“It all started with a prophecy,” he started, pausing as if searching for the right words to say. “Before the current war, there was a period of peace. My father was a great king that designed a treaty that granted peace for the Elves of the sky, the Ljósálfar, and those of the earth, the Dökkálfar.”
“Which kind are you?”
“I am a Ljósálfar.”
I took in his appearance once more. “But you look just like a man, an impressive man, but there is nothing Elven about you.”
“I can take many forms that may fool the eye. I needed to appear human in order not to bring attention to myself,” he told me. “But I can take on whatever form pleases you.”
I felt my face grow hot. I thought he looked fine just the way he was....
Feeling a draft, I suddenly realized that my ears were exposed and quickly brought my hands to them. I tried to fix my hair to cover them up, but Nalin grabbed my wrists.
“Do not hide from me behind your hair. Never be ashamed of who you are, Willow,” he told me firmly, letting go of my wrists. “You are perfection.”
Staring at him, I was completely enthralled by his every mannerism. I watched his lips as he spoke with fascination and heard every word like an attentive student. “Please, I want to hear more.”
He nodded and continued, “As per the beliefs of my people, every Elfling receives a prophecy at the time of their transition from Elfling to Elf. I went to an oracle,” he said, then paused.
“What did the oracle say?”
“She foresaw that I would grow to become the great king,” he said sadly. “But she also said that great power would come at a high price for me. The oracle made it clear that I would never have a satisfying union with any woman from my kingdom. I was doomed to live a life...without love...without offspring.”
I watched as his face changed to one of unfathomable sadness.
“I couldn’t let that happen. I was going to be a king. What is a king without an heir? What is life without true love?” he asked me, not really wanting a response. “My parents were heartbroken. They believed in the oracle. Yet they held onto the hope that she was wrong, but... I knew she wasn’t. At the height of my despair, I started to comb through ancient books―books filled with forbidden magic. I learned how to do things that were beyond the laws of magic. See, it is normal for Elves to manipulate nature. That kind of magic is a part of our being, but making doors into other dimensions is strictly forbidden. That is manipulation of the universe and may alter the natural order of things. As you know, I can enter realms... beyond my own.”
I nodded, sitting on the edge of my seat.
“One night, I had fallen asleep on the books I had been examining. When I awoke, there was a spell, a spell that held the answers I had been searching for. After all of my searching, I found out how to create another being. Not just another Elf, but my other half. Spirit of my spirit. Flesh of my flesh,” Nalin told me, keeping his dazzling eyes trained on the floor. “I learned how to split my soul and sacrifice a piece of my flesh to create a twin soul of sorts.” His eyes shifted upwards until they met mine. “I created you.”
I felt my heart race within my chest. My breathing became labored, and my thoughts were a jumble. “What are you talking about? You couldn’t have created me, because I have a mother!” I told him, bursting with sudden emotion.
“You don’t have a mother,” he said adamantly, shaking his head slightly. “I created you, and I named you Willow.”
I was visibly shaking. It was a tremendous shock to find out the life I had been living was a lie. I wasn’t who I thought I was. Why couldn’t Nalin just let me continue to live that lie? Why did he have to find me and tell me this truth that I didn’t want to hear?
“Please, just let me finish,” Nalin told me, grasping my hand and holding it firmly. “I didn’t fully understand what severing a piece of my soul would do. It created a yin-yang effect. I gave the best parts of my being to you, and I was left with the darkest parts of my personality. I only felt complete when I was in your presence and you in mine. That is why in my presence, you have been quick to anger. I, on the other hand, have been more understanding of your feelings. When we are around one another, our qualities seem to rub off on each other. Your personality may turn angry and mine may turn more peaceful,” he said with the wide eyes of awareness. “I also didn’t understand that you would be the complete opposite of me in that you do not have the appearance of my race. You took on the appearance of the Dökkálfar.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, glancing at his black hair and blue eyes. “Do I look that different from you?”
“I appear to you in the form that is most pleasing to the human race,” he said. “I did this in order not to draw unwanted attention with my true appearance.”
I understood. My ears always seemed to draw unwanted attention, and I would’ve given anything just to appear normal.
“My parents were furious with me when they learned of your existence. They said you were an abomination, and they stripped me of my birthright. My sister was to become queen, and I was to remain a prince until a probation period of two hundred Elven years or forty human years. Almost a hundred have passed so far.
“They wanted me to end your life, but I refused. I hid you in a small cottage I created from a willow tree. I forged a necklace for you and fashioned a ring for myself so that our life forces would always be linked,” he said, squeezing my hand. “I thought my parents would get over your unconventional creation and even your appearance, but everything change one night. Someone set fire to the cottage that I made for you. That same night my parents were murdered in their beds. I believed the Dökkálfar were responsible, and in my grief, I waged war upon their kind.”
I cupped his hand with mine. Feeling his grief, I wanted to comfort him, but I didn’t know how.
“I lost my parents and you in one night,” he told me, his face grim. “All these years, I thought you were dead, but it turns out that you were stolen from me.”
“This is all so much for me to take in, Nalin,” I told him honestly, clutching his hand for stability in my confusion.
“I understand,” Nalin said, nodding his head in agreement. “You must rest. When you awake, everything will make more sense.” He looked down at his bloodstained shirt. “I have to wash up, and then I am going to rest. It has been a long day for the both of us.”
I nodded as he let go of my hand and moved away from me, making his way towards the bathroom. “Nalin,” I called, his name rolling off of my lips deliciously. “You forgot to mention something.”
He turned to me momentarily at the threshold. “What is that?” he asked, sounding exhausted.
I smiled at him, not feeling the smile reach my soul. “What does the lotus flower symbolize?”
Glancing at me across the room, he smiled tiredly. “Peace.”
* * * * *
CHLOË:
I awoke feeling troubled. Who was I? Was I Willow? Or was I Chloë?
My mother was not my mother. She was actually my abductor. Was she a Dökkálfar? Did she find me somewhere abandoned by my real abductors? What was the truth?
I glanced over at the opposite side of the bed and gasped. The man sleeping beside me was not the Nalin I had seen all evening. His appearance had changed. His hair was long and nearly white. His skin was pale and as smooth as porcelain. His ears were elongated... like mine.
Suddenly, the realization of what I was seeing dawned on me. It was the man I had dreamed with a month earlier. This was the true Nalin. Now, I could see what he meant when he said I had the appearance of a being outside of his race.
As he lay beside me, I watched as his abdomen rose and fell with each breath. He was as wondrous as an angel and as handsome as a devil. What could he ever see in me? Even if I was his other half, the pairing would be disproportionate. I was ordinary, and he was something magical.
He slept soundly as I climbed to my feet, throwing the sheets
off of myself.
All I could think about was talking to my mother. I needed to see her. I remembered Nalin had told me the room had a doorway back to my dimension, but that it was masked as an object. I paced the room, looking for something that seemed like a doorway to another world. I thought that if I found it, I could go talk to my mother and be back before Nalin awoke. There was still so much I wanted to understand, and I had not yet seen his world.
On my third turn around the room, I touched the walls, trying to feel for a door. My eyes drifted to the compass across the room and then the books on the desk. Then, I caught a glimpse of my own reflection, and something clicked within me. I walked to the mirror cautiously.
I thought if eyes are the windows to the soul, what is a reflection considered?
Tense, I brought my fingertip to the cool glass. With little effort, my finger went through the glass, rippling the reflective surface as if it were liquid mercury and breaking up my image. I glanced back at Nalin briefly, and without further hesitation, I plunged through the mirror.
With a hard thud, I landed awkwardly on my bedroom floor. Looking back at the wall, I realized the portal was closed. Feeling the wall, I knew the search was pointless. The doorway had been sealed, and I wouldn’t be able to get back to Nalin.
Instantly, I felt like I had made a huge mistake. Feeling tears well up in my eyes, I wondered if I should have waited to tell Nalin of my plans to return.
Without warning, my bedroom door burst open, and my mother hurled herself inside. “Where have you been?” she demanded. “Do you know how worried I have been?”
I shook my head, unable to register anything but the inability to open a doorway back to Nalin.
“You have been missing for two days!”
My eyes met hers instantaneously. “Two days?” I questioned, confused.
She nodded angrily. “Where were you?”
Without warning, another figure entered my bedroom. A figure I recognized....
My body quivered, and my heart began thudding in my chest with the realization of a deep rooted fear.
It was him, my intruder. It was the police officer from the alleyway. This was Nalin’s adversary. The Elf was dressed in the same armor he wore when he invaded my home a few days earlier. His appearance was unmistakable. He was not of this realm. He was not Ljósálfar. He was Dökkálfar!
I felt myself back away from my mother and her companion. I stepped backwards until I reached a wall and could move no more.
He came forward, reaching me in three strides. Grabbing my arm forcefully, he glanced at my mother. “Surely, you know you cannot trust a teenage Elfling, Sister,” he spat, his voice free of any charm. “Especially a Ljósálfar!”
“Brother, don’t hurt her,” my mother begged.
“She is not our kind, Rosalyn,” he told her firmly. “You shouldn’t have formed such an attachment to this thing!”
He dragged me against my will into the hallway. We moved towards the mysterious metal door that I had remembered seeing the last time he appeared. I recognized it for what it was now. It was a portal to another realm.
Shaking with fear, I looked over my shoulder at my mother, sobbing. “Mommy, what is he going to do?”
“She is not your mother,” my abductor screamed at me, his eyes afire. “You don’t have a mother! You are an abomination, and you are about to be exterminated.”
“Callan,” my mother cried, clutching her brother’s arm, but he threw it off.
He dragged me through the magical doorway, tossing me on the ground.
Landing hard on my hands and knees, my flesh felt instantly cold as my skin came in contact with snow. When I looked up, I saw a world that I had only seen in my dreams. Every inch of ground was covered with freshly, fallen snow. I recognized every tree and every bush. It was the same valley of oaks I had seen through my mind’s eye. But this time there were no feelings of elation. I was not here for a visit. I was being taken against my will, and Nalin wouldn’t ever know. He would think I abandoned him. He would hate me. There was no way for him to know the truth....
Callan lifted me up by my arm roughly, bringing me to my feet. His eyes drifted to the pendant that hung from my neck. With one swift movement, his hand latched onto it, and he yanked it off, snapping the chain and throwing it on the ground as if it were nothing. “You won’t be needing this little tracking device,” he said heartlessly, dragging me further into the Realm of the Elves.
TO BE CONTINUED...
* * * * *
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List of Literary Works by Sandra Madera
Short Stories:
The Collector
Overboard
Sangre Falls
Scattered
Shattered
Weeping Willow - Part One
Weeping Willow - Part Two
Novels and Trilogies:
Restraint
Lament: A Restraint Novel
Malcontent: A Restraint Novel
Wicked Magic: A Weeping Willow Novel
Wicked Love: A Weeping Willow Novel (coming soon!)
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