A Darkening World And A Sleepy Protagonist Chapter 8 (Unedited)

“Ugh!” Sudden pain spread up from his leg in one quick, strong jolt. 

Being woken up in such a matter was not pleasant in the slightest way for Neal. Even worse, as he opened his eyes various faces staring down at him fills his vision. The bright ray of sunlight currently hitting his eyes makes it difficult to make out their facial features. The light could not mask the pungent smell in the air, one that made Neal’s stomach turn.

“Finally awake, sleepy head?” A rough voice fills his ears as one of the faces came closer. He furrows his eyebrows, full of confusion at this mysterious man.

“Quite a good looker ain’t ya?” Deep brown eyes took in the unusually beautiful face.  Absolutely no way someone this good looking could be human. 

The mans eyes glance to the giant jeweled egg in Neal’s arms, greed filling them at the sight of something that looks so expensive. 

Considering the faint rope markings that still remained on the boys wrists, the man figures Neal was a runaway slave of some kind who stole something on his way out. 

“Girl, I suggest you give us that jewel of yours. If you do I promise we won’t call in the authorities to take you back where you came from” He decides to offer Neal a deal, to make taking the egg easier. However, he had no intention of keeping his word in the way Neal may think it meant, freedom. After all, why let someone so good looking go free? Instead he felt it would be great to take this girl in as a slave to them, to serve him and all the others in his group. 

A group of traveling bandits, Neal’s luck seems to be getting worse and worse these days.

“What..what are you talking about? I’m not giving this to you..” Neal had no idea what they were going on about, but he did not want to leave the life of whatever creature this was in such mans hands. They look like the type who would not treat it good at all, besides this egg was the one good thing of coming into this strange place. He is very unwilling to just give it up. 

Now the bandits would have taken it from him by force as soon as they had saw him, however it seems their was some kind of magic on the egg which made it impossible for them to touch it. An example of the one who first tried would be the bandit sitting a fair distance away cradling a shaking hand which had the flesh of its palm melted off, almost down to the bone. 

Neal, of course, was unaware of this as he had been asleep when this occurred. Having slept through those screams was impressive in its own way. 

“Well..that makes things very difficult. You see I don’t plan on accepting any, lack of cooperation, here girly. If you refuse to hand over that egg then…” the man reaches over, tucking a strand of Neal’s light colored hair behind his ear before trailing his fat and dirty fingers down his neck to his shirt collar. A small cut forming from the sharp edge of his dirt caked nail cutting into Neal’s soft, defenceless, skin. Giving an ugly smirk as he roughly pulled the material, causing it to rip and expose his collar bone. 

“We will have to take much…rougher measures to get you to obey.” Neal’s eyes widen, unable to stop himself from trembling as he registers what the man meant. Gripping the egg tighter to himself as a form of comfort to his raising panic. 

“I..I am a guy you know” They seem to have mistaken his gender, so he hopes this may help him some how. At least get out of where this was leading to.

The man just gave a small shrug, as if he did not care. 

“Nice try, like that is gonna change my mind. Even if you are, that is no matter. With such a pretty face..” Neal felt shivers go down his spine, panic rising in his heart once again as he tries to think of a way to get out of this. 

Give the egg to them? Even if he wanted to…would they let him go?

“I can make these men disappear, just wish it”

The voice didn’t reach Neal’s ears, after all he had decided to no longer pay attention to it. This caused the voice to get more and more frustrated, just why was this boy so stubborn? Humans usual made a wish the first time he offered! To be more then a week and this boy to still fight him on it..how ridiculous! 

A cruel kind of laughter fills the air. They are laughing at the fear clearly displayed on the poor boys face.

What was wrong with the people in this world..what had he done for all of this?

He shut his eyes tightly, continuing to tremble as he tries to ignore them. Pretend what was about to happen wasn’t happening. 

Just as they all move to take a step over to him, the laughter pauses as a loud howl fills the air. 

“Shit, is there a pack of wolves around here?” One cursed, looking around with fear flashing in his eyes. 

“I thought they only came out at night? Well unless…do you think we are in their territory?” The bandits had heard the rumors that the land around the abandoned land was filled with ginormous wolves. If caught in the middle of a pack of them, no normal person could even hope to survive. If seen as prey…their was no escaping, they would hunt you down in till they got you. 

“We don’t have time for this, lets get moving before they see us.” Another voice suggested.

“What about this girl?”

“Just leave her, she will be good bait for them and distract them while we get moving. We can come back later to get the giant magic jewel then”

Some were disappointed in not being able to have some fun, but their lives were more important to them then a good time.

After that, all Neal hears is the sound of feet getting further away, no one giving him another word as they quickly got moving in order to avoid bumping into the wolves. Every second was precious after all. 

As soon as Neal is sure they are gone he opens his eyes, looking around cautiously before sitting up. Doing all this while never letting go of the egg.

“Looks like I got lucky..” He let out a breath of relief, calming down as he focuses in on the faint heart beat inside the egg. 

“I wonder..what you will look like?” He lookes at the egg, the one thing he had begun to get excited for. 

He needs to find a safe place to be when it did hatch, trying to care for a baby animal out in the open like this didn’t feel like the best idea.

With this in mind he gets up and begins walking in the opposite direction the bandits had headed in, not wishing to bump into them again. If he did..who knows what could happen, what if they changed their mind on…

He shakes his head at the raising negative thoughts. Continuing on his way hoping to find a place of shelter he could use soon. 

–

It took half a day to find a place, a lot of time spent on breaks to rest and munch of whatever kind of food looking things he found on the way. Be safe to eat or not, he needed to take the gamble as he needed to eat.

What he found was a run down little cottage, seeming to have been abandoned for many years. Although it was not in the best shape, their were no holes in the roof and it seemed livable enough that Neal was satisfied. 

He decides to look around for any animals inside and clean it up, so the rest of the day was him chasing out racoons and tossing out what he thinks to be rotten food and piles of dirt. He had set the egg down on a single bed before he started this, wrapping it up in a old worn out blanket and checking on it frequently as he tried to make the place more livable. 

Thankfully an old stone well was near by, the bucket a bit rusted but useable inside. He ripped a piece of the old blanket and used it and the water to help wash up things better.

“Looks a lot better now” He felt proud of his efforts, the place seeming a lot more livable now. 

He gives a yawn, bringing his hand to his mouth. His previously tense body was now very relaxed, he felt after all that work it was time for a good nap. So he shut the front and back door, setting things in front of them so if someone came in he could hear it. 

Then he lays down on the bed beside the egg, holding it close to him and brining the blanket over them both. 

This was bliss. 

With that final thought he fell right into a deep, comfortable, sleep. 

–

The egg gives a slight shake, a crack beginning to appear. This didn’t even make him stir, even as the egg shook more and more, the crack getting larger and larger. 

The top pops off, a little scale covered hand waving around before placing itself down on the bed. What looked like a human toddler crawled out of the egg, the only differences being the scales that appeared here and there on his skin.

The child’s hair is short, stopping at its ears and an usual color. Starting with a corn flower blue that faded into a silvery color. Each strand glitters in the moon light which came in through the window. Glittering as if each strand was not made of what normal hair was made of, something much harder and very reflective of light. 

The unusual hair is matched with large, beautiful yet unusual eyes. The pupils like that of a cat, large in the darkened room but becoming thin as the light hit them. The left was cut into two colors, the top being an sapphire blue and the bottom being a mint green. Meanwhile the right eye a silver top and golden bottom. Both glimmering in the light as if each one was its own gem placed into a an expensive dolls head.

Such an unusual child, yet this was no normal child at all. Since no normal child has scales on the back of their hands and along their skin here and there after all. Perhaps it would have been more odd if it were a normal child that came out of that beautiful egg.

The small child looks around the dark room curiously, mismatched eyes faintly glowing as they slowly around. The child’s eyes then land on Neal’s calmly sleeping form. The child’s eyes glancing to the egg that Neal still held tightly to himself. 

After noticing a scratch mark on Neal’s neck from when the bandit had traced it with his dirty chipped nails, the child frowns. With a small hand the child lightly touches Neal’s cheek, shutting their eyes as they lightly kiss Neal’s forehead. The spot gave a warm glow, Neal’s skin lighting up a moment before disappearing as if it never happened. 

Looking over at where the scrape was again the child smiled, glad to see it gone now. Satisfied, the child pushes away the egg onto the floor, and snuggles into Neal’s now free arms. Burying their face into his chest and drifting into rest, a satisfied smile on the child’s face.