Agartha

Chapter sixteen

“Come on Angel! You have to take me back to the palace”. He gave me a wide gorgeous smile after hearing it.

“I have a name!”

“And apparently you have a family too…”

“What do you mean?”

“I´ll explain it later. I need to be sure, let´s go”

We waited until midnight and walked to a stream away from the treehouses and he touched the water with his palms. We immerse ourselves in and went out again, this time we were at my realm. Wasting no time, we rushed to the palace, by this time everybody must be sleeping. I was wrong. The palace was packed, and they were probably alarmed by my disappearance. We would have to wait.

Before coming back to the satyr´s realm I took Angel to the gazebo. I took a branch from the tree and did just like my great uncle did to give me a wand. It worked! He must be related to me!

“A cricket it´s looking for you”

“What?”

“I feel it. There´s a cricket coming to see you”

“Ragnar´s cricket! He can´t see me! We have to go back, quickly”

We rushed to the satyr´s realm where I spent a week trying to teach him to use the wand.

***

I have to admit, Angel was way better than me at handling that wand. After a week of peace and joy, duty called.

At midnight we went to the palace. This time it wasn´t packed but the guards would alert everyone if they saw me.

“We need to get to the library unseen, let me think…”

Suddenly, he grabbed me by one arm trying to lead me to the library. I was struggling with him, but he said “don´t worry, satyrs can walk unseen by wizards or elves. If there are no other creatures here, they won´t see us”. Surprised as I was, just walked with him.

Truly, we passed unseen, he was able to hide me as well. At the library I went straight to the family´s area and searched for the royals bloodline. After a lot of reading, we found a small codex titled Dinorah. We opened it and started to show scenes of my aunt´s life. History books do that here if the writer saw what he or she wrote about. Angel was excited, turned out she was my father´s sister and she was the true naturalist of the family, my cousins lied! She was taken by a satyr and never seen again until the great war. As Angel said, she disappeared after the death of her satyr.

We needed one more test. “Angel, I need to go to my room unseen. Can you take us?”

“Sure” As we walked upstairs my heart was beating loud.

At the entrance of the third floor I stopped but Angel kept walking. Before I could stop him, he entered pulling me by the hand. He turned to see my widened eyes and I pointed downstairs again.

At the library, I explained things to him. He seemed puzzled and confused.

“Angel. I need to tell them I'm back”

“You´re not coming back home with me!”

“No. And you should stay too”

“Galia, they won´t accept me. You know that”

“I know. It will take time… But we need to try. This is your family, we are cousins. No matter what, I will never leave you”

As usual, with no warning, he gave me a sudden bear hug. I made calling bubbles for all my relatives and waited.

In less than two minutes, the doors were opened (more like thrown apart) and my family rushed in.

“GALIA!” They all said.

My grandparents hugged me crying their eyes out. And after kissing them, I asked for a meeting.

“Your highness” I addressed to the king, “may I call a meeting?”

“Of course, dear!”

A guard interrupted announcing Ragnar, who had just arrived and asked to enter. My great uncle was about to protest but my uncle asked to send him in.

Ragnar´s eyes widened as he saw me. “Gal… Princess! What a relieve to see you are fine. How did you…”

“Thank you General” Suddenly his eyes darkened, and he started to look everywhere like searching for something.

“The satyr is here! I can feel it!”

Everybody gasped alarmed and took their wands in a defensive fashion.

“Yes, General. A satyr is here. Everybody, please, have a sit. We need to talk”

My great uncle looked concerned “please don´t tell us you felt in love with a satyr…”

I found it funny and smiled “No, your highness. Please have a sit”

“Just like that? What about the satyr?”

“Don´t worry about it, trust me”. The awkward looks were hilarious.

After many hugs from everyone, we sat. They kept searching for the satyr in the room.

“How come no one told me about my aunt Dinorah?” I popped the question and my tone was scolding.

They were surprised and all hesitated. My twin cousins lowered their heads. My grandma spoke “My dear child, that story is too painful…”

“Hari and Tera told me my father was the family´s naturalist, turns out it was my aunt!”

“Yes” said aunt Marilin. “Dinorah and I were best friends. Her disappearance was a big tragedy, we all blamed ourselves for not being able to help her. We all suffered too much when that satyr kidnapped her and after his death she was completely lost. I'm sorry we didn´t tell you, Galia. It´s just too hard”

“My father didn´t kidnap her! They were in love!” Angel appeared in front of me, hurt, wings spread, speaking after his father. Everyone pointed at him with the wands, even Ragnar who had his sword ready since he felt Angel´s presence. Quickly, I made a haze to cover and protect him.

“C-a-l-m d-o-w-n!” My voice echoed. “Angel sit next to me”

“That is the satyr that took her!” Ragnar looked furious.

“Yes, General. That satyr has a name, Angel, and he is Dinorah´s son, my cousin, a child of this family”. Ragnar was puzzled. I find his jealousy amusing, generally, but not now, I need to protect Angel.

***

Convincing my family was not an easy task. We even had to empty the palace and take a tour upstairs to show he was able to enter, like all other royals, and go back to the library to continue. We explained about satyrs and their world, about the misperception of kidnapping. We showed them Dinorah´s neckless, now hanging on Angel´s bare chest. I told them about the wand, that made the king furious, it wasn´t my right to do that.

“He is my grandson…” grandpa seemed shocked.

The king was still skeptical. “This can´t be true. This boy has wings! Wizards don´t have wings!”

Grandma defended him “Yes! But look at the color of his wings, golden and green at the edges! Maybe he is just different because his father was a satyr”

“I don´t know” Uncle Den was hesitant, “we can´t have a satyr in the family”

Aunt Marilin, for the first time since I arrived, disagreed with her husband. “If he is my dear Dinorah´s son, he is all we have left of her”

Hari asked to speak up. “I believe, having a satyr as a relative would be a sensitive issue since most families have suffered the lost of a witch to the satyrs. Politically speaking, would bring disadvantages” I rolled my eyes.

Eric lifted a hand as he was standing to talk “I agree with my older sister. A satyr cannot be introduced as one of us”

I was getting really angry. “Hari, Eric, shame on you! You are turning your back at your own blood! Our magical bloodline runs strong in him. You didn´t turn your back on me when I arrived, being barely nothing but a human. Why are you rejecting him?”

Everybody was speaking at the same time, arguing about his right to stay. Angel looked sad, broken. I couldn´t take it anymore. I took Angel´s hand and spoke loud, echoing around “Angel is my cousin and I will not abandon him. Make a decision, if he can´t stay and begin his training at the center is fine, I'm leaving with him to his land” Angel smiled at me with relief.

Ragnar spoke for the first time. “Princess, you´re being reckless. You don´t know this satyr, he could be a spy. Cousin or not, he was raised by satyrs” My scolding eyes made him shut up nervously and he excused himself and left, promising to keep all this a secret.

The king´s eyes were bright red “Are you trying to extort us? How dare you! Antinoo! This is your fault, you allow her to get away with everything”

My grandfather answered and I was nervous about what he was about to say. “My beloved brother. This boy is my grandson, like it or not he is a child of this family. We don´t have to decide right now what to say about him, like we did when Galia arrived”

My grandma had tears in her beautiful eyes. She approached to us with a very solemn expression making us take one step back. I stepped in front of Angel defensively, but grandma said “don´t worry, dear. I won´t hurt him”. I know she is a powerful lady, so I needed to be careful. After moving to one side, she walked to him staring at his features. “you have my daughter´s features…” her voice was trembling. Slowly, so Angel wouldn´t be frighten, she motioned to hold him in her arms. He closed his watery eyes like hugging his own mom and hugged her back tightly. He whispered to her thank you, madam.

“Is grandma, if there are no strangers around” Angel´s smile was so wide and beautiful, happiness was invading him.

The queen finally intervened, “it´s really late. Galia, we are happy and relieved you are back, we missed you. We will continue this meeting tomorrow after breakfast. Angel will sleep in one of our special guests rooms on the second floor until he is presented as a member of this family, if we decide to do so”

“May I say something?”, he interrupted. “I appreciate your kindness, my lady, but I don´t feel safe sleeping by myself on a strange place, I could go back home and come back here tomorrow after your meeting”. He sounded like a scared child.

My grandfather answered “No. I will keep you company, don´t worry. We are your family, you are safe here, we will protect you no matter what” I underestimate my grandpa sometimes, he is such a kind-hearted gentleman. My grandma looked so proud of her husband.