Free Secrets [5] Echoes: Part One by A.M Hudson

free of Adam and his curse.”
    “But not free of the forest?”
    “No.”
    “How long have you been the guardian of the Stone?”
    “For a time that no half-life can comprehend. But I guess, in your feeble understanding, I would say it has been lifetimes.”
    “Will you ever be free?”
    “One day, when the Mother of Eternal Life, also known as the Guardian of Immortal Souls, awakens and sets it free.”
    “Well, where is she? How can we wake her?”
    “To wake, one must be asleep. But to awaken, a catalyst must present itself and evoke the knowledge of oneself.”
    “When will that happen?”
    “When the time is right.”
    “When will it be right?”
    “When it is.” She looked over her shoulder then, and I noticed small murmurs of conversation lilting in on the breeze as the people made their way back toward the manor. “I must return to my dwelling.”
    “Okay . Well, good night.”
    “Good night, young queen.” She bowed her head and the light faded, leaving me in darkness.
     
    ***
     
    I didn’t get much work done after that profound experience, so I took to the library to read a book instead and was ambushed by a very eager Emily and her baby store catalogue, a notepad and pen. Consequently, I think I read about two lines of the book I’d been waiting a year to get my hands on!
    “We should go to bed, Em.” I jerked my head to the clock. “It’s nearly morning.”
    “You’re right. We should.” Emily laid the long list of “essentials” down on the lamp table between us. “Hey, can I ask you something?”
    “Sure.”
    “I often wonder … do you miss him?”
    “Who?”
    “David.”
    The mere mention of his name flooded my mind with everything I once loved about him. I closed my eyes and pictured his face—the way his eyes changed from emerald to almost lime green when he’d smile—and that gentle half-turn his lip would take when he read something on someone’s mind that they would never have wanted him to know. I didn’t miss fighting with him. I didn’t miss his nasty side. But I missed the way things used to be. And though, for various reasons, I no longer regretted sleeping with Jason, for this one moment, I regretted ever wanting to. “Yeah. I kinda do miss him—the old him.”
    “I heard he’s coming home next week.”
    I nodded, still not sure I was ready for that.
    “How’s things going with Jason then?” she probed, sporting a suggestive grin. “I see you two are getting pretty close.”
    “We’ve always been close.”
    “Yeah, but now you’re closer.”
    “I guess. I mean, we’ve just been working together so much lately we…” I shrugged. “Yeah, we are closer.”
    “Does David know?”
    “Know what?”
    “That you’re … with Jason.”
    “I’m not with him, Emily.” I sat back in the cosy armchair and cast my longing gaze to the neglected book.
    “I saw you holding hands,” she teased.
    My shoulders dropped.
    She laughed, hopping up from Arthur’s armchair and coming to sit on the lamp table beside me. “You look happy, though—happier than I’ve ever seen you. Both of you, actually.”
    “We are happy. But I still feel …” My eyes wandered absently to the roaring fireplace, settling there while my mind focused hard on that empty place inside me. “There’s still a hole there where David used to be.”
    Em’s delicate hand patted my knee. “There always will be.”
    “I just keep thinking that, maybe, if I could've gotten through to him last time we spoke, maybe I could've changed the way things ended, you know?”
    “Like, how?”
    Good question. “I just wanted to make him understand. I mean, he hides behind his anger, but he’s gotta be hurting pretty bad, Em—for what I did to him. And then he just up and left—no previous planning. Just a ‘sudden’ need to sort things out at the Ninth Order. Who does that?”
    “A new king with a lot to sort out,” she said simply.
    “Yeah, okay. Fair enough. But normally people