Page 25 of The Elves and the Shoemaker (The GriMM Tales #4)

Nineteen

Johan

J

ohan didn’t even have time to be angry when he came to. Light that didn’t belong in the dead of night danced behind his eyelids, and he opened them to find a blazing fire on the main street.

He knew instantly what Elias had done.

Heart racing until he feared it might stop entirely, Johan leaped to his feet, abandoned his belongings, and ran down the embankment.

Dread and fear filled his stomach like a bitter, poisonous concoction, and when he got close enough to spot the slumped, lifeless form of his love on the street, he had to swallow down the vomit which rose in his throat.

No. No you don’t get to leave us behind.

Covering his mouth with his shirt to avoid breathing in the thick smoke that billowed from the place, which just hours earlier had been home, Johan rushed to Elias’ side and scooped him up into his arms.

The heavens opened up, and Johan battled his way through the torrential downpour, slipping several times in the mud as he made his way back to where he’d left their belongings.

Thunder cracked overhead as Johan laid Elias’ limp form on the damp ground.

He put his ear to Elias’ mouth and stared at his chest, willing it to rise.

Johan nearly collapsed onto the ground with relief when he felt the warm puff of air against his cheek. He shook Elias by the shoulders but got no response.

Giving himself just enough time to catch his breath, Johan gathered all he could into a bag to carry on his back and cradled Elias in his arms before setting off back towards the forest. Back towards Henrik, who Johan prayed would know what to do.

Endless burn marks littered Elias’ arms, chest, and face, but none looked severe enough for him to have remained unconscious.

Johan feared that all the smoke Elias must have breathed in might have harmed him in ways Johan couldn’t see, but he couldn’t take him to the doctor since Elias had just… had just...

Johan could hardly bring himself to think the words, but he needed to. He needed to face up to what had just happened.

Elias had murdered a number of men in his home. It would be unlikely to be safe for any of them to show their faces in Falchovari again.

Regardless of what Elias had done, the only thing that mattered right then was that the small yet larger-than-life elf wake up from whatever sickness had overtaken him.

Johan prayed to any god who would listen that Elias would be well enough to brighten every new doorway with his smile once more. Johan would sooner witness Elias and Henrik argue like they had just earlier that night, every day for the rest of his life, than live a day without Elias in it at all.

“Please be okay, you need to be okay,” he whispered to Elias’ unconscious form. “You need to be okay, because I love you. Henrik loves you.”

Johan felt like a coward but promised himself that if Elias pulled through, he would find the words to tell both of them how much he loved and adored them. How much they’d turned his life from a mere existence to this effervescent, blinding thing that Johan would go to war to protect.

The walk home felt like the longest trek of Johan’s life. He stopped only to catch his breath twice, Elias getting heavier and heavier with every step he took.

Under the thick canopy of the trees, the rain had slowed to a trickle, which gave the forest an eerie quiet. His own laboured breathing, however, seemed so loud he was certain it could be heard for miles around.

By the time he reached the cabin, his arms were screaming in pain; nothing but the surge of energy swimming in his veins had pushed Johan forward in the direction of Henrik. The sun had risen at some point during his return, but he couldn’t even guess the time now.

Johan had barely stepped foot inside the clearing when the front door burst open and Henrik came running towards him.

“What happened? Why are you back already? Eli? Eli?? What’s wrong with him?” Henrik’s voice became more panicked with every question.

Johan couldn’t speak yet. He needed to get Elias inside. Once he’d gently placed Elias down on the larger mattress, he collapsed onto the floor with exhaustion.

“They. Came. For. Us,” Johan panted out. “He. Killed. Them.”

“Eli did?”

Johan nodded.

“Did they hurt him? What’s wrong with him?” Henrik stroked Elias’ hair as he tried to press the spout of a skin of water to his lips.

“I don’t know.”

“How? How do you not know? Weren’t you with him?”

Johan glared at Elias’ on the bed and said, “No.”

It was then that Johan spotted the second mattress on the far side of the room, and it was like a punch to his stomach. He was too tired to even attempt to piece together why Henrik had made a bed for him so far away from theirs.

“Watch him while I get water?” he asked Henrik.

“Of course. But… what do I do? How do we make him better?”

“I don’t know.” Johan hated that he himself didn’t know. Hated how useless he was right then.

Feeling defeated, Johan grabbed the skins and dragged his tired body the thirty-minute walk to the freshwater spring.

He’d never thought himself a coward, but after hours with nothing to focus on except Elias’ too-still body, he couldn’t do it anymore.

The image of Elias slumped on the ground would be burned into Johan’s mind for the rest of his life, and he just needed a moment to gather himself before facing reality once more.

The air was crisp, and the rain had stopped. Fortunately, the freshwater spring hadn’t frozen yet and was flowing fast from the earlier downpour, so Johan filled all the skins he could carry.

Too exhausted to immediately manage the walk back, he took a few minutes to wash himself, like if he removed the sweat and ash from the smoke then he could somehow erase the events of the night.

He should be more angry at Elias for burning down his home than he was. But he’d meant what he said, homes could change. He could grieve the loss and move on, but his anger at Elias wasn’t about the fire.

The fire he understood. Given the chance, he probably would also have burned alive the people who had caused his loves so much suffering. Even though the smells from the fire might haunt him for the rest of his life, it was a price he was glad to have paid.

No, what he was angry at was that Elias had used magic on him without his permission and incapacitated him to the point he hadn’t been able to keep Elias safe.

He hadn’t trusted Johan to have his back and support him, and Johan wasn’t entirely sure what else he could do to show Elias that he was devoted to him and Henrik. That he was in this for the long haul.

How did he forgive Elias for something he probably didn’t even regret? Would his love for Elias be enough?

Johan was an expert in repairing damaged, broken shoes, but what tools did you use to repair broken trust?

With a heavy heart, Johan trudged back to the cabin, where he found Henrik sitting on the bed with Elias’ head resting in his lap.

He glanced at the mattress set aside for Johan on the other side of the room and nearly crumbled.

Henrik must be angry with him for not keeping Elias safe.

But then, Henrik had done this before they’d even returned, so Henrik must be angry with him for something else.

What if Henrik had felt abandoned when they’d left him behind?

Maybe Johan was supposed to have fought for Henrik to come with them, and he hadn’t realised. He’d obviously messed up somehow.

He slumped miserably onto the mattress, wondering how it had all gone so wrong so fast.

“Wake me if… anything changes?” he asked Henrik quietly.

“Of course,” Henrik replied absently, gaze remaining focused on Elias’ still form.

Johan curled up with his back to them so he could hide his face in the wool blanket.

Sleep evaded him for a while as he ruminated on everything that had taken place in the last few days. They’d had a plan, and now Elias was unconscious and Henrik didn’t want him in their bed anymore. His chest was tight and painful as panic took hold.

Johan wiped at his eyes with the back of his hand and prayed that Henrik wouldn’t hear the change in his breathing as he cried silently and alone until exhaustion eventually dragged him into sleep.

T

he sun was setting when Johan woke. He rubbed at his eyes with his knuckles, still groggy from sleep.

Rolling to face where the elves lay, he spotted Elias first, exactly as he had been earlier that morning. Unconscious but breathing. It was cold enough in the little cabin that Johan could see Elias’ tiny puffs of breath in the air and be reassured by them.

Henrik must have fallen asleep sitting up because he was slumped against the wall, a hand resting on Elias’ chest. Johan suspected that Henrik had only found sleep because of the steady heartbeat resting beneath his palm.

Johan got up and snuck out quietly to relieve himself, and when he returned, Henrik was staring at him with bleary bloodshot eyes.

“How could this have happened?” Henrik whispered.

Johan’s shoulders slumped. “Should I… leave?” he asked, staring at the floor.

“What? Why would you leave?”

“I… sh-sh-should have pr-protected him.”

Henrik snorted derisively at that. “The Queen and… and any man who believes they have the right to keep people as their property are to blame for this, Johan. And the rest of my wrath is reserved for this pig headed, stubborn elf in my lap.”

Henrik looked as though steam might begin to shoot from his ears in anger, his eyes flashing darkly in a way Johan had never seen before.

“You don’t… blame me?” he asked.

“Of course I don’t blame you,” Henrik said more softly. “He destroyed your shop, your home, Johan. You have every right to be angry with him.”

Johan swallowed the lump of emotion lodged in his throat. “Not… why.”

“That isn’t why you’re angry?” Henrik clarified.

Shaking his head Johan said, “Used magic… I couldn’t… couldn’t… reach him. He…” Johan couldn’t get the words to come out how he wanted them to, and he groaned in frustration.