by Jessa Lucas
“I am not offended, Saylor.”
“Then what is it. Jealousy?”
Oh god, I wanted it to stop. The defense mechanism was triggering, the one where anger was the balm for pain, fight the reaction to fear. But more terrifying than irritating was the secondary layer to my emotions that I sensed manifesting: the siren felt some measure of rejection at Sy’s abandonment. And when the siren felt strongly, it was so not a good sign.
“I’m not jealous,” Sy said in the same maddeningly calm tone.
The siren bristled, relentless. “Good, cause I’ll tell you right now I’m not interested. I don’t need the leftovers of an insane queen.”
“You really decided that was the narrative in your head, didn’t you?” he breathed.
“Isn’t it?”
Silence.
“Why do you do that! You just stare at me, Syrus, no words, no answers. Frankly, it’s... it’s... the most frustrating—”
Sy moved forward suddenly, grabbing me by the arm and shoving me against the wall. His shadow hung over me, his grip on me tight enough to keep me in place but not hostile enough to feel threatening. Even still, I barely held back the small gasp that slipped through my lips at such an unexpected move of aggression.
“This curse is not just yours to bear, Saylor,” he hissed. “I would ask you to remember that, every time you implore with questions none of us can answer but you.”
My heart shuddered in my chest, but it wasn’t fear. I didn’t know what it was as I stared up at him, those deep eyes endless up close. I searched the far reaches of my mind for a hint to whatever was pulled taut between us, but it was something named only in memory. Memory which didn’t sing open with his touch.
I reached a hand up to his face, surprising even myself. Sy tensed underneath my hand but didn’t move away. I swallowed as my song echoed through the halls to a dramatic close and he stilled beneath my touch.
Nothing. There was absolutely nothing here— no clarity, no clues, not even the suggestion of a dream within the dream. Nothing but him and I, staring each other down, one of us the pendulum and the other gravity.
“I’m always on the tip of your tongue,” I said as I closed in, eyes latched onto his lips. “Admit it.”
“It is not my place to say such a thing.”
My thoughts stilled and soon my heart followed suit. I dropped my hand from his face. “Let go of me,” I said without much passion. Sy immediately released me, looking as if he were about to say something else.
Instead he turned away, long and determined strides carrying him farther and farther away from me.
Chapter 14
Dramabomb
“If you so much as try to put a slipper on my foot right now, so help me—” I growled as Dash tipped my door open for me.
“Why would I do that?” he asked, tossing my shoes onto the bed.
“Nevermind.” I sighed, sinking down onto my bed next to my traitorous shoes. “Well that was an anticlimactic ball.”
“On the contrary, I would say it was very climactic,” Dash said, “though not in the way either of us would have apparently preferred.”
I eyed him. “I was a Drama Bomb tonight, Dash.”
“‘Drama-Bomb’?”
“I like to make up words, okay?”
“I’ve discovered. And what does this one mean?”
I frowned. “It’s a new name for me to account for the explosive amount of drama I cause. I mean— four full days trapped in a tower, three offended watchmen, two accusations of jealousy, and one very theatrical siren. That definitely sounds like—” I made a sound effect and indicated a catastrophic explosion with my hands.
“Well,” Dash said, shutting the door behind him as I sat on the edge of my bed with another sigh, “I had a lovely time. And, I would not be offended if you picked a fight with me so long as we could kiss and make up after.”
I shook my head. “I’m a princess, Dash. You can’t talk to me like that. It’s probably super improper or whatever.”
“You are hardly a traditional version of proper, temptress.”
“I could be a classy-ass princess if I wanted, you know,” I narrowed my eyes. “I might even be a virgin in this world for all any of us know! I mean if like patriarchal standards like that matter to my people. Side note— if patriarchal standards like that matter to my people, getting rid of a bitchy queen is just the beginning of the work ahead for me.”
“You are definitely not a virgin,” Dash grinned.
“How would you know?” I worried, fleetingly, that maybe Dash and I had done it once upon a time, and here I had forgotten like a common frat boy. Which would not exactly be helpful proving my point that I was classy.
The bed sagged under Dash’s weight as he seated himself next to me, our hands millimeters apart as they lay side by side. I thought he might actually take mine this time. He didn’t.
“You don’t look at me like you have virginal intentions, temptress.”
“Well, maybe I just have a lot of built up energy and a very detailed imagination.”
“Maybe you are a siren. That’s alright too, Saylora.”
I rolled my eyes. “People keep telling me this as if I’m not hyperaware of it. Who decided we were going to have a ball anyway?” I asked indignantly.
“Someone who was obviously way too idealistic about what was going to happen,” Dash muttered.
I flung myself back onto the bed, expelling all the air in my lungs. The mural stretched across the ceiling seemed a little too pointedly poetic now as I glared up at it, the eyes of the perfect humans indifferent to their real counterparts as they peered down from the seclusion of their otherworldly garden. I wanted to give them the middle finger, nonchalant as they were hanging up out there, elevated with the stars like some unattainable vision for whatever mankind was supposed to’ve been.
“Give me long enough, Dash, and I’ll take you up on that dark corner,” I said. “It’s tough in this tower with a bunch of hot guys I can’t boss into my pants.” It was supposed to be a joke, but it came out too seriously to be a good one.
“Is that what you did in the dream of Earth?”
“Boss men into my pants?”
Dash nodded.
“Not exactly,” I answered after a moment. “I bossed men around when they deserved it. But I never did it to benefit my own... impulses.”
He laid back on the bed with me and I turned my head to him when he asked, “Why not?”
I frowned, taken aback by the absurdity of such a question. “Because I couldn’t live with myself if I forced myself on someone.”
Dash smiled, satisfied. “It seems you were right about yourself. Classier than most who wield power.”
“Being anti-sexual assault is the minimum requirement for, like, the lowest standard of human decency, Dash. Not exactly something I pat myself on the back for.” Also, I was a murderer. So.
I watched his eyes moved back up to the ceiling. “I hope it’s a relief for you, knowing that when you take me into that dark corner, it will be because I choose to be there with you.”
His crystalline eyes didn’t find mine as he admitted this, and I entertained the idea of pulling him on top of me and asking him to do whatever he wanted to me right then. But I sensed the strain in the heavy implications those eyes suggested, and something deep in me mimicked the tension of that wayward gaze. Just like me, Dash seemed to oscillate between a desire for the tangible expression of this lust and this stilted, unqualified need for self-control. My mind raced forward to the part where the radiance of those blue eyes was extinguished by my siren.
“Why are you lying here with me?” I asked quietly.
“I wasn’t sure if you wanted company after being a drama bomb.”
“Are you sure you aren’t just a masochist, being alone with me all the time?”
“I know I am.”
Don’t do it, Saylor. Don’t tempt yourself. His life isn’t a fair price for your pleasure
.
“You can go,” I said simply, hoping I didn’t sound as defeated as I felt.
Dash nodded and stood, lingering a second by the door. When he turned, he seemed uncertain. He finally said: “I don’t believe you wish this with me now. It’s not that I don’t want to touch you like that… but when I do, temptress, rest assured it will be very difficult for me to stop.”
“You danced with me tonight,” I pointed out.
His smile was almost regretful. “Why do you think I threw you around so much?”
Of course. You are fae-blooded.
Even though every ounce of my body was ready to collapse onto my bed, my mind was hella wired. Turns out discovering you have magical powers— other than, like, bend-men-to-your-will powers— aka cool ones— is basically like five shots of espresso straight to the brain.
I stared at the ghost of the curtains, the panels of gossamer flapping in the breeze. I was more than a little skeptical that I’d gone almost five whole days with none of these so-called “watch”-men of mine telling me that magic coursed through my veins. I mean, considering our circumstances, one would think it was relevant enough to mention.
Then again, maybe they thought that the whole waking inexplicably from a curse thing was a decently sized hint?
I launched forward and fumbled for a match. Now with a little light to work by, I straightened my back and folded my legs criss-cross on the bed.
“Laïntar vé-ah aldaron-nen var-ávanya,” I whispered. I didn’t feel much conviction muttering gibberish, but I recited the words and closed my eyes.
Over and over I repeated the strange language, sounding ridiculous to myself. The words came to me easier with each incantation, and I let the darkness in my mind populate with the first thing that came to it: a circular room that opened out to the night, a circumference of Grecian-looking pillars for windows.
“Var-ávany—”
My eyes opened, the last word catching on my tongue as I gasped. Because holy hell, I wasn’t in my room anymore.
I was sitting on a huge round bed situated right next to the very pillars I’d just envisioned. Glowing orbs dangled from the domed ceiling and shimmering silver waters rolled just beneath the canopy of leaves outside.
What the actual fuck. Times two.
The vision before me quivered, as if it were only roughly calibrated. I was afraid to move— to breathe, even. It all felt so fragile.
A gentle knock sounded from what was now a wall, and the mirage jolted slightly when I jumped. I swallowed, instincts warning me to keep this place hidden. For some reason, I imagined Sy on the other side of the door, come to rectify to our argument. Something in me leapt at the thought of sharing this strange miracle with him.
“Come in,” I said, staring out in awe at what I’d done. Probably, I should apologize to the guy for my outburst. Sigh. I turned to the wall just as the outline of a door emerged.
“Oh, I thought—” I shook the rest of the sentence from my head as the mirage slid from the room. “Never mind, come in, Jabari.”
“Were you expecting another?”
Jabari slipped in and shut the door discretely behind him, eyes surveying the room for the magic which had slid out of sight seconds ago.
“I wasn’t expecting anyone. What’s up?”
He looked up at the ceiling as he said, “Only moments ago I swear there were cherubs.”
My voice was hushed in admittance. “Will you lock the door?”
He did so, and then Jabari approached me with smirk. “You remembered the spell, I see.”
“Okay, like I know that it’s ironic but I actually have a stellar memory.”
“And equally impressive skills with magic, it would seem.”
I cleared my throat, feeling vulnerable. “I didn’t believe you.”
“Why ever not?”
“I think for obvious reasons, Jabari. One,” I pointed at myself. “Two, if I have magic, I’d really like to know how I managed to let us all get so unbelievably doomed.”
“No man is privy to Fate’s hand.”
“Blah, blah, blah,” I agreed. “Still. Getting my ass teleported to a realm I don’t remember was already kind of a big deal, and now I’m supposed to believe that I’m good at magic? Like, come on.”
“Yet the evidence was just before you.”
“That shit was cool, Jabari, but not gunna lie. I’m a little freaked out.”
“Magic is a great gift, wielded by the right individual.”
“Yeah, delusional siren princess. Obvious choice.” I stood abruptly and began pacing, “I mean, why did none of you tell me sooner?”
“There is only one among us who I imagine may have seen your full magical capability.”
“One guess who,” I muttered.
“Manifesting a belief such as what I saw moments ago is no small feat, Saylora. Either you came into possession of your magic long before today, or you are more powerful than I expected.”
“Or both,” I suggested with a smirk. I halted my stride, looking over at Jabari expectantly.
“Quite curious,” he murmured, lost in thought.
I raised a brow. “Oh yeah? Care to share?”
“Curious that, your protectors though we are, none of us have witnessed your practice. If you knew magic before the curse, this omission is intriguing— for it is either a dangerous one or an intentional one.”
“Well that’s a downer.” Secrets, secrets are no fun, when you can’t show off in front of everyone. “So none of you knew, except maybe Sy?” I shook my head.
“Perhaps not even him. He has certainly had more opportunity, having known you longer.”
“Great. You’re basically telling me to interrogate a wall about it.”
Jabari smiled sympathetically. “Sy is not very forthcoming, it is true.”
I scoffed at the biggest understatement of all time. “Maybe I should keep some tight lips on it for now Jabari. Just until I know who we can trust. We still have a snitch, you know.”
“Am I not suspect?”
I laughed. “You’re not the traitor, Jabari.”
He looked at me, clearly amused. “Why do you say this?”
“Because the one useful thing the Reflection said was that the traitor’s voice was like honey. Yours is all deep and gravelly... then again,” I mused, “I guess you’re the only one of the guys who has magic, so who knows what devious tricks are already up your sleeves.”
He smirked. “Come sit. Hold your hands out, palms up.”
“Skipping right over that part, I guess,” I muttered as I plopped back onto the bed.
“The Reflection cannot be spelled. One of the advantages to being an oracle.”
“Oracle? I thought she was just... like me, only trapped in a mirror.”
“She is a soul cleaved from her body. The body is what grounds a creature in time, and all those who exist outside of time are considered oracles, able to see beyond its restraints.”
My eyes grew wide. “That explains a lot.”
“The most important thing I’ve learned in all my years studying magic, Saylora, is that light’s desire to overcome darkness is so profound that it is not beyond using the enemy to its advantage. The light shines even brighter in darkness, yes? The things which the Queen meant for evil, such as those she has done to her sister, or as she is doing to you—”
“Us—”
“These things,” Jabari smiled, “have not made victims of Aiayla, or of us, in the ways that she meant for them to. She has simply given us opportunity to fight harder, and to become stronger.”
“The Reflection told you her name, too?” I asked.
“A name holds much power. It is a great intimacy, its own sort of magic, to call someone by their true name.”
I frowned up at Jabari and wondered if he was also some kind of oracle, but there was definitely a soul behind those viridescent eyes. “Could Aiayla ever be returned to her body?” I asked.
“I do not
know.”
“I woke up,” I pointed out.
“You did.”
“I still don’t know why.”
“Surely you do. There are powers greater than illusion, greater even than death.”
Oh god, it took everything in me to keep from bestowing upon him the most epic eye roll of all time. “If you say anything about The Fairest of Them All or True Love’s First Kiss right now, I will exile you from this kingdom of mine forever.”
Jabari folded his hands over one another and smiled, his dimples showing. “Do you know what you say when you repeat those words I taught you earlier?”
I angled my head at him sarcastically. Of course I didn’t, because I spoke English.
“You ask to believe in that which you imagine. You make a claim on a truth, when you say something as though you believe it.”
“But the wanting and the believing are different.”
“Yes,” Jabari said kindly. “Our want to believe will always be held in tension with our inability to do it well. This is the difficulty of magic.”
I thought back to the chamber which had appeared with my words, wondering how it’d been possible. “Well, I have no idea where that room you walked into came from, cause I’ve never seen it before. I’m here like five minutes and this world is apparently already wearing off on my brain.”
“Magic seeps through the crevices of self, unbound to memory.” Jabari took my hands into his, the gentle tingles which came with his touch barely stirred beneath my skin. “Come, let us imagine something together.”
At his soft muttering of the incantation, the room burst into a explosion of space and we hung suspended among planets, the milky whorls of stardust sweeping around us as light glimmered between the dusting of stars. I whispered the words myself, and a star shot across the sky overhead, burning out fast and bright. Then I imagined Earth, as I’d known it from satellites images: a glittering pale orb of blue and green, swathed in clouds and the golden glitter of light pollution.
“Earth,” I nodded, and Jabari turned, looking over his shoulder at the planet.
“Home?”
“Not anymore, I guess.”