by A. M Martin
“The prophecy.” Derrick mutters.
“What?” I gasp. This isn’t real, none of it. He’s telling lies all lies.
Rylan’s voice sounds small as it slices through the tension in the tent.
“~One will be born. Four she shall bind. Two of Friendship. Two of Love. Shall it will be. The Aether~”
“No.” I state loudly.
“You are lying.”
I flee the tent with tears in my eyes. They must be lying. My whole life was not a lie. It can’t be. I will not believe it.
ten
Everything is a blur as I run out of Rylan's tent. I head straight for the trees. The woods that were created for giants. Just another difference in this place. Elementum.
The word tastes dirty in my mouth. Something to spit out and never taste again.
I push myself harder as I run through the woods. No direction in mind. A need to get away. Tears fall freely from my eyes.
My legs pull and cramp. My breathing is fast and short. The thudding of my feet sends vibrations to my throbbing head. I still tread on. Push myself harder. Can I out run this nightmare?
Why would she lie to me? For seventeen years. How could a person that supposedly loves me lie for that long? I don't understand it.
I was born here. I'm a princess here. Why take it all away from me? Because of a kidnapping? Nothing makes any sense. Even if I did get answers could I trust them?
Tears start to smear my vision. I stumble, catching myself and just keep going. Running from the lies. From the deception and deceit. From everything.
My Custo. A keeper. Is what she was. Not my mother. Not even a blood relation. Someone who was picked for the job. Someone my family thought would be best. Would raise me better. Raise me for what my position needed. They were wrong. She taught me nothing of this place. I’m just like a new born baby in the world for the first time.
I laugh. An awful gritty sound full of misery.
I stumble again. Falling to my knees. This time I don't get up. I have nothing left to give. Nothing.
I lay on the leafy forest floor. My hand curled in the soft dirt and silk like leaves. My gasping pants the only sound.
How could they?
Who am I now? So many things it seems. Basil. A princess of the Ingis Gen. The Aether and what is an Aether? My fingers push deeper into the dirt. I squeeze my eyes shut.
Why would they think this was best? They couldn’t have hidden me in some forgotten valley or protect me better. Why send me to Earth? To a place that has no similarities to here. I don’t think they had a clue what they were doing.
I jerk at the sound of snapping branches. A wild animal? Will it put me out of this heart ache? This lost fullness.
“Stop your melancholy.” A gruff voice snaps from above me.
I just want to go back to bed. My thoughts a world wind. Trolling from one thing to another. Who am I? What will this place make me become?
“Hey.” A male snaps.
I feel a nudge on my head and flick my eyes up.
Rylan. Now that I’ve seen him. Smell his campfire scent that pulling in my gut starts up again. Tug. Release. Tug. Release. Tug. Release. Over and over and over.
What is that?
I still don’t move watching his eye light with fire. It’s mesmerizing as the red and orange hues come and go. Dance and spin.
I watch as pity flashes across his normal stern face. He lets out a gust of air and settles in the dirt beside my head.
Tug. Release. Tugg. Release. Tugggg. Release.
I bit my lip as the tugging gets stronger and just watch him. Rylan picks up a bright green leaf from the forest floor. It glistens like a gem. He holds its stem with the tip of his fingers. His right hand comes up, fingers sliding over the leaf.
My eyes widen. No, it’s not my imagination. The longer he runs his fingers along the left, the brighter it gets. Soon it’s glowing, bright green.
I get up on my hands and knees, crawling closer as the leaf gets brighter and brighter.
“What is it?” I breath. I know it’s a leaf, but normal leaves don’t glow like a light.
“It’s a glōwan. They only glow when they fall from the Beorht trees.” He says lightly.
“I know this is hard on you Basil.” He says carefully, “Frack it’s hard on all of us. Being here isn’t a bad thing though. It might seem like it at the time, but look.” He waves the glōwan around making it look like a light saber. “There are many beautiful things here. It’s not all bad. You need only to find them.”
I look up at him. His dark curly hair. The soft small on his lips, the stumbling along his defined jaw line. Maybe I already found my beautiful thing.
“You can get through this.” He states getting up.
I stay on my knees. He’s right. All the bad things have happened to me, and it could be worse, get worse, but that doesn’t mean I have to give up. Lose myself.
I get up and take the offered glōwan leaf from his lean fingers. I fall into step next to him the glowing leaf at my side and maybe just maybe something that could be my beautiful entity.
Ten
I twirl the glōwan leaf in-between my fingers. It’s still glowing just as bright when Rylan showed me minutes ago; I can’t quite be looking at the emerald green light. This is just awesome.
“Hey. Can I call you Ry?” I ask him, running to catch up to his fast pace.
“No.” He snaps out in that deep voice.
I flinch and fall back a couple of steps behind him.
My eyes tear up, and I have no idea why. He doesn’t know me. I don’t know him. I don’t even know why I asked that other then it just felt right. I ignore the tug, tug in my gut and the pain in my heart. Why does it hurt?
He stops , and I stop, looking at his strong back. The muscles are moving.
He turns around, and I flinch.
His dark eyes flash red, “Look I’m sorry. This is hard on me too.” He sighs looking at me. Looking at me for the first time like I’m a person and not a bug he wants to crush underneath his boots.
His dark eyes soften, and he steps towards me.
The tugging gets stronger. My hands start to tingle.
“I thought you were dead Ariea. Dead.” He hands roll up into a fist. “But you’re not.” He looks at me something going through his dark eyes.
“I’m not Ariea,” I whisper, crossing my arms.
His eyes turn hard again. “No, I guess you wouldn’t be.”
He turns around and starts walking, no more like stomping through the forest. I follow slowly behind him.
“What you said back in the tent. The prophecy. Is that one of the reasons I was sent away?”
Air heats.
“Ariea was sent away on a suspicion.” He scoffs moving faster.
“A year before you were born the wise women came to tell a tale.” He bits, “Girls will finally be born and among them will be the Aether.”
I step over a patch of glōwan leaves, “What do you mean finally?”
He cocks his head, marching on, “She really didn’t teach you a thing. There was a dry spell with girls being born. A year went by. Then two then three. Everyone was starting to panic with only boys being born. No one ever found out why no girls were being born, but many think it’s because of the prophecy. So, when the wise woman sprouted off those words and a year later pregnant women started having girls again. They’re treasured. Those few girls. Many of them started going missing all because of a few words from an old lady on her death bed. Everyone wanted the power that would come with the Aether. You got sent away, and I was told my Electus was dead.” He spats out.
I remain quite following him. All of this. My whole life in lies because some old women whispered a few words.
“Why does everyone thinks it me?” I mumble seeing the camp coming into view.
“It was just a thought that you could be.”
My eyes lock on Derrick and Quinn at the edge of the camp.
; The tugging comes full force. A pull to Rylan on my right and a pull to Derrick.
Rylan stops thirty steps from Quinn and Derrick. He looks at me out of the corner of his eyes, “That gods awful tugging you were screaming about is your bodies way of telling you that you’ve found your other half. Your Electus. Normally it’s only one. The wise women’s words said the Aether will have four. Two of friendship. Two of love. It looks like you’ve found your two.”
He stalks off into camp leaving me open mouthed. Another half. Four. My hands go into my hair, and I pull. This can’t be happening.
“Hey.” Derricks voice has my body jerking towards him.
I ground my feet into the ground. “I can’t do this,” I mumble considering his silver eyes.
“Yes, you can.” He steps to me hand landing softly on my elbow.
“I’ll help you.” My eyes zone in on those soft lips that slowly turn up into a smile.
“You don’t even know me,” I whisper as he moves closer.
“It doesn’t matter. My soul knows you.”
He leans down eyes on my lips. My tongue slips out licking my lips.
Boom.
I gasp and jerk back looking up at the sky.
“Is that a fireball?’
“Rylan ’s doing.” Quinn mutters walking towards us, “He has a temper.”
“Ya don’t say.”
Quinn smiles at me, “Come on.”
We walk back to camp. Four. Four guys. My other halves. The ruler of the Ingis Gen. This is gods, I just don’t know.
Eleven
As we walk through camp, I start to notice something. The men and the few women around slightly incline their heads as I walk by them.
My eyes go wide, and my spine stiffens. Heir to the Ingis Throne. A princess. This stuff doesn’t happen in real life. But hey this isn’t real life, is it? It’s Elemuntum.
"Are you alright?" Derrick asks softly.
I shake my head. No, I’m not alright. So far from it. I duck into Rylan’s tent. My heart squeezes. Why does it hurt so bad knowing he doesn’t want anything to do with me? Why do I even care?
I plop down on one of the many fluffy pillows around the dark wooden table.
"Where's my... I mean the King?" I mumble twirling the glowen leaf with my fingers.
"The tough questions first?"
I nod not looking up at Quinn. I feel betrayed by him. Hurt even with all the lies. Which is really insane. I don’t even know the dude, but I still can’t help the way I feel.
"The King pasted away from the Tus a month after your relocation."
I jerk my head up, looking at Quinn from the other side of the table. He takes a dough ball, maybe? I have no clue what it is, but he dumps it in a small bowl full of green slush.
Gag.
"What’s the Tus?"
He chews, swallows and dunks the bread ball back into the green slush.
I frown as he waves it around.
“The Tus is like a virus.” Chew, swallow, “When one pair of the Electus passes on the other person in the pair can sometimes get The Tus.” Dip, wave, “The Tus is like death from a broken heart is the plainness of terms.”
I look at Quinn. Really. He can’t be serious. Tus is a virus that causes a broken heart, then death.
“Are you for real?” My eyes narrow at him. He can’t be serious.
“Yes, Basil I am for real.”
I roll my eyes, stretching out my legs underneath the table.
“He died from a broken heart.” I scoff, my fingers tapping on the table. Ridiculous.
“Look at it like this.” My eyes flick up to Derrick. I shift on the pillow my muscles going tight. The tugging becomes worse when he talks, or I’m looking at him. “Imagine your heart is like a sponge and it soaks up a piece of your Electus. Now when your Electus dies that part of your heart dies with it. Some are strong enough to go on while others just can’t.” A sad smile covers his sinful lips. It doesn’t look good on him. That sadness.
“So, his heart really did break,” I mumble picking up the soft dough bread. I bring it up to my nose and sniff. It smells sweet. “How do you soak up a piece of your Electus?”
I nibble on the bread. Not bad. A little sweet for bread but still good. I look up as I feel the tension pull tight in the air.
Quinn’s looking down, and Derrick is biting his lip. My gaze zeros in on it. I bet he tastes good. Gods, where did that thought come from. I don’t think about boys that way. A blush heats my face.
Derrick clears his throat, “You and your Electus goes through a bonding ceremony. It’s during that time that you get a piece of your Electus.”
A that didn’t sound so good. A piece. Like a chunk of flesh.
I lean back with wide eyes, “What piece?”
Derrick’s head tilts to the side. His silver hair is falling partly in front of his eyes, “I forgot you do not know our customs. What I meant by piece is the sharing of each other’s blood.”
Well, that doesn’t sound so bad. Maybe not safe per say but not bad.
I take another bite of the sweet bread. “Who’s been ruling? I mean someone takes the place of the King, right?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
I relectually pull my eyes from Derrick and look at Quinn.
“You would have taken the place of your Father with the advisers till you came of age. Since you were not able to and there are no other heirs or royally family member to take your place, it goes to the strongest of the Ingis Gen, Rylan.”
My heart jumps in my chest. Rylan. Why does he hate me?
I cross my legs, “So. Now, what’s going to happen?”
“No more questions?” Quinn smirks.
No. Not right now. The bonding. Sharing of blood. Rylan ruling. Its all filling up my head.
I shake my head.
“We leave for the Ingis Mountains,” Quinn says standing up.
I follow suit.
“And where is that?” I watch Derrick out of the corner of my eyes. He’s breath taking.
“A week’s journey from the Neutral Hills.” Quinn walks out of the tent.
I cross my arms, shift my feet.
“What is it?” Derrick smiles.
“Are you going with us?” I question softly.
His eyes sparkle as he walks towards me.
I get butterflies in my belly.
“No not at first.”
I frown as the butterflies flutter into a queasy feeling. Shouldn’t he be going with me being my Electus and all?
He takes my hands. A shiver goes through my body.
“I’m the heir of Aeris Gen.”
I look up. What does that have to do with going with me?
He laughs softly, “I’ll need to inform the King and Queen of what’s going on.”
“Oh,” I mumble.
It makes sense. I suppose.
“I’ll see you in the Ingis Mountains in a Moon turn.” He lightly kisses me on the lips. I gasp.
He pulls away slowly. A wicked smile etched on those lips, inclines his head and struts out of the tent.
My breathing his heavy and my head fills cloudy. Wow. That was even really a kiss. Just a touch of lips and it has me on cloud nine.
I shake my head, ducking under the tent flap. Ingis Mountains here I come.
Twelve
Its chaotic when I step out of the tent. My eyes widen as people rush by moving in every direction. I feel shaky and blame it on the chaos when I really know it’s the fact that Derricks leaving. Why is that bothering me so bad? I shake my head on the move into the mess of moving people. I dodge two guys with a trunk, go around people and look for a familiar face.
“Hey yeah.”
I jerk around and see Amy. A sigh flutters from my chest.
“Is it always this way?” I mumble ducking out of the way of more trunks.
“Only when it’s time to go home.” Amy smiles. She grabs my hand, “Come on. Quinn’s looking for you.”
&nb
sp; I let her drag me through the chaos to the outer edges of the camp where Quinn and Ryland are standing.