St. Quiteria

***This story is prequel for Calla Lily for Matjaž***

It was a cloudy morning when they first met.

Little Matjaž was playing with his twin brother Clave, in the red deer forest. That was when he heard a soft cry from behind a young angel oak tree; it was a girl’s voice. He could’ve easily ignored it, but somehow the cry sounded so sad and fragile. When the spoiled Clave was busy clinging to the Red Warden, Esther, Matjaž decided to see who was crying behind the tree. Just when he approached the tree, a pale hand reached out from behind the tree, as if it was trying to reach him. Without hesitation, Matjaž reached for the pale hand and pulled on it.

There she was, standing before him, a little girl with a beautiful yet sad face and shiny hair with a blue ribbon tied in it. She was sobbing quietly, looking down to the ground.

“Who are you? Why are you crying?” he asked softly. The little girl looked up, looking right at him with her big blue eyes. There she saw, a fine looking kid, with the most angelic face she could ever know. His hair was silky, his eyes were big and friendly, his skin was heavenly beautiful.

“My family abandoned me for I am unwanted and now I’m lost…”, she answered, sobbing. Her voice was trembling, she sounded like she was in a great sadness and had been crying a long time.

He looked at her closely, there was this feeling that he couldn’t describe at that time, it was like he wanted to stop her from crying, it was like he wanted to make her feel safe.

“I’m Matjaž, the prince of the red deer blacvetrese…”, he said, “And I love berries…”, he stretched out his other hand toward her, then opened them to reveal a bunch of fresh blueberries.

The little girl stopped sobbing when she saw the berries. She smiled for the first time and kept looking at him. Matjaž knew that this girl must be very hungry. She took the berries from his hand and put them inside her pocket.

“Do you also like flowers?” she asked while untying the blue ribbon on her hair.

Matjaž paused for a while before nodding, “But I don’t really have a particular flower that I really like…”

She looked at him and gave him the sweetest smile, “Well now you will… It’s Calla Lily… That’s my name…”

She handed him the blue ribbon, “ And I give you this… Please wear it…”

Matjaž looked at the blue ribbon with this weird expression on his face, “But… I don’t wear a ribbon”, he said slowly. “Girls do…”, he said shaking his head.

Calla, still holding out her hand with the blue ribbon dangling from it, stared at him with her big blue sad eyes. Matjaž could see that her eyes were watery, as if she was about to cry. “But I-I w-w-wanted you to…”, she said, with her sad trembling voice.

Matjaž shook his head again.

“This is my treasure…”, she said again, but this time, tears were rolling down her cheeks.

Matjaž was stunned. He didn’t want to see her crying again! What he wanted was to see her smile. With this intention, he took the blue ribbon from her hand, while his other hand rested on her shoulder.

“Don’t cry… Don’t cry… Here… I’ll tie this blue ribbon to my hair…”, he said in the most caring voice he could.

She looked at him, this time, with a smile, she nodded happily and giggled. She grabbed his hand and held it.

Matjaž smiled, he was feeling relieved. “Now let’s go, let’s find more berries to eat!”

Calla nodded happily. Holding hands together, they ran to the other side of the forest, ready to hunt and pick some berries.

It was just like that, Matjaž invited Calla to enter his life. From that day forward, they were always seen together, playing in the forest. When it was time for Matjaž to go back to the castle, he made sure Calla had enough food and warm blanket, a shady tree where she could stay safe under, until they met again in the morning and spent their happy times together.

Little did they know, that the darkness was lurking… A very malicious BlacEvil was waiting to appear, in order to kill the little girl, who was said to have inherited a powerful J flower, which was believed to have the power to break a blac curse.

On one fine spring day, the three of them, Matjaž, Clave and Calla, were in the forest. The weather was delightful, with a light breeze and warm sunshine. Well, it would have been a more beautiful day, if only the spoiled brat Clave would stop crying. He cried as hard as he could, for reasons that Calla failed to understand. She didn’t think it was such a big deal that Esther the Red Warden hadn’t showed up yet.

“She is late! She is late!” cried Clave, sitting in front of a big angel oak tree.

The soft-hearted Matjaž, who couldn’t bear to see his twin brother crying, tried to cheer him up.

“Look what I found earlier today from the vampire castle library, Clave!” he said, as he held out a piece of paper to Clave.

Still sobbing, Clave turned his head to see. It was a torn parchment with a bizarre symbol illustrated on it. Clave took it, gave it a good look and then threw it to the ground.

“Where is Esther? She should’ve been here already!” cried Clave, stubbornly refusing to stop crying.

Calla stood next to the tree, quietly watching the twins, her hands were busy making flower crown.

Patiently, Matjaž picked up the parchment.

“If you stop crying, I’ll draw this symbol on the ground for you.”

Clave stopped crying for few seconds.

“Prove it first!” he yelled.

Matjaž smiled and nodded, he took a twig and walked to the open area, surrounded by angel oak trees.

There was a mysterious whisper in Matjaž’s ear when he was about to draw the symbol. The whisper sounded like a sinister message but he couldn’t really understand what was being said. Calla and Clave walked behind him, wondering what game they were about to play with the symbol.

It was indeed a game. A lethal one. By the time Matjaž finished drawing the unknown symbol on the ground with his twig, inexplicably the sky started to turn dark and the air became chilly. It was then, Matjaž felt something was not right. He looked up and there, before him, a pitch-black creature was forming.

Seeing this creature forming in front of them, Clave screamed as loud as he could, calling out for Esther, the Red Warden.

“Run, Matjaž!” he said as he started to run away from the creature. Calla and Matjaž froze; they couldn’t believe what they saw. The black creature was very tall, hiding inside a robe with a large hood that reflected light as if it was made of black blood.

“You have summoned me, I am the Most Evil, Sammael.” The BlacEvil looked at them in a way that was most horrifying.

Matjaž was trembling in fear, frozen, he couldn’t run.

“The heir of the calla lily flower…” the BlacEvil pointed his hideous finger at Calla, who stood behind Matjaž.

Matjaž looked at Calla, frightened, but at the same time he was ready to stand up for her.

“Run and hide, Calla!” cried Matjaž as he stretched his arms, trying to protect his little friend by blocking the BlacEvil while she ran away.

But the little red deer prince was no match for a powerful BlacEvil Sammael. With a whisper, he invoked a curse on poor Matjaž.

“An unwanted thou shall be, eerie and vile I shall make thee. With crestfallen memory and ominous mind, thou will be an absentee…” Sammael chanted the curse.

As the curse was invoked, Matjaž’s physical appearance started to change into the most frightening visage of ugliness. There was no more angelic face, beautiful eyes and skin tone, heartwarming smile. All gone, replaced by a pair of hideous red eyes, greyish skin tone, and a very twisted shape of his lips.

Calla could neither believe what she witnessed nor could she do anything about it. Her hands trembling, she dropped her flower crown and began to cry in fear.

The cursed Matjaž began to cry quietly, but kept whispering, “Run Calla, hide…”

Calla didn’t know what to do as BlacEvil Sammael approached her and tried to reach her. She screamed and cried, she ran for a bit, but had no clue where to go. The angel oak trees seemed to turn into devil trees now. In tears, she summoned the calla lily flowers with an incantation.

“Grow and tall, protect us from sorrow Take us down and below…”

Calla Lily For Matjaž Part 3

Stories, drawings and characters by @flolady and @silentiaworld

Calla looked at Matjaž with teary eyes. Her tears were about to fall down. Matjaž looked at her with an uneasy feeling. He was going to kill her, wasn’t he? But now, looking at those teary eyes, he knew had seen them before. Where? Of course, it all went back to the past. The little Calla, who kept following him everywhere, who cried over everything; she was, nothing else, but a crybaby. Matjaž never had the heart to see those tears.

“Don’t cry…” he whispered.

“Go ahead,” she continued, sobbing quietly, “Kill me…”

Her tears were ready to fall down on her cheeks.

“No… No… Please don’t cry,” he said, his voice sounded shaky.

“Then what do you want me to do, Matjaž?” she asked, still looking at him, ready to burst into tears.

“I…” he paused, “I don’t want you to cry…” he said softly.

“Do you… still want me to leave…?” she finally started to cry.

Matjaž glanced at her, anxiously. “No… Don’t leave…”

Calla stared at him in silence. Then she gave him the sweetest smile ever. With no more tears on a sad face.

“Then I’ll stay here with you!”

As she said that, she reached out to Matjaž’s neck, and then she gave him the warmest hug.

Matjaž was shaken. He didn’t know how to respond, yet he knew how soothing that felt. Slowly, his skinny long bizarre arms and fingers reached out to her shoulders. He hugged her close, awkwardly, but wholeheartedly. At that moment, Matjaž had made a decision, he would let this girl enter his life once again, he made a promise to himself that he would protect Calla, and the most important thing, he made a promise to not make her cry again.

Just when Matjaž was going to tie the blue ribbon to Calla’s hair, he sensed that the Legere*6 led by Vampire Viktor, had entered his area, along with Esther, the Red Warden. They were on alert position pointing arrows at Matjaž.

Esther moved a step forward; she didn’t have a weapon with her.

“It seems like you have a prisoner with you Matjaž…” she said, calmly.

Matjaž held Calla closely; he wouldn’t let anyone hurt her. He whispered a spell and within seconds, he shape shifted into a red deer. Matjaž didn’t stop, he kept casting the spell, which made his red antlers stretch out, grew so fast and started to tangle up around them. Esther was startled, she held her breath witnessing this; she realized that Matjaž was making a cage out of his antlers to protect Calla.

It happened so fast; it was like watching a miracle. Standing before the Legere and Esther, were Matjaž the red deer with Calla holding his neck, looking scared, but what amazed everyone was, Matjaž and Calla were inside the red antler-shield.

Esther approached the shield hesitantly. “What are you doing, Matjaž?” she asked cautiously.

Matjaž watched Esther from inside the shield.

“Leave us alone…”

As the Red Warden, Esther could communicate with all the red deer telepathically.

“I’m afraid we cannot do that, Matjaž…” Viktor, the leader of Legere stood beside Esther. He looked at Calla.

“Who are you?” he asked in the most gentle voice.

“I’m not his prisoner…” answered Calla, fearfully.

“Well whoever you are, we will get you out…” replied Viktor.

Calla shook her head and held to Matjaž’s neck tightly.

“You misjudged him…” she said.

But Esther saw the bruises in Calla’s neck. She feared that Matjaž had hurt this girl and would do it again.

“You have bruises… Did Matjaž do that to you?”

“I don’t care what you all think of Matjaž. But I’m staying with him.” Calla replied sternly.

Esther sighed. Both Matjaž and the strange girl were stubborn. Esther turned to Matjaž.

“Whoever she is, Matjaž… You know you could hurt her,” said Esther persuasively.

And Matjaž knew this, he knew Esther was right. What if later on, he would try to hurt Calla again? He would never forgive himself for that! He looked at Calla as if he wanted to say to her, ‘what if Esther’s words were true?’

Calla held him close as if she didn’t want to let him go.

Esther and Viktor could see that Matjaž was in doubt. They kept persuading Matjaž to let the girl go.

“Let her go, Matjaž… We promise we will take care of her and try to find her family…”

Calla was scared. Scared of losing Matjaž once again. Tears started to roll down her cheeks.

“Don’t listen to them, Matjaž…” Calla the crybaby started to sob in sorrow.

Matjaž didn’t have the heart to see that. Right away, his defense was shattered, the red antlers shield started to disintegrate, scattered into pieces, turned into red dust and swept away by the wind. Matjaž had turned back into his human shape again, holding Calla so tightly to stop her from crying.

Seeing that the shield had been broken, Viktor quickly gave an order to the Legere to shoot Matjaž with an anesthetic arrow. But alas, when the arrow was shot, Calla moved fast in front of Matjaž, and the arrow stabbed her shoulder.

Matjaž was shocked to see this. Without thinking, he carried Calla and ran as fast as he could toward the Legere, and he kept running past them. Calla held onto Matjaž’s neck tightly, half awake, in pain from the shot, she summoned the calla lily flowers with an incantation.

In a blink of an eye, calla lily flowers started to sprout fast around them. It’s like the flowers were to trying to form a shield for them. Calla quickly grabbed onto one of the tallest flower and chanted a spell.

“Grow and tall, protect us from sorrow Take us down and below”

Once Calla recited the invocation, all of a sudden, the ground beneath them opened.

“Don’t worry Matjaž, the flowers will protect us…” she whispered faintly.

No one could believe what they were about to see. They startled.

It happened so fast, it was implausible. There before all of them, Matjaž and the girl were devoured by the ground, they fell in to the earth and forthwith the ground closed up again, leaving the calla lily flowers bloomed beautifully above it as if nothing extraordinary had ever happened.

It was like a grave, guarded by beautiful white flowers. Beneath the glowing flowers, Matjaž and Calla were buried deep down, safe from everyone who wanted to separate them, protected from the tainted world that Matjaž was worried about, away from all the doubts. No more sadness, no more tears, no more judging, no more fear.

For they were together, and that what all matters…