Scarlett Hayes's Arc

Chapter 8 of 9

The winged beast stepped aside, and the path past the bridge lay open. Scarlett lowered the glowing sword. Her arms shook. The beast had bowed to her love for Azumi, but Azumi didn't know that love had a name. Scarlett had risked a flood, a cave, a waterfall, and a monster to reach a boy. Now she stood on the far side of everything, holding the truth in both hands with the blade. Azumi hovered close, her bare feet an inch off the timber. "You did it," she said. "The scary dog liked you." She grinned, wild and easy, the way she grinned at everything. Scarlett couldn't grin back. "Azumi. Land for a second." Azumi dropped. Her sneakers hit the wood. "What? Is it another trap? I can't read the dog, its brain's all fuzzy." Arachne folded her eight legs and settled by the far post. Her purple eyes moved from Scarlett to Azumi and back. She said nothing. She only waited, still as the rock she'd climbed from. Scarlett looked at the sword. Cthulhu's carved face stared up from the hilt, tentacles frozen mid-curl. The beast had read her heart and found one thing at the center of it. Not the boy. Her. "The beast bowed," Scarlett said. "You know why?" Azumi shrugged. "Because you're brave." "No." Scarlett set the blade down against the post. Her hands felt light without it. "Because of you. It felt what I feel when I look at you. That's what stopped it." Azumi went still. For once she didn't laugh. "What do you feel?" Scarlett's throat closed. She thought of turning it into a joke, the way they always did. Then she thought of the flood, the cold cave, every step she'd taken chasing the wrong person. "I love you," she said. "Not best-friend love. The real kind. I've loved you the whole way up this mountain and I was too scared to say it." The words hung in the cave air. The waterfall roared behind them, purple stones glowing along the runes. Azumi's green eyes filled. She stepped forward and pressed her forehead to Scarlett's. "I heard it," Azumi whispered. "Days ago. In your head. I waited for you to say it out loud." She laughed, wet and shaking. "You took forever." Scarlett laughed too. The fear drained out of her chest. She wrapped her arms around Azumi and held on. Arachne rose on her legs. "The beast bowed to a love unspoken," she said. "Now it is spoken. That changes what you carry." She nodded at the blade. "And who follows you." Scarlett pulled back. "Follows us?" Arachne pointed one dark leg past the open path. In the shadow beyond the bridge, something watched. Not the winged beast. Smaller. A pair of eyes low to the ground, tracking the sword's glow. The boy. He had come back. Scarlett picked up the blade. She had spoken her heart. Now the one she'd chased was watching her hold the thing he ran from.