Ruellia

Found

"Lulu." A quivering small voice called out in front of him.

He inclined his head and put away the book he was reading aside. Under the soft glow of sun, her watery eyes shimmered, holding close a lump of her close to her chest.

"I found it at the edge of the barrier." She sniffled. "Help her, Lulu!" She shoved it on his lap.

He covered her view with a wing and let light shine through its body, revealing its damaged insides. After examining thoroughly, he concluded, "Broken bones, infected wounds, malnutrition. It's too late."

She held her breath. "Why?"

He stopped the light and opened the wing, seeing her tears fall down for the unknown kitten.

"It's time for her to go," he said.

"I don't understand." She shook her head. Oh, but she understood. The grip in her heart showed him how well the five year old child understood death, yet she stubbornly kept asking why.

They buried her near the house. A paper taped to the stick that said "Rest in Pece Kiten" written in red crayon. She insisted on sitting in front of the little grave until the sun set. Hugging her knees close, she asked, "Lulu, why do we all have to die one day?"

He didn't have an answer to that. No soul scientist from his family knew the answer. She seemed to have understood his lack of response, but only looked at him with such grievance.

The day was going to end, night wind blowing by. "Come, Kou," he said. She stood and patted the dirt away before jumping onto his arms. He leapt up to the sky and flew her home. A regular routine she grew up with.

The flight was gentle. It lulled her to sleep on the way, heartbeat a slow steady beat. After a chaotic day in her home, she begged to take her to his house even though her parents were not working today. It was a big risk but at least her heart was calm now.

He felt every breath, every heartbeat, every shift she made, the short peaceful state of her emotions. Not everything was clear as if it was his own body, but it was still a second sensation to him that's enough to bother at crucial times and cause confusion.

For countless decades, he tried to find the missing piece of his soul like a creature lurking in the shadows whom everyone fears, hidden away from the world for the sake of keeping the sacred knowledge of souls safe. If it were to fall in the wrong hands, he'd be the only one responsible for it, so he hid it all and himself, locked up away safely.

No one but his bloodline did such practise. The study of souls was his family secret, sworn by blood to not utter a word about it to another, else they'd be murdered on spot by an elder family member. His whole bloodline was massacred, he barely managed to escape it and now that he was alone no one could punish him if he spoke about it or even spread it to the whole world. But even if he was young, he knew how dangerous the study of souls was.

It could flip the world upside down and disturb the law of nature, perhaps even the extinction of human beings. And he was the fool who invented a forbidden method, used it to attempt saving her, and live together forever. Something went wrong and all he remembered was her hollow eyes and a piece of his soul missing, making him unable to revert back into mortal and end his life.

He burned all of the books and scrolls containing the knowledge, including the lavender field around his house, and blew the ashes away. Not a single trace of its existence.

All that's left was him.

But he couldn't die no matter how many times he'd killed himself.

If he were to be discovered, there's no question the humans will take him like an alien to be observed and studied. If he wouldn't answer, they'd torture him until death was a blessing, yet his soul couldn't leave his body without the missing piece.

He thought he'd to be hidden forever until one day he felt his soul born into the world like lightning struck onto him. He tirelessly tracked it through the second sensations and emotions belonged to someone else and found Kou.

All that's left was to do the ritual that made him this way called Clavis, unlock her soul, and, in theory, his piece should separate itself and go back to him.

But then he saw a black dot on her chest like a hole the size of her heart that no one else could see.

The mark of a soul from Hell.