Meeting The Guardian

Meeting The Guardian
Sebastian's POV

I thought I was dead. Unalived, not breathing. I was supposed to be. But then I felt the harsh sunlight stinging my eyes, felt the sting in my ribs, sharp and shallow like splinters, and felt the sharp pain slicing through the whole of my body, my blood, and my bones, every inch of me creaking and groaning inside of me.
My eyes blinked open to a faint gray world, one that was barely split by the golden beams of a not-too-bright sun. I grunted and blinked again and again as the little sunrays burned my eyes.
The world swam before me in broken fragments of sound and color. Blood crusted at the corner of my mouth, the coppery taste thick on my tongue. I groaned, turning on my side, the pain in my body reminding me that I was really still alive—barely. But enough to get my wife to a physician and have her treated.
I forced myself to sit up, and I bit down on the sharp pain that jarred up to my brain from my stomach. I blew quick and heavy puffs of air and held tight to the gunshot wound on my stomach to ease the pain a bit, then I searched around for her—my wife, Emilia.
But I didn't need to look far. She was right beside me. Despite the protest of my shoulder joints and the agony that shot to my head at each movement I made, I leaned low to lift her from the cold cobblestone. But I stopped midway, cold tremors washing down my core as my eyes traced her body before me.
A heaviness, like my heart just dropped into my stomach, settled at the rungs of my belly as my painful gaze lingered on her.
She was unnaturally still, eyes closed as if she were only sleeping, but her lips—once soft and warm and pink—were now pale and blue at the edges. Each moment that my eyes stayed on her, my breath seized inside of me like my lungs were being cut off slowly inside of me. Her throat was drenched in dried blood, so much of it, and a ring of caked blood was etched into her neck where a musket ball had drilled through. Every inch of the bodice of her gown was stained deep red.
“No…” My voice cracked, hoarse. She couldn't be dead. She damn well couldn't be. Hot heat burned behind my eyes, but I squeezed my eyes shut tight for a moment to hold back on the flood. She couldn't be dead. My wife couldn't be dead. She was supposed to be my anchor, my salvation. She just couldn't be dead. She couldn't be.
I dragged myself closer, ignoring the pain in my ribs and shoulder and the heaviness setting at the pit of my belly. I gathered her into my trembling arms. My fingers shook badly as I moved back her hair from covering her eyes. Her skin was cold. Too cold. I pressed my hand against her chest, searching desperately for a heartbeat. But nothing beat against my palm, not even a flicker of a heartbeat—nothing.
“Wake up, Emilia. Wake up.” I screamed her name, and I shook her gently, then harder. I could no longer keep back the flood in my eyes, and I let it drop. I let my tears splatter onto her lifeless face. “Wake up, Emilia. Please… Wake up, wife. Please, just breathe.”
But all I got was silence, one louder than any sound in the world, and it crushed me, twisted my insides, and constricted my lungs so bad that my breath stilled, forcing its way raspily out of my nostrils.
I stared at her in my arms, my sight coated by the watery veil of tears. I kept searching her face for life, searched her chest for any chance that it might heave to signal life, and still couldn't believe my wife was dead. Emilia just couldn't leave me like this—she was my salvation, my anchor. She was supposed to outlive me.
A sound tore out of me, raw and animal, something between a scream and a sob. I buried my face in her neck, choking on the smell of blood and the absence of warmth from her body.
I don’t remember how long I held her. Minutes. Hours. Time had no meaning anymore. When the sun began to bleed across the sky, ignoring the agony that coursed through me at each movement and the fact that my limbs were as heavy as lead and my heart nothing but shattered glass, I forced myself to my feet. Emilia deserved more than to rot on cold cobblestones like discarded flesh. She was my wife, my duchess, my salvation. She deserved to be buried right. I had to bury her before my madness claimed me again, and I left her again.
I carried her cold, lifeless form to my chest, and I strolled, slowly, staggering gently into the woods just behind the house. I laid her on a stretch of grass. Dropping to my knees before the soft soil before me.
My hands shook terribly, yet I didn't let it stop me; I dug into the earth with whatever I could find—stones, broken wood, even my bare hands when the tools failed me. The soil tore my nails to the quick and filled the cuts on my palms, but I didn’t care. I kept digging until my arms were numb, until I collapsed into the shallow grave I had made, chest heaving, tears streaming down my dirt-streaked face.
When it was done, I lowered her in gently, cradling her head as though she might feel the motion. My lips pressed to her forehead one last time. “You were my only light in this cursed world,” I whispered, my voice broken and hollow. I still couldn't believe she was dead. I was the one who deserved to die; I was the mad one, the crazy one.
I cradled her tighter to me, and I pressed a kiss on her lips now, which were now terribly cold, and hard, and lifeless. “Forgive me, wife… forgive me for not saving you.” I stared into her lifeless, unmoving pale green eyes; my tone was firm now, steeled with resolve. “I swear to you, wife, I am going to make everyone pay for ever hurting you, Brian. Nathan. Your mother, Lady Rochelle, and the stupid, greedy lords of Duchessester. I am going to make everyone pay.” I assured her.
I held her for a couple more minutes before I lowered her gently into the hole. Then I covered her, each handful of dirt tearing into my soul. When the last of her face disappeared beneath the earth, something in me snapped, and the madness crept in once again.
I stumbled back from her grave, my hands filthy, my breath ragged, and the silence closed in. My mind began to fracture—one moment I was staring solemnly at her grave, the next I was laughing, a jagged, hollow laugh that ripped through my chest. I had a vague idea I was wandering away from her grave, staggering into the streets like a ghost, but I had no idea why. I moved not because I wanted to, but because I was propelled and directed by a force that consumed my mind.
People stared as I passed by—bloodied, broken, muttering to myself—but I didn’t see them. I only saw her. My wife's face in every corner, her voice in the wind.
I smiled, beaming up at her when I saw her down the street, her flowery dress flowing from her as always, her face bright, radiant with that lovely bright smile she always wore.
“Come, Sebastian.” She called from ahead, her shoes tapping on the cobblestones hurriedly, preparing for flight. “Come, husband.” She giggled, waving her small arm at me.
“I am coming, wife.” I called back, and I ran fast for her, despite the throbbing ache from every bit of my body, and I tried to catch up with her, but I never could. The more I ran, the faster she moved; she was like a flightless bird, but I didn't stop, and I kept running and running, my lungs burning wild like I had a furnace inside of me, yet I didn't stop, even though she proved very elusive.
“Come, Sebastian. Come, husband.” She kept calling, giggling with a smile that brightened her face and caused me to smile as well.
I kept mumbling continuously, rambling for her to wait, and I kept after her, hot on her heels as she led me away from the street and deeper into the forest.
I kept chasing after her, resting at times when my lungs burned so hot they needed to be quenched by some rest; she then continued after. I couldn't let her continue to wander off into the forest; I had to catch her and take her back to my place. And gradually, days bled into one another, dirt caked beneath my nails, her blood dried across my chest. Though I had a vague memory of her dying, I could see her also, lurking between the tall pine trees.
Her lips creased in a warm smile, her arm moving as she waved for me. “Come on, Sebastian. Come on, husband.”
I held my tight chest, sucking in fast, deep air as I sat on the rock, panting for breath after hours of running. “I am coming, Emilia. I am coming, wife...” I kept mumbling, breathing out the words fast and hard.
Once in control of my breath once again, I moved fast after her again, but then something snapped in me again. My mind spiralled back from the darkness that swallowed it up, and I fell back on the rock. I stared at my hands to see them dirty, with grass and dirt stuck in my nails, and so were my feet. When I stared down at them too, deep mud covered my feet, and more than half of my boots were torn away. My clothes were wet and tattered too.
I was checking myself over when the sharp pain came again, shooting across my chest, and I reclined into the stone, burying my face in my hands. Tears stung my eyes, wetting my palm. “I am sorry, Emilia. I am terribly sorry, wife. I should have protected you better; then you wouldn't have died. Then you will be alive and well…”
“Crying isn't going to bring her back, Sebastian.” A voice chimed before me, soft and careful—a lady's.
I started up then. I didn't bother to clean the tears in my eyes, and I stared at the woman in an awful, white cloak before me. Her cloak wasn't just white; it was bright as well, seeming to shimmer under the sunlight.
She was middle-aged, wearing a smile as bright as her cloak, with a little of her golden hair spilling from under the hood of her cloak.
My eyes narrowed fast on her. “Who are you?” I demanded.
Her lips stretched more, brightening up her smile. “I am the guardian of his verse.” She answered, “The gatekeeper to the portal in and out of his world…”
I dismissed her with a wave of my hand. “Just get out.” I barked at her. It seems she was far crazier than I was. “Get away from here and leave me the hell alone.” I yelled, burying my face in my hands once again.
“...and I am the only person who can help you see your wife again.”
I jolted back to her at that, sitting up on the rock. I narrowed my gaze to her again, my eyes sweeping her carefully, studying every inch of her. “How do you know about my wife?” I demanded, my gaze still sweeping her, narrowed more with suspicion. “And how can you help me see her again when she is dead?”
I fought back the shock that consumed my eyes as she drifted in the air like a paper, I swallowed back my gasp, and my eyes narrowed still on her, following every bit of movement as she drifted closer to me.
“I can take you back to the past, in her world actually, not this one,” she smiled, spreading her arms under her cloak wide, but still, no hands came out of the cloak; it just spread around her like a feather. “You will have to warn her and convince her not to return to this world; only then can she survive the fate that binds both of you.”
“And why would I do that?” I demanded.
She smiled again, her lips stretching almost to her ears. “Because you would want her to live too, if not here, at least there in her own world. You will want her to stay alive and be happy, and that is the only way she can do that, far away from you.” She said.
I moved my lips to speak, but she suddenly appeared before me and pressed her finger against my forehead, her touch warm and hard. “Go, Sebastain, but remember to return quickly, for that is not your world.” She whispered in her soft, careful voice again, and then a bright, blinding white light flashed against my face, pulling me fast into its luminous fold.