Gregory
Gregory looked up at his sister’s apartment as his father came up from behind him. He was supposed to recruit his sister to join his side, but she had a new life now. She had gone back to school to finish her astronomy degree. As his father came up from behind him he cringed. “Greg, did someone beat you to it?”
“Yes, her boyfriend that she had left six months ago, Demetry.”
“Don’t worry,” his father promised. “she won’t make the same mistake. Not if she’s a Fenelly.”
Gregory nodded as he and his father disappeared into the night with the shadows. Not far above was Celeste working intensely at her studies.
________
She groaned, as she focused her attention to physics and astronomy. All her pain that she left after leaving Demetry was focused into her school. Her mother constantly texted her, asking if she was alright. They were trying, very much to reconnect after the loss of losing Demetry.
Are you okay? You’re not obsessing are you?
Celeste typed intensely. No, I’m not, I’m just studying.
To long. Take a break.
Celeste sighed, as she closed her computer as a paper airplane hit her in the head. She looked down and saw a note written in Demetry’s handwriting. She rolled her eyes and looked outside, half hoping, half dreading that she would see him. He wasn’t there.
Sometimes she would hallucinate that he would come back to her in dreams. That he would forgive her for leaving him. They did somehow weaken the curse, somehow she could have been happy with him. A part of her wished she had gave in and told him how she felt.
_____________
Demetry didn’t hear back from her, the message didn’t work and neither did a telepathic link work. She was blocking him somehow, so he had made it up in his mind to get into the building somehow where she was. Finally he told the security of the building he was a friend of Celeste. As he walked upstairs, he heard her laughter.
Celeste had a solitary room,filled with alchemy and astronomy posters. Albert Einstein took a special place near her headboard. She had a solitary room, as she had Fane were long friends-well she didn’t know if they were friends no more. Last year had been a complication one ordeal after another coming onto her like a storm that woke her from a pleasant dream.
Her wand was hidden away in her draw, she hadn’t used it since last year. Any magic she used was simple telepathy and telekinesis. Demetry brought out the magic in her, he brought outa lot of emotions, feelings and nuances.
The darkness that shadowed her heart had overcome her sometimes. With the constant training with the new High Priestess and her brother, she had learned to control it.
__________
Demetry felt the change also, he could tell she was heartbroken as much as she was. She was right however, that she showed how much she had loved him, with every kiss and every embrace.He missed her, a lot and his sulking hadn’t gone unnoticed. He replied apathetically saying that the developing romance between Arestar and Quigley hadn’t gone unnoticed either. Remembering how he felt when he and Celeste declared their feelings, the high of hormones and the absolute inability to keep their hands off one another.
He ate his bowl of cereal after his last attempt to visit Celeste. He couldn’t bring himself to do it, every time with an invisibility charm he goes to knock on her door and he stands there frozen. Demetry saw it in his mind’s eye, playing like his dream over and over taunting him.
“You don’t look right man,” Daniel said.
Daniel had looked the same as him. Sulking in his inability to tell Fane how he felt. They hadn’t talked about, but somehow they didn’t need to, they both knew the other was grieving.
Pouring enough sugar on his cereal, he shoved a spoonful into his mouth. “I’m fine.”
’I’m fine’ was another phrase for ‘I’m not feeling well, but I’m doing okay’.
“Take it easy man, all right?”
Daniel nodded as he opened his phone and typed in Celeste’s number. Just a plain a simple text, he didn’t want her to be too appalled. Can we talk?
The response made his stomach turn over. Soon, not yet. I have midterms coming up.
It was better than nothing. He had a chance.
_______
“He wants to talk to me again,” Celeste told Joanna.
Joanna had accepted that Celeste loved Demetry, and even though she hadn’t wished the darkness upon her daughter, it wasn’t Demetry’s fault and she stopped blaming him. Celeste told her mother what she could, and they both weighed the possibilities. They had grown closer somehow, and both had put aside that Demetry had felt discouraged about his feelings towards Celeste because Joanna had warned him.
“You have to stay away from my daughter, do you understand me?”
“I think that’s Celeste choice too, if she doesn’t want to see me she doesn’t have too.”
“She does want to see you, don’t you understand?” Joanna asked.
Demetry’s features softened as his heart lifted. “She does?” He chuckled slightly, for want of more information. “I was warned to keep my distance, for some whatever reasons no one wants Celeste to be comforted! For some reason she thinks our whole relationship was her fault, which is not true. She did nothing wrong, she keeps pushing away from me. I want to be with her, I don’t want her to go through this darkness alone.”
“You have a very soft heart, and I appreciate it,” Joanna replied. “but let her come to you.”
“I told him you would come to him.”
“How could I come to him? I don’t even know what to say to him.”
“I’m sure if you say what is in your heart, you would find the right words.”
Celeste wasn’t sure if that was even possible. It was like walking in to a labyrinth in her mind, trying to find the right moment, to calculate it. Should she tell him immediately? How was he going to react anyway? Was he going to be angry at her for never saying she had loved him back?
Her mom, was not the right person to talk to about this, she needed to talk to Fane.
_________
Daniel put away his headphones as he walked into the forest, hoping to run into one of the faeries, or one druid. He heard them giggling by a fountain; he heard the crackle of sticks as he began walking towards them. He took out in wands in anticipation, as a man appeared pinning Daniel to the ground. He seemed to be larger, more muscular, his face was well rounded, and he had a double chin. It took Daniel all his strength not to laugh.
“Real mature, Daniel, real mature,” he heard Arestar say in his head.
The man lifted Daniel’s wand and put it to his chest, apparently the man knew how to kill a mage. “What do you want, mage?” the man spit out the words like it was venom.
“I need to speak with the Queen of Fae,” he spit out.
The man let him offered a hand for Daniel to stand up. “What’s your reason?”
“What’s your name?”
“I need to know your reason for visiting the queen, before I can tell you anything.”
Daniel raced through his mind, hoping for the more eloquent form of ’Yeah I formed a telepathic emotional bond with the Queen of Fae, who killed her own father to save me and my friends and she literally kicked me out of the court because of this whole Power of Five thing that is relatively known to me and my friends’. “It’s a personal matter. Now who are you?”
“I’m the Queen’s fiancé, Prince Alster, so I’ll ask you another question. What’s the ‘personal’ matter you speak of?”
Fiance? That is not possible.
“Oh let him go Alster,” one druid replied. “let him speak to her.”
Prince Alster, as the druid in white explained was the son of Aubrey. Which gave Daniel hope, if he could find the Queen of the North Forest he could convince Aubrey to at least break off this ludicrous engagement. He was sure Prince Alster was a nice man, but right now he wanted to break out into his wolf form and attack him. Fane would be angry with him, if she cared for this prince at all. He doubted it, how could she move on so quickly?
Did time move differently in the Fae Realm? It would explain why Fane was so much older than him. They gave Daniel a well bred white horse, as he rode aside the druids. His heart beat faster in anticipation of seeing Fane again? Did she change? Did she still talk to Celeste?
As they arrived at Fane’s home, she exited the house in an armor of bronze, with a sword attached to her back and flowers in her hair. Her mouth almost hung open, her eyes swelled as she saw him.
“Darling, there is a wolf that would like to speak with you? The druid let him pass, do you know of him?”
Fane stuttered, struggling for the truth. “No, I have not.”
“He wasn’t a lover of yours?”
“No,” she replied. “leave us, I’ll deal with him.”
Prince Alster grabbed her arm as she whimpered at the twist of her arm. “I would advise you not to fraternize yourself with creatures who are lower than you.”
“I can handle myself.”
He left, without so much as another word.
Daniel and Fane exchanged glances, then without having a need for words Fane embraced him and for the first time in a long while, kissed him. “I’m so sorry for that, I meantto make it like I didn’t care-I had to for the Prince, we’re engaged.”
Daniel pulled away from her. “Engaged?”
“Not for my personal reasons, the other queens personal reasons. They want me as a daughter-in-law. It’s political reasons.”
“You’re the Queen, can’t you get out of it?”
“No, unfortunately, but I missed you so much, I wanted to talk to you.”
Not knowing what else to do, he followed her back into her house. “I would offer you something, but all I have are dried figs and fruit.”
“Fane, it’s fine. I know last year I couldn’t break the bond, and Margaret and Maisie wanted to kill you-“
“It’s fine Daniel, I don’t mind it, really. I thought about it everyday since we’ve been apart, and its made my feelings even stronger. I’ve had desires and urges, but I don’t want to push you away-“
He took her arm and pressed her body against his. The summer heat made her skin warm and tingly, matching to his warming temperature. “You could never do that, and just so we’re clear, I feel the same way.” Her excitement rose between them, as she brought him to her as he held her in the middle of the living room floor, clinging to each other.
_________
“Who is that wolf?” Prince Alster asked his council. “What is he doing with my fiancé?” The crowd was murmuring to themselves, as Fane and Daniel were gone for a considerable amount of time. Alster came from the North Forest and agreed to the union to satisfy the people of the forest. It wasn’t even a complete proposal, it was an arrangement. He held her hand, as if she had a growing grotesque spectacle on her hand. He declared his intention in front of the entirety of the Fae Court.
Fane, at the moment went along with it. The words of protest died in her throat, every reason seemed to slip away, as she took his hand. All that time she was thinking of Daniel, and thinking Celeste. Celeste gave up everything she was to be with Demetry, and that’s what love is just complete and utter sacrifice, giving up everything that you are to be with the one person; it left Fane wondering why she couldn’t do the same.
All that time she wanted Alster to be Daniel, even as she sat at the high end of the table, she was as far from Alster as anyone could be. She sat near the Council of Nymphs, hearing them giggle as a song played through the flutes and violins. Their green dresses hung so low from the trees, as they walked the nymphs carried the train of their dresses behind them.
Alster was talking with his friends from his council, discussing the important details of the marriage. In a year or so Alster wanted a son as heir on the throne.
_________
Maisie was brought to Demetry to talk, he was busy writing a speech for the position as Head Mage. He wanted the responsibilities that came along with it, to be involved more in the magical community and hopefully he’ll be able to find out more, anything about the Celestial Sword that would defeat the curse. There had to be a special incantation to activate it, a wizard or a crystal. He groaned as he minimized the computer that had allowed him to contact the magical community and opened the Pages app on his computer. As he waited for Maisie, she was brought in with large men from the new Headmistress Heywood as a precaution. Demetry dismissed them and gave Maisie a glass of water to sit. Her eyes were blood crimson red, the bags underneath her eyes nearly went to her cheeks. Her blond hair was extremely dirty, a thick layer of dir was underneath her long fingernails as Demetry sympathetically touched her hand. She had been with Headmistress Heywood for nearly a year since Demetry couldn’t bring himself to kill her or Margaret so they had been put in jail for the rest of their lives.
Maisie, explained after Demetry and Celeste brought her back to Institute with them, that she had a contract with the King of Fae, as she had promised that Celeste would bring his wife back. She sacrificed herself; she didn’t want to live anymore than Fane wanted to stay with her father. She took the throne and now had her rightful place.
“Are you alright?”
“No, of course I’m not alright. You could have been on my side, your blood is pure. The purest of them all. Demetry, help me we can work together, please just let them stop torturing me.”
“Heywood doesn’t torment-“
“No Demetry, not her, the voices. There are voices that are whispering in my head and in Margaret’s head too. We hear demons.”
“Demons don’t communicate that way. They don’t have to power to haunt people.”
“Well something is, and it’s not just coming after me, it’ll come after all of us.”
“Is there anything else that you can tell me that might help us?” he asked hopefully.
“Why?” she snapped. “Are you afraid that this new threat will ruin your chances with Celeste?”
Demetry frowned and looked down at the floor, he couldn’t help but admit that was true. He wanted Celeste to believe, in more than anything that she would come back to him. All he was told was to give her space, and he gave more than he had the patience for, now all he had wanted to do was yell at her and tell her to come back. “What happens to me and Celeste is none of your business, you tried to kill her best friend. You have this obsession that only witches and mages that come from a family of all magic, but there as thousands of angels, werewolves and millions of other creatures who are not fully all magic. Being different in a world trying to make you the same, is one of the best things in this dark world we live in.”
“I don’t have an obsession, I have a right. It used to be like this, a long time ago when magic came into this world. Humans are the same, Dem, they will always prosecute us, hunt us down.You know how humans are with magic, they’ll want to interview us and dissect us until there is nothing there, and then they will use our magic for their own selfish gain.”
“Not all of them,” Demetry replied demurely. “I had some humans friends that I grew up with in school that knew me for who I am.”
“Did you tell them who you are?”
“That’s not the point, I’ll keep you here in a guest room where hopefully you’ll be safe from the voices, but you are no longer family to me.”
She nodded as he led her towards her room; he shut the door mumbling a few protection and barrier incantations. “Celeste, I need you,” he whispered to himself, hoping no one had heard.
________
Celeste heard his plea, echoing in his mind her heart calling out to his. The darkness swallowing her up, until what she felt was nothing. There was a reminder that magic would always hurt her, to take what she had cared about. Something in her heart had called out to him, she had turned to Headmistress Heywood during this time in her office.
Her red hair pulled back in a tight bun, with her nonchalant but cool stare coming from her eccentric colorful glasses. She was staring hard in concentration, looking at the important papers in front of her.
“What exactly did you tell Demetry, last year when I went home?”
“I told him to give you space, which you need. You need to control your powers and control your darkness.”
“I can control my powers,” Celeste replied impatiently.
“Really can you say that you really love Demetry without getting scared and running away?”
“You’re my mentor, not my friend,” Celeste reminded her.
“It all goes to say, I just know what you’re afraid of. You’re afraid of saying ‘I love you’, and you need to embrace the emotions you think of protecting those you care about. Only then will you have full control over your power and then you can break the curse.”
“I don’t know how-“
“Then I’m afraid you can’t be with Demetry,” Heywood said with a smirk.
“You’re not making this easy on me.”
“If I’ll be easy on you, you won’t learn.”
