Goddess Unravelled

Empty Spaces

                In the hallway it was dead silent. No voices came from behind the door of Azura’s apartment, and tears began to cloud her vision. If only she heard Altair’s loud voice, or Gabriel and Maya arguing from behind the door. But there was nothing.

                Her hands shook as she tried the doorknob, expecting it to be locked. The door swung open with a slow creak, and Alice took a deep breath and stepped inside.

                The apartment was dark and silent. Alice walked in further, stomach full of lead. There was only the faint glow of orange light coming from the kitchen, a night light in the shape of a lantern that Azura always kept on at night, since she got up to make tea when she couldn’t sleep.

                Alice turned the corner, bracing herself to see an empty kitchen and beyond that, a dark and silent bedroom. She stopped abruptly, socks sliding on the tile floor.

                Azura and Shakra were sitting at the table, eyes wide in the dark. Maya and Gabriel were sitting on either side of them, all of the totally silent, all of them sitting perfectly still. In the middle of the kitchen, Altair was standing, his expression shocked and dazed. No one said anything, and Alice had a moment of panic so extreme that her vision narrowed to a pin-point and she thought she was about to pass out. The goddess had brought them back wrong somehow. She hadn’t specified that they had to have souls, or that they couldn’t be insane, or that they had to come back with their voices.

                Gaia had tricked her. What had the goddess done?

                Then Altair blinked, looked straight at her and said, “What the hell was that about?”

                Ten minutes later, the lights were on, and Azura had made a fire in the tiny stove in the living room. The kettle was boiling on the stove, and Altair had insisted that there weren’t enough chairs, and kept pulling Alice onto his lap. For once, Alice didn’t protest this in front of the others. She couldn’t hold on to him tight enough. Feeling the scratch of his whiskers on his neck, his hair under her fingers, his arms tighten around her whenever she shifted, was a constant reminder that he was alive. That they all were alive. She had nearly lost them. She had lost them. And now here they were.

                Maya and Gabriel had moved so that they were sitting side by side, and Maya kept reaching out to touch him, brushing her fingers over the top of his hand, or grasping his sleeve, as if she were afraid he might disappear. Alice remembered how she had screamed his name after the collapse of the building, but she didn’t ask what had happened. She could imagine it well enough.

                In any case, they weren’t fighting anymore, and the way Maya was looking at Gabriel, with a mixture of relief and rapture, it was evident that Gabriel’s worries were over. They wouldn’t be ending their relationship anytime soon. Alice tightened her grip on Altair’s arm. It was funny how losing someone could put everything in perspective. She should be furious with Altair, for the hairbrush thing, for letting that thing into her house, and starting all of this, but it was hard to be angry with him when she was just so utterly relieved he was alive.

                Azura brought a tray of tea to the table, setting it down on top of the glass surface, leaning down to squeeze Alice’s shoulder gently after she did. “You clearly saved us somehow, Alice. We were brought back, a little confused naturally, but all in one piece. I have no idea how anyone would get Gaia to do that.”

                Shakra nodded, her dark eyes searching Alice’s face. “Do you want to talk about it?”

                “It was Aunt Ruby.” Alice felt a pang of sadness. That was all that was missing here. If only there had been a way to bring Ruby with her too. It would have completed this perfect reunion. “She somehow knew all of this was going to happen, so she put a plan in place.” Alice continuing talking, taking sips of the hot tea between sentences. It was a long story to tell, but the others were hanging on every word. When she was finished, there was a moment of silence that hung in the air.

                Azura set her mug down. “We are lucky that you are wise beyond your years.”

                Alice felt her cheeks go red. “But not that wise. My second wish isn’t good enough. I didn’t realize it until now, but what about you? The gods know who all of you are, that you’re with me.”

                “We can get help from the magical community,” Shakra suggested. “Spread a rumour that you’ve retired from the store, that you’re no longer working here. The rest of the community hate the gods, they’ll be happy to help.”

                “They’re not attracted to our power,” Azura said gently. “They’re attracted to you, and since they forget you right away, they’ll forget the power as well. You won’t attract any new gods.”

                “But now Dione has it in for me, she’s holding a grudge.”

                “We move from city to city, and nobody wants to give the gods information, but the time she figures out where we are, we’ll be gone.”

                “It’s not enough.” Alice frowned. “I’ll still worry—”

                Altair crossed his arms over hers, pulling her back when she tried to get up. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it. There’s nothing we can’t handle. So just relax. Her point is you won’t attract any new trouble, which is a huge advantage.”

                Gabriel linked his fingers into Maya’s, grinning around at all of them. “We’re all alive, we’re all well. There’s nothing to worry about, Alice. We should be celebrating.”

                Alice chewed on her bottom lip. “I know you’re right, I just feel like…I don’t know…”

                “Like there’s always something you should be battling?” Shakra smiled. “That feeling will fade when the trouble does.  Trust me, I know. Allow yourself this victory.”

                “What about the Halfmoon Order? Did any of them make it out?”

                “We don’t know any more about it then you do, but I can send someone out to look,” Azura said. “It’s best if we lay low, and move as soon as we possibly can. If Adonis still knows the location of the shop, staying here could be asking for trouble.”

                Alice’s hand drifted to her pocket, which was empty. She’d completely forgotten about the life line that she’d had. It was gone, which meant Gaia had taken it from her when she’d been unconscious in the bed after she’d first fallen.

                “I think he has bigger things to worry about. But you’re right, we should move tonight, right after we find out what happened to the order. If any of them are hurt, I want to help.”

                Azura stood up and collected a handful of threads from the ceiling, working them into a complicated pattern that quickly took on a peculiar shape. Alice wasn’t sure what it was until it the older woman passed a hand over it one last time, revealing a small, electric blue robin sitting in her palm.

“Go to the building down the street, the one which lies in ruins, collect the information you find there and return to me quickly,” Azura whispered. She released the bird, which hurled itself out the kitchen window with a high-pitched squeak and vanished out of sight.

Alice felt her eyes go wide. “Now that is a spell you’ll have to teach me.”