by Lucy Auburn
"Time? Why not?"
The smile that turns up his lips is a little hopeful, and a little sad. "Your mother and I are ready to move on. Looking forward to it, even... though it may be a little difficult, now that her second husband is ready as well." He chuckles. "I suppose I'll have to get used to sharing her."
I very resolutely don't look at Grayson as he says this, thinking of my other three Conduits. "She always loved you best."
"I suppose. Though we've had very little time together, all things considered." Stepping towards me, his smile turns warm, and if it weren't for the slight haze around his form and lack of warmth or presence coming from him, I'd almost believe he was alive right now. "Tell me what you need, my dear."
"Answers." I hold up the pentagram necklace. "This was in a knife with your initials carved in it... why? What is it?"
"Ah, yes. Your mother told me that she kept that—though she seems to have misplaced it in a move. Apparently she hid it well even from herself." He studies the pentagram for a moment. "It's a symbol more than anything, an empty vessel that fills with power."
"Can it be used to defeat Marcus Junius Brutus?"
A grimace, and he shakes his head. "I'm afraid the object itself is mostly beside the point. It's about what it does... what it can do. I never fully figured that out before I was killed over it, but I'm certain it holds some key to ending Brutus's crude immortality."
"And Cleopatra?"
"She will die if he does. Their immortality is tied to each other—more accurately, he anchored her to him when he resurrected her body, because he was paranoid and afraid he would be betrayed by her at some point. Just as he was a traitor himself, he saw treachery everywhere he looked."
Not hard to imagine, given the most infamous thing he did was put a knife in the back of someone who trusted him. "So we just need to off him, and that'll take care of her too."
"Exactly. Which is why she's stayed by his side through the centuries, despite his less appealing qualities."
"How do you know all of this?"
"The main thing I studied when I was a member of the Shadow Fold was Brutus himself," he says. "Killing him was my biggest goal—an obsession, even, you might say. But he found me before I was able to complete the mission, and while my close friend Connor tried to take it up, he ran into issues as well. Every mistake I made, every time I didn't cover my tracks—Brutus found all of it. Just like he found out that your mother had my dagger the night he killed her, when it woke up and he realized death could still come for him. And the first thing he did was come for anyone who had touched the dagger."
Which included my stepfather, apparently. And now me—not that it matters much, since Brutus likely was already on my trail before I found it.
"Why not kill me, though?"
"Because you woke the dagger up the moment your powers were awakened from their slumber," he tells me grimly, "and just like you're the only one alive who can use that pentagram necklace now, you're also the only one whose blood and powers can destroy it forever."
Chapter 17
My mind reels, only to settle on one particular point that makes me burn with shame and anger. "So you're saying that my powers brought the dagger to life, which Brutus became aware of, which is the reason why he killed Mom... so this whole time, I'm the real reason why she died. Even though I didn't kill her myself, she'd still be alive if it weren't for me."
I can't stop thinking about the moment she took in her last breath. It'll be with me forever. And if what he's saying is true, it never had to happen in the first place.
The image of her in my mind feels so real that it's not terribly shocking when her spirit shows up as well, standing beside my father, her expression peaceful and open.
"You weren't responsible, Ellen," she says. "It wasn't your fault that I died."
"It feels like it was, though."
Grayson is the one who tells me, "It's easy to blame yourself. But you had nothing to do with it. More importantly, it sounds like you're the only one who can truly stop Brutus."
My heart wants to hold onto the guilt, and I know it'll take time for me to process this, but Mom looks so serene. So does—well, Dad. I can tell they're going to move on after this, which means my last moment with them is here, now. If I make this moment about me, I'll never really feel like I've truly said goodbye the right way.
"I promise that I'll avenge your murder... both of your murders. Marcus Junius Brutus will pay for what he did." Clearing my throat, I try not to get any more misty-eyed at the way they look at each other, so full of love, two sides of the same coin. "I wish we had more time together. But if you have to go... just know that I love you. Both of you. Even if I barely knew you. We never got to spend time together."
Vincent—Dad—smiles at me, and in his smile I see a reflection of myself. "Once you're on the other side of everything, like we are, I hope you're able to see that we have so much more time than we realize. You and I will be together one day, my darling girl. I hope it'll be a long, long time before that day comes, but I look forward to it with all my heart."
Each breath I take tightens my chest. "I wish I'd known you better."
"You can still get to know me. There are things I wrote down. Secrets I kept." He smiles a little, one side of his mouth lifting higher than the other. "Make your way into the Shadow Fold, and you'll learn more about me than you could imagine. Uh-uh," he shakes his head as I open my mouth, "I'm not going to spoil the surprise by telling you everything now. You're going to have to work for some things."
Ghosts. They just have to be mysterious.
Mom tells me, "You know I love you, sweetie. This isn't goodbye forever. It's just goodbye for now."
My heart feels like it's being torn in two. "Do you really have to go?"
"It's the only way," she says, sounding peaceful and distant. "I'm sure you'll be okay, my darling little girl. You always did have a fire within you. Don't forget to fight."
"I love you."
She takes Vincent's hand, and together they turn away, their forms fading as they take a few steps forward and disappear—into the unknown, where I can't follow. At least for now.
Grayson's hand is the only thing anchoring me to the real world. Otherwise I might try to chase after them into the great beyond. I can feel the ground tilt beneath me as two fat, miserable tears well up in my eyes and roll down my cheeks, but I manage to stay on my feet and resist the urge to fall on my knees.
"I know it's tough," Grayson says, his voice raw with an echo of grief, no doubt reminded of the moment his own family walked away from him as well. "You'll get through it, though."
"How? I don't know how to mourn something I never really got to have... a whole family, together and happy, taken from me just like that."
"There are other types of families," he says, sounding contemplative and quiet, his voice uncommonly gentle. "Families of circumstance. Close friends. Allies. Blood families aren't the only kind that can grant happiness and love. We all have to make the most of what we have... and let's face it, Ellen, neither one of us is alone in this. We might be one kind of orphan, but we'll always have each other."
Turning towards him, I don't resist the urge to get close anymore. I need him—need to feel his warmth, his presence, the very reality of his life beneath me as I press my palm to his chest and feel his heart surge towards my fingers. Every breath he takes is a reminder that even as one type of life moves on, another stays behind with me.
"I don't want to think anymore," I confess to him, staring up into his eyes and blinking away my tears. "I just want to feel... something. Something other than grief, preferably."
In a hollow voice, he asks, "Aren't you afraid?"
"Yes. Of everything. Needing you, wanting you..." His breath hitches beneath my palm, and I move close enough that our joined hands are pressed against our middles. "I'm afraid of not being able to let go. In the end, though, isn't everyone?"
"I know I am."
&
nbsp; "Then let's be afraid together."
We share a breath, then a kiss, our lips coming together like two old lovers greeting at sunrise after years apart. Kissing him feels like drinking sunshine and going a hundred miles an hour down a highway without guardrails, the wind whipping through my hair, untethered and unprotected from danger. Grayson kisses me like a dying man; he kisses me like a worshiper at prayer. He kisses me like he might never get to again.
I press up against him, slide my hands up to his shoulders, and meld into his warmth.
He brings his fingers down to my waist and explores the contours of my body beneath the thin cotton of my shirt, his mouth growing hungry, the kiss deepening until all I feel, taste, and see is him. Grayson, Grayson, Grayson. The bitter black-hearted boy who comes alive when I touch him.
I see him.
He feels no pain with me.
It was inevitable that this, here, now is how we come together, tears drying on my cheeks, his mouth trailing kisses down my skin, our touch never parting so we never have to let the darkness or the pain in between us.
It takes coordination to pull my shirt off, to grab his belt and remove it, to lower ourselves down to one of the practice mats, all without our fingers ceasing in their constant press and exploration, our mouths meeting between every gasping breath.
I want to curl around him, pull him into me, and never let him go.
Based on the raw, desperate look in his blue eyes, he feels much the same. His lips do little but kiss me, our constant jabs and bickering falling away as we find other ways to bond. I never would have thought at the start that I'd come to this moment with Grayson, wanting him closer than anything, desperate to be together and have it never end.
"You're stunning," he says, staring down at me and pushing stray blonde locks of hair behind my ears. "And I'm not just saying that because touching you is better than heroine."
I laugh. "You're handsome, and I'm not just saying that because touching you is the only way I can see your face."
"We're a real pair, aren't we?"
"A complete mess."
"I like us just the way we are, though."
"Me too—oh!"
I gasp as he sucks a kiss against the hollow of my neck, just above my collarbone, his touch precise, bringing just the right balance of pleasure and pain to my delicate skin. He brushes his fingers against the bottom edge of my ribcage, tickling me just a little, his touch moving higher up to the sports bra I threw on this morning without a care. Some part of me wishes that I'd gotten the chance to put on my best lingerie—mostly stuff that Eve put on her credit card for me—but the rest of me knows that Grayson was always going to see me like this, laid bare and true for him.
He moves his mouth up to the side of my neck and pushes his fingers beneath my bra. Arching beneath him, I stare up at the ceiling and marvel at all the little details I've never seen before, the recessed lighting and old popcorn texture, noticing the things that Grayson's touch makes possible. My eyes are hungry now in a way they never were before; what I once took for granted as a given is now a miracle.
Pressing his hips down towards me, his arousal clear, Grayson nips at the edge of my ear. I can feel the same desperate eagerness of his movements that I feel inside. It's not just lust or all this time spent waiting that drives him, but also the freedom he feels being without his weakness. His leg is sure and strong, his cane a forgotten unimportance laid aside, nothing between the two of us but the barest bit of air.
I grab his arm as he pulls my sports bra up over my head, keeping our touch intact every second. He presses his mouth against my jaw as I grab onto his waistband and unzip his pants, greedy hands searching for what lies beneath.
We're like two sides of the same circle, a snake eating its own tail, Yin and Yang curled up together. The thought of parting from each other is unbearable. I stare at him and he moves against me without pain, and together we let ourselves be needy and hungry, desperately addicted and unable to let go.
Our mouths meet as he pulls me up and onto his lap, his strength no longer held back by pain or weakness.
I break our kiss to memorize the lines of his face with my own eyes, reaching down to grab the hard length of his erection beneath tight briefs, enjoying the way his mouth jumps and his breath hitches at my curious touch.
"Do you think we could—"
"Right there is good—"
"Touch me here," I tell him, and he says, "Hold my hand."
Soon I've somehow lost my underwear and he's shimmied out of his pants, despite the lack of space between us, the way we slot together like we've never known a world where we were apart.
It's hard to imagine I ever thought of him as my enemy.
It's impossible to believe we ever could've stood on the opposite side of the same lines.
Especially because all our rough, broken edges meet together and make me feel whole.
He guides me into his lap and I wrap my hands around his waist. We lock eyes, and I tremble as I rise up, as he grabs his hard and yearning cock. I draw it into me slowly, enjoying every exquisite moment as it pushes past my lowers lips and pierces inside me. Grayson moans; I gasp. He rocks his hips up and palms the back of my neck. I lean my forehead against his and relax onto his shaft, which pushes me open wide, pleasurable and inevitable.
There's euphoric joy on his face.
I don't even realize until we're touching in every way that I forgot to put a barrier between us.
Freezing up, I lick my lips, and a shock of realization crosses his face. "Fuck," he mutters, staring around wide-eyed. "Oh, shit, Ellen—"
"I forgot too," I tell him, even as I instinctively clamp around his cock, which feels so warm inside me. "I should've realized when it felt this good."
"We can still get a condom," he tells me, sounding utterly unbothered at the thought of stopping now, even as his abdomen tenses and his balls twitch against me, his cock as hard as ever. "I don't want you to do anything you're uncomfortable with. There should be one in my pants, over there..."
Though I want nothing more than to keep going, I remind myself that what feels good isn't always wise, and I'm full to the brim with every hormonal bit of desire right now. It'd be best to make decisions with my head, not with my aching pussy, which wants to ride him all the way to both of our orgasms right around now.
So I let him slide out of me, hold onto his shoulder for balance, and lean across to pull his pants towards us. Grayson grabs a foil packet out of one of his pocket and prepares himself, his rock hard, aroused cock straining against latex. Then we're back in action again, this time without any worries.
Though there's a secret, insanely hormonal and horny part of me that wonders what would happen if we were to forgo any protection at all. I don't know if it scares me or excites me more—but the thought is enough to make me kiss him deeply as I dig my fingers into his shoulders and ride him for all he's worth.
I watch his face as I clench around him and push him to climax.
He grinds up into me as he puts his fingers on my clit and forces me towards the cliff of my orgasm.
We kiss. We groan. And moan, and pant, and dig our fingers into each other, intertwined in every way.
It's bittersweet when the waves of my orgasm descend on me and I tighten around him over and over again, feeling it as he fucks deep inside me and follows me over the cliffs.
The truth is, now that Grayson is deep within me, so deep I can't tell when he ends and I begin, I never want it to be over. I would do this with him again and again, until I was parched and hungry, until the sun set and rose a dozen times, just so I could watch his face as constant pain is replace by pure pleasure.
He moans my name as he comes.
I gasp and clench around him a final time, trembling all over.
His fingers cup my breasts. His mouth kisses me with warmth and hunger. I lift up and back down on him again, enjoying the remaining hardness of his still-twitching cock inside me.
&nb
sp; We don't speak as we fall down onto the exercise mat together. Just stare at each other. And clutch each other, skin to skin, naked and unaware of anything else going on around us. Someone could walk in at any moment, and I still don't think I would care enough to part from him.
He nuzzles my neck, murmuring, "Just for another moment..."
"Stay inside me," I tell him.
Eventually, his softening length slips out of me, and he skillfully disposes of the condom. I wrap my legs around him and press myself as close as I can get. His shaft stirs against me; my nipples press against his chest. Looking into his eyes, I memorize every shade of blue, the position of all the freckles in his iris, wanting to be able to dream of every inch of him.
When he breathes in, his chest presses against me, and I feel that much more alive.
As I lay down next to him with my arms loosely hugging around his shoulders, unable to part from his touch completely, I admit to myself that it's not just because our connection gives me sight again or makes me feel more powerful. It's not just my need for him that draws me close long after his breathing turns into the shallow draw of sleep, or even my desire for him that keeps me in contact with his body.
It's the fact that I'm falling in love, too.
Chapter 18
Mental Class with Professor Covington
Life as normal... or what passes for normal around here. The student body is still shell-shocked, and receiving what counts as therapy from Professor Killington, of all people. Despite the insane name, he's a certified counselor with an undergrad degree in psychology, and he's been guiding students through crying sessions and his unusual type of cognitive behavioral therapy. Apparently being in touch with his spiritual side has made the man a bit of an expert when it comes to helping students through extreme trauma.
There's a lot of that around here, but it's not going to stop Headmaster Shu from starting classes back up again. That includes me going back to my Affinities classes now that my powers have returned, this time with special dispensation to take Killer along with me as my seeing eye dog—much to his pleasure, given the number of scratches and bits of food scrap he's gotten lately.