by Paige, Bea
“What was that all about?” I ask.
“Nothing you need to worry about,” he responds, avoiding eye contact.
“Fine,” I say, feeling the web between us becoming more tangled still.
Chapter Twelve
The firefly flits down the tunnel ahead of us, its wings making a sound not unlike crickets chirping. The smell of the soil is pungent, the walls of the tunnel curve around and above our heads. It is warm beneath the earth and I feel a drip of sweat slide down my back. Every now and then I see the green, pulsating light of a vine twisting in and out of the dirt as we make our way through the tunnel. It is the same green light as the firefly in front of us, the luminous green of the trees in the Forbidden forest, the stunning eyes of the fae and those of my best friend Clover. It is a colour I shall not forget in a hurry.
“Did Clover say how long it will take to get to the fae city?” Ezra asks.
“No, she didn’t.”
Out of the corner of my eye I see him swipe a hand over his face. We have only been walking a few minutes and he looks horrendous, the green glow making him appear sicklier still. I pull up sharp. “What is it, Ezra?”
He stops, facing me. “There are things we must discuss, but now is not the time.” He winces, unable to hide the sudden pain he feels.
“You don’t have time. You’re dying, or have you forgotten that?” I say, unable to keep the anger from my voice.
“I… argh!” he cries, stumbling back against the wall of the tunnel. The full force of his pain is back sooner than either of us expected.
“Accacia!” He bends over, his body convulsing. A scream rips from his throat. His hand fumbles inside his leather satchel, but the bag falls to the floor and I hear the distinct sound of glass smashing.
“No!” I rush forward, bending down to pick up the bag. Not thinking, I put my hand inside and feel a sharp sting as a piece of broken glass slices along my middle finger. “Shit!” I say, pulling my hand back quickly. The cut is deep and runs from the top of my finger to the base, stopping above the ring that had appeared on my hand only a few days ago. I watch as a long drip of blood falls to the ground. Ezra slides down the wall, his face ashen, deathly. It is worse this time, so much worse. I see the life draining from him right in front of my eyes.
“I don’t have much time,” Ezra says, looking up at me. “Give me the rest….” His words are lost to the hacking cough that overtakes him.
“The bottles have broken, Ezra. There is no blood left,” I say, helplessly.
He attempts to grab the bag, but he’s so weak that he falls onto his side. I drop to my knees beside him. Above the firefly is circling our heads frantically, flitting backwards and forwards in a panic.
Ezra groans on the floor, clutching at his chest. The skin on his face seems to have shrunk, the bones of his cheeks have become sharp, the shadows beneath his eyes dark. His lips are cracked and dry. Even his clothes look as though they don’t fit him properly anymore. The once fit, strong man has been reduced to skin and bone in a matter of seconds. A tear slips from his eye as he looks blindly at me. They are no longer stormy, just the grey colour of death. There is no life in them now, no anger, no pain, none of the dark looks or the heated gazes I’ve come to expect. Nothing but a fading light. A light I am desperate now to hold on to, even if he isn’t.
I stare in shock, caught for a moment in the horror of his rapid decline. It’s happening so fast. I have to do something, anything. I look at my finger, at the blood oozing from it, then back at Ezra’s face. He is mumbling incoherently, the words unintelligible, barely audible. I shut my eyes against the tears that are threatening to fall. There really is only one choice I can make. I will not lose him. He can hate me for the rest of my life, for the rest of his, but I will not watch him die.
“I’m sorry, Ezra,” I whisper, before resting my bleeding finger against his lips. For a moment he stills. His whole body is like a corpse in a morgue. Then I feel the gentle suck of his lips as they draw my blood into his mouth. A noise escapes his throat as the deathly grey of his eyes brightens. I swear I can see the storm clouds brewing in them once more, swear there is something igniting within them. I keep looking at him, aware now that silent tears are tracking down my cheeks. Ezra releases a deep moan, opening his mouth wide over my finger until it has slipped fully into his mouth. I feel his tongue swirl around it whilst he sucks and pulls on my finger. It throbs, the feeling is both painful and erotic. My gaze is drawn to his lips, how my blood has reddened them, then to the skin of his face as it brightens rapidly, colour blooming on his cheeks. I look back up at his eyes and blanche at the fire I see burning in them. I attempt to pull my hand away, but he lets out a low growl, bringing his hands up and holding it fast. He sits up, pressing his back against the wall, all the while still drawing on the blood. My finger is numb now. I feel no pain, just a dull throb in a place I never expected to feel. I have to press my lips together to stop a moan slipping from my mouth.
I watch, fascinated as Ezra’s body begins to fill out once again. The broad width of his shoulders, the strong defined muscles of his arms and legs returning as if they had never disappeared. He is as handsome as he was the first time I met him standing in my kitchen. Stunning, powerful and completely terrifying.
“Ezra, that’s enough,” I say gently. Our eyes meet, and I am caught by the hidden depths of emotion I see passing through them. I know if I were to let myself, I would fall into them and never come up for air. Ezra’s hands fall away, and I pull my hand from his mouth. It is almost completely healed. I take a steady breath.
“I had to do it. You were dying.” I wipe at the tears that still persist in falling. “I couldn’t watch you die. Please understand.” He remains staring at me, saying nothing. The silence is suffocating. Ezra raises a hand to my face and wipes at my wet cheeks.
“These tears you cry, they are for me?” he asks gently. The cadence of his voice is soft, warm, a far cry from the starkness I am used to.
“Yes.”
“Why do you cry tears for me, Accacia? I’m pretty sure I do not deserve them.” His lips lift slightly, a half-smile, uncertain.
“Because you think you do not deserve them, because you believe you deserve to suffer, because I think of Rhain and Devin and the grief they would feel if you died, because your wife Thalia and your daughter Roseanna would not have wished this for you.” He flinches at that, but his eyes remain fixed on mine. “Because I want…” I falter, unable to continue.
“Yes?” He is looking at me so intently I can barely breathe.
I swallow. “Because I want you to live, because I need you to live… For yourself, for me,” I whisper softly. It is true, just as it was with Rhain when we underwent the Claiming, so it is true with Ezra now. These men, these vampires, have settled under my skin and I cannot part with them.
“Then I will live… for you,” Ezra says. I feel the breath leave my body as he rushes to his feet, pulling me up with him. He places a chaste kiss on my lips, then pulls back.
“Ezra, I want you to know…”
“Shh, I understand.”
His reaction is not what I am expecting. I expected anger, hatred even, but understanding? No, that isn’t what I thought would happen.
“There’s no time right now for me to say all that I wish. First, we must save my brothers. We will deal with everything else later, okay?” he says.
I nod my head. “Okay.”
Ten minutes later we see a light at the end of the tunnel. The firefly flits out into the brightness, gone, its job complete. Ezra lays a hand on my arm. I stop to face him.
“Pass me the map. I can memorise the route.”
I pull it out of the deep pocket of my robe and hand it to him. He studies it, running his hand along the route, nods his head, then pockets it.
“You ready?” he asks.
“No,” I say, laughing nervously.
He steps closer to me, his hands reaching behind my head, drawing me c
lose. He presses his lips against the spot just beneath my ear, as though he knows instinctively that this is the exact place I love being kissed the most.
“When this is over, and we are all safe, you and I will have that talk.” He steps back, pulling the hood up over my head. I can barely see out of it, so I am pretty sure no one can see my face beneath it either. I watch him pull the hood up over his head, then he holds his hand out. I take it, and we walk into the unknown together.
Chapter Thirteen
We emerge beneath a wooden bridge. The same purple hued water that I saw when we first entered yesterday flows beside us. I can see strange coloured fish swimming beneath the surface. A yellow frog with sparkling blue eyes leaps from a lily pad and into the stream. Beside the opening of the tunnel, the green firefly rests on a petal of the most beautiful red rose I have ever seen. It is huge, the size of a side-plate. I reach up to touch it, my fingertips grazing against the smooth velvety red of the petals. The firefly lifts off and disappears into the air. “Isn’t this the most beautiful thing you have ever seen?” I say, pulling the flower to my nose. The smell is divine.
“Not the most beautiful, no,” Ezra replies, his eyes smouldering. I feel my cheeks flush, but I don’t look away.
“Shall we?” he says after a moment.
I let the flower go, the scent lingering in my nose. “Okay.”
We walk out from beneath the bridge and up the mossy embankment. A gravel pathway leads to a gateway between two bent trees. Their trunks are twisted and gnarly, their branches joining together, curling around one another to form an arch above our heads. Ahead of us the pathway appears to lead into more forest, but I am not convinced. There is magic here, I can almost taste it. Ezra pulls on my hand and we walk through the gate. The moment we step inside, a city unlike I’ve ever seen unveils itself before us. There are dozens of buildings carved from white marble. Tiny green veins run through every surface, just like the vines that run through the earth beneath us, above us, and all around us. The buildings differ in size, but they are all beautiful and they all sparkle in the light. Trees grow out from every available gap, their canopies spreading out above us forming a natural roof. Abundant flowers trail across every surface. Some I recognise, like the white jasmine and purple clematis, some I don’t. But all are beautiful and alive. Lavender sprouts up from the floor in patches, and all around us fireflies swarm, lighting up the place in a multitude of colours. There are fae everywhere, the majority of whom are wearing robes not dissimilar to our own. Some have their hoods drawn up like us, others have theirs pulled back. Avery was right to lend them to us, no one gives us a second glance.
“This way,” Ezra says urgently. We walk across a large central square in the middle of which sits a bandstand built from a mixture of wood and marble. I wonder about the use of it, then I recall the memory Clover showed me of the people of Clan Terra singing in the fields. At least some of their traditions were not lost to the curse, it would seem.
“To the north of this square is an alleyway that leads through the back of the city. The inn we are looking for should be a few streets along from the point we pass through it,” Ezra says as we make our way across the square.
We move quickly, keeping our heads low. Ezra still has hold of my hand, he hasn’t let go from the moment we stepped out of the tunnel. As we make our way through the city streets, around us the fae talk, laugh. They seem happy, despite the curse and what it means for them. I see no sign of any sickness here. Nostra, Clover, Avery and Eldon, they all said that the forest was sick but from where I am standing this place looks far from it. More like alive, abundant even.
We pass through what appears to be the living quarters of the city. Single-story huts line the streets. These are wooden, rather than marble, but still very pretty. All of them are covered in more flowers, growing up the walls and over the roofs. I am tempted to look up, to see if there are more homes nestled amongst the trees, but to do so would risk being seen so I keep my head down.
“We’re here,” Ezra says after about five minutes. We are standing outside a double fronted wooden building. This one has two floors. It looks vaguely like a tavern you’d find in one of those western movies. I half expect a cowboy to come walking out. A nervous giggle explodes up my throat, garnering strange looks from some fae nearby.
Ezra pushes open the door and we enter. “What’s wrong with you? Do you wish us to get caught?” he hisses under his breath.
“Sorry, I don’t know what came over me. Nerves, I guess.”
Ezra lets out a breath. “I apologise, I shouldn’t have snapped at you.”
“Apology accepted,” I say, grinning under the cover of my hood. This is a first, Ezra apologising.
“So, how do we know which one is Solomon?”
“I’ll know when I see him,” I say, looking about the room. All the fae have their hoods pulled back. Clearly, wearing hoods up inside isn’t the done thing around here.
“Can I help you?” a voice says from behind.
Ezra squeezes my hand tightly within his. We turn. In front of us is the man Clover showed me an image of. “Are you Solomon?” I ask.
“That is me. And you are?”
“We are friends of Clover. She said that you would have rooms for us here,” I say, trying not to look at the fae nearest to us who seem very interested in our conversation.
Solomon’s eyes widen, but he recovers quickly, plastering a courteous smile on his face. “Ah, yes. I’ve been expecting you both. Your room has been prepared.” With that, Solomon turns on his feet and we follow him up to the second floor. As soon as we enter one of the rooms upstairs, he shuts the door, locking it quickly.
“You can remove your hoods. No need to hide from me,” Solomon says.
Ezra and I pull them down. Solomon’s mouth drops open.
“Well, if it isn’t Tolindo’s son. What a pleasant surprise.”
Ezra narrows his eyes at Solomon. “How do you know my father?” he demands.
“I know it has been a long time, Ezra. Perhaps I have aged a little since we last saw one another,” Solomon says as he pulls Ezra into a hug, his green eyes dancing in amusement. Ezra looks at me stunned, stiffening under his touch. The awkward, one-sided hug ends pretty quickly.
“You father, Tolindo, was my friend. It’s me, Sol,” he says tapping his chest.
I watch Ezra’s expression change from one of suspicion, to shock, then surprise before finally settling on happiness. “Sol? It’s been…”
“Over a thousand years. Yes, Ezra, it has. Come, sit,” he says, ushering us to a table in the corner of the room.
Ezra is looking in awe at Solomon. “The last time I saw you, I was a young man, no more than nineteen.”
Solomon laughs. “Yes, at the time your father said you had fallen in love and had no interest in anyone else but your new love. Is this her?” he says, turning to me. I feel my cheeks colour.
“No,” I say quickly. “Ezra and I are…” I falter, unsure how to describe our relationship.
“It’s complicated,” Ezra finishes for me. “The girl you speak of was my wife, Thalia. She was killed the day the curse was cast, alongside my daughter Roseanna.”
Solomon reaches across the table and squeezes Ezra’s hand. “I am sorry. We have all lost so much. Your father?”
Ezra shakes his head. “He died a year or so after you left for the southern lands. We tried to send word.”
“It seems there has been great loss in your life too. I am sorry for it.” Solomon wipes a hand across his face. The bee tattooed onto his cheek glistens under his touch. I wonder if it is some kind of fae magic.
“I had no idea you returned to Ever Vale,” Ezra says.
“The day before the curse was cast my family and I returned. We missed home.” Solomon shrugs. “We were drawn into the earth just like everyone else.”
“Your family are here now?”
Solomon shakes his head. “They are gone, claimed by the sickne
ss that plagues this realm.”
Ezra’s face pales. “I am sorry.”
“This sickness you speak of…” I start, not sure how to continue.
Solomon looks me in the eye. “You look about this place and see all the wonderous things and wonder what sickness plagues these lands, am I right?”
“Yes. Clover said that she stays because this realm is sick, she believes she has the power to help. Yet, I don’t see any signs of sickness.”
“Believe me, the sickness is here. Your friend, Clover, she is the key to curing it.” Solomon takes my hand in his. “I wish I could say more, but I can’t. Please do not be offended, there are things we cannot speak of to those outside of Clan Terra,” he says apologetically.
“We’ve been told that too,” Ezra says. “But what of the sickness, though?”
Solomon sighs. “You passed through the upper forest, did you not?”
“Yes.”
“For almost one hundred years, the Forest above has been slowly dying. Did you notice how very quiet the forest is, the lack of wildlife?”
“Yes, I did. I just thought it was to do with the magic or something.”
“It is, in a manner of speaking. The animals left because they know the forest is sick, that it is no longer safe for them to live amongst it.”
Solomon notices my confusion. “You saw the vines, too?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“The fae king, he was once an elder member of Clan Terra. Before the curse he was a good man, wise for his relatively young years. When we first arrived, he took charge, became our leader. But just like the vines that bind us to this land, all these years trapped here has made him twisted. He believes that to break the curse we must sacrifice our people to the earth. My wife, my son, they were two of his victims. An argument between us led to their murder.” Solomon takes a deep breath. “His belief, and that of the fae who reside in the city, is that eventually Mother Nature will break the curse once enough sacrifices have been made to her. Anyone found wandering in the forest is captured and offered to the earth. Your friends Rhain and Devin, that is their fate now.”