Page 84 of Crown of Ellova: Vol 1

In an embarrassingly strangled voice I say, “We should get started.” At my feet, a vine is coming up through the ground to reveal my lustful thoughts. I stomp my boot on it before Leon can see it.

He starts to chuckle but it dies on his lips when I take off my dress, his eyes going to the tight, yellow band around my chest, tied with a bow in the front. The same fabric is sewn into bottoms that wrap low around on my hips.

Now it’s his turn to stare, his eyes darkening as he drinks in my body, my soft middle, and the dark places the fabric covers.

His fingers twitch at his sides.

“Ready?” I ask loudly and cackle when he is startled by the question, looking a little dazed.

I open the small box Tavien had given me and pull out one lochkiss bubble, offering the other to Leon, who takes it curiously.

“Lochkiss. It lasts for weeks, so there will be plenty of time to collect what we need and return for more if needed. It’s going to give us the ability to breathe underwater. The spring is deceptively deep; you just can’t tell with how clear the water is. We’d run out of air long before we reached the blutells, so we will need these. With these, we will also be able to speak and hear each other under the water.” I pop it in my mouth and chew. It has a gummy texture, but no taste.

“Anything else to know?" he asks, chewing cautiously.

“When you go under the water, just breathe normally. The lochkiss will turn water into air for you. You can also control buoyancy. Imagine yourself heavier or lighter to stay at the bottom or rise to the surface.”

We tread into the water, and with the heat of the bright midmorning sun above us, the cool water is a pleasant touch.

“Anything behind the waterfall?” he asks, focusing on the flowing water.

I pause for a moment. “An underwater cave.” When his eyes light up with excitement, I reluctantly add, “I can show you before we collect the blutells if you would like to see it.”

“Only if we have time.”

“Come on, and stay close.” I dive in, indulging in the freeingsensation of being weightless, the rest of the world fading away. It’s just Leon, the healing water, and me.

Leon cuts through the water at an impressive speed, swimming in a large circle around me before chasing a small school of fish. My laughter sends bubbles rising to the surface. He looks back at the sound and returns to me, offering me his hand so we can swim together.

He follows me, diving deeper. The cave opening is just to the right of us.

The entrance is wide enough for two, the tunnel only taking a few seconds to swim through, leading into a small, hidden grotto. Slats of light break through the arched rocky ceiling with moss crawling up the walls, vines hanging down. A small but beautiful waterfall comes down from the Airvell River. The grotto is damp with a hint of minerals clinging to the air, so much hidden from the sun.

This place does not hold happy memories like the spring does. I’m transported back to when I was an angry dewling seeking solace here. Unable to control my powers, mourning the loss of my parents, lost and afraid. I came here to hide, to be angry alone so no one would think I was ungrateful, my pathetic attempts not to be a burden to Nueena or her family. Guilt grabs at me. How is it possible that over a hundred years have gone by and I’m in the same place I was before?

The only difference is instead of mourning my parents, I’m mourning my own life, threatened to be cut so much shorter than I was promised with fae heritage. Mourning the inevitable loss of Leon. Mourning the loss of what could have been if things had been different.

I should have sent him in here alone.

I use my strength to sit on the rocky ledge, my legs still dangling in the water, and stare into the depths below us.

Leon swims up to me and pulls himself out of the water with far more grace than I did. He sits close, our thighs fully touching. “Are you all right?”

Ellova’s grave, this man is always so attuned to my moods. Tears spring to my eyes.

He picks up my balled fist. He doesn’t speak, just brings it to his lips. He kisses my first knuckle and uncurls that finger, repeating the process ’til every finger has been kissed. Turning my palm up, he closes his eyes and presses his lips into the center, then my wrist and the top of my hand. Each tender kiss absorbs a piece of my anger until I sag against him.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have brought you into the grotto. This place holds memories I would rather forget. We should start collecting what we need.”

Before I can slide back into the water, he stops me. “What memories?”

I sigh, not wishing to expose even more of my heart to him, but wanting him to understand my fear too. “I lost my parents suddenly. One after the other. I felt utterly betrayed by my mother’s death in particular. It wasn’t until later I learned that the fae can die of broken hearts; the fae call it an enervation death. I never knew love could end so tragically. Then, on top of it, I didn’t truly understand how my magic worked. I was a grieving dewling dealing with emotions that were affecting my magic.”

“That is too much for someone so young to handle. You were a child. I’m sure your mother didn’t want to leave you alone to figure this all out by yourself,” he says, tucking me into his side, arm tight around me.

It’s easier to say the next part with my head on his shoulders, not looking into those deep green eyes. “I know now it wasn’t her fault, but I blamed her for loving someone she knew she was going to outlive. Having a child with him. Knowing I would lose my father when she would lose her husband. Knowing there was a possibility she would die from a broken heart, leaving me alone. Maybe she didn’t know that at the time; maybe she didn’t care. Maybe she didn’t think about it, but it felt like a betrayal at the time. Still does, actually, but knowing you now, I think I’m beginning to understand.”

I try to fight off the memory of her last few days. The brightwhite scars that spread all over her skin, like she had been struck by lightning. An enervation death is excruciating. Her grief-stricken sobs still haunt me late at night. Knowing her magic was decaying from the inside, slowly killing her, and yet her cries were not for herself. They were for my father and me. At his loss and what I was about to lose. Her.

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