Spoiled

Chapter Twenty

Simon

"Are you sure she's ok?" Simon asked the child.

"Yes. She's fine. Why would I lie to you and risk our entire existence." The child replied calmly.

"Ok. What's your name?" He glanced around at the hallway. Light had returned, brighter this time, and he could see the walls were cleaner and more pristine.

"You will not call me by my name. You will, however you will call me Leoline." The child's voice was still in the soothing yet commanding tone, and it was difficult to tell the gender. The name didn't help.

"Alrighty, Leoline. Now how far do we go? How will Deidre find us?" Simon shivered slightly.

Leoline stopped and turned around. "Show me your mark."

"What?"

"Show me your mark." Leoline's voice was more demanding.

Simon lifted his sleeve and held it out, the child took his arm and slid a nail across it swiftly; only the beading blood showing there was ever a contact with it. The red line distorted the mark in half.

Simon jerked his arm back and looked at the mark. He wiped the blood away and noticed the mark starting to fade. "What did you do?"

"You're under my service now. You won't need a silly Mark telling you when you'll die." The child's emotionless face grew more chiseled as Simon realized Leoline had grown taller and filled out more. Leoline was no longer child like, but was now a full grown man with a deeper voice.

"Leoline what did you do?" Simon gasped and wiped away the next layer of blood. "How will Deidre find me?"

"She won't, you idiot." Leoline's voice hardened. "She wouldn't be able to even if she could remember you."

Simon ignored the blood for a moment and looked up at him wildly. "You - you took her memory of all things?"

The man's eyes had turned more of a purple but still had the same look in them, as if he were staring into something instead of at it.

"You wouldn't understand. You beings are too subtle, too straightforward."

Simon's heart felt heavy again and he seemed to feel all the fear he should've felt when he stepped into the car. The fear mixed into anger against the Iota, against the Society and their Order. Against Leoline for taking Deidre's memory and lying to him.

"How could someone do something like that?!" Simon yelled. He couldn't think - though he wasn't sure whether it was from the seeping darkness or from the loud whispers from earlier.

He swung his fist and it connected with a strong force; something much stronger than even something like Leoline could be. Yet it was Leoline's hand up.

"This is what I mean," he said calmly. "You're too busy drowning in yourself that you don't understand. You don't understand how I'm helping you. You and that girl."

"You're right. I don't understand. I don't understand and frankly, I've got to go. Call me later?" Simon decided that next time he wouldn't run. But this wasn't next time.