Notes: WARNING! This chapter is very sad! Read and review at your own risk! It is also chapter 7, which is exactly how many I promised, but as you can see, it is far from over. There are now 14 planned chapters! Woot! I have a forum dedicated to my stories, so visit it if you can…
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The boy tried to knock the seeker away, but it disappeared and reappeared behind him and growled. I watched as the two brutes began to freak out as the seeker was seemingly all around them, nipping at their heels. They finally realized I wasn't worth the trouble and ran off, screaming about a ghost dog at the top of their lungs. If the seeker had saved me by showing itself to humans, the very thing that had caused its banishment, I must mean a lot to it…
I had thought that after it had told me its past that it was only with me to get its job back as a seeker, but now I realized…
"You saved me!"
"Yeah well, I wouldn't have much to take back to the library if they beat you to a pulp, would I?"
I nodded. That was exactly what I had expected it to say. There was no way it was going to admit it.
"Its just business. Nothing personal."
But I knew that it had saved me for another reason. A much more personal reason indeed. I was its only friend. I was pretty sure that such a companionship had never occurred before between a human and a seeker.
"Well, we can't go back up to the farm and risk being caught, so where are we going to stay for the night?"
The seeker came as close as possible to frowning with a dog's face. It looked almost comical. I nearly laughed.
"I really don't know." It said.
It occurred to me suddenly that I must have died on the farm and told the seeker, or else it wouldn't have known to take me there for shelter from the rain the night I had fallen through the portal...
"Do you have a name?" I asked it. I didn't know why, but I had the sudden urge to ask. I had been dying to know, but hadn't found the right time to ask.
"I'm a spirit, we do not need 'names'. We are not pets. We do not eat, we do not sleep."
"Sounds like the perfect pet to me."
"Excuse me?"
"Uhh… I said… Sounds like a great place to be."
"Where?"
I paused for a moment. I had no comeback for that one.
"Well, you don't have a name, and neither do I. One other thing we have in common."
"I have a name! I just can't remember."
We both sat on the steps of the house until the hustle and bustle of the morning had died down. I should have been bored, but I had nothing else to do. Besides, it was fun to watch the people of the village carry on with their daily lives. That was when I saw Mikko, she was shopping with her parents, looking at the pots the old lady named Kaana had made.
"Hide!" I yelled out, instead of thinking it.
"I don't have to."
"Yes you do! She can see you!" We both hid behind the house. I looked around the corner. She looked sad, almost as if she had wanted to say goodbye to me before I had left. Maybe she was going to…
"Forget about her! We need to go back to the farm and check out the grave before they get back!"
I agreed. If they were shopping I had the perfect window of opportunity to check out the grave. We headed toward the farm on the hill. I wondered why I had wanted to hide from Mikko. It seemed so stupid to me now. She wouldn't have done anything if she had seen me. Not in front of her parents…
Half an hour later, we had arrived at the farm. I was sweaty and exhausted, so I took the loaf of bread Mikko had given me out of my pack. It was slightly stale, but I wolfed it down anyway. I knew Mikko and her parents could arrive at any moment, so I had to check out the grave quick.
The seeker however, wasn't tired at all, being a spirit.
"Humans, always tired…"
We went to the back of the house after I had grabbed a shovel from the barn. The only thing that remotely resembled a marker was a large white stone as big as the seeker. I wondered how my mother could have gotten it there…
"Well, let's start digging." The seeker said, and started digging. Almost by instinct, dog instinct.
I remembered my dream and was afraid at what I would find. What if there were bones? But I was right here, how could that be possible? Every time I struck something hard I flinched, but it always turned out to be a rock. I became increasingly aware of how much time was passing, and imagined what would happen if Mikko's parents saw a strange boy digging behind their house…
Finally, we stopped. We had dug a hole six feet deep and three feet wide. There was nothing there but rocks. I felt exhausted and wiped my hand over my sweaty brow. None of this made sense anymore. And for the first time I wondered if this was some sort of nightmare. I crawled out of the hole and lay on the gound. Every muscle in my body hurt terribly.
The seeker too, finally gave up. It sniffed the dirt one last time and appeared next to me.
"Well, things just keep getting stranger…"
For the first time I could remember the seeker was at a loss for words. There was nothing I could say. The whole situation was impossible, and yet, I had expected something to be revealed when I finished digging up the grave. Some question had to be answered. I couldn't have just… come back to life. And then, my head started to hurt as the world began to blur around me. Suddenly, I was in the house…
My mother was at the door, crying out, "Zerek, we don't have any more money. We've given you all we have. Please, I'm just a widow…"The man forced his way into the house. She tried to push him back, but he slapped her across the face and she crumpled to the floor. I ran over to help her up. I heard myself yelling at the men, but the one called Zerek pushed me to the floor. I got back up and punched his face as hard as I could. One of the soldiers shoved me off him as the other rammed his spear into my chest. I fell to the ground as my shirt became covered in blood. My blood. I could hear the soldiers threatening my mother as she cried. They finally left, and my mother bent over me and cried out,
"Jack! Jack! Don't leave me alone!" Her tears fell onto my face like raindrops.
And then, there was darkness.
