by Krista Wolf
Her legs were still trembling when he finished inside her. Eric’s ass left the bed, his whole body frozen mid-thrust as she felt him go off, splashing her womb with strong jets of his hot, thick seed. Melody locked her thighs around his, grinding herself downward to make it good for him. As the last of his spasms wound down Eric smiled up at her, the two of them sharing the same knowing, blissful look.
“You’re so beautiful,” he told her, stroking her face. He was still inside her. Still connected.
Slowly his hand dropped downward. It closed smoothly over the jeweled pendant around her neck.
“This is beautiful too…” Eric murmured.
The amethyst sparkled as he rolled it in his palm. It seemed to absorb the cold moonlight, turning the jewel a deep, dark violet.
“Uh, thanks,” Melody replied.
He fingered the amulet almost lovingly, running his thumb over the intricate golden setting. Eventually she rolled off of him, pulling it gently from his grasp.
“Let’s sleep,” she said, snuggling against him again. “Big day tomorrow. Lots to do.”
Eric nodded and pulled the covers back over them both. His warm, heaving body was as comforting as ever.
Melody was asleep in a matter of seconds, not minutes.
She woke at the crack of dawn. Or what seemed like dawn, anyway.
Looking out the window, Melody could see the sun’s rays diffused with a strange greenish hue. It was a slight tinge, just enough to be noticeable. Just weird enough to cast bizarre shadows over the manor house grounds and plantation fields.
None of it mattered. She couldn’t wait to get started.
Extracting herself carefully from Eric’s sleeping form, she slipped back into her undergarments and snuck out of the bedroom.
But not without first swiping his key.
She figured it was old enough, and close enough, that if she jiggled it around enough it might also open her door. Luckily, she never had to find out. Standing practically naked out in the dimly lit hallway, the doorknob to her room turned the second she placed her hand on it.
Somehow, it had been unlocked.
“Thank heaven for small favors?” she muttered under her breath.
She was sure it’d been locked last night. Then again, she was frantic. Not thinking straight.
Back in her own room, Melody’s ball gown still hung from the same wooden peg. She shimmed into it reluctantly. It was better than nothing.
Get looking, the little voice in her head went off. Now, while everyone’s still asleep.
She left the shoes. They’d be too loud against the manor’s hardwood floors, plus they hurt like hell. A stream of forbidden acts ran through her mind, and Melody began picking out the ones she’d do right now for some jeans, a T-shirt, and a comfortable pair of sneakers.
The hallways was empty again, both sides. She wondered where Lurch had gone, and almost laughed as the hilarious image of him wearing an apron and cooking breakfast popped into her head.
“I’ll have three eggs, Lurch,” she snickered. “Sunny side up.”
Treading lightly, she made her way back down the staircase. She wanted to finish searching the conservatory first, and then go from there. Room by room was her best chance of finding the egg. She’d do the bedrooms last, hopefully later on, when no one was using them.
Melody turned the corner into the conservatory and stopped dead.
The piano was gone.
It seemed strange, almost impossible, that it had been moved sometime during the night. Then again, Evermoore was shaping up to be strange in every way. Its halls, its occupants, and especially its guests.
Hey, you’re one of its guests too, she reminded herself with a smile.
Last night had been crazy. Sleeping with Eric, even crazier. One night stands were never her thing, and she wasn’t even sure that’s what this was. It was more like she’d been terrified, chased through the manor’s darkened halls, and Eric’s strong arms had been her salvation. Her refuge.
“Any port in a storm,” she shrugged, gliding barefoot across the big room.
You did a little more than just pull into port, though.
She sighed. Yeah, going forward it was definitely going to be awkward. Melody certainly wasn’t looking for a relationship, especially given her past track record. Almost every guy she dated ended up disappointing her, and usually in the most cataclysmic of ways.
Isn’t that your own fault though? the little voice asked.
In truth it was. Every romance she’d been through started out the same: excitement, lust, love… all puppy dogs and unicorns and rainbows. Melody would usually glide through the honeymoon phase of the relationship, enjoying the ride for what it was, but knowing in the back of her mind the inevitable fall would always come. ‘The disappointment of truth’ she once called it. The sorrow of knowing.
By the time she’d been hurt a half dozen times, Melody swore a solemn vow not to let her powers interfere with her personal life. And yet, that never happened. Just as they’d ruined her prom, her inane abilities also ruined whatever she usually had going with her significant other.
Examples were everywhere. Bobby was perfect in every way, until in ‘reading’ him one morning she found out he was suppressing a huge, even violent anger problem. Breaking up with him had been difficult, especially because she couldn’t tell him why she was ending things, but she was strong enough to do it anyway.
Leaving him drove her into the arms of Andy, who made her very happy for almost a year. Thinking it was okay to pry a little, Melody had peeked into his mind only to see that more than half his thoughts centered constantly around comparing her against his ex girlfriend.
Reading her boyfriends was always a problem. Every time she vowed not to do it, she broke down and did it anyway. It was always the same: just a touch, just a hint, just a tiny little glimpse… something to tell her that this was the one. That this particular guy was the good one, the right one, the one without an irreconcilable past or a troubled future.
Anthony had the hots for a girl in his apartment building — he’d be actively cheating on her in a matter of weeks. James was attentive, and a true gentleman, but he secretly liked men a little more than women. And Scott…
Scott’s mind held a secret so dark, so disturbing, she deleted his number and never took another call from him. Ever again.
Melody had given up on dating more than a year ago now. And she hadn’t looked back.
All of these things threaded their way through her mind as she searched the rest of the fancy, wood-paneled room. Aside from the piano being gone, half the stuff in the trophy case had been swapped out. She saw new things, old things, even a few things she couldn’t recognize. But nothing even remotely resembling the jeweled egg she’d been tasked by the Order to bring back.
Maybe I should wake Eric…
It would make looking faster, that’s for sure. At the same time, something told her not to do it. A sense of independence. A desire to accomplish the task all on her own. And yet, on the flip side of the coin, Xiomara’s voice urging her to hurry up. Reminding her that when it came down to it, this might be their final chance…
A breeze flowed in somewhere off to her right. Melody followed it, stepping out through a pair of glass-paned side doors and onto a small patio on the side of the house.
The air smelled fresh, but with an underlying heaviness to it. Almost like a moisture, but without the dampness. She looked up, out over the road. Beyond the road, into the fields…
The mist was still there.
Somehow, the strange grey mist was still shifting and churning. Only now it was closer. Much closer.
It’s taken over half the field. Or pretty close to that.
Sure enough, the fog that had enveloped the silver gate yesterday was now halfway across the lush green field she’d managed to cross. All evidence of the treeline beyond was now obliterated. There was only the mist, heavy and thick.
Melody turned lef
t and right. The fog stretched in a huge oval too, all the way around. The road she’d come up yesterday disappeared straight into it.
So much for finding my way back…
The thought worried her, but only for the briefest of moments. She didn’t even have the egg yet. And she wasn’t leaving without it.
“Focus, Mel,” she said, pinching herself on the arm. “Focus!”
It was one of her biggest weaknesses, getting distracted. She’d tried all sorts of meditation techniques to keep herself honed in on certain things, but no matter what she did, Melody always found herself thinking about — and often working on — ten things at once.
She scanned the small patio, then looked beyond it for anything interesting. She was on the same side of the manor as the carriage house. It was a little ways away, but she could see the blacksmith out there again, bent over and working on something. It was the same man she’d waved to on the way in.
Maybe he knows something, Melody figured. She could talk to him, maybe even get something helpful out of the conversation. And it was still very early. The man might speak more freely if there was no one else around.
It made sense to at least try.
She started off barefoot through the wet grass, enjoying the feel of it between her toes. She was in her element. This was the reason they’d sent her. Melody raised her head, a smile of grim determination curling across her lips.
Whether he wanted to or not, the man was certainly going to tell her something.
11
“Hey!”
Melody’s voice startled the man right out of whatever he was doing. He whirled on her so quickly it almost scared her right back.
“I’m Melody Larson,” she said, before he could utter a word. “What’s your name?”
The blacksmith — if that’s what he was — stared back at her in what seemed like astonishment, or disbelief. For several moments he said nothing.
“Lucus,” he muttered at last.
Melody smiled. “Well good morning Lucus,” she said pleasantly. “Looks like we’re both up early enough to—”
“Who sent you here?”
The words were short, even harsh. He didn’t say them angrily, but he meant them. And there was an accent too. Something thick and staccato Melody couldn’t make out.
“I— I just saw you working, and I wanted to—”
“You really shouldn’t be here.”
Melody crossed her brows in confusion. The man was looking around now, glancing over his shoulder. Staring back at the fields. At the house…
“And why not?” she asked defiantly.
“Because…” He looked almost like he might say something, then let it go. “Never mind. It’s… it’s nothing.”
He turned back to his task, adjusting the pin on a pair of long iron tongs. Melody watched him for a moment. Noticed his corded arms, bare up to his shoulders, flex and release as he twisted the metal between his hands.
“How long have you worked here, Lucus?”
He ignored the question without looking up. “Hand me that hammer.”
Melody looked around quickly and grabbed the nearest tool. She held it out to him.
“Not that one, the other.”
For the next minute the air was filled with the sounds of metal striking metal. It echoed across the plantation field. Reverberated strangely off the big manor house.
She chuckled. “You’re going to wake everyone up.”
Lucus looked up at her, then back down again. “No I’m not.”
He hammered some more, then tested the fit. The tongs moved, but creaked noisily along the pin. He grabbed a bottle of something — some kind of clear oil — and poured some directly onto the joint. When he was finally satisfied, he looked up with a sigh.
“What exactly did you want, Melody Larson?”
The question broke her out of a sort of trance. She’d been staring at the smith’s arms, his shoulders… the sharp cut of his square, stubbled jaw. But her gawking went beyond simple attraction. There was something else about Lucus that seemed… somehow familiar.
No, not familiar. That’s not the word. Maybe… compulsory?
“I’m looking for something,” she said carefully.
“And what’s that?”
She paused, biting her lip. Melody didn’t know how much she should say. But she needed him to open up, at least a little bit, if she was going to read him successfully.
“Is it some new clothing?” Lucus smirked. “Because you’re way overdressed for a barefoot morning stroll.”
“Not exactly,” Melody said.
The blacksmith folded his big arms in front of him. “Then what?”
She locked eyes with him. That was always the first step. His eyes were steel blue, cold yet warm. Full of strength and determination, but also an underlying compassion and understanding.
Things came then, as they always did. Bits, pieces, fragments of thought. Emotion. Will…
“I said—”
But then something else happened. Something that had never happened before in all the times she’d read someone.
Melody got too much.
Her eyes widened as her mind took in even more stimuli, even more perception and awareness than normal. Thoughts, feelings, sentiments of grief, of sorrow, of remorse… these things flew through her head, spinning out rapidly and gaining in strength and speed until Melody was reeling with the sheer weight of it all.
She grew increasingly dizzy. More and more alarmed as the thoughts kept coming, all seemingly without end. Melody felt hope fall to desperation, goodness give way to menace. The man standing before her represented a never-ending stream of pure consciousness — a wave of unchecked emotion that threatened to drown her in imprints of tragedy and heartbreak, of joy and love and ultimate sorrow. She felt the terrible anguish of crushing loss. The abject terror of near limitless fear, along with unfathomable depths of regret.
And there was confusion too. Confusion and hopelessness and eventually, a grim resignation so dark, so depressing, it sent a frozen shudder rocketing throughout her entire body.
She swooned and then fell… and Lucus caught her. It broke their gaze, broke the connection. When she came to her senses Melody was being held against the smith’s chest, wrapped in his two strong arms. She could feel his heart, beating powerfully beneath the surface of her cheek.
“W—What happened?”
“You fainted,” said Lucus.
“I did?”
“You did.”
She felt stupid. Wanted to get up immediately. But his arms felt too good. His closeness… and again, that strange familiarity, that made him less of a stranger and more of a—
“Thanks for catching me,” Melody said, pulling herself upright. She wiped her forehead with the back of one hand. “I— I must have…”
“Come with me,” Lucus told her suddenly. “I have what you need.”
He stomped off, leaving her wide-eyed and still a bit woozy.
Does he have the egg? she thought hopefully. Is that what he’s talking about?
Hurrying along, she followed him into the carriage house. Lucus led her through the interior, beyond a pair of inner doors and into what appeared to be a living area. There was a chest, a wardrobe, a small table with two tiny chairs. A tall ladder led up to a high-flung loft. Melody glanced upward, wondering if the man truly slept there.
Her host opened the wardrobe and began rummaging through it. He paused for a moment, as if considering something, then turned and handed her a simple cloth dress.
“Here,” said Lucus. “This is lighter, and much easier for you to wear than that ball gown.”
Melody glanced down, taking stock of herself. It couldn’t have been more than an hour after dawn and already she was sweating bullets.
“That’s why you passed out, isn’t it?” asked Lucus. “You’re too hot?”
“Yes,” she said quickly. “That’s probably it.”
“There you go,
then.”
The dress she was holding was actually somewhat pretty. It looked handmade.
“Where’d you get this?”
“It was my sister’s,” Lucus replied.
“Your sister?”
He nodded. “Cora.”
“She’s not going to be mad if I borrow it, is she?”
Lucus’s expression went uncomfortably dark. “No,” he said, shaking his head somberly. “My sister is… no longer here.”
The statement bred all new questions in Melody’s mind. She decided, wisely, not to ask them.
“You can change in here if you like,” Lucus said, stepping back through the doorway. “Unless you’d prefer to go back to the house.”
“Here’s fine,” smiled Melody.
Lucus nodded and closed the doors behind him. The second he did, she began shimmying straight out of her ball gown.
“Oh, and Lucus?” she called after him.
“Yes?”
“Thank you.”
12
Back outside, she felt immeasurably better.
The dress was thin and made from a breathable cloth that, unlike the ball gown, didn’t stick to her skin. Melody felt ten pounds lighter and five degrees cooler. She found Lucus back at work, sanding the spokes of a large carriage wheel.
“Lucus…”
This time he looked up at her. He didn’t stop sanding though.
“I’m looking for something. An object, that might be at the manor house.”
She’d made the decision to tell him while getting dressed. For some reason, despite all her trouble with trying to read him, she felt she could trust the blacksmith.
“It’s an egg,” Melody went on. She held her hands slightly apart. “About this big. Ivory chased with gold. Studded with gemstones.”
Dust flew as he sanded down hard on the wooden spokes. She saw his jaw go tight. His white teeth clenched with the effort.
“Have you seen it?”
She studied him. Usually Melody was pretty good at body language, at knowing when people were hiding something. In this case though, she got nothing. Lucus was practically unreadable.