Paper Moons - Part 16 (Patreon)

“What is wrong with you?” I snapped, my voice breaking across the cave in which we stood.  “Why did you do that?”

“Because if I had not,” he said patiently, “you would have.”

“I am aware of that, Gabriel. And that was my choice to make.”

His laugh was condescending.  “You think that’s what that was? Consent? She had you under her thrall and you weren’t even aware.”

“What I’m aware of,” I yelled, “is that I have been hired by your fathers to protect you and yet you seem hell-bent on putting yourself in harms way each time.  Tell me, would you like to let the madness consume you or would you like for me to actually do my job?”

Gabriel’s jaw was locked tight, his eyes refusing to look at me.  I could feel my own anger bubbling within as I stared at the pinched wound on his neck. Blood and spit still lingered against his skin, all signs of the bond he had made with the vampire for my namesake.

“I am going to make something very clear to you now,” I told him. “I am my own person. The decisions I make, whether they are good or bad, are my own to make. You do not get to make them for me. Continuing forward, refrain from it, understood?”

Silver flared in his eyes but he did not argue. “Understood, Graceling.” The words were thin and came out like a cracked blade.

Straightening, I looked out over the desolate stretch of land before us, tipping my chin upwards.  “Let us get back to the market,” I said firmly. “We shall take this moonlight and conduct the spell to make you better. We have floundered but we are still on the right track. We just simply should have been better. That does not mean we have failed.”

Gabriel looked at me out of the corner of his eye.  “We are assuming the moonlight will work.”

“Of course it will work,” I said with conviction.

“How do you know?”

“Because I will allow for no other truth.”

~~~~~

We found Kavatti dancing, having forgotten about us.  Her hair glowed silver however, and her skin looked flush.  She blinked upon seeing us, as if it were for the first time. Then, her smile grew even further.  “Moonlight,” she said with a bow. Bits of dust trickled from her fingers, the light from the sky swelling within her.

I made no comment towards Gabriel or her as I walked towards the opening of the village cave.  The man that had stood guard was still there and as I walked past him, head held high, he said nothing. We were within the outskirts once more, ready to walk across the cold stretch of land to a market who may or may not let us back in.

The bravado I had possessed only hours before began to wane as the village behind us disappeared into the dark and the night market lights weren't even a blur on the horizon. Kavatti lit up a small patch of the land around her as she pirouetted forward, dancing to a show all of her own.  I watched her, wondering what kind of life she had had before.  If she had family. If anyone missed her.

Next to me, Gabriel kept touching at his wound, an unconscious swipe of his thumb against where the bite mark had once been. It had faded into a crack however, as if it were no more than a tear against parchment.

“Does it hurt?” I asked.

He frowned. “No. But it does not feel right.”

“How so?” I had heard things about bite marks from vampires. They were used within brothels and pleasure districts to control men and women. Secrets were excreted from those bites.  But Gabriel didn’t look to be verging on a source of pleasure. If anything, he looked as if he wished to peel the skin in which Kavatti’s lips had touched, pushing it far from him.

“I do not feel myself,” he stated.

“Is it the loss of grace?”  My heart skipped.  When Kavatti had fed, did she take the rest of the grace from him? Had we already stopped our mission long before it could come to fruition?

“No,” he said with a small shake of his head. “But my head feels fuzzy and there is a buzzing noise. Something distant. I–” he stumbled. Reaching out, I grabbed at him, looking him over for injury.  His skin looked ashen and felt clammy.  “It’s the madness,” he told me, all too calmly. “It is calling.”

“Calling?”

“I can hear it,” he whispered. “Elias says he can hear his in the middle of the night. The world,” Gabriel winced. “It is too quiet out here. There is nothing to distract me from the thoughts in my head.”

I glanced ahead to Kavatti who had stopped. She was staring at us now, a beacon.  “We need to get to the market. Faster.”

“Fastest way to the market is to go underground,” Kavatti said. “Dig dig dig.”

“You are not helping,” I snapped.  There was nothing nearby. No cave entrance. No convenient tunnel that could lead us beneath the land. Just miles and miles of nothingness.  “Okay,” I said, trying to gather my thoughts. “Okay. We just need to keep walking. Gabriel, can you do that on your own or do you need help?”

“I am fine.”

He looked far from fine but I had no other option than to hope that he would last.  “We just need to get you to Elias and Reese,” I assured him. “You’ll be okay once you are there. You’ll–”

There was a splitting crack that sounded. It shot through the air like thunder. Eyes wide, I looked towards Kavatti, watching the smile cross her face. “Rivers rush through to valleys far and true,” she sang.

I had no time to question her. No time to do anything other than stare at her as the land shifted beneath our feet.  I felt my stomach plummet as we dropped downwards, falling over ourselves as we tried in vain to hold on. But an icy plunge of water rushed in around us, filling our lungs and dragging us down.  A flood of water shifted beneath us and I grabbed at Gabriel, trying to hold onto him as we tumbled against rock and stone, hitting against jagged edged walls, being consumed by the dark.

With a solid hit to the side of my head, the world went black.

~~~~

I opened my eyes slowly, a distant whisper circling me.  My mother stood not far away, her fire red hair shining in the sunlight. She was bent at the knee, her arms held out for me as I ran through a field of wheat to get to her.  I could smell the day's harvest and see the workers bailing the gold spun grass.  We would be turning it to grain soon.  The village would smell like bread.

“Kiddo,” I heard her call.  I ran faster, trying to get to her but noticing that it didn’t seem to matter how far I ran, she never got closer. Her smile was stagnant as the big rolls of wheat began to burst into flame, exploding against the bright blue sky as she continued to call for me. “Kiddo!”

“Mama!” I screamed, my voice far younger as I tried to run towards her. The world began to roll into a pit of fire and the fields in which I used to play turned into nothing more than cloying ash.  “Mama!”

I sat bolt up right, muscled arms surrounding me as I gasped for air. I chocked, spitting out water, bending at the waist as salt and bile burned my lungs.

“Easy there, kiddo.” The voice was familiar but it was not my mothers.  They patted my back as I coughed and heaved, still keeping a firm hold on me. When I lifted my head, I saw Reese, the dark eyes of the man staring back at me.  When he reached up to wipe the hair from my face, I felt the tears run free.

He pulled me in then, cradling me against his chest and rocking me slowly. “It’s gonna be alright, kiddo.  You’re safe now.”

I didn’t know how long I was like that, rocking back and forth, feeling the world around me spin. The sound of rushing water was all I could hear and the sight of my mother was all I could think about. Reese protected me through it, waiting for me to come to my senses again.

I did with a start, jolting out of his embrace as I looked around.  We were in a cave but I could see the ocean just outside the opening. White capped waves rolled to the short, splashing against obsidian cliffs and forming small barnacle filled tide pools.  Gabriel laid nearby, breathing steadily, sodden and covered in sand.

“What happened?” I asked.

“Was gonna ask you that.” Gently, Reese extracted me from his arms where I shivered in the breeze coming off of the ocean.

“We’re home?”

“The market, yeah,” he said, scratching his head. There was something different about him. He looked far more dangerous than he did bustling around the kitchen, making breakfast each morning. Here, he was shirtless, his bare chest riddled with scars, a sword strapped to him that I had never seen before.

Sitting up, I wrapped my arms around myself. “Is Gabriel okay? The madness… he said he was hearing a call?”

“Fuck.” Reese looked over at Gabriel, several warring emotions filtering over his face at once.  “Did you get whatever the fuck the ingredient to that spell was?”

Kavatti. I looked around but she wasn’t here.  I lost track of her when the ground had swallowed us whole.  “I’m sorry.”

Reese stood there for a long moment, fists clenched at his sides before a scream of rage erupted from his throat.  I held my hands over my ears as he yelled, the rocks around us crumbling.  Stalking out of the cave, I saw him draw his sword, lighting swirling over the ocean. I didn’t see where he had gone but I could hear his curses on the wind.  Crawling over to Gabriel, I checked him over, not knowing what else to do. I didn’t even know where within the market we were.

“Come on.” My head snapped up as Reese entered the cave again, blood dripping from both him and his sword. Lightening swirled in his eyes.

“Reese?”

“We’re gettin’ him back to Elias,” Reese said.  Without preamble, he came over, bending to take Gabriel in his arms in a fireman hold.  “You can either come with me, Graceling, or stay here. Tides’ gonna be comin’ in though.”

I didn’t move. As I stared at the man at the entrance of the cave, Gabriel limp in his arms, I just didn’t move. Even his voice sounded far more like steel than it had all the times I had spoken to him before.

“Kiddo, come on,” he snapped.

Something was off. There was something about him that was far too different from the caring man I knew.  And it seemed far too much of a coincidence for the ground to open just to spit us out right at his feet.

[[Follow him silently but stay wary]]

[[Try to get Gabriel away from him]]

[[Run from him and get help]]