Chapter 6 One Aeon Pre-Great War
One Aeon Pre-Great War
“I’m not sure whether everyone was more excited to graduate or to no longer be in classes with you.”
At the sound of Lila’s voice, Luc turned, and his smile was just for her. His body, a sliver of light slicing through the Void’s dark canvas. He’d been standing near the edge of the marble platform, but as she approached, he met her halfway at the obelisk.
“If they’d worked harder,” he noted, “they could have graduated early and would no longer have had to deal with me. It’s their fault, really.”
“In an aeon or so, I’m going to thrust your face into the Void and wipe off that cocky expression so thoroughly you’ll never find it again. Or the rest of your face, for that matter.”
“But then you won’t get to look at my face.”
“The back of your head is better.”
Luc raised an eyebrow. He sat down with his back against the obelisk.
“Then sit,” he commanded, patting the ground next to him, “and tell me about the festivities. You don’t have to look at me. You can look at the Void since you prefer it so much.” He pointed to the endless, matter-less darkness.
“Meeting here was your idea.” Lila sat, remembering the first time they’d met there to discuss his Earth project, away from prying eyes, half an aeon ago. “You said you do your best thinking while staring into blank space.”
“Well, never mind that. What happened? Did the Void explode when shot at?” Luc raked his hair across his forehead, and Lila couldn’t help but be drawn in by his gray eyes that were nearly silver and his chin-length hair, so blond it was white, that flared out at the tips as it flipped away from his sculpted jaw.
Despite her earlier remarks about his face, it was, truly, one of his best features, his bones sharp as blades honed on a whetting stone.
He’d always been one of the taller students in their class, but now the muscles in his filled-out frame gave him dimension—not too much dimension for her taste, as in Beni’s case, but enough to convey solidity.
Enough for her to fantasize about being enveloped by his strong arms at inconvenient moments, mostly when she was lying in her dormitory bed alone after Castor had persuaded her to do something she found particularly undesirable.
She should never have thought of Luc in that way, but she’d thought him attractive ever since she’d known she was supposed to find Castor attractive.
At least, as long as Luc kept his mouth shut. Which never happened.
Lila snorted.
“An exploding Void would have been better than listening to those awful love letters Beni read aloud.”
“Ah, those.”
“Yes, and before you ask, no, I will not repeat such nonsense.”
“Will you write me a love letter?” His face crinkled with mischief.
“No.”
“That was a fast answer.”
“You write enough love letters to yourself, I’m sure. You can hardly have need of mine.”
“Come on, what did the letters say? Were they really that bad? Why don’t you whisper them in my ear?” Luc gave her a salacious grin.
“Why don’t you be silent and still if you want me to do anything at all?”
Luc raised his hands in surrender, and Lila swiftly arranged herself on his lap.
“I thought you said no more kissing.”
“I said, after graduation, there would be no more kissing.” After graduation.
When she gave in to the demands of her actual existence, as opposed to her near non-existence at the edge of the Void.
“But, technically, we haven’t graduated yet,” she continued.
“The celebration is ongoing.” Lowering her head, she touched her lips to his and breathed into his mouth, deciding a near non-existence was as close to an alternate existence as she would get, and that would have to do.
At one time, Lila had wished to be as sweet and compliant as Eva and Adrianna.
She’d begged the Creator—silently, but furiously—to rip her desires out of her.
She’d felt guilty that she didn’t function properly as part of her pair when she knew the Creator didn’t make mistakes—that the fault must lie within her—but she had no idea why she didn’t find Castor attractive.
Why she couldn’t muster the right kind of affection—of late, any kind of affection—for him.
Or why she and Castor had such opposite interests, personalities, and sensibilities that it was a wonder they’d come from the same soul.
Or why, instead of getting closer to him as they aged, like the instructors promised her she would, she resented him more than ever.
So she’d begged and begged to become something different, something that made sense, up until she’d been told she would never be an architect.
And then, with that one true dream stripped from her, she’d decided if she had to spend an eternity bearing the weight of a soul that wasn’t hers, she would carve out a tiny bit of happiness for herself in that eternity.
It was a horrible thing, wrapped in shame and secrecy, and it wouldn’t last, but for this brief moment, it was hers.
“It’ll be like this,” Luc rasped in the lull between kisses, “only huge clusters of lights.” He waved his hand over the curtain of the Void. “Spirals of lights and clouds in infinite colors.” Bringing his hand to rest on the small of her back, he stroked her spine.
Lila laughed. Of course, he was talking about his imaginary world. Any other angel would have been annoyed by his drifting thoughts, his inattention to the matter at hand, but she found this quirk of his amusing, having lived with it for so long.
“And the rest of it will be black?” Lila asked, bracing her arm on the obelisk as she leaned over him.
“Well, you couldn’t see the lights very well if it was all bright like this.” His eyes darkened with desire as she lowered her face to his slowly, very slowly.
“So an intentional Void?” she asked.
Luc smiled.
“It’s not the Void. It wouldn’t be made of the same material.”
“It’s the Void.” Lila straightened.
Luc creased his face in annoyance.
“You like the Void, don’t you?” she teased, brushing his hair away from his face. “You like that there’s something in our world that no one has figured out yet because that means you get to.”
Luc shrugged.
“Well, it’s got to be useful for something. Otherwise, what is it doing here?”
“You realize it was here before you? Maybe it’s wondering the same thing about you.” She drew a line down his chest.
“The Void”—he grabbed her wrist—“doesn’t have sentience.”
“Why not?” She slipped out of his grasp and stood. “The Creator has sentience.”
“Well, what is the Void saying then?”
“Get out of my stomach.”
“What?”
“We could be in its stomach right now. We don’t know.” Whipping away from Luc, Lila drifted to the edge of the platform. She wondered if the Void would have anything to say about their speculations.
“The Void is not a being.” Luc crept up beside her. “And stop! That’s weird.”
“You’re weird.” She turned to him. “You want to create another Void.”
“It’s not…” Luc huffed. “I’m going to steal your pin,” he threatened, reaching for her collar.
“Hey! No, I need that!” Lila protested, but she didn’t stop him from unhooking her carpentry pin and removing it from her robes.
“I’ll trade you.” Luc removed his architect pin and placed it where hers had been.
He smiled, his metalworking pin still gleaming on his collar. A hammer and anvil.
“It suits you. You should keep it.”
Lila arched an eyebrow.
“I doubt you want to start your career with the Council by losing your pin at the first opportunity.”
Luc shrugged.
“They’ll give me another one. Keep it. I won’t take it back.” Pocketing her pin, he smirked and assured her, “I’ll keep yours too.”
“I suppose I can steal Castor’s,” Lila mentioned, relenting with a sigh.
“Good. He deserves it.”
Lila smiled.
There were few moments in Lila’s existence where she allowed herself to feel all that she wanted to feel, but this was one of them.
She beamed with pride as she smoothed her finger over the metal pin she’d longed for: a half-circle inside a circle, each formed from a series of interwoven knots.
The knots symbolized the interconnections of all the arts when they joined together in architectural designs.
When she looked up and saw Luc’s eyes mirroring her happiness, she felt a surge of love for him, and, for once, she let it wash over her, and she didn’t stop it.
She kissed him, and she thought she heard the Void shudder, but whether it was chastising her, approving her, or mocking her, she couldn’t say.