The Secret Keeper

We walked among the trees a little while later, nobody really saying anything. In any case, I don’t think any of us wanted to acknowledge what we all knew was bound to happen.

One of us might not come back.

We tried not to think about it, but the thought itself was unavoidable. When you think about the sheer numbers these Creatures apparently have on us, the doubts creep into your mind like icy water into a not-quite waterproof wetsuit. We should’ve been using the time we had left together to remember the others by, but I don’t think it ever occurred to us that these moments would be important.

I think that’s because people’s minds tend to focus on the present, not the future. But I guess that’s a mystery I’ll leave to the professionals.

I thought about the stuff I’d learned about being a Keeper… or whatever it was that Bo and I were supposed to be. While it was hard to sort through it all, I couldn’t help but think that maybe we didn’t know quite enough. There were gaps and blank spots in our information, ones that should be filled.

How do we know for sure that the Creatures are here to escape the Secret? Suppose my assumption was wrong? Then what?

I heard Bo clear his throat beside me. Ivy and Arkarian had gone ahead, looking for the precise spot that the latter had detected the Creatures. We didn’t know if it was the portal, so much, but it was our best chance.

My parents stopped suddenly up ahead, looking at a bush. It didn’t look like Bo and I were needed.

“Eve,” he said quietly.

I looked up at him. The small hoop in his ear glinted back at me in the moonlight, and this close to him I could see the birthmark on his neck and the faint tooth-mark scar on his lip. He looked like a tough guy on the outside, but I knew better.

“Yeah?”

He didn’t say anything. Slowly, deliberately, he reached up to the object hanging around my neck.

Ever since the day Arkarian had first talked to Bo and me about being Secret Keepers, I had kept the key I’d conjured around my neck for safekeeping. I knew, deep in my heart, that it would mean everything if it were to be lost. And as I looked closely at Bo’s chest, I could see that his key hung there on a leather cord, very similar to mine.

As his fingers brushed the metal, warm from being so close to me, it started to emit a slightly bluish light, like the book had. I didn’t say anything, afraid that one word would throw everything out of balance and the moment would end.

I could feel Bo’s hurried breath on my face, he was standing so close. The look he had in his eyes was one I’d never seen before… I couldn’t place it. He was concentrating hard on the key, and as the seconds went by it grew brighter and brighter, illuminating the darkness of the forest around us.

Did I know what he was doing? No. Did I care? Nope.

I could see Bo’s other hand move to his throat, clasping his own key. It took me a moment to realize what was going on, and it was barely a moment after it clicked that Bo somehow connected the keys to each other. The blue light doubled in size, illuminating a space that must have been ten feet around us.

My breath hitched in my throat.

And then, as suddenly as it started, it stopped. The blue light shrunk into itself, and eventually disappeared.

“What was that?”

Our gazes turned to Ivy, who was pointing at some apparently random direction. As I followed her finger, my breath caught in my throat.

The wolf.

There is was, on top of a rock between the trees. It was staring hard at us, its pitch-black eyes silently fuming. I couldn’t move.

Bo stiffened next to me, as if he knew exactly what the wolf meant.

“Eve,” he murmured, so softly I almost couldn’t hear it. “Run.”

I managed to shake my head, all the blood drained from my face. “No. I’m not leaving again.”

He winced, as if the memory of just last night had physically hurt him. “You have to. That damn wolf is going to do something, I can feel it.”

“Isn’t that my job?” Okay, so this was not the best time for sarcasm. But I wouldn’t resist.

He still managed to crack a smile. “Yeah, it is. But I don’t know what’s going to happen, Eve, so-”

He was cut off by a low growl.

“It wants Eve,” Ivy said softly. It actually surprised me that she could read it’s mind, but it probably shouldn’t have.

I stared at the wolf, and the wolf stared back. Neither of us moved.

If I could get it trapped, and figure out how to get rid of it, then Bo and my parents could probably get out okay. Maybe I wouldn’t. But if they were safe, that was all that mattered, right?

I glanced at Bo. He didn’t seem to know what I was thinking, and I was grateful for that. His expression looked worried, almost pained. It occurred to me then. I fell in love with my enemy. Cliché, I knew, but there was nothing that could be done about it. I felt the key at my neck, still warm from the… whatever it was.

Then my gaze flickered toward my parents. Ivy’s face was twisted into a grimace, and Arkarian’s just looked outright panicked. I couldn’t even comprehend all that they’d done for me, in my lifetime. They weren’t even my real parents. They owed me nothing. And yet, they were my parents.

They were the reason I did what I did next. I stared directly at that wolf. I picked up a little pebble that rested at my feet, my face almost burning under the stares of the other four pairs of eyes.

And then I threw the rock at the wolf, hitting him in the head.