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Acacia/Ciarán - Age 18

H-How is this possible?

I'm staring at my reflection, a chill running down my spine before I hear the water distilled around me. Ripples erode away the clear reflection, slowly bringing my gaze to see Lailoken standing a few feet away. I glance to my left and right, observing Taron and Rian, their expressions reflecting the same I feel inside.

"I..." there are no words that can form the mass hysteria I truly feel, tears slowly filling my eyes as I rest my gaze back on Lailoken.

"Now you see yourself as I have, since the moment I saw you," Lailoken affirms what I see and it causes me to panic slightly.

All the confusion Lailoken must have felt when he kept telling me that he didn't realize I was in a mortal form...he saw me as this...a true born hybrid...how?

How am I this?

Did...Lars...all this time...he placed a glamour on me to prevent others from seeing the truth, suppressing who I am for his betterment.

A sharp pain begins to radiate in my teeth...a few seconds later, I feel the tips of two sharp fangs that cause my eyes to widen again. A very dark pulsation erupts in the area a split second later, my gaze locking with Lailoken as he states, "It slipped through...during the time the veil was brought down."

"What slipped through?" Rian asks with hesitation, glancing from Lailoken and me as if we hold the reason. I'm not sure who Lailoken is referring to, but I feel that strength, that power.

"It's an extension of itself," Lailoken nods at me, clearing everything up the second he tells me, "it's the one who tried to take your soul."

"Wh-What is it?" I ask, seeing Taron also apprehensive, unsure of what exactly is happening.

Lailoken replies, "Aeon."

"Aeon?" I've heard that name before...

..Nimue. She mentioned that name before when telling me about Lars and how not to trust him...why the veil has to exist and how they need to stay living beyond it.

Did it really get through...

...and what is it?

"How do you know it's just an extension?" My voice is uneasy as I ask this, not knowing how much more Lailoken truly knows that I'm still learning how to grasp.

Lailoken arches a brow and replies, "We'd be dead if it were he."

"He?" I ask.

"Aeon is Selene's counterpart, one who's true form lays dormant beyond the veil as well as beneath the Earthen plane...a sleeping god, though his conscious is awake and is now on this plane of existence," Lailoken pauses a moment before he thinks it over, "the question is...who does he reside within?"

Darkness finds those who are broken...

...dad.

"Dad..." my voice trails off as I flick my gaze upward toward the edges of the lake. I push off the ground, landing on the upper ledge while I feel the presence of my mates also appear alongside me.

There's something I can't understand though...Lailoken was able to connect with me mentally, something none of my other two mates can do because I've not been able to claim them. Was everything slipping and breaking through the surface of the glamour...that moment of when I cut myself?

How was he able to do what he did?

We're through the doors of Castle Valentine only moments later, walking through the hallways. I see a very hesitant Aohdan, Rochelle standing next to him as they are in the living room. The regard for my presence is quite different, so many questions laced with confusion fill their features. They don't ask though...because something much darker is within these walls.

I'm not the only one who can see the purple hue, the area around us all a haunting memory of everything I've been able to see. I'm not alone anymore and I don't even have to say a word before Rochelle nods at me and Aohdan points in the direction of the ballroom.

That walk is long, the heaviness in the air settling on my shoulders as we walk toward the partially open doors. Lailoken halts me though, taking the lead as a protective shield while Taron and Rian are close to my sides. The moment we set foot in the room, I feel the coldness, but it's no stranger to me as it's identical to the way I'd reach for it within my chest. It was a comfort, but the way this coldness radiates...is much, much darker than anything I've felt.

Correction.

I felt it once more...

...in Elysium when the tendrils came for me, now knowing it wanted my soul.

Aeon.

An extension at least...

What I find interesting, is there's no spoken words between my three mates. Taron closes the doors behind him, Rian moving out toward the side of the ballroom as Taron also begins his walk to the opposite. Lailoken must be communicating with them, because their movements are precise.

I feel it when his voice slips through my mind again, continuing to baffle me...

It will have to be you that forces Aeon from your father's body.

Another shock surfaces when I'm able to respond to Lailoken...

How is he even residing within him? I know broken beings are the easiest to manipulate.

Speaking of myself from experience now.

Your father is the Moirai. Three secular beings in one as they are connected to fate far more than anyone else. He's a vessel as well, but when every ounce of hope is gone, a shell remains.

Marc, mom, even Dante...me.

Everything has brought him to this point and I don't even know what to do. It's within me though I feel an equal darkness rising, it draws out the being inhabiting my dad.

The pulsation of power nearly knocks Taron and Rian off their feet, causing me to stagger a step backward while Lailoken holds his ground.

My dad turns around, seeing his eyes are hallow dark pits with purplish wisps dripping from the sockets. The entire time, I feel the darkness pooling outward, consuming every bit of light...except for Lailoken.

"You cannot hold the veil forever," the words that come from my dad's lips are not his own. A demonic touch causes a shiver to trail down my spine as it eats at my very soul.

Aeon holds no true power...

...this is a warning.

He's not strong, though his aura says differently...it's an act.

An astral projection, though more real due to the ability of him harboring a portion of himself in dad's body.

He's not strong...not like this, Lailoken.

Aeon speaks of what is to come...should the veil fall.

Ekáti, use my strength.

"Your soul should have been mine before you ever came into existence," Aeon speaks through dad as he tilts his head to the side, watching as Lailoken walks behind me. Lailoken rests his hands on my waist, feeling the warmth flood my body a second later. Aeon cackles, "Selene should not have interfered, though she can't change fate...it'll just prevail at an alternate time."

I notice that as Taron and Rian draw closer to Aeon, realizing now they are to help restrain him, Aeon lifts his hands and the tendrils entwine around them before rocketing toward my mates. A light exhale leaves my lips, my hands raised as two individual walls of spiderwebs weave as a shield, a barrier between the two.

Aeon takes one look at me before he redirects his attack. My eyes widen when I'm about to scream, because the tendrils fly right toward me...but a glowing white light flashes before my eyes and it's Lailoken who surrounds the two of use. Encased in a reflective shield, Aeon never has a chance to harm any of us. The look on his face is one of rage, taking a step toward us...

Lailoken's lips are near my ear as he says, "Find yourself...Ekáti. You are too good for this world, but it needs you far more than you need it."

I've heard this before...

Mom told me once before, that it takes knowing what makes you each of your gene traits for dormant hybrids to appear as they want. That's not the case with true borns, as their genes are already unlocked and there's no need for them to control these aspects...

...but as Lailoken reminds me, I'm not just this...

...I am a goddess.

What makes me this?

The love I have for this world? The joy and life I once found in every living being? The way I'd come to see the good in others...even if there wasn't anything there? The way I still want a lasting peace and love for everyone?

Serenity.

That's all I want.

Reigning tranquility.

I feel a different strength flood my body this time and I hardly realize I've moved until I'm face to face with my dad...Aeon's grimly haunting eyes staring straight into my soul. The darkness swirls around the two of us, taking a rooted form like a whirlwind.

"You cannot have this world," my voice is even.

"I will claim her soul one day," his voice haunts me greatly, the sound of it almost peeling away my skin...

...yet I raise my hands up and they connect with dad's chest, knocking him backward. Taron and Rian are on either side of him in an instant, grasping an arm each while the force of my impact deflects the extension of Aeon from within. His protection disintegrates from this moment of separation, seeing Lailoken's godlike presence having shifted to be behind this projection.

Just like all the other creatures he'd sent across the veil...it appears that Aeon's projection is no match and he begins to flicker in and out of this plane of existence.

I see the white light created by Lailoken...

...I see something entirely different myself.

They're here.

They're all here...

I see an open field as I sit with my legs crossed. A small girl sits on my lap while one in her teens runs around. Marc is the one chasing her as she nearly screams at the top of her lungs when mom laughs at the way they fall crashing to the ground.

Taron is quick to pick the little girl up from my lap, seeing how she's rubbing her eyes while Rian says something to dad. It's a man I don't recognize that helps the teen to her feet, kissing her forehead before he then kisses Marc.

Marcus is wrestling with another who looks to be a year older than I, the two shifting a moment later. There's a girl giggling, shifting a moment later before her wolf is regarded as the world to Marcus'. The other wolf is quick to shift back a few seconds later, changing before coming to stand near Marc.

"Cay!" He calls to me, grinning from ear to ear, as if he's known me his whole life.

Mom walks with dad, Uncle Keveon, and Rian, all of them coming closer together...

...even Grandpa Keir is off in the distance alone...

Nothing else.

I breathe out sharply, my eyelids blinking rapidly.

You may only choose one to bring forth from the world beyond, Ekáti...though it will cost you your foresight.

It's Selene's unmistakable thoughts that weave with my own. I don't understand exactly what she means though, because I now stare directly into dad's eyes.

She will help undo what was altered...

She?

Who is she?

A split second later, I feel the dark connection, the spiderwebs weaving a backdoor from the veil where Aeon has been sent back...

...I feel him.

Taron asks with utter confusion, "Can't her eyes just stay one color?"

"I like the white," Rian chuckles, seeing how they both have released dad.

Dad stands before me, his eyes searching mine. All emotions flood through him and I feel it...I feel everything. A second later, he throws his arms around me, a sob leaving his lips as he says, "I love you."

"I love you too," I feel the way everything lifts from he and I, and when he pulls back, our gazes meeting once again, his eyes widen.

"Acacia?" Dad questions me.

"Hey dad..." my voice trails off, as even I'm still adjusting to what I truly am.

"C-Cormac?" His voice causes my heart to skip a beat, dad and I separating while turning around to see Uncle Keveon gasping on the marble floor.

"Ke-Kev?" Dad's eyes are wide open, kneeling down in front of him as he looks him over. He doesn't look like how I've come to recognize him...because Uncle Keveon's features are that of an incubus.

There's a slight distortion in the veil and I glimpse Nimue, her eyes full of light as she says, "I've given him a chance at his own life...the moment Lars died, Keveon no longer remains tied as a beacon."

He's been given a second chance to live?

"Nimue..." Uncle Keveon's voice is watery as he's almost crying, glancing to me as he cries out, "Acacia!"

My eyes fill with tears as I nod to Nimue saying, "Thank you."

"Aeon will return to sleep, so long as the veil can be held up, and there's nothing we can't account for, we should be able to live in harmony," Nimue smiles as she releases a very heavy sigh. A few moments later, the distortion in the veil is brought to its full strength, nothing able to crash through its defenses.

Finally...balance beyond the veil, though that leaves one thing...to bring those who'd hurt me all those years to justice.

There's one thing for certain though...

...that was a future I saw.

One with Marc in it, a man I don't know, and another who was about a year older than me.

Who is she referring to that I can only choose one and even if I do, I'll lose these visions?

This is a future...

...one where fate was not tampered with.

Who's missing?

💫--To Be Continued--💫

Who's missing that Selene is hinting? Guess right and I'll have a list of names at the end of the reveal chapter for everyone who was correct for a shoutout. Think like Cormac and Acacia...

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