by Marie Hall
Where his was shrouded and darkness and lit only by the twinkling glint of millions of stars, hers was an oasis of light. It wasn’t as powerful as it might normally be, because it was he and not she that reigned over the sky at the moment. But it was brighter than any light he’d beheld in ages.
For a moment he stood upon the demarcation between darkness and light and just soaked it in. Allowed the heat of her world to sink into his flesh. After feeling nothing but the coolness of night for two centuries, this heat was almost unbearable. But he stayed where he was because he thought he’d never get to feel it again. Like a vampire crawling out of the shadows, he tipped his face up to her glorious warmth and smiled.
“I like it when you do that,” she whispered, startling him from his reverie.
Blinking, he licked his lips. “Aye. When I stand and stare like a hypnotized fool.”
A throaty chuckle tumbled from her lips. “You did not need to deny yourself the sun for so long, Jericho. I’ve been here waiting. Waiting for you each month to realize I’m not your enemy.”
She spread her arm and a tea table appeared before them, over loaded with buttery scones and lemony curd. Pitchers of flowery tea tickled his nose and silver trays full of triangular sandwiches were piled high, coming almost to his waist.
Feeling unburdened and gentlemanly, he walked to the opposite side and held out the chair for her. Tossing him a grateful smile, she sank into the white, wrought iron chair.
He sat beside her. Neither spoke until they’d taken their share of treats from the table and poured their tea.
Calanthe wasn’t expecting him, he kept reminding himself as the seconds continued to tick by. Spending even an hour longer apart from her was agony, but as he continued to tell himself, his visit tonight would be a surprise. Hopefully a pleasant one, his body tingled as he remembered the way she’d mewled and purred in his ear the last time. It made the wait only a little easier to bear.
“Are you my friend?” he finally asked after swallowing his bite of scone.
“What?” She looked up with wide eyes.
“You say you’re not my enemy, are you then implying that you’re my friend, Siria?”
Her answer was long in coming. “And if I say I was?”
Swallowing the hibiscus laced herbal tea, he debated on his answer and as he did so he methodically set the teacup down precisely on the white china plate before answering. “Then I’d have to ask you why? Why now?”
The firm skin of her flesh barely moved with her frown. Siria could pass for a very young twenty, when, in fact, she was far older than most inhabitants of Kingdom. Unlike the Man in the Moon who changed out every five hundred years, she’d been around for a long, long time. He wasn’t sure how long, he’d never asked. But he’d understood from past conversations that her cycles did not run in the way his had.
It was a topic she rarely discussed and he’d always wondered why, but that was a tale for another day, as she had always used to say.
“And my reply would be, why not? I’ve not been subtle in my attempts to approach you. I never have. I’ve not hidden my feelings for you. So why act surprised?”
“If we’re being perfectly honest, then I’ll tell you it’s because you’ve made no bones about the fact that there is always a scheme.” Leaning back, he licked his lips. “Why? What is it about me, Siria, that draws you the way it does? Why is it that when we get to talking of our relationship, or rather the lack thereof, you become vindictive?”
Her teacup hovered around her lips as she held onto it with both hands. “I was wrong,” she finally whispered, “I realize that now.”
His brows dipped. Had she apologized? Surely he’d heard her wrong. “And after two hundred years you suddenly figure this out?”
She didn’t answer until she’d taken several sips of her red colored tea. Setting it down, she dabbed her lips with a napkin. “I didn’t just ask you here today for tea, there was another reason for it.”
Every fine hair on his body stood on end as his heart picked up in rhythm. “What did you do, Siria?”
“No, you misunderstand. I’m helping you, Jericho.” She squeezed her eyes shut. “For two hundred years I’ve tried to hang on to you, tried to force you to love me as you once did, but I was wrong.” She opened them again, piercing him with her sincerity.
“What are you talking about?” The good food he’d eaten just moments ago now sat like a brick in his gut.
“I had a visitor, two in fact, a few days past.”
“Who were they?”
If she was telling him this, it stood to reason the visitors had called upon the sun for one reason only. Because someone knew something about him, about Calanthe. He clenched his jaw.
Her fingers slid over his fist resting on the table.
“Stop,” she chided. “No harm shall come to that fairy, Calanthe, is it?”
The very blood in his veins ran cold as ice as he snatched his hand away.
“Jericho, listen to me!” her voice rose in tenor. “I am telling the truth.”
“Then stop speaking in riddles and just tell me what they said,” he growled.
“They came to share a story, one I’m sure they thought would drive me mad. I will admit to being hurt, wounded, furious for a moment… but no longer. After days to think on it, I’ve realized one glaring truth. I held on to you too tight, I drove you away and the only way to bring you back to me again is to regain your trust.”
“Siria…”
“Calanthe has broken fairy law by…” she gulped, “lying with you.” Her eyes wouldn’t meet his.
She looked sincere, what his eyes were seeing—the grimace across her face, how her body was curved in on itself, as if wounded but trying to be fearless in her pain. And in his heart he wanted to believe her.
But Jericho was no fool. Siria had clung to him for two centuries with the thread of hope that someday their relationship could be what it once was. And over the years he’d learned to keep his thoughts to himself, because once when he’d dared to mention the beauty of the sylphs flying beneath their castle (angelic beings with wings of pure gold and heavenly voices) she’d cast down a jet of light so powerful she’d scorched their delicate wings to ash, forcing the poor creatures to forever walk the land, never again to know the freedom of the skies.
It was why he’d feared her ever discovering what he’d done with Calanthe. So to hear her now, tell him that this was alright with her, it didn’t make sense to him.
“And you’re saying you’re alright with that?” he asked incredulously.
The amber in her eyes blazed. “Of course, I’m not. It kills me to have discovered it. But,” she held up a bronzed hand and took a fortifying breath, “that’s when it dawned on me that if you love something, you cannot keep it caged. If you love it, you must set it free to decide for itself whether to stay. And I love you.”
If she was being honest, then he had no choice but to be so himself. “I love her.”
She flinched.
“And I do not say it to hurt you, Siria. I feel a great many things for you.”
She scoffed. “Scorn, apathy, regret…”
“No.” He grabbed her hand, bringing it to his lips and planted a quick kiss. Her lips parted soundlessly. “Well, yes, at times I do.” He grinned weakly and she chuckled out a breath. “But these past two weeks proved to me that we can be friends again.”
She nodded. “It is why I’m being honest with you. Because, I will never stop holding out hope. But I also will not punish you for what I led you to do.”
He wanted to tell her that her anger and jealousy hadn’t forced him to fall in love with Calanthe. The fairy was his soul mate and he feared, as ungentlemanly as it might sound, that had he been with Siria already but seen Calanthe from afar he would have still gone to her. In this world there was only one great love and Calanthe was his, but he would not hurt Siria by telling her that either.
“Then are you giving us your blessin
g?”
She shrugged. “Do I have a choice?”
Jericho wished things were different, wished Siria hadn’t fixed her heart on his. But he also could not change what was. And he didn’t want to hurt her, but he feared in this, he always would because he would always choose his fairy.
“You always have a choice.”
Pulling their still clasped hands to her lips, she rubbed her cheek against his hand. “Then I choose your happiness.”
“Siria, I…” the words stuck in his throat, his tongue felt impossibly full and thick and he didn’t know what to say to her that wouldn’t wound her. So he shook his head and swallowed the thought and simply stood.
“May I have a kiss?” she asked with a voice so soft it was barely a whisper.
He licked his lips. A kiss, and then he was free to be with Calanthe and they could figure out how to get the fairy council to redact their antiquated edict. Then again, the thought of kissing Siria felt somehow wrong.
Rosebud lips tipped downward. “I understand, Jericho. Go to her then.”
And it was that understanding that was his undoing. He’d loved her once, for a time Siria had been his entire world and it was the memory of that love that made him move into her body.
Her breathing quickened as she planted her hands on his chest. “Are you sure?”
Tipping her chin up, he let the joy of getting to spend his free moments by Calanthe’s side without fear of hiding shine on his face. “Very,” he whispered and then took her lips.
She melted into his touch, her body soft and pliant in his arms. Her lips were bold and seeking and feverish and he sensed the hunger, her need for more.
His body buzzed because in some ways it felt right. She was his first love and would always remain his first love, Calanthe owned his soul, but Siria had once owned his heart and he would never forget what she’d done for them.
Finally breaking the kiss, he panted as his forehead touched hers. “Thank you, Siria, for everything.”
Squeezing her eyes shut she nodded quickly. “Go before I change my mind.”
Jericho could not believe his good fortune, and with a jubilant cry, he picked Siria up and hugged her fiercely. “Thank you. Thank you.” Bowing, he ran for his balustrade and called his portal to him.
It was time to return to his fairy.
Siria watched him go, and if he’d turned back he might have noticed the glint in her eyes or the mysterious smile playing about her lips. But he never turned and he never noticed.
~*~
Calanthe knew what tonight was. She looked up at the sky, waved once, and then ran in search of her friend.
It was hard knowing that Jericho could come to her if he wanted, but that he definitely shouldn’t. She’d broken so many rules already, just to be with him. They played a very dangerous game, she was just happy that she hadn’t been caught.
What she needed was to take her mind off of him, off their time spent together and what they could be doing right now if he returned. Her body burned with the memories of his touch, the way his thick girth had filled her.
Sucking in a breath as red crept into her cheeks, she smirked. That memory had kept her warm many a night.
“June,” she cried when she entered the glen where the games were being held.
Tonight, everything seemed different. Yes, her heart ached for Jericho and probably always would, but she’d found her contentment, and she was that, she was at peace. Finally, she could breath and smile and know she was right where she should always have been.
“June!” she cried again as a pair of drunken fairies waltzed passed her hand in hand and giggling into their acorn cups.
“Serena,” Calanthe grabbed a red headed fairy dressed entirely in leaves of green. Hiccupping, Serena turned her shiny blue eyes in Calanthe’s direction.
“Aye?”
The apple cider was potent tonight and brought on a coughing fit as Calanthe inhaled the fumes emanating from the woodland fairy’s breath.
Clearing her throat, she grimaced. “Have you see, June?” she asked with a somewhat scratchy voice.
Serena turned to Aniada and frowned. “We did see her, did we not, sister?”
Aniada bobbed her cafe au lait head, balancing the sunny yellow tulip bloom back onto the center of her head as it’d nearly toppled to the ground. “We did,” she said in the melodious chiming voice of a flower fairy. “Earlier, she was with The Blue. Oh, Calanthe, look what I learned to do.” She pulled out the star tipped wand from inside her tulip petal gown and swished it about.
A massive wreath of baby’s breath encircled Calanthe’s slender neck.
Aniada had only just come into her powers recently and was rather proud of her limited skills.
Calanthe plastered on a smile and pretended to ooh and ahh over the simple spell when, in fact, her heart was currently tripping in her chest. Why was June with The Blue?
True, Galeta was their head mistress and if she called, a fairy must obey. Most likely this could be absolutely nothing, but something felt suddenly very wrong.
The pair of fairies meandered off before Calanthe had a chance to question them further. Standing just outside the circle of campfire light, she hid in the shadows and watched as the other fairies raced and played and drank themselves silly. What’d seemed like so much fun mere seconds ago now made her want to run away.
She was probably overreacting. In the month since Jericho’s return to his home June had been nothing but her normal, fun self.
Calanthe licked her lips. Because even while she continued to berate herself over her foolishness of impending doom, she couldn’t keep her palms from slicking or her gut from churning.
Twisting on her heels, she shot into the sky and raced back toward her haven. The spot where she’d always met Jericho in the past. It was where she could think and keep away from the prying eyes of other fairies with too much time on their hands.
So it was a shock when upon entering the sanctity of her knoll, there he was.
Jericho was sitting on their stump, with his chin on his fist and staring out into space.
Halting so suddenly it was as if she’d slammed into an invisible wall, Calanthe could only stare on in shock.
As if sensing her presence, he jerked his head to the side and then shot to his feet. “Calanthe!”
The smile across his face was radiant and unexpected and her already frantically beating heart was threatening to rip out of her chest.
“Jericho,” she breathed. “What… what?”
“No time.” He rushed to her, holding out his palm for her to land into. “Change me. I wish to move away from such open places. Something about this night feels wrong.”
Her sentiments exactly. “Jericho, you are right. I do not like the charge in the air, the feeling that is prickling at me. Something is not right. What are you doing here?”
Forcing herself to talk and think rationally was so far from what Calanthe wanted to do. But ever since hearing of June with The Blue and now Jericho so openly engaging her, she didn’t like the strange feeling twisting through her inside. Whispering that something was amiss, something so obvious she should sense it. Should automatically know it.
She looked up at the sky.
“There are no crows following me tonight. She knows, Calanthe.”
Her nostrils flared. “Who knows?”
“Siria. She knows and she’s said it’s alright.”
Taking a hesitant step back, Calanthe held up her hands. “You told her?”
“No, no, of course I didn’t. Well,” he grimaced, “I had every intention of doing so eventually. But not so soon, not right away. She said that two fairies visited her and told her of us.”
Her stomach threatened to revolt. “Oh gods,” she squeezed her eyes shut, pinching her brow, “was it June and Galeta?”
Was that why June was missing? Had her friend told? Before Jericho even nodded, hot tears gathered in the corners of her eyes.
�
��Yes. I assume it was,” he said softly. “What does this mean for us?”
The tears slipped then, because all the pieces were beginning to come together. “It means I am ruined.”
Bringing his palm to her cheek, he rested her body against his firm flesh so as to hug her. “That is why I came, we can fight this. We should fight this. There is no shame in love, Calanthe. Surely when your council sees that they will understand.”
“No,” she pulled away from him, “they will not. Jericho… I—”
“You are absolutely right,” another voice piped up then.
With a startled cry, Calanthe twirled about. But it was neither Galeta nor June staring back at them.
It was Miriam the Delighted. The seer of the glen and the fairy who’d told Calanthe about the seed in the first place. Her strange swirling lavender eyes chilled her to the marrow.
“Miriam, what are you doing here?” Calanthe cried, looking all around for more fairies to come crawling out of the woodworks.
Miriam tucked her speckled moth’s wings behind her back as she landed upon the head of a polka dotted toadstool. “You must understand that what is about to take place has been foreseen.”
“What does that mean?” Jericho growled and Miriam cut him off with a swish of her wrist.
“Listen to me and listen well, I set the game board, I know all its players. This is not the end, have faith and take heart for there is powerful magic at work.”
Miriam was a lovely creature, as were all fairies, but there was also something very creepy about her too. Something that made Calanthe wish to draw into herself. The pale skinned, ebony haired fairy’s eyes were beginning to bleed through with pure white. The spider silk dress clinging to her body began to glow as a rushing wind suddenly shot through the leaves, rustling branches and shaking ancient trees.
“Kiss him now,” Miriam said in a voice that’d grown ten times deeper.
“What?”
“Now!” The seers word boomed as a bolt of lightening crashed to the earth between them.
“Calanthe?” Jericho's eye were wide, mirroring her own.
Calling her magic, Calanthe jumped out of his hands and shifted to her human form. She didn’t have time to tuck in her wings or adjust her dress. Because there was magic in the air and to ignore Miriam was not an option.
