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“Get Forwal,” she says quickly, harshly. “Run, girl, run!” I drop the pot I’m cleaning and take off down the hallway and up the stairs. I can’t find Forwal anywhere, though. He should be in his office or in the library. In just a few hours, he’s supposed to go to the village and collect the debts owed him. Why can’t I find him?
I search the second floor and the third, and finally I realize the only place I haven’t looked for him is the dungeon.
The only place I haven’t looked is that room.
I don’t think he’s in there, but there’s something happening outside and I need to find him before it’s too late. I need to warn him that someone is coming, that something is happening. I need to find him and tell him.
Something bad is going to happen.
Someone has come, and judging by the cries outside, they brought reinforcements. There are plenty of people who don’t like Forwal, plenty of people who would want to hurt him, and the thought pains me.
I don’t want anything to happen to him.
I need to save him the way he saved me.
I get to the dungeon room and when I place my hand on the knob, I’m surprised it turns easily. I push the door open and sure enough, Forwal is in the center of the room. He’s standing with his back to me. He’s staring at the shackles on the wall. He doesn’t move, but I know he hears me breathing. I’m out of shape and the running has me gasping for breath.
“Forwal,” I say, but he just shakes his head.
“There were three girls before you,” he says, and suddenly, I’m quiet because I’ve never heard him talk about the ones who came before me. I knew there had to be other women, other girls he had stolen. Why else would he have a room like this?
But he’s never talked about them before.
He’s never mentioned them.
He’s never opened up to me.
No, Forwal, for all of the things I love about him, is essentially a closed book. He keeps his guard up constantly. He never relaxes, and he never calms down. He can’t. He doesn’t have time for that.
For Forwal, letting his guard down could mean getting killed. It could mean betrayal. It could mean a thousand things, and none of those are good. So he guards his secrets, and he maintains his privacy, and he doesn’t talk about the other women he has taken.
Until now.
“The first girl I thought I was saving. Her father beat her, and I took her away. I brought her here, gave her a room, and left her alone, but she ran away at the first opportunity. She ran away and she left and she was lost in the forest.”
“There are wild animals in the forest,” I repeat the warning he gave me the first day. I think of the creature that grabbed me when I wandered too close.
I still have bruises, and sometimes I even have nightmares.
The creature completely caught me off guard. I wasn’t paying the closest of attention, but it completely ambushed me. I was lucky that Forwal and his workers saved me. I was lucky he heard my cry. If he hadn’t found me when he did, I would have died. I would have been torn apart, completely eviscerated by the creature.
“We found her in pieces,” Forwal says. His eyes hold a certain sadness, but he keeps going. “The second girl, I locked up. It seemed fitting. I was saving her from the prison she was in, but I only replaced it with a different one. When I was sure she wouldn’t run away, I gave her a room, but she ran anyway.”
He shakes his head sadly, and I can clearly read his emotions.
He’s wondering what he did wrong.
He’s wondering why he wasn’t enough for them.
He’s wondering why he couldn’t save them.
If anyone could have saved them, it should have been him.
He should have been able to, but he couldn’t, and now it eats away at him. Forwal has a dark, fierce exterior, and he is merciless when it comes to loaning money to people. The debts will be repaid, one way or another. They must be, so he must be strong.
There’s another side to him, though, and I have the feeling I am one of the very few people who gets to see that side.
There’s a side to Forwal that isn’t so strong, that isn’t so hardened.
