by Simon Archer
“Thanks, Encyclopedia Brown,” Daniella said with a chuckle.
I tipped a fake hat in her direction, taking the jab as a compliment.
“That’s an obscure monster,” Kari said offhandedly.
“No kidding,” Jade commented as she picked at her teeth with her pinky finger.
“That’s been happening a lot lately,” Hailey added. “They are popping up more frequently and the Military’s having to send out more soldiers. I wouldn’t be surprised if more of them get deployed off campus.”
“Do we think it’s Eris’s doing?” Daniella asked, getting to the heart of the matter as she was known to do. She pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose, a tell for whenever she was nervous.
“It has to be,” I concluded. “What could be more chaotic than bringing more monsters to the mortal world? The more she brings, the more spread out the Military is going to be.”
I held the rest of my worries in my head, choosing not to voice them. If Hailey was right about the multitude of monsters, then there was a very good chance that she and Kari would be shipped out. I tried not to think about that and how it made my stomach twist into nauseous knots.
“I hate to say it, Cam, but you’ve got to help the Fates,” Daniella said suddenly.
My head turned in her direction so fast that I thought I got whiplash. “Where did that come from?”
“Yeah, party pooper,” Jade said as she reached across the couch to playfully push the healer. “I thought we weren’t going to talk about that tonight.”
“That was before I knew about the monsters and hearing about Bella getting deployed,” Daniella defended. She leaned forward, put her elbows on her knees, and looked me directly in the eye. “If you help the Fates, then they tell you where Hephaestus is. You find him, he helps with the Ultimate Weapon, then the war ends. The sooner you do this, the sooner all of this is over.”
As much as I didn’t want to admit it, I knew she was right. I twisted my fingers over one another, suddenly sweaty.
“And I know the Stratego is going to talk to you tomorrow about your duties as an Elemental Official but I think, in the end, that’s going to help you more than it will hurt you,” Daniella continued arguing her point. “You’re going to have advantages as an Official that you would never have as a student.”
“She has a point,” Kari added her vote of agreement. “Even though I still think you were an idiot for doing that, it might be helpful.”
There was a ruffle of fabric as Hailey shifted in her seat. I eyed her suspiciously but continued to address Kari and Daniella’s concerns.
“Do any of you have any idea how I’m supposed to learn weaving and woodcarving?” I asked. “Because I’m screwed if I can’t find anyone to teach me. It’s not as though I can look up a YouTube video or something out here.”
“I did have one idea,” Bethany said as she raised a single finger in the air.
When she didn’t voice it right away, I waved my hand to encourage her to talk. “Care to share with the class?”
“You’re not going to like it,” Bethany winced.
“Okay,” I said, drawing out the word into two syllables, emphasizing my hesitation.
“Well, you see, there are the nymphs in the woods on campus that helped you with the dance…” Bethany said as she squinted her eyes, preparing for my explosion.
The pieces clicked in my mind, and my mouth dropped into a frown instantly. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“She’s really not that bad,” Bethany offered. “You worked with her before and I took one of her drama classes last semester. She’s eccentric, but she could be your best shot at learning these skills.”
“Drama classes?” Kari asked with a single raised eyebrow. “Are you guys talking about Sasha?”
“Unfortunately, yes,” I grumbled.
Sasha Manuel was a daughter of Dionysis, the god of wine and theatre. Consequently, she was the drama teacher at the Academy. She came back to campus a couple of years ago after saving a bunch of nymphs from their forest burning down. The nymphs now lived on campus, but they were really persnickety women who didn’t answer to anyone except Sasha.
While the drama teacher helped me organize a school dance last year, she also forced Hailey and me to perform a skit in front of everyone. While it allowed me to realize the extent of my love for her, I still didn’t like Sasha’s eccentric behavior. She was too much for me and our values on what we thought was important for a soldier to learn were completely opposite of one another.
“Bethany’s right,” Daniella agreed. “The nymphs would definitely have those skills and could teach you, if Sasha lets them.”
“This really is just getting worse and worse, isn’t it?” I groaned, knowing that even though I didn’t want to have to appeal to Sasha for a second time, it was my best option.
“So you’re going to do it?” Jade asked, reading between the lines of my complaint.
“I don’t think I have a choice,” I said, keeping my voice at the same groan as before. I leaned my head against the back of the chair and closed my eyes for a moment, letting the situation sink in.
“You always have a choice,” Hailey said under her breath.
My head snapped up at that. “Do you think I shouldn’t do it then?”
“You know my feelings about Sasha,” Hailey answered, putting a hand to her chest.
It was true that the daughter of Apollo and the daughter of Dionysis never got along well. But I didn’t think Hailey’s dislike of the drama teacher ran that deep.
“But I learned a long time ago that I can’t tell you what to do,” Hailey said, that hand on her chest moving to gesture towards me. “It’s always up to you, Cam.”
I looked around the room, taking stock of everyone’s opinions. When my eyes moved Bethany, I thought about the pain she must be feeling at Bella being deployed. Afterall, Bella was Bethany’s girlfriend before they both joined the rest of us in our relationship. It was a realistic part of our role as soldiers, but we’d been living in a bubble as students. As the war escalated, this would become more and more a part of our reality. What if that happened to Hailey or Kari? I couldn’t let that happen, not while I had the chance to stop it.
“I’ll talk to Sasha tomorrow after my meeting with the Stratego,” I huffed, announcing my decision. “And I’ll tell the Fates tonight that I accept their deal.”
Daniella reached out and tapped my knee, a sign of her approval. “Then we should head out and let you get to it.”
“Aw man,” Bethany moaned. “I was semi-serious about spending the night here.”
“Cameron just got introduced to a lot of changes,” Jade said as she pushed Bethany’s legs off her lap. “If anything, the only one who should stay the night is Hailey so they can talk about some of Cameron’s duties as an Official before he talks to the Stratego.” She shot a look over at Kari, “I would say the both of you would be staying, but since you’ve been away for two years, I figure Hailey has the most up to date information.”
Kari waved off her comment with a sad smile, understanding her reasoning.
I sent a glance Hailey’s way, hoping to catch a smile or some sign of her amusement or agreement to Jade’s comment. But the soldier kept her eyes trained on the floor.
My girlfriends made their way to the door, taking their sweet time. It wasn’t until I promised them that they could come over tomorrow that they finally got off their asses and left. Kari waited for Hailey outside on the porch. My girlfriend had gotten up with everyone else but lingered on the landing. Her hands were in her pockets again, and she kept looking everywhere else than at me.
“You coming, Hailey?” Kari wondered. Her voice was gentle, as though she were reminding Hailey of something.
I looked between the two of them and thought about their whispered conversations during our walks across campus. Not for the first time, I wondered what they had been talking about.
“I’ll meet you back
at the apartment,” Hailey said with a nod in Kari’s direction.
She closed the screen door and ventured out into the night, after giving us both a wave.
Finally, Hailey and I were alone. I melted into her arms with a sigh. I wanted to hold her tight, but her body was stiff and unwelcoming. It felt like I threw myself onto a coat rack rather than in the arms of my lover. I pulled back from her and crossed my arms over my chest.
“Okay, what’s going on with you?” I asked outright. “You’ve been weird all day. I know it’s a lot but this is us we’re talking about here. We’ve been through hell and back, literally.”
“I know, Cam, I know,” Hailey said as she kicked the ground as though she were embarrassed about something.
“So tell me what’s going on,” I asked gingerly. I stepped forward and ducked into her line of view, forcing her to look at me instead of the ground. “What’s up, Hailey?”
“It’s just… ” Hailey released a puff of air, hard enough to make her lips flutter into a raspberry. “I’m angry.”
“Okay,” I said, drawing out the word into two syllables. “About what?”
“Not about,” she corrected with her hands on her hips. “At you. I’m angry at you.”
I blinked and stepped back, completely stunned by her answer. I never expected those words to come out of her mouth. Before I could ask why, the daughter of Apollo continued.
“But it’s not fair for me to be because it’s not your fault, but I can’t seem to shake it,” Hailey said. Her foot jiggled up and down in anticipation. “Because I know why you did it, I really do, but it’s just… so much is changing and I can’t do anything about it. It’s all so out of my control.”
“I’m still confused,” I said plainly.
“When you sat in the chair and became an Elemental Official,” Hailey explained. This time, she met my eyes so I could see the seriousness flowing out of her green irises. “I know you were thinking about saving Kari but you didn’t think about anyone else. Like us.”
“What does being an Elemental Official have to do with us?” I asked, worried for the first time that my choice had ruined way more than it had actually helped.
“It’s a lifetime position, Cam,” Hailey said as she ran her hand through her hair. “You committed to the Academy for life.”
I waited for her words to process through my mind, but I couldn’t actually grasp what she was saying. I may not have understood that this was a lifelong choice before I took the position, but I still didn’t understand why she was so forlorn.
“Why are you so worried?” I asked, deciding it was better to voice my confusion aloud. “Is there like some no dating rule when you are an Elemental Official? Because we both know that’s bullshit, and we’ll just ignore it anyway.”
“There’s not anything like that that I know of,” Hailey said as she shook her head. “What concerns me is that you didn’t think of us when you made that decision. Any of us. About what we want to do. Our future.”
“Because you don’t want to stay at the Academy for the rest of your life,” I said, finally putting all of the puzzle pieces together.
“I don’t know if I do or not,” Hailey said. She reached out and took my hands in hers. “I know that I want to be with you and the others. But I also wanted to have a choice in our future, in what direction our lives took. I’m worried that you making this rash decision means you don’t think about us in the same way that I do.”
“That’s not true,” I said as I squeezed her hands. “Look, I’m sorry about the consequences of my choice, but I’m still not sorry that I did it. Kari needed it or her life was going to be ruined. We would lose her and I wasn’t about to just throw out our relationship with her just like that.”
Hailey closed her eyes and gathered her thoughts. “I know that.”
“And I’m angry that you think I would just toss away our future like that,” I said, letting my voice fill with some of that frustration. “The thing is, Hailey, I believe in us. I believe that all of us, all the ones we love can weather any storm together, this one and the next. Do you think we can’t?”
The daughter of Apollo heaved a heavy sigh, her perfect chest rising and falling rhythmically. When she didn’t answer me right away, I dug deeper trying to think about the subtext of her words. “Or does this have anything to do with what the Stratego said to you earlier?”
Hailey nodded, unable to say her answer aloud. My eyebrows pinched together and I examined her hunched posture. I thought about all the clues she gave me over the past couple of hours.
“My becoming an Official isn’t the only thing bothering you,” I concluded, not even bothering to ask the question, just knowing that it was true. “That’s not the only thing that’s changing.”
This time, the soldier nodded again with a slow and measured rhythm.
“Hailey,” I said, hardening my voice. “What did he tell you?”
“I’m getting deployed,” she whispered so softly that I didn’t think I heard her at first. “All available soldiers are. They are removing us from campus.”
“All of you?” I said, the words stalling in my ears. “That means, Kari too then?”
“Because she was just reinstated, they need to make sure she’s physically fit, but I’m sure it won’t be long before she leaves too,” Hailey answered, as though she were a nervous student reading her report straight off the page.
I swallowed my nerves and tried to stick to the facts, not let my emotions interrupt the conversation. “When do you leave?”
“Tomorrow morning,” Hailey replied. She licked her lips and coughed as though her mouth suddenly went dry.
I closed my eyes, squishing them shut. It didn’t seem real. I had never been at the Academy without her and now I would have to go through one of the toughest trials without her by my side. Without her words of encouragement, her smiles, her kisses… they would be gone.
“How long will you be out in the field?” I asked, sticking to the questions with solid answers instead of the swirling bout of sadness and anger that threatened to bubble up.
“He said until the war is won,” Hailey announced.
I ran my tongue over my teeth and put a hand to my chest, thinking that would help even out my breaths. “You weren’t kidding, that is a lot of change.”
“I’m not really mad at you,” Hailey said quickly. “I think it was easier to be mad at you but I’m not.”
“I get it,” I said as I transferred my hand from across my chest to her hips.
“I believe in us, I do. I just had this… I don’t know,” Hailey threw her head back and rolled her eyes, as if she couldn’t believe she was admitting this. “I had this plan for a future for all of us together, and I’m angry that’s no longer an option, with you being an Official and me being out in the field.”
My heart swelled and I sucked in a sharp breath. “You… you had a plan? For our future?”
“I mean, yeah,” Hailey said as a blush crawled up her cheeks. “I wanted to travel the world with everyone. Not only fighting monsters, but living the life, you know? Eating and drinking the world’s finest delicacies, seeing the sights.” She ran her hands up and down my arms, causing goosebumps to pop up on my skin. “Ever since we were in Italy together, I thought about what grand adventures we could have. And now, you’re going to be tied to the Academy with duties and obligations that will prevent us from doing any of those things.”
I didn’t say anything, still mesmerized by the idea of traveling the world with the women I loved. Suddenly, there was a pang in my stomach. I’m sure it was the same disappointment Hailey had been feeling all day. I got a glimpse of the loss she felt at having that dream be taken from her. From us.
I leaned into my girl, putting my forehead to her forehead. Hailey wrapped her arms around me and rubbed her hands up and down my back, in a slow and relaxing rhythm.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I’m sorry that this happened. I didn’t mean
for it to hurt us or any plans you might have made.”
“I know, and we’re going to be okay,” she said before she kissed my nose. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you right away, but I was trying to process my feelings.”
I turned my head so I could go back to looking her in the eye. I laced my fingers behind her neck and used my thumbs to play with the strands of angel fine hair.
“I love you, Hailey Barlow,” I said, never breaking eye contact.
“And I love you, Cameron Alpin,” Hailey said as she tilted her head closer to mine, brushing our lips together in a teasing way.
“I’m going to talk to the Fates,” I said suddenly, shocking both myself and Hailey.
She pulled away from me and raised a single eyebrow. “Talk about a mood killer.”
“I’m sorry,” I said as I shook my head. “But I realize now that I have to talk to them. I have to make the tools. Because if I have to be separate from you until this war ends, then I’m going to end it as fast as possible. If bargaining with the Fates is the first step to doing that, then so be it.”
“I love it when you make declarations like that,” Hailey said with a look of longing in her eyes.
“Shut up,” I said as I wrapped my lips around hers.
Our bodies pressed into each other. We found the familiar grooves and locked into place, like puzzle pieces. I felt the hairs rise on her neck when I ran my tongue along her bottom lip.
My hands traveled down to her pants and I unbuttoned them. “Why don’t we go upstairs and you tell me all about this future you had planned? There is a whole bedroom we haven’t had the chance to explore yet.”
“From my count, there are three bedrooms we need to explore,” Hailey said with a smirk playing at the corner of her lips.
I slid my hands around her waist, slinking my fingers between her waistband. I explored the smooth skin of her ass, rounding over the firm cheeks. I yanked her pelvis forward, pressing into my length already hard and ready, so that we lined up perfectly.
“Right now, you’re the most important thing to me,” I said, looking her straight in the eye. “And if for some gods awful reason this is our last night together for a while, I’m going to spend every single second of it with you.”
