Crown of Faeries

1 | Passing Embers

It must have been the sun that morning that brought tears to my eyes as I ran further and further away from the ever leaking scent of cherry blossoms and patchouli. Its rays were soft and tantalizing as the sun rose just beyond the cliff tops of Monte. The vibrant green blades beneath my bare feet sliced small wounds that almost reached my heart with each step I took further from my home.

I couldn't go back. Wouldn't go back.

But as the lands swirled and the seas beyond crashed a thunderous beat, I stumbled and caught my breath just as the sun stretched over the cliff tops and exposed me in its full light. On the ground, my knees pressed firmly against the crisp grass. I arched my back and wailed.

She had passed, the only thing I truly had left, and something inside of me disappeared with her as her dying hand stayed caged and bolted against my soul.

______

My Uncle Silas was standing there, in the middle of door frame, two hours later as I made my way back home. Determination to not let my mother's death go in vain vibrated through me as I stomped the last couple of yards to meet Silas's grim face. His lips had thinned in a sorrow line since my mother's passing. I lifted my face as the stretch of distance between us became less grand with each dragging step.

"Let me see her," I demanded. My bones trembled. He shook his head and placed a hand firmly on the door frame, closing off my path to getting back inside.

"Caelia," he said with a breaking tone. "She's gone and you have to let me bury her."

I looked into his Irish blue eyes. He seemed so sad, but strong within his weakness. I could only imagine what I looked like in my nightgown with the sun beaming through the light material, exposing me, making me more vulnerable than I already was. "Then just please let me see her one last time." My voice broke and his hand slipped from the frame.

"Go inside child," Silas said as he stepped aside to let me enter the small cottage I'd called home all my life.

It was tiny, that much you could see from the outside. But, this house was the most cherished thing my mother ever had, or so she said. My mother constantly told me about the way my father built this house on the first night they met. How he did it so swiftly and with such ease that it was nearly like magic.

I've never met my father, nor have I ever been able to conjure up an image. I'd mainly relied on pure imagination when it came to picturing the man that had once loved my mother.

My mother was always bittersweet when she spoke of him. She loved him, anyone could tell just by the way her body would relax and the way her eyes sparkled whenever she spoke of him. But, then her disdain was seen in her lush  lips as they flattened whenever she spoke of my father. Her hands would fidget before rubbing her arms; her nails digging slowly into her skin.

He'd left her as a mess, and most days I wished I'd known who he was so I could find him and force him to fix her.

My mother's days of happiness and time for fixing were over. This became evident when I stepped completely into the house.

My mouth parted as I breathed out a silent breath of awe. There she was in the middle of the round house, sleeping eternally. Her golden blonde hair was fair, and not from age. Her skin was clean and smooth, and her hands were at her sides.

I stared at her hands and shook my head. Thinning my lips as she would do when speaking of my father, I walked carefully on my tiptoes over to her and knelt down at her side. Reaching over her body slightly, I grabbed both of her hands in my own and placed them gently on her stomach, folding them together elegantly.