A/N: Working on getting back on track. Sorry for the delay.
Thank you VidiaPhoenix, Wounded Wing, LunaEtSidera, and Guest for your review(s)! You guys are great. I hope you like this chapter, and forgive me again for the wait. I'm sorry. T_T
::XVII::
dreaming of life
There was a woman singing.
Singing soft, distant words, like a lullaby she was too sleepy to grasp onto.
What were those words? Floating, falling…
Falling…
A woman's voice…
That's enough…
Hush…
Don't cry…
And she was FaLlInG
And then it stopped, like a tape recording cut mid-track.
Dexné came awake in the past unable to feel any part of her body except her head. It felt full of blood, pounding and aching. Her eyes peeled open to rays of light spilling softly through the windows of what appeared to be a small cottage. The light, though gentle, cut her like knives and she closed her eyes to shield them from the blinding intrusion.
The scuffling of feet, the creak of wood as someone leaned onto the headboard, and the warm puffs of breath caressing her face made her brave the light once more.
She opened her eyes to green irises shining wet as glass, reddened at the corners, and full of entirely too much hope. Hope that was nearly overflowing, and she wondered if the water in his eyes would follow suit.
"L-Le…" she tried to say his name, tried to pry a hand from under the quilts, which glowed with strings of strange transcribing.
He stilled her immediately. "Shh-shh, no." Lea's hand gripped hers through the quilt. "Don't move, don't talk. It's okay." As he said it, voice whispery and shaky, Dexné thought he sounded as if he couldn't quite believe it himself.
Blue from over Lea's shoulder caught her eye. Isa stood ridged like a solider at attention with a face of impassible stone, yet in his wide eyes buzzed the remnants a haunting fear. "Your parents are on their way," he said stiffly, and it was then Dexné heard the winded quality to his words, as if he was exhausted and had run from one side of the kingdom to the other.
Dexné swallowed thickly. The fear, the hope, on both their faces—was she truly the cause? Shame and grief welled in her. She had not meant to scare them so.
And over what? What was it she had risked her very life for?
The bloodied lavender scarf stood out then, from where it was draped over a chair set at a round little dining table. The pristine table cloth and quaint tea set seemed far too cheery next to the rusted stain of blood that covered nearly the entire strip of lavender fabric. It looked like a battle flag of some unnecessarily started war.
"Now, now, come now! Give her some room to breathe."
Dexné startled at the new voice, jolting under the quilts. It was then pain seared through every bone, every muscle, and she nearly cried out. Tears welled and oozed from the corners of her eyes.
"Easy, easy!" came Lea's frantic command.
"Out of the way, boy!" said the new voice. It sounded thin and stretched with age, yet carried in it a sense of knowing.
Dexné's tears made her vision a blur, and it was only blue she could see. Blue and white, like clear skies with puffs of gently billowing clouds. She tried to speak. She tried to ask the unknown figure who, and what, and where, but all that came out was a garbled croak.
"There, there, my dear girl," said the wise voice, speaking in a consoling murmur. "You took quite the tumble, but you should be fine now. You were very lucky I was passing by. Luckier still that your blue-haired friend ran fast enough to catch me."
Dexné shut her eyes, squeezing the water from them. When she opened them again there was an old man before her, wearing blue robes. His white beard nearly touched the floor, it was so long. It made her think of a frothing waterfall in the glades.
"Isa…" she rasped in response to the old man's words.
Said boy sharpened to attention.
"Ah, yes, yes that's his name. Quite right. But on another matter…would you mind holding still? The magic cannot work its full effects if you wriggle like that. You may be out of the woods, my dear, but you are in much too fragile a condition to be moving around."
Lea hovered at the head of the bed. He reached forward and smoothed a hand over her forehead. "Hold still, - - - -."
In the present, Dexné's mind shuttered sporadically like a broken camera.
What was that? Why was there a blank space? He had said her name. He had said Néde.
Hadn't he?
The memory, not content to wait for her return, instead wrapped itself around her consciousness. Wrapped around her like the glowing magic of the wizard's quilt. The strange transcribing stitched therein glowed so brightly. The unknown letters seemed to leap off the fabric, dancing circles around her like a chain of little paper doll children. Pain eased, turned from rankling roars to a dull feel of pins and needles. Which in of itself was uncomfortable, being it was over her entire body. But then how had it felt before? She could not remember.
She had hit the ground, and there was nothing.
No pain. No feeling. Just the open blue sky, and…red.
"Lea…" she rasped.
"I'm right here."
And then her eyes fell like a curtain of black.
She woke to her mother stroking her hair, eyes shining much like Lea's had. The water welling in Mirron's snow-blue depths appeared almost crystalline. Wilam stood just behind her, towering like a protective mountain, worry evident in the heavy lines of his face.
Again Dexné felt the stab of shame. Why had she put them through this?
She tried to think of something besides the scarf. Surely she had a better reason for being so foolish.
But she came up with nothing.
There was just the scarf, fluttering in her mind's eye, waving to her from that grand arch, beckoning her to the edge.
She could not leave the bed of the wizard, and so Mirron and Wilam took residence in the old man's cottage. They apologized profusely, hands wringing in Mirron's case, head bowed in Wilam's, but said they could not leave their only child.
"Quite all right, quite all right! I understand completely. Do make yourselves at home. But, eh…don't touch anything. Especially not those books over there, or those bottles over here, hmm…" The old wizard scurried swiftly. "Perhaps I should do some reorganizing..."
"Oh, I'd be happy to help you—"
"Quite all right, dear lady. Don't touch those, please!"
Dexné's heart twisted in her chest. What a mess she had made for everyone. What an inconvenience.
Her parents slept on pallets on the floor, taking turns between watching over their daughter and taking care of things at home. Dexné could see in the way they grimaced and cringed when moving that the floor was doing a number on their sore backs and weary joints, but she said nothing. She had already tried to make them leave. But they would not entertain the notion of leaving her for a moment.
"I'm fine, I'm fine…"
"We'll wait until Mr. Merlin says your fine, and then you will be fine," Mirron shushed as she tucked the quilts around her daughter tighter, white hairs springing into her face.
Wilam sat by the table, working a piece of wood into a clock for selling. Money they still needed, and it had to come from somewhere.
"Dear, do you have to do that at his table?"
"He said I could," Wilam reasoned without looking up from his carving.
"He says a lot, but we are already intruding. Shouldn't we try to be as discreet as possible?"
"He's not here right now."
"It's still his house."
"Quiet, woman. What do you want me to do?"
Mirron tutted, but said no more.
It was when they thought Dexné asleep that they spoke of payments.
"What can we give him?" fussed Mirron. "We have to give him something; he saved our daughter's life."
Wilam was quiet for a long while. "…I don't know. Anything. Everything. Nothing we have can compare. But I intend to tell him if he ever needs anything, no matter what it is, to just ask for it, and we will deliver."
Mirron hummed her assent.
Dexné's heart throbbed.
First putting them through life and death stress, and now she had put them in debt.
She willed herself back to sleep.
It was the only way she could escape herself.
The healing magic worked quickly, would have worked quicker if not for the severity of her injuries. Merlin the wizard said it was a miracle she was alive at all, incredible that she had not died upon impact, and he attributed it to the banners she had hit on the way down. They slowed her descent just enough, just barely enough to give her a scrap of a fighting chance.
A chance that would have been left for death to take had it not been for the wizard's magic. And Dexné's parents knew this. They thanked him with hearts that did not know how to express the overflux of gratitude. The wizard waved them off, saying he was happy to help, that he was glad Dexné would go on to live, and seeing that was reward enough.
Dexné could not comprehend it. Not the man's kindness or his words. Did her life hold so much value? To her parents she understood, but to a wizard who barely knew her…
She managed a whispered thank you of her own. The old man's responding smile was so bright and warm she had to look away from it, or else be blinded by a blur of tears once more.
She was carried home in her father's arms, his steps slow, and his pace careful.
The unhurried ambling gait lulled her into sleep, pulled her to times when she was far smaller, being carried home in this very man's arms. Away from the shadow dragons that guarded her among the towering trees. Away from hunger. Away from loneliness and uncertainty. Away from an eternity of waiting.
Though she was well enough to be carried, she was still on strict bed-rest orders. That kind of waiting she didn't seem to mind. She was not alone; she was surrounded by the very people who cared for her. And that was more than enough. She spent her days listening to the birds sing, watching the clouds and sun drift by from the window by her bed, feeling the gentle breezes filled with the scents of promises and flowers.
Lea and Isa dropped by almost every day.
The entire ordeal of ignoring and raging and following wolves was left forgotten. They only spoke of happy things. Of listless school days and sports and video games and plans for vacations once the work days let up.
"But you're going to have a lot to catch up on," Lea teased, sticking the tip of his tongue out at her.
She returned the gesture like a snake, tongue out and then back in in a flash.
"Dork." Lea laughed, ruffled the top of her hair with a feather-light touch, as if he were still afraid of her breaking.
"Not too much to catch up on," said Isa, appearing in the doorway. He motioned to the papers and books piled under his arms. "Sera was kind enough to help me gather your work for you. Something to do while you lie here for hours on end."
"She's supposed to be resting…" Lea started uncertainly.
"Resting her body, not her brain. Come on, it won't kill her."
It didn't, though at times Dexné wished it did. How she hated algebra…
"No, like this, sweetheart," Lea murmured one day later as he sat by her bedside, helping her with her math homework. He took the pencil from her limp grasp and erased her numbers before flipping the writing utensil around and showing her the correct way to achieve the answer.
But she could barely focus. What had he just called her?
Sweet…heart?
Had he ever called her that before?
He had become uncomfortable stretching over the bed to her paper it seemed. Why else would he move from the chair to sit beside her on the bed? He was resting back on the headboard like she did, leaning so that their shoulders smooshed together.
The contact sent electric sparkles under her skin, made it crawl in a way she wasn't used to. She was more accustomed to touches smarting, to being causes for flinches and withdrawal, but this…
…this made her feel both frightened and…
She wanted to lean closer.
And without asking her mind for permission, her body did.
Her mind was slow to catch up, did not register the situation until her head rested neatly on his shoulder, until the crown of her head brushed his chin, the strands being tickled by the puffs of his breath.
She froze when it finally did. Froze and scrambled to think up an excuse. When she did, she latched onto it. "M'sorry. Tired." She even slurred her words. She willed her tongue to become thick, and it became so.
He did not move for a whole minute, and she feared she had offended him irreparably.
And then the pencil was dropped and his arm came around her, pulled her ever closer.
His mouth came down on the top of her head and he just stayed like that, breathing warmth over her.
When she could go out in the garden again, she was thankful for it.
She sat and listened while her mother hummed and weeded the lilies and trimmed the magnolia. Birds fluttered about, swooping down to nab worms and seeds, and hummingbirds buzzed busily with the bees at the open blossoms.
The wind was pleasantly cool, the sun gently warming. And Dexné found herself just thankful to be able to see, and hear, and move, and breathe.
Things the dead did not get to participate in.
Wilam relented and let her go to the market with him. He walked at Dexné's side with a patient pace, towered beside her like a silent guardian angel. His mere presence was enough to garner her strength for the trip there and back. She watched him sell his newly made clocks, helped to carry back the ones the store needed repairing. He only let her carry one. It was the smallest clock, and a bit of Dexné felt ashamed that she was considered still so weak, and yet another bit of her was grateful he let her carry at all. He did not let her feel like an invalid. She felt something like a helpful little child again, plodding alongside her father.
She could not say the same for Lea or Isa.
School started back up for her, and they would scarcely leave her be. They flanked her in the halls, did not let anyone or anything bump into her, and she daresay they even glared at anyone who looked too closely at her. It was like she was a leaf, and they were afraid she would blow away with just the slightest touch of the wind.
"Good morning," said Sera, waving with a cheerful spring in her wrist. Her blue ornate bracelets of clouds jingled merrily in response. "It's so good to see you, - - - -. I'm happy you're back."
Dexné nodded unsurely. "Th-thank you…"
Present-time Dexné banged her head against the wall, once, twice, three times. It still did not dislodge the name she knew she had.
The school day went by like any other, save for the slightly irritating way Lea and Isa encased her. She was not a leaf, she was not glass, and she wished they would go back to normal.
"I'm fine, I'm fine," she insisted, waving them away, "I do not need help going down the stairs—please!"
Isa was the first to back off. "She's right, Lea. Let's go, we're annoying her."
Lea grumbled something incomprehensible, but followed Isa regardless. Though he kept glancing over his shoulder with sharp eyes, stayed on the stairs a few feet in front of her, his gait not straying too far from hers. He did not outdistance her by too much. She realized he did so on purpose, did it in case she fell, and he would be there to catch her.
She could not help the warmness that spread over her heart, combating the prickling of irritation. She smiled. "I'm fine."
His eyes softened.
And she was fine. Fine.
Until Uné came around the corner.
Dexné clutched at the scarf she kept in her long skirt's pocket.
Uné skidded to a stop and stared. Nothing but stared.
The silence was long and tense.
No one seemed to move and it was like an omnipotent being had pressed the pause button on their lives.
Then a sneer twisted Uné's otherwise pretty face. "I see you've got your dogs guarding you again."
"Fucking bitch," Lea snarled, lurching forward.
Isa held out an arm, held Lea in check with the single nonchalant motion. "Don't bother, Lea. It's a waste of time, and we don't have time to waste."
Uné's lip curled. "Of course you don't. Off somewhere together? Off to do some…group activities?"
Dexné didn't like the sound of that, didn't like the undertone it carried. Her heart twisted and prickled at the implication.
Isa's hand lowered, a fist gathering at his side. Dexné could not see his face from where she stood, but she imagined cold indifference hiding the current of anger beneath. For a moment Dexné feared. Could Uné spurn Isa into a bestial rage the same way Zane had?
But such fear was not given enough chance to come to fruition.
Lea walked forward slowly, a strange look on his face. His eyes flared wide like green fire, his lips in a tight, straight line. His focus was solely on Uné, so much that he did not even blink.
Present-time Dexné knew that unblinking, dark look. She had seen it in Castle Oblivion. Had seen fire and blood and death.
In the memory, Lea's eyes flicked to the stairs residing behind Uné. They were in the curve of the stairwell, one flight up behind them, another flight continuing down before them. Down was where Uné had come from. Down was where she was about to go again if Dexné did not do something. Uné did not even seem to notice Lea's stalking approach, as she was still directing a patronizing smirk in Isa's direction, her hand on her cocked hip, her head tilted back haughtily.
Lea bared his teeth. He lunged.
Dexné got there first.
She swung her hand and with a loud crack her palm slid across Uné's cheek, and Dexné curled her fingers mid-way, leaving red lines in the trail of her nails. Uné's head snapped to the side, the smirk gone, her eyes round.
Dexné's heart beat wildly in her chest as those purple eyes came back to focus on her, a look of shocked stupefaction taking place of the usual deriding glare.
"I do not need anyone but myself to put the likes of you in your place, Uné." Dexné spoke in a hiss. "You are a sad girl. Sad and petty. Because nothing about you is real. False status, false appearance, false friends. What do you have of unyielding worth? I have my friends beside me, and there are no others more real or true than them. And if you ever speak ill of them again…"
Dexné stepped forward, pulling the scarf from her pocket. She draped it around the other girl's shoulders and took a step back, face blank as stone.
"…I'm afraid you will look far worse than I ever did at the bottom. The color of rusted blood suits you, wolf girl."
And with that she strode past Uné, descending the stairs with an air of authority she did not know she possessed. She felt heavy and powerful. Fast, yet steady.
She heard the footsteps of her two friends coming behind her. A firm hand grasped her shoulder, gave a gentle tug and a proud squeeze. She looked to her right to see Lea with a smirk of satisfaction riding his lips, a sparkle of something in his green eyes.
"Well," said Isa from her left, "that was certainly something. I didn't think you had it in you."
"I have many things in me." Dexné stopped. "Wait, that…didn't sound right."
"Don't let Uné's dirty mind rub off on ya." Lea swung an arm around her shoulders.
Dexné clamped her mouth shut with an audible clap. "Indeed," she said after a regal silence, feeling even more powerful with their presences beside her.
They did not crowd her so much after that.
They saw she could walk on her own.
The meadow where they usually skipped class was a welcome sight after so many weeks of non-stop schooling.
Neither said a word to the other. They just showed up, avoiding the same class taught by a cantankerous teacher, the only class they shared. He laid beside her in the grass, red against the bright green bathed in the sun, and her, dark gold tangled in the coins of shade from a nearby tree.
He plucked up a poofy dandelion, turned towards her, and in one breath spread the white umbrella seeds over her. She felt the tickle of them as they gently floated down, one landing on her nose.
"Did you make a wish?" she asked softly, none perturbed.
Blazing green eyes stared at her a little too long.
"I sure did." He smiled, and the day got a little brighter.
His touches became more than touches. The contact was more than what it seemed, though Dexné did not understand it.
His hand on her shoulder lingered a few seconds too long, sliding from there to her back.
Fingers around her wrist slid too close to her hand, tugging her where he wanted to go.
The fluttering in her stomach made her madly uncomfortable. It made her want to squirm and get away and yet…
She eased under the pressure of the palm on her shoulder, leaned into the hand resting on her back. She followed the tugging hand wherever he wanted to go, without fuss or fight.
Such closeness, causing waves of shock to traverse just beneath the surface of her skin.
And yet she wanted to be closer.
She never thought he would want to be closer too.
Not until he frightened away someone who had tried to take the space.
Otto was a nice boy around a year younger than Dexné. She only knew his name because he introduced himself with the most stammering voice she had ever heard, and she had seen him mingling with the lower year classes. Every sentence was littered with stutters, and she could not help feeling sorry for him. She listened with rapt attention learned from her mother, with patience learned from her father.
The boy finally got out that he wanted Dexné as…more than a friend.
She blinked, perplexed. How could they be more than friends if they were not friends to begin with?
Dexné looked him up and down. Otto was shorter than her by about a foot, though that could've been because he couldn't seem to stand up straight. His black and white checkered shirt distracted her mind for a second, before she met his eyes. The earnestness hidden behind his square glasses struck her, pushed out the possibility of mockery or bribery from her thoughts. Did this boy…really like her?
Dexné understood the bravery and determination it must have taken for Otto to approach and speak to her. And out of the pitying of her heart, she could not refuse. She steeled herself to give the answer.
"If that is truly what you want. I suppose it is…accepta—"
An arm swung around Dexné's shoulders.
"Hey there!" Lea's voice was cheerful but there was something…off about his ear-to-ear grin. Why did it look more like a snarl?
"Good evening—" Dexné started.
"Who's your friend," Lea said, interrupting her.
She did not become put out, as his odd behavior wrangled too much of her attention. What should have been a question sounded far too close to an accusation.
Otto took a step back, suddenly looking like a sheep caught in lamplight.
Lea's teeth-filled grin widened, and his chin came down to rest on Dexné's shoulder.
Otto turned tail and ran. Dexné watched him speed down the hall and around the corner.
"Huh. I wonder what his problem was." Lea did not sound like he truly cared.
"Why did you do that?" Dexné asked, turning to look at him with surprise and befuddlement.
"Do what?"
Dexné's voice lowered. "Do not play the innocent act. What was that?"
Lea did not answer for a moment. He busied himself by running a finger up and down Denxe's arm. A shiver shook her in a current from the contact point all the way to the base of her skull.
"Nothing," he finally said. "Don't worry, there are plenty of other people the kid can bother."
With that he circled her wrist and tugged her along.
The shivers remained, and made her forget that she was ever upset.
In the present Dexné lay curled on the floor, grasping her hood, pulling it so tightly the top rim came down to her neck.
Memories whispered and images raced through her head.
Why did he touch her, why did he push so close to her?
What happened…Lea?
His hair was getting longer, he was getting taller. Isa the same. She remembered flashes of them on the beach, of blue mornings and golden afternoons and red sunsets. Years were passing. Years were rewinding. She saw them at different points in their lives. Her mind, the scattered pieces embedded in the black, they were converging together at indescribable speeds.
They glinted in the light, some like stars, others like teeth.
But the question of When had it all fallen apart? remained.
When Dexné passed out, she had the dream again. The dream where Lea—no, Axel—was holding, restraining her.
Burning her pictures, her memories.
He whispered in her ear, whispered words she could never remember upon waking.
But this time she did. She remembered.
Don't remember, he had told her in the dream. Don't remember.
A/N: You all guessed right! I hope Merlin was in character. It's been so long, I can barely remember what he was like.
I keep forgetting to mention the song Staying by Koda. It is referenced in this story, as I listened to it a lot while drafting up the idea for Voidlings.
Any-hoo, thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed! I'd love to know what you think. I will try to get the next chapter out soon.