SAVE POINT 19

Rosabella

"What's she doing here?"

Joy's voice.

Joy's scowl.

Seriously, this was how I was greeted after busting myself (and my reputation) wide open trying to get out of this birdcage everyone'd been keeping me in lately? I got an unimpressed, cross glower from the pink-haired Warrior? ...Really???

"No offense, but we kind of need you to stay alive," Joy continued, her eyes sparking like the sharpest saw blade. She snapped her gum as she placed a bored hand at her hip—chipped, black nail polish tapping impatiently on her body-armored waist. "In case you haven't noticed, you fixed the darkness in part of The Game world but not all of it so—chop, chop! Back to work unless you want it creeping up on people like me again—"

"Always a pleasure to see you too, Joy," I said. Loud enough to try to cause a wince out of the girl.

But it didn't work. She just raised a manicured eyebrow.

"You guys are serious?" she volleyed, throwing down her hands before thinking better of it and crossing them again over the guard uniform of her chest, "You're going to let her come with us—through the Darken-infested Dark Woods and The West Side?"

Not getting the reaction it looked like she had hoped for, the pink-haired girl huffed, turning to the side and throwing even more weapons into a satchel that was already filled with them. "If Rosabella dies, I will personally kill all of you, you know that?" I heard her grumble, and I had to stifle a chuckle.

'All of them.'

She meant our group—the group. We were all back together again—well, I'd demanded that we all be back together again, did that count?

Rainer, the burly, bearded Nomad, was in the corner, sharpening his ax on the edge of the bench seat by the far wall. Dormouse, Coder and nerd extreme, was fiddling with some sort of technology, anxiously shoving wires into a backpack with his eyes darting up towards mine every three minutes. Mimi stood, ready and waiting, running her fingers on repeat up and down the straps of her backpack—a nervous tick even though her freckled face was smooth and calm like always?

We'd commandeered a side chamber of the guard's locker room, and the air felt tense like the shadows draping the corners as everyone readied their gear, using the benches along the walls to sit their bags on. With all of us in here, the place felt smaller than it looked—cramped and...silent. Hardly anyone but Joy had said much. It was...a little unnerving. Afterall, this was my idea: all of us trekking out into the unknown to find more root powder so the darkness didn’t kill me from the inside out. Was it a good one?

I heaved my own pack (mostly filled with food) off my back, slipping my hand inside the zipper to check—

Yep.

Still there.

The three, glass mason jars of root powder—a last minute request to the maids. This was all of The Higher Place's stash and, seeing it there in the folds of my backpack, I let out a sigh of relief. I’d have enough to keep me feeling well while we found more. I wouldn't let the darkness get to me. I zipped up my pack again, slinging it over my shoulder when—

Thud, thud, thud!

An urgent, full-fisted knock on the metal door made my heart lurch.

Not the guards again.

"We're going whether you like it or not!" I yelled at the steel edifice, "You can stand down. We're taking care of it!"

"Let me in, small one!"

My breath caught. It wasn’t the guards. It was—

It was—Sparo?!

My fingers couldn't work fast enough to unbolt the lock. They scrabbled over the cold metal, yanking till—

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

With a grunt, I heaved the door open—

"Thank God, you made it in time," I breathed, pulling him inside the secure room, "I thought they'd stopped you."

And there was his face.

Deep, brown eyes. White teeth but—was he grimacing?

“I brought you this,” he thrust a sword-shaped parcel wrapped in brown paper between us. “It’s your mother’s sword—well, yours, of course, now. Figured you’d want it for the trip—”

“Thank you,” I leaned in to take the weapon from him.

[System Alert: Rosabella’s Mother’s Gold & Silver Broadsword Will Be Placed In Your Inventory Unless You’d Like to Equip. Would You Like to Equip?]

[Yes] [No]

“Not right now,” I murmured. Right now, I wanted to hug the man. Right now, I wanted to lean in and—but his expression stopped me. Was it the kiss? The huge weapon went slack in my grip. ...Oh my God, it was the kiss. I’d made things awkward? We’d made things awkward between us? Please don't be because of the kiss! My brain raced into panic mode. I guessed he saw it on my face—

"Hey, hey!" he pulled me to him, his warm hands on my hips like the reassurance I needed that every bit of our last encounter wasn't a mistake, "What's wrong?"

"Your face—" I blurted—undeniably not my most eloquent statement—"You're wincing. Is it because of...the kiss?" I whispered the last part; it hissed through my teeth in an embarrassed admittance that I hoped the others couldn’t overhear.

But the man shook his dark head, "No, no, absolutely not. I'm just—Grand Dragon, I just—wish I didn't have to tell you this." He said it like he was suddenly walking on eggshells—like each word might bust him open.

"Tell me what?" My heart fluttered in my chest for a different reason now, obliterating any concentration I had except on the agitated lines forming on his forehead.

"Uh..." he paused, then, lifted the leg of his black jeans.

And it took my mind a minute to understand what I was looking at. It was a black tracker. Like they used in prisons on Earth. And it was strapped to his ankle.

"Sparo...what?" My eyes darted up to his, searching for an explanation but not finding one in his melting, tortured expression. His face just kept twisting and contorting!

"Ah—it was something stupid!" he finally spat, throwing his hands down, "I can't come with you, and it's all because of a stupid prank that they literally all took the wrong way—the assholes. And, now, I can't be outside of 10 miles from this place. If they even find me in here, they'll probably strap another one to my other leg—"

"Hey, slow down, slow down," I placed two hands on his arms, trying to get him to breathe, "What did you do?"

And he winced again.

Harder this time.

I watched him swallow.

"That paperweight of a shar-pei bitch!" the dragon-non-dragon swore—translation: the high-and-mighty, wrinkled woman, Miranda? "She thinks she runs this place! Putting on a grand show! Well," he chuckled a little, though he quickly tried to hide it with the back of his hand, "someone might have broken into her bedroom and painted a shaving cream beard on her while she was sleeping—"

"Sparo!" I exclaimed, half-mortification, half-admiration.

"The bastards labeled it 'destruction of property'. I got some on her pillow—Goddammit. I believe the official charges also include theft of a necklace which I didn't do," he insisted.

"Good—" I barely had the word out before—

"And dentures, which I did do." He winked at me, almost throwing me into a fit of giggles imagining the dignified woman running around her room trying to find her teeth. "...Also," he pondered, scratching his chin, "They haven't found the spaghetti in her favorite heels yet so..."

"You didn't!" I crowed, not minding the volume of my exclamation even as the others looked up. "Sparo, why didn't you tell me—about the tracker, I mean?" I asked, my voice lowering to more serious levels.

He ducked his head, embarrassed, running a hand through his hair. When his eyes darted up to mine, they were filled with a different emotion...that longing again that took my breath away. "I kinda had some other things on my mind," he admitted with a sideways smile.

Rainer's hulky form sidled up to us, interrupting any kind of response I might not have been able to give in my current, flushed state. "Rosabella," the burly Nomad barked, "if we're doing this, we need to move out and now. The Higher Place Guards are going to be on our asses no matter what, but, maybe, we can get a head start."

I nodded.

But my insides fell.

Because this meant I had to leave Sparo. I had to lead this expedition to get the root powder. I had to do this alone—again. I’d thought he'd be with me...

"Is this goodbye for now?" I whispered, ducking a glance up at him with sudden emotion clogging my throat.

But the man's fingers tightened on my arm, and a sly grin spread across his face. "They said I can only go ten miles out, but I'm going ten miles. Howabout I take you, m'lady, on an aerial tour of the beginning of your route? You'll see the dangers up ahead before they see you?"

"It's a good idea," Rainer nodded gruffly, but, then, self-conscious that he was listening to us, swiped a swift hand across his beard, "Not that I was listening or anything—"

"Okay!" I chimed breathlessly, excitement filling my core at the prospect of this adventure and a few more minutes with Sparo, "Let's go. Rainer, you start everyone out on foot, and we'll report back."

"I'm on it," the Nomad said, ducking away.

“Is she for real, ‘cause it kind of feels like she’s putting you in charge when I’m more qualified,” Joy spat at Rainer, pointing at me.

I caught the guy smiling even from under all that beard. “You want the babysitting job, take it. You lot cry louder than forty Nomad infants and they scream bloody—”

“I’d be cool if you don’t compare all of us to infants,” Mimi countered from the corner.

And I was suddenly glad to be leaving—leaving with Sparo. There. Grinning at me.

And that warm sensation sizzling through every inch of my bones at his gaze.