~
In the weeks that followed Aleks and Vera spent more time together. They both graduated from the Lyceum, and Aleks and Vera’s parents began to discuss the idea of a match between the two.
Aleks visited the Lyceum, and each time marveled at the guardian plant’s rapid growth. Even Master Fyodor said he couldn’t understand it — the strains Aleks had used only gave the creature the ability to eat insects. How could it increase in size so quickly?
Aleks solved the problem, although he decided not to tell Master Fyodor. The guardian plant was supposed to ward off birds. Standing pensively at the Lyceum with his head tilted in thought, Aleks’s gaze was on the closed jaws and the splash of color across the plant’s now barrel-sized head when it happened. He saw a pigeon fly too close to the guardian plant. Almost faster than Aleks’s eyes could follow, the jaws opened and the teeth closed down. Blood gushed out as the bird was crushed and then swallowed. Aleks told Vera, who also cautioned him not to say anything.
Yet Aleks still hadn’t told Vera the truth – that there was something of himself in his creation.
Then one day the guardian plant disappeared. Master Fyodor was perturbed; he’d thought to garner a tidy profit for Aleks, but Aleks told him not to worry. A notice was put up at the Lyceum, asking for the people of Rosarva to be on the lookout for Aleks’s guardian plant.
Strangely, Aleks missed it, and found himself wondering what had become of it, yet he was also disconcerted. With all of his other creations, he’d known exactly what traits he’d given them. Perhaps it would be best if he never saw it again.
~
“Look who it is?” a husky male voice spoke. “It’s the two bookworms. Why cultivate in the sun when you can bury yourself in your books?”
“Go find a hole yourself, Lev,” Aleks said.
“The worm speaks,” said the second newcomer, Sergei.
“You’ve certainly got your heads together, you two,” Lev said. He walked slowly forward, and then shoved both of their heads so that Aleks and Vera’s crowns cracked together painfully.
Vera cried out in pain, while rage began to surge within Aleks. But though he could feel anger running through his veins, he knew he was too weak to handle either of his tormenters on his own, let alone both Sergei and Lev together.
Aleks opened his mouth to call Lev a coward, but then he saw it, standing behind Lev, taller than all of them. “Lev, look out!” Aleks cried.
“What…?” Lev said.
A vine whipped out from the guardian plant, and as Aleks looked on in terrible fascination he saw that the vine was tipped with thorns. The vine wrapped itself around Lev’s neck, thorns digging into the soft flesh of the youth’s neck, and then it pulled.
Lev’s eyes were wide with shock and his face turned white as blood gushed from his throat. He fell to one knee, pressing both hands to the gaping wound.
“Sergei,” Aleks said. “Quick. Get out of here.”
Aleks put himself between the guardian plant and Vera and Sergei. When he saw that Sergei had made it away, he turned and pushed Vera to get her moving. The guardian plant reared up, the vines whistling through the air. Aleks remembered again how it seemed to think it needed to protect her. The plant hesitated – did it know its creator?
Aleks turned away from it and ran.
~
Aleks was at his home in the living city. The walls of the residence where he lived with his parents were made up of two oaks, their trunks pressed together as if kissing, and Aleks lived in the space created underneath. Draughts often made it cold, and Aleks shivered.
He wondered where he should look for the guardian plant. People were out hunting for it, flasks of poisonous liquid clutched in their hands. Some even had enchanted swords from Altura, or a prismatic orb or two at their belt. Aleks almost felt sorry for his creation.
Where could it be? Where would he go, if he were the one being pursued?
Aleks felt responsible for everything that had happened. Lev was dead and it was his fault. He knew the strains he had chosen for the seed well, and there was nothing in there to give the creature such aggression.
Only whatever had come from him.
Was it the dark side within Aleks himself that made it what it was? Would Aleks have killed Lev, if he had the strength?
Aleks knew he had to find his creation and destroy it. He wondered again where it could be. It was aware. It knew it was being hunted.
He wanted to search but first he needed to know where to look. Aleks felt that if he thought hard enough, he would know where to go.
Where would he go?
As he pondered he looked into a mirror and into his own eyes. Remorse filled him. He should have said something. But how could he have known that there was such darkness within him?
Alex's eyes stared back at him.
Something moved in the reflection.