by Rue Volley
I had no choice but to follow her.
So the three of us headed out across the field, looking for what… I had no clue. All I was sure of is the fact that I was on the hunt and I had every intention of helping Sam find whatever we need to make this dress. We flashed through the forest at breaking speed, following colors swirling all around us. Suddenly, we broke out of the trees and I slowed down as I watched Sam crouch down and peek over this long line of bushes. I stopped, leaning down next to her, and she smiled at me and pointed forward. My heart was pounding in my chest… I wanted to make her happy, I really did. This was such a monumental thing for us all.
She stood up and held her hand out to me. I crinkled my eyebrows and took her hand as she pulled me up. I looked out and we were at the edge of a town. I looked at her and shrugged my shoulders.
“I’m confused,” I said to her.
“Let’s go,” she said.
She pulled me along with her and we started to walk along a sidewalk, shops lining both sides. I bit my lip and hoped that we did not wear human for these things. She suddenly stopped and I looked up at a storefront that read “Unusual Fabrics”. I shook my head at her and she pulled me in with her. We stopped and looked around the shop at hundreds of rolls of fabrics and skins. I laughed as I covered my mouth. She nudged my shoulder and winked at me.
“The look on your face was priceless when I said we were gonna go kill something,” she said.
I rolled my eyes at her.
“You are a bigger turd than my brother,” I said.
Lily skipped over to a table and started to run her fingers along all the rolls and I watched Sam take the other side. I looked straight ahead at stairs leading to a second floor. For some reason I was pulled in that direction, so I walked to the stairs and started to climb up. I took the last step and watched color swirl above me. I didn’t know what was up there, but I would assume that it was skins as opposed to fabric.
I looked along the walls until I spotted it, the source of the color swirling, and stopped in front of the long roll on the wall. I reached out to it and ran my fingers along it and it sang to me. It was a beautiful blue, more beautiful than anything I had ever seen before. My fingertips vibrated as I ran my hand across the fabric and I closed my eyes to hear the sweet sound of a violin well up in my ears. I opened my eyes and decided to try to pull the roll out and struggled with it a little. I heard a throat clear behind me and young girl stood there with her arms crossed on her chest.
“Would you like any help?” she asked me.
I grinned and nodded my head to her.
“Yes, please. I want to see this one,” I said.
She stepped up to me and we both pulled the roll out and it thudded to the floor. I looked down at the fabric and it rolled in color to me. I knew that the girl could not see it, but I could. I ran my hand across the fabric and it rolled in blue and white.
I smiled and looked up at her.
“This is perfect,” I said to her. She smiled.
“Well, it should be… it is made of organic material. I know that it took weeks to weave it together. It comes from the Iceland, mountainous region… some plant that exists there. Some believe it has magical power.”
I smiled as I continued to touch it.
She leaned over me and grinned.
“I don’t believe in all that, but it sounds neat, huh?” she asked me.
I nodded and Sam and Lily came up the stairs and spotted me.
Sam walked up and knelt down as she touched the fabric too.
“There you are,” she said to it, like she knew what it was.
I smiled and she started to lift it onto the large table in the middle. Lily grabbed the other end of the roll and they both gently laid it down on the table. The girl stared at them and grinned.
“You girls are strong,” she said.
Sam placed her hands on her hips and grinned.
“Work out,” she said.
The girl smiled and started to pull some of the fabric out to measure.
Sam held up her hand to her.
“There is no need to cut it. We will take the whole thing,” she said.
“The whole roll?” the girl said, obviously shocked.
“Yes,” Sam replied.
“Okay then,” the girl said as she called out to another employee.
A boy ran up the stairs and looked at the three of us.
The girl smiled at him and looked at the roll.
“These girls are buying the whole roll.”
Sam looked at her.
“Everything you have in this. Is there more?” she asked.
The girl raised her eyebrows.
“We have ten rolls. Can’t even tell you how many outfits you could make with that much… I guess enough for an army,” she said.
“We will take it all,” Sam said to her as she pulled out a black credit card and the girl took it from her hand.
“Let me price it for you.”
Sam smiled and touched the fabric.
“Price is nothing; just have it delivered today,” she said.
The girl bounded down the stairs, dealing with the biggest sale of her entire life.
I smiled at Sam and ran my hand along the fabric.
“I thought that we were going to hunt down and kill something,” I said as I laughed.
“Well, you did, right?” she said as she smiled at me.
“Now, we have a dress to make,” Sam said.
I took my fingers from the fabric and looked at her.
“We?” I said.
“Yes, it is customary that you help make it. Let me get my card from that girl before she rings me up for this entire place.”
I laughed. “I thought price was no problem,” I said.
“Oh, it isn’t. I just need the card… We have more to buy,” Sam said.
I looked at her and Lily and then Lily smiled at me. Her teeth looked normal and I leaned in.
“Your teeth look so pretty, Lily,” I said.
Lily shrugged her shoulders.
“I don’t need them to be so sharp now; apples put up less of a struggle,” she said.
I laughed and we walked down the stairs after Sam.
I stopped as I looked at all the fabric and my heart had a pain go through it. I promised that I would push the thought of Josh and his injury out of my mind, but there it was… creeping up on me again. Sam touched my arm and I looked at her.
“Stop,” she whispered.
I grinned and sighed. Well… I tried to grin. This should have be a happy moment, the best moment in my life… but it wasn’t. Eventually I would have to deal with the reality.
We left the shop with a lot of weight added to Sam’s card. She held the receipt in her hand and stared at it. I tried to peek but she folded it up in her hand and placed it in her pocket.
“Sam… you so did not have to do that,” I said to her.
“Are you kidding me? I am so gonna make Josh get me the best birthday present ever,” she said as she looked down the street and spotted the flower shop.
“Oh, look… destination number two.” She said.
We started to walk towards the flower shop and I looked up at the sky. It was the most beautiful day, it really was. I couldn’t think of a time when the sky had ever looked prettier or the clouds more interesting. Made me want to lie on my back and pick out the shapes. Maybe later, maybe with Josh at my side… if I could control myself and not jump on him. I smiled and then the smell of the flower shop hit me like a wave. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I stood there letting it fill me with the most peaceful feeling ever.
I felt a hand in mine and opened my eyes to see Lily grinning at me.
“Come,” she said.
I let her pull me towards the flower shop and we stepped into heaven. At least it is heaven to me. I looked down the rows of flowers and then spotted the atrium, jetting up from the back. I ‘oh’d’ and ran towards it, just knowing that it would be a sensory overload for me
there. I pushed through the glass doors and stepped into a beautiful garden of everything. It was like a whole other world. The smell was amazing, and the life was overwhelming in here.
I looked up at the glass skylight and closed my eyes as a memory floated into my mind. I almost expected to turn around and see Josh standing there, as he had in the atrium at the asylum. I turned and Lily stood there smiling and looking at the skylight too.
“Pretty,” she whispered.
I had to grin at that. I mean not long ago this was a girl who wanted to eat me… and Josh, no problem. Now I was standing there in a sea of greenery and flowers and she was just as happy as me. Weird how things changed.
I heard Sam call out and I ran to her, around the fountain in the middle, and saw her leaning down touching something. I leaned over her and smiled. It was a white lily. I looked back at Lily and smiled.
“Look, Lily… meet Lily,” I said, joking of course.
She stepped up and looked down at it and grinned.
“Hi Lily,” she whispered.
I heard a small whispering to the right and looked over in that direction. I started to walk towards the small voice and didn’t even look back as Sam said that my joke was goofy. I knew that it was. I was trying to be in a good mood.
I stepped up the edge of the flower garden and looked out across the flowers. They seemed to be talking to me, in a language that was familiar, but so distant to my ears. I leaned over, and then I felt a hand on my shoulder and I got pulled back. I looked to see Sam staring at the flowers.
“Are they singing to you?” she asked me.
I nodded to her. I had no idea that she knew… I don’t know why she would. I never told anyone. Sam waved her hand and a green color came from her palm, misting onto the flowers. They all trembled a bit and then the chatter in my head stopped. She looked at me and smiled.
“There we go,” she said.
I looked at her completely confused.
“What did you do?” I asked her.
“These are, well… what you would call sirens. They contain energy from creatures that have been bound to them. You can hear them… most cannot. This is always a treacherous thing to deal with,” she said to me.
I crinkled my eyebrows at her.
“Why?” I asked her.
“You already had a run in with one of them when you were a child… You trapped her,” Sam said.
“I don’t remember,” I said.
Sam smiled at me and pulled me along with her as I peeked back at the flowers.
I swear I saw them moving and I turned my head.
“There are many things that you don’t remember, I would guess. Theo has been piecing together your childhood with the book that you wrote.”
“OMG… I totally forgot about the book!” I said to her.
“You know what?” Sam said as she turned to me and placed her hands on my face.
“This is so not the time… We need a lot of flowers… Start picking them out, any but those,” she said as she pointed to the right.
“Sam… those are the same flowers in Valon,” I said to her.
“What?” she asked me.
“The same ones, they whispered to me there too,” I said to her.
Sam looked at the flowers and grinned. “Well, that is interesting,” she said and left it at that. She placed me in front of a field of flowers and pointed.
“Whatever you want, okay?” she said to me.
“Uh huh,” I said, as I kept peeking at the flowers to the right.
I stood there thinking about the whispers on the wind, and about the book she referred to. I remember bits and pieces, but as I stood there and stared at the flowers in rows suddenly something hit me… a different memory, one that took my breath away. I wrote more than one book. I wrote five. The first one was too early to remember clearly, but the one after that hit me like a brick. I ‘oh’d’ so loud it echoed in the atrium. My heart started to beat really hard in my chest, like a drum… preparing for battle.
I turned and ran to Sam and grabbed her arms. She stared at me like I was freakin crazy, because at that moment I bet I looked like I was. She tilted her head at me and I shook mine and started to ramble like a drunk.
“I have to go… I have to go home now,” I said.
She grabbed my arms and stared at me.
“What is wrong?” she asked me.
“Omg… Nothing… nothing is wrong… Everything is right!” I yelled at her.
She looked at Lily and Lily shrugged her shoulders at her and held out her hands.
“Listen… if you are getting nervous about doing this with my brother, I can totally understand… He is a pain in the ass; I admit that,” she said.
“No… oh god, no. Sam, listen to me. I wrote more books. I wrote this!” I said as I looked around the atrium.
“I wrote everything that has happened so far!” I yelled to her.
She shook her head.
“Are you sure that you are not having a meltdown?” she said to me.
“Sam… please, help me get home… I have to get to the tree house. There is a secret compartment in it… with my books,” I said.
“You are serious?” she asked me.
“More serious than I have ever been… Please, please help me get there,” I said.
“Wait, wait. If you wrote them, then you should remember what you wrote,” she said.
I shook my head.
“No… I just know right now… not what will happen, but I wrote it down. I know I did,” I said to her.
“Oh my god,” she whispered to me.
I hugged her and then pointed to Lily.
“Lily, go and let them all know where we are going. Tell them that we will be back as soon as possible, okay?” I said.
Lily nodded and ran from the atrium.
I looked at Sam and smiled.
“Okay, let’s do this, Rue,” she said to me.
I grabbed her hand and we ran out of the atrium and broke through the front doors as the girl behind the counter lifted her hand and I waved to her.
“We will so be back… I saw a lot of flowers that I want to get,” I yelled out to her.
Sam and I ran to the edge of the forest and then we started to flash through the trees, faster than I ever thought I could run.
***
Sophia stood at the end of the bed staring at Clytie in Rue’s form. She smiled as she heard the door open and she glanced back at Caine as he stepped into the room, decked out in his white leather gear with the creator’s tree embossed on his chest. He closed the door behind him and looked at her and then looked at Rue on the bed.
“She seems to be injured,” he said to Sophia.
“No, I have healed her. She rests… as she should,” Sophia said.
“Her energy feels weakened.” Caine said.
Sophia looked at him and grinned.
“She put up quite the fight. As I told you, we lost many to bring her here to you.”
Caine stepped to the bedside and looked at her.
“And what of her companions, her brother and Joshua’s siblings?”
Sophia sighed.
“All perished, honorably I may add. They fought bravely to stop us, but we were too many,” Sophia said.
“Well, may they rest now,” Caine said.
Sophia looked at him and tilted her head.
“Is that compassion I hear in my Lord’s voice?” she asked him.
Caine looked at her and shook his head.
“No. I simply respect a warrior, that is all,” he said.
“Good, there is no room for weakness here,” Sophia said as she looked back at Clytie. “She is quite the trophy for you, seeing that she is one of a kind.”
Caine sat down on the bed and touched Clytie’s hair. He stared at her face and grinned.
“Yes, she is a remarkable creature,” Caine said.
Sophia stepped to the window and looked out at all the flowing banners on the buildings,
indicating a celebration of the new Lord’s return from Trial. She watched the clouds in the sky and spoke.
“I do realize that I was not what I could have been to you. A mother to a son. I assure you that my hope for you led me every step of the way,” Sophia said.
“Why, Sophia, is that compassion I hear in your voice?” Caine asked her.
Sophia looked at him and waved her hand.
“Of course not. I simply want you to know that I would have done everything exactly the same… to ensure that you ended up here,” she said to him.
“You mean that you ended up here. You know that the mother of a Lord is revered above all others. You have just solidified your standing in Valon forever,” he replied sarcastically.
“There is that tone again. Of what do you want from me...? An apology...? For I have nothing to answer to.”
Caine stood up and looked at her.
“You owe me nothing; your gift will suffice,” he said.
“That is acceptable,” Sophia said as she walked towards the door.
She turned back to him.
“You will be able to wake her at any moment. She is strong enough now,” Sophia said.
Caine looked down at her and smiled.
“Then I shall… I want my mate by my side at the ceremony,” he said.
Sophia nodded and stepped out of the room.
Caine looked down at Rue and smiled.
“It is time, my love,” he whispered.
He placed his hands out over her and a light started to form in between his palms. Light started to spark in the room all around them. He concentrated on her, and let the light pass from him and into her body. Clytie’s body arched on the bed and she rose up as if she was under water, her limbs moving slowly and her hair flowing around her head. She suddenly took a deep breath and opened her eyes. She slowly turned her head towards Caine and stared at him… not knowing if this was the beginning of death or if he was giving her life.
He opened his mouth and a black color inched from it towards her. Her eyes became wider as the black inched its way around her, pulling her arms and legs to her, wrapping her like a snake. It rolled around her until it faced her and she cried out as it rushed into her body through her mouth. She twitched and shook and then suddenly dropped to the bed with a little black color tracing from her mouth. She slowly blinked and the room came into focus for her. She turned her head as Caine placed his hand on her face and stared into her eyes.