Forty Four

Ash woke up only to find himself sleeping in a weird place. It took him a lot of time to finally agree to the fact that the place was a cave but not a house. It was the half-ripped white ceiling above him that made him realize that, because through it he could see the stone wall above it. If not for that, he would have never figured out that he was in a cave because of how beautifully decorated the room was. The room he was sleeping in had a huge king-sized bed made with his favorite color, deep blue sheets, a cotton blue quilt, and blue pillows. Even the walls were painted blue. He slowly got out of bed, wore the blue flipflops already arranged for him, and pushed himself to walk out of there.

He walked to the glass door, a few steps from the bed, and pushed it open. He walked into a sparkling bathroom with white tiles on the walls, a huge bathtub that could probably accommodate three people, a shower, and his favorite soap and shampoo on the shelf. There was a blue towel hanging on the rack, and the bathtub was already filled with water.

His body was numb, and he wasn't feeling it anymore, so he let go of the thought of taking a shower. He only washed his face and walked back to the room, thinking If he weren't able to walk, he would have thought that maybe he was paralyzed because of how numb he was. Pushing the wooden door open, Ash peered, hoping to find any person walking around, but he met an empty corridor, which took a bend toward a staircase, which he was sure would take him to the living room. He walked past the stairs and looked at the photos hanging on the walls, and he couldn't stop but wonder where he had seen the photos from. An elderly man with a white beard and a strand of white hair on his head, and an elderly woman sitting beside him with white hair and a charming smile plastered on her face. There were many pictures, and if he were to count, he could have lost count halfway through, but the fact that all of the people in them had white hair didn't pass his notice.

There were pictures of wolves as well, and they were all huge, with black fur covering their muscled bodies, glowing red eyes, white tails, and white ears. They looked stronger than normal wolves. "There are..." He thought while scratching his head. He was not given the chance to complete his sentence because the sound of the door creaking open forced him to rush downstairs in the hope of meeting with the person who took him in. He was lost in the decoration of the living room downstairs. A huge television was playing silently on the wall, and huge purple sofas and a white table with a remote on top sat there. The floor was covered with a purple carpet, reflecting its beauty on the white ceiling board above it.

The walls were white, and the heavy purple curtains covering the windows added to the glow. It looked like he was inside a king's palace. With the thought of a king, he shifted his eyes to look at the door, but he screamed when he met the last thing he hoped to. A huge wolf, carrying fish between its teeth and with glowing eyes, stood at the door, staring at him. It had white ears and a white tail, which it kept wagging as it was happy about something. "Does it think I am prey?" He thought while moving backward. When his back came into contact with the couch, he stood there paralyzed, wondering into what hole he had fallen. The images of the wolves in the corridor upstairs came rushing to his head, and after looking at the wolf in front of him, he gasped.

"A Lycan? Weren't they a myth?" He thought while chewing his inner cheeks to stop himself from trembling. "Did they finally come and kill all the werewolves? Have they taken me captive?" He couldn't stop thinking. He scratched his head, trying to recall all that had happened, and the images of him coming from the restaurant with Larrisa came rushing into his head. After taking her back home, the pack's investigator gave him the file he had asked him to look for, and he was shocked to find out that Camila was banished just because of Alina's and Larrisa's deeds. It was from the files that he realized that they released the pack's secrets, killed so many people, and framed Camila for all the deeds.

He went to his parents house and told them everything, and with their blessing, he set out to look for her, only to be hit by a truck. He recalled that when he thought he would be dead because the truck driver left him to die on his own, he got lifted into the air. After a while, he let the darkness cover him after he was sure that whoever had taken him had good intentions. Coming back to his senses, he looked at the Lycan still standing in front of him, and moving from that place, he planned how he should escape from there.

"Camila." He thought of that again and again while pacing around the living room. It seemed like the Lycan was not letting him go because it had blocked the door with its huge body while still wagging its tail like a puppy, which had been promised a huge treat. When he made it through the window, the Lycan followed him, and after a second, he was pushed back into the room. He fought, but because he was weaker compared to it, he decided to stay still and let the Lycan lick his face. It was sleeping on top of him, and no matter how hard he tried to signal to it that he couldn't breathe, the Lycan never came from him.

"I am Ash. It's good to see you awake." A soft voice echoed in his head.

"Ash? I am Ash too, but isn't your name Akshar?" He asked, thinking it was his wolf talking to him.

Silly, that wasn't me." His wolf chuckled.

"If it wasn't you, who was it then?" He asked, a deep sigh escaping his mouth. The huge Lycan was rubbing its nose all over his body and was trying to bury its face in the crook of his neck. It was sniffing him, and it was behaving as if it couldn't get enough of him.

"It's me. Ash. I am on top of you. My human told me that you are Ash, just like me." The voice giggled. Ash struggled to sit with the Lycan still in his arms. He then asked it to get down, but the Lycan tightened its front legs around his neck. "I missed you." The first voice came again. Ash rubbed the Lycan's back after a while, thinking that it had confused him with its human. After a while, he mind-linked back, saying, "Thank you for taking care of me, Ash, but for now you need to let me go. My friend Camia is in trouble."

"But don't you want to meet my human? She is the one who had been taking care of you all this while the only thing that I did was talk to Akshar because he was bored." The voice suggested

"Fine, I'll meet your human and thank him, but first you need to let go." He said this while trying to push the heavy Lycan off him. When he failed to, he roughed his hair, and desperately he said, "Fine, let me meet in." It was in that moment when he agreed to meet the Lycan's human that Ash felt the Lycan in his arms shift. In a flash, a girl with a small body took the Lycan's place and wrapped herself around him. She had long black hair that covered the whole of her buttocks, and she kept sniffing instead of raising her head and looking at him.

"Hey girl!" he called, but she never responded. "Look at me, please," he begged while rubbing her smooth back softly to calm her down. Slowly, the girl raised her head to look at her. Brown puffy eyes, small, plump pinkish lips, a small nose, and a black mole on her chin. He had seen that face somewhere, but where?

"You can't remember me? Did you really forget about me? What was I expecting?" The girl asked, and she broke into tears once again. "You promised to come back? You promised that you wouldn't let anyone hurt me again, but you failed!" The girl thumped him on the chest with her tiny fists. Ash remained silent, trying to think about who that girl was and when he made such a promise to her. The girl's hair was blown by the wind, and the huge cut on her buttocks made him gasp. He flipped her so that he could look clearly at her ass cheeks, and with tears streaming out of his eyes, he whirled as if he wasn't sure of that as well.

"Camila? He called while flipping her again so that she could sit on his lap. "Camila, is this you? You have changed." He whirled while pulling her much closer to him. Waking from the ground, he carried her into his arms, and wrapping her legs around his torso, he carried her to the sofa behind them. He kept sniffing her hair while they both cried silently. All while he kept on whispering her name, and he couldn't say more than that. "Your wolf came?" He asked after both of them had calmed down. Camila nodded.

"Cogratulations." He chuckled. Camila still nodded. "I am sorry I couldn't keep my promise." He apologized and started nibbling her earlobes to calm her down. After a short silence, Camila finally raised her head to look at him. She still had her hand wrapped around his neck, as if afraid that if she unwrapped them, he would go away from her. As if Ash were reading her mind, he chuckled and joked," Enough, Mila; let me go because I promise I won't disappear from you ever again. Camila smiled, taking her hands off him. When Ash sighed, she jumped into his arms again, giggling happily.

"Where were you going?" She asked him after some time.

"I tried to look for you, but your Lycan kept on blocking me," he chuckled.

"Not today. Where were you going? A month ago?" She asked while getting off his lap.

"To look for you." He shrugged, But you found me instead." He chuckled while chewing on the apple Camila had peeled from him. "Wait, what do you mean by a month ago? Have I been sleeping all this while?" He asked.

Camila sighed, and then, coming back to sit beside him, she responded, "Yea, I and Ash thought we would lose you, but Akshar kept on asking us not to lose hope."

"I am sorry for getting you worried, Mila. Now that I am here, I will never go away from you again, okay?" He promised, stretching his pinky fingers toward her. Camila slapped it away, and she giggled.

"That's childish." She said.

"Chidlish? You kept on asking me to do this when we were young, remember?" He reminded her. When Camila was still at her father's house, she would cry any moment Ash would leave her. She would always make him make a pinky promise and swear that he would come back to her again.

"Because I was afraid that one day you would get tired of babysitting me and let me go," she mumbled, but Ash had heard her clearly. Shifting closer to her, Ash pulled her back into his arms again, and while playing with her hair, he apologized, "I am sorry if I ever made you feel that way. Just know that I would never let you go, Mila, because you are mine, okay?" He rubbed her back.

"And you are also mine, right?" She asked while looking at him through teary eyes.

Yes, Mila, I am yours," he smiled while helping her dry her tears away. That was their motto. Anytime they get separated, they will find a way towards each other, and they will take that vow again and again. Ash would say that she was his, and she would respond that he was his. What both of them were not aware of was how deep that vow was and how deeply it was about to take effect on their lives. Or maybe the vow was already taking effect.

"How did you suddenly realize that this was me?" Camila asked him after a while.

"Because of this," Ash chuckled while tracing his hand over the mark on her ass. Camila got it because of him. He was out teaching her how to ride a bike, but she fell on pebbles, which resulted in a cut. They rented a room, and he looked after her for a while. After a month, when she healed, they went back home. Camila was beaten really badly for running away from home. If it were not for him to lie and say that he was with her all that time because they were both infected with chicken pox and had quarantined themselves, maybe that horrible stepmother of hers could have killed her.

"I love you, Ash." She said this after taking the memory off her head, a broad smile covering her face.

"I love you too, Mila," he smiled while burying his head in the crook of her neck.