#chapter ending

The halls of Kanosoni Detai were a strange place. Not exactly in The Linking Gardens as the typical person knew them, but not quite outside of them. It was woven into the fabric of the universe as they knew it, but the murals of days long past made the whole place have a terribly aged atmosphere. Old, forgotten tapestries hung, clean but still forgotten. The floors were spotless, but they felt as if they would crumble away at a moment’s notice. The whole place used to be so lively…but now…

Was that even true? Was that an invention of Juno’s mind? Was this whole place miserable throughout its existence, and was the only concept of illumination only brought forth by Juno and Mag as they danced through the corridors, scheming and laughing?

It must have been. Everything seemed so much darker without Mag.

Juno had not even tried to find his room yet. It was probably destroyed. Notado Detai probably wanted nothing to do with him, or Mag for that matter.

I wonder if Notado Detai…she would not. She cannot be…that cruel…

Still, he found himself using her epithet of death. Maybe she had killed them.

He brushed past a mural on the wall. Old, but lovingly carved. The organic seed and plant pastes used to dye the illustration were fading. It was depicting the fall of Kanosoni Aedalu to Sickness and Destruction, and the failure of Kanosoni Detai in rescuing her sister. No writing in sight, so clearly a relic from before the Phonecian Outrea—

“You know history quite well, don’t you?”

Juno jumped and whirled around, expecting to see the Kanosoni towering above him. Instead, she had lowered herself down to Juno’s height. It hardly counted as a polite gesture, she had still made herself taller than him. 

“Well,” Juno thinks back to the centuries he spent excitedly studying all the history he could get his hands on, “yes. I suppose so. I taught history to Hiraeth when I was still riding the Primordial Sea’s Train.” Juno fully turned around as he shifted the tip of his ghostly form to mimic a circling hand movement.

“What history did you teach?” The goddess asked, wandering over to the mural and dragging her hand down its length.

“Primary Earth’s history, for the most part. It was the one the others could connect and add to the most, in addition to my particular interest in it.” 

“...I see.” Ninokada Detai hummed as she considered Juno’s words. She did not look back at Juno. “You know the story of Sickness and Destruction, yes?”

“Of course.” Juno floated back, watching the goddess warily. Why would she…the only connection that the two have to Primary Earth is that they spurred on the Bubonic Plague in 134—

“So then you would be familiar with how they used me.” Ninokada Detai interrupted Juno’s thought tangent with a bitter, sharp tone. Her face was a cloud of anger, guilt, and weariness. 

“Pardon?”

“As you know,” she gestured to the mural with a defeated hand wave, “the two siblings took advantage of the relative freedom I granted them. They almost snuffed out my sister’s soni, which could have destroyed all of our lives.”

“I am…aware of this.” Juno’s translucent brow furrowed. “I was there.” He winced at the self-imposed reminder of his age.

“Would it be so abnormal to think that their betrayal of my trust…hurt me?” Ninokada Detai turned back to Juno with an unreadable expression. Her ghostly, billowing hair seemed to almost deflate.

“...What?”

Ninokada Detai looks back at Juno with a disappointed frown, towering over Juno without the extra height. “Juno.” Her voice was an intimidating deadpan. “You are old enough to know the life of an immortal. No one expects us to have…emotional responses. You know this, don’t you?”

Juno stuttered under the weight of the goddess’s disappointed tone. “N-no, I suppose not.” He considered this as he responded. “I would expect someone—anyone—to feel betrayed when someone takes their trust for granted. So, yes. I suppose I do understand that.”

“Recall when exactly you were first banished from my halls?”

Juno bristled and backed up. “Why would you even mention—”

“Quite a bit after 1347 C.E., correct? So, I urge you to wonder why I might feel a painful reminder of Sickness and Destruction when two similar siblings take advantage of my trust.”

Juno defensively curled up. “Was this who—”

“Juno,” Ninokada Detai’s face softened, “as much as you betrayed my trust, yours has also been treated the same. I see my pain in you, pain you don’t know is even there.”

She carefully inhales and exhales.

“You’re scared, and I know you are.”

Juno’s face snapped to one of confusion and fury, sending out angry waves of heat as he uncoiled. “Scared?” He looked appalled at the mere suggestion.

Ninokada Detai’s expression wrinkled into one of pained sympathy and sadness. Her head tipped to the side. “You don’t know who to trust anymore, do you.”

The room entered a deafeningly silent standstill. Each wave of the furious heat Juno sent out seemed to make the room glow brighter, creating a similar illusion to the past days of when Mag was still safe with him. The dense air pounded against the walls and floors, and even Detai’s ever shifting hair seemed to move slower.

And Juno didn’t know what to say. All of it, frankly, made no sense—Sickness and Destruction’s betrayal was nothing like what Mag had done to Juno. Kanosoni Detai had done nothing wrong, Juno had. Juno broke the construct that was both of theirs by right, Kanosoni Detai had merely let her creations be free. But still, her patient and sad expression—didn’t she hold the epithet Ninokada?—made him question himself.

No. The situations were nothing alike. She had to be lying, manipulating the situation to make herself the hero.

“Good day, Notado Detai.”

He was right. She was wrong.

That had to be the truth. That had to be it.

But as he swiftly made his way away…

He couldn’t help but question his logic.

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You've reached the end of Dear Shadow, the first chapter of this blog.