XXXVI.V ‖ endless love

  JAXEN JACE EVRARD

LONDON
February
Location: Jaxen's House

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I woke up all wrapped up in her warmth and she snuggled closer, as though we weren't already close enough. A chuckle left me when I tried to pry her limbs away and she grumbled unhappily but remained deep in her sleep. My eyes went straight to her feet. I noticed.

I went ahead to grab the first aid box and applied medication over those incisions. Worry settled in my heart but I remained silent about it. It was only a moment after when she stirred awake and beamed towards me with the brightest smile she could manage. My heart stuttered — this woman had no idea what she held over me.

Then, Iva spent the entire morning playing with Thea and I wasn't quite sure what games they were getting at, but Thea was almost squealing at the top of her voice while being chased around the house. Marianne was laughing at their silliness while preparing lunch for all of us and I simply watched as they went high and low, just fooling around with each other. They were so tired playing with one another that they fell deep in their slumber in the afternoon all cuddled up in each other's warmth.

In the evening, I dropped Iva by Vivienne's place before returning back to my own place. When I closed the door behind me, my heart was pounding hard against my ribs and I nearly wanted to laugh at myself for feeling these ridiculous emotions again. Resting my palm over the left side of my chest, I felt alive — a feeling that I haven't been able to feel for a while.

"Jaxen, are you alright?"

Marianne's voice startled me and I lifted my gaze to meet hers, realising that she had halted in her steps as she looked towards me with worried etched in her face. I smiled, and replied, "Never been this right."

She didn't exactly understand my reply but had known of my bad habit of talking in riddles, she laughed, "I should assume that Iva helped to hang that little smile on your face."

"She definitely did," I breathed out a light laugh and walked into the house. "I'll go check on Thea."

"That little munchkin was asking for you just a moment ago," Marianne nodded while smiling warmly.

Pushing on the handle, I opened the door gently and saw my daughter wiggling under her blanket, as though trying to find a comfortable position to fall asleep in. I asked funnily, "Why are you so restless, ángelé?"

"Daddy!" Thea shrieked excitedly at the sound of my voice and sat up to look at me. Despite the dimness of the room, her honey-brown eyes still sparkled. She swung her hands animatedly and grinned cheekily, "Thea was thinking about Daddy and poof, Daddy appeared."

"Humans don't poof and appear, ángelé," I laughed.

"Daddy does," the five-year-old giggled.

Shaking my head slightly, a wide smile lifted from the corner of my lips and I walked over to carry the child up into my arms. As usual, she rests her head on my shoulder and I patted on her back, I asked, "Should I sing you a song?"

"Thea wants the lullaby," she requested.

"Sure," I chuckled and began humming.

The lyrics to the song came naturally, so did the memories that I held dear in my head. I haven't been the kind to dwell in memories but that woman rendered me helpless and I was never myself with her. She made me into this whole new different person that I never knew I could become and perhaps for a being who was born within shrouded darkness, I never knew I hold onto light that wouldn't burn me. She cradled me in her soft light, making me believe that I deserved more than the shadows I possessed.

The child in my arms soon fell asleep and I gently placed her back on the bed and covered the blanket over her tiny frame. Brushing her the curly tendrils off her face, I kissed her softly on her temple and whispered, "Sleep tight, ángelé."

I went upstairs and walked back into my room. My feet pivoted themselves to the bookcase and my hands were compelled by the urge within me as I took out an old journal of mine. I rested on the recliner chair and read the words penned on the yellowed pages.

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October 1851

Without telling Thales and skipping duties that Hades — that ultimate bitchass — had skipped himself, I roamed to the surface again. It's becoming a habit lately, one that I'm not exactly proud of since the day Aphrodite decided to present me with a ridiculous gift: a lover.

Aphrodite made the knowing circle swore an oath before she carved her divine name on my left arm, above the vein that linked closest to my heart: διαυγής. It irked me because in all the millennia I existed, I was never tied to someone. It felt like a brand, like a nasty reminder that I would be damned from this day forward.

Gods who existed beneath were known to mind their own businesses but that's not the case for those who dwelled above. Those who sat in the marbled, holy throne of Mt. Olympus had a sadistic hobby of adding trouble into everyone's list — as though their own insane, romantic rendezvous were never enough to satiate their dramatic appetite. I owed Aphrodite a favour when I told her to end my engagement with Makaria and she stupidly decided to gift me a lover as my payment.

I was quite confident that a fragile attachment such as love wouldn't quite affect me and all I had to do was to fulfil my side of my deal. Yet, I was proven wrong the moment I visited her on the day that she was born. The striking hazel of her eyes cursed me for the past eighteen years. It was a constant longing and I just had to see her again to keep my sanity in check.

Sadly, I couldn't be saved from the depths I fell. I had fallen even deeper at the end of the day.

November 1851

Just one of the evenings, I watched as she stood under the porch of the theatre for a whole hour, waiting for the thunderstorm to end. Never would she know that this heavy downpour was simply Zeus' angst over the fact that Hera had been finding faults with him again. 

Using her gloved hands to rub over the length of her forearm, she eventually hugged herself in a seemingly futile attempt to warm herself. My feet moved on their own and I was in front of her before I could even lay command over my body.

When she lifted her gaze, the first thing I saw was the gold that danced in between the greens within her irises and marvelled at how lively they seemed. I offered to share my umbrella and walk her to the train station. That night, I learned of her name — Isabel.

How beautiful, was the only thought I held.

December 1851

I wished I knew how to stay away from her and protect her from afar like how I was supposed to. I couldn't keep my hands off her and my heart was the culprit of these desires.

She allowed me to hold onto her hand in the carriage we sat when I dropped her off back at the Hamilton household. The thought of loving her punched all air out of my lungs but my immortality wouldn't allow me to cease to exist so easily.

January 1852

She caught me playing the piano and never stopped pestering me about it. I memorised every piece she liked by heart and it was apparent that Beethovens' pieces were her favourite.

I tried teaching her how to play it but she has never gotten them right. There were three movements to Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata and at the thought of it, it was funny how Isabel never played it past the first movement until I felt the pang in my heart — maybe I had also wanted to wish for time to never move past this moment.

February 1852

Nothing occupied my mind except for the thought that Isabel was ever so lovely. She was so much that my unfeeling heart ached.

May 1852

Tonight, I would confess to my sin: I ravaged the lips of an angel.

February 1854

Isabel didn't understand that the eternity I mentioned was not a mere sixty years of her life but it was beyond my ability to explain to her. Sometimes, I wished she knew but I only wanted her happy, even if I had to do something as trivial as a mortal marriage.

I engraved the words of her vow deep in my heart and admitted defeat to love, unable to fathom the reason that I felt so much for this woman that I softened.

May 1860

Keres told me to end her life prematurely and end my afflicted bond to her. When she lay asleep beside me tonight, I slid the silk robe off her body and traced an apotropaic symbol of death over her chest. The only thing: I couldn't bring myself to kiss that mark and hit a stop to the heart that had been beating for me. Death and nonexistence never seemed so horrifying until this moment.

I'm so afraid of losing her, so terribly afraid. Erasing the cursed mark, I dressed her back and hugged her tighter to me. I wonder if my love had turned obsessive. If all I wanted was her, would that be too much to ask for?

September 1891

Forty years couldn't compare to the number of years I lived but I began to notice the toll time had on her. She grew feeble as any humans would, her weak heart almost failed her and I could only prepare myself for the day when she's beyond resuscitation. The impermanence of human life scared me and it's ludicrous how I couldn't offer her the limitless amount of years I had. I only changed my appearance to suit hers as time grew by, but I wished I could really grow old with her till the time comes and we rest beneath the earth.

The other day when I held her in my embrace as we sat by the window, she began asking me questions like, "Why do you think we met, Jace?"

I could only reply, "We're not really strangers, latreía mou."

January 1892

The fragility of mortality caught up to her. That night, she exhaled her last breath and I kissed her to take back my breath which she held against her lips all along. Unfortunately, I didn't feel any much alive. When she closed her eyes for the very last time, so did my heart thumped its final beat and I struggled so badly to not shake her back to life.

I wish feelings leave when the person does because she's gone and all emotions I felt were displaced. For the first time, I willingly returned to the underside, but only to find myself in a desperate search for her soul within the silvery meads of the asphodel field. Yet, she already lost everything about us to the oblivious waters of River Lethe.

February 1997

The Moirai assigned a fate to her soul and her time in the land of asphodel was up. She waved me goodbye and I promised her, "Don't worry, I'll find you again in your second lifetime."

I hope I could keep that promise because Aphrodite did warn me about the difficulty to seek her out in each of her subsequent lifetimes. But I need to find her. I need to find her before she starts dreamwalking.

Or it'll be too late.

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At the last sentence, I dropped my head down on the headrest and placed my arm over my eyes as I exhaled a sigh. I was a little too late. 

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did i reveal enough for now?