Of Gaea Read online

  Ari shrugged and stuck it into a pocket and walked away.

  “Oh, and darling?”

  She glanced over her shoulder.

  “I liked you better in the wheelchair.”

  Ari flipped him off and left. There was no way to rationalize with the man. She may not have dealt with asshole before, but she could recognize it easily enough. She had more important things to worry about than a prick anyway.

  She had to figure out how to deal with Ghita. Ari would rather deal with a hundred of Leonidas than one of Ghita but there was no avoiding it. She owed her something. Ghita was still - regardless of mentality - family. And now that Ari knew what she had been hiding Ghita’s mentality made more sense.

  The phone bleeped in her pocket as she walked and Ari pulled it out to stare at it. The only person she knew of that had the number was Kleisthenes. After some fumbling, she figured out how to read the text message.

  I called Ghita. She’s on her way back. Good luck.

  Ari sighed. Ghita would have been back in four hours anyway if she kept to schedule to be home before dark.

  Ari stood on the sidewalk in front of the house for a few minutes studying it. If she had looked she would have seen a cottony wall around the property. Ari didn’t bother looking, she could feel it.

  How could Sasha stand being at her house all the time? Ari was getting itchy just standing on the sidewalk outside the house. How had she not felt it before? Or maybe she had. The house had always felt kind of oppressive. She just figured it for Ghita. Maybe that hadn’t been it though. Maybe this wall of protection was the reason.

  Ari could enter without breaking the wall. She’d just suffocate for a few hours. There was no way she was going into the house with that thing intact. None. She wasn’t going to be uncomfortable in what was technically, still her home.

  Ari tipped her head and imagined a fire spreading across the barrier turning it to ash. The fire spread as unseen as the wall it burned to ash. Ari smiled to herself please with her work.

  Once the wall was gone, Ari went into the house. There was no reason for her to apply a barrier like Kleisthenes had. Ghita wouldn’t stand for that but she made sure as long as she was in the house, Ghita couldn’t re-establish her protection.

  Ari sat at the table, like she had so many times before and closed her eyes. She was already tired, not from what she had done already but from what still needed to be done. She would wait, and then once this was done, the rest was a blank page.

  She heard the car pull up and the door open and close. Then a second door opened and closed. Keys jangled outside the kitchen door, and Ari got up from the table to open it.

  Ghita juggled two grocery bags in one hand with the keys in her other. She was dressed in a casual business suit and her hair was stylishly twisted up. Her favorite string of pearls was around her neck.

  Ari smiled. “Let me help.” She took one of the bags of groceries and stepped back into the kitchen to let Ghita in.

  “Sure.” Ghita’s tone was weak.

  Ari set the bag down on the counter and then went back to her seat at the table. “Kleisthenes has offered soup for supper. Sasha is on the mend.”

  “Oh, it’s good they figured out what was wrong with him. He’s such a nice boy. You’d have been devastated.”

  Ari mirrored her polite tone. “He had been marked by the Tainted. Not really that difficult to undo if one knows where to look.”

  The can Ghita had been holding slipped out of her fingers and hit the counter. The ping echoed in the silence.

  “Is something wrong?” Ari asked innocently.

  Ghita turned and looked at her. Really looked at her, not just a once over but a slow measured study. “So, you’ve met Gaea.”

  Ari nodded and watched Ghita’s eyes close and lips move. It was a prayer, perhaps.

  “You know how I feel about that. I told you not to bring that pagan trash into my house.”

  “It cannot be undone. Nor do I want it to. I feel right for the first time in a very long time. Something that you could have done yourself if you weren’t so scared of it.” Ari’s tone sharpened unintentionally.

  “I want you to leave.” Ghita’s voice rose with the words.

  “I need to talk to you.” Ari pleaded gently. “Please. I just want to talk. Nothing else, please.”

  “I’m asking you,” She glared and Ari felt the swell of her power. “To leave.”

  Ari nodded slowly and held out her hands peaceably. “You are the only person I know as family. I had hoped you would at least give me one more conversation as such. I’ll be at Kleisthenes’s house if you change your mind.”

  “You are a monster. If you continue on this ridiculous path on your eighteenth birthday you will die a monster. That’s all you’ll get from me.”

  Ari nodded and moved slowly, so not to startle her, to the patio door. “I loved you once, as my mother. I love you still as my aunt. I just needed you to know that.”

  “Get. Out.”

  Ari left.

  Ghita listened to the soft click of the door. She wanted to scream. She wanted, badly, to throw something.

  All her hard work, all the evasion, and lies had been futile. There was no taking Ari off the path she was on. There was no saving her.

  She had failed. She hadn’t been able to protect her niece any more than she had protected her sister. A quiet sob escaped her as she crumpled to the floor and cried.

  ARI SAT ON THE EDGE of Sasha’s bed and watched him sleep. Some of his color was back. It wasn’t enough to ease her mind, but his breathing was finally normal.

  “I’m sorry.” Ari whispered in fear of waking him. “There are a lot of things I’m sorry for, but one of the most important is how I feel. We’ve always been friends, so I can’t really say how long I’ve loved you. Maybe I’ve always loved you. Leonidas made it very clear that I may not keep you. That scares me more than you dying, more than my birthday next week. I’m sorry for all the time that I wasted when I could have told you, and I’m sorry for all the moments missed because I was too much of a coward to accept how I felt. Something I learned while I was away that my every action has a consequence, and because of whom I am, the ripples spread out farther and wider than with anyone else. And I’ve learned that I need to be certain in everything I do, or I could lose everything. I don’t want to lose you.”

  She leaned forward and placed an innocent kiss on his forehead. “I will not lose you. Promise. I will do whatever it takes to keep you, if that’s what you want, too. I love you. Sleep well.”

  Ari silently exited and went to her bed.

  ARI COULDN’T SEE ANYTHING THROUGH the hazy smoke. She could hear screaming and crying, but she couldn’t figure out where it was coming from. The smoke was far too thick.

  She picked up a broken piece of metal and used it as a fan. Ari put the full intent of air behind the swoosh motion. When the air cleared she could only stare, frozen in shock. The makeshift fan dropped from her numb fingers.

  The town lay in broken rubble. Fires burned in odd intervals. People lay everywhere in various states of injury and death. Blood ran through the streets like water.

  A familiar screech filled the air, and Ari ran and ducked next to a broken building just as the Tainted thing galloped down the street leaving death and destruction in its wake. The Pure swooped through the air close behind almost as if trying to catch the Tainted creature, but the buildings did not restore shape nor did the people come back to life. All the fires went out and a sort of peace prevailed in her wake. Like the aftermath of an event, with the Tainted being the headliner.

  Ari ran towards home. She didn’t know what she was going to do. Or what she should do. She knew, deep down some part of her knew, it was her they were looking for.

  When Ari turned down the street she saw Sasha wielding a massive sword against Damia. Damia laughed manically as they fought.

  Sasha seemed to be on the losing end. He was continuously forced back un
til he tripped. His sword flew out of his hand and Damia laughed triumphantly.

  Damia’s blade streaked forward faster than Ari could move. She impaled Sasha on her blade. She thrust forward with all her weight even as he struggled to pull out the blade against it.

  Power surged out of Ari and Damia burned. Her screams were but a song to Ari. She had no regrets for killing Damia.

  Sasha’s face was smeared with blood and he looked tired. He smiled at Ari and held up her bow. When she took the bow, his eyes closed. There were no words. There was no need for them.

  There were no arrows, but that didn’t matter. There was more than one way to use a bow. Ari knew most of them.

  She ran again, but this time towards the woods, and the cliff. She could get better vantage from the height and make hasty arrows from the branches. She didn’t make it there.

  Ari made it to the clearing. Bodies scattered across the ground like broken toys. They wore armor unlike anything she’d ever seen before. Ari grabbed an arrow protruding out of someone’s chest and ran to the top of the hill.

  A Pure and a Tainted were locked in battle on the other side. They screamed at each other and lunged. When they fell back Ari saw them for who they used to be. They shared the same face; a face she had seen all her life.

  Ari only had one single arrow. She knocked it to the bow and took aim. To kill one without the other would mean choosing sides. She didn’t want to choose sides.

  “I am Gaea.”

  SHE WOKE COVERED IN SWEAT with the sun just barely peeking over the trees. It wasn’t hard to understand what the dream meant. Ari dressed silently and went out for a walk.

  There was no point in staying in the house with only her troubled thoughts. Sasha wasn’t awake yet to talk to and while she knew Kleisthenes wouldn’t shut her out, she didn’t want to wake him. Her nightmares were hers alone.

  She had a choice to make. She knew that. Ghita had hinted it was between Pure and Tainted. No one had considered the possibility of choosing Gaea. Was that even possible? Was she fighting against the inevitable?

  When Ari emerged from her thoughts she found herself in a park she hadn’t been to since she was a child. She and Sasha had played there often until they were old enough to be in the woods alone. The dew hadn’t melted off the grass, and the fog was still patchy in areas. Not nearly as thick as it had been in the dream, but thick enough to give her a moment’s pause. She crossed the familiar playground and sat heavily on a swing.

  It creaked as Ari swayed slowly. She wasn’t trying to swing, but the familiar motion was comforting.

  “May I join you?”

  Ari looked up to see Leonidas with his hands in the pockets of his pea coat. “I would think you’re too bad ass to ask.” She was too tired to deal with him if he was in a mood, yet even if he was in a mood, wouldn’t that still be better company than her nightmares?

  He chuckled and sat in the swing next to her. “I’m pretty bad ass, but not rude. Well, okay, I can be rude. What’s troubling you?”

  She sighed. “Just life.”

  He laughed again. “When I was about five or six, the oracle – did you know they still use those in Sparta – announced that I would make a sacrifice that would challenge the very foundations of our society and when I did it would cost my life. When I was twelve it was determined I was the one chosen to be your Guardian. I refused, of course. I thought that I could change my fate, by refusing the destiny Gaea set for me. Instead it seems I’ve made that future an inevitable truth.”

  “You’ve at least known of your burden all your life. I’ve just learned of mine and I wonder, as I’m sure you do, if I will do the right thing.”

  “Ariadne, when Alissandre came to me, begging for your life I did not want to get involved. I had fully intended to let you die. I even refused to help, at first.” He sighed and Ari looked at him, giving him her full attention. “Circumstance being what it was, I was forced to leave and come here. I still didn’t want to help, but when I saw you, I felt the strength of Gaea unlike any I had every felt before. You were meant to be here. You are not clouded by Spartan society or their ridiculous traditions. You have the freedom to just be Gaea. Even if you were to go to Sparta now, you still have the strength to still just be Gaea, without the inhibitions of pomp and class. I believe that’s what we need. We need someone who doesn’t fear the upper class and will stand for Gaea as Gaea, not just a figurehead.”

  “I don’t know what to do. I mean, I know what I want but it can’t really be that simple.”

  “You know, it took both Alissandre and I to save you?” He rocked in his swing idly. “I could not have done it on my own. I didn’t have the will for it, and he doesn’t have the skill. To me at least, that means we were both meant to be here. We were both needed. It’s… challenging to admit that. Especially about Alissandre, but Gaea wanted him here.”

  “I don’t think you’re even listening to me.” Ari muttered.

  He reached out and took her hand. “Be yourself. Act and think as you always would. When the time comes, you will know what to do. I did. Even if I really, really didn’t want to.” He let go of her hand and gestured.

  Ari looked and saw Sasha standing a few feet away. “Sasha.” She jumped up and ran to him enclosing him in a hug. “Should you even be up yet?”

  “Alissandre.” Leonidas came up behind her. He studied the girl and then the man. “I have some herbs that will help.”

  “Why?” Sasha’s tone was suspicious and acrid.

  “For her.” Leonidas walked away.

  “I don’t understand him.” Ari murmured in Sasha’s chest. She didn’t want to pull away. The beating of his heart was a lovely sound.

  “He’s torn between what he was taught to do and what he knows is right. It makes it difficult to see truth when your eyes are already clouded.”

  “Want to see a trick?” Ari lifted her face to smile at him.

  Sasha smiled back. “Sure.”

  She feathered her mouth over his and they vanished into thin air.

  They staggered to the ground in his yard, mainly because Ari was laughing like a loon and couldn’t concentrate enough to make the shift in gentle.

  Sasha laid still breathing deep and slow. Probably shocked. Ari jumped up and dropped down on top of him. She put her hands over his heart and leaned forward to look into his face.

  His face was priceless. Stunned wasn’t a good enough word for it. It was a cross between stunned, scared, and joyous.

  “You okay?” Ari leaned down to peer into his eyes. “I’m sorry. We would have been a bit more stable if I hadn’t been laughing so hard.”

  “Incredible.” He blinked and smiled. “Just incredible. I’m happy for you.”

  The smile didn’t quite reach his eyes, and Ari knew it was a lie. She felt his heart stutter under her hands and rested her forehead against his.

  “We’re not in Sparta.” She whispered. “We’re not bound by their ridiculous laws or castes. This is America.”

  His eyes were pained. “When we go back…”

  “Do you love me?” It took every ounce of will power to ask without stuttering. With his eyes on hers it made the words more important somehow, than when she said it with him sleeping.

  He froze. Ari literally felt every muscle in his body stiffen under her. It wasn’t the reaction she expected. It felt like her chest had been ripped open when he remained silent.

  “Am I worth fighting for?” she whispered closing her eyes against the pain in his. She knew already, she felt it, the answer he was going to give her. It wasn’t the answer she wanted or needed.

  His hand jerked up and paused inches from her face. His voice was a pained whisper. “You know I believe you are. You know I would do anything for you.”

  “Why Sasha? I need to know why? I need to know if you love me the way I love you, or if it’s just some stupid Spartan duty. I need to know if you love me for me or if you love me because I’m Gaea.” She opened her eyes t
o stare him down. She felt the water welling up in her eyes and willed herself not to cry, not yet.

  He looked away and didn’t answer.

  “I see.” Ari slowly stood. A part of her broke with the motion, but she couldn’t tell which part. Her movement was stiff, mechanical even. “When I woke in the hospital and realized I had no legs, I had plans to commit suicide.”

  His eyes cut back to hers.

  “But I didn’t. I didn’t, because of you. Now,” her voice broke. She ran her hands over her face and sighed. “I can’t take back my words or change how I feel. Consider your debt to me fulfilled.” She smiled down at him through teary eyes. “Thank you for your service, Spartan. You are relieved from duty.”

  “Ari, wait.” He reached out for her, but she was already wind and thought. A single tear drop landed in his open palm. That was all she left behind.

  SHE DIDN’T REALLY HAVE A plan when she left Sasha. Ari was too numb and hurt to really think about it. It was with some surprise, she ended up on the bench in the solarium of Goddess Ink.

  She lay down on the bench and just stared up at the painted glass. Gaea’s beginning stared back. The coming of the Pure and then the casting out of their Tainted upon Gaea’s soil was depicted in clear, crisp strokes. Funny, how she could see it now, when only last month it was hard to decipher.

  Two angry voices snapped her attention towards the pathway.

  “Why would she come here? You’re being ridiculous.”

  “This is the only place for her to come. You are the only other person she can trust with her secrets and we both know it.” Nasya voice was clear, and annoyed. “Besides, as of right now her control only limits her to where she’s been. She’s not strong enough, not until after her birthday, maybe, to go where she’s never been.”

  “A shuddering thought.”

  “It’s what’s needed. The balance cannot remain the way it is.”