Boelik (2 page)

Boelik smirked for an instant as well before
tentatively stepping around her to keep her on his right when he
sat. Then the woman ripped off a strip of her long, brown village
skirt. The hood of her short, tawny cloak had fallen back and
Boelik could clearly see her warm, brown eyes.

“
What is your name?” she
asked as she ripped off a second strip and soaked it in the creek
to wash his wound.

“
My name is
Boelik.”

“
Boelik? A strange name,
that.”

“
For you, maybe. I come
from far away.” He flinched as the cold cloth was dabbed onto the
wound.

“
Ah, I see,” she said,
continuing to clean the bite and putting her hand on his wrist to
keep him from moving again. “My name is Olea.”

“
Olea?”

“
It is inspired by the
Oleander. My mother is fond of greenery of all sorts.”

“
I see,” Boelik said,
repeating Olea’s words. She smiled.

There was silence between them for a while.
Boelik watched as she took care of his wounds, the sounds of the
wind and birds filling in the silence between them. Olea eventually
glanced up at him, her gaze flicking to the clasp on his cloak.
“That is quite beautiful. A fox?”

Boelik nodded. “My father was… fond…of
foxes.”
So much so that he fell in love with one
that had nine tails.

”
I see.” Then, as she
finished cleaning the wound, “There. Now we can wrap it up. Hold
still just a little longer.”

“
All right,” Boelik yawned.
Fighting and running with such ferocity had drained him for the
day; now that his adrenaline was draining, fatigue was taking its
place.

“
It isn’t even midday. Are
you tired already?” Olea said, a mild tease in her
voice.

Boelik looked at her with a hint of
amusement. “It is exhausting saving the damsel in distress, you
know.”

“
Well, at least this damsel
doesn’t throw herself at you,” she replied with a huff. “I like to
repay favors.”

“
Rather than simply
accepting them?” Boelik said, and she nodded, wrapping the large
strip of cloth around his arm.

“
There we are. Feel any
better?” she asked. Boelik stretched his arm a bit before nodding.
It still throbbed, but the pain had dulled.

“
Thank you,” he said,
putting his arm down. Olea gave him a small smile.

“
You’re quite welcome.”
Glancing back through the trees, she said, “I should return home
now. Though, I will need to get more apples before that. They all
became soiled after the fight and being thrown about.”

“
I saw that. You didn’t do
too badly fending off that wolf. Though I wouldn’t recommend using
a basket as a consistent weapon,” Boelik suggested with a
smirk.

“
Oh, come off it; I only
had the basket,” Olea muttered. Boelik laughed.

When was the last time I
laughed?
He thought vaguely.

Recomposing himself, he said, “Well, either
way, I’ll need to go and fetch that wolf later. That pelt should
make for a nice bed, if not fetch a pretty price.” Olea nodded.
“But, before then, I could accompany you to the apple trees and to
the edge of the woods again. That way you needn’t worry about
predators.”

“
That would be nice,” she
agreed.

The pair walked back to the path, and Olea
picked up her basket. Boelik took a moment to kick the apples off
the road and drag the wolf off the path as well. Then they walked
to the apple trees, and Olea began to fill her basket, which was
surprisingly intact.

While she picked, Boelik and she talked
amiably, a spark of friendship igniting. Eventually, Olea adorned
Boelik with a shorter name: Bo. “It’s quite long and strange to me,
your name,” she had said. “Could I call you ‘Bo’ instead?”

“
Of course,” he had
replied. “I don’t mind.”

Finally, Boelik escorted Olea to the edge of
the woods. “Shall I see you in town tomorrow?” Olea asked, her
golden hair shining like a halo in the evening light. It would be
an understatement to say that they’d dallied in their errand.

Boelik shook his head. “I won’t often come
into the village. I enjoy my life out here, away from people,” he
explained. It wasn’t exactly the truth, but it wasn’t quite a lie,
either.

“
Then shall I come back and
see you?” Olea asked. Boelik shifted and bit the inside of his
cheek for a moment as he avoided the woman’s gaze.

“
You can if you
like.”

“
I would like to. How shall
I find you?”

Boelik looked at her. “If you call for me,
I’ll come,” he replied at last. He was hesitant to show her his
home. Fire and blades still danced in his memory from when he was
last discovered.

Still, Olea nodded. “All right. Then I’ll see
you tomorrow about midday,” she said, waving a farewell. Boelik
waved a small farewell in return, hiding the fire in his arm as he
did. Then he turned to fetch the wolf’s carcass, and he brought it
back to his home.

He ended up taking the rest of the day
carefully skinning the wolf despite his fatigue and pain. Boelik
didn’t want to waste the fur, but he didn’t want to go into town
for the skinner, either. And once he did finish, he decided to try
the meat. It wasn’t exactly his best meal, but Boelik refused to
waste food, so it was stored in the shed and salted to keep from
spoiling.

The next day Boelik woke and rekindled his
fire to have his breakfast. He ate and then went to the edge of his
grove to find a broken branch, bringing it back so he could sit
next to the fire as he pulled his knife from his boot. As the sun
inched higher in the sky, Boelik listened to his surroundings and
carved into the branch. Around midday, his ears caught a strange
sound on the wind.

Someone was calling his name.

Tossing the stick in the fire, the scrolling
picture of a bird flying was consumed by the flames as he ran to
the edge of the forest.

Reaching the end of the trees, Boelik slowed.
As he emerged, Olea smiled at him. “Hello, Bo,” she greeted
him.

“
Hello, Olea,” he
replied.

“
How is your
arm?”

“
Fine.”

“
Still sore?”

Boelik shrugged. “Not the worst I’ve
had.”

A few moments passed before Olea said
anything. “Why did you look so surprised when you saw me?” she
asked, an amused glint in her warm eyes.

“
Did I?” When she nodded,
Boelik said, “Well, I suppose I didn’t actually expect you to
come.”

Olea shook her head, tutting at him. “I said
I would, didn’t I? What, did you expect that I would lie?”

“
No, that’s not it,” Boelik
said, taking a step back. “I was just…” he sighed
. I was just expecting to be alone again.
“Never mind.
You are here. What do you want?”

Raising an eyebrow at him, she replied,
“Nothing. Well, not really nothing. I just wanted to talk, I
suppose.”

Boelik glanced around a moment, making sure
that this wasn’t some sort of trap. Returning his attention to her,
Boelik said, “Then talk.”

“
What?”

“
You said you wanted to
talk. What about?
I
certainly don’t have
anything to converse about.”

“
Oh. Well, um… hm…” Olea
started, putting a hand to her chin. “Can we walk while we talk,
then?” Boelik shrugged and followed her as she led the way down the
trail between the trees, making her way to a hill where Boelik
liked to sit to watch the sun set.

“
Do you come here often?”
he asked as she sat on the hill, the green grass spread in fields
before her.

“
No, not anymore. I did
some time ago, but I’ve been staying in the village more as I’ve
aged.”

“
I see,” Boelik replied,
sitting on her left, some distance away from her. “That’s a shame.
These woods are quite beautiful, especially around this time of
year. As are the sunsets,” he added, nodding out to the horizon
where the sun would be.

“
And you said you had
nothing to talk about,” she accused.

“
I don’t.”

“
Hah! Liar.”

“
The forest is not a
conversation topic that most would find interesting, I
believe.”

“
Well, am I most? Because,
the last time I checked, I was a singular woman. And I like the
forest,” Olea said.

Boelik snorted. “You like your family and
your friends and your village celebrations and hunts. That is your
home, after all, as this forest is for me. And in the same way that
you describing the village to me would be redundant, my describing
the forest to you would be redundant. We’ve shared nothing of each
but for this and the plaza.”

Olea glared at him, scrunching her nose.
“Now, see here; it may be redundant to share words on one another’s
living place, but we’ve shared more than this and the plaza now. We
shared the orchard, the trail, the stream, and the woods between it
all—in each other’s company, nonetheless.” Her eyes sparkled as she
seemed to think of something. “And, speaking of village
celebrations, we’re having one tonight. We could share that
together, and then we’d certainly have something to talk
about.”

“
I think not.”

“
And
why
not?”

Now it was his turn to glare. “I am not fond
of people, Olea. Least of all large gatherings of them.”

“
Oh, come on. There’s a
dance as well.”

“
That is worse,” he
replied, his statement blunt.

Olea sighed, turning her gaze out to the
fields. “All right. I won’t force anything.”

“
When will you be leaving
for that, then?” Boelik asked after a few moments of
silence.

“
Leaving?” Olea scoffed,
facing him once more. “Boelik, you honestly expect that I would
leave you all alone out here on a night of celebration?”

Boelik blinked. “Yes?”

Olea shook her head, her golden hair bobbing.
“No. Now, where’s that playful, bantering Bo that I met
yesterday?”

A small smirk tugged at Boelik’s mouth. “You
mean the one that suggests that you get a sturdier basket from now
on?”

Giving him a flat glare, Olea muttered, “Yes.
That’s the one.”

Laughing, Boelik guarded himself from a
pebble that Olea tossed his way. “You asked for it,” he
laughed.

“
You are a mean man.” Olea
crossed her arms and turned her head away from him, and he laughed
harder. She glanced back at him, smiling herself.

“
Ah, I suppose you do
deserve some credit. After all, that basket did hold up for you,”
Boelik sighed finally, his laughter fading to an occasional
chuckle.

“
Thank you. I don’t know
that that is actually a compliment, but I’ll be taking it as one,”
she said. Overhead, the sun crept across the sky as their words
filled the air, the atmosphere warming and cooling as the day
passed by. The blue above paled and turned to yellow, and slowly to
a harmless fire.

Olea finally glanced up to see the sunset,
and gasped at the sight. “What?” Boelik asked, glancing out to the
sun as well. The fields shimmered in gold from the light and the
breeze, and the forest beyond was rimmed in a bright orange.

“
It’s beautiful,” she
replied, staring out at it. “I remembered it being so, but it’s
been so long…the village doesn’t see this, not as it is here,
now.”

“
There are a lot of things
you people see differently,” Boelik said, following her
gaze.

“
Why did you say that in
that way?” Olea asked, turning to furrow her brow at
him.

“
In what way?” Boelik
asked, turning back to the forest as his ears picked up the sounds
of music on the breeze. The celebration was starting in the
village.

“
Like you were sad, or
bitter. Why?”

“
I believe that that was
your imagination, my lady.” Boelik turned to her and gave her a
gentle smile. “Anyhow, I believe you’re missing your dance. I’m
sure someone is waiting for one with you at your
celebration.”

“
Fie on the celebration!”
Olea said, standing. Boelik blinked as she approached him, holding
out her hand. “We can dance right here. Or am I more frightening
than a wolf?” she asked, brown eyes glinting with
mischief.

“
Ha,” Boelik huffed,
standing. “You, Olea, are no more frightening than a butterfly.
But, you must promise me one thing if I dance with you.”

“
What?” she asked, her
mischief turning to honest confusion.

“
No stomping on my
feet.”

Laughing, Olea nodded. “Do you know the
steps, then?”

“
I have watched. Though you
should still lead, I think.”

“
Oh, I will,” she said,
taking his hand.

***

Days passed, and the two continued to meet.
They took strolls through the forest, and Boelik shared his
favorite spots with her. Weeks continued, and Olea taught him how
to dance. Months began, and Boelik’s bandages came off.

One evening as the pair watched the sunset
from the hill, sitting near one another, Olea leaned her head
against Boelik’s shoulder. The light from the sun burned everything
in the plains red, making it almost like a crimson sea beneath
them, the trees whispering at their backs. “Bo?” Olea asked.