AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Tears streak Gaia's cheeks. "You're blaming me when I was the only trying to help you."
"What do you mean trying to help?" Lark asks, stepping between us. As she moves, a plumage of feathers drift out from behind her. Her raven hair is colored with bright shades of green and purple. She looks like a mythical creature. And somehow, she's my flesh and blood.
Gaia tries to explain. "I knew the gods were planning on locking you up. When I was there helping you deliver the girls, I heard them plotting."
"And you didn't tell me?"
"I did what I thought was best." She runs a hand over her long, thick braid, now flecked with grey. "Had I told you what needed to be done, you would never have let me take your daughters––"
I cut her off. "Of course, I wouldn't."
"Don't you see, Sephy?"
Hearing my nickname on her lips causes my eyes to fill with tears. How long has it been since someone called me by that name? Any name? How long since someone even looked into my eyes?
Twenty-one years, that's how long.
"Listen Sephy, had I told you they were going to take your daughters from you and lock you up, there's no way you would have given them over freely. You would have fought until the death to keep them in your arms and it would have cost all five of you your lives."
She exhales and begins pacing the large room, her words echoing off the high ceiling. "I took your daughters knowing it was the only way to keep you all safe. I found places for them all over the Earth."
At that, she stops pacing, and turns, looking at Rem. "I thought I had found a safe place for you," she says, tears spilling down her cheeks. "The last thing I wanted was for you to be put in danger, to make you believe you weren't wanted. You are so beautiful, Rem, and so brave. I tried. I tried for all of you to be somewhere safe, where you would be looked after until you turned twenty-one. Until you were strong enough to come after your mother yourselves."
"Why didn't you just go get Persephone? Explain all this earlier?" Harlow asks. "Why did you wait twenty-one years?"
"I didn't know where she was. I spent two decades searching Heaven and Earth from her. For you," she adds, looking into my eyes. "And of course, you were in the one place I didn't have access to. The Underworld. The gods weren't stupid when they put you there. They knew I was your best friend and they knew that was the one place I'm not able to go. I'm Mother Earth and have no place in hell."
Sitting back down, she reaches for my hands, her story is softening me to her, and I let her take them.
Is it because I ache for a friend? Or is it because the story holds so much truth?
"I put a barrier between the gods and their daughters," she tells us. “It has taken so much strength for me to keep them safe, that much of the world is in turmoil, the land, and sea in chaos because I have done a poor job. When I created the barrier between the gods and the girls, it forced the barrier between all gods and goddesses and the girls. There were a few times I was able to shift, but only sometimes, and afterward it would make me so weak I could barely move for months at a time. I gave each of them rings hoping against hope that one day... One day all the pieces would fall into place. The rings are what shielded them from their fathers. Once they put them on, as we all know, it unlocked the story I tried to keep at bay, in order to keep everyone safe."
Remedy wipes her eyes. "You did that so that one day we would find one another. Find our mother."
She nods. "I'm sorry it took so long."
"You did that," I ask in barely a whisper. My eyes filled with so much sorrow and so much regret. "You made all those sacrifices for me?"
"You're my best friend, Persephone," she says, clasping my hand tightly. "I love you." Tears flood her face. "You thought I was against you, but all this time I was only trying to protect you and your precious girls."
"I'm so sorry," I tell her. "I was so wrong about everything. I should have listened to you all along. You are the only person who could see clearly. The gods were cruel, you saw that plainly. You warned me and told me not to marry them. I was so naïve, a fool. Instead of hearing you, I let them take everything."
I pull Gaia into my arms, so grateful for her, knowing we wouldn't be here right now, all of my daughters and I, together, if it weren't for her.
