Her gaze flitted to Dan… and surprised him staring back at her. And frowning, like she was a puzzle he couldn’t solve. Hah. Ditto. She suppressed the desire to stick out her tongue.
“Hey.” Roth touched her forearm to snag her attention. “Don’t I know you from somewhere?”
“M-M-Me?” Opal managed a light laugh. “D-D-Don’t th-th-think so.”
“I never forget a face,” he said.
God. She sure hoped that wasn’t the case. And that she was pulling off a credible “don’t be so silly” expression.
It’d been almost a decade since “Jordan Cast” had featured prominently in the tabloids. She remembered jumping at the chance to reinvent herself when she’d been discovered by the modeling agency. At her mother’s suggestion, she’d taken her middle name of “Jordan” and combined it with her grandmother’s maiden name of “Cast”. And after she’d run away from a promising career, she’d been grateful for the anonymity her real name had provided.
She didn’t want to lose that anonymity. She didn’t want to uproot the life she’d carved out for herself and Sera here in Philly. It was safe. Familiar. Comforting. With luck Roth would conclude she reminded him of someone famous and that would be the end of it. But if the worst came to pass, perhaps Desiree could prevail upon him to keep his mouth shut?
Desiree did her spooky tap-into-Opal’s-thoughts thing again. “You’re thinking of that girl who fronted the Dion Vonette label, oh,” she waved a languid hand, “about a decade ago. You know, the one who got embroiled in a huge scandal when that tape of her and that skeevy photographer was leaked? I’m sure Opal’s been told she reminds people of that girl, like, a thousand times.”
Opal screwed up her nose as if to say, “Yeah, and what a pain in the ass it is, too.” She had to admire her friend’s quick thinking. Especially since “Jordan Cast” had also been a skinny blonde who, ironically, had originally been offered the Vonette exclusive. And she would have taken it, too, if she hadn’t had to disappear from the public eye in a hurry.
Roth shrugged. “Must be it.” He glanced at his watch. “Better head home. I’ve got an early shift tomorrow—we mere mortals who haven’t been blessed with the goddess gene need our beauty rest.”
Desiree rolled her eyes at the compliment. “Nice try, but you’ll have to do better than that.”
Opal summoned the ghost of a smile. “I th-th-thought it w-w-was a… a… good one, m-m-myself.”
“Hey, Roth,” Desiree said, casting a glance at Opal. “Before you go, can we ask one last favor?”
Uh oh. What was she up to now?
“Depends,” Roth said. “Is it going to hurt?”
Desiree puffed an exasperated breath. “Don’t be an idiot. We wondered if you could drop Dan off at a shelter. He’s got, uh, housing issues at the moment.”
“What leads you to believe I am going anywhere?” Dan’s voice held more than a hint of a challenge.
“You can’t stay here,” Desiree snapped. “Isn’t that right, Opal?”
Opal darted a quick glance at her daughter and discovered Sera curled up on the couch asleep. Good. It would make giving Dan his marching orders easier.
“Th-th-that’s right,” she said. And God. Dan’s expression…. For some reason it was ridiculously easy to read the emotions skating across his face. Betrayal. Anger. Acceptance. And, as he gazed at Sera, sadness. It was as though Opal had forged a connection with him that allowed her to see straight into his heart and mind. But she couldn’t afford to feel sorry for him. She couldn’t afford to let him in to disrupt her life—or Sera’s.
“Enlighten me about this… shelter,” he said.
Roth frowned and cocked his head, appearing to take stock of Dan’s I-kick-ass-and-take-no-prisoners leathers for the first time. He’d opened his mouth, doubtless to ask some interesting questions, when the doorbell’s insistent chimes cut him off.
Opal glanced at the wall clock. Two twenty-five in the morning. Who’n the heck was visiting at this hour?
Roth’s longer strides beat her to the door. “Let me,” he said, and without waiting for her reply, yanked open the door. “Can I help you?”
Opal peered past Roth’s lanky form to see her elderly neighbor, Peter, juggling a box of groceries and a bulging plastic bag stuffed with what looked like clothing.
“Opal, I’m very glad to see you, my dear.” He ducked beneath Roth’s outstretched arm and headed for the lounge. “I’m afraid I forgot to ask for your mobile number, hence I was unable to call you back and explain the situation,” he announced once he’d relieved himself of his burdens. His wide smile encompassed everyone in the room and then his intense blue gaze focused on Desiree, still perched on the arm of the easy chair. “Peter Stone,” he said, approaching her and extending his hand.
“Desiree Grant.” Desiree shook his hand and smiled back at him, obviously charmed to her polished toenails.
If Opal hadn’t known better she might have thought her friend appeared the slightest bit dazed. But then, Peter did have a style that set him apart from other septuagenarians. His thick hair, a startling shade of true silver, brushed his shoulders, and made his blue eyes seem even brighter. And even simply dressed in a royal blue long-sleeved tee, black jeans and black boots, he looked very stylish indeed.
“Lovely to meet you, my dear.” Peter beamed at her, and moved purposefully toward Roth, who had followed him into the living room. “Peter Stone. I’m Opal’s neighbor.”
“Roth Morgan.” The two men shook hands. And then Roth scratched his head as though trying to make sense of a confusing situation.
Opal nibbled her lower lip. There was something strange going on but she couldn’t quite put her finger on it. Her gaze flit to Danbur, who was watching Peter through narrowed eyes that gleamed with an intensity that rattled her.
A shiver of unease danced down her spine. Did Danbur perceive the old man as a threat?
Why?
Some deep-seated need prodded her to confront Peter about the crystal he’d given Sera—the crystal Danbur insisted he’d emerged from. But the words forming on her tongue dissolved.
Peter nodded. “I imagine you have many questions, my dear. And they will all be answered when the time is right. Unfortunately, that time is not now.”
Opal blinked. She’d almost fallen asleep on her feet. God. How embarrassing.
Danbur and Roth stood by the door, Danbur hefting a box of groceries and a bag of clothes, Roth clutching his medical duffel. “I’ve arranged a bed for you at a men’s shelter run by a couple I know,” Peter was saying. “Roth, I’m most grateful for your offer to drop Danbur there on your way home. It will save me a trip. Please give either Max or Mickey the groceries and clothes—I do my best to aid their worthy cause.”
Opal blinked again. The two men had disappeared outside and the rumble of a car’s engine drifted to her ears.
“If we leave now, we can make it back to the motel in time for a couple of hours shut-eye before breakfast,” Desiree was saying.
Opal found herself nodding. Another blink, and she was standing by Sera’s bed, tucking the comforter securely around her daughter’s shoulders. She kissed Sera’s brow. “L-L-Love you, baby,” she whispered.
Blink. She was buckled into the passenger seat of the loaner car, and Desiree was driving and chattering on about how fortunate it was that Peter, who still had it going on for an old dude, was happy to fill in for the absentee sitter and look after Sera.
Opal almost pinched herself to make certain she was awake. Whoa. Talk about surreal. It was like…. It was like she’d awoken from an incredibly vivid dream.
“Yes,” she murmured. “Peter’s great.” But the face forming in her mind wasn’t the old man’s weathered, kindly countenance. It was Danbur’s face. And, despite the fuzziness in her brain, she couldn’t banish him from her thoughts.
~~~
Pieter, who often went by the name “Peter Stone”, quietly shut the door to Seraphine Stewar
t’s bedroom. The child was sleeping peacefully; no bad dreams, no issues with her lungs or ability to breathe. Even so it took every ounce of his self-control not to pound his fist on the wall.
He snatched a breath, counted to five, and exhaled slowly. Only when he was certain he’d regained a degree of equilibrium did he stalk downstairs and head for the kitchen. One thing he’d learned throughout his long life was that it was most unwise to commune with a goddess when one was angry enough to spit tacks.
Opal should have been the one to call Danbur from the depths of the danburite crystal. Sera was a child. Her almost-crystal name aside, her will should not have been strong enough to accomplish the task. He had been foolish to tell the child it was a wishing crystal, and suggest she give it to her mother. He should have personally thrust the crystal into Opal Stewart’s hands and stuck around to supervise Danbur’s emergence, as he had once done with Malach and his chosen, Jade.
But Pieter was not the only one to blame for this mess. Would it have been too much to expect his goddess to warn him of the dangers of giving little Sera the crystal?
Apparently so.
There was one other possibility—one that threatened to have him spewing his stomach contents over his boots. This could be intentional on Saiytada’s part. Yet another twisted plan devised by a cruel, capricious being.
Pieter sucked in a calming breath. He would need all his wits about him to convince Saiytada to right this wrong.
He rummaged the cupboards for a suitable container, and spotted a cheap ceramic serving bowl decorated with scattered sunflowers and finished in a deep blue glaze. His scrying crystal, painstakingly infused with magic and energy, would give a clearer, cleaner communication link but this method would do at a pinch. More importantly, the weaker link it would initiate would grant him a measure of privacy.
Hence the reason he did not simply utter a prayer to summon her. Mind-to-mind communication was efficient but terribly invasive. It could bode ill if Saiytada learned the true extent of the fury and horror lying curled in his belly. Pieter had learned to lock his emotions down tight but a moment’s carelessness could reveal his true feelings… and provoke the goddess to act without thought—as deities throughout the ages tended to react whenever displeased or thwarted. Not that Pieter wouldn’t welcome death after centuries of manipulating those chosen for a “greater purpose” he’d long ago given up trying to fathom.
The things he’d done sickened him, and whenever he glanced in a mirror he barely recognized the man he’d once been. Death would be a welcome relief. Death would bring an end to playing puppet for a deity he suspected would never release him from her service. And, as he too often did, Pieter wondered anew whether his actions that fateful day hadn’t been subtly influenced by the same goddess he’d begged to aid him. If only he’d parleyed with Lord Keeper Wulfenite he might have learned the truth behind the raids. And, given the power Pieter could invoke and his knowledge of crystals, he might have been able to aid a dying race. Instead, he might have hastened their fate. This troop of crystal-bound men could well be the last of their kind.
Pieter rolled his shoulders but didn’t fight it when they settled back into a slump as though burdened by a heavy weight. What was done, was done, and Saiytada had mercilessly leveraged the suffering of those trapped warriors for centuries. Pieter suspected she would continue to use him to further her own agenda for countless centuries more. She had nothing to gain from releasing him. In the manner of all deities who were no longer worshipped, she would have faded and eventually been unmade long ago if not for Pieter’s devotion to her. Apparently it mattered not a jot that his devotion was forced.
Enough. He filled the shallow bowl with tap water and carried it to the small dining table. With a word and a gesture he conjured a small ceremonial dagger, and used the tip of its razor-sharp blade to cut a shallow slit across the heel of his hand. He held his hand over the bowl and watched the droplets of blood mingling with the water. One pass with the flat of the blade and a murmured power-word sealed the small wound.
He cradled the bowl in both palms and peered into the blood-infused water. A breath to center himself… and another. And then he could find no further excuses to delay the inevitable. Best it were done quickly.
“Lady Saiytada, your humble servant invokes thee.”
Laughter, high and pure like the tinkling of bells, speckled the air. “Humble? I would hardly call you humble, Pieter. As they like to say in this time, ‘that ship has sailed’.”
Pieter made no response. He heard a distinctly disgruntled huff and then the water in the bowl rippled. The surface smoothed to glassiness far too quickly to be natural, and a second later the goddess’s face appeared. “Spit it out, Pieter,” she said. “I haven’t got all day.”
It never failed to amaze him how modern she sounded when she spoke. If she were to materialize here and now, she could seamlessly insert herself into this world. Even her emerald-colored eyes would cause little comment when colored contact lenses were considered a fashion accessory. Provided she didn’t stare directly at anyone, of course. Anyone who insisted green was a cool hue would find themselves hurriedly rethinking their stance once they’d suffered the regard of those scorching, flame-filled orbs.
Another huff. “How can I help you, Crystal Guardian?”
“Seraphine is but eight years of age, my lady. And her age is hardly going to be more acceptable four weeks hence when the Testing descends. How is Danbur to have any hope of breaking his curse when he must complete the bonding process with a child?”
He waited for a response. In vain.
He knew Saiytada hated being questioned. He knew, too, that she took failure personally. She had brooded for a decade after Malach’s disastrous first bonding with Chalcedony’s mother. But Pieter felt no pity for the goddess who pulled his strings. Bonding a child to a grown man was unconscionable, and the sooner Saiytada was made to realize that the better for all involved.
The silence beat at him, goading him to speak bluntly so there could be no misunderstandings. “Have you chosen falsely again?” He ground out the words from between teeth clenched so tightly his jaw throbbed. “Is Danbur to be another Malach, failing to bond and condemned a second time? Forced to suffer twice what no man should suffer even once?” At least Malach had had a fighting chance with Francesca Beryl Laureano, his first chosen bond-mate, even if she had eventually rejected him.
He waited.
Still no response.
Damn her to the fiery pits of whatever hell waited for deserving gods! “Is my role as Crystal Guardian no longer one that offers hope and redemption?” he roared. “Am I reduced to a torture-monger who sets either impossible tasks, or morally repugnant ones that would turn an honorable man’s stomach? By all that is mighty, Saiytada, you were the one who insisted sexual congress play an integral role in initiating the bonding process. So what can you possibly hope to gain by bonding Danbur to a child? I swear on my life—for what it’s worth—if Danbur so much as looks at Seraphine Stewart wrongly I will castrate him with a spoon. And then I will use that same spoon to gouge out your soulless heart and feed it to the first flea-ridden mongrel I encounter.”
Disgust and fury swarmed in his belly as he awaited his punishment. So much for reining in his emotions and controlling his tongue. He couldn’t regret his outburst, however. This pairing was a cruel travesty, and someone needed to talk some sense into this capricious, selfish—
“Goodness, Pieter. Say what’s really on your mind, why don’t you?”
Saiytada didn’t sound the least offended. And Pieter didn’t know whether to feel relieved or disappointed. Apparently he would live to oversee another cursed warrior redeemed. Or condemned once more to a living hell at the whim of a fickle being who hadn’t faintest idea of what it meant to be human and mortal and vulnerable.
“Oh, carry on for the Mother’s sake,” Saiytada snapped. “Surely you realize I’ve outgrown that lamentable habit I had.”
“Yes.” She wrinkled her nose. “I’ve come to realize it’s too much effort to patch up the humans and get them working properly again afterward. And I’ve never been a fan of groveling when I’ve overstepped my boundaries.”
Pieter’s mask of studied indifference slipped and his eyebrows shot upward, threatening to merge with his hairline.
The image in the water sniffed, and if Pieter didn’t know better he might have believed the goddess ever so slightly miffed. “Don’t ask,” she said, her Cupid’s bow lips curving downward. “I’m not at liberty to speak further of it.”
It was the first time Saiytada had slipped up and hinted that she, too, was subject to a higher power. This could give Pieter the edge he needed to wrest back a measure of control over his destiny. It could be a game-changer. But it wouldn’t be prudent for her to know how much this knowledge both shocked and energized him. A change of subject was required.
“It is obviously a mismatch—likely caused by the child’s name being so close to the crystal seraphinite,” he said, providing her an excuse that would leave her pride intact. “We both know the child’s mother, Opal, was meant to call Danbur from the crystal. You must dissolve the connection between Danbur and the child.”
“I must do nothing, Pieter. And for the record, I do not make mistakes. Malach could not have become the man Jade loves with all her heart had he not failed to bond with that awful Francesca woman. Humans are tempered by their experiences, are they not? Malach simply required a decade or so more… tempering.”
Pieter’s abused jaw gave another painful throb. Tempting to snap his fingers and whisk Jade’s Aunt Lìli here. Lìli adored Malach. She was still outraged by the suffering the crystal warrior had endured when his first bonding had failed and he’d been re-condemned to his crystal prison. And Lìli would not have tolerated such a blatant lie for an instant—not even from the lips of a powerful goddess. Goddess or no, Lìli would have impressed the gravity of the situation upon Saiytada with a few choice phrases. She might even have turned the goddess over her knee and whacked some of her arrogance out of her. And Pieter would have sat back and enjoyed every minute of the encounter.
Opal's Wish: Book Four of The Crystal Warriors Series Page 7