Author's Note: With the taste of your lips, I would die! You're toxic, your name is Kimber.
Thigil took a shuddering breath. Glisteen noticed that his face was wet with fresh tears. She felt  bad for asking him to tell her this tragic tale, and relive such a painful memory. She wished that, somehow, she could change it all. Make this tragic tale happy. But the past was the past. Nothing could change it. That made Glisteen even more upset for the sad, hopeless boy.

Thigil continued. "The days after that were the happiest of my life. We met in our secret place, everyday. We played in the sun all day long. Sometimes, when I had enough money, we would eat at a restaurant. We became closer and closer. We were a support system for each other, reassuring each other that there was still hope for us. Or, that was, until my family, and her's found out."

Thigil was openly sobbing now. Glisteen's heart ached. "You don't have to tell me if you don't want to."

"No, I want to tell you," Thigil said. "I need to tell someone."

Glisteen nodded. "Then, please. Continue."

"Okay. We- we were in the woods again. Picking wild blackberries and laughing at how they stained my fingers, and her gloves. I- I remember the exact taste of those blackberries. They were so, so sweet... yet so bitter. Just like that day.

"Someone had followed us. I don't know exactly which of us was followed, but it didn't matter. It was a man, from the town. Kimber's father. He was big, really big, and had a gruesome scar across half his face, from some kind of fire or something. He came for us. He captured me and ordered Kimber to come with him, quietly. He was afraid to touch her. He took us to my parents. My family put us in the cellar. It was very dark. They wrapped Kimber in clothes so she couldn't use her Gift. She didn't fight back. She didn't want them to hurt me. I was scared...so, so scared... I remember how my mother reacted when Kimber's dad brought us in. She was so cold... colder than I'd ever seen her before, colder than the time she found out about my Gift. She said, "Well, looks like we have to punish these two." I asked why, and she laughed. I still don't know why we were punished. Eventually though, they left us in the cellar.

"Kimber got out of the clothes and told me we were going to get out; have a family, and actually be happy. She picked the lock, and we snuck out of the house. Our neighbors had a dog, that dog. It barked at us, and alerted my family. We were running down the alley way. My mother yelled, "Kill the girl, kill her." I ran around a corner, I remember her voice. She said, "Go ahead! Don't worry about me!" I looked around the corner... she was impaled. She smiled, and gave a thumbs up... before she fell." Thigil sobbed for a while. Glisteen tried to give him comfort, but failed.

"I ran, and ran. Without looking back. I ran to the woods, to our meeting place. I didn't consciously understand that that was where I was running. I just ran. Out of grief, out of fear... I woke up the next morning, with my mother standing over me. That wicked smile on her face." Thigil shuddered, as if the thought still haunted him.

"She told me that she would take my Gift away. I didn't understand. 'Obviously I can't kill you,' she said. 'A mother who murders her own child is not welcome in the light of God.' I spat back at her that she had killed her only son's true love, and that was just as bad. She just laughed. 'Is that what you think, Son? That she was your true love?! You can't have true love with someone as poisoned as her!' I screamed at my mother, screamed and screamed and screamed, told her that it wasn't Kimber's fault she was born a poison. That it wasn't either of our faults we were Gifteds.

"My screams turned into sobs, and I fell to the forest floor. My m- my mother told me she would make the pain go away. That she would make it to where I never had to use my Gift, never have to see another death. She took a vile out of her pocket and said, 'Stay still, my boy. Mama's going to make it all better.' She dripped something, some liquid, in my eyes. I didn't know what it was at the time. During the whole process, I didn't fight back. I believed her for a second, her crazy assumptions.

" I- I let her drop the blood of my best friend into my eyes. The poisonous blood of my best friend, whom I had witnessed being killed by my own mother. The poison in the blood... that's what took my sight away. The last thing I remember seeing was the face of my mother, smiling gleefully in the thought that I couldn't ever bring harm to her or the world ever again," Thigil ended his story with a shuddering sigh. His face were stained with fresh teardrops. In that one moment of silence, Glisteen felt a sudden protective friendship for this fragile, hopeless boy.

Suddenly Thigil looked at Glisteen, and it almost seemed like his sightless eyes had somehow picked out her figure from all the other things in the room. The sensation was haunting. "Glisteen, please don't tell anyone about this," Thigil said desperately.

"Have you told Mictochra?" Glisteen asked.

Thigil shook his head. "No. She..." He pulled a photograph out of his pocket. It was a picture of him and a girl, smiling. He had his arm around her shoulder. For some reason, the girl looked really familiar to Glisteen. And then she realized it. The girl looked exactly like Mictochra, except with yellow-green hair that was pulled into a graceful, messy bun, tendrils of her hair falling around her face. She was beautiful.
"This was Kimber."

That was why he hung out with Mictochra so much, but couldn't tell her about a word about this. She reminded him of his lost love.

"Do you... love Mictochra?" Glisteen asked.

"I- I think so." Thigil said.

Glisteen nodded, unsure of what to say next. "Let's go outside and get some fresh air." Glisteen suggested, leading Thigil outside to find Mictochra.

Suddenly, Sabecary's voice sounded from the crow's nest. "Land ho!"

Glisteen turned to see a flat sheet of ice. What? Where were they? Was he joking? As she squinted, she saw something that looked tiny, but what must have been a massive mansion. She turned back around to see Mictochra, completely white. She said one word that chilled Glisteen to the bone.

"Niactarcta."