Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
- Matthew 5:4
Princess Lethia's Cottage, The Floating Kingdom of Zephyr, Northern Ardeneon.
May 26
"Skai you don't have to make a grand gesture, just beep him" Emily tells her sitting back on Skai's bed with their tea. she hands Skai a cup.
"I know it doesn't feel enough." Skai sighs.
"You're just scared because Dexter actually likes you, but you need to understand that he is waiting for you to call" Emily shrugs.
"Okay, I'll call him." Skai mumbles and Emily sits watching her, waiting for her to take out her scroll touch.
"What?" Skai asks "Well not now" she says after realizing what Emily was waiting for.
"Now" Emily insists, and Skai sighs taking it out.
"Hey Dexter" she greets after he answers, and Emily takes that as her cue to leave. She exits Skai's room, only to be faced with Suzumi coming out of her door.
She holds eye contact with her then walks away. She stops in her tracks turning around.
"Have you seen Elijah, by chance?" Suzumi asks and Emily nods.
"Well?" she asks again.
"His room" Emily tells her "I'll call him out for you"
"It's fine, I'll just talk to him later" She sighs
.....
"Is everything okay" Elijah looks at Emily and she pecks him as she enters his room.
"Yes, yes, just thinking" she sighs
"About what" Elijah pulls her closer, back to him kissing her longer this time.
"It isn't important" She shrugs it off
"I think it's important" he pushes.
"Ellie it's fine" she assures him, "You don't look so at peace yourself" she turns him to the subject
"Well," he sighs "I was just wondering why there were shards of glass in the trash this morning and on the kitchen floor.
"Oh, River and Suzumi crossed eachother at breakfast" Emily smiles fondly, a bit glad that she and River weren't bickering as often again, since he found someone new to bully.
"And the glass is because?" he smiles in confusion moving closer to her, wanting her near.
"It's River and Suzumi...take a guess" she pushes him away giggling "If breakfast together went well, I'd be surprised"
"You don't seem to like her either" Elijah tucks her hair behind her ear.
"Says who?" she asks confused.
"I've never seen you two exchange words" he tells her, and she stares at him blankly knowing he wasn't wrong.
"A lot has been going on, I don't know her" she shrugs.
"If you really knew her I'm sure you'd really like her" he smiles.
"Oh, so you really like her?" she asks him
"She's a good person" he defends and Emily sighs. "Give her a chance, she's all alone here"
"No one really asked her to come if you think about it" Emily says.
"You did not just say that Emily" Elijah eyes his girlfriend disapprovingly. "I did. I asked her to come, I don't get why you're all treating her like a ghost"
"I didn't mean it that way"
"Then give her a chance, okay?" his eyes soften.
"She's just so mean sometimes" Emily frowns.
"Everyone isn't what they seem, I believe she's just a hard shell to crack" he caresses her cheek, "Just try okay sunshine?" he leans in to kiss her, and she moves away teasingly.
"Stop" he whines.
"Maybe next time" she winks standing up, he pulls her back to him pinning her to his bed.
"Don't tease me like this, sunshine" he pouts using his irresistible puppy eyes. "It's been weeks since we actually spent time just you and me" he kisses her forehead "Let's go on a date" he kisses her left cheek then her right cheek "I miss taking you out my love" he kisses her nose.
His hands move to her waist resting there. His eyes moved from her right eye to her left eye then her lips, he bites his lips hesitantly just like the first time they kissed.
"Are you teasing me now?" she asks him
"No, I'm done with games" he crashes his lips on hers.
It is passionate and hungry yet gentle and soft.
"Elijah is killing sister Lily" Seraphinius screams and Emily pushes Elijah off of her. He falls on the fall groaning. They were so engrossed with each other that they didn't notice when Seraphinius entered.
"Sorry" Emily winces looking down at him.
Suddenly everyone was at Elijah's door, including princess Lethia.
...
"It's okay young ones" Princess Lethia starts on a light note as they are all sat in the living room. "It's nothing to be ashamed of, as long as you're staying safe and protected" she smiles casually, and Emily internally groans hiding her face with her hair "They did have protection on earth didn't they? Although I'm sure you wouldn't need it" she says in thought "Their father and I do this all the-"
"Okay okay" River calls out.
"Lethia you came for a reason didn't you?" Skai asks. Her and River both cutting her mother off at the same time.
"Oh Yes, I brought gifts, I will be teaching you younglins on protection later, although I'm sure you don't need it yet, but for now let's see what we have" she places a big sack in the middle of the living room.
She digs inside the sack and pulls a telescope out "This is for Elijah; Dexter says you haven't used this in months" she smiles at Elijah handing it over to him. "I will get a better one, this one is quite small, but I didn't have time to put all the gifts together."
"It's perfect" he smiles gratefully "Thank you"
"This one's for Skai" She hands Skai ice skates "I'm sure you and Suzumi can create a rink somewhere"
Skai squeals in excitement.
"This is for you little tide" She pulls out a guitar making Emily wonder just how deep the sack is. "Your father said you play instruments, he wasn't specific with which one so If you don't like this one, i can switch it for another at the music shop."
"I play the piano, but it wouldn't hurt to keep this" River smiles thankfully. Although, he knew he'd just end up giving it to Dexter.
"For Emily, I wasn't sure what you hadn't read to be honest, so I got you a journal, you can give writing more a try, I'm sure you can make good use of all that knowledge you have stored up in there." She hands it to Emily, and she smiles gratefully taking it.
"For Phinius I got him some more learning materials, but I think I will keep that with River, oh and this stuffed toy" she takes it out giving Seraphinius. "He should get enrolled in scire soon though."
"Oh, and last but not least, Suzumi I honestly wasn't sure what to get you and I didn't want to come empty handed" She sighs and Suzumi nods in understanding. "So, I asked little tide and he recommended these" she pulls out a case. "It's for your glasses, he also said you like painting" she takes bottles of paint out of the sack. Suzumi's face lights up, which was a first for Skai and Emily. "Elijah I trust you'll keep Dexter's gifts safe" she hands the sack to Elijah "I'll get something better for you all next time."
"This is more than enough princess Lethia" Suzumi smiles warmly at her hugging her.
...
It had been exactly a week since princess Lethia gave them gifts and Skai was about to call Dexter again.
"You must be Tahl" She nervously stares at a mini Dexter who responded on her scroll touch "Where's Dex?"
"In the bathroom" he responds blankly "I've been wanting to see what's so special about you" he sighs somewhat confused.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Skai asks.
"Just stop hurting my brother" he ends the call.
She knew she deserved that one. She'd been so stupid.
She sucks in a deep breath, letting the tears fall.
She wished Dexter was there, she really missed him.
Her scroll touch beeps, and she picks it up checking who it is.
Dexter's name and ID flashes on the page.
She wipes her tears off quickly picking up.
"What did Tahl say?" he asks in a serious tone.
"You're supposed to say 'hello' when you call someone" Skai jokes but his facial expression doesn't change "It doesn't matter I deserved it"
"I'll talk to him" he sighs looking over his shoulder "He can't just be answering my calls"
"Doesn't he go to scire?" Skai asks
"No, they're on summer break I guess" he shrugs. Dexter and Skai resolved their issues a week prior, they've been talking a lot since then.
"Are you gonna come visit?" Skai asks and his expression softens.
"Miss me?" he chuckles, and she nods humming, noticing him walking outside.
"Well, Dharti says he wants to help me discover my other skills... but I'm back today"
"You are?" She jumps up.
"Yes Skai, Dharti is with me right now, he'll walk me and Adira to Shivan gates, then she'll drop me off in Zephyr, they are so scared" he rolls his eyes.
"We can't lose him again" Adira comes into the frame.
"When will you be back?" Tahl asks his brother.
"Soon" Dexter responds not taking his eyes off Skai. "I'll talk to you later, we're nearly at the gate" he smiles softly "Okay bye Dex"
"Hey Skai" Skai turns around. "I swear I miss him so much; I'm starting to hear things." She mumbles to herself. She's sat outside the cottage waiting for Dexter.
she sighs staring back at the ground.
"Hey there beautiful" Dexter appears in front of her with a bouquet.
She gasps, not sure if she should thank him for the flowers or ask when he could turn invisible. She does neither and runs into his arms.
"I've dreamt about this day for weeks" He hugs her back.
"You're really fine with everything?" She looks up at him and he nods kissing her forehead.
"One step at a time" he caresses her cheek. "Your hair is dry" he points out.
"I haven't had time to do it, between being kidnapped and falling through an interdimensional portal getting my hair done isn't at the top of my priorities." she says matter of factly "Come on let's go inside"
She ushers him in, and the living room is empty like it was when she left. It's still early, so everyone is still in their rooms.
"So how was Maver Island?" she asks as he closes his door behind him.
"It was great, I love it there." He smiles at her and she smiles back.
"I'm happy for you"
He sits next to her "How have you been?" he asks her taking her hand in his. "I'm sorry I wasn't there after I promised"
"You can't always be there Dexter" she tells him "You're here now and that's all that matters."
"Still, I shouldn't have made a promise I couldn't keep" he tells her seriously.
"Dexter I treated you awfully and you're apologetic?" she looks at him in disbelief.
"I'll be honest with you" he lets go of her hand with a small sigh. she wished he hadn't let go, his warmth was everything she needed and more. "I questioned your choices a lot, it made me go crazy, it made me question myself, it made me wonder why I liked you so much, how it started, why it kept growing when you didn't seem to care." He sighs. "Skai there was no answer" he turns to face her. "There's just something about you that pulls me in" he shrugs "Maybe it's because we're sort of the same, you have that beautiful chaos that surrounds you, I know it's dangerous, but I want to see it, I want to touch it, I want to feel it, it's addictive to watch, to be around" he bites his bottom lip uncertainly.
"Has any girl ever told you that you have a way with words?" She asks and he chuckles lowly.
"Girls usually mistake me for a clown, you know that"
"Skai, River and Suzumi are fighting" Emily barges in "Dexter?!"
.....
"Your reasons just don't make any sense" Dexter tuts. They were all gathered in the hallway trying to resolve the misunderstanding between River and Suzumi.
"Yeah" Skai agrees "You both crossed paths and wouldn't move, you're both to blame" she shrugs.
"River let go of her hair" Elijah sighs.
"Tell her to let go off me" River says stubbornly.
"Be a man Ladiston" Dexter rolls his eyes.
"I'm dealing with a man here, no need to get courteous" River scoffs.
"That's it!" Elijah pulls both of them apart. "We're playing 7 minutes in 1990"
"No!" River yells horrified
"The hell is that?" Suzumi asks confused.
About 35 minutes later, Elijah, Emily, Dexter and Skai are still waiting for River and Suzumi to resolve their differences and let them out, they hadn't heard one thing from inside the closet, as the game goes the seven minutes only count when both parties start talking.
"It's been thirty minutes" Emily looks at her watch, one which she had taken from Palace Zyran and princess Lethia let her keep.
"Should we go in?" Dexter asks "They might be dead"
"River wouldn't kill her in his own closet" Skai points out "So they're alive, or maybe Suzumi is alive, she wouldn't kill him would she?" Skai asks and Elijah presses his ear against the door.
"They aren't even talking, let's just lock them in." he shrugs locking the door slowly enough that they don't hear. "We'll let them out before my dad gets here." Elijah's dad is coming soon because he wants to see the rink of time for himself.
Inside the closet River finally talks.
"This is stupid" River mutters after over 40 minutes of silence.
"Something we can agree on" Suzumi rolls her eyes reaching for the door handle. "I'm not doing this."
"It's locked" fear washes over her as she tries to open the door.
"Great, so much for friends" River mutters but whatever else he said was drowned out by the voices in Suzumi's head.
'I didn't kill her. I didn't kill her.' She says repeatedly in her head trying to overpower the voices.
She tries to drown them out.
IT WAS ALL YOU
IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT
The voices get louder, and she moves her hands to her ears covering them.
River slowly begins to worry, staring at her with a face full of concern.
"Suzumi" he calls out to her.
"Suzumi" she starts to hear her name drawing her back to reality.
"It wasn't me" she tells him shaken; she didn't realize that all that was left of her voice is a small whimper.
Her mind starts spinning, all her thoughts jumbling, she couldn't think straight. Suddenly, her mind didn't feel like it was her mind again. River was still staring at her unsure of what to do, then he chooses to comfort her.
"Suzumi, it wasn't you" his voice brings her back and she looks up to see River, his eyes felt soft to her in that moment unlike the hard, unapproachable eyes that have been taunting her the past few weeks.
"River, it wasn't me" her voice trembles slightly, her brain fogs up and her eyes begin to grow teary.
"Suzumi you're stronger than it" he tells her resting his hands on her shoulder. She takes her glasses off not wanting to see the pity on his drawing-like face—as she perceived it.
"This is really not my style" She does the breathing exercises that her brother, Takashi taught her trying to stay in the right mind space, but she couldn't, she really couldn't. She wished her brother was there, he'd know what to do.
"I'm scared" she confesses, her breathing hitching.
"You're not alone" he tells her uncertainly.
"I am" she says before repeating "It wasn't me" she begins to sob, and she feels arms wrap around her.
"You're okay" he tells her "It's okay"
It wasn't for Suzumi though. It was anything but okay.
Because she really believed it was her. She really believed It was her fault.
......
"Truce?" River asks after she finishes crying, she's still in his arms, scared that if she leaves she'll go mad again.
"What because you saw me cry?" she scoffs.
"No princess" he chuckles "Because I realized that you're not just an a-hole, you're a ***** with a back story, and that's pretty cool...you know I said it as a joke a while back, but I guess I was right."
"That's pretty messed up" she tells him.
"We're all messed up in ways we don't understand princess" she feels him shrug and she groans because of her pounding headache. "Sorry" he murmurs, and she shakes her head moving closer to him, fear still settling in the corner of her mind.
"Sometimes I forget that you're just fifteen" he comments.
"Please shut up"
"It's a free world" he chirps.
"It really isn't" She responds. "You can't tell anybody what just happened" she warns him, and he sighs.
"Why would I?" he asks "I have nothing to gain"
"hmm" she hums "I'd appreciate getting out of here"
She could only go so long using the guy that she believed hated her guts as a shield from her own mind.
"You're not scared anymore?" he asks seriously.
"I am" she answers truthfully "I would feel better if we could leave"
"Okay then princess" He knocks on the door. No response. He knocks again. No response. "I think they forgot about us"
Everything around her begins to disappear the lines that aided her sight were gone.
"Wait, wait" River rubs her shoulder "Don't cry, you're okay"
"I don't cry" she tells him.
"You're crying right now princess"
"Is it the dark?" he asks her as she shrinks further into him in fear one of her hands moving back to cover the ear that wasn't pressed against his chest from the voices. He gently moves her hand "Is it the dark?" he repeats.
"Huh?" She lets confusion spread all over her face.
"Is it the dark that you're scared of?" he asks.
"No"
"Then what is it?" he asks but she doesn't reply.
"It's okay, you're okay" he repeats patting her back and soon she falls asleep.
"Well that definitely wasn't on my June Bingo card" Dexter stares in awe and confusion. Suzumi and River snuggled up to each other asleep.
"I guess there won't be any more fights" Elijah smiles proud of himself.
"Elijah!" Mr. Starling's voice booms through the house.
"Who left the door open?" Dexter asks looking at them "Where's Seraphinius??"
"He's in his room" Emily tells him, and he lets out a breath of relief as they all go to the living room, to meet Mr. Starling.
Elijah and his dad settled on the living room ground trying to travel to the rink of time again, but they had no luck.
"Why isn't it working?" Mr. Starling asks after him and Elijah open their eyes.
"I can't concentrate" he groans.
"Should we leave the room?" Emily asks
"Yes, that might help" Mr. Starling urges and the others leave the living room.
They all end up in Skai's room, Emily sat at the desk, Skai and Dexter on the bed.
"When they fix it, are you guys gonna stay?" Emily asks her voice wavering.
"yes" Skai responds the same time Dexter says "No"
"Well, I don't know" Emily looks out the window, but Skai turns to face Dexter instead.
"What do you mean no, you have a family here" She gasps.
"My earth mom is dying" he tells her "I have to stay with her"
"Oh but your biological mom..." Skai trails off.
"You wouldn't get it Skai" he sighs.
"Make me get it" she pushes.
"I have hundreds of years to spend with them supposedly, but only 5 with her" that shut Skai up fast.
"This is why you want to take things slow isn't it?" She asks.
"Skai the world doesn't revolve around you" Emily interferes "Dexter must have been conflicted making this decision, you don't have to make him feel even worse"
"I'm just asking" Skai defends "It's not like that"
"Can we not do this right now?" Dexter runs his fingers through his hair.
"Sorry" they both murmur.
"I miss when things were normal" he frowns.
"You know they'll never be normal again don't you?" Emily tells him "Be it here or on earth, we've officially escaped normalcy"
"My parents; Dharti and Adira think that scire would be good for me." Dexter tells Emily and Skai. "Tahl will be back in school in two months, they said if I choose to stay then scire will help me settle in."
"Would you go, if you stay in Ardeneon?" Skai asks him and he nods.
"Whether I like it or not, I'm still a minor and they are my parents" he sighs.
"Where is Elijah?" Suzumi walks into the room.
"Living room" Emily answers slowly.
"Where's Riv?" Skai asks and Suzumi shrugs.
"I wouldn't know" she walks in "I have questions"
"I don't think we'd have answers but sure come in" Skai chirps.
"It's about the rink of time" she hesitates.
"What about it?" Dexter asks.
"Why do you guys want to enter it so bad?" she asks and River walks in just after she asks the question sitting next to Dexter awkwardly making Dexter wonder what happened in the closet?
"Oh" Dexter breathes out "We never told you"
"Yeah" she waits for an answer.
"The world is coming to an end" Skai shrugs.
"The portals in and out of Ardeneon are shut, we assume both worlds are ending." Dexter adds "Mr. Starling says someone tampered with the rink of time"
"How does one even tamper with it?" She asks.
"That we don't know but Mr. Starling knows how to fix it" Emily responds.
"How can he fix something he's never seen" Suzumi murmurs to herself but River and Dexter were the only ones who heard her.
....
"We couldn't do it" Mr. Starling says.
"The clock can't be moved, I don't even think it can be touched" Elijah adds
"It was too heavy for me" Mr. Starling tells them.
"The clock defies gravity" Emily starts, "What if we make the rink follow the laws of gravity"
"That's impossible" Mr. Starling points out and they all agree.
"No, it's not, Emily is right. When I was in Elijah's head in the rink, it felt controlled- Regulated." Suzumi tells us.
"You were inside his head?" Emily asks.
"Perspective shifting" Elijah and Suzumi respond.
"That's not the point." Suzumi says "The rink is 0 gravity, at least it's meant to be, but you guys could practically walk on it, or bounce" she says unsure of what terminology to use.
"Someone is in the rink of time" Mr. Starling breathes out realization hitting him "That's why I couldn't open the portal, there's a portal open somewhere"
"Great" Dexter mutters sarcastically. "So, what you're saying is we can regulate the rink?" he asks anyone in general who had an answer.
"In theory we can't" Emily responds, "The only thing of my knowledge that is proven to defy gravity is heat, and heat goes up, so what comes down?" Emily asks no one in particular.
"Cold?" Skai asks and Emily lifts a brow at her. "I don't know man, nothing else that can defy gravity comes to mind."
"The rink is relatively cold, if it is an ice rink" River points out and Elijah nods. "But the rink wasn't cold when we were in it."
"Skai" Dexter decides to answer, and they all look at him confused. "Air sprites defy gravity" of course, the answer was completely irrelevant to their conversation at the moment, but he found it rather interesting.
"But if the rink is regulated like you said" Mr. Starling points at Suzumi after thinking deeply about it "then that would mean that the clock is at it's lowest point, if whoever is in there stops regulating it then everything would only go higher, what I need to do is get the clock lower not the everything in the rink."