Melona
After that time in the forest I spent a lot of time alone. A few days of Eris purposefully tried to ignore me before he had been sent off to the other side of the land to deal with whatever it was his father needed him for. Leaving me in my rooms dealing with Tyren’s studies of the dynamics of the Autumn Court. Being taught my place and each person’s role. My role mostly being to be the pretty female at Eris’ side at formal gatherings, being the symbol of mercy and kindness to the lesser fae, and the most important one. Making babies.
The more I am told about my role the more it makes me want to crawl out of my skin, and run away with the wind. The more I block out the lesson’s. The more I spend time in my room and think about that little boy drowning.
This isn’t fair to him. Thirty minutes was not good payment for him, he deserves more from me. I will not let him see me as just another female. I will one way or another show him that I am his equal. Weather he wants to or not.
So I told Pomona to inform me as soon as Eris was back.
The guards didn’t move to stop me as I went past the doors to his personal manor. It was a good half hour walk from my rooms to the surface, and another length ways. Still, that didn’t stop me.
It was much more lovely a smell of old paper, and dusty leather. The walls painted a deep terracotta, with darkly stained redwood floorboards, trim, and stair rails. The chandeliers where iron forged with real candles there. Accents of gold in the ceiling trim, and grey stone in the fireplaces. With red mandala rugs and brown leather couches.
I had to stand in the middle of it all and spin under the light of the sun that I hadn’t seen all these days he’s been away. Spin and admire the craftsmanship of ancient hands with woodwork and paintings. Spin just for the sheer joy of being out of my cage for a while.
“What are you doing here?”, Eris asks from the top of the stairs. Looking for all the world that he had been flung against a wall. . . several times.
“What happened to you?”, I gasp and rush for the stairs.
“Nothing”, he answers when I’m only half way up, but I don’t stop until I can full see him in the light of day.
“No you’re not”, I tell him. My hands reaching for his horribly bruised face. “What in Prythian did this to you?”
“Nothing”, he answers again and dodges my touch like I had poisoned figure tips. “Why are you here Melona?”
“I wanted to see you”, I say gently. “I - I feel like that you feel cheated by what you shared with me. That maybe you feel taken advantage of because you haven’t had anyone listen to you, really listen to you, for a long time. Then suddenly having that let you slip, and now you’re treating me like I had beaten it out of you. I don’t want you to feel that way. I want to offer you a bit of myself.”
He looks at me blankly for a really long time before shaking his head.
“Go back to your rooms Melona.”, he scowls as he turns to walk away.
“No”, I tell him firmly and he pauses to look at me.
“That wasn’t a suggestion. I am ordering you to go back to your room”, he hisses.
I plant my feet to the floor. No.
“I am not playing this childish game”, Eris warns.
“Neither am I”, I tell him. “If I am going to be your Queen then I am not going to let you face anything alone. If you can’t love me, fine. I can find a way to deal with that, but I wont let you keep believing that you are alone anymore.”
“We come into this world, and that’s the way we leave it”, he growls.
“You’re wrong”, I tell him.
“Like you would know anything of death”, he sneers as he turns to me. “As if you know anything of pain up there in your ivory castle on top that mountain. With a loving family.”
“I watched my mother be butchered in front of me!”, I tell him softly. Sadly and without anger at his assumptions.
It made him pause as I walk to him.
“Do not pretend to know my pains. I don’t pretend to understand yours. I can see the effects of your pain, I see the loneliness in your eyes. The anger, but no, I cannot even fathom the idea of a father trying to kill his own children”, I tell him. “So do not think for a moment that I do not carry my own sorrows with me.”
His features have softened.
“I was born during the war between Hybern, the Fae, and humanity”, I start. “Me and my mother were of course hidden away as best as possible, but that didn’t last long in a war. No one is safe.
I was ten and she had hide me in a cupboard. Forcing me to watch as Hybern soldiers used and tore her to shreds. I had to watch and could do nothing without risking her sacrifice to be for nothing and be discovered.
So do not think for a moment Eris Vanserra that I do not know what pain is, or that I am naïve to the cruelty we are capable of”, by the end hot tears are streaming down my cheeks. Shaking breaths as I try to press the images from behind my eyes away with my palms.
“There”, I wheeze. “Childhood trauma for childhood trauma.”
“Why are you telling me this? I already said the payment was enough”, he mutters still turned away from me.
“I felt guilty. It didn’t seem fair for you to have told me something like that without giving something in return”, I murmur. “And I don’t want to turn into your mother. The Phantom of the Autumn Court. . . I don’t want to spend the rest of my life wondering empty hallways to try and avoid you. If we can’t love each other can we at least be friends? Or if that’s too much, can we at least talk to one another now and then. Please, I don’t want to be forgotten.”
Eris turns and takes a step. Then another, and another until he is standing only inches from me.
His hand reaching over to take mine cautiously. As if he wasn’t quiet sure how physical contact should work.
“I’m going to make you a promise. One I intend to keep”, he says softly but firmly. His other hand holding my chin to make me look up at his amber eyes. “If I cannot do anything but this my life will be well lived. I will never let never let you end up like my mother.”
He wasn’t lying, and I hugged him for it. My arms tight around his waist as I burry my face into his chest.
“Thank you”, I murmur. “Thank you.”
We stayed like that for a while. Eris placing one of his hands on the small of my back to press me there for a moment before letting it slip away and I take it as I sign to let go.
“I’m s-”
“Do you want to talk now?”, he asks before I can say much else.
“If you aren’t too busy”, I offer.
“I shouldn’t be for the rest of the evening. You could stay for dinner?”, he suggests.
“I’d love to”, I try to smile and he does too. Only very briefly. “Only I’m not really dressed for it.”
Eris looks down at my plain marigold dress. No jewels or fancy stitch work. A simple day dress that buttoned up in the front and flowed just below my ankles.
“I think you look fine”, he says simply before offering his arm. I don’t hesitate to take it. “I like how plainly you dress. It’s a refreshing break from the constant flooding of peacocks I have to deal with in court.”
“Well, this court does seem to enjoy making loud fashion statements”, I smile and poke at the forest green silk jacket he was parading around in. He looks down at it with disapproval.
“Clothing is so impractical”, he grumbles in irritation and I try to not choke on the images that popped into my head.
“Maybe so, but they are very warm”, I contradict and kick up my skirt a bit more to watch it flow nicely.
After being lead around the manor house corridors we end up at two heavy wood doors that open up into a master bedroom. The walls are burnt orange with cathedral windows that start at the floor and almost touch the ceiling. Those leading out to a stone balcony looking over rolling hills of grass and wheat.
The four post bed of dark wood could fit at least four people. Covered in thick deep emerald green wool blankets, and beige pillows. Wood floors covered in pelt rugs of animals that were huge and no longer walked the lands of Prythian. Pressured perfectly by fae magic.
Eris gesturing to the two chairs set before another grey stone fireplace like the one down in the main entrance. One was much loved with age and the other not as much. I sit in the one that was obviously not his favourite. A bowl of chocolate covered nuts appearing on the table between the two. Set up much like my own room.
“This is where you live?”, I ask as I sneak one of the treats into my mouth.
“Yes”, Eris nods as he goes around the room collecting papers scattered over desks and piling them neatly. “Each of us boys is given our own area to look after for our father. A sort of training for when one of us takes the throne. I think mine is the best with being kept in running order, but unfortunately that isn’t the only thing a Autumn High Lord needs to be good at.”
“Maybe it should be”, I hum.
“It should”, he agrees as he comes to sit next to me once more. Again the two of us sitting in front of a fire to talk. Maybe this would become our own little preference.
“Why did you bring me here? I wouldn’t have minded sitting down stairs”, I question. “This seems a bit too. . . interment for you.”
He smirks a bit at that. It’s charming but sly.
“You might as well get comfortable in here. You’ll be spending a lot of time in it after Mabon”, he purrs and I think my heart burst.
I try to turn away from that look in his eyes. That hungry look. Try to cover my mouth to stifle the surprized squeak, and to hide the red I my cheeks.
“You not used to talking about that sort of this are you?”, he smiles.
“No”, I grumble and squirm. “. . . Did you want to start right after we’re married to have faelings?”
He pauses and frowns a bit.
“No. . . Not until you’re ready to. . . And hopefully not until my father is berried”, he answers with a flash of darkness in his eyes.
“You aren’t going to-”, I stammer.
“I promised you I would not let you be treated like my mother was, and still is. I can’t control what other’s do, but I can control myself”, Eris says firmly. “I will not hurt you like that Melona.”
Again, the truth.
A heavy weight that I didn’t realize I was carrying lifts from my shoulders. Breathing coming much easier to me now, and for the first time in getting here. I feel safe.
“The other day you said that you read colours. . . Can I ask what blue means to you?”, he asks out of the blue.
“I’ll tell you”, I nod. “But only if you let me help heal you. You look like someone threw you into a stone wall.”
He signs but agrees and I stand. Coming to stand in front of him. Reaching out and gently holding his porcelain skin. Soothing the deep purpling bruise over his eyes with my thumbs. The touch making him hiss and flinch.
“Sorry”, I coo before letting my power seep into my fingers and into his skin. The warm glow of golden light quickening his natural healing cycle.
“What is this?”, he asks as he looks up at me.
“Not even the Archivers in the Day Court can really could find anything close to describe it. So they just call it a form of raw magic. Somewhere between the healing power of the Dawn, and the killing power of the Illyrians”, he stiffens under my touch at the mention of the big bats.
“It’s okay, mine isn’t lethal. Mines more of a shield”, I try to reassure him.
“How much do you have?”, he asks.
“Don’t know. Never got a chance to really let myself explore with it other then doing little things throughout the day so I don’t go bonkers”, I hum. He only nods and relaxes in my hands.
“What hit you that slowed your own healing so much?”, I ask.
“Ash wood”, he grunts. “Let’s just say that father has his own personal stock of the stuff to use when he really isn’t happy.”
I wince.
“. . . Blue, what does it mean?”, he asks.
“The mind. Blue is for the people who thrive on intelligence, thinking, philosophy, and the written word. Deep thinkers. The darker the shade the deeper the thoughts. You prefer to be hidden, and enjoy quiet. You don’t like showing people who you are because you don’t trust, but you have ambition”, I list off as I focus on his eyes. How they soften as I talk.
“That’s. . . alarmingly accurate”, he mutters. I smiles softly as I finish healing him.