by Andra Leigh
Unless…
A soft tapping interrupted her thoughts. Recognising Laleita’s knock, she called for her to enter.
“You knew I was about to come see you?” she asked, sitting up.
Laleita laughed. “You know I don’t see the future. It’s been a long day. Everyone’s worked up and saying things they won’t mean tomorrow.”
“I thought you didn’t see the future.”
Laleita smiled, bumping her shoulder into Eliscity playfully as she sat next to her. “I wanted to check you were alright.”
“I’m alright,” she confirmed.
“Good. So, why were you going to come find me?”
“Can you help with a regression?”
Laleita frowned. “You’ve been doing fine by yourself.”
“There’s no garden sanctuary when I dream.” She pictured the expansive mess of pathways and overgrown trees that she had visited in her first few regressions with Laleita. “The memory just begins.”
“Is the garden important?”
“Yes.”
Laleita accepted her short answer, agreeing to help her with another regression. Eliscity lay back and Laleita made herself a seat out of pillows. The room fell away the moment Laleita’s fingers pressed to her temples. Her bed washed out from under her. She was suspended, flying. Then the ground flattened against her feet and she was in her garden sanctuary once more.
Above her, night and day intersected; the noon sky full of stars shining impossibly bright against the blue. Thick green vines curled along the ground, snaking around tree trunks and rising into the snowy canopies. Rather than being dropped on a particular path, she had appeared at a meeting point of many different lanes. But that didn’t matter. Her garden had given her what she had wanted.
Juliette sat under one of the trees, her legs crossed, head lifted to the strange sky.
Eliscity slid down next to her.
“Hi.”
Juliette smiled at her. All teeth and dimples. “Hi.”
“I have a request.”
Juliette laughed, her dark curls bouncing around her shoulders. “I know.”
“I need some direction.”
“Which path to take.”
“That would be nice,” Eliscity said. Countless paths twisted from their resting spot. Cobblestoned, muddied, lush grassed, even carpeted. “I don’t know what way to turn when I walk out the door. Show me which path would lead me to a memory that could help?”
“You realise by asking me, you’re really asking yourself.” Juliette raised an eyebrow.
Eliscity smiled. “You’re the part of me that can give me what I need. The other parts of me like to ignore all my requests.”
“Just walk,” Juliette said. “You’ll get to where you need to go.”
“But the paths are all…” she looked around her garden, “…oh.” The variety of broken and brick trails had been replaced with the same dry rocky road.
Eliscity clambered to her feet, staring down at the dark haired girl she had left behind in the Cityel so many months ago. Even in death she was giving her answers and hope. “Thank you.”
Juliette grinned up at her, shrugging lightly. “Go.”
Eliscity obeyed. She took the closest version of the path, glancing back to Juliette in time to wave to her as she disappeared into the tree she leant against. She knew it would be the last time she would see her old friend.
Looking back to her path she began to walk. Deep wheel grooves marred the track on either side of her. As she stared at them she thought she could hear the rattle of a wagon and clattering of horse hooves. Then dust blew up around her and she was in a carriage speeding along the stony road. Green filled the window she stared out, the blur of colour created by the thick forest she seemed to be riding past.
The sight meant little to her. It didn’t help her pinpoint where her memories took place. Unseen, she felt her right hand seek her left. As she touched a cold metal sitting around one of her fingers her hands quickly pulled away from each other. Her chest heaved a slow deep breath like she had been trying to gather herself. Then her hand retraced the same movement back to the cold metal. This time she didn’t pull away. Glancing away from the forest, her past self looked down to her lap. Her hands were unbranded as they had been in all her memories. But unlike her other memories she was wearing a ring.
It was a simple marriage band.
The carriage bumped over a rocky section of the track causing her to look around. There was a man sitting to her left. Straight backed, impeccably dressed and sharp nosed.
She had married Harmon Reinhold.
A sickness sat in the pit of her stomach like a poisonous weight and for the first time Eliscity wasn’t certain whether it was her past or present self that was feeling that way.
The window on Harmon’s side of the carriage had been taken over by a pale blue descending into a burnt orange. The Cityel, she was sure of it. Though it looked hotter and flatter than any part of the Cityel she had seen before.
Alerted by a yell from the coachman, she peered through the small window at the front of the carriage. She saw the man’s shoulders, the two horses strapped into the carriage guides, another wagon off in the distance and then far beyond that the tiny smatterings of what looked to be a town.
“Talcony,” Harmon said from his seat. He hadn’t moved forward to peer through the window with her.
Sitting back in her seat she continued to stare out the window, though from her new angle the town was no longer visible.
“So that’s my new home,” she said, watching the other carriage on the road absentmindedly. It was getting closer, dust kicking up around its wheels.
“We should reach it near sundown,” Harmon said emotionlessly.
As her past self looked for the current position of the sun, Eliscity realised they were still hours off their destination. Apparently her past self had agreed as her body slumped further into the seat, shifting to find a comfortable position. She had clearly failed and chose instead to lean forward, staring out her window.
Their carriage swung left and right with the curves of the road as the land on either side of them sloped down into gullies. She watched as the forest slowly disappeared behind the twists and turns of their journey and the high ridge face they now travelled the top of.
The Cityel still stretched into the sky on Harmon’s side, though now it could only be reached by falling from the cliff’s edge to one’s death.
The distant carriage she had been watching was now close. It looked as if they would be passing it at the peak of the ridge they had climbed.
Her past self was paying it little attention. She could see a wider section of road between them and guessed she had assumed they would meet there, passing each other with ease. But rather than veering to the wider area and waiting for them, the carriage trundled through and came to a stop in the narrow track just moments after.
Her mouth opened to say something, she wondered if it had been to query the strange stopping place of the carriage, when their carriage jostled and pulled to a stop. Her eyes flickered over to Harmon and she felt the unease of finding him calm and unfazed radiate throughout her past self.
This was it. Eliscity was sure of it. Her past self may have been confused and apprehensive but she knew this must have been where her new life began.
As their coachman clambered down from his perch and opened their door her past self found her tongue.
“What’s going on?”
Harmon smiled his smirk at her and stepped out onto the high, narrow road. A man and woman were doing the same thing from the other carriage. She could see a boltbow in the hands of the woman.
“Come out,” Harmon dared. “The view is lovely.”
She inched over to the door. The coachman offered his hand to help her out, but she didn’t take it, stepping out alone. Harmon was already striding toward the couple. Peering over the steep incline they were perched on top of, she felt a shudder run throu
gh her body. Slowly she followed her husband, a frown cutting so deep into her expression that it narrowed her vision.
“As promised,” Harmon’s pert voice floated back to her.
“Well done,” the man said, eyes scanning her. “Eliscity Naux. Descendent of the LaCur line. Wonderful.”
“Who are you?” she asked, making her wonder if that had really been the most pertinent question on her mind at the time.
“Oh, that’s unimportant, Miss Naux,” the woman said. There was nothing warm about her. She was so emotionless she made Harmon look like a jester.
“I’m pleased to say this is where our pitiable marriage ends,” Harmon sneered at her with glee.
Her mouth sought words. It opened and closed. Eliscity had a few choice words for Harmon, but unfortunately she had no control over her past self.
“The only thing amusing about the last week of my life is that you really thought I’d take you as a wife,” Harmon said. “No, there’s nothing worth collecting about you.”
“Then why?” she breathed, finally finding her voice. It wasn’t a particularly strong voice.
Harmon looked at the couple. The man fluttered his hand as if giving him permission to go on. Harmon straightened his back further, pushing himself up higher and puffing out his chest.
“My family has always had wealth,” he gloated. “But I, I am the one that has given our family prestige. I serve the Lord Reigner himself. What he wants with you is beyond me, but I won’t judge him for his tastes. It’s not his fault you’re so ordinary.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Of course you don’t,” he simpered.
Eliscity found it funny. Clearly Harmon didn’t understand why the Reigner had wanted her, yet here he was, believing himself to be important and all-knowing. He was just another pawn.
“Let me make it simple for you. The Realm ensured your family suffered into financial instability so that you would consider an offering of a marriage of convenience.”
“They…” her hand was clutching at her chest. “They made this happen?”
Harmon answered with a smirk.
Her eyes swept from the steep drop to her left to the shiny boltbow hanging loose at the woman’s side.
“Is this where I die?” Her voice sounded hollow, like she couldn’t muster the energy to feel angry or scared.
“No,” Harmon said. “This is where I tell everyone you died. I was very fortunate. I only just got out of the carriage before it plunged off the cliff. Tragically I couldn’t get you out in time. It was devastating.” Harmon feigned the emotion. “The fall killed you instantly and your body was dragged off by wild animals. Only the body of my coachman was found.”
The coachman who had offered her his hand to step from the carriage made a noise behind her. He wasn’t given the chance to react beyond that. The woman lifted her boltbow and loosed the sharp bolt into the coachman’s chest.
It was immediate. One moment he was alive and in control, the next his eyes emptied and he crumpled to the ground.
Her body moved toward the dead man but she was yanked back by the woman. She collapsed to her knees.
As the woman kept a firm grip on her shoulder, the man walked forward. He yanked the bolt from the coachman’s bloody chest, picked him up and deposited him onto his seat in the carriage. Wiping the thin bolt clean on the dead man’s breeches he grabbed one rein and pulled on it hard.
The glossy black horses neighed and backed up. The carriage went with them, turning into the open air of the drop. The back wheels rolled from the cliff’s edge. It all slipped, tilting down into nothingness. The horses were wrenched backwards. Their strong legs fought to keep them on the road. They scrambled at the loose ground but it was no use. The carriage was pulling them down. The front wheels disappeared and one of the horses lost its last footing. The remaining horse was being dragged over the edge on its belly. There was a sickening crunch as its leg snapped with the desperate attempts to survive and it too fell. The carriage, horses and dead man plummeted down, landing with a splintering crash.
But silence didn’t follow. Horrendous screeches floated up to where she knelt in the rocks. One of the horses was still alive.
It was only then that Eliscity became aware that her past self had been screaming. A sharp pain exploded across one side of her face, silencing her. Harmon had slapped her. No longer screaming, Eliscity felt her body react to what had just happened.
She threw up.
All over Harmon’s shoes.
Harmon screeched in disgust, jumping back.
“How dare–” he leant forward, clearly intending to slap her again but the man grabbed his arm.
“I let you hit her once,” the woman said dangerously. “That’s all you get. Her life is more precious than yours.”
Harmon looked like he wanted to argue. But instead he settled with shooting dark looks down at Eliscity. She felt herself return the look.
“Time to go,” the man rumbled.
As she was pulled to her feet she glared at Harmon.
“One day you’ll regret this marriage as much as I do,” she spat.
A cloth drenched in an overwhelming sour scent pressed against her nose and mouth. A fog pushed itself through her mind, her body became heavy and she passed out.
Struggling to open her eyes Eliscity found Laleita’s face swimming above her. Blinking away the haze of her memory she sat up slowly. She felt tired and weak, but not to the extent she had when she had first begun her regressions.
“You’re leaving,” Laletia said softly.
“Yeah.”
“You found home?”
“No. I found…” Eliscity trailed off thinking of the town she had never reached. Talcony. She didn’t know if it was truly Harmon’s home town, it could have been a further fabrication of the Realm, but for now it was the only direction she had. Talcony, the eastern town bordered by the Cityel and The Horizon. The Horizon, Eliscity thought suddenly. Remembering the flat burnt orange desert that had stretched out from the base of the deadly cliff, she realised it must have been The Horizon. Harmon let her family, let Drae, believe she had died on the edge of The Horizon.
“I was married.” The admission burst from her before she could stop it.
Laleita’s eyes went wide.
“I married someone I did not love for my family. While he married me for the Reigner. And now my family think I died at the bottom of a canyon. Drae thinks I died at the bottom of a canyon.”
“How do you plan on setting this assumption right if you haven’t found home?”
“I don’t.” Eliscity stood up and pulled the satchel she had borrowed from Cyan out. Hopefully he wouldn’t mind if she kept it. “As much as I want to see them all again, especially Drae, it’s been years. I refuse to walk into their lives after I’ve been dead to them for that long. Not if I may not be able to stay.”
“Where are you going?” Laleita asked.
“The Realm set my entire family up just to make me disappear. I’m going to make the man who helped regret it.”
Eliscity stuffed her few changes of clothes in the satchel.
Stopping, she looked at the Witch. “Laleita?”
Laleita gave her a questioning smile.
“Why won’t you be with Casamir?”
Eliscity sat down on the edge of her bed as Laleita heaved a sigh.
“I want a family,” the Witch admitted.
“Your child would have Witch and Wolf lineage,” Eliscity muttered. With the Clinic searching for people with lineages, a child with two would be a sought after thing. It would be in constant danger.
“But you would know,” she tried to reason. “You’d be able to find ways to keep the secret.”
Laleita was shaking her head. “No child should have to keep secrets. Or be kept secret.”
Eliscity took the woman’s dark hand. “I still don’t think that’s a good enough reason. I don’t think you do either.”
“T
his world scares me,” Laleita said. “There’s too much unknown. Add an unknown child to that unknown world and…”
“Knowing the future would make you crazy,” Eliscity stressed.
“I understand. But not knowing the future isn’t something I handle particularly well either.”
“I know,” Eliscity conceded. Latching the satchel she asked if it would be alright to take some food from their stores with her.
“Of course,” Laleita smiled before becoming serious. “Are you going to say goodbye?”
Eliscity winced. She hadn’t thought about the goodbyes. Every member of the Family knew loss and how fleeting life could be. She wasn’t going to add to that by leaving them without a word.
“If I wrote a letter…”
Laleita nodded. “They would understand.”
“Truly?”
“Eventually.”
“Even Jinx?”
Laleita grimaced. “I think Jinx is the only one who would be better without the goodbye.”
Eliscity agreed. “What happened when he went back to Hynxt?”
“I don’t know,” Laleita said softly.
“What’s his real name?”
“I don’t know. Not even Cyan knows. Sometimes I wonder if Jinx knows.”
Eliscity considered this for a moment. No, she decided he knew his name. “He’s not happy,” she said. “And if he is happy, I think he’s wrong to be. I don’t feel that way about anyone else here. Just him.”
“I think he struggles with what family is,” Laleita shrugged. “We’re happy to just love one another, whereas he feels like he has to prove himself.”
With Laleita’s support, Eliscity followed through with her plan to say goodbye to the Family, writing a letter to them. She told them she would miss them all and thanked them for everything they had given her. She hoped they heard the sincerity in the letter.
Laleita helped her get food from their stores, making her take more than she would have if she had been packing alone. She also took the map she had circled and written on during her attempts to locate her memories. This time she was focused on one town that hadn’t been circled. It was going to take her weeks to reach Talcony. The cities could be walked in a matter of days, but the remainder of Rylock was spread out. It was going to be her longest journey yet – including her journey from the Clinic into Stource.