"Strangled she was, I saw her dying. The Mistress spoke, and I forgot I loved her."
~ Ode to Anushä (Unknown Author)
Götteril
The grass crunched beneath Gorst's feet, and he made his way to the meadow with a smile and sweaty palms, knowing he would find what he desired at its centre: Celissa. The Immortals and Götteril itself glowed with spiritual lustre, a sort of shimmering semi-translucent luminosity, but Celissa glowed more than any created thing. Even the meadow with its swaying grass and little white flowers could not compare to her glamour.
A willow tree stood at the centre of the lush pasture, green with unnatural thick foliage, and dusted with minute pink flowers. Long green grass swayed with a warm breeze as though an artist had methodically planned each swish. Lone blades whispered against his feet and pants as he made his way up to the tree.
Under the willow's shade, he looking up to find Celissa. And there she was, on a lower, almost substantial branch. On Erdil, a branch like that would never have held her weight, but this was Götteril, where oddity was the norm.
Celissa's right leg dangled from the branch, and her left was curled beneath her luscious body. White skirts pulled up to her right knee, but billowed behind her in the slight breeze to the other side of the branch. A floral anklet decorated her perfect ankle, one he was sure she had weaved herself. Her long, wavy hair glimmered with every colour of the rainbow. Gorst knew her hair was pearly-white when it was not in the sunlight, but he'd only seen it that way once.
Opened before Celissa was a window to Erdil, and she was enraptured with whatever she saw. His heart fluttered in his chest as he watched her beautiful white eyes light up with hues of colours and flicker back to white. What an exceptional, wondrous creature she was.
The Mistress of Tales had a protocol when it came to greetings. One couldn't just stroll on in and strike up a conversation, he'd learned the hard way. A captivating sentence to honour Celissa's position as Mistress of Tales milled in his mind. He cleared his throat and began, raising his voice like an actor would.
'A fair maiden I beheld once upon a time, sitting in a tree.' He smiled when her bright eyes turned to him. 'Her eyes gleamed and sparkled, and rainbows were in her hair. Oh, to hear her voice, if only once, would satisfy my ravished heart!' This last he said with feigned desperation, clutching at his chest with mock desire. Celissa smiled and laughed that laugh that sounded like bells to him.
'Why Gorst, what brings you here? Aren't you supposed to be wreaking havoc on the other planes, oh Master Mischief?' She raised one eyebrow. 'But that was ample greeting.' She nodded. 'You may enter my tree, brother of Huiden.'
The skinny branch she perched on bent and swayed while he climbed, and he crawled straight through her window on Erdil. 'Gorst,' she whined. The window faded away into the slight shimmer of the air.
She scowled at him. 'Did you have to do that?'
'I'm sure it wasn't that important,' he retorted.
Celissa crossed her arms, pouting. 'I was watching a man's mind. Oh, the tales I spun in his head!' Her demeanour brightened up.
'I'm almost sure I can change the path the Fathers chose, with him and the unique time he has found himself in. It's quite amazing. Would you like to see?'
'She is excited,' Gorst realised. He eyed her, trying to be nonchalant, and failing. 'Oh, fine. Show me then, Celissa.'
The branch creaked and he settled in behind her, chancing it to curl his arms around her waist. For balance of course, nothing else.
Different colours spat and swirled in her eyes, and she spun her hands in The Way. The window opened before them on the tree. In it he saw a young man with light brown hair carrying a load of baggage through the Sheia desert.
He shrugged. 'So?'
Celissa glanced at him balefully, slack jawed and sharp gazed, and pointed at something behind the man. He peered closer, leaning against Celissa's warm back. The thing she pointed at turned out to be a child whose hair was the colour of the desert sand. She was very young and pale as a moonbeam.
With a closer look, Gorst noticed the mark on her. How could one explain the mark? It was not physical, and not spiritual either. Most people on Erdil couldn't see the mark, but the Immortals knew it well. All the Masters and Mistresses of Götteril hoped to find a marked one on their ventures, Gorst included.
'A Stormchild of the Fathers!' he gasped in surprise. 'Is she newborn?'
Celissa's eyes gleamed with delight, going a pinkish hue. 'You should have seen it, Gorst. A sandstorm unlike any we've seen in maybe two hundred years. Most of the Northern and Sheian army were caught in it.' Her white eyes widened and she waved her hands about in excitement. 'The Stormchild replaces another who died before his time.'
Understanding dawned on him. 'Well, who can say they know the Fathers' plans.'
She nodded acquiescingly. 'He was rather young for a storm creature. They usually die at a far greater age.' A pause ensued, a natural ebb in the conversation. 'He was killed in the war.'
'That is quite a tale dear Celissa, one I'm sure you'll have in every history book fifty years from now.'
Celissa beamed at his praise, but he could tell she knew he was only flattering her. 'Master Mischief, why does your tongue flatter me so?'
Her words were light hearted, but not her expression. She raised her eyebrow at him. Was he pushing it? Take the safest route and arrive late, or the take fastest route and risk your life. The saying arrested his thoughts. He had to take the wise road.
'I came to ask you to dine with my brother and me, and to hear a proposal we have for your consideration,' Gorst said. Celissa looked pleasantly surprised, so he congratulated himself with a satisfied inner smirk.
'Would tonight, at the darkening of Götteril suite?' he asked in a genteel way, hoping to win her over, willing his eyes to be larger and his face to be innocent.
'At your place?' she asked.
Gorst nodded with all the, charm he could muster, imagining charm leaking from his pores like a sweet perfume. When she smiled that sweet smile of hers that made the sunlight seem pale in comparison, he knew that he had won, charming or not.
They shared a parting hug, one with a little extra passion. Gorst lifted her chin with his fingers so that they were again gazing into each other's eyes.
'Of course,' she said.
His heart hammered in his chest, but he could not risk the kiss he so desired. Their lips were so close, but a bottomless pit divided them, a divide he could never cross. The Mistress of Tales wrought the tale of the hero, but also that of the villain. He had to tread with care.
Celissa pulled away and looked out into the meadow as if it held the secret to endless joy. 'Well, my old friend, run along then.' She grinned at him, her eyebrows dancing, a lopsided grin playing on her cheeks. 'I'm hard to satisfy, and the darkening is almost upon us.'
'I still have a few hours,' Gorst countered, 'I think you may be surprised.' He leapt from the branch on to the soft grass and walked out of the meadow with a thumping heart in his ears and an unquenchable smile on his face.
#
'Brother?' Gorst strolled into their dwelling, expecting Huiden's sulking form in his chair as usual. 'Brother?' he raised his voice. Huiden was not in his usual spot. It was ridiculous that he expected an answer from his ever silent sibling.
Always with the dreary self-pity and morbid grief. Why was he so dramatic? With a grimace on his face, Gorst threw his hands up in the air in aggravation. He scowled at his brother's chair. Huiden must have gone off somewhere again. Of course. And he hadn't let him know. In disapproval, he shook his head as he thought.
Now he would have to prepare their abode for Celissa's visit by himself. And why did Huiden always disappear so mysteriously? He swore it was like this every day. Hands stuck in his pockets, he perused the room. Dirty, unkempt. Gorst sighed, rolling up his sleeves. Time to get dirty.
© Joy Cronjé 2015