Kingdom of Life and Death (The Fifth Element Chronicles)

Chapter 5 "Meetings" [part 1]

I never knew which was more difficult, meeting someone new or meeting again someone you thought you had lost.

Someone new was a challenge, someone you had to decipher, to learn to know. Meeting someone again was to rediscover that person, to dissipate the lost time to return to a certain normality, even though nothing would ever really be the same.

I was going to meet Phoenix's mother, I had already met her sister once, although I could not say that I knew her. That filled me with doubt, because I knew it wasn't necessary, nothing was necessary. But how to tell Phoenix without breaking his heart. He had feelings for me, and I felt incredibly bad that I didn't feel the same. It would be easier to love him, it would be all so much easier. But those weren't my feelings.

And then there was Caelus. I had been reunited with him. All the anger I had felt for three months vanished the moment he smiled at me. I could no longer fall at his feet so easily. He would never be mine and I had to accept that once and for all. However, I could not think of doing the search of the signs without his help. I could not imagine living without him.

All that was going around in my head when I saw Polar's face when he saw Isabelle.

They knew each other, I wasn't sure under what circumstances, but whatever they were, they were brought out in that moment of frozen stares in which Polar, the boy of few words, lost the very few he still had left.

'Isabelle...' he said to her once more and at her terrified face, I stepped forward towards her. Perhaps my protective instinct was coming to the fore.

'Do you want to come to my tent?' I suggested, giving her my hand to lift her off the floor. I was going to keep the promise I had made to Suzanne and take care of her as if she were my sister.

And in that moment I could tell, my sister needed help.

She did not take my hand, but she did move to join me, ignoring the petrified look on the fire bender's face.

Caelus was nowhere in sight, which gave me a break. I couldn't deal with him at that moment, it would be too much.

I opened my tent and there I found my sister.

'Gaia, heavens, what happened?'

'Mena, I'm not in the mood to talk right now. This is Isabelle, she'll stay here with me. Is that okay?'

My sister just nodded.

Reading my face, her big sister instinct came out.

'I'll get some other sleepwear for her.'

'No need, I don't want anything,' Isabelle quickly replied.

'You'll just put the clothes on, okay?' I replied unwilling to put up with any more trouble.

She picked up on my attitude and lay down on my bed, making herself into a bun, trying to shrink into a reality that was now too big for her and me.

Mena found something for both of us, helped me take off my pant dress and then said goodbye by giving me a kiss on the head, just like she used to do when I was younger.

Those were the moments when I was thankful more than anything that I could still feel like her sister, beyond blood. I wish it had been like that with Marco. None of this would have happened if he had seen me as his younger sister, at least I don't think so.

When it was just the two of us, Isabelle got up from my bed.

'Don't you want me to go somewhere else?'

'No, stay here. I think we both need the company and the rest.'

It was risky to stay with someone I didn't know. Yes, maybe it was. But for some reason, she felt familiar. I could trust her. At least that's what I felt at that moment.