Jim Gem's Arc

Chapter 4 of 23

Lena climbed ahead of Jim, up the narrow stairs to her loft. She slid the bolt behind him. The room was small and warm, one round window open to the night. Below the hill, a waterfall spilled down the rocks in a bright sheet. Jim heard its steady rush before he saw it. He turned to say something. Her hand cracked across his cheek. "Ten years," Lena said. Her voice was tight and fast. "Ten years, Jim. Not one word." He stepped back, cheek stinging, and pressed his palm to it. "You slap hard for someone in a trapeze suit." "Don't joke. You vanished." She folded her arms. "You walk in tonight like a week passed." "I know." He lowered his hand. He wanted to explain the woods, the shapes he was climbing, the reason he stayed hidden. None of it sounded like enough. "I couldn't risk anyone finding me. What I can do now, people would use it. Or fear it." "So hide. Fine." She threw her arms wide. "But a falcon. One falcon, Jim. You send birds. I know you do. You could have sent me a single word." He opened his mouth. The excuse died in his throat. Birds came out wrong for him, hollow-boned and broken, but that was not why he stayed silent. "You're right," he said quietly. "I could have. I didn't." The honesty took the fight out of her shoulders. She looked away, toward the window and the falling water. "You want to talk about silence," Jim said. "You had my name too. Ire's tavern isn't a secret. You never wrote either." Lena's jaw tightened. She started to answer fast, then stopped. Her hands dropped to her sides. "No," she said. Shorter now. "I didn't." "Why not?" She was quiet a long moment. "Because if you'd said no, I'd have known. This way I got to wonder." She swallowed. "That's not brave. I know." Jim crossed the small room and stood beside her at the window. The waterfall glowed pale in the moonlight, folding over the black rocks below. They watched it together. The rush filled the silence so neither had to. "We both ran," he said. "We're good at it." Half a smile. It faded. "I stopped being angry the second you walked in. I just needed to hit you first." "You landed it." He smirked at her. She laughed, short and real. Her head leaned against his bicep. The peace outside was pretty. The peace he felt came from her. "Show me," Lena said. "What you learned. All of it. Then I'll find you a place to hide, and I'll guard it." She met his eyes. "No more vanishing. You send word, or I climb every hill in Mosswood looking for you." "I'll send word," Jim said with a blush from their faces being close. He meant it. For the first time in ten years, someone knew where he was going, and would come after him if he fell. And what’s more, they started having romantic feelings for each other already.