One Soul

Scar ridden hands traced over his cold form, beautiful features haunting me. Hands drew over emerald eyes as I slid them closed. My throat bobbed with tears as I anchored them to my heart. Shivering, the memory of the cold dagger possessed me. Still I could feel the knife as it burned through his form like a flame to paper.

"Do it," he had begged. "Go away from this place."

I felt myself fall to the blood stained snow, turning my white gown a deep scarlet. My shaking fingers loosely hung to the edges of the fabric as I trembled with fear.

"Away from this place," my thoughts reminded me.

Heart beating I scooped a puddle of blood into my hands as I had read to do hundreds of times before. It poured sickly, deep in my burning throat. Already I could feel the iron sting me as I swallowed. I clung to my chest as the urge to sob came over, my breath becoming shallower by the second.

"Fionan," I choked, yet no tears clung to my face.

I shook his body.

"No!" I screamed in the barren wood. "No!"

I buried my head in my knees, and when I opened from my confined solitude, my body seemed to be made of ice. I looked around and found my form had fallen, covered in snow. Standing up I felt lighter somehow, as if I had been stripped of my doubts and worries. I felt my eyebrows curve with confusion as a stray hand brushed against my wrist. I whipped around to find him, his tall form smiling as he embraced me. I broke away, breath ragged, and faced my body with question. Was I dead?

"The way out was unexpected, was it not?" Fionan inquired.

My stare never left my lost form as Fionan explained to me the truth of it all. The rules of the prophecy had always been fickle, every time I had gazed over them.

Something valuable must be taken for one to escape.

I felt my body turn to walk away, expecting him to follow. I suddenly stopped with remembrance.

"Only one soul would leave."

Around me the forest shrunk as despair filled me.

"Fionan," I stumbled. "Come."

Yet, he only stood silently, brushing a hand across a grand oak.

"Come!" I commanded.

He only shook his head, grief filling his gem cut eyes.

"I cannot, my love," he smiled remorsefully.

I shook my head, trying to understand.

"Tatiana-."

"No! There must be a way, we shall leave together."

I walked over to him, and watched him shift from side to side.

"It is the gods will, and the gods will it shall be."

He grabbed my wrist and stroked my raven black hair away from my shame stricken face.

"I will not leave you," I said, standing closer to him.

At this he only stared down at the snow ridden ground.

"If you were to stay here with me, it would be a horrible eternity, would it not?"

I bit my lip, drawing blood, and staining my teeth in a wicked malice. I then turned to glance back at him. He seemed placid and pale, a ghost of a man. I gulped. I wasn't dead. No, I was being given a goodbye.

"No-"

"You will not suffer my fate, Tatiana!" He scorned, letting go of me. "For I am the one who is dead, am I not?"

Jaw clenching I turned back to my body, still wrapped in grief.

"It is the god's will for this-."

"I have had enough with gods and monsters Fionan! Heros and villans, they are all the same to me if I am not here with you."

"Foolish you are, and always have been," Fionan muttered, pushing past me.

"Once a boy told me it was a strong thing to be the way I am!"

He turned back to me quickly, a look of profound misery overturned his features.

"Once I would have. Yet, I too was young and foolish. I could not comprehend a clever person from a witless one."

A tight line spread across me as I dug my boot deep into the snow.

"We will leave together," I protested once more.

"No we shall not!" He yelled.

"I will not subject you to such pain and suffering! This is not a silly game you play in the palace Tatiana, it is a game of fate!"

"A fate that I can control," I argued.

Fionan suddenly swelled with anger and shot me with a hot glow, pushing me back into my body, staring at me always with his never ending gaze

"A fate you cannot control," Fionan whispered.

Somewhere his soul was hidden in the depths of the trees, watching me forever more, knowing I would never be able to reach him.

I stood feeling betrayed, and broken. Only one soul would leave

In all my anger I did not heed to notice a tree, glowing with what seemed to be his spirit.

"Leave this place," he had said, as the dagger swam through his chest. "Leave this place."

I stood, tears falling. Where this door of oak lead, I did not know. Yet, I went anyway, into the unknown. I drew closer and felt myself plummet through a bed of light. All around me I could feel his soul cling to me. Then, my eyes flashed open. 

"Over here men!" 

A strong willed voice called from afar. I tried to compel my eyes open, yet they did not respond. 

"Men!" 

My ears now filled with the sensation of sound, ocean waves blasting. 

"Hello?" One said, a thick accent taking over his speech. "Miss, are you alive?" 

My eyes flashed open, as water spilled from my mouth, I heaved out a cough and faced the man in front of me. He cocked his head, and started to speak. 

"Miss, we saw your ship get stranded, there were no survivors, or so we thought."  

"My ship?" I thought. 

I looked to him again, and a stare matching Fionan's met mine. 

"Miss?" 

"Where-, where am I?" 

"Port Landen, home of the King and Queen of Yika." 

I raised and eyebrow, never had I heard of Yika in all my years geography. 

"Yika?" I asked. "Where is that?" 

"Off the coast of Aiea miss, have never heard of it?" 

"I'm sorry I haven't, will you excuse me?"

I felt my form stand from the soft beach, the sailors stare never breaking. 

"Miss, don't you need to recover? We have an inn near here-"

"I'll be fine!" I said waving my hand as I walked away.

"Crazy wench," he muttered to his crew mates.

I looked around engrossed in my surroundings, my thoughts swirling. Over and over again I thought of the name, strangely familiar. Then, the realization flooded me like a wave crashing onto the sand. Yika: Paradise. I looked around me once again and now noticed the glory of it all. The gleaming ocean, the breeze cool under my skin and wild beneath my hair. Yet, something seemed amiss in it all, something was out of place. I made my way over to a near by cliff, where people danced and talked. As I climbed I gazed further, inhaling the sweet salt air.

"Hello!" A women called from above me.

A bright smile was spread across her glassy eyes as she reached out a hand to me.

"I am Alexei, and yourself?"

I felt myself stumble a little, sending rocks to scatter to the sand beneath me.

"Everything alright miss?"

"Yes, it's just you seem so familiar, I don't know you, do I?"

Alexei shook her head with a smile.

"No, I don't think so."

With a single pull I was placed upon the soft grass of the mainland, my eye caught a better glimpse of it all. Laughter rung throughout the flower filled meadow as Alexei led me further into the circle.

"Yika is a small country, but we have our way," she explained as my feet crunched in the soft earth.

Her blonde hair blew in the dry wind, which sent whiffs of burning wood from the camp. Her as her golden curls swung from side to side, it reminded me of Fionans own lush ones. At once I felt an ache come over me as I thought of him again. I was the only one who had gotten out, the only one who lived. Yet, everywhere I felt him.

"One soul would leave."

I knew what I had to do when I killed him. He knew. Yet, I never realized how strange a feeling it would be when I was here, without him. He was the one who was trapped but I felt as if I were chained down to this place, a place where everywhere I saw him. Swiftly my mind started to drift, placing me in the day the Oracle had read my fate. My Father and Mother tight lipped by my side.

"Someday, your daughter will face a choice, that will define her," she had said, brushing fiery red hair away from coal slitted eyes.

At this my Mother scoffed.

"Tataiana will not have time for such foolish things Oracle, you must have read the chart wrong, give it here," my mothers long arm stretched across the table of amethyst, yet the Oracle hissed with disgust.

"The stars never lie."

I never saw the Oracle again after that. She was sent away, to another kingdom, somewhere far away from my own. As a child I always wondered how she had known such things about me, taking my focus up to the sky, I studied its surface filled with stars, as bright as diamonds.