House of Longing | Part 3 of 3 [a nightbb story]

Part 1
Part 2

I grew even more restless.

What had she meant when she said I had been dreaming of myself?

Food could not satisfy me, music left me unmoved. I lived for dreams and visitations, for those moments when she would turn to me and the barriers between our worlds would shimmer and thin. Once upon a time, she had longed for someone that I could never know. Now, she had begun to long for me too. Her longing was in the roses that she left strewed around my bed, the ghostly vines that curled lovingly around the bathtub while I bathed only to disappear when they got close to my skin. Sometimes she would appear as a small, rosy dancing light hovering around me as I completed the tasks of living. Her words haunted me. The attic remained locked.

I used the clues she had given me to unravel the riddle: the dream of eggs, the scrolling words across the walls, the significance of the hearth. I devoured every book I could that mentioned these things and slowly I began to feel it… It dawned upon in waves until I could not know when the knowledge had revealed itself to me. My beloved was indeed a ghost, or had been, but she had not been content to remain so. She had stroked the flames of her passion until the twilight had come to her and rebirthed her in flame. My beloved had become a liminal creature, a kin to magic, more than ghost and no less than part of magic itself.

No matter how dangerous it was, I was seized with the need to follow her path. She was my light in the dark, her soul burning down a path and mine following it. 

I did the unthinkable. I broke every prohibition, every rule, and gathered what I needed to make magic. I cast circles in the living room at midnight with salt and herbs. I made altars of every surface I could find. Every act was a summoning, a tightening of the cord between us. I began to know and hear the story of her life in the strange phantom places that played out in the room - a story I began to know not as a progression towards death but a progression towards life… Her life.

In the dining room I slowly filled the walls with poetry as I ravaged my dreamscape for words to turn into spells. I alchemized every part of my existence so that it became a spell of awakening.

The world began to take on golden hues. I rubbed my eyes and wondered if this was part of her magic too. At night in my bed, I traced my body considering the pleasure I had denied myself for the sake of longing. She had sparked my fire in a grey world… but what could continue to feed this flame? I was between worlds. Could I cross over?

My obsession changed. I watched myself as closely as I had watched her. I noticed the subtle shift as my dark skin took on a more unearthly lushness. My eyes became sharper, more vibrant.

“What is happening?” I murmured.

The hydrangeas I had planted bloomed a pale blue. I fed the earth beneath them different tonics, watching over days as they deepened into purplish dusk. I wondered at them, at perfection and mystic colours. I marveled at the wonder of them, how the pale and then rich colours could fade and deepen all on the same flower. I felt intoxicated with myself.   

Finally, the attic door unlocked and swung open. The hearth caught.

Light spilled out onto the stairs and I followed it up into the shadows… into the twilight. Into myself.

I was surrounded by a forest, the trees thick and black, their limbs swirling up and around me. Cold winds cut through, ice in the air tinkling like bells and I shivered in delight. My whole body was covered in thick fur that kept me warm. The wind was invigorating. I began to run.

My limbs were strong, my feet sure. I raced through the undergrowth and low branches, the crisp air biting my nose and burning my lungs. Soon I became aware of a scent, at first only the tenderest touches. I breathed deep and explored the air with my nose. I followed wherever the new lushness was strongest. It was especially fragrant in this stark air.

I didn’t hesitate when I came to the cliff only lept and felt my desire unfold as great wings sprouting from my back. I soared and glided across the chasm to land heavily on the other side. In the trees ahead of me, a rosy light pulsed. The air was thick with her.

I followed it, sniffing and searching until I caught glimpses of her flanks through the woods, heard the laughter and the hooves. I dug my paws into the earth and launched forward with great strides. Finally, finally she came into view. Standing to face me in a clearing among the trees, her eyes blazing. I paused at the edge, my muscles quivering. 

“Come,” she said. I crept forward, each motion a sensual ripple of my muscles, my delicacy of step born from the total control of my own power.

“Come,” she said again, the words a soft whisper.

I nuzzled my way between her thighs and drank.

As we lay nestled in the twilight with our bodies entwining, I drew from her secrets that in my infatuation I had never considered.

“I had to make a choice,” she murmured against my ear as she nestled into my lap, my tail twining around her back, her wings expanding to enfold us. “Just like you did. The strength of my passion brought me between worlds but if I wanted to embrace the new me that was being born, I had to make that passion my own. When you first came to me, you reminded me of how I had once been. You were drawn to the shade I left behind. But then you opened yourself to a new way of being and let that passion transform you into a new self. That is why I showed myself to you. That is why we are here together now.”  

The twilight faded and we stood in the warmly lit front room of the House, watching as a figure wandered through, caressing the walls. They unbound their hair and sat gracefully on the floor, their skirts pooling around them. Their face was different but the scent of roses clung to them in the twilight that we were a part of now.

“There's another drawn to your spell,” I murmured.

My rose fairy smiled at me, her hands caressing my cheeks.

“You were not the first I’ve guided into their own gifts,” she purred, nestling close to me. “But you alone chose to share my world. To share my world means to share in their guidance and protection.”

From above us I felt and heard the attic unlock itself and the door swing open.

Hey! My name is Ciel Sainte-Marie (aka So Nefarious). I'm a writer and artist hanging out on Steem, writing stories, and studying games. You can read my previous short stories: The Ghost at the Auction Party and The Unexpected Ghost.