Written: 6/25/24
Word Count: 2,069

I'm doing everything I can to try and fix it, but knowing me, I'll probably miss it.

"The most fulfilling thing to happen to us elvas," Gardenia Rose said, inhaling a devastating drag of her willow pipe, faulty smoke regulators blowing that trifling miasma straight up my nostrils and covering my eyeballs with a suffocating cloak, "...is to bear elvants and raise them to elfhood."

Using the white linen napkin placed artfully on the table of one of the Capital's most refreshing cafes, my mental log recognized the scent from the night before. It belonged, of course, to this High Elf who had spoken quite proudly about her dexterity in bending her legs nearly behind her head, only for the moment to come, and she spit up a mixture of the dark wine and edamame seeds we'd consumed at the palace's grand gala. The combination had slid down her stomach, the deepest and most tranquil shade of ebony I'd bedded. All for naught, for even my lust-addled brain couldn't quite retain that beautiful feeling of throbbing, expectant wetness upon the idea of my tongue touching a puke-slimed stomach.

What had started as a silky, drunken promise to participate in a vigorous bout of acrobatic frottage had ended instead with my hand holding that accursed willow vine as said Limber Expert patted herself dry with, of all things, the hotel's pearly white drapes.

A shame.

Rather than a vast library operated by command words, my sensory catalog worked more like an open book, pages splayed on a never-ending slide. As the smell of the willow pipe curdled what was left of my poor, acid-riddled stomach, I allowed the pages to flutter away, effectively sealing my nose from recounting such memories so I could focus on the now, where the self-proclaimed acrobat waved her poison stick through the air, ruining the elegant and calm atmosphere of the cafe.

Pushing away the burned crisps of some overly-buttered breakfast fritter, I tried to focus on the words coming from Lady Gardenia's mouth, a hard task as her lips' pouty purple left lipstick smudges all down the end of the willow stick hanging from between her equally-smudged teeth.

"Yes, I'm sure," I said, nodding for good measure. The page in my catalog book after "willow smoke" was "will-o' wisp," but that wasn't right. "Will-o'" should proceed "willow," but wait, why had that page been put in the "Smells and Scents" section?

What did will-o' wisps smell like?

A brief nod toward the symbolic page was all that was necessary to unleash the impression the memory first gave me. Immediately, a horribly gut-wrenching sensation like downing a ream of grilled serrano peppers and balsamic vinegar flattened me to the table. I groaned, clutching my stomach, wishing for a bucket of ice to filter down my esophagus and end this misery.

"Holy Goddess," Gardenia swore, skidding her triple-the-price-you-thought-you-overestimated chair halfway across the immaculate birch floorboards. "Is the wine affecting you still? Get a hold of yourself, Lady Rosetta."

That sensation most definitely did not belong to "Smells and Scents." And I know for a fact I'd never eaten a will-o' wisp, so something was seriously wrong with my organizational system to make my stomach react like that. Did too much elderberry wine addle the brain so much that I prematurely descended into the stages of the elverly?

A new thought jarred my spine into sitting up straight, scooting the hard-backed chair roughly against the floor. No doubt the ferocity created scrapes against the sturdy wood. Lady Gardenia flinched, then took an especially long drag as if to make up for the precious wasted microsecond where she was not actively poisoning herself.

Was this jarring experience similar to what those capsules were wreaking on Becky's system? The latest brain divinations they'd taken of my niece several weeks ago showed dangerously high levels of anger-inducing hormones, as well as a severe lack of ones that categorized happiness. Further divinations taken on Becky's eyes showed a distinct lack of response to basic categorical stimuli obtained within the first week of catalog-and-shift teaching. She'd had no recognition of the blue swallow, nor of the purring cat.

Not only were her hormone levels severely unbalanced, but her sensory controls had numbed to near nonexistence.

Every elvancy teacher must instill the same ten sensations within each tot, for those were the ones tested during divinations. A baseline, guiding further medicinal care if any problems surfaced.

What had Valencia Primadin and Risette Arborshire taught my niece that she couldn't recognize any of the ten baseline sensations? Didn't my idiot brother know how dangerous it was to favor a cultivation style that alienated his daughter from being understood by those with the licensing to help her!?

"Are you hearing me?" Lady Gardenia snapped her fingers, while lunching High Elves stared at the incident before them like we were paid actors employed to make their food taste better. "Are you blocking me out?"

At last, the unsettled, spicy waves sloshing in my stomach eased, and I was left with the normal feeling of a hangover's queasiness. I sat up, my shoulders pulling down on the tablecloth until it spilled to my side like a pixie's bathrobe. Rectangular ceramic plates clinked and then shattered against the floor. My burnt fritter splattered on the cedar in a mess of tomato sauce and black crumbles. "I'm thinking," I told her.

"What...did you just say?" If purplish rage could spread from lipstick and rise to heat one's face, then Lady Gardenia's cosmetician should surely earn a prize. "Can't you tell I'm breaking up with you?!"

"Oh," I said, trying to push the tablecloth back to the center. Instead, I succeeded in knocking the flower vase off from the center, spilling delicate coreopsis petals to the ground. With a crash and a shatter, pretty blue-glass shards scattered every which way. "Alright, then."

Lady Gardenia sucked in a fuming breath only to choke on the poison she bandied about. As her coughing worsened, one would think she'd finally let go of that horrid, odiferous vine.

One would be wrong.

"You—you don't even care about me at all! How can you be so heartless?"

I joined the server, both of us quickly pulling blue glass and roasted vegetables off the ground with our bare hands. At one instant, our hands touched, and I instinctively looked up into a pair of blue irises. A curvy Ice Elf with an extra dimple near her chin. Her eyes sparkled, and she winked where Lady Gardenia couldn't see, yet the professional lines never smudged from her profile. Not even a twitch of the mouth betrayed her real feelings.

Somehow, I'd found myself in the middle of a public breakup with an elva I'd never been in a relationship with while a different elva batted her lashes at me.

Goddess.

Elvas were the best. If only they had dicks for those nights when I needed the friction against my sensitive inner walls. That throbbing heat couldn't be matched by any toy, though those were fun every once in a while. But when I needed to feel another living folk, I needed an elve inside of me, his pulsing, lively little pet happy to please. Blooming larger with each bit of praise.

"All this time, and you didn't care for me at all! You really are an elvara! A predatory, reprehensible elvara!" Lady Gardenia began shrieking, so I forced my thoughts away from Ice Elves with pretty blue eyes and throbbing penuses playing puppies.

I wiped my hands against my pants, flicks of food and moisture staining the linen.

"You're getting married, then?" I shot Lady Gardenia a cursory glance as I shifted a knee to the ground. My hands twitched as I decided on the best way to wrangle the dethroned tablecloth back to its reigning peak. "Congratulations." I grabbed hold of the willowing cloth, flower petals tumbling free amidst a cacophony of knives and forks clattering against the hardwood. The Ice Elf helped me dash the linen back onto its table, though I knew the table and the cloth would both be rigorously cleaned once I left.

A note passed to my hand, no doubt a calling card. I stuffed it into my pocket, meeting the elva's blue gaze and the promise of drama-free sex swimming there. Then she spun on her heel and retreated to the edge of the scene, letting us continue our dramatic episode. I was sure she wasn't as high-ranking as either of us, and that was why she let this foolishness continue.

But I didn't see her running for her manager, so it couldn't be more obvious that this Ice Elf enjoyed witnessing the humiliation.

Her calling card was wasted on me.

Lady Gardenia sucked in a breath—this one, not poisoned with toxic fumes. She pursed her pouty purple lips at me, an endearing sight. The third daughter of the 9th Ring's Head was a stunning beauty—eyes that created their own shadows underneath all those lashes, cheeks so sharp they looked like art, small, thick eyebrows that looked like mere commas, a unique trait in High Elf fashion. This was the elva who had shared many trysts with me, the one who held an elusivity that alighted my most basic instincts of hunt, catch, enjoy. Perhaps I was an elvara, no better than a hunting predator.

"You really don't care for me at all?" she asked, a morose drooping pulling down those thick eyelashes. Ah, the proud and noble Lady Gardenia had been wounded. Not her heart—her pride.

I stood up. Eyes that showed no shame of looking and ones that didn't bother to hide their gleeful delight buffeted me on all sides. These gazes were far more dangerous than my dragons.' A dragon could only know rage so long as they were threatened. In the Capital, there was no rage, but all were threatened.

"Are you well?" I asked, straightening out my cuffs. I hated these restricting clothes. Far better to be home, far better to be alone, where I decided who came to see me. I decided who could look at me, touch me, please me. If I wanted no companions, the Dark Elves thought it just as well. It wasn't an easy alliance by any means, but they tried. Put in effort. So long as that remained true, the alliance would hold.

I couldn't relocate the clinic again. It...wasn't feasible.

"Am I well?" Lady Gardenia's pout turned honest for a flashing second. She showed it in the stilling of her breath, the twitch across her brow, before remembering to smooth it all back into place. An unruffled visage, as clear cut as a decorated vase. "Is that really how far your concern spreads? To see I am well?"

Nodding to the Ice Elf who stood off to the side as the intrusive third party to a scene that had nothing to do with her, I crossed the table. Bending at the waist, I gently pried Lady Gardenia's fist out, giving it a trail of kisses. It was regrettable that we weren't able to have one last night together. I would miss the way her pitch-dark skin looked against mine. In contrast, my freckled, reddened mess looked smooth as pearl when paired up with hers. Side-by-side, Gardenia had made me feel...beautiful. Not elvish, not plain, not rough and uncouth, but one who glowed under the moonlight. One whose reddish hue could be followed in a trail of soft kisses as a beacon for more and yes, please, and not to be confused for a skin condition.

We were never built to last, but I would miss it, nonetheless.

"I wish you happiness, Gardenia," I said and meant it. She was a fun partner, an excellent cook, and a rambunctious conversationalist. "Let us greet one another as friends if we meet in the future."

A hush had fallen across the cafe when no blood was drawn for a more entertaining end to the drama, but I didn't bother looking at any of my vindictive spectators as I walked past them.

"You care more for dragons than us folk, Rosetta." Gardenia Rose's voice followed me.

I smiled, pushing through the pastel-painted doors. With my last Capital lover off to start the next exciting era of her life, I decided then. I would not be coming back to this poisonous place.