Because I Love You✔️

Chapter 66: Rite of Ascension

Chapter Sixty-Six: Rite of Ascension

The Sprites came back at dusk, just like Krishna said they would.

The rain roared down around them even more strongly than before.

Xaphile, still feeling oddly detached, didn't speak at all.

Didn't acknowledge any of the women who cast an admiring glance his way. Not even Krishna herself, who after asking him if something was ailing him, gave him a confused stare as a result of his silence. The faeries took them into Gwyradyll Hollow on the squirrels' backs.

He didn't really know where they were going, but after about ten minutes of frantic riding, Krishna pulled her mount to a halt. 

Before them was a looming structure that made his eyes widen a fraction.

His eyes rested on a carved stone archway with a huge boulder pushed in front of it. The gate itself had been engraved with images of Salamanders and male faeries in battle up the two pillars on its either side, though the upper arch's relief depicted something far stranger.

It showed male sprites... ascending?

Wings?

He didn't know what to make of it.

The carved images started off normal, but they changed and grew larger as they went up. Near the top, two primordial sprites stood with their hair falling in absurdly long waves past their feet, with two wings that formed the arch's border.

Deep in his gut, he suddenly had a very bad feeling. 

For what reason, he didn't know, but the sensation of foreboding was intense... and as he was mulling over it, he was struck by an odd realization.

The guys who were in the clearing were all fifteen and coming of age, he realized, blinking rapidly. If that's the case... where are the ones who've already come of age?

The question made him worry.

When they approached, two female faeries dressed in simple grey tunics that blended in with the stone appeared out of the arch's shadows. They said nothing, only nodded when Krishna told them to move the boulder aside. Lifting their clawed hands, the blonde women began to glow bright green and the stone, screeching madly, glowed similarly and rolled away.

Xaphile's ears quivered and involuntarily jerked back as his anxiety spiked.

The constantly muscle spasms that took place near his temples had been bugging the hell out of him lately since it was almost as if everything he was feeling was telegraphed by his ears. Not only did it make how he was feeling harder to hide, it was still strange to feel.

He hated it.

Speaking of things he hated... a familiar purple itch was suddenly inside his brain.

I know you dislike me doing this, Ella silently told him, but I cannot... stop myself. Why do you feel such fear? Is there something else you haven't told us?

No, he told her, keeping his face blank, but his stupidly long ears once again betrayed his true feelings by jerking lower. I don't know why I'm nervous, but something weird did just occur to me.

Tell me, she ordered. Now.

It's stupid, he said, and there's probably an actual explanation for it, but for some reason, I haven't seen a single guy any older than fifteen. Something about that bothers me a bit.

Is... is that all?

Yup, he said, rolling his eyes. Anymore questions? 

He waited for an answer, but she must have taken the hint because the purple itch vanished.