I Know You

13

At first, Maleficent did not know where she was.

As she fought to pull herself out of the deep sleep she had clearly been in, she opened her eyes momentarily before blinking them shut again against the electric blue light that hurt them.

The Blue Cap cave. Aurora.

Rousing herself a little more, she became aware that her head was rested against something soft.

Maleficent did not fall asleep by accident – not so far from her nest, and certainly not in the company of others. Not without something to help her along.

"Are you thirsty?" Stefan had asked.

Struggling to sit up, the fairy's breath hitched in her throat as a familiar sense of dread swept over her.

Attempting to sift through the thick fog that seemed to have set in inside her head, Maleficent's hand went instinctively to her back. She stole herself for emptiness but instead was met with the softness of her own feathers.

Her hand went to her head, next, and there were here horns, both present and correct.

"Godmother?"

The word brought her to, and Maleficent realised she was just inches from Aurora, the girl sat with her back against the cave wall and her legs outstretched in front of her, where her own head had rested just moments earlier.

She brought her hand back down from her head, finally able to reason with herself that nothing bad had happened. This was Aurora. And nothing had been taken from her.

Maleficent frowned. Had the girl softened her heart enough for her defences to drop and allow her to slip into slumber?

"Blue Caps are highly empathic fae. They have an innate ability to hone in on whatever is troubling you the most, and to take it away. If only for a little while."

She glanced up at the blue creatures, floating lazily as if in suspended animation, their tiny wings twitching as they began to stir. And it made sense.

It had been days since Maleficent's body had allowed her peaceful sleep. The girl, it seemed, brought her endless amounts of worry and she was unable to stop the constant fears and thoughts from surfacing long enough to rest.

She knew it foolish, well aware that she would be no kind of protector for the girl or the moors exhausted. Yet there was little she could do abate the feeling, and if this was what being a mother did, she wondered why so many humans chose such a feat.

And now, the girl was looking at her with such hurt in her eyes that it caught Maleficent off guard.

"You feel asleep," Aurora told her softly. "That's all. I didn't do anything."

"Beastie..." she began.

But Aurora stood up, straightening her skirt, brushing the sand from it as she did so.

"We should go," she said, turning and disappearing out of the cave.

Ω Ω Ω Ω

The journey home was an altogether silent affair.

Diaval sensed an atmosphere as soon as they arrived back, and had initially pursued Aurora in the hope that she might talk to him about what happened, deciding she was a much more likely candidate than his mistress.

He was mistaken however, and after an hour's stony silence, he had given up and left the girl in peace.

Returning to the tree, he had made a few feeble attempts at encouraging Maleficent to open up to him, but these proved no more successful and he had eventually admitted defeat.

Finally nesting in his favourite branch, Diaval tucked his head beneath his wing and prepared to sleep.

"Godmother!"

Diaval watched as Maleficent shifted to look down to the floor below.

"What is it?" she asked, stiffly – the sullen expression on Aurora's face telling her the girl had not yet forgiven her.

"I just wanted to tell you that I am going to leave the moors for a short while, and visit my Uncle in Wolfslock," Aurora told her.

"What?" Maleficent asked, her voice dangerously low.

Aurora took a breath. "You told me that should I wish to leave the moors, I was to tell you. That is what I am doing."

"It is not safe," the fairy said, leaning back in so she could no longer see the girl's face.

"I'm sixteen, Godmother," she pointed out.

"Exactly."

"I wasn't asking permission," Aurora told her, boldly.

"Fine," Maleficent said simply, giving up.

Diaval let out a squawk of surprise.

Glancing up at him, Maleficent arched a brow, daring the bird to challenge her further.

"You'll be needing a horse," she said, and the raven hopped swiftly from his branch toward the ground before he was changed.

For a moment, Aurora stood rooted to the spot, clearly caught off guard by her Godmother's lack of resistance.

Maleficent leant back against the tree and closed her eyes.

When she opened them again, Aurora and Diaval were gone.

Ω Ω Ω Ω