The silence that followed the defeat of the Claimoor was almost as heavy as the battle itself.
Fragments of ice were scattered everywhere. The air was still charged with magic, and the cold that my spell had caused was slowly beginning to dissipate. My breathing was ragged, and my hands were still trembling from using the relic's power.
Eleonor turned to me and brushed off her clothes, as if nothing had happened.
"You took your time," she said in a dry tone.
I took a step... and then another.
Suddenly, the weight of the relic on my arm became unbearable. The magical pulse became erratic, my breathing became irregular, and a buzzing filled my ears.
"Noah, listen to me," Eleonor said to me...
I couldn't answer. I started to feel short of breath. I collapsed into Eleonor's arms.
In those moments, thousands of thoughts raced through my head. I remembered the exact moment of my father's death and saw my mother saying goodbye to me, wishing me a safe journey and giving me the family's shield of protection.
Suddenly, I heard a voice I didn't recognize.
—Take a deep breath…
Do it slowly. Stay calm, it was just a faint.
I blinked. A woman with black hair was kneeling beside me, holding my wrist, while a small device emitted pulses of blue light.
—Who…? Who are you?
—Sophie —she replied with a smile—. I'm in charge of logistics, supplies, escape routes… and right now, your life support.
—You're still the same —Eleanor told me—. You never stop worrying me —she whispered so no one else could hear.
"I wasn't entirely conscious," I replied, still trying to catch my breath. "Tell me, how did you show up so conveniently? No… rather, tell me, what are you doing here?"
Eleonor looked around, tense.
"How long will he need?" she asked.
"He used the relic without preparation," Sophie answered. "He's exhausted, but he'll live."
Eleonor put my arm over her shoulder.
"My apartment is nearby. We should leave now."
"Your apartment?" I said.
The cold was still biting at my lungs, but there was something heavier than that: the feeling that there were too many things I didn't understand.
Halfway there, my legs gave out.
Eleonor caught me before I fell.
"Relax," she said. "You're not alone anymore."
"Hurry up!" Sophie shouted, already waiting for them in her van.
With Eleonor's help, I walked and got into the van of this girl I didn't know, and we headed to Eleonor's supposed apartment.
The apartment was quiet, orderly, protected by seals similar to those in the mansion.
"You need to rest; even though you're the bearer, your body wasn't prepared to use the relic's power. I'll give you something to help you sleep for a couple of hours so you can regain your strength."
After that, I don't remember what happened. I fell into a deep sleep.
When I woke up, Eleonor was sitting in front of her computer, her elbows resting on the desk. Sophie was speaking softly near the window. She was talking to someone on her cell phone. It seemed like she was making changes to some kind of schedule.
"Cancel the old routes," she was saying. "Change the flight records. Yes… the bearer is alive."
She hung up and went to another room.
"Eleanor…" I murmured and asked her, "Why were you here?"
She took a moment to answer. She sighed deeply and replied,
"I've been secretly watching over you for a year."
I frowned.
"That doesn't make sense."
Eleanor looked at me directly.
"A year ago, Grandma Ciara gave me an order," she continued. "As your guardian, my duty was to protect you… without you knowing."
"What do you mean, for a year? What have you been doing all this time?"
I felt a knot in my stomach.
"The library…" I said slowly.
She didn't deny it.
"The girl who helped with the books. The one who was always on the afternoon shift. The one who always avoided you. That was me all along."
The silence became heavy.
I swallowed.
"I was fulfilling my responsibility."
"And what is that responsibility?"
"To make sure you stayed alive."
I closed my eyes.
"So I was never alone," I murmured.
"That's right. You never were," she repeated.
She looked me straight in the eyes and said in an angry tone:
"Noah, you abandoned everything. After the Mark chose you, after everyone died… you left."
"I didn't run away, I distanced myself," I replied.
Eleanor let out a dry laugh.
"That's running away, Noah. You moved to Canada, hiding, pretending to be normal, while our family was preparing for another war."
I clenched my fists. I wasn't ready.
"You never are," she retorted. "Not even when we were children."
Those words made me remember the day I left my family to move to Canada.
Flashback
The night I left the academy, no one tried to stop me. I walked down the corridors with a small backpack. The Mark burned on my back, as if it knew what I was about to do.
Eleanor was waiting for me at the entrance.
"If you cross that door," she said, "there's no turning back."
"I can't be what everyone expects," I replied. "I'm not you."
"You're right," she answered. "But you're the bearer, and that's worse."
I couldn't answer her. I just kept walking.
"Are you listening to me?" she shouted.
Her shouts pulled me out of my thoughts.
"Do you know what it was like to stay?" Eleanor said in a low voice. "To train knowing that everything depended on someone who wasn't there.
To defend a broken legacy."
I looked at her.
"Do you think it was easy for me?"
"No," she replied. "I think it was convenient."
Those words hurt more than I expected.
"Every time you failed at the academy," she continued, "I had to cover for you. Every time you hesitated, someone else paid the price."
"And yet, the Mark chose you. And what did you do? You ran away."
"Because I was afraid, because I couldn't bear your criticism anymore, the stares of my classmates, the whispers in the hallways. I broke down, I couldn't take it anymore."
Silence fell between us.
"Me too," she finally said, "but I didn't leave."
"I lived every day expecting the worst, with the memory of seeing my father lying on the ground and watching my mother die in that bed."
"Yes, your father died too, but what did you do? You ran away like a coward. You couldn't handle being reprimanded and being asked for a little more from yourself. You're pathetic."
Noah clenched his fists, took a deep breath, turned around, and shouted:
"Maybe I am pathetic; I don't have your strength or your magical abilities, but I always wanted to be like you."
"Since we started at the academy, I've always admired you. I wanted to be as great as you were."
"That night, even though we were just children, you stood in front of a Claimoor and protected us. You didn't hesitate, and from that moment on, I no longer saw you as my cool cousin; you were my hero, the one who risked her life to protect us."
"And when the Mark manifested in me, I was surprised too. I didn't understand, and I still don't."
"But in those years, I tried to live up to it, I worked hard."
"But the night you saw me, your words broke me."
I could endure the laughter of the other students, the indifference of the instructors.
"None of that mattered to me, but you... you were the person I respected and admired the most. And for you to despise me, to humiliate me... I couldn't bear that."
Eleanor listened to me with her back turned.
Suddenly she turned around and said to me:
"I'm sorry I said all that to you, and I apologize for what I said a few moments ago."