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I knew he had it. Eydis has spelled it into his skin, like every other tattoo he had. Objects bound into his flesh. He was a walking storage bin of monsters and ungodly power.
“Milo!” King Windre yelled, throwing his hand out before him. Magic made the atmosphere thick, holding me in place like cement.
I panted as agony built and strained under my skin. Jerydin and the other winged Fae were already at my side. Bony fingers dug into my arms as King Windre dropped his magic and his men pulled me away.
“You can’t stop me,” I shouted. “I can’t stop myself until what Randsin has stolen has been returned.”
“The world has really gone to shit now, hasn’t it?” the red-haired man said.
Jerydin scoffed as he tugged me through the door. “You have no idea.”
Hattie skipped in front of me. Her braids, that mother had tightly done behind either ear, bounced against her shoulders. I followed closely behind her as she ran in circles, arms outstretched, singing at the top of her lungs.
“Hattie, I don’t want to play this. I’ll race you to the top of that tree,” I shouted, already turning for the nearest tree to climb.
A gentle breeze drifted between us, pulling the single daisy behind Hattie’s ear toward the ground. Hattie snatched it out of the air with a pout. “I climb trees with you all the time. You could play my game at least once.”
“Your games are boring.”
Both of us turned toward our mother who sat on a fallen limb, sewing a patch over one of the few pairs of pants that I owned. She didn’t look up from her task as she responded.“Why don’t you play a game that you both want to play?” she said with a small smile.
Somewhere in the back of my mind, I wanted to cling to the image of my mother. No, memorize her face. Take in every laugh line, her soft flowing straight hair, take in the tender love in her eyes and the gentle care that she handled her project with.
Ten-year-old me looked away.
“What about hide and seek?” I snickered, leaning against the tree. Bark transformed and molded over my skin until there was no part of me left to be seen.
“You have an unfair advantage,” Hattie said, sourly.
“Fine, you pick something else then.” The pout was evident in my voice.
Hattie plucked a couple of wildflowers from the ground and held them up. “Let’s weave together some flowers and make crowns. Then we can play the princess and the queen. I call being the queen.”
“No, because then you’ll just boss me around the entire time. I want to be the queen.”
My mother shuffled behind us, setting down her work quietly as my father walked toward us through the trees. His hands were clasped around a small wooden box, his face pale and grim.
“Ibarra,” he whispered to mother, “the spell is complete. We just need to bind it.”
Mother glanced at me and Hattie. Hattie was already knotting the ends of the flower stems. My fingers interlaced with the grass as I grew white, delicate flowers around us. I kept my gaze on the dirt before me and so did Hattie, but we both knew we were listening to our parents. They knew too.
“How long will we have with them, Calton?” she asked, her voice heavy with sadness.
“A year at most.” His rough hands stroked down the length of her face. Mother’s gaze drifted between the box he held against him and us, playing cluelessly next to them. “It’s important we do this. The Mother didn’t give us this to let it fall into the wrong hands. It’s meant to be used with its other half, should we need it to protect her holy lands against the other realms of the gods.”
“I know, I know.” She gently pushed his hand away. “I just worry about leaving them alone in this world. I don’t want them to feel burdened by this, just as we have since your family passed this down to us. I wish they would never have to know what this was.”
“And they won't.”
“What do you mean?”
“I made a deal with the burgundy witch who spelled the box. All we have to do to wipe the memory of this from their mind is to complete the spell with our blood. They will remember nothing unless the spell is broken. I pray that never comes to pass.”
Plucking a few flowers from the ground, I started braiding them together and watched my mother as she pressed a kiss to my father's lips. Hattie hummed in front of me, a crown nearly complete. Her lips didn’t lift with a smile as she continued to listen to our parents with me. I didn’t want to forget this box. I didn’t want something to be lost to my mind and never even know it.
“A year isn’t very much time to love someone,” Mother said, her tone growing more mournful by the second.
