8. She’s Riding a Wolf
Chapter eight
She's Riding a Wolf
Athanasius
I can feel my twin near. She's somewhere in these woods, she arrived not too long ago, doing whatever it is that makes her happy. I have no clue, she's all sunflowers and love and some other bullshit. We are on opposite ends of the spectrum, born at the same moment.
As everything lives, it dies, wasting away into the nothingness from where it came to recycle back into the wave of life that continually washes over this realm.
Ione's arm is under mine, her body pressed close to me, and I look down at the top of her head.
Her scent is thick there, warmed by her skull, I wish to lean my nose on her head and smell her.
Not now, I am on a mission, and I will not have her feminine wiles trying to distract me.
"How will you know when you've found your sibling? What do they look like?" She asks softly.
"Why are you whispering?" I ask, stopping in my tracks. "It is only us here."
Ione stares up at me, shrugging. "I don't know, I'm scared, well, I'm not scared." She jumps as an animals breaks a branch to her right. "I'm nervous."
"You are scared," I shake my head, pulling her along. "I can smell it. Your heart is racing, and you are starting to sweat."
Ione snatches her arm from me. "Fuck you Athanasius."
"Not now, we're busy." I try to grab her, but she steps backward. "Come, woman, now."
"Say please." She hisses. "You're being rude and mean. You do know how to comfort a human don't you? When we feel fear, just hold us closer, especially a woman."
"I do not care for these trivial feelings." Throwing my hands up, I growl at her. "What do you need to fear when I am with you? I am death. I am darkness personified! I—"
"Athy, I do not care. Apologize."
I will not. She will not make me. Reaching for her again, she side steps me, and now she's pissing me off. "Woman!" I snarl, finally grabbing her shirt to pull her close to me. Her nose is pressed against mine. "Do not tell me no."
"Athanasius," A voice coos to my left. "Normally you'd have burned up whatever avatar this was, but this one you play with."
"Luciara." I sigh. Placing Ione on the leaf carpeted ground, I stare at my sister. "What the fuck, your avatar is a Lycan? Why couldn't I have gotten a Lycan?"
Ione scoffs. "Fuck you."
"Not with the way you're speaking to me," I mumble. "How?"
"Oh," She rubbed between the ears of the wolf. "Destiny and all that." She laughs at her joke.
The air hums around my twin, bending toward the presence that approaches, as if the trees and earth themselves ached to be nearer. The scent of wild jasmine and storm-wet soil filled the clearing, thick and heady, twining with the golden light that spilled through the branches above.
Luciara Ethelaris.
My sister, my radiant counterpoint, my eternal foil.
She rides as a queen might, her spine straight, her fingers light upon the thick midnight fur of the beast that bears her.
The wolf, vast as a war steed, moves with the soundless grace of something ancient, something from before the dawn of mortal time.
Its eyes, burning amber, fix upon me, as knowing as they are untamed.
A singular white paw breaks the darkness of its form, a stark contrast—one flaw, one perfection.
And atop it, Luciara smiles.
She's always smiling.
Not the cold, cruel smile of gods (Yes, I'm talking about myself and sometimes Time) who toy with lesser beings, but something richer, something indulgent, something that sees through to the bone of existence and finds it all terribly amusing.
Her skin, deep and dark as polished mahogany, glows where the sunlight touches it, kissed by divinity itself.
From beneath the cascade of dark green hair, the elegant rise of her antlers stretches toward the heavens, gleaming as if they have been carved from jade.
And her eyes—all four of them—hold me fast.
The upper pair, a fathomless green, no whites to soften them, see beyond time itself. The lower pair, honey-brown, human in form if not in wisdom, flicker with mischief.
She pats the hip of the great wolf to a stop before us, her laughter carrying on the wind, rich and silken, a melody that belongs neither to the earth nor the sky, but some place in between.
“Well,” she muses, her voice golden, lilting with that knowing amusement that has plagued me since the first dawn of our existence. "I must say, brother, your avatar is quite comely."
She tilts her head, allowing the sun to trace fire along the elegant ridges of her antlers, and that damned smile deepens.
"Tell me—have you partaken of her yet?"
The words are a blade wrapped in velvet, a jest, a challenge, an inevitability she already knew the answer to.
Luciara. The ever-knowing, ever-radiant, ever-infuriating Luciara.
"Partaken?" Ione asks. "Is this a custom I am unaware of?"
"It is a custom, in some way." Luciara replies. Turning back to me she expects an answer. "Well? You two seem awfully intimate with one another."
Rolling my eyes, I let this human form slip and regain my true one. "You know I've never asked."
Luciara winks at Ione. "He's shy."
"The Lycan." I point, deciding to ignore them.
Ione creeps closer to my side. "I'm sorry, werewolves are real?"
Luciara laughs. "Did my darling brother not tell you this? Many…creatures are real." She slides off the Lycan's back. "This is Delilah, change my dear."
The wolf shakes its fur and becomes a human woman with peanut tinted skin and soft brown eyes. She's much shorter than my twin, just reaching her shoulder. "Primordial," She greets me in the old way, bending at the waist, hands outstretched before her, palms up. "I welcome you."
"This is the type of respect I want." Acknowledging Delilah, I tap her right palm with my index finger. "Mine could use some work."
"I could leave you out here." Ione scoffs. She extends her hand to Delilah. "I'm Ione."
The women shake hands. "Oh, that's pretty." Delilah smiles. "Let's give them time to talk." Grasping Ione's hand, she leads my avatar a little ways off.
"Your eyes are on her like a hawk." Luciara comments. "We have taken consorts."
Closing all of my eyes, I sigh heavily. "Where are the others?"
"Ignoring me," She clucks her tongue. "Normal."
"Luciara."
"Fine, fine." She arranges her long-sleeve robe around her arms. "Out and about, around and everywhere. You only need call us and we will convene, oh overbearing one."
Does she not understand the complexity of the situation nor the amount of wrong that has been done to us? It's infuriating me and I cannot seem to wrap my head around the fact that she does not feel as I do.
"I would like my revenge." I rub my forehead. "We have been wronged."
"I am well aware." Luciara answers. "I understand, Athanasius."
Does she? Betrayed by the ones we held dear, warped into this miniature versions of ourselves, and attached to trinket items. Her form is held captive by a silver bracelet.
My sister once roamed this earth in water form she chose, seeping into soil, expanding into air, bursting as rain, and she is content with what she is now?
"I can hear you thinking. I can feel the irritation coming off of you." She sighs. "Are you sure your domain isn't revenge and anger as well?"
I shrug. If I peddle on with this it'll fuel her to annoy me more. "In five days, bring them to Ione's home. We will speak more."
Luciara rolls her eyes. "Destiny has been keeping tabs on the mages, those that are left. You do realize you've killed four of the six."
"And we have one more." I reply, arms crossed over my chest.
Luciara pulls my arm. "You do see the reason why they might have done this?" I narrow my eyes at her. "Not the mages, absolute power corrupts absolutely, that this the way of things." She forces me to uncross my arms. "Our avatars, Athanasius."
I don't care to think about it.
The air hung heavy with the weight of Luciara’s words, each syllable a measured cut against my long-held beliefs.
“We used them,” she said, her voice quiet but unshaken.
“We took and took until they were nothing but tools to us.
We abused our powers, never seeing mortals as they were—as individuals, as beings beyond our purpose.
" She sighs. "We could not, perhaps, because such is the way of a primordial so far removed from the frailty of human existence.”
I listen, silent, though my thoughts churn.
Luciara steps closer, her gaze unyielding. “But we should have known better. We should have seen deeper. There was always another to replace one, and the humans knew this. Perhaps this punishment—this entrapment—is a lesson we failed to learn.”
I shift slightly, but still, I do not answer. Luciara and Destiny are always the ones who speak freely, who feel things in ways I do not. That much has never changed.
She exhales, tilting her head to study me. “You never did move with empathy, Athanasius. Affection is a slow tide for you, distant and hesitant.” Her eyes flicker with something almost amused. “But I see the difference now. I see it in how you look at her.”
I do not have to ask whom she meant.
“How long has it been?” she asks.
“Days,” I answer, the truth a simple thing.
Luciara arches a brow. “Then tell me—why do you allow Ione to challenge you?”
I say nothing.
She studies me for a breath longer, then nods as if she has already decided my answer for herself. “Think on that.” She turns, lifting a hand. “I will gather the others and meet you later.”
"Delilah?" She calls gently. The Lycan land bids goodbye to Ione before inclining her head to me. She shifts effortlessly, paws landing soundlessly on the earth. Luciara climbs onto her back, and with a final glance, they're gone, racing into the distance.
I stand unmoving, her words echoing in the silence.
Then, I feel her beside me.
Ione.
Looking down at her, I see the mirth in her eyes, the unwavering defiance that sets her apart from all who came before. Her eyes are not dull and lackluster from duty. She finds entertainment here…with me. That's the difference, she wants to be here.
“Have you ever been in love?” I ask her.
The question hangs between us, though I do not know if I am prepared for her answer.