Fruit of the Elements

Chapter Three

After the conversation with Cailean I got out of the bed and tried standing and, oddly enough, my knee didn't buckle under me and really didn't hurt. My brother and mother were speaking in the kitchen about recent events and I walked fairly steadily into the little reading room where I spent most of my time home and saw Cailean standing by the window looking out to the garden I had planted years ago. It was filled with many flowers. My most prized flowers were the peonies. There were red ones, pink ones, white and pink ones. But the most beautiful ones in my eyes were the porcelain white ones right outside my bedroom window. They had grown strong and healthy over the years and I was proud of them. My flowers reminded me that even though I had gone through a lot in my life so far, I still had something to show for it. I still had something that I could hold onto and ground myself so that I knew that I was still on Earth and not floating into outer space without a cord to keep me locked to the ground. They reminded me that there was a reason to stay where I was and not run off and disappear off of the face of the planet. Now it looked like I wasn't going to have even my peonies to help me, I was on my own with this strange boy from another world.

"I don't understand," I muttered to Cailean, who had taken to looking around my little reading room and thumbing through the books on my shelves, "why did my, parents I guess, leave me here when they needed me back in Aldell?" Cailean turned to me and walked closer. I was sitting by the arched window on the window seat with a pillow on my lap. As he sat down at my feet on the other end of the bench I noticed a scar running from his jawline by his ear and disappear into his shirt and out of sight.

"Well, I'm not supposed to tell you about that because your parents personally threatened me so yeah, no can do Princess-" I stopped him there with a pointed look.

"Please, don't call me that. I have never been a princess and I still am not until I have proof. Whenever we cross that bridge or whatever and don't die, that's when I might believe you. But until then, I am not Princess Avalon. I am Lillian Everest, Lilli to my friends. Okay? Because I'm still wondering how on earth, or not on earth, you healed my leg. And I'm angry that not only am I an adopted freak of nature, but according to this cute guy that popped out of nowhere I'm a freaking princess of a whole world that nobody else knows about. Honestly, I don't even know who you are. It's just so frustrating and confusing." I felt angry-tears boiling up in my eyes and furiously wiped them away with my sleeve. When I glanced up at Cailean his eyebrows were raised and he had a smirk splayed on his lips, "What?" I asked.

"So you think I'm cute?" he replied.

"Oh that is so not the point here... Ugh, boys and their balloon sized egos, of course, it strays to other worlds in fact..." shaking my head I turned to get off of the window seat and blow off some steam outside when a hand grabbed my own. Cailean began talking in a gentler voice.

"I know that wasn't the point, I was just trying to make you laugh. While I'm not really in the position you're in right now, I can imagine how you are feeling. Scared because you don't think you can handle this war. Angry because no one ever told you about Aldell and your parents, and confused because I'm sure none of this makes any sense to you at all. It's overwhelming I know." he gave a reassuring turn of the corners of his mouth and his hand left mine. I was a bit taken aback at how he knew almost exactly what I was thinking. The little flurries that had started swirling around the room began to dissipate. My eyes looked to the floor and I stepped away from Cailean.

Leaving him in the reading room I went down the hall and made a left at the kitchen where I knew my mom and Kyle would be. I heard their voices floating from the other room before I arrived there myself and from what I could hear my mother was close to tears and Kyle was a bit angry, and I think I knew the reason why.