The Virgin and the Fae

Quick author's note to start off--for those who don't know the myth of Persephone: Hades, god of the Underworld, falls in love with the young goddess Persephone and kidnaps her to be his queen. Her mother, the goddess Demeter, is able to get Zeus to force Hades to release Persephone but before she leaves the Underworld, Hades tricks her into eating six pomegranate seeds. Since she had eaten the food of the dead, Persephone must live out six months in the Underworld as Hades' queen and the other six months she is able to return to her mother, Aboveground.

And on with the story.....


The two Fae found Charlotte lying on the floor of her bedroom.

Indeed Locke found the whole sight rather shocking as he took it in. She was wearing a knee-length white nightgown with the most bizarre tan boots on her feet. Really they were atrocious, he thought. Flat soled and made out of some animal skin, they covered just past her ankles with hints of wool peaking out around the openings. The heels were stamped with the word “Ugg.” Locke couldn’t help but snort softly. That seemed like a word an elf would say.

In addition to her already undignified outfit, she had tied her hair back in some kind of strange, wispy knot with what appeared to be several writing implements stuck through the center.

She lay on her stomach, a pillow beneath her chest and her ankles crossed in the air. The expanse of skin that this position exposed was…Locke looked away in a sign of respect for Garrick. Her entire lower legs were bare and he even believed that he could make out the lower backs of her thighs.

Curiosity won out over respect, however. What was she doing?

A thick hard-covered book lay out in front of her with abnormally glossy pages as well as loose sheets of white paper, lined in blue and covered with numbers and symbols. She turned a glossy page excitedly and Locke thought he caught a glimpse of a graph of some kind.

He looked over at Garrick, wondering if he too was shocked by the human, but found only an oddly tender look on the Fae’s face.

“You said you wanted to clean up for lunch. It seems you readied yourself for bed instead,” Garrick said.

Charlotte looked up from her book with a smile.

“I make it a general rule to avoid ever wearing anything that involves a corset.”

Locke saw the evidence of her statement—her dress and underclothes from that morning—lying crumbled, thrown haphazardly on the bed.

“If you give me real, modern clothes, then I’ll save the nightgowns for nighttime,” she continued.

“Your clothes from the visit North?”

“Gone. I looked for them when I came back. The woman who dressed me this morning probably took them with her.” Charlotte thought of the elderly elf and how she had looked with such disgust on the jeans and t-shirt. She would, no doubt, have greatly enjoyed burning the garments.

Charlotte pushed herself up into a standing position.

It wasn’t such a reveling outfit after all, Locke admitted. The nightgown was thick and long sleeved. Really, though it reveled her knees and shins, it was such an ugly, ill-fitting outfit that the show of skin was sterilized.

“You would be much more attractive if you simply wore the clothes that were provided to you,” Garrick said in a tone somewhere between seriousness and levity.

“How about this? I promise to obstinately refuse to change my clothes no matter what you say, so you may as well transpose me down to lunch now.”

Locke stared at Charlotte. Her good humor was infectious, though where it had come from he wasn’t entirely sure.

Garrick took her hand, nodded at Locke and within a moment they stood in a smaller, brighter dining room.

Here there was only a small round table; big enough for four, maybe five, place settings.

Charlotte looked around, the walls and the ceiling seemed covered with rosy-cheeked nymphs either locked in torrid embraces or fleeing them. Was it appropriate to call them nymphs, she thought all of sudden. Or was that a non-technical term?

Yes, it did seem appropriate enough, Charlotte decided on closer inspection of a few of the tableaus. These seemed to present various Greek myths. There was Pandora, cracking the lid of her accursed box. And there was Daphne fleeing Apollo, her body already turning into the laurel tree as she fled. And there was poor Io, trapped in the form of a beautiful white cow, her eyes filled with sorrow.

“Charlotte, are you not hungry?” Garrick’s voice filtered through her cataloging of the myths, remembering some from Ovid, others from her childhood.

“No, I am. Sorry, I was…distracted.”

Charlotte moved and sat in the chair between the two Fae, starting on the egg dish that had been portioned out on to her plate. She speared a slice of potato with her fork, chewing delicately on the warm cube.

They ate in silence for some time, with Charlotte finishing several servings of the frittata as well as much of the loaf of bread that had been set out.

“Is this why you refuse to wear a corset then? Because they won’t let you eat as much?” Locke asked once she seemed to be slowing down.

“I thought just last night I couldn’t eat enough for your taste,” Charlotte responded before taking another bite of bread.

Garrick smiled quietly to himself, watching the delicate motions of her hands as she tore piece after piece of bread to place in her mouth.

“Well, I did not say I wanted to watch your gorge yourself. Perhaps a corset could teach you some restraint.”

“Perhaps not watching me eat would solve the problem as well. And without my organs being shifted. I think it would be an all-around win.”

Locke looked sick for a second.

“Your organs?”

“You didn’t know?” Charlotte feigned innocence. “That’s what happens if you wear a corset for too long. Your internal organs are pushed higher up so your waist can be thinner. Kidneys, pancreas, spleen…they can’t simply go away but there is no room for them anymore but up.” Charlotte made sure to hit the “p” particularly hard, popping her lips together. When Locke gave an odd, half-stifled shudder, Charlotte ducked her head to smile.

“I will ensure that you have clothes that do not put you at such a risk by tomorrow,” Garrick said, ending Charlotte’s play with Locke. “What were you doing when we found you?” He asked, trying to feign disinterest.

“Oh!” Real pleasure flooded over Charlotte’s face again, sweeping away the soft amusement from the moment before.

“I was on the walk back to my room and I was just thinking about…I don’t know…just letting my mind wander, and I remembered that the proof that I’d been working on that night that—“ here she stopped, unsure both how to put what must come next and how she felt about it. “—the night that you took me. And I realized that the reason I hadn’t understood the proof was that I hadn’t taken into account that I needed to take the continuous partial derivative of the open region rather than the total derivative, which looking back was quite silly of me because obviously this is a derivational geometry problem so the only way it could work would be as a partial. I really should have known better…” She trailed off for a moment, in yet another round of mental chastisement, before continuing again, gaining in speed and excitement as she spoke. “Anyways, I was working through the proof when you came. I didn’t finish but taking the partial already got me much farther than the first time around and I think that the rest should fall into place, which is a good thing too since the midterm is really only—“

Charlotte didn’t finish her sentence; a flash of realization reminded her of her situation. There would be no midterm. Her fingers drifted up over her open mouth and she stared thoughtfully ahead, not sorrowful, rather pensive.

“And I thought I was silly for not realizing to take the partial…”

Charlotte suddenly felt an urge to break something, to pick up the glasses on the table and smash them against the wall, one after the other. But instead she stood up, walking about the room.

“It’s a bit ironic, isn’t it? That we are eating in a room of kidnapped women.” She raised her arm, naming each of the beautiful women as she pointed. “Europa, Psyche, Ariadne, Helen, Persephone—“

Charlotte paled immediately, the blood draining out of her face.

“Oh my God—“ What if…oh God…

Garrick nodded at Locke, silently dismissing him. And then Locke was gone.

“You would be no freer if you hadn’t eaten, merely more hungry.”

“No pomegranate seeds to hold me captive?”

“I am strong enough on my own to keep you here.”

“I don’t know why that should make me feel better, but it does. Somehow knowing that I didn’t curse myself…somehow that helps.”

“You don’t have to consider your presence here a curse.”

“Oh? And why is that?”

“You’ll be taken care of here. I can give you everything that you ever wanted. I can give you all the knowledge of the worlds; show you things you never dreamed existed. I can make every day more perfect than the last—“

“At what price?” Charlotte asked. “Is there where I have to pay with my soul?”

Garrick’s face hardened. “Just your body. I’ve no use for your soul.”

“If I do that, if I gave you my body, would you let me return home when you’d had your fill?”

“Yes,” Garrick agreed, pausing before adding, “But I’ll never tire of you.”

Charlotte looked towards the painting of Persephone’s capture, the girl’s long golden hair streaming behind her as the Lord of Death carried her down to the Underworld; her mouth open in a silent cry for her mother, pleading for Demeter’s help.

“Even Hades gave Persephone half of the year to be free.”

“I’m not as liberal as Death, it seems.”

She stared into the eyes of the captured goddess, realizing she recognized something of herself in them. There was that same confusion, same fear of what was to come mixed with hope for escape mixed with something entirely different that she could not quite name.

“I don’t understand any of this,” Charlotte said at last, turning towards him. “Please, help me understand why--”

Within an instant Charlotte felt herself pushed harshly back against the wall, her feet lifted off the ground. The suddenness of it pushed the breath from her, leaving her body in a whoosh. And then his lips were on hers, harsh and unforgiving kisses that shook her. She cleaved to him, her neck craning to get closer to his warmth, her arms struggling against the hand that held her wrists together above her head. She wanted desperately to touch him, to run her fingers along his face, his back.

It was like her body was on fire, but she only wanted more heat. His heat. Her legs drew themselves further up and curled around his waist, resting on the smooth hardness of his hips.

And then it was too much.

First it had been as if she were drowning in his kisses and now it truly was just that. Charlotte was realizing too late that she couldn’t breathe. She tried to scream against his mouth, but that only drove what little oxygen she had out faster. She began flailing harder, her legs struggling uselessly to kick. He kissed her faster, harder, seeming to think that this was merely her responding further to him. Dots began to dance in her vision, dark spots swarming over her eyes like black flies.

She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t breathe.

Do something! Her mind screamed as she struggled against him.

With that, Charlotte unceremoniously bit down hard on Garrick’s lip.

He recoiled, letting her crumble to the floor; her nightgown bunched up around her hips.

Charlotte rolled to her side, gasping in air in gulps.

“We really can’t get this right, can we?” She asked after a moment, thinking of their last kiss, her voice still somewhat breathless.

“No,” he responded, sinking to his knees beside her. “I forgot. I’m sorry.”

“You forgot that I need to breathe?” Somehow that thought was terrifying. “You don’t have to breathe?”

He shook his head.

Charlotte crawled towards him, her hand reaching out and then stopping, almost at his cheek.

“How do you work?” She asked. “How are you alive?”

An image flashed in her mind, one of cold steel and alcohol. Garrick lay on a corner’s table, the Y-shaped incision baring his insides. And there Charlotte stood, just a step too far away to see what lay within. What would she find if she looked? Would it be like dissecting a frog or a bird with the various systems similar but not the same as her own or would it be something entirely different and unknown. Did Garrick have heart? She wondered, and though she only meant the question anatomically speaking, the appropriate ambiguity of the phrase did not escape her notice.

He stood, brushing off the question.

She stared up at him softly, confusion etched across her face.

“I don’t understand…“ she trailed off.

“I thought I made it quite clear just now—“

“Not your intentions. I don’t understand my own. I should want to go back to my world. But I don’t. Or at least I don’t know if I want to go back there. Does that mean
something is wrong with me?”

She looked up almost pleadingly.

“I don’t know why it should be that I…like this world. It’s all new and exciting and confusing but I feel alive here. Not like I am just waiting to die. I feel alive here. I don’t think about remission here. I don’t feel like a statistic here. I don’t have to hide myself away here. Why should it be that captive, I feel liberated?”

Garrick looked down at Charlotte, his expression unreadable.

She was so beautiful, he marveled. Like one of the nymphs on the wall, only better, more real. She had blue ink smudges on her right hand and the knot holding up her hair had slipped to one side and tendrils spilled out freely. It appeared that one of the pencils that had aided in its construction was missing, though where it had gone he couldn’t say. She had pulled her nightgown down so it covered the fronts of her thighs, but, as if it were transparent, he could still see the curves of her legs as they were, through the opaque fabric, as if they’d been burned onto his mind.

“I can’t give you an answer, Charlotte.”

“I guess I didn’t really expect that you could.”

She rose to her feet, oddly somewhere between sorrow and elation and yet somehow displaying both.

They merely stood there, looking at one another, both unsure of what should be said.

She stared back at the frightened Persephone.

“She came to love him, you know,” he said softly.

Charlotte never looked away from the mural, taking in the tension in the struggling girl’s body.

“I think it is far more likely that she simply lost the will to fight back.”

“Isn’t that love?”

Charlotte turned back towards Garrick, rather sadly.

“You really don’t understand this, do you?”

“Emotions are quite foreign to us. Love, tenderness, affection, things that mortals take so lightly are rarities here, if not impossible.”

Charlotte turned back again towards the painting, examining it as though it held hidden clues.

“Why would she ever come to love him? He enslaved her.”

“Maybe she came to desire him. Like you do me.”

Charlotte sighed softly.

“Physical desire has nothing to do with love. Its only lust.”

“But you lust for me.”

Charlotte stiffened, a bit ashamed to admit what was already clear.

“I—I am attracted to you. But that has no regard to how I feel towards you.”

“And how do you feel towards me?” There was a note of tremulousness that Charlotte found odd.

“I wish you would let me go.” Not home, she amended mentally, just back into those woods. Back to that feeling of bliss and back to the unicorn.

It was like watching storm clouds roll in on a clear summer’s day. Darkness descended over his visage, blotting out hope and curiosity with anger.

He moved to strike her and she readied herself for the blow, raising her chin up slightly, too proud to try to escape it.

Their eyes met and Garrick felt an odd sickness descend over him. He wondered passingly if this was what not being able to breathe felt like. Her eyes were so accusatory, daring him to hit her and expecting nothing less. He let his hand fall to his side, suddenly feeling awkward.
She was his. He should be able to use her as he wished and yet he found the idea of hurting her—in anger, anyways—repulsive.

“I…” he trailed off, caught between wanting to apologize and threaten. He did not like this place of in-betweens.

He watched Charlotte turn back to the painting, apparently deciding he was no longer a threat at present.

“She could never have come to love him.”

Somehow he understood that she viewed it as vitally important the she believe this to be the case.

“Never is a very long time for gods who have all eternity.”

“Perhaps, but never is quite short for a mortal who does not.”


A/N:
basilisk6--Thank you so much for such a detailed review! Yes, you are probably right that Charlotte and Garrick will end up together. Well, actually I haven't quite decided yet. But do agree with a lot of the complaints you raise. I am hoping to try and show a development of Garrick's character as this story goes on so that should they end up together it wouldn't seem Stockholm Syndrome-esque. I would like to stress that Charlotte does not love him yet and will not love him for some time. She is attracted to him, but she also wants to return to the forest. In the next chapter especially, we will (hopefully) see just how ambivalent Charlotte is towards Garrick...

Onihime--Thank you so much! I'm really glad that you enjoyed it. Yes, I have all sorts of possible plans for Kaeyln :)

Thanks for reading everyone and please please please rate and review! I am probably 1 or 2 chapters away from the Day of the Fallen and I have some ideas of what form I want that to take but if you have any specific suggestions about that or about the story in general, I'd love to hear them!