In Her Element

Frederick finally cornered Almyra by her family graveyard, standing in front of Matthew’s still fresh grave. Behind her, a large gazebo that had been erected in Matthew’s memory stood alone against the light grey backdrop of a sky foretelling an oncoming rain. The gazebo itself was adorned with flowers all around—a mix of all kinds but specifically amaryllis, fairy primrose, and some early jasmine (Matthew’s favorite)—courtesy of Almyra’s Powers, which had been growing stronger all this time.

Several weeks had passed since their return and Almyra still refused to talk to Frederick, avoiding him whenever possible, and politely ignoring him when their meeting was inevitable. Now he had her alone and he was not going to leave without getting her to say something.

She was staring down at the tombstone bearing her brother’s name and dates and she slowly dropped one deep red rose after another from the bouquet in her arm. Her black mourning dress moved slightly in the wind and when she reached a hand to her cheek, Frederick knew she was wiping away a tear. Her curls had been pinned up neatly, but loosely, so that several strands had fallen free, brushing her long neck and framing her pale face.

“You can’t keep running, you know. If you keep suppressing your emotions, you may soon explode.”

For a moment he wondered if she had even heard him over the wind because she did not respond until she answered softly, “I already did.”

Frederick let out a breath of relief at the sound of her voice. “No, Almyra, you didn’t. You lost control for barely a minute; you pulled yourself free right away without doing much damage.”

Her chin and voice dipped lower and he leaned forward to hear better. “I tortured two people, nearly killing them, and I enjoyed it so much that I blocked out their screams. How is that not exploding?”

Frederick blinked at the degree of regret in her words. “They deserved it,” he replied icily, a shadow passing over his face for a moment.

“Nobody deserves that.” Her voice hitched and she started to walk away, towards the gazebo. But Frederick was not going to give up now, not when this was the first real conversation he was having with her in about a month, and so he followed her.

“The fact that you can say that even after knowing all that they had done shows that you are not, after all, a bad person,” he shot back at her.

She was slowly climbing up the gazebo’s few steps and, losing patience, Frederick pushed past her and turned to face her, waiting to see how she would respond to that.

Almyra stepped under the roof and rested a hand on one of the thick posts. “A truly good person would not have lost control like that in the first place,” she whispered to her feet.

And ironically, in the end, it was Frederick who was the one to explode. “So that’s it. You are an immoral person because you made a mistake. It is unforgivable and you need to keep away from all human beings, lest you harm them. You need to be in solitude forever.”

He took a deep breath and angrily ran his fingers through his hair, mussing it so that pieces fell lopsidedly in his face. “You are being unreasonably foolish—stupid, even.”

Finally, as he had hoped, Almyra’s head came up, fire flashing in her eyes. “Unreasonably stupid?” she said, dangerously calm. “You have the audacity to call me foolish for being disappointed in what I have done?” She was blinking rapidly, probably trying to keep herself from tearing up or from showing any deep emotions.

“You can be disappointed all you want—even though I don’t know why you would be—but you can’t let yourself be swallowed or drained by your grief. It is selfish; you need to let it all out.” Frederick felt like pulling his hair out. Goddess, she was being so stubborn. How could he get her to realize the good she had done?

“I have every right to be like this, Frederick!” She was yelling at this point; it relieved Frederick tremendously to see her finally showing some emotions. He was about to comment but Almyra was not done.

“I almost killed not one, but two people!”

“And you saved our lives in doing so,” he snapped back at her. “You were doing it in self-defense, not out of spite.”

“But it was spite! I saw myself in that mirror. I saw the look in my eyes—it was vicious and sadistic!”

“But—you—controlled—yourself.” With each syllable, Frederick took a quick stride toward her, backing her up against the pillar. He had had enough.

“You need to grow up, Almyra. Get over it. Get over yourself. You made a mistake, because you cared and because you didn’t want to die, and so all the emotional pain that had built up inside got to you for a moment. But it’s done, and you did not actually kill them. So stop acting like a baby and start being there for others who also lost loved ones to those two vile, pathetic excuses for human beings.”

He paused in his rant to take a deep breath. He stared into the bright greenish eyes that were wide open in shock and wondered if he had gone too far this time. But then, those eyes began to water and he watched for a second as tears rolled down Almyra’s cheeks before she threw herself at him. Frederick was surprised, but he held her tight as she buried her face in his chest. He rested his chin in her hair and reached up with a hand to stroke her curls that had come almost completely undone in the winds. They stood there like that for a long time, unmoving, his hands around her shoulders, hers around his waist.

And if one had looked closely, that person would have seen that Almyra was not the only one crying; Frederick’s eyes were also wet.