Entwined

by A. J. Rosen

  I had learned about our origin myth back in Hellenic school, so all I needed was to dig deeper into the gods and goddesses. I started with Apollo since he had been the one tasked by Zeus to help the Hellenicus find their soul mates. I tried to find insight into the whole mind-reading thing but nada. After all, the Hellenicus are very secretive and would never allow the Nescient to have easy access to information.

  I was moving the cursor to click on Eros when a high-pitched sound pierced my ears. The noise kept going as I searched for the source.

  “Shiitake mushroom!” The source of the obnoxious sound was on the floor, half-hidden under the couch—my dad’s cell phone. Geez, Zeus! Could he have picked a more annoying ringtone? “Hello?”

  A deep, manly voice shouted back at me. “Hawke! Where are you? We’ve been waiting for more than an hour now! You were the one asking for an emergency meeting, at least have the decency to inform us if you want to call it off!”

  Who?

  I brought the phone closer once I knew for sure that the man had finished yelling. “There is no Hawke here, sir.”

  “Lincoln, is that you?”

  “No, sir, there is no Lincoln either.” I borrowed Domenico’s polite formality and Kris’s patience as I continued, “I think you may have dialed the wrong number.”

  There was a rattle, for which I couldn’t distinguish the cause, and then the sound of a chair being dragged before I heard his voice again. “I am damn sure it’s the right number, missy. Who the hell are you, and how on earth did you get a hold of this phone?”

  “My name is none of your concern, and I know for sure that you dialed the wrong number because this phone belongs to my dad, whose name I won’t disclose either.”

  It was quiet for what felt like a full minute; I thought the man had hung up. I glanced at the screen. The call was still connected. Maybe I should hang up. But before I could do anything, the man said something that led me to believe that he actually knew my dad after all. Or, to be more accurate, me.

  “Shit! It’s the girl!” He went on to spew a bunch of curse words.

  There were more voices in the background, but none that I could understand. Then the call ended. As I put the phone on the table, the cogs in my brain started to turn. Three questions needed to be answered: One, the less important of the three, why had my dad chosen an ear-shattering sound as his ringtone? Two, what in Poseidon’s name was that call about? Three, who the heck were Hawke and Lincoln?

  After the disturbing phone call it was difficult to go back to focusing on what was proving to be fruitless research. Still, I aimlessly clicked on a number of Nescient websites about Greek mythology that led nowhere in terms of finding any answers. As the laptop battery drained, so did my energy, depleting to zero.

  Then a typo in an ad at the bottom of one of the Nescient web pages caught my attention. The ad read:

  Click here to get high-speed internet at a faction of the cost!

  It should have said fraction, but instead said faction. Was this another cruel joke of the gods, taunting me with the fact that I was never going to find any of the answers I needed?

  But right next to that ad was another one; one that sparked a memory:

  Want to know more about your family history? Check out our internet archive with over ten million records.

  Archive! During my odd encounter in the jail, the woman had mentioned something about taking a file from the archives. Maybe that was where we should be looking.

  I reached for my phone to call Adrian.

  “I told you, Montgomery, I couldn’t find Caitlin’s card.”

  “Have you ever heard of the archives?” I blurted.

  His voice changed from slightly impatient to now slightly confused. “What’s that?”

  Aware that I couldn’t tell him about the woman from jail, I simply offered, “Oh, I thought maybe the Court would have a place to keep their important files or something. Like an archive maybe?”

  “I’m sure they do. But why would I know anything about that?”

  “I don’t know. I thought it was worth asking just in case.”

  “Admit it. You just wanted an excuse to hear my voice.”

  I didn’t have time for Adrian’s antics. “Good-bye, Adrian.” I abruptly ended our call.

  What I needed was a long, luxurious bath with expensive bath salts and lots of bubbles.

  There was something relaxing about sitting in the hot, bubbly water while listening to my favorite playlist on my phone. The crick in the back of my neck loosened as I stretched and let my eyes rest, listening to Jimin’s soulful voice singing in the background. The last song in my playlist came to an end, and there was peaceful silence afterward. My eyes fluttered open at the same time as my hands broke the water’s surface. Pruney fingers made me realize how long I had been in the water. I grabbed the side of the bathtub and pulled myself up. I stood naked, scanning the room for my towel.

  “Fu—” I caught myself before the swear word came out and quickly corrected myself. “Fruit salad!” Damn. It was hard to reform my drunken-sailor mouth sometimes.

  I stepped outside of the bathroom to get a towel. The bedroom was quiet. Hell, the entire unit was dead. I moved around the bedroom, dripping water everywhere, until I found a clean towel in a drawer, pulled it out, and wrapped it around my body. Just then, I heard a soft click from the front door.

  Who was that? Maybe it was Kris. Perhaps she had forgotten something from her earlier visit.

  “Kris?” I called out. “Kris, are you there?” No reply. I called out again and waited. Still there was no reply. Just when I was about to head back to the bathroom, the bedroom door swung open and revealed the object of my distress: Vladimir.

  “Avy! Are you all right?” he blurted, surprising me with the slight note of panic in his voice.

  Our eyes met. He scratched the back of his neck, causing some of his dark locks to jut out. His lips parted as if he was about to say something, but he clamped them shut and hung his head. This was not a dream! I scurried back into the bathroom, and behind the closed door, I frantically pulled on my dark-grey hoodie and sweatpants. I was so nervous that I almost inserted my head into the hole meant for my arm.

  My hair was still wet, so I wrapped the towel around my head, twisted it, and tucked it in at the back. I tossed my dirty clothes into the laundry basket in the corner then headed to the living room.

  Vlad was sitting on the couch, eyes focused on the newspaper. I plopped myself down on the couch across from him. “Um, hi?”

  “Hey,” he answered without looking up.

  The long moment of disconcerting silence that passed made me wish I had something to read too. “Why are you here?”

  He did not answer immediately, but when he did, I was shocked by what he had say. “I just got back from work—a trial actually. Kris asked me to come here and accompany you to dinner since she’s eating with Domenico’s mom.”

  I was surprised for two reasons: one, the realization that my best friend had no subtlety now that she knew that I felt something for Vlad, and two, the fact that he had actually followed her request.

  Ah, you’re nervous around him, aren’t you? said a traitorous voice inside my head, and I ordered it to shut up. It didn’t. Admit it, you like him being here.

  “Are you ready?” he asked, followed by the crinkling sound of the newspaper flipping to the next page.

  “For dinner? I ate a while ago.”

  He looked up from the newspaper and I caught a faint redness on his cheeks. “Check the time. It has been hours since you had your last meal.”

  “I suppose you’re right,” I said after consulting the clock. “Do you have anything in mind? I feel like I have tried nearly all the food at Court already.” I paused, noticing that my dad’s phone, which I had placed on the table, was gone.

  Had he c
ome back home while I was in the bath?

  Vlad folded the newspaper and put it neatly on the table as he stood. His dark-green eyes twinkled in a way that made my breath hitch as he said, “I might. Grab your coat. Let’s have a good dinner.”

  Surprisingly, the place he had in mind was outside the Court, so we would be driving. I stood frozen, staring at his car. Both Bryan and Carlo had died in car accidents, and I was wary of getting into the vehicle.

  “You okay?” Vlad’s voice broke through my thoughts as he opened the passenger-side door for me.

  “Yeah. Fine, thanks.”

  “Get in, it’ll be breakfast by the time we get there at this rate,” Vlad teased.

  “Oh, shut up.” I pushed aside my hesitations and stepped into the car.

  I didn’t think that coming and going from the Court during the Gathering was possible—this whole place was heavily guarded, and the Court Guards didn’t just open the gate on command to let people in and out as they pleased. But apparently I was wrong. Vlad handed one of the guards a letter and they let us out, no questions asked. “Whoa, how did you do that?”

  “I have my ways.”

  Vlad handled the road better than anyone I knew. It made me feel less nervous about being in a car. Without speaking, we stared at the road as a classic tune filled the car. The low, throaty growl of the engine hummed in the background. I could only contain my curiosity for another twenty minutes before it got the better of me.

  “Where are we going?” It was dark outside and I couldn’t make out where we were. Not that I would be able to if it was broad daylight, either, considering this was my first time being here and I always had trouble with directions. Ferdinand Magellan could come back to life and teach me about circumnavigation and I would still get lost. I was that bad.

  “It’s a secret.” He quickly looked back at the road.

  “Oh come on!”

  Something fluttered in my stomach, but I was completely sure it wasn’t butterflies. A loud growl erupted from the depths of my belly and I wished I could crawl under the seat and disappear.

  “Don’t worry, we’re almost there.” As if my stomach had listened to him, it stopped embarrassing me further.

  The road passed by outside the window. Hawke and Lincoln. Who were these people? Then there was the Faction, which Carlo and that woman in jail had mentioned.

  “What’s wrong?” Vlad’s thumb reached out for the volume button on his steering wheel and turned the song down.

  Not knowing how to answer, I remained quiet. Oddly, even in silence, I did not feel any awkwardness in the air.

  Things were definitely changing. I had always considered him as a jerk, but lately I had seen a different side of him—a side that made me reconsider my earlier thought about him. I had thought he was selfish but he wasn’t; he actually cared about other people, not just himself. He cared about me, and he cared about Adrian. He even cared about Althea, Adrian’s maid, from what I had seen the other day.

  I made the mistake of turning my head slightly to the right and risking my eyes meeting his. His moss-green eyes, wise and warm, and undeniably perceptive, were focused on mine. For one split second I had a bizarre thought that he somehow knew everything about me—every little bit. Things that not even Kris knew about me. That moment back in Verona Ti Amo, he knew I was trying not to have a breakdown and he swiftly changed the conversation. It seemed, in that moment, that he, more than anyone else in the world, truly knew me. Inside and out. No matter how many walls I had built to prevent that from happening.

  It was thrilling.

  But more than that, it was terrifying. So I did what I always did best: totally avoid the situation and talk about something entirely unrelated. “Do you know anyone named Hawke and Lincoln?”

  “No,” he replied. The good thing about Vlad was, unlike Adrian, he never asked why. He knew that if I wanted him to know more, I would tell him.

  We had arrived at our destination and Vlad parallel parked with ease, turning off the engine as he undid his seat belt. With one hand on top of the steering wheel, he shifted to face me.

  “What about the Faction?” I was desperate to find out anything. Because otherwise, today had been completely unproductive, and I was no closer to my end goal. And with my birthday looming time wasn’t exactly on my side. He knew something, and from the expression on his face, I could tell that he was debating with himself whether to share this information with me or not.

  I wasn’t sure what came over me, but I placed my hand on top of his on the steering wheel. “What is it?”

  Whether it was my touch or his own decision that changed his mind, I didn’t know, but whatever it was, he unclasped his lips to say, “It’s just, this afternoon I was tidying up Dad’s desk—I’ve been using it to work. Anyway, earlier today, my parents were at another Council meeting, and he’d left a bunch of papers all over his desk. The word Faction was in bold, capital letters on one of his Council files.”

  “Did you read anything more?” I asked.

  “No,” he said, looking surprised that I would even think that he would pry like that. “But I did ask Dad about it.”

  “And? What did he say?”

  “He said it’s something to do with the Great Massacre and how it ruined the unity of our people. People taking sides, and the Faction was proof of that. He didn’t explain further.”

  The silence returned. I was trying to remember everything I knew about the Great Massacre and how that could connect to what the woman in jail had said, when Vlad finally said, “Let’s go.” Acting like a gentleman, he walked to my side of the car to open the door for me, but I had already gotten out and closed it by the time he reached me.

  The restaurant was called No. 5. An interesting choice of name. Maybe it was the property’s address, but something told me it had a deeper meaning.

  “Vlad!” The restauranteur greeted him with a warm hug. “It’s been a while. We’ve missed you around here.”

  Vlad blushed slightly, somehow looking younger than usual. “I’m sorry, Lilly. I’ve been busy.”

  “Well, at least you’re here now.” Her gaze traveled to his left and locked on mine. “Is this your girlfriend?” she asked with a smile. “It’s about time you brought a girl here, Vovochka.” Turning to face me, she extended one hand. “Hello, dear.”

  “Hi.” I greeted her and shook her hand. “I’m Avery.” Once she let go of my hand, I pointed my finger at Vlad and me in a back-and-forth motion. “We’re not dating.”

  The lady raised her brows as if asking, Are you sure. “Oh?”

  “I’m his little sister’s best friend.”

  “Oh, that’s interesting,” Lilly quipped. “No matter, dear. Come, sit down.”

  Soon Vlad and I found ourselves sitting face to face at a table in the corner of the restaurant. There was a baby grand piano at the front of the room, next to a medium-sized Christmas tree. Mistletoe hung from the top of the ceiling, right in the middle of the room. The whole place was clean and something about it made me feel like I was at home, despite it looking nothing like our house, which looked more like a bland corporate office, all cold glass and stainless steel and nothing like this place, with its warm wood and colors.

  Since I had no clue what was good here, I let Vlad order the food for me. A moment later, Vlad stood with the menu and walked to the counter to let Lilly know our order. When he came back and was seated in his chair, I quickly asked, “Why did she call you Vovochka?”

  For a second he looked slightly embarrassed, almost sheepish. “It is one of the diminutives for Vladimir. Lilly loves to use it, especially since it’s closely associated with a long-running series of jokes featuring a naughty schoolboy.”

  I laughed. “Now that you mention it, I’ve always wondered why your name is Vladimir. Aren’t you Greek?” He nodded. “Isn’t Vladimir a Russian name
?”

  Lilly came back with a young boy who was carrying a tray. “I’m sorry. I interrupted something, didn’t I?”

  I felt the heat of a blush on my cheek as I heard the tone she’d used and the way her eyes sparkled as if she knew she was intruding on a special moment.

  “No, you didn’t. Don’t get any ideas, Lilly.” Vlad turned his attention to the boy. “Do you need a hand with that, Jake?”

  “Nope,” Jake said. “I’m good, thanks.”

  They served our drinks, and I thanked them before they left us on our own again.

  “Why? Does my name not suit me?” Vlad asked.

  “I did not say that.”

  “Most of us Hellenicus are doomed to have weird names, whether it’s our first name or our middle name. The names our parents choose are supposed to represent a blessing or a hope.” He shifted in his seat. “Actually, I was named after my great-great-great-grandfather. I don’t think they cared whether the name sounded Greek or not, as long as it had a good meaning. But I think Kris lucked out while I got the short end of the stick.”

  “I’d have to agree there,” I said. “But tell me, what’s the meaning behind Vladimir?”

  “Vladimir is formed from two words: vladeti, which means rule, combined with miru, which means peace or world. The name literally means one who rules the world.”

  “That’s pretty cool.”

  “Every name has a meaning,” he said.

  “Oh yeah? Then what’s mine?”

  “Your name, Avery, is derived from the old French name Alfred,” he explained, stroking his chin with his thumb and forefinger. “Alfred breaks down into the Old English words of aelf, which means elf, and raed, which means counsel. Avery means ruler of the elves.”

  “What the flying pigeon!” I shouted. “I’m going to strangle my parents.”

  “It’s not that bad.” He laughed

  “My middle name is Zosime, in case you didn’t know.”

  “I know.” One corner of his lips tugged slightly upward. “Your parents chose your middle name to represent their hope for you. I think you’re just as lucky as Kris.”