Midnight Soul

by Kristen Ashley

  “We did not earn that treasure,” he retorted.

  “Fine, if you believe I did, then it’s mine to do with as I wish and I wish to share it with you. And,” I said my last word tersely, “if you refuse it again, then I’ll bestow it on Timofei, then, when he or she arrives, I’ll bestow more on your unborn child. That you cannot refuse.”

  He scowled into my face for a long moment before he muttered, “You’re very stubborn.”

  “Do not say this as if you haven’t known it about me the extent of your life,” I returned.

  He looked to the treasure displayed.

  I waited.

  My brother said nothing.

  I grew impatient.

  “I’ve just decided to visit a goldsmith and have him immediately begin work on a set for Brikitta, earrings, necklace, bracelets, rings, at least one hundred Sjofn ice diamonds, with perhaps a few Korwahkian gems thrown in,” I declared.

  Kristian looked to me, grinning and shaking his head.

  “You’ve always been impossible,” he declared.

  I tossed my head. “A trait of which I’m most proud.”

  His next came abruptly, with no warning.

  Though, even warned, it was one thing all my life I knew I could never endure without breaking.

  “You know I love you.”

  I took a small step back.

  My brother did not take this nonverbal cue.

  “From the first memory I have of you, I fell in love with you. As a child, you were so beautiful, dazzling, and that never changed. And even then, I felt your strength.”

  “Please, Kristian,” I whispered.

  “I would not be here without you.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “You know it is. My mind would have broken. They’d have driven me literally mad.”

  I shook my head. “Kristian, don’t.”

  He ignored my plea.

  “I will love you until my dying breath. And I will tell my children stories of your courage and strength and the depth of love you had for me so often they will love you until their dying breath. And they will share this with their children in a way that the name Franka Drakkar will never die, but will be spoken with devotion and reverence until my line ceases to exist.”

  I felt them, cold and wet, hovering on my cheekbones. The burn in my throat threatened to consume me as I fought to keep them back, but I failed.

  They fell down my cheeks.

  “Please go to this other world and find happiness, sister,” Kristian whispered.

  I nodded, swallowed, and more tears fell.

  He opened his arms and continued whispering.

  “Now please come here so I can hold you.”

  My feet moved me directly to him, right into his arms.

  They closed around me.

  The instant they did, the sob wracked through me.

  It was painful, pain so deep, there was no cure.

  And it was cleansing, a clean so thorough, I’d never, not once in my life, felt so pure.

  “I wish I had magic like you do,” he said into the top of my hair. “I’d wipe away the scars that mar your beauty with ugly memories and remind you that you were never allowed to be happy. Doing this making you believe you have that right and you should reach for it.”

  “Y-you…m-must…stop,” I stammered through my weeping.

  “For you, Franka, I will stop.”

  And he did as promised, holding me as the wet poured forth. Years of tears I was not allowed to shed, I did so, letting them leak into my brother’s shirt, dousing it, giving him the privilege for once, of returning the favor and absorbing my pain.

  When I quieted to unladylike hiccoughs I didn’t have the energy to feel mortification over, his arms tightened and he said quietly, “You give Brikitta and I what you wish to give from your treasure, love, and we’ll accept it with glad hearts.”

  I nodded.

  One of his arms left me so he could put a fist light to the underside of my chin. He leaned back as he lifted it and looked down at me.

  “I shall call Josette to see to you. Would you like me to share with the others that you’ll need to miss drinks and will join us at the dinner table?”

  This meant I looked a fright.

  Gods.

  I nodded again.

  He smiled at me tenderly. Shifting his fist so his hand cupped my jaw, he swept his thumb through the wet there. Once he’d done this, he bent and touched his lips to my forehead.

  He straightened, gave me another squeeze with his one arm and held me steady until I made a slight move to share I was all right to stand on my own.

  He let me go and went to the cord that would send Josette to me.

  He pulled it and moved to the door.

  Stopping at it, he turned to me. “I’ll see you at dinner, sister.”

  I again nodded and replied, “You will.”

  Another tender smile before he started to close the door behind him.

  “Kristian,” I called.

  He stopped and tipped his head to the side.

  “You know I love you too,” I told him.

  He stood solid in the doorway, eyes on me, and I watched them grow bright with wet.

  I also watched the one tear fall.

  And I heard the hoarse of his voice that was so beautiful, if it held healing power, the scars on my back would vanish in but an instant, when he replied, “That, my beloved sister, you truly must know I always, but always, knew.”

  And on that, he shut the door, disappearing behind it.

  * * * * *

  Averting my face from Noc (who was my dinner partner, again) an hour later, with Josette’s assistance, feeling and more importantly looking refreshed, I sat down at the table as Noc held my chair.

  Regardless, I averted my face, for I looked refreshed but Noc had a way of seeing beyond the surface, and tonight of all nights, this was something I didn’t wish him to see.

  I busied myself with my napkin, my jaw tilted away from him as Noc took his own seat.

  My efforts were instantly foiled when he barely got his arse in his chair before his lips were at my ear.

  “Baby, what the fuck?”

  Damn.

  And he hadn’t even properly seen me!

  I smoothed my napkin over my lap.

  “Pardon?” I asked with an effort at innocently, failing miserably because this trait was something my parents stripped from me when I was five, so I had no idea how to pull it off.

  “Look at me.”

  Oh blast.

  I couldn’t demur, he’d force the issue. At the dinner table. And it was safe to say I’d already endured enough mortification at this dinner table.

  I turned to Noc and he pulled his head away while I did.

  His eyes traveled my face and I fought both a blush and shifting in my chair.

  He looked at me and his repetition was this time growled.

  “Baby, what the fuck?”

  “I’m returning to your world after Brikitta delivers my future niece or nephew safely,” I announced.

  Noc did one of those odd blinks that was slow and included his eyebrows lifting.

  “Say again?”

  “I’m going to your world,” I stated. “And when I shared this with my brother earlier, he and I had a…” I struggled to find a word, “moment. I found it…” more struggling, “affecting. I needed some time to collect myself. I’m collected. Now I need wine.”

  “Great. And now I don’t know whether to go high five Kristian for pulling that off or punch him in the face,” he declared.

  My shoulders straightened with affront. “Why would you punch him in the face?”

  “Because you look emotionally wasted by whatever was affecting and he was the one who did that to you.”

  “Noc—”

  “But you’re goin’ home with me so I should probably keep my shit.”

  “There’s no probably about that,” I stated tartly.

&
nbsp; Finally, the harshness in his face disappeared and he grinned.

  That was worse.

  Drat.

  I moved past that and queried, “What does ‘high five’ mean?”

  Inexplicably, he grabbed the wrist of the hand sitting in my lap and lifted it up in front of me.

  “Palm out, fingers straight,” he ordered.

  I did as told.

  He kept hold of my wrist, and with his other hand, slapped mine.

  I jumped in surprise at this preposterousness.

  He then slid the hand holding my wrist up so his fingers were laced in mine and he brought both our hands down to rest on the table, like we were lovers out at an intimate dinner by ourselves, not sitting at a table in a palace surrounded by royalty.

  By the gods.

  Bloody Noc.

  “High five,” he declared.

  “Pardon?”

  “Five fingers, slapped high, high five.”

  Oh.

  Well that explained the name of said maneuver.

  But it did not explain the absurdity of it.

  “Why would one do that?” I asked.

  “To celebrate,” he answered.

  “You do know that’s absurd,” I shared.

  He grinned again. “You’re comin’ home with me, sugarlips. That means I’m gettin’ you into the Seahawks. We’ll be in Saints country, but you and me, we’ll keep our allegiance true. And when they kick ass, you’ll get the high five.”

  “You do know that all those words are understood by me and yet all of them are not.”

  His grin grew.

  I sighed.

  “Wine, milady?” the footman asked, and I pulled my hand from Noc’s to look over my shoulder at him.

  “Absolutely.”

  He nodded and poured. He barely got to Noc’s other side before I had a healthy dose down my gullet.

  I took the glass from my lips, drew in a large breath, let it go and relaxed.

  I ceased relaxing when Noc’s hand wrapped around my thigh under the table and squeezed.

  This was not bolstering, as Cora’s squeeze had been.

  It was something else entirely.

  “Pleased as fuck you’re comin’ home with me,” he declared, thankfully letting my thigh go.

  “Mm…” I murmured.

  “It’s gonna be culture shock, trust me, huge. But you’ll get over that and love it.”

  I hoped so.

  I said nothing and took another sip of wine.

  “Baby?” he called.

  I looked his way and nearly downed the glass at the happiness warming his face and making his handsome so much more handsome it was almost unendurable to lay witness to.

  “You made the right decision,” he decreed.

  “I hope so, Noc.”

  “I know so, Frannie.”

  I nodded.

  He smiled.

  Hesitantly, I smiled back.

  * * * * *

  Late that evening, after Josette had prepared me for bed and gone to seek her own, I stood in front of the mirror in the dressing room and closed my eyes.

  It had been so long since I’d tried this—and the last time I’d done it my mother had sensed it and punished me for it—I was quite certain it wouldn’t work.

  But I needed to do what had to be done and I’d made a variety of decisions that day.

  It was time to carry them all out.

  Therefore I sought it and it wasn’t hard to find, the quickening I felt in my innards, always there in truth, but vague, and it having been there for so long, I’d learned to live with the sensation.

  And ignore it.

  Now, I focused on it, and the instant I did, to my astonishment, I felt it sparking up my spine, the sensation like the light touch of a lover, stirring tickles of awareness all over my skin.

  I opened my eyes and saw the muted glow of the one lamp I’d lit had a sapphire, hue and the mirror in front of me had gone from clearly showing my visage to cloudy.

  “By the gods, it worked,” I whispered, staring at the clouds in front of me as they started to swirl, those too, tinted blue.

  I’d managed that, it was time to try my next.

  “I wish to speak to you,” I said into the mirror.

  I stood there and waited.

  The clouds swirled languidly.

  I waited longer.

  Nothing but clouds.

  Over time, I noted it was actually quite mesmerizing in a relaxing way.

  But after more time elapsed, I noted it was also quite boring.

  All right then, maybe it didn’t work.

  I started to turn away, seeing the tinge of blue in the room starting to dissipate when suddenly, the entire room turned jade green.

  My eyes flew to the mirror and I saw Valentine’s reflection there, not my own.

  “I’m impressed,” she declared.

  I’d done it!

  “This delights me, my sister,” she stated. “It would seem you do have some instinctual understanding of how to harness your power.”

  It seemed I did.

  Excellent.

  “I’m pleased you’re delighted,” I replied.

  “Though, I have things to do,” she told me. “And although I’m communicating to you on the astral plane, it is taking my attention and I wish my attention on something else at this moment. That something is very good at waiting. But I’m in the mood not to do the same. So you had something to share with me?”

  “Yes,” I replied. “I’ve informed my brother and Noc, and neither delayed in sharing it with the others that I will return with my brother and sister-in-law to their home, await the birth of their child and then journey to your world.”

  This reminded me I hadn’t spoken of any of this to Josette, including the fullness of understanding the parallel universes (something I knew she understood, of a sort, considering the twins wandering around the palace, something I had not gotten into with her in any direct way).

  Not to mention sharing with her I had magic.

  I needed to rectify that first thing in the morning.

  “But I must also note, where I go, if my maid agrees to go with me, she goes as well,” I added.

  “Of course,” Valentine murmured. “I’m pleased this has progressed.”

  I nodded. “And in an effort not to keep you, I shall also share that I’m agreed to learn how to use my magic and absorb what you stripped from my mother but only on the contingency that you assure me it is not tainted with her malice.”

  “Magic is never dark, Franka, only the bearer of it makes it so.”

  I found that most interesting.

  “So you have no fears with that and I’ll set up the ceremony as soon as I’m able,” she carried on.

  That made me somewhat anxious.

  Valentine sensed it, even through a mirror.

  “It will be glorious, Franka, and you will savor the memory of it until your dying breath.”

  I lifted my chin. “Then I look forward to it.”

  “As do I,” Valentine replied. “Is there more?”

  Outside of wondering what an astral plane was, there was not.

  I could ask that later.

  “No, and I thank you for coming to me.”

  “To receive this news, it was my pleasure. Goodnight, chérie, and you know I feel this way, but I will say it again, you chose rightly.”

  With that, she faded from sight and her magic receded from the room.

  But I stood there staring into the mirror that was now just a mirror.

  And I did it hoping she was correct.

  * * * * *

  The next morning, first thing, before my breakfast tray even came, incongruously and in a way that would make my mother apoplectic and my father spit fire, I sat cross-legged on my bed opposite Josette, who was in bed and cross-legged as well.

  I did this sharing with her I held magic and informing her of how my future plans had changed and that I desired her to change her
s with me.

  “It’s unlikely we’ll be able to bring Irene,” I finished. “Though, it’s my understanding things are much different there so it’s also my understanding we won’t need her.”

  Josette simply sat still and stared at me.

  “Josette,” I called.

  She blinked but said nothing.

  “Josette, my dear,” I called again, reaching out and wrapping my fingers around hers.

  The instant I did, hers twisted and captured mine.

  “We’ll not have an adventure, we’ll have an adventure,” she breathed. “And how exciting! You’re a witch!”

  There were many witches in our world so I really had no concern she’d react badly to me being one.

  But I was so worried that she would refuse to undertake something infinitely unknown with me, the light I did not see was budding in her eyes bloomed, and I fancied it lit the room with its brilliance.

  “You’ll journey with me?” I queried to confirm.

  “Anywhere, Franka.” Her hand held mine all the more tightly. “Everywhere.”

  My heart felt light and thus, as I was learning happened, my mouth started moving.

  “I don’t know what caused you to gift me such loyalty, Josette, but what I want you to know is that it means much to me.”

  “My position means there were scars I could assist you with your clothing to hide from others, but you couldn’t hide them from me,” she shared readily.

  “I don’t…” I shook my head. “How did that gain loyalty?”

  Josette studied me with curiosity, asking me, “How would it not?”

  “Many people have many scars for many reasons.”

  “And all of them I admire,” she returned. “But you most of all for you lived your life and you did as you pleased and whatever caused those scars did not beat you. My father prized strength and taught my sister and me to do the same. He was himself so strong he refused to believe he could not save his family from icy waters. He didn’t stop believing, even dying because of it. This makes me sad. But that sadness has never cobbled me because I’m far more proud that he was that man and he died displaying that strength. And I didn’t allow it to cobble me for I knew if my father knew I had, he’d be disappointed in me. So,” she shrugged, “that’s it, I guess.”

  After this, it was I staring at her.

  “Oh no,” she whispered. “Are you going to become a simpering ninny? Because…you mustn’t, seeing as if you do, I will.”