Of Gaea (21 page)

A ring of fire rose from the ground and traced the
circumference of the circle.
When it touched itself it went out, but there was
a light, that she couldn’t explain in its place. It wasn’t the red
light of fire either, but a cool, almost clean feeling light. When
the moon hit the edge of the dome it flared to life and was nearly
as bright as any lamp.

“Our Mother Gaea, this night we ask for protection, this
night we ask for healing. This night we ask You to bless the
Faithful with Your love.”

Ari could hear Leonidas’s prayer from where she sat, or
rather, she felt it.
The words weren’t quite right though. She didn’t
hear them as he spoke them, but as a chorus of voices together as
one. The voices chanted together and drowned out Leonidas’s words.
Goosebumps broke out along her arms.

As Leonidas shuffled back over Ari saw movement behind
him.
The
darkness that she feared manifested along the edge of the circle.
It had more form than it had previously. The demon horse was more
pronounced in shape and larger than she remembered it being. There
was with ooze streaming from its head and tail and dark rivulets of
liquid streamed over him that she could only envision as some form
of acid.

The trees and plants seemed to shrink back away from
it.
Or at
least that’s what she thought until the light creature joined it.
Then she realized what the darkness killed the light was bringing
back to life only for the vicious cycle to continue.

She was more shaped this time too.
She looked like a white peacock with
the train of light behind her wings and tail. Everything about her
glowed and it was painful to look at her for too long.

“Can you see them?”
Ari gestured to the edge of the circle.

Leonidas turned and even though Ari didn’t see his face she
saw his posture still and harden.
“You are not welcome here. Gaea walks
here, not you. Be gone! You have no business here.”

“The child is our business.” The light creature danced up
the wall searching for an entrance.

“Give her to us and we shall leave everything as it was
found.” The dark thing wasn’t so subtle and struck the wall of
light with its hooves.

“Gaea walks here.” The Kirin appeared inside the circle.
Her voice was a beautiful song. “Leave this place. Now.” She
stamped her hoof once.

The other creatures only hissed at her.
The Kirin reared backed and
then charged. She rammed into both of them and all three vanished.
Before their eyes the trees and plants sprung back to the way they
had been only minutes before.

“Now I’ve officially seen everything.” Leonidas muttered.
“How often do you see them?”

Ari laughed weakly. “Do nightmares count?”

Leonidas bent down to look in her eyes. “Nightmares
always
count.”

Ari cringed. “More than I want to.”

“Let’s get started before they come back.” He slid some
latex gloves on then looked at her. “Front or back first? We have
forty eight marks to cover you in and around seven hours to do
it.”

Ari hadn’t moved since she rolled onto her back so she just
pointed. “I’m already here.”

“Lose the
pants.”

“That requires
sitting up and rolling over.”

“Ghluwht goes on your tailbone should I remind you.
And Kicul on the
back of your calf.”

“Fine, fine.
But if I’m rolling over, you’re doing the front
first.” Ari rolled over and slipped out of the light cotton pants.
She silently thanked Nasya for her foresight with the bathing suit.
Ari rolled up the pants, added it to her shirt pillow and laid
back.

Leonidas took her arm.
“We’ll start here; I’ll do one, patch it
up and then move on to the next. Once I start we can’t stop.
There’s no reversing this. Are you sure?”

Ari took a deep breath and nodded. “Let’s do
this.”

She felt the cool cloth for cleaning, the shaver, and then
the cloth again.
Ari blocked it all out by studying the paintings on the
dome. They could be seen clearly in the moonlight whereas the
sunlight was too strong to look at them directly.

Ari felt the sting of a million bees when the needle went
in the first time but she didn’t flinch or tense up.
Leonidas murmured
in approval and kept working.

“Can you talk
and work?”

“Depends. What do you want to talk about?” The needles
never hesitated and Ari gave him credit for their swift clean
movement.

“Tell me about the paintings.” She had looked at him when
she made her request and she saw his soft smile.

“In the beginning there was only the earth. Gaea walked
alone. The earth was Hers and She loved every part of it fully. Her
creatures were what She sculpted from dirt and sand and water and
fire. She was happy.”

“She didn’t
stay that way?”

“Nothing is indefinitely eternal.” He cleaned up the first
tattoo, covered it up and moved on to the next. “Her garden was
beyond comparison and attracted the attention of many.”

Ari listened with half an ear. His voice wasn’t unpleasant
and his way of describing it was so clear she could imagine being
there. His tone turned to a murmur of sound and then instead of his
voice it was the hum of running water.

The garden that sprang up around her made Leonidas’s look
like a weed patch. It seemed to breathe as she did. As she walked
along the path toward the babbling water another sound dance with
it. A harp or some kind of stringed instrument.

Ari’s feet barely rustled in the lush grass as she followed
the sound.
Since she was so silent she heard other sounds and saw
other things. There were animals; they came out of hiding as she
passed and she saw creatures that could not exist in her waking
world.

The noise came from an instrument that graced a woman’s
lap.
She sat
next to a bubbling fountain. Animals sat around her, the plants
seemed to lean towards her like she was the sun. When she looked up
Ari couldn’t prevent the shock.

She wore Ari’s face.
Or Ari wore hers as the woman felt older than her.
Much older. Her sandy hair was shades darker than Ari’s, but still
gleamed in the strong light. Her eyes were different, though. Ari
could see the forests in them, and oceans and volcanoes. It was
like the world was encompassed in her eyes. She didn’t stop playing
but smiled. And in that smile Ari felt… she felt more connected to
this mysterious woman, than she did to either Ghita or
Lyris.

“You came. I wasn’t sure you would.”

Ari knelt in front of her careful not to sit on the sand
colored skirts that were spread out around her. “Why do you have my
face?”

“Perhaps, it is you that has mine?” She smiled again and
stopped playing. The animals disbursed as if on cue and she rested
the instrument against the fountain.

“What is that?” Ari gestured to the instrument.

“A zither. A beautiful instrument. It brings me comfort
when I am trapped here.” She brushed off her skirts and stood in
the same motion. “Walk with me?”

Ari rose slowly and nodded. “Of course. Where is
here?”

“I’m sure you have questions. I would love to be able to
answer them all, but I cannot. Not because of restraints, as I have
none, but because of time. There simply isn’t enough of it to give
you everything you should have.” She smiled again at Ari. “But for
your first question, we are where all life use to spring from. My
garden.”

“Who are
you?”

Her hand reached out and held Ari’s as they walked.
“I am you. It is
difficult to explain. We are Gaea.”

Ari’s muscles seized in her surprise and her hand clamped
around Gaea’s. “Gaea?”

“Long ago I created children of my flesh and tears. They
were my comfort. Together if need be we could assimilate and become
one entity. Then I was tricked, and my mortal form lost. My
children were the only mortal connection I had left.”

It made sense. In Ari’s memories there was never a time she
hadn’t felt calmer, more at peace when within nature’s embrace. She
and Sasha camped and hunted often. She wondered slightly if that
was Gaea’s influence on her.

Had there been other times Gaea had protected her?
Guided her without
Ari actually knowing she did? Ari blurted the first memory that
came to mind. “At school, when Damia was choking me?”

Gaea nodded. “Yes. You needed me. Desperately. And I came.”
She looked at Ari sadly. “You are the last of what was once a great
line. Over time, the Pure and the Tainted have digested members of
my house.”

“Pure and
Tainted?”

“The Pure are heavenly celestials and the Tainted are the
fallen ones.
Unfortunately we are trapped in the middle.”

They crossed a
wooden bridge in silence and then Gaea pulled Ari down to sit under
a blossoming cherry tree.

“They fight over control of the earth. Of
our
earth. Of course in
the beginning they could control some of it, through my children,
but I ended that. If the child sided with them I would no longer
allow the child to draw from our source.”

“Lyris said that on my birthday I would have a choice to
make. And Nasya has said the Kirin has never stayed after majority.
The Kirin is you isn’t it? And you don’t stay because they don’t
stay with you?”

Gaea’s eyes glowed joyfully. “The Kirin is a part of me,
yes. She is one of my many creatures that can still maintain within
the mortal society with little difficulty. She’s an ambassador
we’ll say, in my name.”

“If you leave
once the Tainted or the Pure infect your child why do they still
come after us?”

“If there are no more of my children left, there are no
more beings to fight for the earth. It’s not just about the life.
It’s about the soil, the water, the fire, and the air. That is us.
We are the elements. Should even one of us rise against them, and
demand they retain the balance, well, it is something neither of
them wants.”

“What do I do? What can I do?”

Gaea took Ari’s hands in hers.
“Learn. Talk to Nasya, ask her for
the nitty gritty, as they say now a days. Listen, and when the time
comes make your choice.”

“But…” Ari couldn’t think. “I’ve never been what Ghita
wants and there’s no way I could be what Lyris is…”

She kissed Ari’s hands. “You’re already half way there. You
need more faith in yourself.”

“What happens to us? Say, if by some miracle I don’t die,
or get digested by one of them?”

Gaea’s smile widened and her hands gripped Ari’s tighter.
“Then we will finally be whole. Together we will defend the
world
. You
will no longer feel broken and I will no longer be alone. We are
two pieces of the same coin.
”

She looked up at the sky and frowned. Her hand ran gently
over Ari’s hair. “Time is running out. You will always be you.
Never fear you will lose who you are. Now, I have a gift for you.
Name anything you’d like. Within my power I will grant
it.”

Ari thought about it for a moment. “Knowledge. I want to
know. I’m tired of guessing.”

Gaea nodded in approval. “I can give you some, not a great
deal, because it could kill you before you are ready for it. But
certainly enough to take some of the confusion out of your
life.”

Before Ari could ask how, Gaea rested her forehead against
hers. Ari felt an electrifying bolt of energy that left her limp
and her hair standing on end. It intensified to the point of
blindness and when Gaea pulled away Ari fell against her. Numb was
a weak description of the feeling.

“That was,”
Ari coughed, “uncool.”

Ari could feel her nose running. She had enough strength
left to deduce it was probably blood. As her body shook and quaked
with the left over energy spasms her brain felt like it was in melt
down mode.

“Sleep now.”
Gaea’s hand stroked gently over Ari’s hair again.
“And have faith in yourself. I am here always.”

It wasn’t as if Ari had a choice. She couldn’t fight the
sensory overload and the energy zap had been taxing to an
extreme.

“When you wake, you’ll know what to do.
Of that, I am sure.”