Grayson turned his head and smiled down at the starry face beside him, animatedly pointing out attractions throughout the forest. Kasey's eyes shone in the moonlight, and her laughter surrounded them as they walked along the path, side by side. His arm rested softly over her shoulders, and every now and then he'd pull her closer to him. He found himself forgetting everything besides her as they got deeper and deeper into the forest, and soon all he thought about was her, her shining eyes, her soft smile, her silvery laughter, and how unreal she was. He still wasn't entirely convinced that he wasn't dreaming, and he thought to himself that if he was, he never wanted to wake up. It had been a long while since he'd felt this kind of fuzzy happiness, and he wanted to cling to it forever.
"Yeah, and that's the flower of armanette," Kasey pointed to a tall blood-red flower growing out of the trees, "It's used for healing, but only on select kinds of injuries." She went on to describe times when the flower had been used for healing during wars of long ago, and even though Grayson didn't fully understand how the flower worked, he didn't care in the least because he could have stood there listening to her voice go on about flowers and wars in it's cheerful up and down intonations for forever and longer than forever.
"Hey, where's your brother? Ethan?" Kasey suddenly stopped, remembering. With a start, Grayson remembered too, and it hit him that in his happiness in being with Kasey, he'd entirely forgotten that Ethan had come with them. Feeling guilty, he turned around and spotted Ethan walking far behind them, looking lost and out of place. His guilt increasing, he called out, "Ethan!" Ethan looked up and yelled that he was coming, when Grayson saw that he'd sped up his pace, he turned back to Kasey.
"Should we wait till he catches up, or - " Kasey questioned.
"If you want we can keep going, he'll catch up soon."
Kasey shrugged, and moving closer together, they continued on.
~
Ethan looked down at his chest, and drew in his breath in surprise when he saw what had decided to land on him. Clinging to his shirt was the most angelic gold and sapphire butterfly he'd ever seen. It opened and closed its wings mesmerizingly, and the gold pattern glinted in the moonlight, deepening the blue that surrounded it. Ethan stopped moving, not wanting to scare it away, and he whispered softly, "Hey, beautiful." He tentatively placed his finger next to it, hoping it would crawl onto it, which, to his enchantment, it did. Lifting up his finger with the butterfly to the moonlight, he gazed at it in silent rapture, and it seemed to him that the gold streaks almost shifted and changed as the light reflected off them.
As he watched the butterfly move up and down alluringly on his finger, a sudden desperate hope surged up within him. He recalled that the girl Grayson had found had been a fly, and he'd changed her into human form by doing something . . . what was it? The girl had said he'd Named her, whatever that meant. Maybe this was a normal butterfly, maybe it wasn't, either way Ethan decided there was no harm in trying to Name it. His heart fluttered, and he felt slightly awkward at what he was about to do. No one was around to watch him; Grayson and the girl had gone ahead again, and unless some monster was creeping up behind him, he was alone. He brought the hand with the butterfly closer to him, and as he watched it, something, something so soft, something so subtle it almost wasn't there, something in his mind whispered a name.
"Lia." He seemed to whisper it automatically, and it caught him by surprise.
He intently gazed at the butterfly, waiting for a change, for something to happen. Just when he thought nothing was going to happen and that he'd been stupid to even suppose that it could, the butterfly spread its wings and lit off from his hand. It fluttered up towards the stars, and his heart sank, thinking that he'd scared it away. Disappointed, and a little hurt, he stood there, watching it until he lost sight of it. Ethan, feeling more alone than before, began to walk again, when all of a sudden the air before him began to shimmer in the strangest way. Before he could make out what it was, something collided with him and he fell over on his back. When he sat up and looked he saw, silhouetted in the moonlight, a girl sitting on him.
Ethan stared at her, not daring to believe she was real. She had dark curly hair all around her face, and her eyes were starry and wide, mirroring his own. The moonlight fell upon her face, revealing the bronze glow at her cheeks, that began to slightly redden. For a hot second they stared at each other, each becoming more acutely aware of the fact that the girl was sitting right in Ethan's lap. Finally, something in her face changed and she whispered tremulously, "Thank you."
Before Ethan knew what was happening, she'd flung her arms around his neck and was hugging him, and dazed though he was, his heart beat a little faster as he put his arms around her and squeezed back. She didn't let him go for what seemed like a long time, even though it couldn't have been longer than a minute. When she finally pulled away, her dark eyes were shining, and she grinned at Ethan, still holding on to his arms as though she couldn't believe he was real, which was an accurate description of how he felt about her.
"I - I'm Ethan," he rasped, and immediately turned red.
She laughed. Her laughter was golden and bubbly, and feeling a little relieved, Ethan smiled.
"I'm Lia, but I guess you already knew that," she said, still beaming at him. She had a perfect glowing smile, and it was infectious too because Ethan found himself smirking back at her, his awkwardness suddenly vanishing. He stood up, and pulled her to her feet with him, and with no warning, impulsively spun her around, both of them ending up laughing and breathless on the ground again.
"How did you know to Name me?" Lia asked, looking up at him. "You don't seem to be from here."
"I didn't know, I just took a wild chance. I actually know next to nothing about this place or why I'm here, but my twin brother did this first and the girl he Named brought us to this place." Ethan glanced up at the stars, adding, "I was tired of being alone." He turned back to her and grinned, pulling her up again. "I guess I don't have to worry about that anymore."
"No you don't, because I'm going to stay annoyingly close by you from this moment onwards and pronounce you to the world as my saviour." Lia laughed her golden laugh again, and catching hold of Ethan's hand, began to run, pulling him with her.
Her dress was of the same pattern as her butterfly wings had been, and as she ran it rippled behind her. The two of them flew across the stone path, and as Ethan intertwined his fingers with hers, he wondered whether he dared even now to believe that this was real.
Soon enough he caught sight of Grayson and Kasey, and they came to a breathless halt. Grayson turned and gaped at Ethan and Lia, while Kasey's face seemed to light up. She tore away from Grayson and ran towards them, her arms wide.
Ethan looked next to him and saw that Lia had also vanished from his side and when he turned again, he saw that she, too, was running.
They flung their arms around each other and hugged joyfully, jumping up and down and communicating in incoherent squeals.
As Ethan and Grayson watched them, something in the atmosphere changed. Ethan turned, and to his awe, the entire sky was split by rays of light.
It was dawn.
