by Kristen Day
“Give me my clothes!” I shouted at him. He whirled around with a look of pleasant surprise masking his underlying merriment.
“What clothes?” he asked innocently, while pulling on his own jeans and shirt. I came within inches of latching onto him, when he twisted out of my reach and continued to swim. Realizing that I had to ‘up’ my game if I wanted my clothes back, it dawned on me that I had many more non-traditional options at my disposal, rather than chasing him all over the Mediterranean Sea. I still wasn’t exactly sure what all my abilities allowed me to do, so I used my imagination and prayed it would work. I held my arms out toward Finn and easily anchored my energy.
“Stop him,” I commanded quietly. A swarm of energy flew outward and through the water toward him. Mere seconds later, that same energy had doubled in strength and raced its way back toward me, in the form of a powerful current. The water flowed past me but didn’t take me with it. Instead, I watched with giddiness as the now-struggling Finn was forced backwards. In an effort to understand what was happening, he twisted around and met my smiling eyes with surprise. As the current brought him back to me, I concentrated more energy on a patch of seaweed below, and pictured it sprouting up to take him captive. To my delight and surprise, the seaweed shot up and wrapped around him tightly, just as I had a pictured it in my mind.
Undaunted and enjoying my newfound potential, I sent more energy to a nearby group of crabs that were scurrying across the sea floor. I pictured them wrenching my clothes out of Finn’s hands and returning them to their rightful owner. They must have gotten the message, because they veered off course and headed straight for him. He twisted and struggled against the seaweed as the pale, white crabs’ claws snipped at his hands; forcing him to let go of my clothes. The obedient crabs expertly retrieved my sinking clothes and laid them at my bare feet.
“Why, thank you,” I thanked them formally with a curtsy. They performed a gleeful dance for me and then scurried off again. I watched a helpless and defeated Finn as I tugged my clothes back on with chagrin. If you’ve ever tried to dress underwater, you’ll know it’s no easy task. After several shaky attempts, my clothes were back on and I swam over to the “Finn burrito”; laughing so hard my stomach hurt.
“I’m glad I could provide some comic relief for your morning entertainment,” he replied dryly with a crooked grin. I released my energy on the seaweed and it snapped back down to its former length like a rubber band. As he made a big show of checking himself for bruises or cuts, I fought the urge to roll my eyes at him.
“I see what you mean about attacking seaweed,” he poked fun at me with heavy sarcasm. “They’re absolutely ruthless!”
“You sure you don’t want to keep it up?” I asked seriously, “I could really use the practice.”
“Tempting…” he cut those swirling blue eyes at me, “but no thanks.”
“You’re no fun…” I teased him with a wink. In response, he wrapped his arms around me and pulled me close, gently kissing me on the lips. I’d always heard horror stories about relationships that went south after the couple slept together, or that just turned weird afterwards - but I experienced none of that with Finn. It could have something to do with the fact that those stories had come out of Laura Beth’s mouth, so the validity was always suspect. But in an odd way, I actually felt more at ease with Finn. I tried to meet his eyes, which were now fixed on the sea floor, but he had suddenly gone all shy and awkward on me. Maybe I had spoken too soon.
“Last night was amazing,” he said shyly. “I knew it would be worth the wait.”
“The wait?”
“I always wanted my first time to be…with you,” he admitted with trepidation and shrugged his shoulders. “Dating other girls just seemed pointless…”
“But how could you have known?” I furrowed my brow, perplexed. “I just got here.”
“I fell in love with you the moment you appeared to me in your reveries.” His tender eyes finally met mine, “I knew you were you of course, but…I didn’t know I was…him. Until recently.”
“You lost me. Who’s him?” I hope he wasn’t going to start talking about himself in third person. That could get confusing. Not to mention weird. He looked down at the sea floor again.
“You’re…Paramour,” he answered.
“Isn’t that a band?” I wondered out loud.
“The prophecy – your prophecy,” he tried again, his eyes filling with admiration and tender conviction as he met my gaze. “It said that your ‘Paramour’, which means lover or partner in life, would be a great warrior; bred to lead an army of men, but destined solely for you. It said that you would make a great sacrifice for him…even if that meant losing everything.”
“A sacrifice…” I breathed, still tasting the pomegranate on my lips and feeling the solid determination in my heart. “Why are you just telling me this now?”
“I didn’t want to sway your path,” he retorted, “and if you were truly meant for someone else, well…I needed to know. Letting you go would have been the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but I would have done it…for you.”
“I think I’ve always known I was meant to be with you,” I divulged. “For the longest time, I thought you were just a dream. You were the only light in my dark past; the only person I looked forward to seeing. The one thing no one could ever take away from me. Even if you weren’t real it didn’t matter, because you were…mine.”
“Yes, I am,” he grinned down at me and kissed me again.
“So where exactly is this omnipotent prophecy everyone’s raving about?” I asked jokingly, “I want to see if I’m going to win the lottery.”
Although I was joking, it was slightly unnerving that my entire life had been scripted for me already. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. And the fact that everyone else seemed to know more about it than me didn’t help. I planned on doing some research on the subject once I got back to Lorelei.
~~~~~
“You guys are the definition of the ‘Walk of Shame’,” Ricker chuckled, casually popping a piece of cheese toast into his mouth. We had returned to the villa at precisely the same moment my roommates had made the decision to come searching for us. Before we had taken three steps into the living room, we were subjected to a strict lecture from Carmen and Ricker explaining how certain they were that we’d been killed, stuffed, and were at that very moment being displayed on Nadia’s living room mantle. Thankfully, Natasha and Charon had left earlier that morning for a meeting on campus. Carmen circled us with a critical eye; pecking at my hair and brushing off Finn’s sand-coated shirt.
“All the signs are there: messy hair, guilt-ridden faces, and wrinkled, sandy clothes from last night.” She chastised us with a disapproving frown and then whispered in my ear with a conspiring grin, “Not to mention the shit-eating grin on your face.”
“You guys leave them alone,” Willow scolded them and draped a supportive arm around me. “They deserved a night to themselves.”
“And now I deserve a shower,” I laughed and inspected the travesty that was my appearance.
“Agreed,” Finn grinned down at his own sandy clothes.
“Just make sure you two behave up there,” Carmen wiggled her eyebrows before Willow elbowed her in the ribs.
“I’m not making any promises,” I winked at them as we climbed the stairs. I had a feeling that our love life had already been a topic of conversation, so why not torture them a little more and keep them guessing? When we reached my bedroom door, Finn hugged me tightly and kissed my cheek lovingly.
“Last night was the best night of my life,” he said.
“Me too,” I agreed with a goofy-feeling smile.
“I knew it!” an eavesdropping Phoebe screeched, as we heard her feet scrambling back down the stairs to tell everyone else what we’d said. I rolled my eyes as I shut my bedroom door and began to undress.
The hot shower felt so good I stood in there for what seemed like hours. The rolling steam and lavender
body wash I’d brought infused my senses and relaxed my muscles. I replayed my night with Finn in my head again and shivered. I couldn’t believe I’d lost my virginity. But at the same time, there was no one else in the entire world that I would entrust that part of myself with, so it felt completely right. I shivered again as I realized the gravity of what we had done. I was his and he was mine. No matter what challenges this Chosen life threw our way, we would tackle it and come out stronger. Together.
Chapter 20
It wasn’t the cold stone floor that pressed into my bare shoulders or the pounding of my head that woke me. It wasn’t even the uncomfortable way my left leg was tucked up under my body, or the vague knowledge that there was blood trickling down my temple. It was the sound of her voice as it exploded inside my head, awakening the tightly twisted rage that had been woven within my heart.
“The itsy bitsy spider crawled up the water spout,” Nadia’s breath heated the side of my face as she ruined one of my favorite childhood nursery rhymes. I felt a slight tickling sensation on my right arm, jerking it spastically in an effort to rid my body of an unknown invader before my eyes flew open.
“Get away from me!” I growled at her. The fact that I was in a reverie did nothing to dull my irrational panic, as the tickling on my arm remained despite my attempt to swat at it. My movements were measured and labored, and I groaned when my hand completely missed my arm; instead flopping down onto my stomach. My panic quickly changed to a very rational fear as I laid eyes on the dark brown spider that was making its way up my forearm.
“I wouldn’t fight her if I were you,” Nadia wore a sharp grin as she crossed her arms over a gray silk blouse and watched the spider with tenderness. A shiver ran down my spine as I swallowed and tried to suppress my rising hysteria. It was just a spider, a simple, harmless insect. So what if it had eight hairy legs and black beady eyes? I was a thousand times larger and a million times smarter. Unfortunately for me, something about those eight legs trumped any amount of intelligence or size.
“She’s a Darwin bark spider,” Nadia explained proudly through dark plum lipstick. “Isn’t she beautiful? She chose me to be her master.”
“You should choose to lay off the drugs,” I muttered in disgust. Her eyes flickered, razor sharp, before a wistful smile crossed her lips and she diverted her gaze back to the spider that was literally making my skin crawl. The mountain-size goose bumps that had risen on my arms only amplified the tickling sensation, and threatened to expose the true horror I was feeling inside.
“I found her magnificent silk web spanning the banks of my river,” she sighed. “I would watch for hours as she expertly weaved her deadly web. She’s the perfect predator.”
So her role model was a spider. How fitting. My arms shook involuntarily as the tiny torture device made its way around my forearm, and stopped in the crook of my elbow. Its thick body was only the size of a quarter, but I could see the black hair covering its eight legs quite clearly. I could also feel the bile collecting in my throat, on its way to the outside world. I pushed it down and fought to harden myself.
“Get it off of me,” I demanded with what I hoped was an unimpressed tone.
“It can also kill with one bite of its venom,” she cackled knowingly. So much for the ‘its-just-a-spider’ angle. “And these are her children.”
Nadia swept her arm out to the suddenly crowded room I now found myself in. My vision zeroed in on at least a hundred identical spiders littering the mass of webs that spanned the rooms’ walls and ceiling. The sunlight shining through the lone open window lit up the strands of silk, which glittered and swayed in the slight ocean breeze. Ocean? My senses sharpened and I tucked away the dizzying déjà vu feeling I was beginning to feel into the back of my mind. The white stone of the walls poked at my memory, but the air that smelled of sea salt and sand only caused a thick longing for the safety of the sea.
I shut my eyes and focused on my body back at the villa on Cyprus. Unfortunately, just as in her underground cavern, nothing happened. I felt the spider being snatched off of my arm as Nadia chuckled at my increasing number of failed reverie-ending attempts.
“I have to admit, that never gets old,” she snickered and waited patiently as her spider crawled back onto one of the webs nearby. “I love watching you fail miserably. It just proves how little you belong in our world.”
“Where am I?” I asked calmly, refusing to take the bait. She stood with grace, brushed off her black skinny jeans, and swept her golden hair off her shoulders into a low pony tail.
“Exactly where you should be,” she retorted matter-of-factly. I watched as her golden eyes darkened and the light evil smoke twirled off of her skin. “Out of my way.”
“You think a bunch of spiders are going to stop me from escaping?” I tried to laugh convincingly. I was pretty certain a bunch of spiders was the best way to keep me from escaping. I pictured my body wrapped in the webs as a hundred spiders ate me alive, and shuddered.
“Of course not,” she grinned sharply. “The absence of your essence should take care of that for me.” My heart hit the floor as she picked up a full syringe from the window sill. My trace had faded to gray, and understanding filled my mind, quickly trumped by rage.
“Why are you doing this?!” I yelled at her, and tumbled backwards as I tried to move toward her. With a twitch of her finger something tightened around my ankles in a faint glow. Enchanted chains connected to chains secured my ankles to the stone wall; further ensuring that I had no access to my abilities. Nadia twitched toward me with a smile and pointed at me with one red manicured finger.
“Because I can.” In one quick motion, something solid and cold connected with my skull; taking my breath away and knocking me unconscious.
“He loves me. He loves me not. He loves me. He loves me….not. Well, crap.” I chucked the bare flower stem aside and plucked another yellow flower from the thick, lush grass beneath me. The neighborhood park had proved to be a formidable safe haven that was rarely frequented by any of the any other kids. They were too busy playing video games or spending time with their normal families. I wasn’t jealous at all. I shifted my attention back to my flower and plucked the first petal.
“He loves me. He loves me not…”
“Love is never left to chance, dear.”
“Huh?” I started a little at the raspy voice behind me. I spun around to see an older lady with a cane peering down at the daisy in my hand with an amused grin. Her starched light blue pants matched her striped white and blue top, and I looked around to see who she was with. She must have grandchildren playing on the swings or the jungle gym, but I was the only kid around. I looked up at her, confused. “Do I know you?”
“No, dear. I’m only visiting.” As she smiled warmly, the corners of her bright blue eyes crinkled from age and I was instantly captivated by those kind eyes. They held such tenderness and wisdom, I found myself unable to look away. They danced with joy, and I got the odd feeling that I should know who she was.
“Who are you visiting?” I asked curiously.
She chuckled, and her wrinkled fingers played with the shining pendant that hung from her necklace. “It would seem the only one I’m visiting with at the moment is you! How’s that sound?”
I straightened, but my ankle rolled over a rock and I pitched sideways. The old woman grabbed my arm to right me, but I cringed as pain exploded from several fresh bruises. She released me when I cried out, but surprisingly asked no questions. She simply shuffled her feet and turned toward me with empathetic eyes. I realized just how short she was. The disfiguring hump on her back forced her slight body to bend over at an odd angle.
“Do you have grandkids?” I looked around again, wondering how an old woman who could barely stand got to the park.
“I will someday,” she laughed again and gestured to the flower I still clutched in my hand. “May I?”
I handed her the fragile flower and she inspected it with interest. She had to be at
least ninety years old. If she was going to have grandchildren, wouldn’t it have already happened? Another odd feeling of familiarity passed over me, as I watched her hold it to her nose and breathe deep. She closed her eyes and smiled as if it were the sweetest thing she’d ever smelled.
“They say Sweet William will always find his Black-Eyed Susan,” she mused.
“Who’s Susan?” I asked. I had no idea what she was talking about. “Why does she have a black eye?”
“Their story is one of America’s oldest and least known romance tales,” she explained, and held up the flower with raised eyebrows. “Actually, this particular flower was named for her. This is a Black-Eyed Susan, named such for its dark center.”
She handed the flower back to me as she continued, “After meeting beneath the silver light of a full moon in a field of wildflowers, William asked Susan to marry him, presenting her with a bouquet of those very wildflowers. Only one day before their wedding, sweet William was taken prisoner on a war-bound vessel set for the high seas. Throughout his plight-ridden journey, her memory kept him alive; the hope of seeing her again pushing him to survive. Upon his release a year later, William was informed that Susan had run away to evade an arranged marriage. After searching for his true love for months and months, sweet William decided to return to the field where they had first met. That night as the full moon rose, William finally arrived at the field to find his dear Susan sleeping. She clutched a dried bouquet of wildflowers in her hands…the very same kind of flower you hold in your hand today.”
