#and in this cultural awakening i came upon the myth of the moon eyed people

[wiillatree]

ok underland chronicles fans how do we feel about the moon eyed people

[wide-eyedscottishlass]

Scarlett and the Professor

[continued from]

“Then teach me, please. Give me the answer I need,” Scarlett insisted quietly. “It’s the real reason you brought me here tonight, isn’t it?”

“Yes...oh yes, Scarlett,” he murmured, laying just the fingertips of his right hand against her neck and softly tracing along her cheekbone with his thumb, “Although I think you might know the answer already---but it seems to me that you’ve buried the notion in the depths of your mind, for it defies rational thought.”

His eyes, like his voice, had gone utterly soft, as she barely shook her head in denial. Her brow creased with consternation, Scarlett parted her lips but words still seemed to fail her, “I...I don’t know what you mean, Professor...I swear that...that I don’t have a clue...”

“My dear little...hmmmm...” Hennessy’s lips were pressed together in an enigmatic smile that rivaled the Mona Lisa’s. “My little water nymph. Quiet your doubts and fears and simply listen. Trust what your heart already knows to be true.”

Scarlett closed her eyes, trying to do as her teacher bid, focusing on the steady sounds of the waves and on the soothing touch of his fingers, instead of the insistent voice of reason. Though she came from a culture rich in folk tales, myths, and legends, she was also a child of the 21st century, with access to the finest of educations and the most advanced technologies. Yet here he was---a brilliant, highly educated man---asking her to forsake reality and embrace the...fantastical. Alright then...I must call it what it is. Either I’ve gone quite mad, and none of this is real...or...or...

Her eyes shot open at the impossible conclusion. “It’s...magic?”

Hennessy was nodding and sounding pleased, “Of a sort, yes...”

“Magic is...real?”

“Real. And though as rare a hen’s teeth, older than civilization itself.”

Concerned that he was teasing her, playing upon her obvious naivete, taunting her as a fool, Scarlett studied his face carefully. She saw not a trace of irony, nor even the smallest hint of amusement at her expense. While her mind continued to revolt against the very notion, her heart---already entangled fathoms deep with everything he presented himself to be---insisted he was revealing a truth she was meant to learn eventually. The mysteries of her past suddenly made far more sense if the world allowed for the true existence of the paranormal.

“And there it is,” he observed, reading her reluctant acceptance as it stole across her face. “I knew you were bright enough to understand, m’dear. And I’ll wager something of the...supernatural...touched your life long before we met. Before you ever came to this place. Very likely before you even finished primary school.” Hennessy’s unwavering conviction and uncanny insight left a wave of relief washing over her. “I don’t need the slightest bit of magic to see that that is true.”

Hearing the long-held secret that he had guessed, goosebumps broke out across her skin. “Yes...yes...and heaven help me, yes,” she exclaimed in surprise, “But I’ve never shared that with a single soul in the world.” Well, only with my confessor, the Sea.

He nodded, having become the absolute picture of patience, while Scarlett felt the circle of water around them finally recede. “Come sit with me a while, love---I’ll tell you a bit of my experience if you’re willing to tell me a bit of yours.”

             ___________________________________________

“...of course, this is not ‘magic’...” Hennessy framed the word in air quotes, “...as it’s understood by the world at large. That is an illusion perpetrated by charlatans and con men and entertainers.” Scarlett was grateful for the clear sky, for the light of the waning gibbous moon allowed for her to read his face well enough to know he was being quite frank. “Like most practitioners of true magic, I come to it through a blood connection--though such powers are latent, and require active cultivation.” He paused for a couple of breaths, allowing her to digest the concept. “My mother is what we call an Elemental Sorceress---a fairly powerful one at that. Meaning that I, like her, have some control over the elements. Air, Fire, Earth. And as you have seen for yourself, Water.”

Having grown up in a household where ancient Celtic superstitions dwelled side by side with the tenants and strictures of Roman Catholicism, the very concept of sorcery raised her hackles as something to be feared for the sake of her immortal soul. And yet, it made sense to her, as though the existence of magic was one of several missing puzzle pieces that could offer a full explanation of her past.

Hennessy watched her, waiting as she wrapped her mind around such an astonishing truth, before continuing this strange, unlooked for lesson. “It shouldn’t surprise you that my strongest skill lies with Water---or that it’s my favorite.”

He bit his lip at that, looking so amused that a sudden warmth spread from her belly on down as she remembered what he’d done to her. “That’s...that’s an amazing skill, my jo,” she nearly whispered.

His hearty laugh warmed her as well, and he added, “And one that I’ve elevated to a fine art, don’t you agree, little lamb?”

Scarlett nodded, wide-eyed and solemn, so that he broke into his most wolfish grin. “But there’s even more to it, isn’t there?” Her instincts were awakened now, her need to know the truth of her own connection to the supernatural enough to override her incredulity.

“Much more,” he affirmed, “More than even I had imagined before I made this place my home.” He narrowed his exotic, ever-compelling eyes, probably reading her to decide if she was ready to hear more. “And Scarlett, I have a strong hunch that it’s a good part of the reason that you found your way here as well.”

‘Nah,” she scoffed, “Twas only that my Da thought a semester or two here might do me well...”

“Then perhaps your Da knows a thing or two he hasn’t told you yet,” he speculated---and then seeing the stubborn set of her brow, left off that topic for the moment. “Regardless, here you are in this very unique place, where elemental magic is just one of many extraordinary things to flourish.”

“One of...many,” Scarlett repeated, not yet completely convinced, “Just how many?”

Hennessy laid his long index finger across his lip, considering his reply carefully. “Well- almost as many as those who live on campus and in the community at large. You could say this island is a supernatural nexus of sorts...”

“Like the Bermuda Triangle?”

He grimaced, “ I suppose you might say that---but I wouldn’t. At least not in front of anyone native to the island...”

Scarlett nodded, choosing not to question that grim sounding assessment, so that he continued, “This place draws the preternatural and mysterious to it. Welcomes it, nurtures it, if you will---and makes all sorts of magic easier to wield...”

“Well, I’m no sorceress,” she protested, chewing her lip thoughtfully, “I mean, I have experienced moments of...crystal clarity...which seem to strike me out of  the blue. Strong feelings about what is going to happen. And...well...I’ve always had a sort of...intuition...about...” Scarlett shrugged and finished with a sheepish smile, “...about...people...”

Hennessy took her hand and slowly ran his thumb back and forth across her knuckles, the soft regard in his eyes making her weak as it always did. “Qualities which I assure you, Scarlett dear, are both uncommon and extraordinary. Even in a place that plays host to descendants of creatures out of legends and myths.” He twined his long fingers through hers. “My intuition tells me that something of the supernatural has more than touched you.”

Scarlett looked out at the dark expanse of the ocean, its gentle swells so close to shore, and even it’s smallest ripples, glittering with moonlight. She closed her eyes and drew several deep breaths, simply listening. Listening for the whisper beyond the rhythm of the waves, searching for the quiet voice she had heard so often in her youth. In those days, the Sea had never failed to give her the answers she sought---but these days, wrapped up in the trappings of adulthood, she had convinced herself that those times were the imaginings of a child’s mind providing her with the simple comfort she could not find elsewhere.

Now she spoke aloud, though the words were far more for her own sake than to answer his theory. “When I was young...as a child and...in those awkward, teenage years...I always felt most comfortable and most at peace ...at the water’s edge. In those days, the Sea was almost...like a mother to me.” Despite the balmy, evening air, Scarlett was shivering as the truths she had hidden away in the past several years as mere childish fancies, came back to her at last. “But at the same time, I sometimes felt I could never go too far from the safety of the shore. That it...that if I went too deep, I might never find my way...” She shuddered with the realization, “my way home.”

Hennessy traced the shell of her ear with his free hand and then rested it against her neck. For once, his skin was warmer than hers, so that she looked to him with a sudden longing to have him hold her and warm her. Warm her through and through, and assure her that she was safe with him here, where the sand mingled with the surf. Scarlett’s eyes welled over with salty tears seeing the patience and understanding in Hennessy’s. “Can you imagine how it was for me as a child...to both love and fear such...such a huge, ever-present aspect of Nature? One that loomed so large in my little world?” Her floodgates had finally opened, for a single soul that had the vision to ask. “To find joy and comfort in the ocean’s embrace, to feel it was where I belonged---but also to understand at the age of five that it had the deadly power to steal my breath? My very life?”

How tenderly he thumbed her tears away, how gently he drew her to him---as though he had known her secrets already, and had only been waiting for her to share it out loud. “I can,” he told her, brushing a kiss on the crown of her head, still holding her close, “Our experiences are not so dissimilar, love---though I had a parent knowing enough to guide me through those growing pains.”

“You? You knew such fear?” 

“Very like.” Hennessy drew a long sigh, answering so softly that Scarlett would wonder later if she’d imagined it. “Though I feared what lay within me more than I ever could the Sea...”

His warmth and solidity braced her well as her memories continued to engulf her reason. “There were awful, terrible dreams too,” she revealed, “As far back as I can remember. That there was something dark and sinister waiting for me out there in the depths. They only went away in the past few years.” That they had recently returned, Scarlett would not, could not, share with him just yet.

Hennessy hummed quietly as he considered her revelations. “I’m remembering all your sweet and saucy missives, from before we’d shared even a single kiss, little lamb. And how you’ve admitted that you were drawn to me from the moment you entered my classroom.” His voice remained calm and even, surely meant to further soothe her. “Given the many ties that also bind me to the Sea, this can be no coincidence.”

She nodded against him, too overcome by that implication to reply.

“Cleary, the roots of this mystery are what brought you to these shores.” He tightened his arms around her and she drew deep of his scent and strength and certainty. “And perhaps I can help you solve it one of these days. But for tonight, it’s best to let this rest---don’t you agree, my sweet jo?”

“Oh yes, please,” Scarlett answered, slipping her arms around his neck, her trust in his wisdom absolute. “Please,” she whispered as he lowered her onto her back, and loomed above her so that, fleetingly, the moon appeared to be a halo behind his head.

This time, the love he made to her was slow and sweet, their combined rhythm an exquisite counterpoint to the beat of the waves. In the end, Scarlett’s cries of pleasure rose full and shamelessly from her heart, to be caught upon the breeze and float their way out above the warm salt water---traces of which she now knew flowed through both their veins. 

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