Content note: suicidal ideation.
The blossoms of the fourteenth month have scattered from the trees with the wilting petals of my youth, and I am sitting with Kieras on the balcony, throwing the cerulean peels of overripe fruits into the terraced azitrus fields below. Kieras sits slightly too close to the edge; sometimes I think that he imagines himself as a sail, waiting for the wind to catch him and snatch him away. I am quiet right now, since Kieras is. I am not the kind of person who has much to say about himself. Next to nothing of note happens in the life of the only son of the High Priest of Elodian, contrary to the speculation of the common people. I study the scriptures with Father, I practice the traditional wind instruments with Auntie, and I meditate in my chambers with the statue of Elodian. Then I escape as quickly as possible to find Kieras in the fields, and steal him away to my family home.
It is said by some that his family is scorned by the very deity which has smiled upon our village for centuries. It is said by others that his father was simply a foolish man who drowned himself in the sea in a drunken stupor. It is said by Kieras that his father drowned while drunk on ceremonial wine, though I am uncertain whether this has diminished or fortified his faith in our religion.
At any rate, he should not have any place in my household, yet he is more or less welcomed.
The breeze blows salt and heat onto our skin, and I sigh and lay back on the tile of the balcony, attempting to capture some of its ceramic coolness.
“Are you too warm?” Kieras asks, flashing a wan smile and passing me a slice of azitrus.
“Obviously,” I reply, taking the slice from him and biting into it, spilling juice down my chin. “Elodian may spare us from his waves, but he is not generous enough to spare us some of the chill of his realm of spirits.”
Kieras does not respond immediately. He looks out beyond the terraces and cottages, towards the domain of the god of oceans and the dead. The slight part of his lips gives such an impression of hunger that I wish to give him a meal, but there is nothing one can serve that will satiate a boy who wants to eat the world.
“You may have the last of the fruit, Caelin,” Kieras says eventually, and nudges the ceramic plate towards me.
“Are you sure? They’re the last of the season.”
“I think I’ve had my fill of azitrus.”
I dislike the finality of his words, and make a mental note to myself to send him home with a satchel of the bright blue citruses. As I pick my way through the rest of the fruit, we fall back into silence.
It is broken, again, by Kieras. “Caelin, I want to go to sea.”
I choke on my mouthful of tangy fruit. “You can’t be serious,” I say quickly, sitting up, facing him. “It’s a death sentence. You know Elodian’s protection doesn’t extend past the reef.”
Kieras shrugs his bony shoulders—gods, when had he lost so much weight?—and refuses to meet my eyes. “I wish to meet with the Sorceress.”
“You can’t do that.”
“I can.”
“Alone?” I bring my fingers to his jaw and tilt his face towards mine, forcing him to acknowledge me. “Kieras, you’ll die over a myth. Nobody who has attempted to meet the Sorceress on their own has ever returned.”
“Perhaps I will be the first.” He attempts to look away again; I grip his chin firmly.
“How do you intend to do that? There are no maps, no instructions on how to meet her. Only word of mouth.”
“Do you truly believe that the people who return are bound not to speak of what happened?” Kieras scoffs, shaking my hand off. “I think they tell us that to scare us off from ever leaving, for wanting more.”
“That may be the case,” I say, trying to compromise with him, “but I’m not risking Elodian’s wrath to find out.”
“It must be easy for you to say that, when you have been raised to do nothing with your life but maintain the holy favor passed down from your father.”
“You know that’s not fair. I—”
Kieras cuts me off. “There is nothing for me here, Caelin. There is nothing for me in the mountains or the fields or on the beach, and so I am going to the Sorceress. You can stay here, keep the village safe from the sea.”
I stare at him then, unnerved by his determination to go on this mission which he cannot survive. I know his eyes—no, I know how his eyes meet mine. I see the heaviness of the earth contained in the pinprick of his pupils in the bright sunlight, and how he attempts to prevent me from shouldering any of the weight. I see the resolve, eroded by the barest trace of hesitation.
I realize what he intends to come of this journey.
“You really think I’d let you go alone, Kieras?” I say with a squeeze of his shoulder, forcing myself not to let the panic under my tongue come to the surface. Kieras’s eyes widen, flickering to mine.
“No, Caelin. In the name of the gods, what are you thinking? Think of your father, of how he would feel if you didn’t return. He has gone through enough, grieving your mother.”
“Yet how would I feel, eating fruit and lounging in a temple while you sail alone into death’s arms?”
“We cannot both return, Caelin. You know the stories.”
“I do. But what is it you said, earlier? ‘Perhaps I will be the first’?” I grin at him. “Perhaps we will be the first pair who meet the Sorceress together and both live to tell the tale.”
I am insistent, if only to send him home alive. I find myself too young to protest this adventure, which could finally show us the truth about the Sorceress. Yet I am too old to believe in my own proclamation that we will meet a different fate than all other villagers who have gone to sea with a best friend or a lover. I think of Kieras’s mother, who works through the night at the graveyard on the edge of town. She will miss the moonlight in his silver eyes far more than I will, if he does not come home. And so I will go with Kieras, leaving my chambers tidy; if Father must face an empty casket, I can at least spare him the agony of sifting through the clothes scattered on my floor, hoping they carry my scent.
***
“He must want his father back,” I explain to Auntie as she helps me to pack my things for the trip.
“That boy is old enough to be a father himself,” Auntie scoffs, but her hand is gentle as she passes me a bag of dried laurelfruits. “You’re nearly twenty; you’re a fool to go with him.”
“He is the one I share azitrus with in summer.” My tone is harsher than I intend it to be. “My dearest friend.”
I can almost hear Auntie’s eyes scrape the sockets as she rolls them. “What will you do when you have a wife and the fruits are presented to you? Tell her, ‘no, I’m sorry my love, I share them with the imbecile at the end of town whose father angered the sea god so much he let the man drown’?”
I grit my teeth so as not to snap at her. My aunt means no harm; she is a traditionalist, who expects marriage by eighteen and children within the year. “When I have a wife I will share the fruits with her,” I concede, but the words sound hollow. “You don’t need to fret, Auntie.”
“I do need to fret, dear boy.” She takes my face in both her hands. “That friend of yours, he intends to kill you. Why would he travel to the Sorceress to ask for his father back, if he would send him home with you? He clearly means for you to be the one to make the sacrifice.”
I cannot deny the logic in her words, and pull away from her as I mumble my response: “It is worth it, to me.”
I can tell, then, from the hitch in her breath, that she understands better than I do why I am going to the sea with Kieras.
“Let us go together to the temple, Caelin. We shall perform a ceremony for your safety, Elodian bless you.”
***
Perhaps it is well that I am boarding the ship to my certain demise this morning. I cannot bear to occupy the same rooms as Father now that Auntie has informed him that I am leaving to seek the Sorceress with Kieras. He stumbled upon Auntie and I in the temple last week, sitting on the floor as she painted protective symbols onto my sunburnt skin over vital areas—heart, throat, temples, nape of neck—with azitrus juice. With a loud clatter, Father dropped his dinner plate, sending wild rice and stewed lamb scattering across the mosaic tile floor. For all the grandeur he presented to the public, he truly was only a man, and a rather clumsy one at that. Being raised by him, I had never fully believed in his spiritual connection to Elodian; I had seen him trip over his own robes too many times to associate him with the divine. Yet as he approached Auntie and I, my skepticism briefly faded. Though he spoke in his usual lilting, gentle tone, he only sounded half himself. For a split second it was as if another was speaking with him, though at a pitch only some could hear, the second voice to me what the shepherd’s whistle was to the sheepdog.
Father asked, “Why do you paint the rites of a soldier onto Caelin, sister-in-law?”
Auntie’s hand stilled for a moment before she continued drawing the brush over my skin. “He is around that boy too much, the one whose father drowned. Taking extra precaution cannot harm him.”
“The boy is named Kieras, and should not be blamed for his father’s idiocy. He and his mother show no signs of being shunned by our lord Elodian. They are only in closer proximity to him than most, as they send the dead from this realm into his.” Father’s voice sounded normal again, then. “Tell me the truth, one of you. For what reason is this ritual taking place?”
Auntie and I glanced between each other, battling over who should answer. She is a terrible liar, yet Father seems to see through all of my untruths just as easily. However, before I could take the risk and speak, Auntie opened her mouth again, taking on a maternal tone which had only ever gotten me into trouble. “He intends to venture out to sea with the boy whom you believe is not hated by Elodian, and solicit the Sorceress for a wish.”
Father visibly paled, and was quiet in his reply. “My son, you will not go.”
“I am an adult. Let me decide,” I begged.
“You are my only child,” he whispered, reaching out with slightly trembling hands to take the bowl and brush from Auntie. “I lost your mother to the Sorceress. You know this.”
I nodded. I did know, of course—how could a child not know when it no longer had a mother? Her death had occurred in my infancy, when I was a sickly thing. Auntie told me my lips were blue when my parents’ ship sailed out, and turned pink again when my father returned alone. I retain no memories of her, but there lies an ache somewhere behind my sternum—a yawning emptiness filled with a diluted form of the sticky, viscous grief which clings to every aspect of my Father’s existence.
“I will not lose you too, Caelin.”
I could have sworn I heard tears choking my father’s words, but all he did after that was call a temple staff member in to clean up the food he spilled and set a table for four. Dinner was to be shared by Auntie, himself, and I—and a scholar to lecture me on the scripture as I ate. I am the only heir to Father’s priesthood. Parental sentimentality and survivor’s guilt are only half the reason for his barring me from my journey to sea.
I shake off the memory of the conversation with Father as I stand at the dock in the predawn chill, watching Kieras approach with our friend Palema, a girl who lives down the street from him. She appears cheerful as she helps him walk his trunks and bags to the side of our small barge, yet I can tell that she is uneasy from the tension in her shoulders. Kieras’s demeanor betrays little of what he feels about our impending departure; the humid breeze blows his ebony curls into his eyes and as he neglects to pin his hair back with his favorite silver clip, I conjecture that he is in a depressed mood.
“You’re early, Caelin,” Palema says with a smile as she drops a heavy leather satchel to the ground with a grunt. “Kieras said you’d be joining us to load the ship after the sun was up.”
“Changed my mind. I wanted to slip away before the house awoke,” I explain.
“Your father knows you’ve left, surely?” Palema frowns. “You bid him farewell?”
“He knows I’m leaving today.” I avoid her disapproving gaze by picking up the satchel she set down and hefting it up to the deck.
“That is to say, he told you not to go and you have snuck away regardless.”
“Enough, Palema.”
Kieras observes this all silently as he begins loading the rest of our luggage. I watch him for a moment; I feel Palema’s stare on my back. I take a trunk from Kieras’s hands and step away to stow it.
We spend two hours or so readying the ship for travel, and then it is time.
Palema hugs me; she dispenses affection freely, as the clouds give rain. “I will miss playing the bird-flute with you. You’ll return soon though, yes? I’ve written new music sheets.”
“We’ll be gone for ten days, perhaps a fortnight,” I affirm as I wrap my arms around her in return. “Kieras and I will be back safe and sound. And then we’ll be able to tell you all the secrets they hide from us about the Sorceress.”
“If you say so.” She squeezes me one last time before pulling back, and I wonder if she knows that my mouth has grown bitter, filled with soothing lies. “Be safe, Caelin. Elodian bless you.”
Then I watch Palema take Kieras aside for a hushed conversation. When they embrace, something about it seems different from the one I shared with her. Palema goes butter-soft in his arms, and her hands tangle in his hair, rather than resting flat on his back. Kieras, on the other hand, is statuesque, his limbs stiff and awkward.
He makes eye contact with me, and I say to myself, oh.
***
The first several days of our journey pass smoothly; we make it over the reef and into open sea without hindrance.
“All of those horror stories we were told as children—and for what?” I laugh and lay down on the wooden deck of the ship, popping a candied berry into my mouth. “The waters are as calm as my father after eating six helpings of that lamb stew he’s always got a plate of.”
“They say that the waves become treacherous the further one strays from the reef,” Kieras tells me from where he stands adjusting the sails.
“How much further?”
“I do not know.”
His speech is not quite curt, but it is flat, his sentences short. He speaks in such a way that each word seems to take a great effort to utter. I do not know how to ask him about it, and so I only call him over to me. “Stop fixing the sails, they’re already fixed. Come, take that shirt off and lay down.”
“You’re going to get a sunburn within the hour. I don’t particularly wish to partake in that activity,” Kieras says, but in a few minutes he abandons the sails and joins me in sunbathing, albeit still in his billowy linen shirt. I pluck the sleeves, too long even for his lanky arms.
“You are overdressed for the weather,” I tease. “Don’t get too close, I don’t want to stink of sweat.”
Kieras rolls his eyes. “You’re still demanding I undress?”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
My friend doesn’t answer, and so I return to eating candied berries. I have a conversation with him in my head. I ask: What wish do you truly want the Sorceress to grant, if we meet her? Kieras answers: I’m not sure. Perhaps for my father to come home. What about you? I: To become an azitrus farmer, and read scripture to trees for the rest of my days. Kieras: Idiot. You’d rather be a farmer than the High Priest?
I chuckle out loud and do not realize it until I feel Kieras staring.
“What are you on about now?” he probes.
“Nothing important.”
I do not tell him that I am thinking about wishes. About how I crave to siphon some of the inklike darkness from those pupils of his, pale eyes full to bursting with unwritten melancholy. And how maybe I do want him to remove that shirt, for reasons other than his own comfort. If only to count his ribs, watch the rise and fall of his chest, and rest my head against it to feel the heat of his skin, hear his heart beating in my ear. In less than two weeks, we will reach our destination, and our bodies will never again exist in the same state. One dead, one living, souls an ocean apart.
I savor Kieras’s living presence this afternoon, from a few inches away.
***
As Kieras predicted, conditions on the water get increasingly dangerous the further we travel, and by the tenth day of our trip, a storm roars in. The ship is overtaken before we have a moment to prepare. Over the screeching of the wind Kieras shouts, “Caelin! Help me tie the sails down!”
I nod and grip the railing of the deck, inching towards the sails. Sheets of frigid rain and powerful waves pummel the ship relentlessly, making every surface terrifyingly slippery. When I loosen my hold on the railing to reach for the nearest sail, I lose my footing, nearly tumbling over the edge into the vast grave below.
A thin arm catches me. “Hold on—Caelin, don’t you dare go overboard—”
Everything that happens next blurs together. The sails are given up on. The door to the cabin is opened. Kieras shoves me inside and the wind slams the door shut again. We collapse in a heap on the rug and crawl under the heavy table, screwed into the floor, to shield ourselves from debris.
It is no quieter inside the cabin than on the deck, but it is somewhat less wet, and I am finally able to brush the water out of my eyes to see. Kieras looks worse for the wear, as must I, but he doesn’t appear to be injured.
“Thank the gods,” I gasp, and pull him into my arms. “We are alive.”
“The storm is not over; the boat may still flip,” Kieras counters, his voice muffled by my shoulder, but he does not bother to pull away. I am grateful for any sort of stability as the waves and wind continue to yank the ship about.
I am certain I confess something to him as we ride out the storm, being thrown about the cabin, certain of our deaths. If not a confession, I utter something which is already known between us. A declaration of love of some sort. Whatever I say, Kieras must remember it, for the air between us becomes strange and thick from then on.
By morning the storm winds have pushed the ship onto the shore of an island, which Kieras quickly identifies on his map of rumors as the final resting place before reaching the Sorceress’s domain. I squint at the parchment, covered in neat black lines and faint watercolor pigment. “Are you certain that’s where we are?” I ask. “I doubt this map is accurate.”
“It’s the best we have. Besides, the weather is pleasant here, and look.” Kieras points to a nearby grove. “Azitrus trees.”
I blink, not quite understanding what I am seeing. In the village, we are all taught as children that the sacred citruses can only be cultivated by the most skilled of farmers, who study for years before being able to harvest a single fruit. The strict training regimen of apprentice azitrus farmers includes not only the basics of agriculture—maintaining the terraces, pruning the trees, warding off pests—but education on the religious ceremonies that must be performed to placate Elodian and produce the sweetest fruit. I recall blustery days in the thirteenth month when I, a young boy, would accompany Father to the azitrus farms for his annual visit. The farmers, skin baked in the sun like red clay, would stoop down to kiss the hems of Father’s robes as he spoke blessings over the flowering fruit trees. At sunset, Father would walk me home, with pale blue blossoms woven into my soil-dark hair by a happy, round-faced Kieras. Father would remind me, “This will be your job, once I am very old and go to Elodian’s home in the sea. It is an honorable responsibility.” I stayed silent each time, my mind filled not with the sanctity of religious ritual, but the image of the farmers’ knees growing dusty as they groveled at Father’s feet.
The island Kieras and I find ourselves on today appears to be absent of any human life, let alone farmers or priests. Yet ripe azitrus hang in heavy bunches from the branches like clusters of sapphires. Our ship could only hold so much food, with both of us agreeing that fresh water was more important to bring along—thus, we have been living off of raw fish for days on end. I step over to the azitrus trees in a trancelike state, and pluck one, and another, and another, no longer questioning how they flourish so. Kieras joins me. We pick fruit until the sun reaches the highest point in the sky; today, we will have a feast, and tomorrow, we will die.
I gorge myself on the azitrus, the juice dripping onto my skin and leaving it tacky. I imagine that if I fell asleep on the sand, ants would lay siege upon my body and devour me whole. But I remain half-awake, because Kieras is finally in a conversational mood. And I am always in the mood to converse with Kieras, and so here we lie.
“I was to be married to Palema in a month,” Kieras confides in me, nearly inaudible.
It is as if the tides cease to turn, the gulls to caw. A joyless shock filters through my body and into the sand. Kieras, betrothed. Kieras, married. Kieras, with Palema. I remember him and I as young boys, half-asleep in the terraces, waiting for azitrus to fall from the trees. Our stubby limbs could not reach them on the branch. Words would seep from us like honey and would inevitably coat the other. Secrets were difficult to imagine. But something has changed since those summer days. We are now tall, long limbed, able to reach the fruits of life on our own with ease. There is no need to scavenge together, to share tricks of the trade. The field of our friendship has become quiet.
“You didn’t tell me,” I reply eventually.
“I didn’t know what to say.”
“That you were getting married to Palema.”
“Don’t be like that. You know things are not so simple, when it comes to these matters. I could not just tell you.”
I fall into silence, feeling like a cloud in a gray sky—flat and unexpressive, with the potential to expand out, to explode. I wish to know why Kieras could not tell me, I wish to know what would have been so bad about it. I wish to know why he is talking like a mature adult—these matters, not so simple. Had Kieras become one without me at some point, escaping my noticing? And meanwhile here I am, seething at the thought that perhaps he pitied me. Perhaps he withheld the news of his betrothal out of a wish to spare my heart, feeling sorry for me, rather than reciprocating my need to exist at his side until our bodies sank into the seafloor.
I pick up a new azitrus, rip its flesh into pieces and chew it and swallow it. And then I bring it down to Kieras’s lips. He has eaten a single azitrus; I have counted. “You need to eat more. Bite,” I say, without any bite to my words, and he does. My jealousy fades as I watch him, for there is nothing I can picture with less difficulty than Kieras eating out of the palm of Palema’s hand. I cannot take my eyes off of him, my dearest friend with whom I share azitrus with in the fifteenth month, whose earthly form takes on the look of the other side of the mountains back home, slate-blue under the rain shadow. His sloping eyelids, his chapped lips, his calloused fingers. There is something sad and beautiful to his perpetual state of disarray.
Salt wind blows. I grab Kieras by the linen shirtfront and after a moment’s hesitation, he wraps his hands around my neck; we collide and our kiss tastes like fruitsugar and gut-wrenching desperation. One more day until I lose this. Gentle shadow, enveloping. Cut the tongue out of my mouth and place it into yours, and swallow it whole with all the words I did not say. Wish and wish.
***
We patch the plethora of holes in the boat that evening with driftwood and spare nails. Our repairs likely will not hold for long, but should give the vessel enough security to bring us to the Sorceress’s lair. She is said to reside at the bottom of the sea, the gateway to her abode a whirlpool of unfathomable depth.
“Are you ready?” Kieras asks as we raise the sails.
“As much as I can be,” I answer, and he accepts it.
The sea is eerily calm; the gusting wind chased away the storm, and the climate feels tropical once more.
“Surely we are going the wrong way,” I say after two hours of smooth sailing. “Did we accidentally turn back towards home?”
Kieras shakes his head. “I heard that the waters should be calm, by this stage in the journey.”
“You hear many things. How are we to trust any of it?”
“I have kept us alive until now, have I not?”
As our banter continues, neither of us realizes the ship has started to run off course, moving in a slow spiral. By the time I begin to feel dizzy, we are nearing the center of the whirlpool. My eyes widen as I look over the railing and see nothing but churning water and a steep drop-off into a void. I feel like I am staring at the new moon—seeing the deep, unforgiving blackness of night, and knowing that it is occupied.
“Kieras? I think we’re here—” is all I manage to get out before we fall in, and the world goes dark.
***
When we come to, I am not faced with the press of the wooden deck against my cheek, but of cold, damp stone. I blink saltwater out of my stinging eyes and push myself up onto my elbows, my gaze darting around the cavernous space. A teal mosaic of light undulates on the obsidian floor, and I realize it is the refraction of the sun shining through the ocean. The whirlpool engulfs the ceiling, suspended so far in the air that a haze obscures it.
“Kieras?” I whisper.
“Here,” he answers, slipping his hand into mine.
“Good.” I smile tremulously. “Help me up?”
The two of us stand, and find ourselves face to face with a woman three heads taller than each of us, her willowy form enshrouded by robes in shimmering hues of green and blue that seem to swirl with the whirlpool above. Long ivory tresses spill down her back and trail across the floor behind her, reminiscent of the crests of monstrous waves. And her three eyes, as they regard Kieras and I, emanate a faint golden glow.
“Welcome, Caelin and Kieras of the Village of Azurias,” the Sorceress says, her deep voice echoing. “I have been expecting the two of you.”
“You have?” I blurt out, and Kieras smacks me in the shoulder.
The Sorceress does not seem perturbed by my insolence, and gives a serene smile. “Indeed. It is not often that I get to meet the child of one of my past visitors. I am glad to see you healthy now. I assume you wish to meet your mother?”
I do. Of course I do. But that is not why I came here.
“Can you tell us the rules, first?”
“But of course—my manners would be dreadful if I didn’t. Come, children, sit with me.”
The Sorceress beckons us with a wave of the hand to a small pool of water. It looks innocuous, yet when I peer into it, I cannot estimate its depth. I make haste to sit down beside Kieras, reaching for his hand again; he takes it.
“I am certain you’ve heard rumors about me. Let me start by saying that it is only advised not to speak on what occurs in my realm,” the Sorceress begins. “I am sure you’ve also been told that single souls do not make it home, nor full pairs. I do wonder how this information has led your village only to send singles or pairs to me—why not groups? But I suppose that humans work in mysterious ways, and so perhaps I am the fool.
“The rules of my magic are quite simple: the wisher’s soul will remain in my domain as payment for granting the wish, and the other will absorb the life force which bound the wisher’s soul to their body. That additional strength should make the solitary return journey survivable. I could tell you more—there is always more to be told about a given topic, I might say—but I think you would rather ask me questions, so by all means, go ahead.”
I nod at Kieras, allowing him to speak first if he wants to, but he shakes his head. I clear my throat before asking, “If the wisher’s soul is trapped in your domain, does the wisher truly die? The soul does not move on to Elodian; surely this induces some sort of half-living state.”
The Sorceress hums, considering her answer briefly. “You are correct in that death does not occur in the traditional sense. Elodian and I have an… agreement. A contract, if you will. But I find those terms too formal. He and I are natural forces, balance incarnate—a world without death and hope could not exist, after all. Once the non-wisher eventually dies, Elodian will receive both souls at once.” Seeing the confusion on my face, the Sorceress continues, “To put it simply, the wisher will not technically complete their death until the non-wisher does. But they will be effectively dead.”
I am silent, processing, when Kieras takes his turn to ask a question. “Do you have a name, Sorceress?”
She smiles at that. “How polite of you. That really does bring a woman joy. But humanity has yet to deem hope a fearful enough force to name it. Only things you believe you may need to fight for survival one day are given names, dear child. That is why Elodian is a named deity, and I am ‘The Sorceress’ instead of your goddess of hope.”
“Is it hope,” Kieras says slowly, “or is it greed that drives people to you?”
I hold my breath. For someone who just hit me for being disrespectful to the Sorceress, Kieras is being careless with his words. Thankfully, the Sorceress’s mild demeanor persists.
“Smart child. It is both,” she concedes. “Greed is hope corrupted. I will grant any wish, if hope is present in its formation. But the corruption involved must be punished to maintain a… divine equilibrium, let us call it. Thus, the claiming of souls.”
Kieras and I both must have further questions, but neither of us opens our mouths.
“Well, it seems that the two of you are done interrogating me,” the Sorceress sings, standing again. “Speak your wish now or later; I have all the time in the world for you to discuss further.” She tilts her head and leans closer to Kieras, as if inspecting his face. “Though I don’t believe you will need much time.”
I register what the Sorceress means as I take in Kieras’s expression; I swear I can see the thoughts writing themselves across the parchment of his eyes.
“Caelin—” Kieras begins as he turns to me, but I interject.
“Let me wish for your father back. That is what you wanted, isn’t it? So I will stay here, and you go back to the village with him.” I seize him by the shoulders. “I am not letting you send me back; my father will still have my aunt if I die but your mother will have no-one.”
Kieras opens his mouth, closes it, opens it again. “No, Caelin.”
Then he raises my hand to his lips and kisses my palm, a gesture performed between lovers during marriages and funerals.
Before I have time to process, Kieras kneels before the Sorceress and says, “We wish to give two human lifetime’s worth of blessings to Elodian, with written proof to show our High Priest, so that Caelin may escape the priesthood.”
“Kieras, you idiot—” I hiss, tears brimming in my eyes. I agreed to this journey to prevent his suicide; how have I let this happen?
“Very well,” the Sorceress interjects, and places her fingertips on both of our foreheads. A searing heat flows into the very core of my being at her touch, but in the corner of my eye, Kieras is shivering. I realize, with a sob, that his life force is being drained into mine.
The Sorceress withdraws her fingers with a gasp, and the burning sensation ceases immediately, yet Kieras still quivers.
“I cannot grant this wish,” the Sorceress declares in a hushed tone, somewhat indignant. “I would be granting two wishes, for Kieras wishes to die.”
“So may I make a different wish?” I request. At this point, I would simply plead with her to make Kieras’s teeth stop chattering. I would do anything she asked to give him my lust for life.
“You may not.” The Sorceress returns her fingertips to our skin. “A wish I am able to grant has already been made.”
And the sun pours into my body again, and within moments, Kieras is no longer beside me. He leaves without so much as a gasp. When I regain my senses, all that is left behind is a puddle of water in the shape of a body. I bring my hand to the liquid, in hopes that I will somehow feel Kieras in it. But I find nothing except for frigid wetness.
“What have you done?” I whisper, to the Sorceress or Kieras, I am not sure.
“I have granted his wish,” the Sorceress answers, as if she did not just rip the soul out of my dearest love, the vicious extraction of my most vital organ. “I will negotiate with Elodian so I may grant the two of you some kindness, however. Your lover’s soul will carry on as a wave, rather than residing in this hall. Perhaps then he will find the freedom he seeks.”
“And what of I?”
“You will return home unscathed. I am sure your family misses you dearly.”
With that, the Sorceress wipes away my tears with her thumb, and slips away into the shadowy corners of her hall.
I am left alone with what remains of Kieras. I consider what to tell those back home—father, Kieras’s mother, Palema. Perhaps the simplest answer would be the easiest for them to bear: his family truly was cursed.
I am still unable to believe it, as the faint scent of him lingers in the air. My tears drip into the water which is now spreading over the floor, no longer resembling a human form. The saltwater mixes, as his life force merged with mine. The union is bitterly inadequate.
I vomit into the remnants of Kieras’s body and hope his soul cannot feel the sting of the acid.