Free The Forest's Son by Cyndy Aleo Page A

live in the forests. We have no need of men but for pleasure and occasional short companionship, and of course, for bearing children.”
    “So why did you leave?”
    She pauses, closing her eyes, and he can feel, more then see, her pain.
    “I left, my Jakub, for you.”
    She swallows once, twice, before opening her eyes and staring at him, her eyes dark and wet.
    “When I say we have no need of men, I mean at all. No men. Ever. If we bear male, they are to be killed. We do not raise them.
    “Human men bring strife to the sisters if they remain longer than it takes to breed with. And our stories tell of a man who would rule over us all. So we prevent that from happening.
    “But when you came, I found I could not have you die. So I ran, with you. And we have hidden ever since.”
    He has to walk away from her and the window and the trees, which he can hear even through the glass. If what she’s told him is true, he owes her his life, twice over. He doesn’t know how to come to terms with the idea, however, that he is an aberration: something that should never have been allowed to live, a burden his mother has had to live with these 200 years in hiding.
    “Yes, 200 years, ” she says, like she’s reading his thoughts. “Our lives do not have the span of humans. They are far longer. And our young take far longer to mature. We have moved often for more than one reason: to hide from the sisters, as well as to hide our slowed aging.”
    It sounds beyond belief, but he can hear the truth in her words, and the confirmation whispered in the trees. Yet it still isn't enough. He want s — need s — more.
    “The passwords? ” he asks. “Do you know them?”
    “The username is Staśu, for your stuffed bear. The password I think you can guess, especially after this evening.”
    She knows, he thinks as he races up the stairs to his room. She knows without him saying a word, and he wonders if it’s some form of telepathy or nothing more than the rumpled way he looked when he came home combined with a mother's intuition.
    Using her clues, he finds the hidden directory on his hard drive, and files spill open: videos, journals, photos. The ancient machine Donovan had found this — yesterday — morning had actually been procured brand-new from a physician his mother had seduced over a hundred years ago. He's torn between laughing at her cunning and being horrified at the means she'd used to procure it.
    The more he reads his own words as well as hers and watches videos and views the photos, memories begin to filter in, and he remembers. He remembers everything. More than the memories, though, he feels the power increasing as it creeps back through his body, moving slowly as tree sap in winter.
    He marvels that he was able to move about each day without feeling this, that his weakened self could get out of bed each day and get dressed and make his way in the world.
    With each memory restored, he feels the power surge, and he wants to weep at the years lost without it. He recognizes the necessity, acknowledges that being reacquainted with his true self will endanger everyone: himself, his mother, and most of all, Donovan, who doesn’t have any stake in this other than whatever she feels for him.
    He thinks of the video he watched yesterday morning, of his voice cracking as he begged himself to continue to forget, to not pursue remembering, to protect her at all costs, and he realizes he has been in love with Donovan for years without admitting it.
    But when he made that video, there were two things he wasn’t as sure of as he is now. One is the awe of this power flowing through his veins. The other is that Donovan feels at least something for him. He isn't in this alone. And she deserves to have a choice. He won’t make it for her again.
    His mother appears at his door. Whether she’s summoned by the surge of power or simply guessed how long it would take him to work everything through, he isn't sure.
    “Do you know what you