Little Girl

Gabriel de le Poer · 01-27-2011, 11:31 AM

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She had changed. Gabriel saw change in everyone he had known, and often it was a sudden realization that such a thing had occurred. Kaena’s change had been like that. One day he had looked at her and realized she was old. Not too old, not yet, but old. Old enough. She had been beaten, something he had never imagined he would see in his lifetime. His mother had always been invincible to him. When Haku had proven otherwise, the last part of Gabriel’s childhood had died inside of him. All that remained was this warrior-king who survived only because he lived for this place.

Talitha’s change was similar to his mother’s. Here was a woman that had once been his little girl, chased by monsters he had no power over. He saw shades and shadows around her that were like fuzzy images, things he had no right to know, but he sensed them all the same. In Talitha alone her mother lived—her brother shared only the Lykoi eyes but nothing more. Where Ezekiel was the dawn, here was his twilight daughter burnished in shades of auburn and coal. She was more his shadow than even Gabriel wished to admit; it forced recognition on those who called him enemy. It was why she had been taken.

He said nothing to her inquiry, and did not move from where he stood. It was that second question that made a shadow cross over his face. Like her brother, Talitha had only been taught so much. Gabriel’s place was not to define their faith. It had to be tested by things beyond his control. “No,” he said firmly. “The wicked are cast into the fire. They are made to suffer for eternity, just as those who are good are given peace.” Dual natures in all things. Gabriel believed this as certainly as he believed that his children had been kept safe by the saint around his neck. “Is that why you’re out here?” He pried with certainty, knowing the weight of a Shadow.

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