Chapter 16
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
SILVANUS
Ifell to my knees as I went to him, the impact of the song carrying me away to the forest clearing, white rose petals falling around me.
The song played on in Paris’s voice, the sound incredible. The finest voice to ever grace my ears.
The world is mine!
Treasures so divine!
Out I go to wander and see!
Oh, how magnificent to be a leaf so full of glee!
Melancholy. Beautiful. Tragic.
Different varieties of trees circled me, in full color where they’d once been dead. A starry night sky stretched overhead, a full moon’s light shimmering on the grass beneath my feet.
This was the metaphysical version of the Carving Glade, apparently. A beautiful place, for sure.
Moonlight…
My skin moonlight…
A gentle wind stirred the trees, a balmy breeze tickling my skin.
There were white rose bushes growing everywhere, elves in silver robes tending to them.
Paris stood over by a blackberry bush that cut across the clearing, more of those elves picking the fruit, plopping them in their woven baskets.
As brightly as Paris shone, the woman with the dark copper skin and incredibly white hair challenged him.
Caer. The elf deity, her lavender eyes flashing as she greeted Paris in a hug.
His arms remained at his sides, every inch of him clearly tense and uncomfortable.
I went to join them, but my feet stayed glued to the grass.
Curse it!
I tried calling for him, yet my words were sealed off from me, the song keeping me from hearing anything else.
Memories flared.
Selene Haven, the palace of onyx and red spires, happy times with my brother. Running through the moonlit forests, hunting those wretched humans.
A thicker veil of petals fell around me as the clearing returned. No further details or memories of my past came to me, only a reminder of what I already knew.
Paris…
My goodness, the more I listened, the further I sank into my obsession with him.
The notion of never touching him again burned like the sun. Every part of me rejected it, demanding it be taken back.
We weren’t enemies, we weren’t lovers, but we were…something else. And whatever it might be, I wanted more of it. More of him inside me, and more of me inside him. In every position, exploring the boundaries of our desires.
I liked being with him.
Despite my shower, his scent remained, enchanting me.
Stay on my skin eternally…
I closed my eyes, seeing him in so many colors. From our first meeting, to him being a thrall, the entire gambit of pain, rage, and lust. A constantly evolving landscape to lose myself within.
No. We were right to stop this. The world needed him, and my people needed me. There was healing to be done, things to explain.
The truth of Paris and I had been exposed. It wouldn’t help ease the disappointment the rebels held for me.
A kernel of rage reappeared. I pushed it down, having unleased enough rage on the world for tonight. The rebels would fall in line, and their desire for our race to walk a bloodier path would be quashed.
We had to be united in the fight for the world.
The rose petals finally gave way to a memory. One of a woman with auburn hair, her skin a similar pale beige to mine. We were standing on the edge of a cliff, gazing out into the night.
“Who are you?” I asked aloud.
An enormous forest spread beneath the cliff and, around it, snow-capped mountains jutted out of the horizon beyond.
The Eastern Pines, five miles east of the palace, home to the silver reindeer the humans loved to hunt.
A forest soaked in blood, a witness to many violent moments.
“This is familiar,” I said.
“What are you doing here?” the woman demanded, not looking at me.
She sounded unhappy.
“I—”
A different version of my voice answered, a past version of me stepping through my body. Slightly longer hair, messier than I usually wore it. A happier Silvanus before sorrow sank its claws into him.
I shivered, staggering backward. My mind ached, and so did the Heart of All.
Soon, I told those souls pleading for my return.
“Did you come alone?” the woman asked.
Past Silvanus’s response came muffled, indecipherable.
The woman didn’t look at him. “You weren’t followed?”
More muffled speech from me.
The woman kept her eyes on the vista. “We have to be careful, little brother.”
I gasped, the action involuntary and laced with pain.
Little brother?
“I have something to tell you,” she continued.
The scene collapsed, heat blooming in my left palm.
A mini-Paris appeared, twirling in a dance until the memory faded.
This woman was my sister?