Harmony

I open my eyes after what seemed to be from my deep slumber.

Turning around, I reach for my phone by the table only to realise that days has passed since. My body was indeed not strong enough to house this gift. Grunting at my fatigued self, I get up, throwing my phone back on the bed.

Finally slipping out of my outfit from that night, I head for a cold shower, reeling into the freshness it filled me with, rather than the tiredness it took away from me.

When I had spent enough time refreshing my blank thoughts, I step out and carry myself in my usual clothing, a pair of dark jeans and an equally dark vest. Taking my belonging, which was just my purse and my phone, I lock the doors of my so-called hideout, hidden within the coast, in between all the others.

I put my dark shades on to conceal the rusty copper in my eyes which glimmered golden in the daylight and head for a café further ahead, across the street. A perfect camouflage I would say, but others might disagree, but who was to remember anything they saw anyways.

I enter the wide-open door of the café, almost tasting the delicious smell of the coffee at this close proximity. Ordering a large cup of latte and a sandwich to go, I wait for them to prepare it. "Elisa." The name I had used for myself comes up and I walk forward to the girl who held a sweet smile along with my food.

"Thank you."

Avoiding her touch, I grab the top half of the cup, away from her hand but end up brushing against the tips of her fingers. "Have a nice day." She looks at me with her innocent eyes and I force a smile out as I nod my head.

Just why?

In a hurry to get out, I bump into, yet another man and it repeats again. "You okay?"

But I continue walking without looking back, not forgetting to erase me as I whisper a word of apology. "Sorry."

Clutching tightly onto the cup and my now scrunched bag of sandwich, I hurriedly make my way towards my parked car and speed out onto the road, wanting to get away, run far from living. Why now?

Following the paths of the ocean, I drive along its curves. The gentle breeze from the ocean plagues in through the wide gap of the window and tosses the thick locks of my brown hair across my face, away from my face. But with my mind and my body disagreeing with every turn I take; I just couldn't go any further.

Screeching to the side, I drive into the narrow road, empty and abandoned, leading me directly into the face of the ocean itself. Slamming the door shut, I get off the car and throw my shades into the fluffy white sand and bashfully hit the hood. Although the feelings confused me, I knew better than to transfer them to the only means of transport I had for miles ahead.

This place was as deserted as I was.

"Why?" I shout out to the ocean. The only one that ever knew my existence. The only one that ever heard my voice, carried it in its waves but dismissed it with a voice of its own.

"I just want to leave." I whisper as the feelings subsides. "I was ready to leave once and for all. So, why is he calling for me now? Why does he need my help? Doesn't he already have enough?"

I cover my face with the palm of my hands as I lean on the side of the car. "Just why?"

Taking deep inhales of the soft breeze, I drop my hands and let them fall on my side. I watch the white clouds, dancing along the blue sky, to a beat only it heard of, travelling to a country, even it didn't know of. I close my eyes and bite my lips, averting its hypnotic scheme from inflicting me and taking me along with it.

Pulling my head back down to the vast blue ocean, I let out a sigh as I open my eyes.

Home.

Far, far away. A land surrounded by the same blueness, a land that once filled with laughter, whispers of playfulness in the air, a sweet voice telling me not to stay out for long. I danced along its rift, jumped onto its puddles after every rainfall, I rejoiced every day as it unfolded itself to me. Each hour, each minute, each breath, a moment of happiness.

I was content with just living.

Then there came a day when I stopped feeling happy, when the seconds bought me torture. When the same sweet voice inviting me home, fed me venoms. I could not speak. I could not tell anyone of the poisons that I was consuming.

For my own parents had fed them to me.

"The crown belongs to you." They said. "Seize it." They whispered.

But my little heart just wanted to be filled with happiness, a repeat of the past days, days filled with soulful laughter, laughter that filled the land. I was content in all that I had. For I had everything.

Then there came a day when I felt nothing at all.

My little heart overfilled with so many conspiracies, greed and lust within them couldn't take it anymore. And I forsake the place that I loved so much, the people I cherished more than the desire for power. I left the life itself as I left the purpose of my existence.

Eventually, I was left with nothing at all. No parents to whisper me back home or feed me with their greed. No tears brimming my eyes nor any pain in my heart. No joy to celebrate the end of my misery filled eternity with them gone and no weight lifted off my heavy soul.

Even they got to leave this world, so why not me? I had asked myself a millionth time. But there was no one to hear my stories let alone give me an answer.

If only I had erased their memories before it got to that point. Maybe I could have saved them. If only I could erase my own memories. If only I didn't remember any of it. Maybe I could have saved me too.

Then none of this would happen, right?

I bring my palms higher. I couldn't save them but was it really too late to save myself? If I will it, if I go deep down and cut off all the memories from centuries, would I be able to forget? Like all the memories I erased from others, would I be able to do the same with my own?

Guilt was such a strong feeling. It even makes the bravest of all cower back in shame. And I was a scared little coward.

Bringing my palms inches away from my face, I close my eyes once again. Forget it all, I tell myself. Your past, your present, your future, your everything. Erase this guilt, this-

But time won't let me.

A golden hue shines through my closed lids even with the sun high up in the sky, and I sense two completely different beings before me. Pausing my ongoing process of self-pitying, an attempt to erase myself, I inhale lungful of breath. But what was meant to calm me only causes me more distress.

I smell the familiar scent weaving its way into my lungs, more distinct and stronger than the breeze of the ocean. It hugs the air around me like it did that night, sending this warmth to my soul but a panic to my thumping heart.

Just who was he?

As something in me begs me to have a peek, I let go of my hands and finally open my eyes.

And there he stands. Few feet away from me with eyes so brown, so rich and so warm, it calms my heart just like that. His brown hair shines brightly, sometimes reflecting a light blond and other times a deep red. That broad shoulder from nights ago stands firm and strong, shoulder that called out to me, as if inviting me back home.

I inhale silently, secretly loving the scent of home radiating off him. He reminds me of a place, warm and cosy, brimmed with happiness, something silver, something radiant.

But I knew better than to believe the lies of my eyes, for my home was long gone, long lost, forgotten, broken. It had fallen down, fallen apart. Home was no more for Harmony as was the world.

I look down at the golden sand and blink several times, yelling myself to come out of my head. And when I eventually do look up, he still has his soft brown eyes on me, looking at me the same way I did a few seconds ago. Not knowing the feelings that he may have felt too. Or was it just me?

But I knew what he was. Like me, he was a true Lycan.

And they always wanted one thing. To bring me back to that place, thinking I was the same girl from back then. Not knowing how much I had changed. The world had changed me. I could never be that naïve little girl who knew no evils in the world, who smiled freely, who knew nothing more than love and laughter.

"You've come to take me back too?" I fold my arms across, leaning more to the car as I look at him. But he stands frozen still, unable to come through of whatever hypnotism he was in.

"Are you Harmony?" The boy comes from behind to stand beside him.

"Oh my, and who do we have here? And here I thought you already knew me." I smile at him.

"Alpha Aries was right. You do love the ocean." He beams brightly nodding to himself. "Who thought we would really find you here?" My smile falters a little, but I stand taller, straighter, not losing my composure. "Alpha, huh?"

"Did you happen to hear any news recently that he is looking for you?"

"And what if I have?"

His mouth opens and closes before he sucks in a breath. "What are you waiting for then? Let's go. We don't have much time."

He steps towards me, but I turn around and open my car door, ready to leave. "What proof do you have that you are really with Aries?"

"I am-"

"And how do I know that you are not luring me into a trap?" I turn my head a little to the side, eyeing him with a sweet smile on my face, mocking him as he stands stunned at my words.

"I'll be taking my leave then." Turning back around, I exhale quietly while shutting my eyes, preparing to leave them be even though I knew they were indeed with Aries.

"You can have a look into my memories then."

The soft honey like voice glides into my mind and makes me breathless. My heart thumps quietly, my eyes still shut, I bite the bottom half of my lip to stop the shiver from bolting throughout my body, making myself look weak.

"You have the gift to do so right?"

Inhaling the air of his sweet melody, I fist my hands tight. Something was happening to me, but I just didn't know what. Trying my best to contain the turmoil in my stomach, I open my eyes and pull my lips to either side.

With a smile, I meet those soft brown eyes that looks back with a puzzle of its own, yet to be solved. "Then you do know what I might also do."

"You can't-"

"Go ahead."

The boy tries to stop him, but he doesn't falter as he glides towards me, his long strides seemingly fast but everything around me slows. I blink my eyes as the wind lightly blows a few strands of my hair across my face, trying its best to conceal the being as if leaving me in his presence for too long might make me insane.

As if I might take him into the custody of my arms and bury him forever in the depths of my embrace so no one could have a peek at this regal creature. As if I would circle him, cloak his entire existence from the sun, the moon and even the air itself.

He stands a few steps before me and I stare at him mesmerised. My eyes follow the movement of his arm, reaching forward, towards me, for me. "Go ahead." He holds his outstretched hand for me to do whatever I please and I look back up at his eyes, doubtful of his intention.

"Are you not scared of what I might do to you?" I search his eyes for a tint of hesitation, a selfish intent in his harmless action but I find none. I see the storm in his eyes as he looks into mine, fearless and bright, his skin silky smooth shaming the softest feather.

"No."

I shake my head at him and laugh a little.

He was foolish, stupid. He was crazy. He knew the power that I hold, a curse that I could inflect. And knowing all this, he still stands before me, hand reaching for my deadly touch.

He looks at me with his brows now wanting to meet one another, a curiousness to his brown orbs. I take a step closer, my face void of any emotions. I look into his eyes as I reach for his hand. But the moment the tips of my finger brushes against the palm of his hand, I withdraw my hands with a soft gasp, just as quickly as he does his.

For his touch burned me.

And for the first time, I see nothing at all, but I feel everything. My heart thumps harder and louder than ever before, in a complete sync with the drumming of his own. He looks at me with eyes and lips equally wide as I do him, holding my scorched hand with my other, I pull it to my chest.

"Alex." The boy comes to him and pulls him back.

But that name alone just sparks my mind restless. There was something to that name. Although my soul comes forth and pricks my heart to understand, my mind was just an empty cassette right now. It was not capable of such memories.

I did not understand the things that was happening around me, to me. But I knew one thing for sure. This stranger, this unfamiliarly familiar Lycan that stands before me somehow holds all the answers to my centuries of loneliness. I exhale softly and look down at my spread-out fingers.

No sign of the burnt marks.

And I look further beneath, at the shiny surface as I bring my hands down. I close my eyes, controlling my breathing, calming my heart to once again be numb. I try to form words but even it betrays me now. The only thing that I could always rely on.

But I had nothing now. Not even my voice.

"What did you do?"

I flutter my eyes open to his accusing grey eyes, a hint of anger to them, but nothing more, nothing else. I smile at his innocent accusation and exhale loudly, forcing my tense body to look relaxed.

"Nothing, I promise." Holding my hands in the air, I try to ease his anger and he immediately relaxes. Innocent indeed. The boy knows no hate. He reminds me of myself long before time.

I walk back to my car, with its door wide open and take a seat. My legs weak to my knees, tiredness had finally taken a toll to this body. I don't think I can remain standing for long.

"Anyways, what is Aries doing with a half-wolf and a Lycan?" I try to think of something else other than the pair of brown eyes trying to dig a hole on me.

"I am Cleo from Alpha Aries' pack, the Blue Blood. Alex here is with Luna."

"So, what do you want?" Folding my arms across, I look at them, one at a time.

And with a big smile on his face, the boy steps forward as he remains frozen on his feet. "Alpha Aries asked us to tell you something about Raven." And I immediately become alert. I was hearing more of her in the past days than my long decades.

"He said something about her needing you to return home, and also that she knows and remembers everything." When the crease between my brows makes it obvious for him that I had no idea what he was talking about, he sighs out loud. "Well, Alpha Aries told us, you will know what it meant, that you'll understand."

He shrugs his shoulders and looks down at his feet as I exhale and lean back, gazing at the slow movement of the white fluffs in the sky.

Why does she need me to return? Know? Remember-

I see a glimpse of the happy little table back in the whites of Greece, crowded with Lycans, air packed with laughter. But that can't be true. I erased their memories of the times they spent with me. I manipulated the reasons for their laughter. There was no way she could-

"There is a war." He finally speaks but his words carry a heaviness of the unseen burden in my heart.

"A war." I repeat his word. My heart now still like it was before, numb to feelings.

"A war does not concern me."

"Our kingdom is in the brink of extinction." I can hear the strain in his voice as he inches closer, trying to implement the importance of the word that I was apathetic to.

I look at the hardness in his eyes that slowly clouds the softness in those brown, but I look with the lifeless eyes of mine. "A war does not concern me." I repeat myself, my voice as empty as my eyes.

I get up abruptly, ready to leave. There was nothing they could say anymore that will hold me back. I will leave them untouched as an answer to the rest. Harmony did not belong amongst them.

"She needs you to return home."

Sizzling fire burns my skin as his fingers wraps itself tightly around my wrists and pulls me around, to fall into his solid body, knocking my breath away and my heart pounding. But I feel no pain, none at all.

It only makes me want to burn in those sweet flames as I stare deep into his eyes. The tall bridge of his nose sits beautifully in the centre of his handsome face, with equally crafted eyes and lips, alluring me into his world. "She needs you."

Blinking my eyes as his breath fans my face, I fall into the myriad of images he impetus in me. I see my world through his mind. My world that I had once abandoned along with my existence.

I see the land once again blooming beautifully. I hear the land laugh along with the soft waves of the ocean. I once again feel my home crowded with cheerful cries in the air. I see my heaven.

"She needs you."

Then I see the faces I once knew as my own. That once upon a time poured me only with affection and embraced me in their body, sheltering me from the sullied eyes of the world beyond. Keeping me untouched, pure.

But who knew that the stain in the world was hiding in-between the corners of my own eyes? Who knew that the hands that held me up when I fall, will one day hold them in the burning flames?

"Althea needs you."

Then I see her.

The little goddess whom I once met.

Like me she exists. She lives. Surrounded by the meaningless laughter of the world, she smiles along with them like I once did.

She breaths, very much alive. But there was no light of life in them.

Then I see her again.

But was it really her?

Her face unlike the last image or when I saw her that night, flames in ethereal happiness yet the fire of dominance burns brightly in her now unique set of eyes. She now smiles with her soul.

And when I was finally able to tear my eyes off the little goddess, I look up at the man behind her, wrapping his strong arms tightly around her. And I see him too. The man that always held the ocean of his broken heart in his eyes.

He stands with her as a man I never knew him to be.

He smiles as he looks down at her, the once harsh lines that marked the weariness of his years, now gone. He looks down at her with love so pure, with love so-

Then I remember the night.

I had once again been the cause of their suffering. Unknowingly so, I had almost separated them. I feel the lines of hot fluid dampening the surface of my skin as guilt once again adds to the already heavy weight in my heart.

...When you find her, tell her that Raven needs her to return home, tell her Raven knows everything, that Raven remembers...

And I hear her desperate voice.

Amara Raven Silvermoon.

I feel a warm hand, gently swiping across my dampened cheek and I blink my eyes causing more tears to fall.

I was crying. But why was I crying?

I felt sadness. But why did I feel sad? And in it I felt a relief, a remorse, but of all, resentment for this wretched life.

And here I thought I had lost the feelings of the world a long time ago. But here I stand before him, in his arm as I pour these feelings out to a man whom my soul desperately yearned for, whose touch scorched me alive.