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Wonder

She doesn’t stop when the bellows shred her lungs. She doesn’t stop when her protests fail to bring him back. No, she only stops when her throat dries, her howls ebbing to short stabs of breath.

However, she does keep rocking. She rests her head against Malice’s chest, muffling the sounds of the archers talking, either to her or amongst themselves, it doesn’t matter.

Then she recites things Malice cannot hear, whispering secret legends, mumbling the notes they wrote in The Archives and texts they read aloud to each other.

Perhaps she sounds like a maddened goddess. Perhaps that’s fine.

His skin retains its warmth, as if he’s alive. Yet it’s a lie, and she hates the deception.

The discussion around her amplifies. Her peers call out, beseeching, questioning, cautioning. Let them exert themselves, for all she cares.

When she makes no reply, footsteps approach, boot heels ticking like a time bomb. The echo resounds down the aisles, across the demon god’s home.

His home, away from home, away from home.

It shall be Wonder’s home too. She will live here, haunting this place like a lonely deity, just as he did.

Those stubborn footsteps proceed. A tall specter intrudes, hunkering beside Wonder and Malice, the male silhouette darkening the already-dark foyer, daring to blot out the specks of starlight.

Wonder’s head leaps up. Bundling Malice against her, she recoils and bares her teeth. “You keep away from him!” she snarls at Anger. “You don’t touch him!”

The rage god wavers, then opens his mouth. However, Anger’s soulmate tugs him back. Even bittersweet Merry, along with sentimental Love and empathetic Sorrow, have the sense to stay away.

Who knows what Andrew and Envy are doing? Wonder suspects the former is shaking his head to further discourage Anger. The mortal has experience with bereavement, having lost his mother. Whereas Envy is unequivocally at a loss, because he has never valued anything but his own reflection.

Yet for all intents and purposes, they care about Wonder.

Wonder. Not Malice.

None of them will mourn him, because he’d been vicious to them. The notion fills her mouth with bile, a bitter aftertaste assaulting her palate.

The air shifts like a funnel, a new silhouette gaining Wonder’s side. Perceiving the contemplative dismay radiating from this figure, she glimpses the one who taught her how to aim, how to ponder, how to muse, how to study, how to discover.

But not how to love someone. Nor how to lose them.

Harmony kneels. In a beam of moonlight, sympathy crinkles the mentor’s brows, her eyes glistening.

The instant their gazes meet, Wonder collapses into another fit of bone-splitting sobs, the onslaught shuddering her frame.

She bows over Malice while letting the elder embrace her, because it’s okay to feel this, it’s okay to unleash.

How do humans stand this feeling? How do their hearts keep beating? How do they endure? How can any soul be this strong?

Why must it hurt? Why must it hurt so much?

Please. Make it go away.

But her mentor can’t do that, nor can The Stars. That isn’t how magic works.

Harmony withdraws, bracing Wonder’s shoulders until Wonder is capable of straightening on her own. All the while, she refuses to let go of Malice, tucking his body nearer.

Mine. He’s mine.

Silently, Harmony presents a few items, setting them on the ground. These include the book she’d dropped in the Chamber—the answer to their campaign—along with the archery crafted of poplar wood.

Upon returning to the mortal realm, Wonder hadn’t thought to bring anything but the Asterra Flora. That, and her own weapons, purely because the quartz archery had been strapped to her back.

Dreading and hoping she’s right, Wonder’s hand steals into the quiver of arrows, from which she retrieves one sepia envelope.

The first missive she had scribed to Malice.

The one they recited while mating atop her sheets, fucking each other slowly, intensely.

In hindsight, it was the closest they ever came to lovemaking.

Malice had been fixated, as if he’d wanted to try but hadn’t known how.

The other letters had been left behind in the dorms, including the one she’d stolen from his quiver and never returned. Yet Malice had stuffed this one into his archery during their impasse in her chamber, after returning her corsage but before chasing after him. He’d kept the note close.

The sight crushes her soul, countless emotions churn inside. Four, most of all. They include wonder itself, for the time they’d shared, envy of the time they’d lost, love from knowing him, and sorrow from losing him.

Then a fifth sensation flares her nostrils, boils her blood, and sets her canines. A mirror reflection of her venomous expression appears in the Guide’s pupils. Any second, Wonder will crush the envelope in her grip.

Carefully, she unwinds her corsage. After pressing the blossoms and envelope into Malice’s limp hands, Wonder settles him on the ground.

She moves with ceremony, making a shaky fist before sweeping his eyelids closed, shutting them forever.

Then her knuckles brush the layers from his face and the blood from his cheek.

Finished, she kisses his villainous, beloved mouth. Fates, he’s still soft and hot to the touch. Her eyes sting, the tears refusing to abate.

Despite that, a venomous growl rips from her lungs. Wrath burning across her flesh, Wonder surges to her feet.

She must look savage, because her features stun everyone into immobility.

Before they can stop her, she stalks across the library with hooded eyes and a livid pulse.

While yanking the seed and blossom phial from her pocket, her mind focuses on one thing, one purpose, one reckoning.

She charges toward a ray of starlight, ready to swallow the mixture in one gulp and return to the enemy.

The rulers who stole such happiness from her, who robbed him of life, who took eternity from them both.

She will make them pay. She will tear them to pieces.

Chaos erupts from behind. Her peers shout and holler.

“Wonder! Wonder, stop!”

“Wonder, don’t!”

“Wonder!”

The world tips as Envy’s arm slings around her waist. “Ah-ah-ah. Not so fast, nymph.”

“Get off me!” she shrieks, arms and legs flailing. “Get the fuck off! They took him! They took him from me!”

“Hon, this isn’t the way,” the god grunts, wrestling with her. “You of all people know this. Come now, we need you.”

“I had him!” she rages, scratching the air. “I fucking had him, and now he’s gone!”

It’s pandemonium, with everyone issuing warnings, all of it overlapping into nonsense. Envy secures Wonder while she thrashes, so that anyone who goes near her receives a kick or a glob of spittle.

Harmony stalks in front of her. “Look at me,” the female instructs, grasping Wonder’s face. “Look at me, Wonder. Look at me, and remember who you are. Remember who he loved. Try to remember.”

Wonder seethes. Vengeance coats her tongue in acid, her retinas burn with red hot fury, and murder curls her knuckles into fists. They will die for him. They will bleed and suffer and weep for him. But not yet.

At last, the fog of hatred clears. And she remembers.

***

Three hours later, Malice’s body rests atop a long study table. Flanked by bookcases, he still holds the flowers and envelope to his chest. However, Wonder has also surrounded him with additional blossoms and pomegranates from outside, and she has set his archery by his hip.

He needs everything close, all of it in reach, in case he requires them. He might wish to smell the flowers or plot to steal them from her. He might ask her to reread the letter, so he’ll want that nearby as well. Or he might crave a book, or he might wish to trace one of his arrows.

She deliberates whether to change his bloody clothes, then dismisses the notion. It would conceal the way he died, and he’d despise that.

As for herself, Wonder had freshened up—with the help of Merry, Love, and Sorrow—once she calmed down. Unable to stomach wearing his blood, Wonder had conjured a soft green gown to replace her soiled garments, opting for bare feet over boots.

Temporarily, the thirst for revenge drains from her pores, leaving blessed numbness in its wake. She perches on the table’s edge, arranging and then rearranging Malice’s wildflowers, unable to get them right. If only she could get the bouquets right .

Perhaps she should start again.

Bodies crowd the space, a ring of silhouettes drawing close. Love and Andrew, Anger and Merry, Envy and Sorrow. And Harmony.

They stand and wait in solidarity with Wonder. Burdened by their attention, she glowers at them. Then a second later, remorse waters her eyes. Among the crew, she sees memories and friendship.

Merry, with her compassionate eyes. Love, with her steadfast expression. Andrew, with his empathetic gaze. Anger, with his turbulent loyalty. Envy, with his smooth tenacity. Sorrow, with her grim resilience. And Harmony, with her soothing patience.

They hadn’t known Malice as Wonder had. Nor will they truly know him, if she doesn’t share what happened. There’s so much to say, and they’re here to listen.

So Wonder tells them her story, his story, their story.

At the end of it, they understand a bit more. Andrew, who knows bereavement. Love, who knows metamorphosis. Sorrow, who knows deprivation. Envy, who knows rivalry. Merry, who knows alienation. Anger, who knows disruption. Harmony, who knows her pupil.

Yes, it has ended painfully. But it was worth it.

Hearing the myth of Malice’s evolution from mortal to immortal, of his redemption, of his sacrifice, the deities lower their heads, having never gotten a chance to meet the person she loves. And when each figure adds a flower to the arrangement, it finally looks right.

***