned, confused. Kieran's eyes bulged out of his head as he looked frantically to his right, realizing that Evie had moved. "Evie!" Whispered Kieran, trying to get her off the cart. The centaur attempted shooing her away, but she sat firmly in place.
            After a few minutes we could tell the centaur was getting fed up and pulled from its back a curved swords, ready to swing at the poor little cat. "No please, stop!" Cried Kieran, desperately trying to move, but was held back by the various weapons pointed at him, keeping him in place. We were all sweating, waiting for the inevitable, when suddenly we heard a firm masculine voice from behind the crowd of centaurs emerge. "No!" Commanded a young man. I stared at him in both shock and amazement. He was fascinating to look at! I had never seen anyone who looked like him before. He was short for a man, but looked to be in his twenties. He had hair that stood up in the most unnatural way, golden eyes that popped against his dark skin. Lily had dark skin from being half Ibhanian, but he was different. He didn't look Ibhanian despite his dark complexion, and his ears came to a subtle point at the ends. He scratched his short beard and looked at us curiously before approaching the cat. The centaurs backed down and the pointy eared young man petted Evie gently on the head as she purred softly.
            Kieran, Lily and I all exchanged the most confused and uneasy looks. Why was this odd young man so focused on Kieran's little cat and why was he with a whole band of centaurs? "Excuse, me" I began, Lily shaking her head at me furiously. I ignored her. "I don't mean to be rude but my companions and I are a little confused right now." I said tentatively to the pointy eared stranger. The young man's golden eyes met mine and he picked up the cat delicately in his arms, making his way over to us. The centaurs lowered their weapons and waited. "I'm sorry," he said in a deep voice. "I suppose there has been a misunderstanding."
            I raised an eyebrow. "I would hope so. We aren't exactly keen on dying so if you wouldn't mind letting us go on our way..." I said awkwardly trailing off.
            The young man who still held Kieran's little feline in his arms smirked with amusement. "Well, I actually think I should thank you first for leading me to my companion." He said gesturing to the cat.
            "Your what?" Lily blurted out.
            Again, the pointy eared stranger chuckled. "I can explain in a moment. But, first I think I should like to know your names?"
            Lily gave him a dirty look, clearly insulted by this random person's cryptic behavior. "I'm Kieran Loveland!" Kieran answered eagerly, though you could detect the nervousness in his voice. "I'm called Nigel Hillshire and this is my intended, Lily Ashon." I followed politely.
            "Nice to meet you. I'm called Noah. Noah Therie." Responded the young man.
            As he spoke, something struck me. The visions from the fortune teller flashing before my eyes. Rosalie Loveland did say I had to "seek out the N." and here was a young man called Noah. This had to be him! I glanced over at Kieran who seemed to be thinking the same thing I was. I didn't know what came over me because this whole time I thought Rosalie and her vision were all a bunch of nonsense, but before I knew it I blurted out, "Noah, I believe you are exactly who we've been looking for!"
             Noah arched a skeptical brow and stared at us blankly, understandably confused by this strange assertion I had just made about him when we had never met before in our lives.
            I took a deep breath and explained quickly to him that a fortune teller told me that if I traveled to Andella I would find a person called "N" and fulfill some kind of destiny or whatever. As I said it, I was only painful reminded of how insane this all sounded.
            Noah furrowed his eyebrows. "And you believe that 'N.' is me?" He asked, still stroking the cat.
            I nodded. "I mean you have to be. We are in Andella and I think it's hardly a coincidence. Trust me, I didn't believe any of that 'destiny' rubbish until now. Meeting you gives me this strange feeling we were meant to meet each other."
            Noah snorted and rolled his eyes. "Look, as much as I would like to help you with your destiny or finding your inner peace and whatever, I think you've got the wrong person. Maybe N. isn't even a person? If you don't mind, I would like to buy this cat off of you and then we can all move on with our lives."
"What about our cart?" Interrupted Lily angrily.
Noah shrugged. "Hey that's not my problem. I don't run the centaurs, they kind of do what they want. I'm just staying with them for now. I can't help you there." He replied as though answering her question at all was a waste of his time.
"Why you-!" Lily said through gritted teeth before I stopped her from making the situation worse.
"Please!" I pleaded. There was something about Noah that had me convinced he was the one I was supposed to find. I didn't know how but I could feel it. There was something I could see in his eyes that gave me the sense he knew something. Maybe he was trying to convince himself that this didn't involve him but I could see a hint of untruth in his eyes that suggested he had a suspicion of who I was, and lucky for me I took a chance. "My father was James Mallory." I said reluctantly and at the time I couldn't tell you why I felt the urge to say that since it was rarely, if ever, a fact I was willing to admit.
Noah stopped dead in his tracks and turned slowly to face me. His eyes grew dark. I continued. "He killed my mother when I was a child and I am a half-breed. I shouldn't exist but I do and if this opportunity for me to find 'inner peace' involves getting revenge on him, then according to this fortune teller, I need you to do it." I said candidly, worried if I had just made a big mistake by admitting something like that to a stranger surrounded by centaurs who could easily slaughter all of us.
Noah didn't say anything for a while, until finally he took a deep breath, looking down at the little cat in his arms which seemed to oddly calm him. Eventually he spoke. "You said that James Mallory is your father?" He asked. I was shocked at his reaction. He did know who my father was! "Yes" I answered firmly, still unaware of what he was going to do with this information. "So you are a half vampire?" He clarified again. And I responded with another "yes." to which he said nothing. He looked down at the ground petting Evie, his expression appearing as though he was losing an argument with himself.
I could see Lily staring at me nervously out of the corner of my eye. I threw her a reassuring smile, but she knew just as well as I did how nerve racking this all was. What if I was wrong about Noah? That telling him this information would make things worse and we would all end up dead as a result of my stupidity.
None of the centaurs looked like they knew at all what was going on. To my knowledge, I doubted we even spoke the same language. The two words they said to us in our language were spoken with thick accents and I think I read somewhere that they had their own way of communicating. I was at least hoping this was the case because I doubt a simplistic lot such as them would have treated a damphyr kindly. They probably would have burned me or sacrificed me to some horse god for all I knew.
After what felt like hours of silence, with Noah internally squabbling with himself, he looked up again to meet my eyes. His golden gaze made me still and slightly frightened. "So am I." Noah said plainly. "We have much to discuss."