Boelik Read Online Free Page A

as he ran just fast enough
to keep ahead of the horses. That was the good thing his mother
gave him, he’d always thought; the speed to get away from those who
saw his defect and desired to rip him apart as if he were some
beast. As far as he was concerned, it was the human race that was
the beast—if something was unfavorable or difficult to understand,
they lashed out to kill it just the same.
    Bo raced through the bushes and over rocks
and branches, finding the narrowest routes he could to try and stop
the horses. But they were relentless. The knights were fox hunters,
and Bo was the prize that they would stop at nothing to gain and
destroy.
    He remembered well the first time he had been
chased like this. He had been no more than eight. A village mother
had seen his arm and had shouted about a monster trying to attack
her son. Then she had pointed at him. And from there, the hunt was
on. The village had picked up every torch and sharp blade it had,
hoping to destroy him. Bo had only wanted to have a playmate.
Living with his fox-demon mother and seeing the boy play with
parents that looked like him, Bo had wanted to join. But he’d left
his arm uncovered, despite his mother’s warnings, unperturbed
himself by how it appeared. That night he had been chased back to
his mother’s side. At the sight of the villagers, she had made
herself look the size of a home and had whipped her nine tails
menacingly. And when she couldn’t scare them off…
    Bo had kept his mother, but the village had
paid the price. As soon as he could after that, he left her side,
and she bade him a tearful farewell. But Bo resolved then that he
would find a way to live in coexistence with humans. “I don’t want
anyone else to die because of me,” he had told her, stroking the
tears from her fur.
    Now, though, he had no mother to defend him,
and he was going to die.
     
    ***
     
    Olea stumbled through the woods, desperately
trying to find the trail that she lost. “Bo!” she cried into the
woods, branches whipping her in the face as she rushed. She finally
stumbled over a root and dug into the ground. Trying for a moment
to get up, she was suddenly tackled by despair and hopelessness.
Olea began to sob then, her feelings washing over her as she curled
into a ball. “Bo…” she wept, “…I’ll never make it. I can’t save
you. I can’t even keep myself from getting lost, let alone stop
Mar.”
    Just then, though, Olea heard a muffled
sound. Her gaze shot up and she blinked away the tears in her eyes
to see something she wouldn’t have noticed before; a little home.
It was overgrown with plant life—so much so that it was hardly
recognizable as someone’s dwelling. But there was a little light
shining through the crack of a door.
    “ Bo?” Olea whispered,
staggering to her feet with a sniffle. She walked over to the house
and knocked on the grassy door, the sound echoing in the
woods.
    Soon the door was opened by a lithe, young
woman. “Yes?” she said in a kind voice, gray eyes scanning Olea in
a way that betrayed her tone. Her hair was a silvery white, and she
wore a simple dress adorned with flowers and herbs. She smelled of
them as well.
    “ I’m looking…for a man
named Boelik,” Olea choked.
    “ I’m sorry, I don’t know
anyone by that name,” the woman said. “But come in. You seem like
you’ve been through quite the ordeal.”
    Olea shook her head. “No, I can’t. I have to
help him.”
    The woman gave her a quizzical look, cocking
her head slightly and raising an eyebrow. “What for?”
    “ The prince thinks he’s
some monster, and so Boelik is being hunted by him right
now.”
    “ And is he a
monster?”
    Olea paused. “He has a strange arm. But Bo is
no monster.”
    “ And?” the woman pried,
sensing something more.
    “ And I love
him.”
    The woman smiled. “Now, that is worth my
help. My name is Helena. Come in, and we’ll see how I can help
you.”
    Olea stepped in tentatively, and Helena
closed