Then, breathless, I forced myself to get the words out.
‘Bane, I couldn’t stop her! I tried, but I couldn’t! What have I done? She burned and I couldn’t stop her!’ I sobbed and shook and he held me like I was a child while the rain came down in relentless admonition.
‘Shalom, Lainie. It wasn’t your fault. No one blames you.’
‘Sarah was one of us. She should have known. I could never have let her cross no matter how much I wanted to. I’m just not built that way! I can call a storm and throw rocks like they’re made of playdough. I can dissolve guns and calm the wind, I can even force you to sleep when I’m in danger, but I could never let a tainted human cross the Skin of the World! No more than a fish can play the piano. How could she not have known that?’ Angry tears mingled with the current flowing around us.
‘I think she did. She was just desperate. Her bonded charge was dying and there was nothing she could do about it. I understand what that must have been like for her. She snapped, at the end. She wasn’t thinking of anyone other than Uncle.’
‘I thought I could save her, Bane. I wanted to. I thought I could manipulate my power, control it, but I can’t even understand it, and the compulsion to keep her out of Eden was just too strong. I tried to do things differently this time around. Tried to get it right and rescue Tessa, and it still didn’t work. I can’t use my authority to save any of us …’ Finally, I accepted the truth, and when I looked into Bane’s eyes, the truth shone right back at me, clean and pure. ‘It wasn’t my fault.’
An ocean of tears later, I wiggled out of his arms and stood facing him, the swift water tugging at my clothes. ‘I still should have found a way. If not with Words, then some other way. I should have saved her.’
Bane gripped my elbows to help me stop swaying. ‘How can any of us be certain she wanted to be saved? Really?’
I had no answer to that. Hot tears mingled with rain and cold river water on my face. ‘But … Noah. What am I going to say to him? I let his mum die. His mum. How can I ever face him?’
Blood. Fire. Bane. Noah. Sarah.
Visions threatened to drown me once more.
‘Lainie, listen to me!’ He held my face with both his hands, forcing me to look at him, at his soft suede eyes, glistening, full of love. ‘Noah doesn’t blame you. He never has. You need to give him a chance to demonstrate that. He needs to heal too.’ Tears welled that didn’t quite fall. ‘We all do.’
He reached one hand under the water and into his pocket, and pulled out a fine thread of gold. ‘I never should have let you get into that situation, Lainie. It was my responsibility to make sure you were safe. It should never have happened. If I’d done my job properly you never would have been compelled to …’ He choked on his words.
‘No, Bane. That wasn’t up to you. You could never have kept me away from there, any more than you could have kept me from handing myself over to Jake. I have a task too. And mine overrides yours whether you like it or not. So does my authority.’
He looked down at the jewellery laced around his fingers, and his next words were spoken with careful formality. ‘Lainie, I’m sorry I failed you.’ His face was lined with sorrow and grief and rain dripped from his hair. He clasped the bracelet around my wrist. The word Shalom was still visible, but had been worn away in places, like my heart.
‘I forgive you, Bane, although there’s really nothing to forgive. I was wrong to have left you for so long.’
Water bounced and played around us, vibrant and full of energy, as if it was trying to offset our sadness.
Bane kept staring at the slim thread of jewellery he had held onto for so long and then asked a question that had obviously been plaguing him. ‘Why did you? Leave for so long, I mean?’
A thread of insecurity still lingered in the way he angled his chin, but at least now I had the memories to be able to offer him a better explanation for my questionable choices.
I picked his right hand up out of the water and turned it, palm upwards. Then I ran the tip of my finger from one end of his long scar to the other. It was even longer than the matching one that Tessa would now bear.
‘I refused to let you get hurt again, trying to protect me,’ I said simply. ‘I can be healed. You can’t. It didn’t seem fair.’
‘Being left behind hurt a lot more,’ he said.
Regret hurt. More than anything else, regret was the hardest to heal.
‘I know that now,’ I admitted. ‘I thought I was allowing you the freedom to do what you wanted, but I didn’t understand. And I refused to face what I had done. That was weak of me, I’m sorry.’
He spluttered a little. ‘Weak? You? I watched you push yourself against that knife, Lainie. I don’t think anyone could describe you as being weak. You need to get some perspective, girl.’
‘Dying wasn’t what I’d call a brave option either.’
‘Option? Was there another?’
There was a deep intensity to his voice, and with it came flashes of vision, of all the times he’d asked himself that same question since I’d left. It was time I resolved it. ‘What you really want to ask me is, was I compelled to die in defence of Eden, or did I choose to?’
He bit his lower lip, waiting for my answer.
‘Is it any different to you choosing to get hurt to protect me?’ I gripped his wrist, turning it to reveal his scar again. ‘Could you have avoided this if you’d wanted to? Or might you one day be forced to sacrifice your life to save mine?’
From the look in his eyes, he finally understood why I’d left him, to free him from the compulsion that could still kill him. The same strength of compulsion that had killed me.
‘It’s my choice,’ he insisted, and I knew he was right.
‘There’s always a choice,’ I whispered, finally understanding what Harry had been trying to tell me by writing those enigmatic words on his fridge all those years ago. Knowing it might be the last piece of advice for me, Harry had imparted a vital truth. Compulsions were powerful, but not unbreakable. I could have chosen not to die, and I needed to let Bane make his own choices too.
Bane gave a small shake of his head. ‘There should have been better options for both of us that day. That was my job. I’m sorry.’
‘Next time I want at least three.’ As I splashed him playfully, hope lit his eyes, as if he was relieved that I was speaking again. That was new for me, people were usually relieved when I stopped speaking.
‘Was it very bad for you? When I was gone?’ I asked. For a second he looked conflicted, as if he wasn’t sure how much to say, but I wouldn’t let him avoid my gaze. ‘Truth, Bane. I need to know. I promise I’ll try not to go wallowing in guilt again if you tell me you spent three years writing country and western tunes.’ Sudden fear gripped me. ‘Or have I got it all wrong? Was there someone else? Is there a girl in Brisbane waiting for you to tie up some loose ends before you go back to her?’ Suddenly I couldn’t quite breathe right.
For seven agonising seconds, a silent downcast expression was all the answer I got, until a slight twitch in the corner of his mouth betrayed him, and he peered up from under his damp eyelashes. Rotten man. So then I dunked him, and he came up laughing, and then dunked me back, but lost that fight when I deliberately stayed under water until he got too uncomfortable and had to lift me up again.
Then he lifted my chin with one finger. ‘I never got over you, Lainie. No one is waiting for me. Not that I didn’t try. Lily made it clear that you wanted me to move on without you and I honestly tried to … I’m just not built that way.’ He smiled wryly as he threw my own words back at me. ‘Honestly? I wasn’t even close to pulling through.’ He took a deep breath. ‘And you? Was there anyone else?’
I could tell he was trying to keep the jealousy out of his tone. I shook my head. ‘No one else. And I had the most confusing time trying to work out why because I was happy there
, or so I thought. It’s only now that I’m realising how lost I was. I missed you so much, but I thought you were dead. Sort of. It’s a bit hard to explain.’
‘You remembered me? You were in Paradise and you still remembered me?’ He searched my face, trying to discern how honest I was being. I could feel my blood humming in response to his closeness, echoed by the Life I felt flowing around me in the water, and not at all discouraged by the way his shirt was clinging to him.
‘I could never forget you, although I am glad I had your photo. It helped me to remember what it was I wanted.’
‘And now? Are you sure about what you want?’ He looked nervous, and for good reason. I could not honestly say that I wanted to remain in this place. My friends, my family, and the one my heart yearned for were here, but this world was full of darkness and hate and pain. My home was such a short distance away, and I could hear its music enticing me back. The metaphorical scent of baking cookies was delicious—and yet how long could I go for without wanting to taste them? Eden was home too, and often felt so much more real than Nalong that it was hard to decide what I wanted most. There was one thing I was definitely sure about though, so instead of answering him with words, I answered him a different way.
Chapter 46
Noah was waiting by the bridge for us when we emerged, shivering, from the water. They had taken me to the nearest part of the river that was safe for swimming, even with the autumn current. It happened to be the same spot we had spent the afternoon of our graduation. It was where Jake had witnessed our first healing.
I tried to hide behind Bane’s back as he walked through the drizzle towards the bridge and when he noticed he stopped. ‘Would you prefer not to see him yet?’
‘Yes. But I will anyway.’ I clutched his hand like the lifeline it was and walked resolutely up the hill. Being a grown-up was going to be complicated.
Noah had borrowed a blanket from the hospital. He really could charm his way through anything. I was becoming convinced it was a superpower of his, maybe his version of my ability to see people’s emotional memories, and Annie’s empathy. He held it open for me but I stopped a couple of metres from him, shivering. He dropped his arms by his side and waited with a look of sympathy on his face.
‘I remember, Noah, I remember what I did.’ I thought I had run out of tears. I was wrong. ‘I killed her. I tried not to … I couldn’t help it.’
Before I had even finished the sentence he had wrapped his long arms around me, crushing me against his chest.
‘I’m so sorry,’ I whispered. The feel of him was so familiar, and comforting; my best friend who had shared so much of my life for as long as I could remember. Whose mum I had killed.
‘It was no one’s fault, Lainie. Not hers and certainly not yours. She left you no choice. If you hadn’t sacrificed yourself the way you did it would have ended up even worse. I am so grateful to you that I didn’t need to intervene.’
Grief tore at my heart as I comprehended what he was saying. If I hadn’t stopped her, then he would have been compelled to. He would have done whatever it took. To his own mother. This job was not fair.
Suddenly I felt really, really tired. I had been numb for so long and now I was submersed in these overwhelming emotions that tumbled me around like the surf. Like a drowning person, I stopped thrashing about and accepted the serenity of giving in to the sensations. Sadness, anger, grief, forgiveness, love. I breathed them all in and began to heal.
My gracious friend wrapped me in the dry blanket and bundled me back into Bane’s car, and as we drove away I looked back through the drizzle at the insignificant little old bridge, the place where my life had changed so profoundly. Twice.
I was officially released from hospital less than an hour after my river dousing but Doctor Vertan insisted on coming to the farm to check me out the following day. She checked my blood pressure and heart rate. She weighed me and wrote out a strict list of foods I had to eat that didn’t include Tim Tams until I asked her to add them in at the bottom. She interviewed me away from the others for a long time, asking me weird questions about how I felt about what had happened with Jake. She asked me about Noah and Bane. Actually she asked a lot of questions about Bane and how I felt about him, which I thought was odd for a doctor. She even asked me about Aunt Lily and whether I ever talked to her about things that made me sad. Then she asked me if I ever had thoughts about dying and I told her I couldn’t really remember, which, luckily, she misunderstood, although her interpretation of my response triggered even more questions. That was when I finally cottoned on that she was trying to assess whether or not I was suicidal. I understood why she was worried, although there was no need for it. So I tried to crack a joke to ease her mind—that only made her frown. Maybe she didn’t get it. My sense of humour definitely had an Eden-like edge to it now and it wasn’t for everyone.
Even Tessa sighed in relief as her car finally pulled away. The doctor had examined her first.
‘Two more weeks of this,’ she complained. ‘Which technically means I could go into labour at any time now and it wouldn’t be considered premature.’ She sounded rather wistful.
‘You don’t want to be pregnant anymore?’ I asked, trying to interpret her body language. ‘Are you uncomfortable? Can I—’
‘No. You can’t,’ she interrupted, and walked out of the lounge room.
I turned to Noah, who explained that she was just bored because no one was letting her do anything useful.
That afternoon, I tried to teach her to carve fruit but after her third attempt she lost patience and threw an apple at Noah’s head. He was so stunned he just stood there and let it hit him squarely on the chin. She hardly flinched so I knew she must have been feeling pretty irritated. I decided to leave her alone a bit more after that.
Soon after, Nicole came by for a visit. After all my progress in the river I had been feeling pretty proud of myself—right up until the moment she knocked on the door, when I literally ran and hid under the bed.
Aunt Lily had explained to me what she and Noah had done straight after Sarah’s death to hide what had really happened. She’d also explained that I had missed both funerals, and Nicole had never understood why. Why did I get to be the one so traumatised that I ran away, when it was her mum who had died? It was a very good question, and I had no answer for her. None that would get past my lips, anyhow, so I hid like a four-year-old instead.
I heard her fussing over Tessa and chatting with Dallmin and Tim. Actually, mostly with Dallmin. Tim had taken a couple of weeks off work and was due to return to Brisbane in a few more days, and he had called in on Nicole more than once. But it was Dallmin who was offered another ride on her ATV, and Dallmin who was now being offered first pick from the box of chocolates she’d brought over, and Dallmin who apparently had the best taste in music, going by the T-shirt he was wearing—which I knew for a fact had been lent to him by Tim. Poor Tim.
As soon as I heard the quad bike leave, I started crawling out, only to find Bane’s sexy hairy legs planted in front of my face. I crawled back under again and so he got down and came in after me.
‘Do you want to talk about it?’ he asked.
‘No thanks, I have it sorted.’
‘Clearly. I can see that. Can I ask if there’s more to your plan or are you just going to hide here every time she comes around?’
‘Nope, that’s pretty much it really. It’s a good plan. I used to use it all the time when Aunt Lily was cross at me. It mostly worked.’ I pointed to a series of scribbles that had been scrawled in childish letters on the wooden slats. ‘See? This bed is actually a therapist. It’s a very good listener, and never forgets.’
The words “Aunt Lily is a poo head” were clearly visible, three slats down.
‘Ah, I can see that. Sorry I doubted.’
I sighed. ‘What am I supposed to say to her? I killed her mother, Bane. And th
en I missed her funeral and ran away for three years. Then on top of all that I wasn’t there for her when she needed me. I was the closest thing she ever had to a sister, and I was never a very good one, but when her mum died she only had her brothers and her dad. What if she needed a girl to talk to? She lost her mum.’
‘She had your aunt. I’m sure she would have helped her,’ he soothed.
‘Not the same. They were never very close. And Aunt Lily’s, you know, sort of old.’ I shook my head. ‘I let her down. Big time. And I don’t know how to make it right. I should have realised she’d hate me for ditching her. I keep forgetting that everyone here has their own issues, which is pathetic because I’m old enough to know better.’
He gave me a sympathetic look.
‘Wait, how old am I now? I’ve lost track.’
He tried to hide his chuckle by pretending to clear his throat. ‘You’ll turn twenty-one in July,’ he said.
Twenty-one. Wow. So old … ‘Hiding under the bed seems even more childish now,’ I admitted.
‘Well, childishness is only to be expected when you’ve been living in a timeless sacred garden filled with innocent immortals.’
I laughed. ‘But then again, it’s me. You know I’ve always been silly.’
He nodded, unable to refute that. ‘You and Noah, both. However, nothing’s silly if it helps you to adjust. Whatever you need, I’ll be here with you.’
‘I need to make things right with Nic,’ I said, sobering.
We both lay there for a few seconds, dwelling on the past, then Bane brushed a wayward curl from my cheek. ‘I wish I could suggest something but I’m not very good with this stuff. Usually I’m the one who needs the therapy. If I were in your situation, what would you tell me to do?’
‘Hide under the bed and sulk.’
‘Okay, and then what?’
‘Apologise to her, for what it’s worth.’
He rolled over and tried to prop himself up on his elbow, only there wasn’t enough room so he rested his chin on his hand instead, and looked me in the eye. Our faces were very close. He had a fallen eyelash on his cheek, which I wanted to brush away with my lips, but I didn’t because he had things he wanted to say.
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