Wild ​Reverence

by Rebecca Ross

War only makes love flame brighter, defiant. It seems to bloom from the bloodshed you leave behind, unfurling from the most unlikely places. From the broken seams of the world. From the graves and the anguish and the fear you inspire.”

I was Matilda alone. Matilda of nowhere and no kin. I would become the herald of the gods, much to my mother’s chagrin. And the goddess of death had certainly seen something out of place within my stars.

because we possess hearts, as much as we try to ignore them, and a heart always wants what it cannot have,”

And I would like to think my story began long ago when I came into the world as a pale, silent boy, destined to one day die. But it truly begins here, in this moment when my dreams grew bones and teeth and skin in the waking realm. The moment I met Red.

Red was not a girl but a goddess. And I knew the stars that belonged to her. I had memorized them. I could close my eyes at night and point in their direction. I could trace them on my palm.

What could I have done to keep a goddess safe? I realized it could not be achieved by embracing her. Only by letting her go.

You hold on to her. But who could hold on to the wind? And—better yet—who would be so foolish as to trust—to love—such a wild being?

“Herald?” Rowena called. “What sort of goddess is made when Fate and Death come together in unison after centuries of enmity and strife?” I paused, far too anxious to play a guessing game. “I do not know, Matriarch,” I said. “Tell me.” Rowena smiled, revealing sharp, crooked teeth. “We create a goddess of peace.”

This is the beginning of the end, I thought. If heartless gods can be made soft by such love, we are all doomed.

We only touched in fleeting moments. And we might meet in startled brevity, like the moon eclipsing the sun every thirteen winters. A meeting that felt so fierce the whole land took note of its shadow. But we were never meant to be bound together. Not even in pretense.

I stared up at the sky, naming the constellations, until I found hers—a bright six points. Herald of the gods. A kestrel in flight. I willed those stars to burn always, because I could not bear to imagine them ever going dark.

“He chose me first,” I replied. “He dreamt of me before I knew of him. His soul found mine before I even knew how to look for his.”

She was not mine by spoken vow but something deeper. Something that felt older, stronger, darker, like a language that had been sung centuries ago but had now been forgotten. Something that simmered in the blood, calling to me, calling to her.

I had never desired to be a god, to wield power as one, but in that moment, I longed to halt time. I would have made an interlude for us, a space when the hour lost its bite and the sun stood still. We could simply breathe and let ourselves unravel this knot between us, slowly.

“He may be irreverent toward all of us, save for you. I think he desires to worship you.”

I do not know when this happened, when the current rose and when I let it take me, willingly, but there came a moment when I looked at you and could not breathe. There was a moment when I watched you depart, and I wanted to fall to my knees.

I will love you to my grave, and even beyond it, when the mists welcome me, when I am hopefully very old and gray and grouchy and have spent the seasons beside you when you are here and dreaming of you when you are gone.

I could not hold her any more than I could the wind, but I loved her for it.

We were doomed, she and I. One day, I would perish, and she would live on, endless as the stars. But if we were doomed, then let us fully embrace it.

“Oh gods,” I breathed, clinging to her. “Are you blessing or cursing me?” she asked wryly, kissing me again. “Can it be both?”

I would call to ghosts this night. To my father, my brothers. I would open my old wounds to mend them. I would let myself bleed again.

But in my heart, she had always been the wind, never staying in one place for too long. I had always known that I could not hold on to her.

I waited for her return like the stars wait for the sun to set.

“I would wait a thousand years for you,” Vincent said. “If you asked me, I would wait for you until only my bones remained upon an altar. But if you must leave again, then let me follow you, Red.”