AN:// Hello friends! This is the final chapter of Book 1 of the Aeon of Daemons series - the Age of Aquarius! I really hope you've enjoyed, if you've made it this far thank you so much and I know there's a lot of editing to do on this so thank you for sticking with it! I'm expecting this to be at least a duology, maybe a trilogy, depending on where the writing takes me, but it won't be started for a little while as I have a different series sequel that I'm working on at the moment! Big love to you all and thank you so much for reading!
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Chapter 29
Bonnie's heart had not left her throat in the hours that passed.
Perhaps she could blame it for the silence that had consumed the three of them since the summoning had ended. Maybe it could be the reason why her stomach was in a knot and her hands had not stopped shaking, even underneath the warm water she was now standing below.
Gremory had been soft with her, although barely able to speak, he had wrapped an arm around her shoulders and guided her to a taxi which she did not remember being called, but then again she didn't know how long she had sat there for. As they'd reached the small B&B, he'd shown her to her room and laid a towel out beside the bath, his usual smile strained as he nodded before leaving.
She had wanted to say something, but couldn't find the words. How could she possibly when she barely understood the truth herself?
But Kimaris... Kimaris could have been mistaken for the shadow itself.
He released her from his arms before she even had time to take a breath, and after that it was as if she did not exist. He sat in the car's front, head turned out the window, and it was then she wondered if daemons had to breathe. She had never seen something so still.
He'd disappeared by the time she had exited the car—his feet on the ground before the vehicle had stopped moving—and when Gremory had only shaken his head, the feeling inside of her twisted more.
Her hand slammed onto the shower wall as pain licked her ankle, bringing back the memories that had almost dragged her to the depths of god knows where. Her frayed skin made her teeth grit, and she held out her arms to get it all over with at once. As mud, gravel, blood and tears, slipped down the drain, Bonnie tried to squeeze the despair she felt in her chest until she could breathe again, but it refused.
His laughter kept ringing in her ears; the way it had frozen her right down to the bone. She did not know who he was, but it was as though her soul did. And he had known her name.
That scared her even more.
She gave herself a moment before stepping out the shower and wrapping the towel around her, the lack of noise now making the room eerily silent. She swiped an arm over the mirror, clearing the condensation to reveal her pale and frightened face.
How had he known?
She shook her head, quickly turning from her reflection and throwing the bathroom door open, determined to not think of what had happened.
But the figure in the corner of her room had other ideas.
She felt the blood drain from her as she spotted their hunched shoulders, shaking hands clinging to the object in them. She could not see what it was, but their attention seemed to be only on it.
The thought to go back into the bathroom crossed her mind, but she knew he had heard her come out. So, instead she stepped towards him, her tongue heavy as she thought of what to say. She wanted to thank him for saving her life first and foremost, but she did not know if he wanted to hear it. From the way he had been, she wondered if he regretted it.
But frivalous questions of why he was in her room flew from her mind as he turned and she could clearly see what he was holding.
"This is why you were adament on dealing with the flight tickets yourself, wasn't it?"
His voice wasn't accusing; it wasn't filled with hate or blame. It was worse. He sounded hurt.
"Kimaris I—"
"Were you ever going to tell us your real name, Sofia?"
His grey eyes turned to look at her so slowly that she wanted to scream. She felt her own well up with tears at the look in them, and she quickly squeezed them shut so she could speak.
"I tried, Kimaris. Right before we summoned Amdusias I tried to tell you but I—"
"But what?" he interrupted, standing to his feet. "But you couldn't bring yourself to admit your deciet? That you were so guilt ridden with shame that the words couldn't leave your mouth? That your so disgusted with working with Sitri that you couldn't do it?"
Bonnie blinked, taken aback by flames behind his hurt but also by his words.
"W-What do you mean? I didn't... I couldn't..."
"Oh please," he scoffed, throwing her passport at her with such precision that she barely needed to move her hands to catch it. "Save your lies for someone who'll believe you."
Bonnie's sixteen year old face looked up at her from the paper, her hair slightly lighter than it was now. She still had some of the youthful hope in her eyes, but it had started to dim with years of abandonment and rejection.
"I don't know how far you looked through my passport, but if you didn't notice there isn't a single stamp in it," she admitted softly, swallowing the pride that threatened to shut her up. "I had big hopes when I got it that I would go off and travel the world, make something of myself and become someone new... that never happened. Instead I just slowly became somone who had no one, and nothing."
"Is this meant to make me feel sorry for you?" Kimaris replied, scoffing and folding his arms. "Is this meant to excuse the fact that you opened a portal for one, if not the most, dangerous daemon to ever be created?"
Bonnie blinked, and she knew that the only reason Kimaris could not see the outright confusion on her face was because of his emotions blinding him.
"No," she replied, putting down the passport and rubbing her head with one hand. "I didn't do anything of that intentionally, I don't even know who Sitri is, I'm just trying to tell you why I go by a different name."
Kimaris watched her for a second before giving the most subtle nod she had ever seen. She cleared her throat and tried to forget that she was standing in only a towel, he was giving her a moment to speak and who knew when that would happen again.
"Sofia is the name given to me by parents who I did not know. After getting passed around through foster families and adoptions that always seemed to fall through, it became something that I hated. It tied me to a girl who was unwanted and unloved by just about anyone."
She blinked away the sharp pain the memories caused.
"When I arrived at Abigail's the defeat must have shown on my face because she started calling me Bonnie Sofia. Whether she truly thought I was pretty or she was just trying to cheer me up, I'm not sure, but the name stuck. Once my foster sisters started using it, they shortened it to just Bonnie. And I liked it. Bonnie was a girl with a family and hope, even if it was only for a short while. After Abigail died and I lost contact with the girls I just put myself as Bonnie all the time, no one needed to know that I was ever anyone else before that. Only official documents have Sofia on them now."
Kimaris said nothing, the warm light from the candle behind him cast shadows over his features, making them change with every movement.
"I don't know who Sitri is, I swear Kimaris."
"Why did you summon him then?"
His blunt words made her face flush. His eyes moved from the ground up to her, and she gripped the towel tighter.
Embarrasment itched to overwhelm her.
"The dreams I've been having... they've been pointing at someone... or something I suppose," she mumbled, struggling to swallow her pride. "Manakel helped me to see them clearer and it showed me an arrow, shooting through the star signs and lighting them up as if they were watching over me. The arrow shot from the archer of Sagittarius and..."
Her mind struck a memory; the page in the book in which she had read Sitri's name before.
"Sitri is the protector of Saggitarius — that's why he was speaking to me through my dreams, that's why the summonings came to me, because he was helping me... That's why I trusted him. Wasn't it?"
Kimaris' jaw tightened, his shoulders moving closer to his ears.
"What did Manakel tell you?"
"I asked him if my Guardian Angel had something to do with Saggitarius... he said yes."
Bonnie had expected Kimaris to shout at her, to leave the room without another word or even attack her if eh thought she was lying, but he did none of those things. Instead, the shoulders that had tensed began to shake, and his formor stoic expression erupted into laughter lines.
Bonnie knew this laugh — it was not filled with joy.
"And that is exactly why you should not trust Manakel and his riddles, because he is tied to letting choas find it's way rather than protect his own brothers. His words are always half truths, and you have discovered today Sofia Lawrence, how deceptive the Angels will truly be."
Bonnie flinched at the name, but she held her ground, waiting for him to explain why she was stupid, and why humanity was so inferior to the Great Kimaris and his all knowing self. Through her anger she knew that she needed to know, she had to understand what had happened.
"Were you even born under the stars of Sagittarius?" He asked, his brown lifting with spite. He already knew the answer, he had read her passport. Anger rippled under his breath, just waiting to burst forth.
"No," she answered, and doubt started to clear edges of fog that had been dimming her senses. She was slowly awakening, realising how dumb she had truly been.
"No, you weren't," Kimaris echoed, head shaking and a tight smile tugging at the edges of his mouth hauntingly. "You were born under Capricorn, which should have clued you in to the fact that Sitri was not your Guardian Angel, however that seems unfair because even if you had been ' a Saggitarius' as you humans call it, the sign of the archer isn't for Sitri."
Bonnie could see it now; the memories darkening Kimaris' eyes. Like pools they showed pain that had no bottom to it, freezing him like it did on the field when Sitri was summoned. The light around him almost glowed, the aura sparking with each syllable that passed his lips. She could taste the hatred—putrid and vile, but she did not know if it was for her, or for him.
"The gods used to be quite fond of each other back in the day, they were friends even, true friends. Not the relationships they have now that come with warrents and equal fortune, depending on one another to validate and hold up to unattainable standards, always ready to stab another in the back for advancement, no. Sitri had a best friend, one who would have died for him if he asked... when he asked."
Kimaris shook his head, turning away from Bonnie and looking into the mirror to his right, staring at his own reflection as he spoke. The air was thick, and Bonnie didn't breathe, watching his fists clench until they were only bones.
"When they were chosen to become protectors it was the greatest honour of their lives, only twelve were chosen after all. So they honoured the person most important to them for eternity. Pinned to the sky where everyone could see how much they meant to one another. Truly. Their signs became homages to them : Capricorn, a goat— representing the stubborness that Sitri lived every day with, and small joke referencing a goat which bit him as a child. And Sagittarius..."
Kimaris moved like a shadow, his arm swinging around and hitting the mirror with an elegence that took Bonnie's breath away. The glass shattered, the pieces flying in all directions as they tumbled to the floor, the sharp edges reflecting the light and bouncing it around the room.
But there was more light than there had been before, because now... Now one of Kimaris' glowing arrows was impaled into the center of the wooden frame, vibrating with power that wanted to be free.
Everything fell into place.
"Sagittarius is the symbol of the Archer, after his most loyal friend and weapon, who watched over Capricorn... The Guardian of it some would say."
"Y-You're the Protector of Capricorn," she whispered, almost falling over the leg post that her feet caught as she stepped back. "But that would make you a god."
She saw it now. The strength in his stance, the way his features were so striking they felt deadly. She'd seen him in action, she knew what he could do. Why was it then she had never questioned who he said he was. Had she been that desperate for connection that she overlooked all the signs that pointed to it?
He looked over to her, an expression daring her to flee.
"I suppose we both have been lying about our true names then, haven't we?"
She knew she should ask, should know exactly who he was but she was too scared to know. She had only barely gotten a handle on everything let alone throwing the idea of gods roaming the earth into it. The words refused to leave her mouth.
"As for you, Sophia," her name was a hiss through his lips. "You better be prepared to forget about everything you know, because now that Sitri is free, there's not stopping whats coming. Now he can come to this realm, can bring his legions, can search for the one thing that could truly bring him every power the universe has to offer. And you?"
He walked towards her, his toes almost touching hers as he glared down, pinning her with the hatred in his eyes. She could see her expression in the dark reflection of them—just a scared girl, in over her head.
"You are the key he has always needed, and with you there's no stopping him, not now he's not tied to the Abyss. Thanks to you, and your refusal to tell us who you truly were—You've brought the Age of Aquarius upon all of us, and you'll be the reason he either fails or succeeds. You'll be death of humanity, or the saviour of a new era... but I highly doubt you're going to succeed in defeating him. Far greater gods than you have tried, ones who actually knew what they were doing. So good luck to you."
He gave her one last stare, watching how the tears built into her eyes before pushing past her and heading for the door, his steps heavy and with purpose.
"Kimaris, I'm sorry," she managed to blurt out as he stepped through the doorway, halting him at the threshold. "I didn't want any of this."
A small part of him softened as he turned to look back at her, her pale legs sticking out from the thin towel that she shivered behind, her helpless eyes begging him not to go. But he had to.
"Even gods don't get to choose their destiny. You should become well aquainted with yours. A Guardian Angel isn't going to save you, you're on your own."
And then he left, the door shutting behind him and drowning her in the silence that remained. Her legs gave out as she slipped down the side of the bed, clutching to the wooden posts in the hope they'd give her strength. But as she sunk to the ground, pieces of broken glass pressing into her skin, she knew she had never felt weaker. She should have felt some sort of power in the knowledge that she was a destined being, someone who could change the world, but all she felt was cold. Without Kimaris, she would have died. Without Gremory, she was alone.
As she picked a shard from her heel, it glinted and made her look up at the wall where the mirror had been, the arrow still glimmering but softer than before.
Kimaris' arrow.
The archer's arrow.
A new kind of pain swept over her as she realised the last piece of the puzzle, and the tears dropped form her cheeks and onto the hard ground below.
Kimaris was her Guardian Angel, someone who could have helped ehr had she only been honest with him, but now he wanted nothing to do with her. No one was coming to save her.
And she wished for the life she had before, because being alone and boring was better than knowing that your death was coming for you and there was nothing you could do about it.
The Age of Aquarius was here, and Bonnie didn't know the first thing about it, let alone how to stop it.
She closed her eyes and sent a silent prayer up to whoever was listening, hoping that they weren't laughing at her as she asked for help, or some way to defeat what she had started.
But no one answered.
Not yet, anyway.
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