Chapter 1 #4
When his warm hands ventured just below the neckline of her gown, she arched up into him. Her body knew what to do. He stilled. She looked up at him, his dark eyes even darker with desire.
"It is okay," she whispered. "I want to. I want this with you."
"Are you sure? Once we do, make no mistake, Vesperin, I will not go back. There will be no escaping from me. Already, I fear the depth of my feelings for you is too great to be contained."
"I am sure." Her thighs fell open. "You are the one thing that has remained solely mine. I want it to stay that way. I want to give you this in return, so you can have something too."
Their clothes were shed. The cold did not touch her nude body, for the fire at their side and the heat of him above her was too grand to penetrate.
He kissed her sweetly, and she returned each one with trembling hands, passing over his hard, bare chest. She remembered him the day she had found him, his bare body, streaked with ash, and the way his manhood had curved between his legs.
Large. In her innocence, she had nothing to compare it to; however, everything about him was larger than life itself, of course, that aspect would be as well.
Her thighs cradled his hips, and she felt him against her heat, and gasped, locking up. He shushed her, pressing open-mouthed kisses to her cheeks and jaw, as if to chase away her fear.
"I am owed nothing from you, Vesperin," Atlas murmured.
She shook her head, hair spilling around her like a dark halo on the furs. "I want you. Forgive me, I am nervous." She bit her swollen lower lip. "I do not know—"
Her words became a gasp as his hand trailed between them. She felt his fingers between her legs, touching her in a place no one had ever touched before. His touch was soft, yet it made her feel like she was a spinning Star in the galaxy.
He explored a place she had no idea had ever existed on her body.
She gasped and trembled, and when she felt like she was being stretched in a million different directions, she arched upwards. "Atlas! What is this feeling?"
"Do not think—just feel."
She was forced higher, until she shattered and fell like he had on the day they met. Pleasure curled her toes and made her chest heave as it crested over her.
She sagged. This was the moonlit darkness of intimacy that she had only heard of in whispers. Now she knew.
Something nudged against her again—larger than his fingers.
He stared deeply into her eyes. "Breathe for me."
She took a deep breath.
He pushed inside her, and it felt like, for one heart-achingly beautiful moment, that everything was right and he was hers and this was theirs and they had forever.
But forever was a lie.
It might be, but this, at least, was not.
As he moved within her, she gasped, fingers curling into his chest. She felt his breath against her neck as his head fell to her shoulders.
The feel of him inside her made a part of her ache. It was the most intimate thing she had ever experienced—and it was with him, which made it all the more precious to her.
He pulled away, and she gasped, hands curling against his forearms, as if to stop him from leaving.
"Don’t—" she gasped. "Stay."
He stilled, hands framing her cheeks. His black eyes revealed her reflection. Through his eyes, she saw herself. Her wide-eyed gaze, swollen lips, and flushed cheeks. He blinked, and the illusion fractured.
Atlas pressed his lips to hers. "I’m never leaving you, Star of mine."
She nodded, tears obscuring her vision. "I am sorry. I don’t know why I’m so emotional."
"Don’t ever apologize for being you—for your soft, sweet heart."
She tensed as he pulled away from within her, but the way he held her cheeks and kept her face up, directed to him, grounded her. She melted as he sank back into her, chasing away the feelings of emptiness.
She found herself approaching that precipice once more, but it was slower this time. A gradual crescendo that was shared between them. Each trembling gasp she made, he echoed in tune, masculine and deep.
She felt a pulse deep inside her, then a wash of warmth, coating her insides, just as she was forced over the edge, rippling around him.
He held her tight, crushing her to him.
Still inside her, he whispered, "You are mine."
The cold gave way to warmth. The flowers returned to the meadow.
The snow in the crater melted, the dark edges softened with grass, yet it never did return to its splendor of vibrancy, as if forever marred by Atlas’s arrival.
The tiny bloom in the blackened edge of the crater reached her knees now.
It was a grey and black flower, strangely solemn for such a pretty place.
All they had done during the cold months was find solace in each other’s bodies.
Vesperin spent more time in the cave with Atlas than she did in her own home.
Her father joked that her head was in the clouds.
Her younger sister asked if someone had turned her eye, to which Vesperin smiled coyly and looked away.
She was grateful for the warmth, for now they could return to the willow tree.
Vesperin sat in the field of flowers, taking in the beauty of it all.
Atlas was beneath the tree, watching her. He always watched her.
The sky blushed pink, the faint impression of the twin moons barely seen.
A small butterfly flitted in the air before her. Its wings were baby blue. Vesperin raised a hand, and the tiny creature perched on the tip of her outstretched finger.
She smiled at it. "Hello."
She looked up, wanting to show Atlas, but his eyes were already on her, a strange expression gripping his handsome face. The long leaves of the willow cast shadows around him.
The butterfly flew away.
Beneath the willow tree, they made love. Moaning as his teeth nipped between her thighs, and he tasted her. Gasping against each other as he moved within her. Afterwards, he held her against his body, using her cloak to conceal her. He held her like he was afraid she was going to be taken from him.
Under that tree, they had each other many times, until the air grew sweltering and the sleeves of her gowns grew thinner and shorter with the suffocating heat.
Vesperin found herself growing sick again; though, she ate better than she ever had with the meat Atlas supplied for her—he did not want her wanting for anything.
She found herself rising early to expel her dinner in the wooden basin that had taken up residence by her bedside. The trek to the willow grew laborious, but she never missed a day.
Vesperin’s father grew ill. She wondered if it was the same illness gripping her, but her sickness seemed to only affect her in the morning.
Her father was sick all day, unable to leave bed.
She had to help her mother more—tending to the gardens and washing.
The time of her visits grew later.
Until one evening, she was unable to get away until the moons were high in the sky and the village was cloaked in darkness.
She pulled the hood of her cloak up, keeping herself covered.
As she walked past the border of her village, the trail grew uneven. Shadows flitted over the ground, and she gasped.
A light sparked ahead, and she looked up sharply, hood nearly falling back.
A shadow was right before her, crafted into the shape of a man.
She stepped back. The shadow wavered in the air.
She was alone. No one to hear her scream.
"Vesperin Vox." The words filled the air. She knew they came from the shadow, but the shadow had no mouth to speak with.
Her feet stuck to the ground. She couldn’t move. Her body was frozen.
"You have sinned. Humans are not meant to know Celestials, and you have not only known a Celestial, but lain with one."
She couldn’t move her mouth.
"In your womb, you carry an abomination. It cannot live."
If she could move, she would have fallen to the ground.
"Fate itself will unravel if the babe within you is born. The Celestial you love"—the voice held a mocking tone—"will die. Your planet will die. Galaxies will fall. The very nature of time will cease to exist."
Her lips were unfrozen.
She gasped. "What—what do I—do?"
The shadow swept nearer to her, reaching for her stomach.
"Sacrifice yourself, and they all will live. This is the only way you can save him and the babe within you. Die or condemn the future of everyone for your selfish wants."
The shadow dissipated.
Vesperin dropped to the ground, cradling her stomach. She was pregnant.
That was the first night she missed going to the meadow.
She tried to pretend like everything was okay, but could not manage it.
When Atlas tried to touch her, she shied away.
She lay in bed, holding her flat stomach and imagining the life growing within—pregnant.
She had never been allowed to dream of something like this before. And now it was stolen from her.
She couldn’t look Atlas in the eye without feeling like she was killing him for her selfishness. It began to eat at her.
Atlas was always at the meadow in the evenings and nights, so she went during the day, pulled by an invisible force. Her satchel banged against her hip with each step.
She felt untethered from her body.
She sat heavily beneath the willow tree, vision blurring as she pulled free a simple shearing knife from within. It was heavy in her hands.
That shadowed voice followed her, a hand reaching from the ground.
"It is the only way," said the shadow.
The blade trembled in her hand. She leaned back against the tree. "He will—he will live?"
"Yes."
"And my b-baby?" It felt odd to claim it, that she was growing a life.
"The babe’s existence will not end."
She cupped her stomach. Her voice trembled as she whispered to the life within her, "If I don’t, you will die. But if I do, you both will live."
She faced the blade toward her chest. She could not hurt her stomach. But her heart…
"Forgive me," she said into the soft midday light of the meadow.
A part of her screamed silently.
No—
She drove the blade into her heart. It took effort. But a force pressed against the hilt, aiding her, as it slid inside her easily. She felt it puncture her heart, and it beat weakly before giving out entirely.
The force against the blade bled away as blood bloomed on her gown.
She sagged against the base of the willow tree.
Eyes fluttering as everything grew blurry, and she knew nothing but darkness.
Atlas walked into the meadow as the sun dipped below the horizon, just as he always did.
He felt strange, uneasy.
He told himself it was because of Vesperin, the way she had been growing sick right before his eyes.
The meadow was silent as he breached the tree line.
Was she not here yet?
He stared at the crater as he passed, a shiver suffusing his frame. It reminded him of the agony of his fall every time he looked at it. The anguish of his banishment from the Stars—for loving humans so much, he had been condemned to walk among them.
It had been the worst pain, but never for an instant had he endured it alone. From the moment his eyes had first opened, she had been there, before him.
He walked up the hill, and that was when he saw—her.
"No." The word was ripped from him like he had been ripped away from his home.
It was a blur as he ran to her, fell to his knees, and took her in his arms.
She was limp. Cold. A dagger embedded in her chest, blood on her beautiful gown, on her skin. It got on his hands as he ripped the blade free. Red ran sluggishly from the hole in her chest.
He held her to him, screaming. There was screaming. Was it coming from him?
"Vesperin? Wake up. Do not do this. No—no. Vesperin!"
His voice broke.
Her head fell limply against his shoulder, eyes closed, mouth still shaped around a final breath.
"Why?" the Celestial sobbed.
The only answer was the willow’s weeping leaves, brushing against the ground.
"It was the only way." A melodic voice spoke.
Atlas grew rigid, gathering Vesperin in his arms.
"You—you did this?" He stared wildly at the meadow and the base of the tree until he found the shadow near the bark.
The shadow wavered. "It had to come to pass. She carried your babe."
Atlas fell against the tree, Vesperin still in his arms. His eyes dropped to her stomach—flat, unmoving, with not even a breath. She was so cold.
"Pregnant?" Atlas breathed.
"Now you know why we could not allow her to live."
He placed his shaking hand on her stomach, trying to feel for her Soul—she was empty, an echo of her and something small and delicate in her womb.
"No."
"She and the Soul of her babe have already been reaped. The babe will stay with us. We cannot allow a being like that into the galaxy."
"What—what about Vesperin?" Atlas demanded, pressing his brow against her cold cheek.
"She will be reborn, but her Soul will be hidden from you. This is your punishment for loving humans more than the Stars. The Stars await you. Do not wander in grief any longer. Come home," said the shadow.
Atlas shook his head, unable to speak.
"Very well, Atlas." The shadow drew out the sound of the name Vesperin had given him, then left.
The sound of that name was what made him break. Nova seeped from his body into her cold form, as if to cling to whatever vestiges of her Soul remained.
He buried her body beneath the willow tree. And knew he would never be able to track down her Soul. She would be reborn, time and time again. He would be left to chase after her, always hunting her down. A moment too late.
He had known nothing but utter singularity, his entire existence driven to one point of anguish, and then she’d come and refocused his attention until all he knew was her.
Now she was gone.
And he was alone.