Sacrifice

by Denise Grover Swank

  “You loved him. Yes, I am fully aware of that. Don’t you think it was hard for me to see you with him when I thought you were my Emmanuella? Don’t you think I wanted to rip the man’s head off? But he had his part to play and I had to stand back and watch until it was done. And the fact remains that he’s human, Emma. He’s not like you and me.”

  Her eyes flew open. “You said he is human. Present tense. You think he’s alive.”

  He rubbed his forehead in frustration. “Look, I understand your need to grasp for straws.” His hand dropped. “But the sooner you accept this, the sooner you can move on and prepare. It was a slip of the tongue.”

  “But the dreams—”

  “Do you feel him now?”

  Her eyes widened in surprise. “What?”

  “Do you feel him now? Reach out to him. You said you felt him in your dreams. Before last night, you could feel him and talk to him when you were awake. That seems like a more certain link than vague dreams that in reality are your subconscious’s way of dealing with your grief. At least your dreams of me pointed to your future. Did your dreams of him do that?”

  Her eyes welled with tears.

  “The surest way to know if he’s still there is to reach out to him. So do it. Prove that he’s alive.”

  Flustered, she squeezed her eyes shut, focusing on Will. “Will? Are you there?”

  Silence was her answer.

  “Will. Please. I’m begging you. Don’t leave me. I need you.” Tears streamed down her face as she choked back a sob.

  Raphael cleared his throat and she expected to find him gloating. Instead, he stared at the floor.

  “You’re not alone in losing someone you love, Emma.” He looked up, his eyes burning with pain and anger. “We both lost someone two nights ago, but we can grieve later. Now we have to concentrate on defeating Aiden.”

  She knew this, but she couldn’t let Will go yet.

  Raphael shook his head and turned to leave. “Get showered and dressed. There’re clothes you can wear in the closet. You’re thinner than she usually was, but they should work. Then come down and eat and we’ll get started.”

  The door closed and she considered lying back down, but he was right, as much as she hated to admit. She needed to save Jake.

  Avenging Will’s death was pure bonus.

  She stripped off her gown and held it in her hand, a fresh wave of tears falling. The gown stunk of bonfire, mildew, and metal. She threw it into the trash can, telling herself that what was done was done. Crying wouldn’t solve anything, but the tears fell anyway as she showered, washing away the grime but reopening the pain. When she turned off the water, she stood at the stall threshold, a towel wrapped around her body. The air-conditioned breeze cooled the water droplets on her skin, sending chills through her body, but she hesitated.

  I can cry in here and I can cry when I go to bed. But when I walk out of this shower, no more tears.

  When her foot hit the tile floor, a change swept through her. Her heart hardened and her back straightened, determination replacing her despair. Aiden would pay for what he’d done.

  She found clothes in the closet as Raphael said she would, grabbing a pair of jeans and a T-shirt. Pulling them on, she tried to ignore that these were meant for someone else. That Raphael might be in pain too. Because to admit that he had suffered a loss made him more like her than she could afford.

  He stood in front of the stove when she went downstairs. The smell of onions and butter, reminded her stomach that she hadn’t eaten in days. He smiled and gestured to a small round table in front of windows with a view of the backyard. “Have a seat at the table. I hope you like omelets.”

  She turned her gaze to the table set for two and her back stiffened. “Look, we need to set some ground rules before we start this. Dining socially is not acceptable.”

  He set down the plate and her traitorous stomach growled loud enough to hear.

  “I have to make sure you eat.”

  “No. You don’t. When and what I eat are none of your business. What we have is strictly a working relationship. I will work with you to save my son and then we are done.”

  His gaze narrowed as his smile fell away. “Whether you’ve eaten or not is my business. You’re entirely too thin and you need your strength to do this. It’s going to be hard work, and frankly, I’m not sure you can do it.”

  She clenched her teeth. “Then what the hell am I doing here?”

  “Because I’d rather take a chance with you than team up with Alex. I loathe the man and honestly, he’s not much stronger than you at this point.”

  “Are you serious? Did you see the storm he created?”

  His eyebrow raised. “Did you see the fires you’ve created?”

  She hadn’t seen the final results of the last fire, but she had seen the first one in Minnesota. She didn’t want to think about how many people she’d killed. “This is pointless. Sure, I’ve created two massive explosions and nearly died as a result. If Will hadn’t saved me the first time…” Mentioning Will brought a sharp stab of grief, but she swallowed it down.

  “And I saved you the second. But you can learn how to do it without killing yourself in the process. You just don’t know how yet.”

  “And you’re going to teach me? Fine, then we need rules. The first is you are not to touch me under any circumstances.”

  “I’m not sure I can agree to that.” His hard stare told her he was serious.

  She took a step back. “Then we’re already done.”

  “What do you think saved you after you created that fire? What kept you from leaping out of a jet flying over the Midwest? I gave you energy. I won’t agree to not touch you, but I will agree to only touch you when I deem it absolutely necessary.”

  She shook her head. “No way. You could claim anything you want to be ‘absolutely necessary.’ Why would I agree to that?”

  A derisive laugh rumbled in his throat. “You think you’re the one holding all the cards here. You think you can set these terms and that I have no choice but to kowtow to your wishes.” His voice lowered. “But you forget that you need me just as much. Without me you have no chance of saving Jake.”

  Her grief boiled into rage, her chest burning with power. “I don’t need you. I can always side with Alex.”

  “Alex.” He laughed again, looking at the ceiling. “That’s rich. You think I’m going to believe that you’ll side with the man who raped you and kidnapped your son? You claim I don’t know jack shit about you, but I know you’d sooner die than team up with him.”

  Anger filled her, her energy begging for release.

  Raphael’s glare softened to disappointment. “You’re still so young and impetuous. You don’t even know how to prevent what you’ve just done.”

  “Fuck you, Raphael.”

  “Close your eyes.”

  She narrowed them instead, her anger and hatred increasing the pressure.

  “For God’s sake, Emma, if you can’t trust me in this one thing then we’re doomed.”

  Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes.

  “As impossible as this sounds, try to relax.”

  She bit back a retort before a jolt shot through her body, then the pressure was gone. Her eyes flew open in alarm. “What happened?”

  He turned around and poured a cup of coffee. “Sit down and eat.”

  “What happened?”

  “I pulled your energy away.”

  “How?”

  “All in good time. Now you eat.” He picked up a crystal juice glass off the counter and sat in the chair next to her place setting.

  “But—”

  He looked up at her with a hard stare. “You have your conditions and I have mine. The first of mine is you let me do this my way. I teach what you need to know when I think you need to know it.”

  She glared. “I’m not allowed to ask questions?”

  “You can ask all the questions you like. But don’t expect me to answer all o
f them.”

  She sat in the chair and picked up her fork. “I have a lot of questions, so don’t expect me to just sit here and let you spoon-feed me.”

  He nodded, his lips pursed. “I’d be surprised if you didn’t have questions. In the past, at this point in the game you’d know all the answers. They would have just come to you. Of course, we never made it to this point before, so it’s all a moot point. But in past experiences, you had memories of your previous lives and your purpose in it all.”

  She gave him a hard stare. “I never would have chosen you, you know.”

  His gaze held hers, his face expressionless. “I know.”

  “I never would have chosen Alex, either.”

  “I know this too.”

  “Has that ever happened before?”

  “No.”

  “Did she always love you?”

  “No.”

  “So sometimes she loved Alex?”

  “In the beginning.” He watched her eat with a serious expression, lifting his glass of amber liquid to his lips.

  She frowned. “That doesn’t look like orange juice.”

  Smirking, he raised the glass to her. “How perceptive of you.”

  “A little early in the day to be drinking, isn’t it?”

  “You have your vice—loving a human—and I have mine.” He took another drink then grinned.

  “You’re creeping me out. This is the second time you’ve watched me eat. Why aren’t you eating too?”

  “I already ate hours ago. It’s nearly lunchtime.”

  “How long have you done this?”

  His mouth lifted into a crooked grin. “Watch you eat or have breakfast before lunchtime?”

  They’d spent centuries fucking with her life and he joked about it. “This might go faster if you actually volunteered some information.”

  With an exaggerated sigh, he shifted in his seat. “In the very beginning, it was a more level playing field. Our life experiences were fresh each time and it was easier to find one another. Travel was an ordeal and people often didn’t stray more than twenty miles from their homes their entire lives. Consequently, at least in the very beginning, we all often lived in the same village or town. By the time we knew who we really were, we already had a history.”

  “How far back does this go? Middle Ages?”

  “Further.”

  “Prehistoric man?”

  He snorted. “It was B.C., but not that distant.”

  “But when exactly?”

  “What does it matter? Ancient Greece. That specific enough for you?”

  She took a sip of her coffee, watching him over the rim. “That’s a helluva long time.”

  “You have no idea.”

  Centuries sounded so vague until she put it into perspective. For two thousand years this had gone on and on. How could Raphael do this time and time again? To be so close and lose it all again. To lose the person he loved time and time again. But at least he knew he’d see her again at some point in the future. She’d never see Will again. She tried to ignore that Raphael had lost his Emmanuella forever too.

  “So go ahead. Ask more questions.”

  Taking a bite of her eggs, she looked out the window. “Where are we? It wasn’t this green in Montana and Wyoming.”

  He watched her for a moment. “Tennessee.”

  “Is this your house?”

  He twisted the coffee cup in his hand. “Yes.”

  “If I wanted to walk out the front door and turn my back on you, could I?”

  He paused. “Everyone has free will.”

  She snorted. “Apparently not.”

  He leaned forward on the table. “Okay, my turn. Do you want your son back?”

  Her fork dropped with a clang. “You really have to ask that question?”

  “Apparently you need to be reminded of it.” He looked at her plate and raised his eyebrows. “You haven’t eaten even half of that. We can’t start until you eat more. You need the energy.”

  “Again with the energy.” But she knew he was right. Will had figured out that when she used too much, one way to re-energize her was give her food. And his touch. She pushed away the memory of Will’s touch. She couldn’t afford to let her mind go there. Not right now.

  Raphael sat back. “I suspect you’ve only used energy from your own body to make fire. But there are other sources. In fact, you should only use your own energy for small things and if there’s no other source. Any other time, you need to pull it from elsewhere. Still, it will be hard on you at first. This is all new to you. Emmanuella…” He paused and took a breath before continuing. “Emmanuella had lifetimes of memories stored. Once she began to remember, she could use those to help her. You have nothing.”

  “That’s encouraging.”

  He shrugged. “It is what it is. That’s why I got so frustrated with you and Will. Will was supposed to protect you while you regained your memories and learned to channel your power, until you no longer needed the pendant to help you. In the past, once your protector was marked, your human enemies were always hot on your trail. And once you no longer needed the pendant, your protector’s job was done and you released him.”

  “So that’s why you got so angry when I said I wasn’t practicing.”

  “Practicing always helped the memories return faster. When you told me that Will thought it was too dangerous to use your power, I wanted to kill him. Literally. But you couldn’t come into your full power without him. Aiden set that little trick up just to add complications.”

  “You had said you couldn’t be around me or it would inhibit my powers.”

  “Yes, but that part’s not important.” He looked away. “Just more of Aiden’s rules.”

  She lowered her gaze. “What would have happened if Aiden didn’t steal Will’s memories and I didn’t release him?”

  “It was unprecedented. You never loved your protector before.”

  “From what you said, me not picking either of you was unprecedented. The whole thing is unprecedented.”

  “Very true. Also unprecedented was the length of time for you to prepare. You were usually given months to remember. This time was a month and a half. Then again, there was nothing for you to remember. Honestly, it’s a wonder you didn’t get yourself killed.”

  “You already said that.”

  “It doesn’t make it any less true.”

  “What does it mean?”

  “It means the world has tilted off its axis.”

  She grimaced. “Very funny.”

  “The world may not have literally tilted but the rules of everything have changed. It’s anyone’s guess what happens now.”

  Maybe so, but she’d do her best to make sure it wasn’t left up to chance.

  Chapter Six

  “Again.”

  Emma stood in the field, hanging over her bent knees. “In a minute.”

  Raphael watched her, his arms crossed. “No. Now. Again.”

  “You think it’s so goddamned easy, then you do it.”

  The log she’d been trying to move shot ten feet away from her without warning. Raphael put his hands on his hips. “There.”

  “Go to hell.”

  “Thanks. I’d rather stick around here on earth. Which means you need to try it again.”

  She was so tired. She’d never been so exhausted in all of her life, but she’d never admit it to him. It didn’t help that she got little sleep at night. It was the one time she allowed herself to grieve, and she spent most of her time in bed crying for Jake, crying for Will, which left only a few hours for sleeping.

  The first two days she was sure Will was there, answering her when she called out for him. But last night, there was nothing but silence. She’d held out hope that her dreams of him meant something, but she forced herself to accept the truth.

  Will was dead.

  Jake was more difficult. During the day, he kept himself shielded from her, but at night when he slept, he let his guard down. He
cried for her in his sleep, smothering her with his fear and loneliness. She tried to answer him, to use their connection to give him comfort, but their connection had become one-way since the night her father changed the rules. All of his feelings flowed out, without her love and reassurance going back.

  He thought she’d forgotten him.

  In his sleep, he begged for her to come to him and save him. Even if she knew where he was, she couldn’t save him. If she couldn’t move a log ten feet, how would she defeat her father?

  Then there were the new dreams, a scene from the vision she’d received in Kansas City after her encounter with the crazy homeless man. It was only one part of the vision, but enough to frighten her. A valley lay below her with multiple fires spread across the landscape, and a voice tickled her ear. “You are the destruction of the world.”

  If she weren’t so irritated, she would have laughed at the idea. There was little chance of her being the destruction of anything. In two days of practicing, she’d made little progress and Raphael had become more and more frustrated.

  “You need to focus. Point your energy to the log and push it with your mind.”

  “I thought you were going to teach me how to use other power sources.”

  He scowled, anger filling his eyes. “You have to learn how to use your own energy to do simple tasks without killing yourself. Once you’ve accomplished that, you can move on to bigger things. You can’t run until you learn to walk.”

  “I’d settle for learning to crawl,” she muttered.

  Raphael released a guttural growl. “If you refuse to take this seriously, then we might as well quit now.”

  She put her hand on her hip, her anger building. “I’m taking this seriously. I’m the one out here for hours on end trying to do stupid-ass shit like move a log two feet.”

  “Then quit talking about it and move it.”

  She took her brewing anger and focused the energy on the wood. “Move!”

  The log shot sideways a couple of feet, jerking and hopping before coming to a stop.

  “No. No. No.” Raphael groaned.

  “I’m trying!”

  He rubbed his face with his hands. “We’re not getting anywhere, so let’s call it a day. Besides,” he moved in front of her, looking into her face. “You look exhausted, and crying all night isn’t helping matters.”