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As Gabriel brushed the last bits of orange from his hands — crumbled remains of a dried maple leaf — the mixture in front of him turned a pale, murky lavender, illuminating with odd flashes of silver as it caught the light coming through the circular window. It was difficult to not be entirely entranced by the swirling, pulsing rhythm of the liquid in the bowl in front of him, but he tore his eyes away, wiping away the dust left clinging to his palms.
The potion certainly looked complete, but there was one more step to go. With any luck, they would soon know exactly what its purpose was, since Fu’s notes neglected to tell them.
“I’m ready for the next ingredient,” Gabriel announced, turning his body towards Nathalie. She nodded, a look of serious concentration on her face, and consulted the notes on the Guardian’s tablet, which she had so cleverly taken in the battle weeks before.
“Oh.” Her brief comment was directed to herself, lost in her own world as she read. She set the tablet down and unlatched the box that they kept their tools in, disrupting a few butterflies as she opened the lid. She began to rifle through, neglecting to give Gabriel a proper response.
“Nathalie,” he sighed. If anything, he was amused, but he couldn’t help a pinch of exasperation from slipping into his tone. “What is it?”
“Hm?” she asked without looking up. “There it is.” Gabriel watched as she pulled a knife out of its hiding spot. “A drop of blood, sir.”
Gabriel instantly felt every muscle in his body tense up, and his head began to spin. He fought against the irrational urge to shield his pulse points — foolish, as there was no chance that Nathalie would open a vein without his permission. Still, it took great effort to not shy away from the tip of the blade, coincidentally pointed towards him. “Are you sure?” he questioned, hoping that they were dealing with a misinterpretation of the text, or even a passage read incorrectly.
“I’m quite certain,” Nathalie said, leaning back over the tablet regardless to double-check. “‘A drop of life — primarily water, and yet, much thicker.’ Without a doubt, that is blood.”
“‘The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb,’” Gabriel quoted begrudgingly.
“Precisely,” she replied. She turned her left palm skyward and extended her pointer finger, preparing the blade over it.
“Wait,” Gabriel exclaimed, catching her wrist. Already he could feel his stomach churning, unhelped by his awareness of Nathalie’s pulse thrumming under his fingers. “There’s no need for that.”
“Do you have a supply on hand?” she asked, entirely earnest. Gabriel’s expression must have revealed his unease because a good-humored smile then pulled at the corner of her mouth. “One of us has to, then. Would you rather do it?”
Gabriel swallowed, fruitlessly attempting to rid his tongue of the cotton that suddenly coated it. Although he certainly should have had objections, especially with Nathalie so newly on the mend, he’d prefer just about anything to seeing his own blood drip out of him, even in such small quantities.
At some point in the past, he must have let slip the secret of his hemophobia, because Nathalie didn’t look to be at all surprised as he muttered, “I’ll allow you to do it,” failing terribly in his attempt to appear casual about it.
He hovered behind her as she approached their makeshift cauldron, split between his urge to put as much distance between himself and the blood as possible and his desire to stay close to her in case something went wrong. Once again, Nathalie raised the knife to her hand, and this time, unhindered, she pushed the blade into the pad of her finger.
Gabriel grabbed the table, instantly lightheaded at the first line of vermillion in her skin. He brought his attention to her face, desperate to distract himself, and was alarmed to find her expression all too determined. A quick glance back down at her finger revealed the blade cutting deep.
His wooziness was gone all at once, dissipated at once by the shock of adrenaline that burst through him. “Nathalie!” he exclaimed, grabbing both her wrists. “Not too much; it’s just a drop!”
She startled, nearly dropping the knife as she herself noticed just how much blood was welling up. Potion forgotten, Gabriel grabbed her by the arms and tried to move her away to tend to her self-inflicted wound.
A crimson stream ran down her finger before he could get very far, and three drips splashed down into the bowl, turning the potion equally red.
For a second, everything stopped.
And then the potion exploded.
Gabriel managed to push Nathalie away from him a split second before it happened, sensing how the energy in the air shifted dangerously. In the next moment, a cloud of hot steam hit his face, permeating his nose and throat with sickening sweetness, as if rock candy had instantaneously crystalized inside his nostrils and on the ridge of his hard palate.
He stumbled back, coughing, and finally fell back as the last clouds dissolved into the air. His ears were ringing, and he could only just make out exclamations of, “Gabriel!”
Still slightly stunned, he choked out, “Too much blood.”
Nathalie’s outstretched arms came into the corner of his hazy vision, and he quickly backed away from her. “Don’t touch me!” he burst out, panicked as she came too close. “We don’t know what this does;” he quickly reminded her, “you could be exposed.”
She took a step back, reluctance slowing her motions down and etching worry into every line of her face. Very quickly, however, her expression shifted to one of bewilderment.
“What?” he asked, dreading the worst.
Nothing could have prepared him for Nathalie to respond, “You’re… sparkling.”
“I’m what?” He looked down at himself just in time to catch the twinkling surrounding his body before it disappeared. For a second, all he could do was gape down at himself, hardly believing his eyes. “In that case, I’m certainly under its effects.”
“But what is it?” Nathalie fretted as he pulled himself to his feet. Odd visuals aside, he felt entirely normal, not at all harmed by what they’d brewed up. “With ingredients like thorns, and ashes, and blood? It can’t be anything good.”
“It’s not ideal,” he agreed, downplaying his own concern as much as possible to avoid alarming her. He looked down into the bowl to find that almost all of the liquid had evaporated into the air. “And I’m afraid we can’t study it further. Not unless we brew another batch. It’s all gone.”
“Really?” She rushed over to peer into the bowl herself, and Gabriel caught sight of her bleeding finger, cupped tenderly in her other hand. “We’ll have to make another then. We can bottle my blood and pipette it into the mixture for better control this time.”
Ignoring the rush of nausea that came back to him once more at the thought, he shook his head. “We should tend to your wound right away.” She made an odd face back at him, and he sighed, “Let me guess; I’m sparkling again.”
She nodded, pausing awkwardly.
He shook his head, not finding it in him to care. “I think we should put a bandage on that right away.”
“Don’t be absurd; it’ll only take a moment,” she insisted, already uncorking a bottle with her unharmed hand.
Gabriel grimaced, knowing that this was a battle he would lose with Nathalie’s stubbornness. “Stay here and elevate it once you’re done. I’m going to retrieve the kwamis.”
He sighed, frustrated and concerned as he descended into the atelier. It would have been preferable to have Nooroo with them as they experimented with the unknown potions, but they had decided that Duusu’s presence would have been too distracting. The best way to keep Duusu away and preserve some silence was to send Nooroo with her. Now, however, Gabriel was regretting the decision.
“Nooroo,” Gabriel called as soon as he rose up from the floor.
His kwami rushed to him obediently, Duusu in tow. “Master, what is it? Was your experiment successful?”
“Oooh, what did it do?” Duusu chimed in before he could answer. “I bet there’s all kinds of fun magic in that old book. Maybe you can change color. Maybe you can fly!” she squealed, demonstrating loops in the air.
Gabriel decided to ignore her, instead answering Nooroo, “Not exactly. There was a little hitch.” He grabbed a first aid kit and turned back to the portrait of Emilie, ready to push the buttons. “Come,” he ordered.
Nooroo followed him to the lift, and unfortunately, Duusu did as well. They ascended into the attic to find Nathalie’s back turned to them.
“Are you done?” Gabriel asked, anxious to get a bandage on her finger or possibly even some stitches.
“Almost,” she replied.
Gabriel approached to see how much blood she had procured. He was sickened to find it filling the entire bottom of the bottle. “We don’t need that much,” he snapped, reaching to take it from her. At the last second, he remembered the danger of potentially touching her, and he drew his hand back quickly. He turned around, saying, “Nooroo. There’s a slight problem.”
“Yes, Master?”
“There was a mishap with the potion, and whatever it is, I seem to be under its effects. Is there any precedence for something like this being spread through contact?”
“No, not that I’m aware of,” the kwami said. “My holders have used many potions in the past, and although the details were kept from me, I’m sure none of them were spread through touch. It should be safe.”
“Good,” he sighed, reaching to take the bottle from Nathalie.
“Wait—” she protested.
“That’s more than we need, Nathalie.”
“Yes, but think of next time,” she insisted. “And the time after that. It’s better to get a good supply now while we have the opportunity.”
“You’ve bled enough for me,” Gabriel said meaningfully, referring not only to their current situation, but to all of Nathalie’s many sacrifices in battle over the past several months.
That seemed to do the trick, causing Nathalie to go quiet and release her hold on the bottle, seemingly understanding the deeper meaning he’d imbued in his words. He picked the cork off the table and went to work at sealing the bottle, too embarrassed by his heartfelt statement to look at her.
Duusu broke the silence by asking, “So what did the potion do to you anyway? You look fine to me.”
“Nothing yet,” he said. “Except… well…”
“It’s causing him to sparkle,” Nathalie cut in.
“What? No, it’s not!” Duusu squealed.
Nooroo flew in close, examining Gabriel’s face and peering into each of his eyes. He floated back a few feet and said, “I don’t see any signs of it.”
“I can’t turn it on and off,” Gabriel snapped. “It happens when it happens.” He shook his head. “It’s hardly of any importance; attending to Nathalie’s finger is a higher priority at the moment.”
“It’s fine, Gabriel,” she said softly.
“No, it’s not,” he insisted, clearing a good section of the tabletop off. “Sit,” he instructed, gesturing to the empty space.
Nathalie was quiet as he opened the first aid kit and pulled out supplies. “First of all...” he said, mostly to himself. He took a few wipes out of their package, and he began to clean up the blood that had run down Nathalie’s wrist and the beginning of her forearm. Slowly and carefully, he worked his way up to her finger, making sure not to touch the wound itself.
“At least it’s congealing,” he said. The thought made his stomach roll uncomfortably, but for the most part, the determination he had to complete his task distracted him from his disdain. He readied an alcohol pad. “I’m about to sterilize it,” he warned. “It’ll sting.”
As he brought the pad to her cut, she hissed with displeasure, but she remained otherwise still and stoic, allowing him to clean it.
He was able to see that it wasn't quite as bad as he had feared, but it was still a nasty cut. “What were you thinking?” he chided. “I’m afraid if I didn’t stop you, you would have cut down to the bone.”
“Don’t be absurd,” she scolded back. But after a pause she admitted, “I was thinking it would be ideal to only go through it once, especially with your aversion to blood, sir. I suppose I did go overboard.”
“That was thoughtful, but unnecessary,” he said, his face heating up now that his weakness had been spoken aloud. “As you can see, I’m perfectly capable. Thankfully, it’s not so bad that you’ll need stitches,” he said, glancing up.
Nathalie’s eyes widened, and then she failed to stifle a giggle.
“It’s happening again?” he sighed, guessing that his unfortunate glimmer was back.
“Ooh, Mister Gabriel! You look so pretty,” Duusu exclaimed.
Gabriel shook his head, turning his attention back to the butterfly bandages he was applying.
“Aw. It went away.”
“Very interesting,” Nooroo said. “The timing seems odd.”
“It never lasts for long,” Gabriel replied, grabbing a piece of gauze.
“I’m sorry,” Nathalie said as he wrapped up the rest of her finger. “I know it’s serious; I shouldn’t be laughing.”
Truthfully, however, Gabriel wasn’t bothered. It was preferable that the only effects they were aware of so far were harmless and comedic in nature. “I don’t mind,” he said simply, rising to his feet. Nathalie stared at him with the same look again, and he couldn’t help but smile as she burst into giggles again, warmed by the welcome sound of her laughter.
Of course, the issue was serious, and they would have to solve their dilemma sooner than later. “Nooroo, I don’t suppose you’re familiar with the effects of this potion?” he said, breaking off to look at him.
“No, Master,” he answered. “Potions and power-ups aren’t meant to be made in front of us kwamis. And I can’t say I’ve seen any sparkling before.”
“Very well,” Gabriel grumbled. “Nooroo, Duusu, you may go,” he dismissed, turning back towards the table to clean up some more.
“What now, sir?” Nathalie questioned once they were alone again.
Gabriel paused, adjusting his tie as he thought. “Although we don’t know which recipe corresponds to which, we do have a complete list of potions, correct?”
“Yes, that’s accurate,” Nathalie said. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her swipe through the notes with slightly less dexterity than usual, her bandaged finger clumsily interfering.
“In that case, we’ll need to go through and see if any of them seem to have a relation to what I’m currently experiencing,” he decided, clearing up the last of their supplies. “And we should begin to take note of how often the effects occur and how long they last.”
“Of course, sir,” Nathalie responded. Gabriel put the last ingredients away and turned back to face her. “Do you feel any different than usual, aside from the sparkling?” She looked up from the tablet. “—Which is happening again, by the way.”
“No,” he said. “I feel entirely normal. Which means that, thankfully, we’re not dealing with a dangerous potion like we thought we were.”
“It doesn’t make sense,” she remarked, frowning. “How did we give blood and end up with glitter? What kind of spell is this?”
They worked their way down the extensive list, proposing different theories as they went. Unfortunately, their speculations didn’t narrow it down by much. The unmatched potions had a decent mix of positive and negative outcomes, and even some of the spells with negative outcomes could have the illusion of something more benign. They quickly realized they would have to comb through the purpose of each potion carefully and even test Gabriel’s reactions.
Bit by bit, options were weeded out. A few quick and purposely invasive questions from Nathalie ruled out the possibility of a truth serum. A few tries by Gabriel to turn invisible proved fairly effectively that it wasn’t that either, though he did sparkle several times in the process. Attempts to change form went about the same, proving that it wasn’t a shapeshifting potion.
It took almost a full hour to determine in all certainty that they weren’t dealing with a weather control spell, when Gabriel nonchalantly wished for rain to quench the dry air and, eerily enough, drops started falling from the sky. Subsequent thoughts of sun and snow, however, proved that it was mere coincidence.
The day dragged on as they ruled out spell after spell, curse after curse. The mystery potion wasn’t a good fortune spell, or a bad one. It wasn’t a glamor spell, despite the appearance. For a moment it seemed that it could be a mind reading spell, but that was soon disproven as well. It had been easy to infer what Nathalie was thinking when she was focused on her worry on Gabriel, but eventually he told her to think of something more private and unexpected. Judging by her blush and relieved sigh, he guessed incorrectly.
They were just about to test out the possibility of telekinesis when Nathalie drew in a deep breath, clutching the table for support.
“Nathalie,” Gabriel murmured worriedly, setting aside the objects he had begun to lay out for their next trial. He approached carefully, bringing a concerned hand to her back. “Are you alright?”
“I’m fine,” she said quickly, brushing him away. Her eyes were squeezed shut, and she pinched the bridge of her nose with her uninjured hand. “I have a headache, that’s all.”
“I think you should rest,” he argued, noticing with alarm just how far the sun had traveled across the sky. They had been on their feet for hours, not taking a single break to sit, or even to eat or drink. “You’re still healing from the damage of the miraculous.”
“I know, but we can’t stop until we fix whatever is going on,” she insisted, standing up straight once more. “I’ll be okay; I just need to...” she trailed off, swaying on unsteady feet.
Gabriel rushed forward and broke her fall, managing to clumsily catch her as she made her descent. “Nathalie?” he cried, fearful that all her great strides in recovery had been flukes, little glimmers of false hope. Her skin felt too cool under his fingers, which roamed across her cheeks in an attempt to wake her.
She groaned, moving her head, and he breathed a sigh of relief that there was at least some level of responsiveness. “I’m sorry, I should have been more cognizant of how long we’d been standing,” he said, brushing her hair back. “We can’t push you too hard.”
“I’m okay,” she mumbled, blindly reaching out to him. “Just need a moment.”
“More than a moment, I think,” he asserted. “Once you’re no longer lightheaded, I’m bringing you down to eat and rest. I’m sure the blood loss only made matters worse.”
“You’re right, sir,” Nathalie admitted, her closed lids fluttering as she spoke. “But I still want to help. If anything happened to you, especially after my mistake, I couldn’t live with myself.”
His heart skipped a beat at her candid declaration. “I don’t think we’re dealing with anything nefarious,” he assured her, once he caught up with himself. “If the worst effect of this potion is some sparkles, I should be in the clear.”
Gabriel shrugged off his jacket and rolled it up to put under her head. He sat silently with her and grabbed her hand, rubbing what he hoped were soothing circles into the back of it as she rested and regathered her strength. After a few quiet minutes, she took in a deep breath and blinked her eyes open.
In his peripheral vision, he could see that his arm was sparkling again, but this time, he couldn’t drag his focus away to look at it, his gaze captured by Nathalie’s blue stare. Something stirred in the back of his mind, quickening his pulse and making him grow warm. There was a grand, heavy feeling inside of him, like the weight of some crucial knowledge that his body had discovered but his mind had yet to catch up to.
“What is it?” she wondered. “You look alarmed.”
Startled by the low, curious tone of her voice, he glanced away and murmured a terse “Nothing.” His eyes landed on their clasped hands, and the glitter speckling his skin disappeared once again. His thoughts raced as he noted the suspicious timing. “I’m merely wondering what that potion might have been.”
“We’ll find out soon,” she assured him.
“I know. But first, you should eat something. Are you okay to stand?”
“I think so.”
She rose slowly to her feet, and he held her arm to brace her when she briefly swayed. Gabriel sucked in his breath the second she was leaning against him, noticing the pinch in his chest as his heart skipped a beat – a pinch of fear, he told himself.
Once steady, she bent over to pick up his jacket off the floor. “Here.” When Nathalie lifted her eyes to his own, a faint smile crossed her lips. He was sparkling again. He’d lost track of how many times it had occurred hours ago, but thinking back now, he was remembering several instances where eye contact may have initiated the effect.
It seemed foolish now that he hadn’t noticed the pattern before, especially as he thought back to one trial that he and Nathalie had conducted earlier in the afternoon. He had held her gaze for a prolonged amount of time as they tested out the possibility of a mind reading potion, and sure enough, he had glimmered the entire time with a multitude of sparkles that had materialized on his skin, refusing to blink out until he brought his eyes back down. That incident had brought them both astray, leading them to believe that there was some mental connection that Gabriel simply hadn’t honed yet, and when they did finally cross mind reading off the list, they did so unassuredly, feeling as if they’d missed an important clue.
Now, of course, it was plain to see that the eye contact played a clear role in his symptoms, but only with one particular person. Both Nooroo and Duusu had met his gaze without any fanfare. Only she had this peculiar effect on him.
It should have been obvious at that time that this had something to do with Nathalie. He wondered if she’d noticed. If she did, she said nothing. Maybe, she hadn’t known what to make of it.
Or maybe, just as he was feeling now, the obvious implications had uneased her, causing her to push them from her mind.
“Nathalie,” he said, “Go, get some food and rest. I will continue working to figure this out.”
She appeared doubtful. “Perhaps, you should take a break as well.”
“No, I’ll be fine. The sooner this is over with the better. Besides, I’d prefer to not still be sparkling by the time Adrien returns from school,” he replied, looking intentionally towards the table where their supplies were still laid out.
“Very well. Good luck, sir.”
He was all too aware of her fingers uncurling from around his arm and the sound of her footsteps retreating towards the lift platform. He glanced back only when she began her descent, catching the glint of soft silver light on the pool of her iris, the reluctant reassurance of her parting smile.
He ceased to sparkle right as her head dipped below the floor, taking her gaze out of view.
It was just their luck that Fu’s translations were such a disorganized mess. Gabriel assumed it was intentional, that the old guardian had provided as much information as was necessary to suit his sufficient understanding of magic, and arranged it in such a way that only one as well-versed in the information as he could fully make sense of. Thus, the grimoire’s catalogue of potions was completely separated from the lists of ingredients. This had just been the beginning of their pursuit to match them.
Gabriel’s gaze skipped over the potions they had already tested out, and after a moment of scrolling, came to rest over the one he had been dreading to see.
Love potion.
He squeezed his eyes shut and set the tablet down, desperate to cool the warmth that had rushed to his cheeks.
It had to be, right? It was the only item on the list that could provide any explanation for why he quite literally glowed whenever he met Nathalie’s eyes. Of course, what didn’t make sense about it was that he had taken hours to notice, and Nathalie herself had failed to show any indication she recognized a change in his behavior.
“But there must have been,” he murmured aloud. His heart raced with that quiet knowledge at the back of his head, the knowledge he wasn’t letting himself hear. “There must have been,” he said once more, firmer, as if to obstruct those thoughts from being realized.
A change in the way he had spoken to her, perhaps, or looked at her, or smiled at her when he heard her laugh, a rare but charming sound; or a change in his reaction to her becoming weak several minutes ago. He recalled the surge of worry as she swayed, and how it deepened into dread when she briefly lost consciousness, the feeling of her bloodless skin under his fingertips softly grazing her cheek, how naturally, thoughtlessly they brushed at her hair, and…
Gabriel removed his glasses to press his thumb and forefinger into his eyes. Truly, none of that had changed. Those feelings were familiar, too familiar. The potion hadn’t made a difference, and if it was really a love potion, then that meant —
At once he turned his back on their table of supplies and stormed towards the lift, minding not the butterfly he hardly missed with the heavy thud of his shoe. His pulse raced as he descended through the dark, further from the magic, nearer to reality, the reality of the beloved wife long awaiting her deliverance from endless sleep by his eager hand. The sanctuary’s lights clapped on at the detection of Gabriel’s movement while he took long and quick strides across the iron bridge to reach her. The sooner he was at her side, the sooner he might find his head cleared of these troubling sentiments.
“Emilie,” he exclaimed once he was before her. From beneath the capsule’s glass surface, her benign smile shone back at him, the closest thing to a greeting he would receive from her as long as she was trapped in that dreadful stasis. He drew in a breath to continue his address but found the words would not come easily.
He was almost too terrified to speak, terrified that whatever affectionate words and eloquent promises he could make would ring hollow.
We’re doing everything we can to bring you back.
Gabriel spread his fingers across the glass. Some days, he’d open the capsule to warm her startingly cool hands between his own, but he could not bring himself to close that distance now. He tried to force his lips to form the words on his mind, but he remained silent. They weren’t true, were they? Miracle Queen’s failure had occurred weeks ago, and Gabriel had unleashed no more than a few akumas in that time. He hadn’t wanted to encourage Nathalie’s involvement. She was still recovering. Even with the peacock miraculous fixed, it wasn’t worth the risk. Was that really everything they could do?
And every akuma attack in that time had been pitiful. Safe. Predictable. He was thinking of Nathalie the whole time, somewhere below him, too eager for her own good. She had become his first priority. After repairing her brooch, he changed the combination on the safe to prevent her from getting to it before she was healthy again. She had watched him from a distance, exasperated but perhaps a little humored by his concern, judging by the glint in her eye that he remembered to this day.
Was that everything?
Gabriel smoothed out his jacket, imagining the flittering of sparkles across his clothes. All of this, too, was probably just some way to convince himself that they were working at it just as intently as before. As if a love potion was going to be useful in bringing Emilie back.
I miss you.
That much was true, he told himself. He missed the warmth at his side when he went to bed at night. He missed the fingers rustling gently through his hair in the morning, the soft palm on his face when he finally stirred awake. He missed the stain of lipstick on his coffee mug he was sure to find when he left it unattended. He missed loving arms around his neck for no reason and wordless conversations. He missed feeling whole again.
He missed being Gabriel Agreste. Just Gabriel Agreste.
No more Hawkmoth.
He was tired.
Something was lost. Mere feet away from her, he didn’t feel any closer to it now. He scolded himself. Loathed himself for a moment.
I love you.
Gabriel drew away, shaking his head in disbelief. He wondered, painfully, if he would sparkle could she open her eyes and stare back at him. Would he see the glow of his person in the reflection of the glass and be assured that his heart still remained with the one who had held it for so long? Or did the potion kill that love–?
He turned his back. His blood ran cold with horror. No. The potion didn’t kill anything, just as it hadn’t brought anything to life that wasn’t already living. It changed nothing of how he felt about Emilie. He hoped that naming the moment that his affections had shifted would somehow tell him how to shift them back, but there was no moment. There was no when. It had happened, and it was over, and Gabriel, with another shudder of dismay, quietly realized that he may not have wanted things to return to the way they were.
Was that the magic? This blasted contentedness? The calm of his passions beneath the turbulent surface?
“Emilie, I…” Gabriel struggled to speak once more, her name trembling between his lips. There was something stark and shocking about his mood; perhaps, it was the clarity of his mind, the absence of any feeling he could link to some unnatural source. He swallowed the tremor in his voice and tried again. “Emilie…I tried. I really did. I wish there was a way for you to know that.”
Hearing himself say it aloud drove a nail into his heart, this piercing, bitter pain. All those months of struggle didn’t feel like enough. Those hundreds of akumas, those numerous failed plans, those countless restless nights spent wondering what he could have done better, those terrible pangs of guilt and anger because every lost battle prolonged Emilie’s tragic fate – and it was his own fault that she wasn’t yet at his side again; none of that felt like enough to him as he stood face to face with this new possibility souring the back of his tongue.
But if it hadn’t been enough yet, would it ever be? Would any of that torment and rage and madness suffice to save her if it had fallen short so many times before? Gabriel did love Emilie, he knew he did if that sharp and heavy grief in his chest meant anything at all, but maybe that love had reached its limits, maybe it had hit a wall.
“I didn’t plan on any of this.” He spun back around to face her, features contorting in agony at the sight of that placid visage. She’d always been hard to look at, but it was different now. “I might have never noticed but for today’s turn of events. I cannot even give myself the credit by saying I would have realized it organically. This, this was a mistake. A mistake, darling. I swear it. I hope you could forgive me for a mistake. I doubt you could forgive me for…” His fingers hovered in midair, unable to settle upon the capsule now “…for not trying to fix it.”
Gabriel’s words escaped at the end of deep exhale, and the wind was thoroughly knocked out of his lungs for the next several moments.
He waited for his breath to return and told her, “I think I’m falling in love with Nathalie.
“No,” he said to himself, jerking his head in admonishment, “I am falling in love with her. I know I am.”
Somehow, Emilie’s silence pained him worse now than it ever had. Maybe it was because his gaze had fallen to the grass, away from her body, so it was easier to imagine her truly standing there, staring him down, absorbing this betrayal – wasn’t it a betrayal?
“I’m sorry,” he murmured, and tears blurred his vision. “I’m sorry. I never dreamed it would come to this.”
She couldn’t reassure him that she understood. She couldn’t tell him he was wrong.
“I’ve wanted this to be over for so long. I just didn’t think it would end this way.”
He sank to his knees and fell silent, unable to say any more. Nothing but the dull drone of the lights and occasional moan of the impressively structured underground filled his mind as he knelt there in the grass for what felt like hours, cradling his head in his hands. He was stirred at last when a butterfly came to a rest on his knuckles. Gabriel shook the delicate creature off his skin and noticed the gentle gleam of its pearl-white wings as it fluttered away. The faintest glimmer, which now provoked some kind of flutter of his own heart.
He thought of Nathalie. Gabriel pulled out his phone to find that only sixty minutes had elapsed since they had parted in the lair, which meant that it had been sixty minutes since he had last sparkled at the sight of her bright blue stare. There was still a potion to fix, and he was certain by now that Nathalie had finished her break and was looking for him.
A part of him wished she was at his side now, with her kind embrace cast around his shoulders. This was not nearly the first time he had been so filled with grief, so stricken with terror at the imminence of change, and it wouldn’t be the first time that her sympathetic touch could alleviate the worst of his misery.
Saying goodbye was always easier with someone to hold.
Goodbye. Gabriel couldn’t say it yet, not because he feared it would be hollow, but because he knew it wouldn’t be.
Instead he whispered, hardly loud enough for himself to hear, “Emilie, I would hate more than anything to make you wait for something that will never come.”
This mission of his, this long and arduous mission, had become a burden. He was strong enough to carry it once, but now…
“This isn’t what I want.”
I want peace. I want rest. I want…
Her.
How little he’d been able to bear the thought of losing her too, the woman who had been with him through it all, striving to make possible what simply couldn’t be. She’d been willing to give everything for it, every breath, every drop of blood.
She’d made this easier. Far from painless. But easier.
Gabriel rose to his feet. The butterfly had drifted towards the capsule and perched on the glass, opening and closing its wings as if to bid farewell. Emilie beneath it could offer no such goodbye. He regretted that most of all.
His pulse thundered in his chest as he crossed the bridge once more and returned to the lift. Now, to fix this sparkling.
Nathalie looked up as Gabriel ascended into the room. She spared herself a glance before she cast her eyes back down to avoid any further unnecessary contact. This gave Gabriel cause for concern; his already conflicted feelings having taken their toll on his mental health.
“Have you learned anything?” She asked, her brow furrowed in concern. Gabriel paused. Her question was expected, yet it struck him like a mallet. If he wanted to reverse the potion, then he should have told her what he found, but he realized he’d learned more than he was ready to admit. Seeing her now, her sharp glance aimed at the floor, her hair catching the afternoon light, everything he had planned to tell her died before it could reach his lips.
Gabriel shook his head. “No…nothing yet,” he lied, his hands falling into their natural position behind his back as if he could bundle up all of his confusing thoughts and feelings and hide them behind him. Careful that his voice betrayed no warmth, he asked her, “Are you feeling better?”
There was the faintest smile on her face. “Yes, sir,” she replied. “I’m ready to continue working this out if you are.”
He looked at the portrait of his wife, the woman he thought he had loved more than life itself. It felt wrong, like he was betraying her to be having these thoughts. He barely acknowledged his assistant, moving to do further research on the matter. A part of Gabriel almost hoped Nathalie wouldn’t find anything, and that they would be forced to let the effects of the potion wear off on their own. At least if he were to do that, he would be able to send her home and avoid her for the rest of the time. But as soon as the thought had crossed his mind, Gabriel regretted it. It wasn’t fair to be so hard on Nathalie for this. It wasn’t as if she knew she had accidentally doused him with a love potion.
“Should we try a different approach, sir?” The way she spoke nearly caused him to shudder. It almost sounded like she didn’t want to continue but was instead asking as a formality.
No, Gabriel thought to himself, I can’t let her know the truth. If Nathalie found out what the cause of this admittedly irritating sparkling was, Gabriel couldn’t even begin to imagine how she would react.
The best way to hide it was to continue as if nothing had changed. While they worked, he would gather the courage, or work out a solution, or find some way to settle his spinning thoughts. “No,” he finally responded, resolving to buy himself some time. “Let’s continue what we were doing before.”
“Fine,” she said. “Where should we start, then?”
The afternoon passed much the same as the first half of the day, except for the sparkling that punctuated every time that their eyes met. Gabriel, however, found himself unable to focus as it seemed like Nathalie was intentionally avoiding eye contact with him. Actually, she seemed to be actively trying to avoid being in his sight at all. He found it unnerving just how much he was impacted by her constant presence. It was almost like she had become a source of comfort, but now, she was drawing herself away from him when he needed her most.
She was truly his rock in the storm.
Gabriel shuddered at the idea. He thought back to the conversation he had… cut short with Adrien some time back. His son had implied that there was some kind of romantic attraction between the two of them, and he had exploded at the notion that somebody could ever take Emilie’s place, much less someone like Nathalie.
He had been so wrong. He needed her.
He needed to tell her.
“This isn’t working,” Gabriel said, gesturing to the list they had been working their way slowly down. He was going to reveal his secret. There was no other way around it. “And we don’t need it to.”
But his willpower and assuredness left him again as soon as he met her eyes, dying as quickly as it had arrived, even though their shared gaze lasted only for the briefest of seconds before she turned her head away, taking the glittering with her. The thought of letting her know became too much to bear as the full weight of it hit him — the explanation of it being a love potion, how he knew, and most dangerous of all, why he hadn’t changed at all under its spell, save for a bit of sparkle.
“I…” He floundered, not knowing how to follow up his bold proclamation. An idea took hold — a way that he could secretly create an antidote without having to reveal the terrifying truth to the woman he’d fallen in love with, who he wasn’t sure would accept his seemingly sudden change of heart.
Of course, it hadn’t been sudden at all, and he knew that. These new feelings had snuck up on him, taking hold while he was unaware, unobservant, and blind to the entire situation. But it was impossible to put into words, especially directly to the object of his affections. It was foolish of him to think he was capable of doing so.
“We should remake the potion,” he said, making the decision to use his newly-crafted cover for his secret task. “Properly this time. We won’t get anywhere with this unless we examine its properties.” The important part, of course, was that he finished his antidote before Nathalie could figure out what they had made, but he was fairly confident he could achieve it in time.
Nathalie stared intently at the table, and Gabriel could see a million gears turning in her head. He wished he had some insight into what she was analyzing, but the moment was short lived. She nodded, saying, “That’s a better plan.”
“Good. Start bringing out the ingredients,” he instructed, laying out a diversion. “I’m going to look over the recipe again.”
It was to his good fortune that while the love potion itself hadn’t been labeled, the antidote was. With a glance over his shoulder to make sure Nathalie was busy at work, he clicked on the recipe and did a quick scan of the ingredients. A strand of the victim’s hair. That was easy enough, and he quickly plucked one from the top of his head, stuffing it into his pocket. A dried maple leaf. Also simple; they’d collected an assortment for the original potion, some fresh and some dead. Mint extract. A broken chain. Apple seeds. Crumpled paper. Those would be harder to sneak into his workspace, but all of them were hanging around the house in one form or another.
He scrolled back to the love potion recipe and walked back to the table. As if knowing instinctively that he needed privacy, Nathalie edged away, saying, “I need to double check the ingredients again. To make sure we have everything we need.”
“Of course,” he dismissed, taking the opportunity to grab mint extract and some paper from the lower shelf, quickly hiding it on his side of the large bowl. Two ingredients down. He’d have to go downstairs for the other two, but he wasn’t sure how he’d get the seeds quickly enough to avoid suspicion.
In the meantime, while he figured it out, he sorted through their maple leaves, trying to find the driest one they had. He finally came across one that was brown and papery, perfect for his task.
But before he knew it, Nathalie was standing over him with a disapproving look. “We need a fresh one,” she said, plucking the leaf out of his hands and laying it at her own workstation. He grimaced, wondering how he could find another under Nathalie’s watchful eye.
Perhaps he didn’t have to. He could grab his back at the last minute before making his antidote.
“Here,” Nathalie said, producing a fresh leaf. “Burn this. I’ll get started on the rest.”
He did so as she mixed together the first ingredients, watching to see if he’d have a moment to steal back his leaf. Unfortunately, it seemed unlikely with Nathalie glancing at him from the corner of her eye, watching his hands as he worked.
Finally, the leaf caught flame in spite of its freshness, and soon it was reduced to ash. Nathalie walked over to him, a critical look in her eye despite the fact that her gaze was directed above him.
“What?” he asked.
“You have ash in your hair, Gabriel,” she chided gently, reaching up to brush at it. He winced as he felt a twinge. “I’m sorry,” she gasped, drawing her hand back. “You got caught on my nail.”
“It’s fine,” he dismissed, apple seeds at the forefront of his mind once more. How many did he need, again? “You deal with the ash; I have to check the recipe again.”
He looked over the antidote recipe, moving quickly in order to not raise suspicion. Five. That was all he needed.
Nathalie had not dealt with the ash yet, oddly enough, but it was the perfect opportunity for him to derail her a bit. “Merde,” he swore, intentionally bumping into the table and dispersing the ash. “We need another leaf.”
Nathalie glanced away. “Okay, I’ll let you do that. Let me check something.” She went back over to the tablet, and as she was preoccupied, he took his dried leaf from her place and put it back in his own.
A glint of silver caught his eye, and he moved ingredients around to discover one of the boxes of supplies was latched with a chain. He looped his fingers around it, and grimacing as metal dug into his skin, pried it apart from the wood.
It was a short chain — too short to break — but it was unlooped, just a single strand. It was possible that it would be enough, but he had to be sure. Brushing past Nathalie as she made her way back to the table, he rushed back to the tablet.
His heart jumped in his throat as he took in the image on the screen. The tablet was already showing the antidote. Had he forgotten to scroll back up? If he had, why hadn’t Nathalie said anything?
“Gabriel!” Nathalie exclaimed, looking up from her hunched position at the table’s lower shelf. “Careful you’re looking at the right page; I think I clicked something as I set it down.”
His heart slowly settled. It was just an odd coincidence. “Yes, thank you,” he said.
He came back to the table, turning over in his mind how he would get downstairs for the remaining items. Nathalie was still shuffling around, searching for something, but as Gabriel looked around the surface of the table, he noted that everything the love potion needed was already laid out.
“Nathalie,” he interrupted, laying a hand on her shoulder. “What are you looking for?”
Shockingly, she flinched away from him, leaving him wondering if he’d done something wrong. “The blood,” she said, in spite of the fact that it was up on the table, right in front of her.
“It’s here,” he pointed out. His brows drew in in concern, worrying that perhaps she was becoming ill again.
“Sorry, not blood,” she said, shaking her head. “I meant… I meant…” She glanced up, eyes locking in on his workstation. His blood ran cold, instantly recognizing that he had been caught. “Mint. Sir, why do you have mint extract?”
“I… well…” He coughed, searching for an excuse. “I was just getting it out of the way.”
“Oh,” she said, reaching to grab it. Gabriel caught her wrist, stopping her. “Gabriel, what are you doing? You don’t need it.”
“Neither do you,” he argued, noting how her fingers curled tighter around the bottle. Confused, he took his other hand to lift her chin and realized that she was stubbornly refusing to meet his eyes.
He instantly drew back, pieces falling into place. His eyes skirted across her workspace, taking it in properly for the first time. A few pieces of silver-blonde hair caught his eye, as well as a necklace Nathalie had been wearing earlier in the day, now snapped in half. “You know,” he sighed.
She flinched, finally making eye contact. She almost looked hurt. “You know.”
“Yes,” he confirmed.
“For how long?” His eyes searched for answers from her as she looked away again, taking the sparkling with her.
Nathalie sighed. “I figured it out shortly after I left to rest,” she admitted, staring at her feet. “I noticed the pattern, connected the dots. And when you’d gone to talk to...well, I found the love potion and the antidote in the translations. I guess like you did.” Gabriel let go of the breath he had been holding, crossing his hands behind his back.
“That’s…” he trailed off, taken aback by her admission. It didn’t sound at all like her to hide something so crucial, but then again, he’d done the very same. “So this entire time, you knew I was under the effect of a love potion, pretending nothing had changed?” He winced, noticing that the words came out far more accusatory than he had intended them to be.
Before he could apologize, however, Nathalie jumped to a frantic defense. “Because nothing has changed. You haven’t acted any different in that time. I didn’t know how to bring it up to you.” She fired back, keeping her shoulders set.
“What did you think I would say?” he questioned, keeping his voice level, but the truth was he was desperate to know. He set his hand gently on his shoulder, prompting her to raise her eyes back to his own. His arm and hand glittered, almost as intensely as her eyes did.
“I...I don’t know. I suppose if I was wrong somehow, I wouldn’t have wanted to make an accusation like that,” she murmured. To his surprise, she set her hand on top of his, making his heart leap. “What did you think I would say, Gabriel?”
He took a step closer, and Nathalie went rigid under his touch. Her gaze flickered. “I don’t know either,” he admitted, his voice low, “but I would have hoped that you would have been...pleased.”
“Pleased?” she echoed, stunned. Her fingertips lingered on his knuckles for a few more seconds before something dark crossed her face and she turned briskly away from him. “Oh, listen to yourself. You have changed. We should finish this antidote. We have everything we need now.”
Gabriel’s heart sank. He hung back wordlessly as Nathalie put together the mixture, feeling wounded and broken. He must have been such a fool to hope that she could be happy with this, happy with him.Now, this was his last chance to prove that nothing had changed since he started this whole venture, but he was doubtful that the results would be what he was hoping for. He resigned himself that he would have to tell her the truth, and when she rebuffed his newfound, long ignored affections, he would offer her the ability to leave. It was only fair.
A few moments after drinking the antidote, Gabriel met Nathalie’s eyes and breathed a sigh of relief when he didn’t sparkle. He looked at his hands, his mind racing. Just as expected, he didn’t feel any different. He gave Nathalie a cautious glance.
“It’s over,” he murmured, setting the vial down. He didn’t look up to see the look on his assistant’s face. He was sure she was still upset about their exchange earlier, so it was a welcome surprise when she finally spoke.
“Do you feel any different?” Her voice was quiet, careful.
“No” Gabriel shook his head. “I don’t.”
“I—-I don’t understand,” Nathalie paled and began digging through the file, hoping to find something they had maybe missed. “We did everything exactly according to the instructions. There’s no way that it—-”
Gabriel placed his hands over hers, stilling her frantic search and pressing the tablet back down to the table, carefully considering his next words.
“I don’t feel any different because… I already felt something for you, Nathalie.” He admitted, trying to muster the courage to meet her eyes. “I began feeling this way some time ago and I just didn’t realize it until now, or I wanted to hide it behind just taking care of you out of obligation.” He paused for a moment. Nathalie was looking at him in utter shock, and he turned away, burned by the heat of her stare. He tried to put up armor around his vulnerable heart, quickly continuing, “I know you don’t feel the same and I have complete understanding if you decide you no longer wish to continue our working relationship. I’m more than willing to provide you a good reference.” He trailed off when he felt a hand on his cheek, guiding him to look back at her.
“I don’t think this development is any reason to sever what we have, sir.” Nathalie’s sea blue eyes pierced his own. “I just want to be sure that’s really what you feel… because I care deeply for you as well. I have for a long time,” She admitted almost ashamedly as she let her hand fall to her side.
“You have?” he exclaimed, wanting to hold her as she pulled herself away from him. “I don’t understand. You were so reluctant to believe me when I revealed my feelings for you.”
“Only because I didn’t want to take advantage if the potion had actually had some effect,” she insisted. “And because as much as I wanted it to be true, Gabriel, it didn’t make sense.” Her shoulders released down. “If I’m honest, it still doesn’t. I’m very… confused by all of this. For so long, the very core of our relationship has been rooted in our goal to bring Emilie back. In some ways, I feel like it’s become our entire identity.”
“It’s not,” he promised. “We are more than that, Nathalie.”
She looked at him sadly, and she confessed softly, “I just don’t want to be a consolation prize. I understand that I’m not Emilie.” She squared her shoulders, drawing herself up to stand taller and finally looking him straight in the eye. “And I won't apologize for not being her.” Gabriel stared at her, dumbfounded for a moment. His arms seemed to act of their own accord and pulled her into a tight embrace.
“I wouldn’t ask you to be,” he assured her. “I wouldn’t want you to be.” She allowed him to pull her closer, but he could still feel the tension built up in her shoulders and arms. “I’ve changed in more ways than you might believe,” he revealed. “There are thoughts I would have never considered months ago that are now more certain to me than anything else. It may be hard for you to believe, but I’m moving on. I wasn’t even aware as it was happening, but it is clear to me now.”
She finally relaxed into his embrace. “Gabriel,” she murmured softly into the crook of his neck.
“My Nathalie,” he said back as he rested his head on top of hers. “I can’t believe it took a rogue love potion for me to realize what was right in front of me. Can you forgive me for being so foolish?”
Nathalie’s hand came up to cup his cheek and he paused, following the movement as she guided his jaw down and pressed her lips softly against his own. Gabriel froze for a brief moment, weighing his options, before he returned her kiss and relaxed his hold to allow her to rest more comfortably in his arms.
It lasted no longer than a few seconds. Nathalie pulled back, briefly catching his glance before her cheeks flushed pink and she turned away. Gabriel’s face was also growing warm. He stepped back and pursed his lips, still feeling the pressure of her own upon them while his gaze fluttered nervously across the room.
“I, uh…” He cleared his throat, folded his hands behind his back.
“I’m sorry, that was too forward of me,” she murmured quickly. “I probably shouldn’t have—-”
“No, it’s okay.”
“That was just my way of saying…” She sighed deeply and faced him again. “Of course, I forgive you.”
Gabriel smiled. Slowly, he offered his hand, which she took in her own, and pressed gentle circles into her skin. His heart raced. The squeeze of her fingers filled him with joy.
Nathalie was still looking intently in his eyes, and for a moment, he felt as if he should have still been sparkling, as it would match the dancing joy inside of him. The sensation only increased as Nathalie drew close once more and brought her hand to his face, tracing delicately over his features with her fingers. He stood still, allowing her to stroke across his brow, over the bridge of his nose, down his cheek.
“What is it?” he whispered, his tone acknowledging that there was something important in her actions as she ran her thumb along his jaw.
“I just can hardly believe it,” she told him. “I never thought we could end up here.” A smile crinkles her eyes. “How did you…? When did you…?”
“I wish I could tell you,” he murmured, pulling her into his arms once more. “I don’t remember where I was when the feeling changed.” She came up for another kiss, and he whispered into her lips, “All I know is I’m glad it did.”