by Eva Brandt
In the big picture, things could have turned out worse.
As I stood in the grand halls of the royal palace of Kerys, facing my dead wife, I tried to make myself believe that. I couldn’t manage it.
“Come now, Mathias,” Dahud said, extending her hand toward me. “Don’t look so dour. We’re together now. We’ve won and this is a celebration. Won’t you dance with me?”
She wasn’t real. I knew she wasn’t real. But she was right there in front of me, as beautiful as she had been the day I’d married her, with Declan and Darius by my side. Dressed in a white and gold gown that made her shine like a star, she was my dream and nightmare come true, my eternal torment and blessing, the hell I could never escape, and didn’t want to.
Her eyes glinted with the same madness she’d displayed when she’d brought down the walls of the palace on her people, at a time when I’d been too trapped in her curse to stop her.
“Won’t you dance with me?” she asked again.
“Of course, my queen,” I replied, because I’d never been able to deny her anything. I would’ve given her the world if it had been in my power.
Once, that had been my dream, to place the world at her feet and have her rule it. At the time, I’d truly believed that she’d be able to do a better job than the emperors of Rome or the leaders of the disorganized, angry tribes that fought against their occupation.
More than a thousand years later, I couldn’t care less about what happened to the world. I wanted her back so badly. And she was right there, except she wasn’t.
“You’re not real,” I told her as the invisible minstrels began to play a half-forgotten song. “You’re not here. You’re just a dream.”
“I’m just a dream because that’s what you want me to be.” Dahud laughed, not unkindly. She’d always been kinder than her people had realized, once she’d gotten the chance to experience emotion, at least.
“It’s not so simple. Nothing ever is, for me.”
Around us, shadowy figures danced, following the gentle tones of the melody. They were recreations of the same men and women Dahud had killed, but she paid them no heed. “What are you afraid of, Mathias?” she asked. “Why won’t you go claim what is yours?”
“It’s been so long,” I told her. “I never lost hope that I’d find you again, but every single time, the same thing happens. I failed you and our son. I failed us all.”
“The only way you’ll ever fail us is by giving up, Mathias,” she answered. “I believe in you. I always have.”
It was true, and I hated my stupid subconscious for mentioning that, when I knew I didn’t deserve the faith she’d placed in me.
In our first life, she’d never gotten the chance to see Alois grow up. It was a pretty recurrent theme. She and I hadn’t always met during our past lives, but the pattern always stayed the same. She’d always run into one or more of us. If it wasn’t me, it was Bjorn, Declan, Malachai, or Darius. Eventually, a baby would be born. It didn’t always happen, but when it did, that baby was always Alois. After the pregnancy, she would die, and the others would follow. I was the only one left behind, still trapped, still unable to die. For a little while, I’d have my son, but time, the curse, or one of my many enemies would find him. Once he died, we’d restart the circle.
It was all my fault. If I’d figured it out sooner, if I’d realized the truth, I could’ve maybe saved her. I’d failed back then and it didn’t seem like I’d do any better this time around.
Dahud brushed her fingers over my cheek in a painfully gentle caress. “You can’t blame yourself for what happened, Mathias. You’re not omnipotent. You couldn’t have known.”
“I should have. I was an idiot and you paid the price for it. We all did.”
She nodded, and I was glad that my subconscious image of her was as honest with me as she had been, in life. “We all made mistakes. But Mathias, that was a long time ago. We should stop focusing on the past and focus on the future instead. You can’t dwell on what happened, not if you want to make sure that fiasco doesn’t repeat itself.”
The simple phrase made nightmarish images flash through a part of my mind, and the palace started to shake in response to my emotions. I took a deep break, forcing myself to calm down. “That’s what I’ve been trying to avoid. You’re not ready to remember, not yet. Your mind will break if you do.” I’d already begun to see it in her before the wedding. It was why I’d pushed her—well, her reborn self—into the wedding, even if I hadn’t been honest with her about what she meant to me and what my ultimate goals were.
“You weren’t wrong,” Dahud said, “but your decision to shy away from our mistakes doesn’t change or affect the real world, not in a beneficial manner, at least. My sanity will continue to deteriorate in your absence.”
“What good am I if I can’t keep you and the others safe?” I asked. Around us, the halls of the palace started to grow dark. The music faded, replaced by the distant rumbling of thunder. This time, I didn’t bother trying to stop it. “I’ve never been able to help you, not when we first met, or in any other life.”
“Mathias, that’s not true and you know it. And even if it were, without you, it’ll be up to Darius to lead the plagues. They’re loyal, but they’re also ravenous. It’ll be very easy for them to consume him from the inside out, even if not on purpose.”
She was right. I was too old to care about what happened to the mortals. After all this time, their existence was ephemeral and irrelevant to me. They’d long ago become mild annoyances, distractions, and occasional sources for food and amusement.
But Darius was not like that. For as long as he’d lived, he’d been a protector of mankind, even if not necessarily out of his own desire. I’d forced him in a position where he’d have to make some very difficult choices to survive, and he only had Declan to help him.
The story of our first life was repeating itself, but it wasn’t over yet. “Can I make my way back, Dahud?” I asked shakily. “Can I go to them? To you?”
“Of course you can.” Dahud smiled at me again, and this time, it was warm and sweet, a little tired, like the smile she’d shot us the day Alois had been born. She was and would always be the most beautiful woman in the world for me.
“You’re waiting for me, aren’t you? Out there?”
“I’ve always been waiting. For you, for the others. We’ve always been one. But Mathias, you need to remember one thing. We’ve never been together at the same time before. It might be an opportunity or it might be a sign, but you have to make your move as quickly as possible. Otherwise, you might not get the chance. He’ll take me from you.”
“I understand.” Of course I understood. It was the conclusion I’d reached myself, when I’d started looking into Lucienne’s situation a little more closely.
“Good.” Dahud released her hold on me and when I reluctantly allowed her to escape my arms, a single, glowing tear slid down her cheek. “I love you. I just need to remember it. Trust in yourself and in me.”
I said nothing. The words just didn’t come. This Dahud was a memory, an expression of my past and my wishes. Until I faced her true self, until I spoke with Lucienne, I couldn’t rebuild my relationship with my soulmate.
She winked at me like we were sharing a private joke, and it reminded me of different times, when Darius, Declan and I had been sneaking around her parents’ back to see her. Ours had always been an unconventional relationship, from the beginning, but I’d loved her from the first moment I’d seen her smile.
I was still watching her when the water crashed into the palace halls, destroying everything in its path, sweeping her white-clad figure away. The water couldn’t touch me, not when it hadn’t hurt me when this had actually happened. The magic of the person I hated most in the world had protected me from it, even if I hadn’t asked for such a cursed gift. But I was still helpless to stop the onslaught, to keep the kingdom of Kerys from drowning under the weight of my wife’s anger and grief.
Wo
uld it have been better if it had all ended then? Probably not. My eternal life might have become a horrible burden, but for good or ill, it had helped me figure out what was wrong with us. Like my memory of Dahud had said, I needed to continue fighting. I couldn’t give up now, because if I did, he would win. Pierce would claim her. And it might be selfish of me, but I couldn’t allow that.
As that decision settled in my heart, the water around me parted, revealing that I was no longer in the palace. Instead, I’d traveled to a garden of sorts. I’d never been here before, but the magic that protected it felt familiar. It was the power of the Dames Blanches, Lucienne’s family, on her dead mother’s side. I’d never been able to find out too much about the woman, so I would’ve been a little more interested in my location had I not caught sight of the real reason why I’d ended up here.
Pierce was right in front of me, on the grass, lying on top of a half-naked Lucienne and eating her out. The sight shocked me so much that, for a few seconds, all I could do was stare.
Lucienne had always been beautiful in her pleasure, and that hadn’t changed. She writhed on the ground, moving against him, fucking his face, and it was so easy to remember a time when I’d been the one thrusting my tongue into her.
“Pierce,” she cried out. “Pierce, please!”
The sound echoed around us like music, stirring my desire to possess her, to claim her as my own. And if things had been different, maybe I’d have tried to do exactly that.
But I wasn’t actually here, and even if I had been, I had more important things to worry about than sex.
Lucienne’s eyes were glazed, her magic going out of control. It was far more powerful than the last time I’d seen her. Worse still, it was elemental magic, something I’d never tried to help her control. Even in her time as Dahud, she’d had trouble with it. She wasn’t doing any better now.
She might have called out Pierce’s name and she might be enjoying herself, but she also looked like she had no idea what was happening to her. Something was wrong. I didn’t know what had led her to gain the ability to use this type of magic, but the last time I’d seen Pierce, he’d been fighting on Louis’s side, against us. Why was Lucienne sleeping with him?
It made no sense, so the only possible explanation was mind magic.
Louis was a nightmare. He could’ve easily twisted Lucienne’s psyche into something it wasn’t supposed to be, and Pierce was taking advantage of it, of her.
I’d never tried to reach into my connection with him. It existed—of course it did—but it had been much too dangerous, and even at my worst, I hadn’t wanted to risk it.
At that moment, I was too angry to care about the chance I was taking. I reached into myself and tugged.
It worked beautifully, better than I had expected. Pierce jerked away from Lucienne, as if I’d physically pulled him back. At first, Lucienne didn’t realize what had happened, too trapped in her haze of pleasure to register the fact that I’d attacked her lover.
I took shameless advantage of that and gripped Pierce’s shoulder, as hard as I could. My hands didn’t have physical substance, but that didn’t matter between me and Pierce Garnier. “Are you going to force yourself on her? She’s not herself and you know it. If she were, she’d never agree to this.”
That was just a guess on my part, but I hit the nail on the head anyway. Pierce went pasty white, his breathing accelerating so much he looked like he was having a panic attack. “No,” he whispered. “No, I’d never... I’d never do that.”
“Don’t lie to me. You know you can’t. You might be able to deceive her, but never me.”
It would’ve been so easy to hurt him. Now that I’d opened the link between us, there was no turning back, and his mind was right there, an available target, so open to my power. It was a chance I wouldn’t get again. I knew better than to believe Louis hadn’t warned him about this possibility. Right now, I’d caught Pierce by surprise, so he’d been unable to put up his defenses. He wouldn’t be so reckless again.
He knew he was at my mercy. I could see it in his eyes. For a few seconds, we just stared at one another, at a stalemate.
I snarled in frustration. “I should squash you like a bug. The only reason I’m not doing it now is because of her.”
Lucienne was still present and if Pierce collapsed in front of her, her mind wouldn’t be able to withstand it. As much as I hated to admit it, Pierce was a part of Lucienne as much as I was, if not more so. I couldn’t eliminate him, not without destroying her as well.
It was at that moment that Lucienne finally snapped out of her trance. “Pierce? What’s wrong?”
She couldn’t see me, which was inconvenient, but unsurprising. I wanted to know what had happened, why she was here with this asshole, but there was no way I could ask her any of my questions.
Once Lucienne spoke, Pierce proceeded to ignore me. “I don’t even know where to begin answering that question,” he replied. “I’m sorry, Lucienne. This was a bad idea.”
“A bad idea?” she repeated in disbelief. “Are you serious? You can’t possibly...” She trailed off, hurt by the rejection and the prospect that he’d just stop in the middle of a very passionate moment. I hated that I’d hurt her, even indirectly, and hoped Pierce would be able to fix this mess somehow.
Thankfully, Pierce wasn’t a complete idiot and he didn’t need me to point out the obvious. He found a coherent, plausible excuse. “You deserve better than a tumble in your aunt’s garden, where anyone can walk in and see us. I want us to get married properly, like we planned, with our parents by our side, without the threat of the Accursed looming over us. And after that, I want us to have a real family together, with kids Mother can fawn over and Diane can mercilessly spoil.”
The explanation reassured Lucienne, probably because Pierce was being honest. He wanted all that, just like we did. A family with Lucienne had been our dream for as long as I could remember.
Our dream turned nightmare, in more than one way, not that she realized it.
She shot him a quick, fond smile that was identical to the one my Dahud had just given me. Gods, they looked so much alike. I had no idea how I hadn’t realized who she was the moment we’d first met at the club. Maybe it was because the other times she’d been reborn, she’d never looked quite this similar to Dahud. Or maybe I was just an idiot and getting senile in my old age.
Either way, I wanted to touch her so much it hurt, and I couldn’t. She only had eyes for him. “You’re right,” she told him. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me. I’m dealing with this so poorly.”
Pierce wrapped his arms around her bare body and kissed her temple. “No, you’re not. You’re being very brave. It’s normal to have trouble, after everything that’s happened. I just wish I could find a better way of supporting you.”
I sneered at him over Lucienne’s shoulder. If the bastard intended to seduce her again, I’d make sure he’d never be able to get an erection for as long as he lived. It would be a bit of a challenge when faced with a naked Lucienne, but I’d figure out a way.
Fortunately, Lucienne was no longer in the mood. “You’re doing plenty,” she told Pierce. “Intimacy doesn’t have to be about sex. I guess I forgot, for a moment there.”
“I don’t know about that,” I drawled, even if she couldn’t hear me. “Sex always worked very well for us in the past.”
Pierce twitched in irritation and held Lucienne closer. “In the past,” he mouthed at me. “Not now.”
With a frown, I silently admitted I’d set myself up for that one. Still, I was right. In our past lives, whenever we’d been married, Lucienne had always enjoyed sex a lot. It was one of the few things that had never changed, no matter when and where we’d lived. It was actually a little funny, considering the fact that my aunt had, over the centuries, become my uncle, while Darius and the others had changed species.
But there was something else that had stayed the same—the fact that no matter what, we’d al
ways come back to one another. Pierce’s sudden appearance changed nothing. “The past and the future have always been mirrors of one another, for me,” I told him. “My life will always hold Lucienne. You won’t have her. I won’t let you.”
He narrowed his eyes at me and all of a sudden, walls of fire popped up around me. They weren’t actually there, as Lucienne didn’t react to their appearance, but I felt the heat anyway.
It didn’t bother me. Darius had once tried to burn me alive. Compared to that, this effort was nothing. “Is this supposed to intimidate me?”
I didn’t expect him to reply. He couldn’t, not without drawing Lucienne’s attention to the fact that I was there. Surprisingly, he did.
His voice echoed in my mind, crystal clear, almost as if it was my own. “She doesn’t belong to you, Mathias Vandale. You were never supposed to exist. You’re a creation of your aunt’s curse, a fragment of my shattered soul. But I’m back now. I’m whole again, without you, without any of the others. She only needs me to be complete, and that makes me more powerful than you’ll ever be.”
His eyes flared red and it was his turn to lash out. When his magic erupted over me, I couldn’t hope to fight it off. It might not have been as strong as my own astral manipulation skills, but some things were more important than others.
Pierce had not lied when he’d said that his connection with Lucienne gave him power. I fell back through darkness and fire, through water and ice, through splintered bone, through a pool of blood and into an ocean that could’ve easily crushed every inch of me. It didn’t. Instead, it chased away the hostile surge of magic that had shoved me aside, welcoming me, soothing my shattered soul. At that moment, I would’ve liked to linger there forever, in that ocean where I could feel her so close, where there was no pain and no death.
But the real Dahud—Lucienne—was relying on me to get my head out of my ass and so I willed my way to the surface. The ocean obeyed me, and before I knew it, I was cracking my eyes open to the sight of a familiar-looking ceiling. Apparently, at one point, I’d been taken back to the infirmary in my main HQ.