"Caeli, I did not know that this lord was following you until AFTER I brought you here.", he choked out the words slowly, trying not to allow his fear to consume him.
He rapidly tried to bring himself to terms with whatever Caeli decided. For weeks now he had tried to convince himself that he would do right by her, he would tell the truth and whatever she decided he would understand, if she wanted to go, he would let her go. He now realized he had done nothing of the sort. He was entirely unprepared.
Caeli slowly leaned back from him and started to drop her hand. He quickly brought his down to cover hers. Her retreat tore at him deeply.
How long had it been since someone showed him that they cared? How long since he had felt a touch that was genuine and warm? He found it difficult to have her pull away when she had just recently become comfortable enough to sleep beside him, to touch his skin and not shirk away in fright or disgust like others had.
"Please. Please let me tell you how eternally sorry I am, I will be, for all of time. I cannot change what I have done but my mistake has changed me forever. I've fallen in love with you Caeli.", he said, his voice cracking as he said her name. Keeping the desperation out of his voice felt like a study in defeat.
The words landed between them like a mountain sized rock, crashing into the silence that surrounded them and sending shockwaves through them both.
Raven could hardly believe the words that came out of his mouth. He had never before said anything of the like.
And what was more frightening is that he knew how much he meant it.
Caeli his heart skipped a beat. No one had ever said they loved her before. Not her aunt or uncle, not any of her "friends", and she could not recall her parents. There was a point in her life when she had been sure that she would never hear that word, "love".
She had prepared herself for that, accepted that she would never be loved.
Yet here Raven stood saying these things to her.
On the heels of having disclosed a phenomenal betrayal.
How could he be so cruel?
Caeli looked at the water and then down at her hands.
"Please explain.", she said around a lump in her throat. She felt as though she was choking. She felt as though someone had driven an icicle into her heart.
"When I sensed your aura, I had little conscious or intelligent capabilities. As I've said before, I was a step above a common animal. I was driven by primal instinct to survive. What I have failed to mention,", he winced internally at this but knew that this was the time to come clean, "was that my ability to survive directly depended on me to consume magic. With each consumption of items or creatures that radiated magic, I was becoming more aware. At first, I began following your trail in an animalistic need to find the source and consume it. After a couple of days I realized that as I was following your trail, I was consuming the remnant magic you left behind, with each passing day I became more myself. Eventually I found you, in the clearing with your companions. And from that moment on I couldn't let you go, I couldn't let you from my sight.", as he disclosed the events leading up to the moment they were in, he spoke more and more quickly. In part because of the fact that Caeli was slowing lifting herself away from him, unwrapping herself from his embrace.
He knew he was saying too much at once, words spilling from him like blood from a freshly made wound, but he was drowning in his hope, his need, to make her understand.
Caeli's mind was spinning, she thought that she would surely be sick.
"I found you and the first night I brought you to this place, it was in hopes of meeting you, in hopes that you would get to know me, that you would….", Raven was at a loss for words. Was he about to say love him? If he did Caeli thought she might truly be sick. "In hopes that I could be a part of your life. In whatever capacity I could. I was beside myself I was thoughtless, careless. My desire to be near you is why I brought you here. It was only after the Naming that I became aware of myself, and my past, that I met the woman I had accidentally brought here and uncovered the fact that the lord was watching you."
Caeli stepped backwards and away from Raven, eyes wide and shaking, eyelids fluttering as tears ran down her face. Her bottom jaw shook as she tried to pull breathes into her stone walled lungs.
*LIAR*, her mind screamed. *MANIPULATION. DECEIT. Like everyone else, but with you it's different. I can't SEE you like I see the others. What's worse is I did exactly as you'd hoped. I started to care for you despite your manipulation. Had you been human, I would have KNOWN, long before now.", Caeli thought to herself, her voice in her mind vibrating her whole head with its intensity.
The way his eyes flickered, she wondered if he possessed the ability to read minds as well.
"I am not the same as I was when I brought you here. I don't want to make excuses, I don't.", he said , leaning towards her, reaching for her hand.
Caeli wrenched away before he could reach her, as though she had touched the surface of a hot stove.
"Oh goddess.. oh goddesses above.", she sobbed brokenly. She had trusted him, she had laid beside him, she had given him the benefit of the doubt because he was her friends. She had believed him. For the first time in her life, she had believed his affectionate demeanor towards her, believed the lies he told her without giving it a second thought.
In all her years, some suitors had tried to romance her with words, others with poetry or gifts. Some even pretended to be interested in who she was as a person.
But within hours, if not minutes, she was often aware of their true intentions, or their lack of true caring, and would remove herself from that persons' presence before ever finding ways to grow attached to them.
But with Raven she had let him in, to see sides of her that she had never dare show anyone else. She had confided in him and she had experienced that fleeting feeling of feeling understood.
Of belonging. Of meeting someone who was like her.
That was what he had said.
She had to wonder if that was why he had said it. Was it because she wanted it so desperately?
Were his words meant to be a trap? A snare like those she learned to set in the woods.
To lay in wait, placed weeks before in anticipation, only to snap and cause harm later on.
"Caeli please. Please I have more to say.", Raven said, his voice thick as though he was holding back tears. He swallowed so hard that he was sure she could hear him do so. "I knew the moment I regained my sanity and my mind that I had done wrong. But then you were here, and speaking to me, you are so beautiful and kind, your ability to trust and accept, any other creature in existence would have ran from me and never looked back. I just…. I couldn't let you go. Not right away. From the moment I saw you, you've brought light into the darkness that has consumed me for so long. For longer than you've been alive, for longer than some of these Oak trees have been swaying in the wind. Like a starving man in a desert, you came to me like an oasis.", he said, a little more strength in his voice, lent to him by the truth of his words.
Caeli had backed herself against a tree and brought a hand out to steady herself against it. Tears streamed down her face in waterfalls, as silent as a graveyard. Her face stone-cold and neutral, seemed unnatural. Her tears and her stoic face making her seem like a duplicitous angel made of stone.
Questions tumbled through her mind, questions that she was sure now he could answer, about his past, about who he was.
But the sound of them were muffled by the ones pertaining to his lies.
Why her? Why act like he cared? What was the point of it all?
The look was one Raven had seen before, on his own face.
Shock. Betrayal. Realization.
He fought the urge to fall at her feet and unleash the shame and despair he was feeling. Every muscle in his body revolting as he forced himself not to reach out to her.
They sat like this for, what Caeli felt, was an eternity.
Raven staring desperately at her, his glowing eyes swimming with moisture as he held back his tears. It made his eyes look like glowing rubies beneath a gently flowing river. Caeli leaning on the tree, teeth slowly clenching and tears falling freely, her face as impassive as a stone wall.
"How could you?", she asked, her tone of voice making it seem as though she were talking about the weather.
Her coldness shook Raven. In all the time they had spent together, Caeli was anything but apathetic. The tangible manifestation of her building a wall around herself made the air become heavy, her aura slowly becoming visible, dark.
"Caeli, please. I am so sorry.", Raven said, reaching for her once more, his instinct to comfort her too strong to correct. The sight of her pain ripped into him like a tidal wave.
"I want to go back. Take me back right now.", she said firmly. Tears continued to to soak the front of her clothes but her voice sounded strong and sure.
He had known. She had expressed to him in many ways how she desired to continue traveling, to find a place she could call home, perhaps friends she could call family.
He knew how badly she needed this. Needed to leave this place and start her own journey.
He had known and still, for weeks, chose to keep her in the dark.
Raven nodded slowly. Without taking his eyes from her he reached an open palm out to the space beside him and a swirling portal opened. Through it she could see the sunlit valley that she had first seen. A small cottage by the ponds edge and next to the cottage she saw Brego and Aurum, seemingly holding council with each other. She could neither hear, nor guess, what they were speaking of but she now, more than ever, knew that she needed to go back. To leave this, to leave Raven behind.
Caeli pushed off of the tree shakily and ignored Ravens' helping hands.
She stepped forward and stopped just before she was through the opening in space. A realization dawning upon her. Her pain bringing epiphany.
"I think loved you too Raven.", she whispered without turning around and stepped through the tear in time.
Raven clenched his fist and let his arm drop. The rift closed rapidly and Raven stared for hours at where she had stood. He was afraid to look away lest it break the image he was trying to brand into his mind. The last time he would ever see her, the last time he'd ever see Caeli.
His heart torn asunder, he sat still, for how long, he wasn't sure.
If the only way to see her again was to stare unblinkingly at this tree, he would do it for an eternity.
A single solitary tear fell from Ravens eyes.