Page 43 of Eight Embers

I try to keep my emotions at bay, but it's useless. I'm far too worked up right now because there's too much on the line. “Because I've spent my entire existence trying to prevent her from doing what she's doing! I've sought the wisdom of every seer on the planet, at the expense of my very soul, all so I could find a future that isn'tthisone. She doesn't get what was given to me!”

“Are you doing okay there? You're coming off a bit hysterical.”

The scream that erupts from me very nearly shatters our partition. “How dare you sit there smugly, feeling sorry for me, feelingbetterthan me. We had a deal. You would find a way to ruin her, and I would... do something. I never remember that part.”

I feel her sigh stronger than I hear it. “Okay, and when would you say you started feeling like this? Can you point to any specific moment in your life that might have led to the creation of this trigger event? Because you're very triggered right now. It's quite alarming, actually.”

I take a few steps back from the partition, not stopping until my back hits the cool dirt of the earth wall behind me. Not until there are bugs crawling over my shoulders, reassuring me that all is still well with the world for now. “You're trying to end me.”

The voices in my head are trying to convince me that she's standing up and brushing herself off, about to flee. She'll go somewhere I can't follow, and I'll have to wait until she decides to give me another audience.

That won't do. I take a deep breath, and I do what I do best.

Well, second best. I'm actually hella good at recreating Bob Ross paintings.

There, see? I'm more stable already. “Please,” I beg. “Haven't you ever been so unnecessarily obsessed with somebody, that it's all you can think about? That your entire existence revolves around them? That you structured your memories and your life around the one time they smiled at you like you were somebody important? When they... allowed you to gaze at their glorious brown, hairy nipples? Because I have. Put yourself in my shoes. Come on, when was the last time you gave up ownership of your soul to curse him and his stupid demon lover? All I did was make him more appealing in the end, blast it all to the nether world. I know you know how I'm feeling.”

It's so quiet for a moment that I’m not even sure she's still there. But then, she lets out a disgustingly vibrant fart, and there's a splash and a flush, and the sound of water running. “Did you just... take a shit while I was pouring out my heart to you?”

The squeak of the paper tower dispenser runs, followed by the soft thunk of a damp towel hitting the plastic liner of the garbage can. “Look, you seem... well, I can't say great, not with a good conscience. But I have a responsibility to my realm. I only told you I wouldtry.

“By all accounts, this shouldn't be working. I gave her no instructions. I've matched her with somebody completely wrong for her. I tied her to my realm, so that she'd forget most of her mates temporarily. I even,” and I swear she shudders, “took her mates and turned them into glorious clouds.” I get the feeling she's bracing herself, trying to get herself to calm down.

“Do you have any idea how wrong it is to grant such an honor to people not even from here? It is an insult to everything I stand for. But I did it. Because you told me you would give me your very special vintage collection of Sparkling Magical Pony Dolls. Mint condition, from 1993.”

“I... yes. Yes, I very…yep. That's exactly what I'm going to give you. I remember now, thank you for reminding me.”

Her footsteps clomp louder, getting closer to me. I can see her breath on the screen now, each exhale getting heavier and heavier. “Do youhavethe dolls? Because if I went through all of this and you were lying... well. I don't think you'd like that very much.”

Double-barreled jumping jiminetty. Why did I have to promise such a very specific thing? My therapist would tell me that my desires blind me to what is happening around me, and she'd be right. Damn it, she usually is.

When I don't say anything, the tension grows thicker and thicker. Maybe I can just slink out the back and she'll never know.

Or, maybe she'll light her hooves on fire and tear through the partition like butter, no, likemashed potatoes, and she'll look at me in all her glory, with bedazzled tits, and make me forget all about that silly human-turned-gargoyle that's taken up the entirety of my existence.

Maybe, the very air will sing for us as she gazes upon me, and we'd come together like two halves of a whole that never should have been separated.

I feel a rictus grin split my face, the skin on my left side only slightly sagging from the insects that I've allowed to take up residence there. Her beauty tastes like a bald eagle soaring majestically over a mountain at sunset. Like the twinkle of sunlight on the bluest of ocean waves as it gently makes its way to a tropical oasis.

Likefate.

“Then again, who needs material possessions like dolls, when you can have this? Snuggle bear, why didn't you tell me? You had the cure all along, didn't you?” I find myself actually laughing, a light, grating tinkle of a giggle that sounds so wrong but feels so right.

Belatedly, I remember why I wasn't supposed to look upon her visage.

But this time, it's okay. As I feel the very atoms of my being cease to exist, I'm at peace. I'm the rainbow shooting across the sky, the dew at dawn that makes everything magical.

And then, I'm a puddle on the floor that the second and best love of my life rinses away with a mere hose. And there I'll stay. I'll be the very foundation that supports her special hidden ground-dwelling toilet. And I'll thank her for it.

Chapter Seventeen

Delaney

“Nothing about this place makes any sense. You know that, right?”

Saladriel shrugs. “It doesn't have to make sense; it just has to be.”

“Wow, that was deep,” Wil says with a nod. “You know, there was this famous philosopher that said—”

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