A Mirror of Eden

Chapter Fifteen: When the Queen Finds the Light Amongst the Haunted

Sienna Kaitlyn Leone

The sky had surrendered itself to a beautiful setting dusk. It was easy, despite it's growing dimness, it was gentle, and it worked to bring about some light to the otherwise gloom that carried the day. I wanted to bask in it and enjoy, but I was much too worried to allow myself the space to do something as simple as be captivated by the setting sun off the poignant waters.

I hadn't seen Leonardo in hours. Nobody had, and eventually we had no choice but to leave the gravesite without him. Gia had demanded it knowing the gravesite was also where his mother rested. I wanted to go to him, but I also knew how sacred that space was for him, and after the day he'd had he deserved a moment of peace without someone else's presence around him. Even if that presence was me. Sometimes anything other than solitude was too much, and who was I to disregard that for the person I loved?

The man I loved. I was still stuck that he'd said it to me, and that I'd so effortless said it back despite how much he moved me with the confession before he dared to say it. When he grabbed my hand, when he said my name, I could feel the words humming in the airwaves between us, and I was praying like hell that he let it echo out aloud. I needed it more than I could manage, but I also needed to tell him. To let him know that my throwing of that knife before everyone was not only in defense of who we were as partners in business, but who we were as partners as kindred spirits in this life. I would bring about the greatest wars and win them for him just as I knew he'd do for me without question. I would give him every arrangent of the skies as he unknowingly brought the sun to mine. To the world, and as I often feared to himself, he though himself to be darkness and incapable of receiving the greatest and purest love that I could provide in this world. However, he was wrong. So tremendously wrong, because to me he was my sweet baby. To me he was this ray of light that although was chaotic and sometimes detrimentally blinding, was always consistent in brightening my world enough to allow me to see things clearer than twenty-twenty vision.

I'd give him all of me and he'd deserve every piece of it. I was itching to find him, and my head was starting to race not one, but two miles a minute.

"Breath," Ilaria's voice eased into my ear as she took a seat beside me on the blanket in the sand around the bonfire the boys were working to build in the center. I looked to her as she looked intently over me holding onto my arm. Her bright eyes sat fixed on me with concern laced in them, but the warmth in them made me follow instructions and breath despite how seemingly hard the task was.

"I don't know where he is," I whispered as I blinked nervously. She hummed as her manicured hands rubbed my arms, nodding.

"And you're worried rightfully so."

"Part of me think's I'm being crazy though, Bambi," I argued shaking my head, "I know how hard today was for him. I can't even begin to image half of the pain he's in because watching it hurt more than enough. However, I know what brought about that pain and him not being around or not reaching out to me isn't normal. I want to give him space and respect his time to grieve but everything here makes me anxious," I confessed.