The guardian, p.3
The Guardian, page 3
Her guardian’s silent “Nope” rang in her mind.
“Well, it’s not like I know what I’m doing,” she muttered. “I merely received the instruction to meditate. I was not, unfortunately, told how. Whose fault is that?”
After another hour of failed attempts, Iliya went down the hall to the den.
Her mother was tying together threads of yarn. Iliya had taken away her needlepoint and knitting tools for fear she would harm herself with the sharp points and edges.
“Mother, do you know how to meditate?”
Iliya hadn’t meant to bark the question, but she was frustrated. Usually, Iliya would work to get her mother’s attention and connect with her as much as possible before asking anything.
Cassandra looked up at Iliya with wide eyes. “Oh, yes.”
“Can you teach me?” Iliya sat in front of her mother. She had to admit, she had not expected such a coherent answer.
“I can try.” Cassandra put down her yarn. “But I’ve never been able to do it successfully.”
Iliya paused, trying to understand. “You mean you’ve never been able to meditate?”
Cassandra nodded.
“But you said you know how.”
Cassandra nodded again.
“I don’t understand.”
Cassandra reached out and took Iliya’s hand. “You can’t try to meditate. You must accept all thoughts, all feelings that come into your mind, and then let them go. They are just products of the mind, and they are fleeting. Touch that which is more eternal. Ground your body, and free your spirit.”
Iliya realized that she had been concentrating too hard on her first meditation attempt, but she didn’t understand the alternative. How could she meditate without trying to meditate?
Cassandra continued, “I know you can do it, Elijah. You were born to.”
Iliya blinked in confusion. “I’m Iliya, Mother. Not Elijah.”
“If you say so.”
Her chest clenching, Iliya stood and backed away from her mother, who picked up her yarn and hummed softly.
Iliya felt determined to meditate effectively—which meant she would need to let go of her determination.
Shaking off her mother’s strange words, she returned to her bedroom. This time, instead of sitting on her bed, she chose the floor. She sat cross-legged again, but she let her hands rest naturally wherever they felt most comfortable rather than recreating a monkish image. She took a deep breath again, but she didn’t follow it with intense concentration. She simply let her mind wander. Although she wanted to meditate, that was just one desire swirling around inside her, and they came and went like water lapping onto the shore.
She began to relax, existing in the space between thoughts, between feelings. Time stretched into an expanse untroubled by minutes and seconds. She teetered on the edge of a cliff awaiting something important she couldn’t quite touch. To reach out might shatter the fragile balance. It would come in its time.
She perceived herself rising but didn’t analyze it. She couldn’t see or hear, but she didn’t try to open her senses. Both fear and excitement joined her on this spiritual journey; she didn’t question that.
Eventually, her vision cleared. She stood in her bedroom. Looking down, she could see her meditating body sitting cross-legged below her.
She suppressed the impulse to run. There was her body resting quietly, her own long, dark-brown hair spilling down her back, her own uniquely jutting nose and thick eyebrows, her own beige skin tanned from gardening and walks to town.
If she’s there, then who am I? Iliya thought.
Iliya looked down at her hands; they appeared solid enough. She waded over to the mirror and was startled to see no reflection. She saw only the closet behind her.
She could sense him waiting nearby, and she felt thankful he allowed her these moments to collect herself. As she turned to a corner of the room, a creature hovered there.
He was enormous, taking up almost the entire space from floor to ceiling. Patches of titanium white and midnight black covered his form. Matching patchy-colored hair spiked atop his head. He wore jagged black rags for clothing. The bottom half of him dissolved into wisps like a ghost. His grotesque, clown-like face bulged black eyes that conveyed a hostile sort of sarcasm. His smile was full of sharp teeth. He hunched down toward her, bringing his gruesome face close to the ground.
This was her guardian.
She strode over to him, paused, and then slapped him clear across the face.
He sputtered incoherently and touched his cheek gingerly with his massive hand. “What was that for?”
“I’ve been wanting to do that.”
“Yeah, well I’ve been wanting a cherry sundae, but you don’t see me hitting defenseless people.” His mocking, expressive tone sounded exactly the way she’d always imagined it.
She regarded him for a moment. “I hardly think you’re defenseless.”
He glared at her. “Is this the thanks I get for looking out for you?”
“Looking out for me? That’s a laugh. What about when you sent me the sign to visit the amphitheater my mother used to dance in—forcing me to spend our last bit of savings?”
The guardian chuckled. “Yeah, that was a good day.”
“What was that even for?”
“Well, you can’t really blame me for that. I needed to see the newest comedian perform.”
Her hands clenched into fists, her blood boiling. “How was that looking out for me?”
He rolled his eyes in an exaggerated way. “You can’t really expect me to be entertained by your little life day after day. How can I do my job effectively if I’m bored to tears?”
Her voice came out as a growl. “And the time you urged me to go into town—on the anniversary of my father’s death—and my mother lit the house on fire using a ceremonial candle while I was gone? The firemen almost called child services.”
“You weren’t really needed at home. You would have only gotten in the way.”
“The house could have burned down! Baq and Pamela were terrified. And all because, if I recall, you were tired of the paint color in my bedroom.”
“Green is such an ugly color, truly.”
“And take today—you called me out of sleep and seized my mother’s attention, just to tell me to meditate?”
The guardian shrugged. “It’s a complicated message. Try symbolizing meditation—not easy. I work hard to communicate with you from the spirit world. Sometimes it lands, and sometimes it doesn’t.
“You’re hardly looking out for me. The fact that you occasionally help me is merely coincidental.”
“Now wait just a moment.” Her hulking monster guardian paused to peer at her. “I’ve been assigned to look out for you, and I’m bound by that code.”
“Seems you have quite a wide latitude.”
“That’s enough,” he snapped. As he gathered himself to his full height, his head reached the ceiling. “I didn’t call you here to squabble. We do that quite well in the mortal world. I must show you your mission.”
Iliya kept to herself that she hadn’t yet decided whether she would accept it.
“Let’s go into town.” He took her small hand in his before she could protest. The world spun, and they were standing—or rather, floating—in the town square. “You could have walked there yourself, but this is faster,” he explained.
The town looked very much the same at first—all the streets, the buildings, the tents. But the people were completely different. They weren’t people at all, more like ghouls. They stared vacantly ahead, their mouths gaping like the echo of their last scream. Their sallow gray bodies stretched unnaturally long, as if pulled like taffy. They floated aimlessly around the streets with an edge of desperation like they were searching for something but had forgotten what. Her skin tingled with goosebumps.
“What—who are these . . . things?” she asked in disgust. There were only about twenty of them, but they still managed to transform her familiar town square into something ghastly.
“This is the spirit world,” answered her guardian.
“But . . . where are all the normal people?”
“Ouch.” Her guardian put a hand on his chest as if wounded. “We’re normal in our own world, you know. Here, you’re the abnormal one.”
“Just—why can’t I see anyone from my world?”
“You can only see your own body for reentry. Otherwise, everyone who is invisible in your world is visible here, and everyone who is invisible in our world is visible in yours.”
“So the people from my world are here, and I just can’t see them?”
“And they can’t see you.”
“What if I accidentally walk into them?”
The guardian raised an eyebrow. “Really?”
“Would I just pass right through them?”
“Ding, ding, ding! Five hundred points for the little lady.”
“But these other . . . creatures, they can see me?”
“Oh, yes.” The guardian became somber. “And you must watch out for them, because some will not like to see a human projecting here.”
The creepy gray spirits had hardly seemed to notice her presence, let alone mind it. But she realized the gray spirits were not the only unfamiliar beings surrounding her. Blood-red spherical demon creatures with horns and sharp teeth, and angelic creatures with fluffy white wings and sparkling gowns—a few of each traversed the streets with considerably more intention than the mindless gray spirits. “So why did you bring me here?”
“Sometimes, I must speak with you directly rather than through signs or feelings. In the mortal world, it takes considerable effort for me to communicate with you and for you to receive my communication. Every message I send to you requires me to expend energy. The more specific and detailed the message, the more it costs me. It’s time for you to know how to create a proper channel, when needed.” He grasped each of her shoulders in his firm hands and peered down at her, locking her into a fixed gaze. “And from now on, when I send you a sign that I need to speak with you, you must obey, agreed?”
She shook off his hands. He was allegedly divinely obligated to protect her, but she did not yet trust in his ability—or desire—to do so. “I make no such promises.”
“How can I help you if you won’t accept my help?” he cried in a dramatic, exaggerated tone.
“Earn my trust.”
He frowned at her. “You know, just because I occasionally want to have a little fun, it doesn’t make me a demon.”
“Doesn’t it?” But she relented. “All right, if I don’t have a compelling reason not to, I’ll obey when you ask me to meet you here.”
“Good.” He clapped his hands together. “We’re off to a better start than I’d imagined.”
She paused, surveying him. “Really?”
He ignored her derision. “Now we’ll go further into the town—stay close to me—and I’ll show you a little bit of your mission.”
They headed down the familiar, yet strangely unfamiliar, streets. The infrastructure, the buildings, and the cobblestones were all the same. But the people Iliya knew had vanished—the shopkeepers, the patrons, the sellers in their tents. All gone. Instead, the empty-eyed gray spirits, with their stretched heads and floating feet, glided down the streets as if they owned the town.
“What exactly are these gray spirits?” she asked, unable to hide her unease. Something about them sent a cold slimy feeling to the pit of her stomach.
“Best not to think too much about them,” the guardian said, beckoning her along. “They are beyond our ability to help.”
He led her to a short brick building on the far edge of the town square—the local gym.
“Why are we going here?” she asked. “Surely you aren’t taking me here for exercise?”
Her guardian grinned crookedly. “In a sense. Follow me.”
He led her to a martial arts classroom with soft gray mats covering the floor. The room was large enough to accommodate ten to fifteen practicing fighters.
“You have abilities that are just beginning to develop,” her guardian explained. “You may have guessed so when you learned of my presence on your thirteenth birthday.”
Iliya remained silent, considering his words as he continued.
“It’s your task now to develop those abilities, try your strength, and build a name for yourself. You have a very important role in the fate of the universe. If you do your mission well, your entire world could achieve salvation.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You’re not meant to understand the entirety of your mission—not yet,” he said in a patronizing tone that so perfectly fit him. “For now, it’s enough to know that your development is imperative. Your goal is to discover and hone each of your talents.”
She hit a wall loudly with her open palm. “That’s not good enough. I won’t do a single thing for you, not anything, until I know what it’s for.”
Her guardian stared back at her evenly. He seemed to be taking her seriously, at least. “I will tell you what I can,” he emphasized each word, “but not all the secrets have been revealed even to me.”
He gestured for her to sit on the mat, and she complied. He sat in front of her; his hulking form oddly bent itself to mock a typical cross-legged posture. It was strange to see such a human position with such a monstrous body.
“Before God tries to save his people, he usually sends a prophet to prepare the way of the Lord,” the guardian explained, his tone growing unusually somber. “You gain the people’s trust by performing miracles, and you bring God’s word to them. If they forsake God, you punish them.”
“I don’t understand what that means,” she said, swallowing her frustration.
The guardian shrugged. “I am not a prophet. I have no intimate knowledge of what that will mean for you.”
“Then how are you supposed to be my guardian?”
His eyes narrowed. “Don’t concern yourself with my job qualifications. You can be sure I was put through a rigorous background check.”
A muffled bang crashed outside the gym doors. The guardian leapt into the air.
“I was hoping we would have more time, but the rapidity of your knowledge gain must have alerted them to our presence here.”
“My knowledge gain?” She stood as well, bewildered. “But I still don’t know anything.”
“I’m going to show you how to perform a miracle. Quickly now.”
A jolt of excitement shot through her. The banging outside grew louder.
“Settle into a comfortable stance and bend your knees—there you go. Now relax as if you were about to meditate.”
She closed her eyes and tried to accept all thoughts and feelings without pursuing them.
“Now center on a singular purpose,” the guardian continued. “Something you and your community really need.”
One thought assailed her mind. Her guardian swayed, as if smacked by the very strength of her will.
“No, not that,” he said quickly. “I’m sorry, Iliya, but you cannot raise your father from the dead.”
She opened her eyes and frowned at him.
“Pick something less personal,” he suggested. “Something you’re less invested in. This is your first try, after all.”
The doors of the gym began to shake. “Guardian—”
“Hurry. We must do this before I let you go, or we won’t have another chance.”
“Okay.” She didn’t bother asking what laws of the spirit world prohibited second tries.
“Think of something the town needs. Agriculture is always an oldie but goodie.”
And then it hit her—the drought. She could wish for rain.
She closed her eyes, achieved meditative relaxation, then focused on a singular desire for rain for her village.
“Good,” said the guardian. “Focus your entire being on that.”
At first, it felt like a minor whim. Then it developed into a fervent desire. If it didn’t rain, her family would starve—
“No, don’t think of your family,” the guardian interrupted. “Nothing so personal. Think of your village.”
She swallowed and thought about how all the food would dry up and the animals would perish. The town would descend into abject poverty if they couldn’t get more rain soon. She felt the emptiness of the sky, devoid of clouds, and she asked the atmosphere to rearrange itself, to form water molecules, to grow heavy over her village—
She hit a terrifying wall. Water did not come from nowhere. The universe demanded a price.
I have nothing, she thought. Nothing that can create rain.
Then she realized the price. The universe was asking for her. For her life.
But I will not give my life for a little rain, she answered.
The unseen universe clarified it for her, in her own dawning consciousness. The words came unbidden to her mind, spoken from no particular source: Not your whole life. A piece of life.
And she understood. She needed to give up a part of her lifetime—minutes, perhaps days—in exchange for rain.
The gym doors banged, and her guardian’s ragged clothing rustled as he leapt toward the sound.
But Iliya wasn’t sure. Did she want to sacrifice some of her own life for rain? Maybe if she just waited long enough, it would rain anyway on its own.
No, said the mysterious universe. This is the price.
She took a deep breath and completed her miracle request. I will do this for my town. Take what you will.
She expected it to be painful, but she felt nothing. Nothing except the closure of a completed contract, a window shutting in her mind. She opened her eyes and saw her guardian engaged in fierce hand-to-hand combat with five demons. The demons came only to about his knees, but they gnashed their pointed teeth and swiped at him with razor-sharp claws.
She started to call out to him, but before she could, he materialized a tail from the bottom half of his body and whipped it around. All five demons were thrown from him. He hurtled toward her. “We must get out of here. To the back exit,” he yelled.
