Caitlin was shocked.
Aiden sighed, turning to her.
“I had hoped to find you elsewhere,” Aiden said.
Caitlin thought about that. As usual, with Aiden, everything he said could be interpreted so many ways. It was so hard to know what he ever real y meant. Did that mean he had hoped that she wouldn’t be fighting? Or that she wouldn’t be with Caleb? Or that she would be searching for the Shield?
She assumed he meant the latter.
She thought about how to respond.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I couldn’t continue the search.”
He didn’t respond, and they continued in silence.
Final y, he said: “Maybe you’ve been searching al along.”
That, too, made her think. What did he mean, exactly? Did he mean that some part of her had never stopped the search? That she was searching inside her mind?
“Sometimes you search for an object,” he said, “and sometimes it searches for you.”
Again, she wasn’t quite sure what he meant. But it felt true to her, on some level. She had felt overwhelmed by the search, and even when she’d decided to stop searching, she had felt it was stil always there, in the back of her consciousness.
“It’s not that I don’t want to find it,” she said. “I do. And I want to help. I just…I also want to live a normal life. I was tired of running. And then… I found Caleb again.”
“And you thought it would work out forever,” Aiden said.
Caitlin turned and looked at him, searching his face for some sort of clue. Did he know what their future held?
But al she could see was his slowly shaking his head in disappointment.
She felt embarrassed, as if Aiden had known al along that it would not work out—and that she had been foolish to hope that it would.
“Some things are more important than forever,” Aiden replied.
Caitlin thought. Had she been selfish to stay with Caleb? To give up the search? Was she being punished for it now?
Was al of this, her meeting Caleb, his leaving—was it al preordained? Had she been a fool to think that she could change their destiny?
“Some things are fated,” Aiden said, reading her thoughts, snapping her out of it. “We can never change our destiny.
We can try. We can run from it. But life has a way of bringing it back to us.
“And yours, Caitlin,” he said, as they final y emerged from the woods, into an open meadow, “is a very special one.”
Caitlin looked up, feeling relieved to be out of the dark, heavy woods, into the open.
The two of them continued to walk, and she saw Caleb’s castle in the distance. Her heart soared for a moment, as she hoped beyond hope that Caleb might have returned.
Aiden shook his head.
“You haven’t listened,” he said. “You won’t find him there.”
Caitlin turned to him.
“Wil he return?” she asked. She scrutinized Aiden’s face, waiting for any reaction.
But he was expressionless, staring off into the horizon with his large, light blue eyes.
“The question isn’t whether he comes back for you,” he said. “It is what you, Caitlin, decide to do. You are stronger than one man. You are stronger than one relationship. You have a mission. A destiny. And you have free wil . It is not your place to wait for anyone. Is your place to create your fate. To take action.”
He final y stopped, turned and looked at her. She looked up at him, and was taken aback at the intensity of his eyes, which looked both prophetic and scolding.
“When wil you stop running from your destiny, Caitlin?
When wil you accept who you are?”
She looked at him, wondering.
“Who am I?” she asked. She wasn’t sure she knew herself anymore.
He stared back. “A warrior,” he said flatly.
A warrior, she thought. She didn’t always feel like it. On some days, yes. But on others, she felt just like everybody else. She had moments of courage, but she felt like they were only moments.
“A warrior is defined by moments,” Aiden said. “A single moment can make you a warrior. A warrior is also defined by decisions. By courage. But a warrior, otherwise, is normal. A warrior cannot be a warrior every moment of the day. But, a warrior’s spirit is always there.”
Caitlin thought about that. She felt flattered by the term, and the more she pondered it, the more she liked the label, the identity. But she also felt it came with a responsibility.
“You need to choose,” Aiden said. “You can stay here, give up the mission, and live a very happy domestic life with Caleb. It wil be a life of the heart. But not of the spirit. We are brought to this planet to choose between two lives: a life of the heart, or a life of the spirit. Our heart can tie us down to domestic matters. But our spirit must soar. It must fol ow its cal ing.
“You’re cal ing, Caitlin, is to find the Shield. To help save us al . To find your father. And most importantly, to find out who you real y are.”
Caitlin stared at him, her mind reeling with al the implications.
“But what if I never find the Shield?” she asked.
“What if the Shield is not something to be found?” he asked back.
She looked at him puzzled. “What do you mean?”
“You assume that the Shield is an object.”
She was baffled.
“Of course I do. What else could it be?”
Even as she asked the question, her mind spun with a mil ion possibilities. Was the Shield something else? And if it wasn’t physical, what else could it be?
But Aiden didn’t help. He stared, expressionless.
“I’l tel you this,” he said, final y. “A warrior’s mission is never about finding an object, or completing a task. It is about the journey. It is not about what you find in the journey, but about what you become.”
She looked at him. “What am I becoming?”
But Aiden turned and continued walking in silence, and she fol owed him, al the way up to Caleb’s castle. The door was wide open, and she looked and saw that it was clear he had not returned.
The two of them stood there, before the open door.
“The price of being a warrior is leaving behind family.
Home. The ones you love. It is the journey that every warrior must take. And one you must do alone.
“The choice is yours,” he said. “You can go inside, and stay here, and live happily. Or you can come back with me. And train. And fulfil your mission.”