12. Eli
12
ELI
“T here is nothing here that will hold us!” Cal shouted. I could hear the note of panic in her voice that she was attempting to mask from Mendax and me.
I hated to admit it, but Mendax had come through with the weathered.
Cal’s hair was darker in the rain, hanging limply as it clung to her face, neck, and shoulders. I hated how much I worried about her in this weather. I wanted more than anything to take her back to the human realm and leave her in the safety of that world. Humans were kept out of the realms for a reason. It wasn’t safe. Humans had no idea about all the magic that was only a fairy ring or tree hollow away. They kept their worries at bay and disguised and soothed their instincts with fables and fiction…or they believed it was all fiction.
The rain had come hard. As soon as Mendax had left the weathered’s house, it began to pour from the murky gray sky, more lifeless and broken-looking than any rain I had ever taken note of. Maybe it was because I now knew it to be the tears of a weather goddess.
I hated the thought of any woman crying this hard.
I didn’t know what Mendax had done to make her cry, and I doubted I wanted to. What was worse was he’d probably loved every minute of it, the bastard. That was one thing I would never be able to understand: How could you want to hurt people?
I was in love with Cal, I always had been, but recently I had started to realize it was a different Cal that I was in love with.
When she had confessed to all the lies and deceit at my castle, my eyes began to open a little to who she really was. Every challenge and conversation along this journey to Moirai had only opened them more. I was desperately in love with the Cal who always seemed as sweet as honey and as kind and caring as Aether himself in the Elysian Fields. The Cal who wanted to be with the animals and in the forest because it made her happy. The Cal who was honest and wholesome and cared about helping people and animals was who I was in love with, and it had taken nearly this entire trip for me to realize that I was in love with a lie, with someone who wasn’t quite her.
I fought against her and Mendax being together tooth and nail, and at first, I assumed it was because I was more in love with her than I had thought. After all those years apart, I had started to notice small changes in the girl I thought I knew, and I had blamed the Unseelie prince’s influence. I know now I was trying to keep the Cal I loved alive, to convince myself she still existed. The truth is I don’t even know if the Cal I loved was ever real and not just a scheme. Cal had hidden so much darkness from me, I still didn’t really know who she was.
I would never forgive her for killing my mother, even though I could understand it.
And I couldn’t help but wonder if all the kindness and love I’d seen in her all those years ago had been the doing of her sister’s drop of good-natured Artemi.
“I’m going back to the house to check on the weathered,” I declared. My feet moved slowly and heavily through the water that slid down the mountainside.
Mendax stepped in front of me, blocking my path. “You will not return to that house. The scroll said to induce a flood in order to get the next clue, and that is what I have done. If you waltz in there and unload your bullshit empathy, this will all stop.”
I tightened my jaw and stepped around him.
“Eli, stop! She will stop the flood, and then I will never get to Moirai!” Cal shouted.
Disappointment made my tongue heavy as I looked between the two of them. They really were perfect for each other. They had the same dark, selfish, uncaring scowl on their faces as they watched me.
“There were children in there. I don’t know who or what kind of kids they are, but I’m not going to just assume any of them can get out before the house is overtaken by water,” I snapped at her. How could she not care about the kids inside? Had she always been this way? “I will not stop the flood. You have my word.” They both looked furious with me. My chest hurt, feeling a little emptier than it had only a few minutes before. I saw Cal’s eyes recognize my disappointment. They flickered for a moment but then turned cold and steely. What was she thinking? If she were stronger, would she have tried to stop me? I thought she would have.
“They are not children, and you know it. Each is at least a millennia, I’m sure,” Mendax offered.
“The rain is going to pick up quickly. Unless one of you has suddenly gained strength and can fly, I suggest you find something to hold all of us. We need to get to the top of the mountain.” I didn’t wait for a response as I turned and began to walk the path to the weathered’s house with a tight jaw.
We were not that high up the mountain. The water would begin rising from below, and fae were notoriously bad swimmers, unless of course they were a water species. Mendax and I were too big to float. Realistically, I should have been carrying Cal up the mountain right now.
I banged on the door, and it rattled on the hinges.
“Please let me help. There is a flo?—”
The door opened, and Jamie, the weather goddess, stood on the other side with her dark hair mussed up. Tears poured down her red blotchy cheeks.
“I’m so sorry for whatever he did. Please let me take your mother and the children—and you—to safety.” I couldn’t help myself. She could still cry at the top of the mountain.
“I loved her so much!” she wailed almost incoherently.
I had no idea what she was talking about, but my heart broke as I watched her fall to the floor in a heap. She was sad and broken.
I swore under my breath before I stepped inside, out of the downpour, and closed the door behind me. I got down on the ground with the goddess, peeking around for the older woman and her children. I couldn’t see anyone in the front rooms.
“Listen, I’m sure they loved you too,” I said softly as I crossed my legs on the ground next to her.
“She never loved me! I’ve spent all this time waiting for her to return and hating myself for being the reason she couldn’t come back to me.” She heaved and gasped the words as she sobbed.
“I don’t know what he said to you, but take it with a grain of salt. None of it may be true at all. I don’t know the details, but if she was half as in love with you as you are with her, how could she possibly want to stay away?” I laid my hand on her shoulder and gently rubbed her back, feeling her bones shake with every wail. “Let’s get out of here, okay?” I asked as I pulled her up to standing. “Where did they go? Your mom and the kids?”
“Mother Nature? She took the others to their realms and left. They are safe,” she responded.
“Mother Nature.” I smiled at the realization.
The weathered’s tears came even faster.
“What? What is it?” I asked.
“Your smile—you’re Seelie. You practically radiate sunshine. I bet you could have made Flora come back,” she wailed, turning to wipe her nose on my soaked shirt.
“Wait, let’s get you a—” Gross! “Oh, okay. So that’s her name, Flora? Like flowers?” I asked, starting to put the pieces together.
Jamie nodded.
“Oh! Well, that’s perfect! You will see her soon then,” I said, relieved.
She looked like she was about to punch me. “Flora can’t come in the snow or rain. She can only return to me with sunshine,” the girl grumbled with surprising ferocity.
I sighed and said a silent prayer to the Fates that I wouldn’t regret what I was about to do. “Do you remember the first time you ever met Flora?” I asked her.
She snorted a sudden laugh, and tears flew onto my chest with her breath. The rain outside slowed.
Uh-oh.
“I do,” she said with a soft blush.
I held my palms up to stop any details she was about to share with me. I needed to hurry. I wasn’t getting my powers restored as I normally would have, and if I needed to use them in Moirai to help Cal or Zef, then this needed to happen quickly.
“You don’t have to tell me about it. Just think about it. Do you think she still loved you when the two of you had to say goodbye?”
The goddess nodded, and a few tears fell from her closed eyes as the pitter-patter of rain returned on the roof. “I could see it in her eyes. I know she loved me. It was fate, her and I,” she whispered, clearly picturing the sad moment in her mind.
“I truly believe the Fates make no mistakes and what is meant to happen will happen. Sometimes a shift in perspective is all that is needed. Trust me, I’m learning this myself right now,” I replied. Was I ever.
“Why did you come back? Why are you helping me?” she said as she wiped her tears away with a sudden look of apprehension. “I know you needed weather from me, and I can only assume it was a flood. Your friend is a smart one. Evil and horrible, but smart.”
I nodded and found myself thinking of my own situation and what was going to happen in Moirai. “I came back because my fault is and will always be that I can’t deny helping someone if it’s something I am capable of, even to my own detriment. Cliché, I know,” I chuckled. “I suppose it’s the curse of being Seelie.”
She shook her head. “Not all Seelie are like that. Initially, I had thought you were fake and manipulative. I see now that was not the case. You are a good man. Better than most.”
My own cheeks heated slightly. “I don’t know about that. I just came back to help. It’s not that big of a thing.”
“Okay, then help me bring Flora back,” she challenged. Her voice cracked like a silent plea with each word.
“Okay, but you have to get to safety right after,” I cautioned.
* * *
“What did you do?” Cal asked with wide eyes as I approached. She and Mendax were busy wedging boards together from one of the old porches nearby.
The hazy sun that warmed my neck felt like the best medicine I’d ever been prescribed. Almost immediately, my mood and optimism about this situation increased leaps and bounds. Everything would be okay at the end of this.
I grinned so wide, my cheeks strained. “I just chose to help instead of hurt. We won’t need this,” I said, pointing to the makeshift raft.
“Every time I start to tolerate your company, you prove exactly why Seelie and Unseelie could never be peaceful with one another,” Mendax grumbled as he stepped up to me.
The sun brightened for a second before the clouds veiled it. The little amount of sun had already done more for me than I could put into words, including restore a bit more of my power.
Mendax couldn’t do shit to me right now.
The rain danced as it came from the sky, falling like happy tears to the sleeping ground.
“Look! A rainbow!” I nodded in the direction of the beautiful arch filled with vibrant colors. It was amazing. I turned to see if Cal saw it. Her eyes were on me. Her gaze was so intense, I broke first and looked away. “I just had her remember all the good moments she and Flora shared.” I turned to face my friend. “I reminded her that even if what Mendax had implied was true and that Flora had chosen to be with someone else, it didn’t mean the times the two of them had were any less special. I reminded her that Flora could still come to her in the in-between but that even if she didn’t, there would be someone else better suited for her. I told her that if she truly loved Flora, then wouldn’t she want her to be happy? That just because things hadn’t gone as she’d hoped, it didn’t mean their friendship or love had died. It had just changed.”
Cal didn’t say a word as she watched me.
“And that worked?” Mendax said gruffly.
“Feuhn kai greeyth.” I smiled and closed my eyes, tilting my face up to the sky as the rain began to pour harder and harder. “Eternal love and friendship.”
Caly smiled at me, and Mendax spat next to where I stood.
“Look! The water is rising!” Cal said as she looked at the land below the mountain. “You did it! We need to add more boards, quickly.”
“No, we don’t,” I said with a smirk as I looked to Mendax and let my wings unfurl.