The Wizard's Broken Angel

Chapter-8

Panting, Miley stopped only when she had reached the middle of the woods. It was now that she looked behind to see if something was following her, "oh my God! My holy heaven! What was there? I felt something breathing heavily behind me. I was so scared that I didn't even look at what it was," she looked at her legs that were still shivering. Her palms were cold and numb. She sat on a rock under a tree with glowing green leaves for a few breaths, "it was scary. Can I travel on my own?" She hugged herself tightly.

Zach was standing in front of her. His invisibility saved him from the misty eyes of the girl sitting before him. He just looked at Miley as she sobbed and shivered due to fear.

"I want to go back to my home with my parents. I want mom, dad and Tragon. I promise God, I will be a good girl. Do some miracle and send me back, I hate this place," she the incessant tears that failed to hold onto her eyes and trailed all their way down to the propped up roots of a huge tree behind her. It was a flat rock almost her size, she laid on it and closed her eyes. "Let that monster come and eat me, why aren't my tears stopping? Why suddenly my heart feels so heavy? Why?" She covered her eyes with her arms lying on the rock.

"Do you remember this place, this tree? Iris, do you remember?" Zach whispered to Miley who still couldn't see or hear him.

It is a story from our childhood when I didn't even know that the Savior symbol was going to come to me. It was your birthday, the whole palace was decorated like a bride. Your beauty trampled the stars and shamed the moon that day. Even though I never told you back then — you looked heavenly in your sky blue fluttering gown. The way its laces floated when you ran down the stairs, the way they complimented your beauty and elegance was out of this world.

I still remember after being busy for the entire day with your royal family and guests you took out time in the evening and came to me. I never expected you to come and see me, I thought you might have forgotten about me, but you came.

"Zach! It's my birthday today," Iris stood before me, placing her hand on her back. Her wings were raised higher than usual, of course, Iris was excited. But I wasn't as rich as his father nor did I earn money. I knew she expected a gift that I didn't have for her.

"Thank you for your existence, Princess Iris," I greeted her with a smile.

She looked at me with pursed lips and her wings drooped, "thank you and…"

It's not like I hadn't prepared a gift for her, but I was afraid to give it to her because it wasn't as precious as the other gifts she got that day, "princess I-I…"

"Stop hesitating and show me what you are hiding behind your back," she was quick-witted, she understood I was hiding her gift behind me.

"Princess, it's nothing special. Not as precious as the other gifts…"

"I don't care what its price is. I just want to see what you got me as my birthday gift," she insisted and I couldn't deny so very hesitantly I revealed a soul healer seed to her.

"A soul healer seed!" She immediately took it from my hand, she looked happy and excited again. "Wow! Where did you get it? I have been searching for it, it's rare to find, isn't it?" She looked at the violet coloured seed that was exactly her palm's length. It had irregular grooves that filled with the violet fluid that circulated in its seed coat to keep the seed alive in its dormancy.

I nodded, "it's a speciality of my wizarding village. One wizard is given a soul healer tree once in their lifetime. I-I want to give my seed to you. This is the only precious thing I possess."

For some reason, her smile disappeared, "it is indeed precious. A soul healer seed when turned into a huge tree has the capability to heal the soul of the one who plants it. It can't exactly prevent death, but it can heal the broken soul. It's like a remedy for death, how can you just give it to me? Take it back, it's so precious that I can't keep it!" She placed it on my hand again and was about to leave when I stepped in front of her and kneeled, raising the seed in my palm before her.

"Princess Iris, please accept my gift. I seriously want to give it to you. My soul isn't as precious as yours. Even if something were to happen to me, I want you to stay safe. No matter what the future holds, we must stay prepared for the worst," I told her.

She kept on peering at me and said nothing, she held my hand, picked me up and both of us dashed to the Highlow Woods. We kept on running until we reached the middle of the forest.

"Princess?"

"Let's plant it together," she smiled and I stepped a few steps back. I didn't tell her back then about the tradition in our village. There was no way she could have known. Back then, angels were trying their level best to crush all our wizarding traditions and customs. They even stopped us from learning magic so that no wizard could lift their voice against the angels.

But according to that tradition, people could individually plant the soul healer seed or only the couples could plant it together with the person they would willingly lend their souls to — their soulmate. I was too shy to talk about it. Iris held my hand and made me sit beside her on the ground.

"Help me dig the ground, so that we can plant it together," she said.

"Princess, I will dig the ground and you plant it alone. I seriously want you to use it just for yourself," I laughed, nervously.

She nodded. I dug a small pit. I was about to get up so that she could plant the seed when she held my hand and we planted it together.

I ran away. My heart was uneasy and left off guard, I couldn't help the emotions that welled up that day, Iris I wish you knew what you meant to me, I wished you genuinely appreciated my love. Things were so good before I came to know that I was the chosen one. If I could have you at the cost of losing my symbol — I would have undoubtedly chosen you, but right now if I need to choose between you and the symbol — I will choose the symbol.

Zach came out of his memories just to see the green light from the soul healer tree falling on both of them. The seed they had planted years ago was a fully grown-up tree now.

"It's a tree now but are we now?" Zach's eyes knew just one face they could worship throughout his life without getting tired. With the conflict from the past overpowering his memories, which once used to be more important than himself, he stepped closer to Miley who was asleep on the flat Rock underneath the tree as if someone had used that place before too.

"You are asleep today in the place where I once laid, how do you feel, Iris? Can you feel my heart? Is it painful? My questions, do they reach you? Iris, are you asleep?" Zach's invisibility cover vanished and he emerged out of the darkness and green scintilla that were showering slowly on the two souls underneath the tree. He walked to Miley, lifted his hand to touch her conspicuous eyelashes but stopped. "Iris…"

Come back to me… Miley heard a faint voice in her dream. Miley saw herself standing far from the tree, "what? Dreams again? I can't believe I slept in such a situation. It looks like the Highlow Woods I came running to, but I am sure there was a huge tree with glowing green leaves somewhere around here." She walked some distance and found a baby tree almost of her height with glowing leaves in place of the huge tree she laid beneath.

Am I in the past? She thought, looking around, just then she heard someone approaching the same spot in a rush, she knew she couldn't be seen, she hid behind a tree. Soon her eyes went on huge white wings drenched and tainted in blood.

An older Iris emerged out of the darkness of the forest in the light of the soul healer tree. She was badly hurt and was breathing heavily as if she was having difficulty in breathing. She fell on her knees and coughed out blood taking a deep breath. Iris was constantly looking back as if someone was following her. Sobbing, she looked at the soul healer tree, "why? Why Zach…"

"Come back to me! You can't run away!" Iris heard a harsh deep voice call her and got up on her bleeding legs, her wings were trampled badly, she couldn't fly no matter how much she tried. She trudged away from the spot with her full strength.

Miley looked in the direction of the sound, "who's voice, was it? Zach? Was it Zach? Did he…" Miley looked at Iris and started panting, gaping in the darkness she tried to figure out whose voice did she exactly hear. But no one showed up. "If Zach was after her why didn't he come searching for her here? That voice, whose was it?" Miley dashed towards the source of the voice, she kept on running continuously but the darkness of the forest turned into pitch-black darkness. A bright green light entered her eyes and he woke up from her dream under the fully grown soul healer tree.

Resting under the tree, Iris' soul inside Miley recovered to a certain extent. Meanwhile, Zach sat on the floor resting his back and head against the rock Miley was lying on. His invisibility chains were still on job doing their work to keep Zach invisible to Miley and others.

"Zach!" Miley got up shocked in turn waking up Zach beside her as well. Tears kept on flowing down her eyes without a reason or explanation. It was as if the soul within Miley knew her scars and also those scars that deeply connected to the place Miley was present. "Why Zach, why?" She kept on repeating.

Zach woke up and looked at her confused, "why is she taking my name? What did I do to her? Can she see me?"

"Why did you hurt Iris? How could you trample her wings? Why did you do it?" Miley sobbed, placing her palms over her face.

Zach looked clueless, "what? What is she saying? When did I trample Iris' wings? Did she have a nightmare? The most important question, does she remembers her past life?" He wanted to ask Miley right away but didn't. Seeing her sob badly, he stopped.

"I feel scared. I feel so scared right now, if he finds me will he kill me too? No! I don't want to die not until I save my parents, I will go to hell if I have to, to hide from that demon Zach. He said he loved Iris, but if he could hurt her so badly he wouldn't leave me alive. Thank God I didn't trust him," Miley clenched her chest and cleared her tears. It was already dawn, she got up and continued walking through the forest.

Meanwhile, Zach was lost in deep thoughts, "when did I hurt Iris? For as long as I remember I never touched her physically. Nor did I allow someone else to. Even when I was angry at her, I never... Wait! Why am I overthinking? Miley had a nightmare. It's impossible that she had Iris' memories with her. It's just because she is scared she is seeing things like that."

Zach tried to erase what he heard from Miley, assuming it was just a meaningless nightmare, but something kept on bothering him the entire day that he spent flying after Miley, seeing her trip and fall, getting hurt with the branches because she was paying attention not to trip again.

There was a reason why those woods were called the Highlow Woods. It was because their land surface ran in a zigzag fashion. Somewhere the land was too high, somewhere too low and among those the impenetrable trees made it more difficult for Miley to walk through them.

Zach didn't face many problems because he had been living there for hundreds of years and also because he was flying and not walking on the land. Although he kept an eye on Miley he never helped her when she fell or didn't remove pebbles he knew were poisonous from her path.

Miley used the blunt dagger that she found in the closet to make her way through the dense vegetation on the ground. Panting she stopped for some rest, "gosh! Is it possible to ever get out of this jungle? I swear on my whole life."

She was sweating badly, her clothes were torn from places, scratches and bruises were all over her body. Her clear glowing face was tainted with dust and algae that grew on the forest floor.

"She looks miserable," Zach looked at Miley sitting on a huge root of a tree, from some height. "I thought she would give up soon, but she is stubborn. Like her previous life…" Zach was floating calmly in the air with the chains revolving around him when he heard Miley scream.

"I WANT TO DRINK WATER! I AM HUNGRY!"

Zach widened his eyes and looked around, "who is she talking to? Is my invisibility not working?"

"It's a forest, right? So why haven't I encountered any river or waterfall or something like that? God! It's pissing me off. Seriously! I thought I might get some fruits or something edible but nothing! Nothing at all!" She messed her hair with her hands.

Meanwhile, Zach had several berries in his small pouch he carried with him, "stupid girl, we just crossed the most fertile area of this forest. You were so busy fighting the bushes and insects that you overlooked these fruits. Of course, I picked some, but not gonna share them with you. Haha." Zach smirked as he crushed berries with his teeth. "I wish I could tease her, it would be so funny." He chuckled.

"FINE! I WILL HUNT!"

Zach widened his eyes and floated to Miley, "do you have the heart to kill?"

Miley didn't respond, of course, she could neither hear nor see Zach.

"Let's see how you hunt," Zach floated back to some height above her. "Iris was so weak-hearted that she couldn't even harm the people who hurt her. Huh! She was indeed weak, fragile and…" Zach was talking to himself when he heard Miley scream behind the bushes, he floated just to see if she was alive or dead. To his surprise, he saw Miley running after a wild baby rabbit which wasn't a rabbit it was a…

"Jackalope! Stupid girl! Run away from it, not after it! Miley!" Zach screamed flying behind her to stop her because he knew. If there was a baby jackalope, the mother jackalope wouldn't be far away. "It's not edible!" He screamed, forgetting that Miley was unable to hear him. "MILEY!"

Soon the baby jackalope that was the size of a normal rabbit ran to its mother who was almost a reindeer's size. Miley gasped and stepped back slowly, laughing nervously, while Zach floated right next to her, "now that's called inviting the storm." He said looking at the huge red eyes of the mother Jackalope, glaring at Miley.