Page 66 of Kingdom of the Two Moons

Melody

I retch some more, sweat covering my whole body, but the hands around me don’t let go. I wipe saliva away before I dare to look up into Caryan’s eyes, the gold-rimmed black in them slowly shifting into a grayish blue like a misty morning.

A rustle makes him look up from me as Calianthe, accompanied by armed, sinister-looking dryads, enters the clearing. I blink, and arrows come into clear focus, the sinews of their bows strung tight, all of them aimed at us. The queen’s head is raised high as she strides up to us. A semi-transparent gown of white fabric flows down her body, making her look like a flower in the wind.

“Caryan,” she says in a royal tone.

“Calianthe.” Caryan returns her greeting, unfazed.

“One might bow his head to a queen, if not fall on a knee.”

“One might do the same to a king,” he retorts coolly.

Her snow-white eyes shift to me then, narrowing to slits before she lifts her hand. The women lower their bows. “What have you done?”

“She is on the verge of death. She needs to rest. She needs warmth. My Fortress is too far,” he says.

Calianthe nods once before she gestures to her right. Another corridor between the trees opens up. I barely register how they undress me, how they put me into the hot water, the spring’s magic burning me from the inside out, chasing off the last remnants of that bluish magic.

Slowly, so slowly, reality returns, and I start to notice the warble of birds in the trees and the buttery light that falls in columns between the heavy trunks, the green so intense it looks like a dream.

A good dream. A peaceful dream.

I want to hold on to it as long as I can.

When I look up, I find Caryan sitting in the shade next to me at the water’s edge, watching me motionlessly. The angel with his black wings and his short, black hair rustling in the mild breeze in the midst of that incredibly beautiful greenery—it looks like a page torn out of a fairytale book. One where the characters live happily ever after and vanquish all evil.

It makes my heart ache.

I never want to leave. This is a better world, a good world.

Only after a while do I realize that this is no longer a dream. That I’m in my body again, the healing water prickling deep inside me.

I look down, trying to calm my swirling thoughts. How long has Caryan been sitting here? How long have I been unconscious, entrenched in those nightmares I thought would never stop; and which I’m still untangling? How long has it been since the snowfields I thought I would never escape?

Then I notice that I’m naked, remembering vaguely that someone undressed me. It isn’t a dream anymore. Caryan is real. His wings are still there, stretched out behind him, feathers ruffled by a breeze, shielded by the shadows and the huge vines that dangle from the columns of those trees.

He is real. He…

I feel tears in my eyes before I swallow them down.

“How are you feeling?” he asks. His face is stern, his eyes shadowed. I sense that it’s a careful question.

“Alright,” I answer, maybe too lightly, because he growls at me, “Don’t lie to me.”

Despite his tone, I wade closer, silently praying that the mineral water will hide most of my naked body. I don’t know where it comes from, this sudden need to touch him, but I stretch out my hand, brushing my fingers over one velvety wing. He tenses at the touch but doesn’t move.

“There were nightmares,” I say, more to myself than to him, as I let the soft feathers run through my fingers. I can’t shake off the feeling that he’s holding his breath. “I saw you. I mean, I was you, I think. And in one of them, a red-haired woman, she—”

“She cut off my wings.” He finishes the sentence for me. His tone is dispassionate, his eyes adamantine, yet weary.

The confirmation takes my breath away. To know that they weren’t just nightmares, but what I feared they were: his past.

I look down again, the memories of all that violence still vivid in my mind. All the pain this man in front of me has endured. And caused.

He stands, and I have the feeling he wants to get away from me.

He pauses at the edge of the pool, looking down at me. “I had to give you my blood because you were dying. I didn’t want to, but I had no choice.” His voice is raw, his eyes bereft of any color, any light, his jaw hard, as if he’s angry. “What you saw weren’t dreams. They were scenes of my life.”

“But your wings—” I say.

Maybe I should be repulsed by what I saw, by the things he did. A part of me is, but my compassion is stronger. Right now, there’s nothing else I want to do but touch him again, hold him. What he had to undergo, whatever he is, whatever he was… no one deserves that. It should have broken him, but it didn’t.

“They grew back. It took a long time, but they grew back,” he says, his voice cold like the relentless, merciless ice on that mountain. “Rest. We will leave when you’re ready.” He turns to go.

I watch him, guilt roiling in my belly. “Did you—did you find the flute?”

He pauses and I spot his wings twitching as he rolls his shoulders, as if to ease his tension. He doesn’t turn to me when he says, “No. I didn’t. ”

There is nothing in his voice. It’s as empty as a void. It sends me into a freefall, tumbling down a dark abyss. I failed. I disappointed him. I messed up—my chance for freedom disappearing along with it—for what it’s ever been worth.

***

Caryan barely looks at me on our hike back through that forest. His wings have disappeared again as if they were never there at all.

I’m keeping my head down as blurred memories of those nightmarish scenes push back to the surface. I can hear screams, voices begging for mercy where there had been none. The faint tinge of blood fills my nose, snippets of faces and people flaring through me. But the scenes are scrappy, no longer so clear, no longer so intense. More like an old film whose reel has been damaged, jumping randomly, the images awash and hazy, the sound disrupted. Once, something hits me, so absurdly vivid I don’t notice a root on the ground and stumble over it. Caryan grabs my arm before I fall.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper, pressing a hand against my forehead, only to find it cold and sweaty.

“It will be better in a few days. This is the aftermath,” he says.

I can’t look at him. I have the feeling he doesn’t want me to anyway.

It’s very strange to witness everything a person has done firsthand. It’s so intimate I can’t find words for it. I can feel that he hates it, though, feel his distaste so clearly in my body, as if it’s my own emotion resonating through every fiber. His disgust is so strong, so much deeper than mine was when I learned he had seen scenes of my life the same way.

But then again, there’s nothing interesting about my life. Nothing but panic attacks, the pain when Kayne and Hunter beat me up. A short life of despair and solitude— everything a feeble shadow of his. My demons, the joke of my life.

He must have secretly laughed about me.

I barely register that we’ve left the forest, barely feel the brush of the invisible curtain and the shift of energy when we enter his kingdom again. One car is still there, the doors open as if waiting for us to get in.

Caryan drives and I curl up on the seat next to him, occasionally glancing at him from beneath my hair. His marvelous face is a mask of stoicism, but I can see the tendrils of anger that twine around his aura, suffocating everything like thorny vines. Can feel the anger as a prickle on the underside of my skin, again as if it’s in me.

Anger and hate and disgust so deep it burns my soul.

He hates me for my failure, and is probably disgusted by me. For trespassing into his life, not that I had any choice.

He doesn’t so much as glance at me once the whole drive. Not when we stop for tiny breaks, not when we eventually reach the Fortress. He just steps into the shadows as soon as we’ve walked up the stairs from the garage, leaving me alone in the corridor, as if he can’t bear to spend another second with me.

***

The Fortress is quiet without the celebrations, and I wonder how long we’ve been gone. It feels like an eternity. I slowly walk back to my room, not meeting anyone on my way. I take a long, hot shower before putting on some fresh clothes and climbing into bed.

But as soon as I close my eyes, there are pictures, clearer in the silence of night—a different kind of hell and anguish once again.

I get up and only then notice a set of paints and some sketchpads and canvases next to a fresh palette and an array of brushes. A tiny card in beautiful handwriting says:

Stay wild, moonchild.

Welcome back, Riven.

I stare at the card, tracing the swift, elegant letters with my finger before a quiet tear falls onto the paper.

I’ve never received such a gift from anyone. Not once in my life .

I stay still for a while, the sudden warmth in my chest like a shield against those dark and evil flashbacks that are still prowling through me. Then I get up, carefully unwrap the colors, and start to paint.