Chapter 28 #2
My gaze tracked the white and pink petals swept along in the stream to my right. It was beautiful here, and I felt that connection to nature I had come to love about Lucia more strongly in this place, but it wasn’t home.
Even if it was relaxing.
Some of the tension had just begun to fade from my shoulders when I came upon a lone female sitting beneath one of the fruit trees, her head turned away from me and her long silver hair like starlight in the dappled light that danced over her as the breeze teased the canopy of the tree that was giving her shade.
Her bare feet peeked out from the ragged hem of her silver-grey dress, toes toying with the water that brushed the grassy edge of the stream.
I stepped back to leave, part of me not wanting to disturb her solitude and part of me afraid of being caught alone in the woods—a forest I was unfamiliar with and didn’t know what sort of creatures roamed it.
“Stay, wolf. You need not fear me.” Her voice was woven of song and silver, bright and melodical.
I locked up tight.
I didn’t know her, and I didn’t recognise her scent, but somehow this female knew me and she had known who I was without even looking at me.
“Who are you?” I planted my feet to the ground even when I wanted to turn tail and run, denying that instinct that whispered I was in danger. “How do you know me?”
She lifted one hand towards the trees in a graceful way, the motion slow and gentle. “The land speaks your name. It whispers in every breeze, tinkles in the melody of the water, and hums in the buzzing of the bees. Do you feel it?”
“Feel what?” It took all my courage to keep from stepping backwards, away from her.
“The land calling your name.” She arced her hand downwards to sweep her fingers over the grass. “The hand of the goddess guiding you.”
I stilled right down to my breathing.
The goddess?
Lucia.
My dreams rushed through my mind in a sudden barrage of images, a stilted replay of running in the woods, of meeting the elkyn, and of the lake.
I looked at the trees that surrounded me, that persistent sensation that they were calling to me still tugging low in my belly.
I thought about the connection I felt to nature here, and when I had first experienced it, back in the Shadow Court.
It couldn’t be.
I slowly shook my head, fighting to believe the dreams and the connection I felt to this land had something to do with a literal goddess guiding me.
A goddess was a deity, something people worshipped to make themselves feel as if they weren’t alone, as if some higher power existed and was there to help them should they need it.
Wolves believed in a pantheon of gods and goddesses, but I had never actually believed they were real, living and breathing creatures.
But the way Kaeleron had spoken of Lucia, the way all the fae did, left me feeling as if they believed she was real.
I looked at my feet and the grass, and then at the trees, feeling nature swirling around me, filling my lungs and lifting me up, that sensation stronger now that I was afraid again.
What if Lucia was real?
What if she was reaching out to me whenever I was surrounded by nature and in my dreams?
But why would a goddess do such a thing for me?
I thought about the times I had felt that connection to nature, that pull of the trees as they called to me, as if they really were silently whispering my name, and the dreams that gave me a great sense of peace and comfort.
And realised that the times those dreams visited me had one thing in common.
I was always close to breaking.
When Lucas had rejected and sold me, and I had found myself here in this new world, afraid and hurting.
When Kaeleron’s brand had been taken from me, my connection to it severed to leave me scared and alone.
Both times I had been on the verge of breaking, feeling as if I couldn’t go on.
And the dream had come to me, offering comfort, offering strength. Offering hope.
“What do you know about the goddess guiding me?” I said.
She waved me away dismissively.
“It is not time to speak of that.” She angled her head slightly upwards, but I still didn’t catch a glimpse of her face. “You should leave. Return to the castle. Run, little wolf.”
“I don’t think I’ve seen you there.” I ventured a step closer to her.
“I am not welcome there.” She remained with her back to me. “Few would welcome me anywhere, yet when they desire knowledge, the path revealed, they seek me out.”
Curiosity had me taking another step towards her but I stilled again as more of her came into view.
Her hands moved in the air before her, long fingers deftly weaving threads of silver light and shadow together, knitting a complex pattern that had a chill skating down my spine when I recognised it.
Kaeleron’s brand.
I touched my chest, the spot where it had been.
“How do you know that symbol?” My words held more force, and a lot less friendliness, as I stepped forwards, towards the bank of the stream, bringing her fully into view. “Who are you?”
“They call me Arianell.” Her head twitched to one side and she whispered in a soft, honeyed voice, “I saw it.”
“On me?” I kept my fingers pressed to my chest.
Her head snapped towards me and her smile stretched wide, but it was the tattered cloth wrapped across her eyes that had me taking a step back. That instinct that whispered of danger screamed it now, but I couldn’t take my eyes off the cloth covering her eyes—or where her eyes had been.
It was too sunken over them for them to still be there.
Her fingers paused their work and she lifted one hand towards her face, her smile widening as the brand she had been weaving from magic disappeared.