Page 12 of Up from the Earth

I hadn’t changed out of that nightgown. Something in my bones wouldn’t allow me to, despite how it had been frayed at the edges and stained red. The shoulder of the dress slipped down my arm, and it was as if…as if I could track the sensation of fingers helping the fabric to reveal me.

Get up, Cerridwen. Come to me.

Before I realized it, I was standing, my legs moving, guiding my feet through the steps out of the room and down the stairs. In the kitchen, my hand poised on the handle of the back door, I stopped. My mind fought against the compulsion to run; at least, it tried.

But I only shook harder and harder until I turned the knob and stepped outside.

Do not fight it. Come to me now, little beast.

In the voice, I could recognize the power that I’d felt before—that of the Wolf and Queen. Thiswasthat force, but it was…different. I was ‘little bloom’ to the Wolf. I was ‘little seed’ to the Queen. To this facet of the ancient being that spoke to me, I was ‘little beast,’ and everything about this version felt darker.

The Queen was not light. The Wolf was not. But this…King reached into depths farther than both. Every inch of me trembled, a furious heartbeat scrambling to fuel my instincts, my instincts to run.

So I did.

I ran through the trees, branches and bush scratching through my skin along the journey. The farthest reaches of the wood were rushing up to greet me. I would soon be at the gate once more, helplessly falling into the World of Below.

“Cerridwen! No!”

I slammed to a stop, dirt and leaves kicked up at my feet. Turning over my shoulder, I saw my mother standing at the edge of the forest. She wanted me to come back. I could see the fear in her doe eyes, the same eyes I’d inherited.

But I could also sense The King. In moments, the shadows grew longer and longer, waves of black reaching out across the ground like hands. The air became heavier and heavier, and in a blink, a massive form of inky substance stood towering over the landscapes, its shape both separate from and part of the trees.

“Your daughter belongs to me, Margaret.”

Six

A Season Comes Only Once A Year & There Can Be No Spring Without Winter.

“Youcan’thaveher!Let my daughter go!”

My mother’s voice rang out through the forest with the thunderous boom of her magic. She thrust her hands out in front of her, calling the vines of the wood to her aid in pulling me away from The King.

They did not respond as she demanded, and any that did could not reach me, stopping short several feet away. I looked back at her, and the urges that warred within me threatened to tear me apart. I wanted to be with my mother, the sweet soul who’d raised me to be kind and gentle.

And yet, I could not deny that part of me wanted to go into the woods,neededto. I was called there like no magic I’d known before, and fighting against it proved more and more fruitless.

“Go back to your home, witch. This is not the time for you.”

The King’s voice was everywhere and nowhere. I could hear it in my mind and ears alike, the power of it making my bones rattle, my equilibrium sent spinning.

“Cerridwen Adaire Locke,” he called, “You are the wife of The Beast King and nullifier of the great threat against the balance. Youwillcome with me.”

My mother fell to her knees, her sobbing racking through her like a torrential rain. I could sense her anguish from her, and I longed desperately to go to her, to wrap my arms around her and take away the hurt.

A single step forward was all I could muster, and the undergrowth beneath my feet sent up sticks and pebbles to jab into my soles.

“You cannot do this! She belongs with me! I am her mother!” My mother shook her head, pounding on the earth as her tears streamed down her cheeks. “Give her back to me.”

The all-consuming essence of The Beast King rose up only to slink back down again, sliding over the ground like fog. Its icy touch created a drape between me and my mother, making my nerves flare into circling bouts of pain and pleasure.

“Margaret,” he spoke, the hard edge of his voice I blade held to our throats, “you were told. You were told of Cerridwen’s fate. You were meant to prepare.”

“How?” My mother looked up, desperate and pleading. “How am I supposed to be made ready for her departure? It will never be right. I willneverbe whole without her.”

Tears coated my lashes before breaking free. My head tilting, I reached out for her, the halves of my chest cracking in half at the sight of my mother so heartbroken. I loved her with all my heart. We were kindred spirits, versions of the same coin in a fountain of mismatched others.

I knew it was no use to argue with The Beast King. I could sense his indifference. He saw so much of the big picture, his gaze falling over the whole of the universe to those here and those lost. A single mother and child were nothing in the ocean of souls that existed across time.

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