Strange place

- Well..., I cleared my throat, because what happened next was just as important, so let's say you manage to see Master Charlouse's memory and discover how to enter the fabulous world of monarchs...

- Yes.

Seiran clearly guessed the question I was about to ask.

- This fabulous world that they preserve with such fury, such jealousy of common people such as us, such as you, and especially likely of a human like me, what do you think will happen to us the moment our so undesirable feet will tread this sacred ground. And if they...

- They won't kill you.

It was my turn to make uplifting hand gestures.

- Are you making fun of me or what, my darling! How can you know that!

- I just know.

- But precisely, how, explain yourself...

This time, he only shook his head.

I let out a slight moan and took his face in my trembling hands. I too could sense the great pain behind the silence.

- Seiran, you have to tell me. Don't you see how much I need to know!

But he bent his beautiful, proud head and showered me with kisses.

- I know. But I can't. Not now anyway. But you'll know soon . It's inevitable.

I stared at him and bit my lips.

- I see. Then I'll wait. I let out an upset little laugh. It would have to be terrible for you to hide it from me.

He simply nodded.

- Yes, it is.

He accentuated his kisses on my skin.

- Then we'd better have children soon before we go through that well-guarded, much-hated gate.

- Oh Seiran...

I hugged him with all my heart.

- We haven't done it for two days, two long days in which I've done nothing but want you over and over again to the point of madness. And my body is starting to deteriorate.

He licked the edges of my lips, consuming my blood.

- You feel it, don't you? My body burning with desire for you to the point of ashes.

- Of course I feel it my Seiran, because mine burns just as much. It burns with the same great, deep pleasure that leads to the undeniable bliss that only you would ever be able to bring me.

- I know. For me too. Seiran buried his face in my long hair and breathed in my skin, my perfume.

- My love. And it must have been like that from the beginning. And until the very end.

- Yes.

Then he took me, he took me as he had said, as he had wished. He took me and soon drowned in my flesh as if this unique moment was already lost and should never happen again, moaning with pleasure and agony, making my tears flow, tears of joy and pain and bringing me once again that serenity, that blazing and unparalleled fullness that I would never forget.

I visualized so well our two bodies united, lost in this immense, singular room, keeping all the secrets of the ancient kingdom of his father Preisax, filled with magic and warmth, moving, tearing, uniting, giving themselves again and again until reaching this so marvelous and imperishable ecstasy.

When it was over, when our tired bodies were resting and our burning sweats were mingling, I carried my languid and radiant eyes to the high glittering ceiling of the dream chamber, gazing absentmindedly at the moving and historical paintings engraved there, then always closing my eyes, wishing that this moment would never end. But I guess it was never meant to be.

***

Later, as my beloved Seiran resumed his frantic search, which he would not cease until he found the spell to view the memories buried in Master Charlouse's unusual mind, I, still naked, resting on a makeshift bed, watched him do it, touched and moved more than any words could say. And it was in this moment, while all my heart, and even my body were directed towards him, my sovereign of the flying, that it was this other, this person again that I saw.

Then I let out a short silent moan of pain and resignation, then I closed my eyes and found myself four years back in time, our first meeting, a meeting that lasted only one night and yet meant more to me than anything I had experienced before, and what I experienced after.

Lost in a sea of light mist that still gave a glimpse of a lost kingdom as he had so well defined it, bearing the simple name of Esis, and that he had of himself led to this desolation, for I had no need to see or obtain any convictions whatsoever to know that this being so bewitching and imperfect was one of the two zeogs who had put an end to the reign of these beasts by using their own ignominy to finish them. He had raised us high, so high that we could see the grandeur of the lost city and the horror it had become after their unprecedented actions. He contemplated in a total and disturbing silence his work while I, in spite of all that was present and outside the human world, saw only him. He was the only one who existed.

And then he spoke to me until my heart bled and I could not bear to hear anything more from him. And yet I had condemned myself, for I asked him what was already evident as this irreparable destruction.

"What a strange place, so desolate," I remarked in a barely audible whisper.

And he agreed, which touched me even more.

"Yes," he said simply, "it is in its own way."

"And yet, I get the impression that you love this place."

"Yes." He repeated, and still in that clear, terribly unfeeling voice.

"But why?" I asked him again, stunned, unable to understand. And with an eloquent gesture, I embraced the place to make it clear as well as my point of view. "How can one still be able to love what is now there, spread out in all its ugliness!

He was silent for a moment before shrugging his shoulders, still admiring this taciturn, devastated place where no soul or magic remained.

"You are right, Dania. If all one could see was what you see now, so empty and obvious, then it would be inconceivable to continue to love such a place. However, this place, this abandoned kingdom will continue to mean so much to me because it is here, for a short time like ours in this very moment, so short, so fragile in comparison to my existence, that I was able to meet him again."

I shook my head.

"Who?"