The Grove

by J. R. King

  Aria swallowed thickly. This hadn’t been the conversation she’d been expecting when she’d shown up. “Not all of us support the Collective’s actions,” she said. She glanced quickly towards her father. “I think what happened to your people is terrible. And I understand some, if not most, of what you’ve had to endure.”

  “Don’t flatter yourself. You understand nothing. Not about me, or my people, or my plight. You? You’re a wealthy, well respected witch, perfectly settled in your community. I am a freak, even by freaks’ standards. An outcast among outsiders. Don’t pretend to understand what that feels like.”

  “Listen to her,” Richard said. “She understands more than you know.” He felt Aria look at him as though for permission. “This is not the time for that though. It’s my hope that we can come to an amicable resolution here. Like it or not, we will be working together. And you’re going to have to trust us at some point.”

  “I’m willing to help,” Ariahna said. “You have my word. I’ll do whatever I can to assist you. And even if I haven’t earned your trust yet, I’m confident in saying you have mine.”

  The sofa screeched back an inch as Kaleb stood. He came to lean over her armchair menacingly, gripping the armrests and blocking her in. “Trust me if you want. That’s your error in judgment, your mistake, not mine. I have no sympathy for you. I could kill you now and I wouldn’t bat an eye.”

  “You could try,” Aria said. “But I don’t suggest it.”

  Richard sighed at his antics. “Please, stop trying to frighten my daughter. She’s seen far scarier things than you in her life. It’s pointless, I assure you. And if you do harm her, you’ll have worse things to fear than the wrath of the Collective.” Richard watched as Kaleb moved from where he’d been looming to linger nearer to the door. “You can both leave if you’d like, but take the night to get comfortable with the idea.”

  “Fine,” Kaleb said. “I’m going back to my room.”

  Richard nodded in acceptance. “That’s fine. I’ll be in touch. Thank you for cooperating.”

  Kaleb scowled as he left. “Don’t thank me yet.”

  The door closed with a surprising amount of care, and Ariahna rose immediately from her seat. Richard looked as though he had prepared for this moment, standing tall and regarding her without any sign as to his true thoughts on the matter.

  “You wanted me to meet him, that very first day,” she said. “You knew exactly who and what he was then, and you sent me to intersect him. Why? What are you getting out of this?”

  “I was ordered to take care of it, and that’s what I’m doing.”

  “No,” she said. “I think you’ve kept enough from me.”

  Richard exhaled. “What is it that you’re referring to?”

  “…Why did you tell me to stay away from Rome?”

  Richard moved towards the kitchen, procuring a bottle of wine from the rack. “I assume you know the answer, or you wouldn’t be asking,” he said.

  Nostalgia was written on his features, his gentleness startling her more than any manner of outburst could have.

  “I want to hear it from you,” she said.

  “Very well…” He moved back into the living area, coming to stand beside the fireplace. Richard rested an elbow against the mantle, staring into the hearth as he spoke. “There are times we try to prove ourselves right even when the whole world is hell bent on proving us wrong. That’s the thing about terrible mistakes; you generally don’t know you’re making one until it’s already too late.” He gazed at her, masking some strange emotion lingering inside the lines of his eyes. “Donna was someone I never truly deserved. I knew that the moment I met her. She was kind where I could be cruel, forgiving where I was known to be stubborn. Logically, we shouldn’t have been a match.”

  “How did you meet?” Aria asked.

  “Back then, there was a small orchestra at the school in lieu of the music group. I practiced the violin religiously, and she ended up replacing our pianist after he graduated. I think the first time we spoke was before she joined us though. I caught her in the music room, playing when nobody else was around. She was breathtaking…”

  Ariahna had never heard such softness in her father’s voice before. “Did you love her?” she asked.

  “Not enough.” He moved away from the fireplace, feeling the warmth leave his body. “If you care about him, you should consider what’s in his best interest, as well as yours.”

  “What I want is to break the curse,” she said.

  Richard shook his head. “You shouldn’t worry yourself with it. We won’t be around long enough for it to matter.”

  Her eyebrows pinched together in confusion. “What does that mean?” she said.

  “It means it’s late, and you should get some rest.”

  Ariahna wasn’t about to mistake his words for anything other than what they truly were: an order, and the designated end to their conversation. If her father wasn’t going to help her then they had nothing more to discuss. She left the apartment without a word.

  ***

  Rome sat on his bed, hunched over a textbook and losing all semblance of sanity. His studies had grown increasingly more difficult, and without Ariahna to help him decipher his lessons, he wasn’t honestly making much headway. A knock came at his door and he slid off the comforter, happy for the distraction. Aria smiled back at him from the hall. “Hey,” he said. “I was just thinking about you.”

  She exhaled in a burdened way. “Can I come in?”

  “What’s wrong?”

  The door closed at her back and Aria turned to him worriedly. There was a lot to be said, but she started with the first concern that had settled in her mind and stayed. “I wanted to ask you about Kaleb,” she said. “How much do you really know about him?”

  Rome leaned against the wall, his palms pressed behind the small of his back. “Did something happen?”

  “I just had a very interesting conversation…”

  “So you know then,” he said. “Who he is.”

  “I know that it’s probably not a good idea for the two of you to associate. Which makes me wonder now why you’ve chosen to befriend him. You do know what kind of danger he poses, don’t you?”

  “We’re both aware of the risks,” Rome said.

  Aria frowned at him scrutinizingly. “I’m not sure you are.” She shook her head softly. “I just can’t believe the Collective is really trying something so reckless. Having a vampire at the school… There are so many ways that this could go wrong. The least not of which is that you might end up badly hurt.” She stared at Rome seriously. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me.”

  “It wasn’t my secret to tell.” Rome let his arms hang loosely at his sides, watching her from the short distance that separated them. “You of all people should understand.”

  “That’s different,” Aria said. “I would never hurt anyone. I would never hurt you. Can he make you the same guarantee?”

  “It was my decision.”

  Ariahna nodded quietly. “All I’m saying is I’m concerned, and that I wish you would have told me. How can you be sure he won’t just take your trust and abuse it?”

  “He’s guarded, but he’s not dangerous.”

  “Are you sure about that?” she said.

  Rome sighed. “I’m sorry I had to keep secrets from you. But Kaleb is my friend, and I do trust him. What he does with that trust is entirely up to him. I’m not going to judge someone based on things beyond their control, though. That’s not who I am.”

  “I understand,” Ariahna said. “And I respect your choice. But that doesn’t mean I’m not going to worry.” She turned away, settling against the edge of the desk in thought. “That wasn’t all I came to talk to you about.”

  Ariahna watched as Rome moved towards her. He brushed a palm down the length of her arm, caressing her softly in reply. She threaded their fingers together, joined hands now dangling on either side of their bodies. They locked eyes and Rome l
eaned in close, kissing her delicately. He slipped his hands away, letting them come to rest along the curve of her jaw.

  “I don’t want you to worry,” he said. He watched Ariahna smile, pulling him back into the slant of her lips. He felt her clutching at the fabric of his shirt a moment later, pulling him even closer. They were already flush, and yet it was as if she knew that it still didn’t feel close enough. “I love you…”

  The door to the room beside theirs slammed, and Aria watched his features distort in guilt. She stepped away, trying to let go of the moment. “There’s something I need to tell you,” she said. “I know where the wand is.” Rome turned to look at her, but Aria could barely meet his eyes. “I spoke to my father tonight. I asked him about the curse.”

  He felt his mouth go dry. “What did he say?”

  “The same thing he told me before: to stay away from you.”

  “So nothing’s changed.”

  “No, something’s definitely changed. I may have just thrown us under a bus.” She looked at him seriously. “We need to get that wand, before he does something with it.”

  “You actually know where he keeps it?” Rome asked.

  “Kind of. I know it’s somewhere at the house at least, but I haven’t seen it since I was little.”

  “Okay. The house can only be so big, right?”

  Ariahna gave him a sheepish look. “Why don’t we just go take a look around,” she said. “No one should be home now.” She held out her hand, watching as his fingers slipped between hers. “Is it safe to assume that you’ve never blinked before?”

  “Actually…”

  “This shouldn’t be too bad then,” she said. She could see his trepidation. “Don’t worry. I know what I’m doing.”

  Rome grimaced. “Last time I almost lost my lunch.”

  “Well this time you’re with me.”

  He sucked in a breath, feeling that spine-tingling sensation racing across his skin. It wasn’t as sharp this time, or nearly as disorienting. Still, he could tell they were moving across a greater distance than before, and it took him a minute to realize they were standing in a foyer already. Rome shook his head, swallowing back the queasiness surfacing in his throat.

  “Are you alright?” she asked.

  He nodded. “I’ll be fine.”

  They tread quietly through an elegant sitting room and down a generous hallway, Rome following her vibrant red curls around the shadowed corners of the house. Dark hardwood shone under their feet, decorated for the most part by fine, plush rugs. Wood paneling done in that same dark brown rose halfway up the walls, where it met with the dull, taupe colored paint. Artwork hung here and there helped to fill the vastness, but did little to make the house warm or inviting.

  “Where do you think it could be?” he said.

  “Shhh.”

  “I thought you said no one was home?”

  She stopped then, signaling that he should wait.

  Rome watched her tiptoe towards an open doorway and peer around the edge of the frame. He leaned away from the wall to try and get a look at what she was seeing. A woman in her late thirties sat on a padded bench in front of an aged window. Her legs were curled up beside her, head resting against the wall nearest the glass. Gentle moonlight flowed into the room, illuminating her red hair and brightening the features of her face. She was gazing out at a garden, admiring the flowers with a distant indifference in her eyes.

  Ariahna snagged Rome’s hand and pulled him past, ducking into another room. She pressed her palm over his mouth as the floor creaked just outside the closed door. The hall quieted, and she looked at him with concern. “Are you crying?” She slowly pulled her hand back, watching Rome swallow around the lump in his throat.

  “They’re not my tears,” he said. It was the closest thing to an explanation he could formulate. “Was that your mother?”

  “Yes. We don’t have to worry about her, but we should stay out of sight of her caregiver. She’d inform my father for sure.”

  “Is she okay?”

  Aria turned away from him. She wasn’t sure how to answer. “We need to be quick and quiet,” she said. “Can you save your questions for later?” He nodded, following as she led them through a small door and up a cramped set of steps.

  “Why are there just stairs coming up from that room?”

  “It’s a servant’s stairwell,” she said.

  “You have servants?”

  “No,” she said. “…Sometimes.”

  Rome let out a breath and Ariahna stopped. He was so wrapped up in his own thoughts that he almost ran into her.

  “Please stop thinking what you’re thinking. I’ve had to deal with people treating me differently my whole life because of my family or their money. I don’t want to get that from you too.”

  “I get it,” he said. “Put the words ‘lack of money’ in that sentence, and they literally could have come straight from my mouth. I’m not judging you. I’m just… I’m adjusting, okay? You weren’t exactly forthcoming with your lifestyle. I mean, I know most people who go to Vardel have some money, but, I don’t know… seeing it is just different I guess.”

  Ariahna smiled. “And my family has a little more than most,” she admitted. “I just don’t feel like your economic status should define you. Someone can have very little monetary value to their name, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t rich in other ways. Material possessions don’t comprise a person’s worth.” Rome kissed her then, and it was so sudden it made her giggle.

  “The princess falling in love with the peasant,” he said. “We really have some fairy tale style romance, don’t we?”

  “Beauty and the Beast,” she said.

  “Cursed roses, poison apples, and now wands… You think by now we’d have learned and stopped accepting gifts from strangers.” He pressed their foreheads together, brushing his nose against hers. “You know one other thing all those stories have in common? They all have happy endings.”

  “We should go,” she said. “We can’t forget why we’re here.”

  “Why are we here again?”

  She smiled and hurried up the steps, hearing him chasing playfully after her. Aria squealed softly when he caught her at the top of the stairs, shushing them both when she remembered they had to be quiet. “The only place I can think he’d feel safe keeping it would be in his study,” she said, guiding him through the upper floor.

  A large archway led them into a small, simply decorated room. A pair of heavy wooden doors sat at the back, and two impressive statues in the form of lions sat on either side of the doorway. Rome drifted towards them, running his fingers over the white stone in awe.

  “Rome…” Aria stared at him worriedly.

  “These are incredible. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think they were real.”

  The lion farthest from him moved so fluidly Rome’s heart nearly exploded, lifting its head and letting out a lazy yawn. The other was quickly coming to life beneath his fingers, gazing back at him with the stunning indifference only a predator could manage. You’re insignificant, that look said. The stone beast stared back at him as if it could eat him or watch him run away, but it just hadn’t decided which it would like more.

  Rome growled, moving backwards.

  “It’s a guardian spell,” she said.

  “You couldn’t have told me that before I pet it? I’m lucky I still have my hand.”

  “It won’t attack,” she said. “Not yet.”

  “That does not sound encouraging.”

  The two cats rose from their pedestals, stretching and then slinking down onto the floor. The sound of their claws clacking against the hardwood had Rome’s stomach clenched. He watched them circle the two of them before they stilled on either side. And when the statue he’d touched opened its mouth to speak, Rome had to stifle the urge to shout in surprise.

  “What fear you more,” it asked, “a lion, or a sheep?”

  “Well I know the obvious answer.” A hand clam
ped over his mouth and Rome glanced back at Ariahna. His voice was muffled beneath her fingers when he spoke. “Is this supposed to happen?” he said.

  She nodded silently.

  Ariahna slipped away from Rome, walking over to the lion who had prompted them. She sunk down to her knees in front of it as he made a sound of protest behind her. Staring unblinkingly back into its intelligent eyes, she said: “‘I am not afraid of an army of lions led by a sheep; I am afraid of an army of sheep led by a lion.’”

  “Alexander the Great?” Rome said. “Really?”

  The second lion approached him with a stern expression, stopping beside his feet.

  “With a storm at your back, do you take to land or sea?”

  Rome shrugged. “Depends what’s in front of you?” He saw Aria standing slowly out of the corner of his eye.

  “There’s only supposed to be one question,” she said. She was staring at the lion in a mixture of bemusement and fear.

  “One answer, one entry. He too must earn passage.”

  Rome squinted at the lion as it seemed to smile. “Passage,” he mumbled. Was it giving him a clue? He tried to wrack his brain for the answer to its riddle, mulling over quotes he thought her father might have used.

  Aria’s face lit with recognition. “A ship is safe—”

  The lion growled fiercely at her, its voice so loud it shook the floor. “The question is not yours to answer,” it said. “Speak again, and your lives are forfeit.”

  Rome took a shaky breath. He knew this. It was on the tip of his tongue. He closed his eyes, trying to summon the rest of the words. “A ship is safe… in harbor,” he said.

  “Is that your answer?” the lion asked.

  “No.”

  “Your time is limited.”

  As if he wasn’t under enough pressure, he thought.

  Rome glanced down at his ring as a glint of light caught his eye. The metal shone a sparkling blue, and the words suddenly sprung past his lips as if they’d been there all along. “‘A ship is safe in harbor, but that’s not what ships are for.’”

  He frowned at the assessing look on the stone cat’s face. “Is that right? I think that’s right.” Neither lion answered as they prowled back over to their perches, lowering themselves onto their bellies as their eyes turned unseeing once more. The doors to the study creaked inward just as the sound of footsteps erupted from down the hall.