“Non. You have my attention now. Dis-moi?”
She felt her cheeks flush. “It’s about the man downstairs. The friend of your father’s?”
He frowned, the humor fading. “Our security man. What do they call them in England? Bouncers?”
“That’s American. In England we call them door supervisors.”
“Ah.” He smiled, but it seemed forced. “Door supervisor, then. What else would you like to know?”
She bit her lip, but she had to know. Needed the reassurance that she wasn’t losing her mind again. “What’s his name?”
“Owen,” he said. “Monsieur Owen.”
She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. “Oh.”
“Why do you ask?”
She shook her head. “I thought I recognized him from somewhere, but it must have been someone else.”
When Thorgrim had come back to her, in the ward, when she had imagined him, he had called himself Donner. Not Owen. Though, that name reminded her of something else. Maybe the resemblance had less to do with seeing ghosts, and more to do with genetics. She had given Thorgrim a son, once, a very long time ago, and if the DeLeons could keep the resemblance to their forefathers, Thorgrim’s line could have done so as well.
“Mm.” Garrit grunted, rolling off the other side of the bed. “Another glass of water for you, I think, and then we should both get some sleep. Tomorrow will be busy.”
She felt herself relax, staring at the ceiling while she waited for Garrit to return with her glass. She didn’t have to be insane. The man could just be some family of Thorgrim’s, three thousand years removed. Why hadn’t she thought of that before? The realization was a balm, and she felt her mind drift away from any other possibility, secure in this one.
When Garrit came back to the bed, she kissed him, curling up against his side. He was warm, and she trailed her fingers through the hair on his chest. “Thank you.”
He kissed her forehead. “Next time, remind me to ignore you when you say it’s important.”
She smiled, resting her head against his shoulder. “Only if we’re in bed.”
Chapter Eleven: Creation
Reu caught her by the arm before she made it into the trees. “Eve? Are you all right? Did he hurt you?”
“Let me go.” She pulled away from him. “Please. Let me go.”
His hand dropped. “Of course. Forgive me.”
She darted into the trees, glancing back to be sure Adam wasn’t watching.
But Reu followed. “What did he do?”
“I don’t know.”
The moment raced through her mind, and she doubled over as her stomach heaved. Her meal burned the back of her throat and she swallowed convulsively. Reu caught her before she fell, supporting her against his body. She tried to steady herself, her thoughts, her stomach.
“He covered my mouth with his.” She pressed her hand against her belly, willing it to calm. She felt as though she could still feel the heat of Adam’s hands on her body. “And then he threw me from him.”
Reu’s grip tightened. “Did you want him to touch you, Eve? Did he give you a choice?”
She shook her head. The warmth was gone from his eyes, and now they just looked black with anger.
“Are you hurt? Did he do anything more than kiss you?”
“No.” She wiped her mouth, and closed her eyes. The image of their bodies moving together swam before her, along with the flare of… of something she didn’t understand, warming her belly, and spreading lower. “No. But he meant to.”
“You stopped him?”
She shook her head again. “I tried to, but he was too strong. I couldn’t push him away. He sent me to bathe.”
Reu rubbed his face with both hands. “I have to stop this. I have to stop him.”
“He’ll hurt you.” Then the words came back to her. Adam’s thoughts about how they should be grateful. “Cast you out. I don’t understand what that is. Out of where?”
“The Garden. Into the barren lands outside to starve.” Reu’s face was dark again, and he looked back the way they had come. The caves weren’t visible through the trees, but she was sure that was what he was trying to see. “When did he say that?”
“After the meal. I told him the women were kind to me. He thought they should be grateful he let them live at all. That he might cast them out anyway.”
“He said all this to you?”
She leaned against a tree, her stomach still twisted. “When he touches me, I hear more than he speaks aloud.”
Reu murmured a word she had never heard and took her by the arm again, though gently, pulling her deeper into the trees. Leaves pawed at her, bushes grasping at her arms and legs. It wasn’t until they had traveled some distance that he stopped, sweeping back the drooping branches of a willow tree.
“We should be safe here.” He guided her inside. The sun filtered through the branches, turning everything green. “Please. Explain to me what you mean.”
She blinked. Reu had seemed so wise. But Adam had told her she was different. Was this how? “You don’t understand?”
He almost smiled. “I’m not all-knowing. None of us are. Can you explain?”
She sank down to the ground, her legs unsteady. All she wanted was to curl up somewhere safe. To hide in the shadow, in the dark, in the void. There was no comfort in this world. She rubbed her cheek, thinking of Adam’s rejection. Dirt and sand had saved her. That was something. She dug her fingers into the dirt and leaves. It was cool and soft and damp, clinging to her skin.
“When he touches me, it’s like there’s another person in my head. I hear so much more, feel so much more. It’s uncomfortable. Overwhelming.”
Reu’s voice was very soft. “Does he know?”
She looked up. “What?”
He was studying her, his eyes gentle again, but still dark. All the anger had left his face. “Have you told this to Adam? Does he know?”
“No.” She dug her fingers deeper into the soil. “I haven’t said anything. I thought he knew. That it was the same for everyone else.”
He crouched in front of her. “That’s why you don’t like to be touched, isn’t it? Why you keep pulling away from him.” He held his hand out to her, palm up and waited.
She shook her head. “It isn’t the same.”
“But you feel something?” He closed his hand.
“Feelings, sometimes. Emotions.” She lifted her gaze to his face. “Is there something wrong with me, Reu?”
He laughed. It was short and sharp and nothing at all like Adam. “You’re supposed to be the most perfect of us all, Eve. If you can do this, feel these things, it isn’t because there’s something wrong with you.”
“But you don’t hear or feel anything.”
“No.” He frowned, looking away, his face darkening again. “If Adam could hear us, surely he would have acted. Done something to punish us.”
“Why? What would he do?”
Reu shook his head. “He’ll be looking for you. We should get you back, or he’ll be angry.”
She closed her hand around the dirt, the images from Adam’s mind racing through her thoughts again. She tried to breathe, but it was too hard. “I don’t want to go back. I can’t do this, Reu. I can’t.”
He took her hand, and she let him pry her fingers open and brush away the earth. “I’ll think of something to stop him. Stay close to the others in the meantime.”
“He’ll hurt you.”
“It wouldn’t be the first time. Or the last. But better that he turn his power on me than you.”
She searched his face. “Why would you do this for me?”
He raised his hand and she thought he would touch her, but he only brushed her hair away from her eyes and dropped his hand again. “God said I should protect you. That I had to keep you from him. And I will.”
Reu sent her back to the cave alone, promising he would follow. Adam would be angry enough that she had disappeared
and not followed his command. She had seen the stream on her way back but couldn’t bring herself to wash. The dirt was the only protection she had.
Eve hesitated at the tree line, watching the other men and women as they ate together, sharing gourds of water. Hannah was sitting with a man Eve didn’t know, using a sharp rock to split a melon. It was quieter than it should have been. No one was laughing or smiling the way they had earlier in the day. Hannah scraped the seeds from the melon without looking at her companion.
As she watched, Adam grabbed a woman by the arm. She could see the anger in his face as he spoke, but his words were lost to her. Eve stepped out from the trees and moved closer so she could hear.
“You were supposed to be serving her. Seeing to her needs. Where is she?”
“You took her into the cave, Lord. And I went to fetch water. I thought she was with you.” It was Sarah, with the golden hair.
He slapped her, the sound carrying even to Eve. Sarah dropped to her knees in the grass with a sob, but he hauled her back to her feet. “You’re not even worth the air you breathe. What do I keep you for if you can’t do what you’re told?”
He pulled his arm back as if to strike her again. Eve’s stomach twisted and she lurched forward. “Adam, stop! Please.”
He spun, dropping Sarah and crossing to her so quickly she didn’t even have time to step back. He grabbed her by the arm, his fingers bruising her skin. “Where have you been?”
“I got lost in the woods.” It was what Reu had told her to say. “I’m sorry.”
He jerked her away from the others. Lost in the woods. And even dirtier now than she was earlier. I should’ve taken her then.
“You had no business in the woods. You were to bathe and return to me.”
She tried to pull her arm free. His anger clouded her mind, making it difficult to think. “I’m sorry. I just wanted to see the Garden. I just wanted to see what was there.”
Insolence. His fingers dug even deeper into her flesh. “You will do what you’re told in the future, Eve. Do you understand me?”
“I didn’t do anything wrong.” She saw his hand rise but didn’t flinch, his anger so strong that it washed her own fear away.
Until he struck her.
Her head snapped to the side beneath the blow. His hold on her arm kept her from falling as Sarah had, but she didn’t consider it a mercy. Her skin burned and her eyes watered. She covered her cheek with her hand and gulped back a sob of her own.
“Don’t ever contradict me in front of the others again.” She has to learn. They all have to learn. I am their god now, and they will obey!
He flung her away from him and she stumbled back, almost falling, but for Reu who caught her. She cried out once in relief and clung to him, more shocked than hurt. He folded her into his arms and mumbled a soft apology into her hair. She hid her face against his chest, his skin cool on her cheek where Adam had hit her.
“You’re safe, Eve,” he murmured in her ear. “It’s all right.”
Somehow she believed him, though she felt Adam’s eyes on her back and she shuddered. Reu held her closer, stroking her hair.
“He’s walking away.”
For some reason, the words were hard. She looked over her shoulder and caught sight of a woman disappearing into the cave with Adam. Lilith. Reu’s jaw tightened, muscles twitching below the surface.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t intend for things to happen this way. For you to be hurt.” He tilted her chin up so he could see her cheek, his fingers gentle. “If I’d only been a moment earlier, I could have stopped him. You’re going to be purple and green by morning.”
She pressed her face against his skin and let him hold her. She wasn’t sure there was anything she could say to reassure him. Or what it meant that another woman took her place with Adam tonight. She closed her eyes against the images springing immediately to her mind, making her shudder again.
Reu lifted her into his arms, carrying her against his chest the way Adam once had. When she had been so new and so innocent.
She didn’t feel innocent anymore. Things were starting to make sense, but it wasn’t an understanding she wanted. Her stomach twisted into knots of fear and she longed for the confusion she had left behind. When she had not known cruelty or pain or fear. And she was beginning to understand, too, what Reu had said her first night.
This wasn’t how they were meant to live.
The sun sank behind the trees and the sky turned red, then black. Reu drew pictures for her in the stars shining down, telling her the stories God had shared when He had lived among them. He traced the outline of a great man with a spear, and an eye that had been lost in the search for the wisdom to save his son and his people.
“The most worthy of sacrifices,” Reu said, then fell silent.
She felt his discomfort and turned her head to look at him in the moonlight. He was frowning, and though he stared at the sky, she didn’t think he saw the stars.
“How so?” she asked.
“God said seeking wisdom for the benefit of those you must provide for is never a sin, but so often we will find ourselves searching for glory alone, and it’s then that we must stop ourselves.”
Eve shivered and Reu wrapped his arms around her in the grasses, tucking her head beneath his chin. Somehow, as the silence stretched, she was certain they were both thinking of Adam.
Chapter Twelve: 984 BC
“Fresh water, Thorgrim?” She slung the skin from her shoulder and held it out to him.
Thor grinned, taking it from her and drinking deeply. “Not as good as mead, but thank you.”
“Better for you than mead, when you’ve been sweating in the sun all day.” Eve took back the water skin and sat down on the nearby rocks. “Your boats are better and faster than any others, but you spend so much time working to build them, I wonder that you’ve even taken the time to sleep.”
“I’ve taken time for more than sleep, Tora.” He smiled. Odin help him, but she was even named for him in this life. He wondered who above him was struck with such a sense of humor. Or perhaps it was something else. The True God trying to lure him into her arms. He was perilously close to succumbing.
She returned his smile, a blush creeping up her neck and into her cheeks. “Yes, you’ve taken time for mead, as well,” she teased.
He put down his hammer. It was crude, and more often than not, his fist made shorter work of the job, but appearances had to be kept even if Odin had not taken his strength. Eve came to watch him almost daily, bringing water with her, or a small meal of bread and cheese they might share together. He had come to look forward to her teasing, and her laughter when he returned it.
“What else should I find time for?” he asked, letting his gaze drift from her face. The tunic she wore did not quite reach the top of her string skirt, the wide neck leaving much of her shoulders bare, for all the sleeves met her elbow. Often, when she sat, he struggled to keep from staring, hoping for glimpses of her ivory thighs, dusted with soft, fair hairs. He was beginning to think she struck such poses just to tempt him.
Her face flushed a brighter scarlet, but she said nothing, only looking out over the water as if it fascinated her.
Thor walked around the half-finished boat and she shifted to make room for him upon the rock she’d claimed. His tunic did not reach his knees, with the same wide neck of her own and belted at his waist. If he was guilty of looking at her, he had caught her watching him in the same manner more than once. And he had surely tempted her, time and again, when he had stripped off the heavy wool to bathe in the sea after a long day spent sweating beneath the sun. Once he’d even thrown the garment into her lap before launching himself through the water, her laughter in his ears.
But he’d had enough of teasing now, and he thought, perhaps, so had she. “I do not love building boats as much as I do the excuse it gives you to bring me water. And the excuse it then gives me to speak with you.” Thor took her hand in his and kissed it. “I wish to r
emain as useful as possible to your father.”
Her eyes were wide when she looked up at him. “Is that why you work so hard? To prove yourself to my father, that he’ll give me to you?”
He thanked Odin silently for removing his power to control the storms, because if he hadn’t, his eyes would’ve flashed with lightning then, and given him away. As if she could be the property of any man. As if she weren’t glowing with immortality before his eyes.
“I seek to prove myself to you, Tora. That you’ll allow me to care for you, whether your father wishes it or not.”
Surprise flitted across her features and she studied his face. “You are a strange man, Thorgrim. So unlike the others here.”
He smiled, releasing her hand to caress her cheek softly. “Would you prefer I declare you my property and steal you away?”
She laughed. “Father might expect it.”
“Is that how your father met your mother?”
“Their marriage was arranged. To make peace with another village. But he will expect me to marry a strong man, to lead our people.” She frowned, her forehead creasing, and looked away again. “He still wishes for a son. Perhaps the gods will grant him one yet.”
“The gods,” he repeated. He didn’t know what to make of her when she spoke this way. If she meant what she said, or simply offered what was expected. “Do you pray to Freyja for a baby brother?”
Something about her body stiffened and she stood, collecting the water skin. “I should go. I’ve kept you from your work for too long.”
He chuckled at her discomfort and caught her by the wrist before she had gone far enough to evade him. He had to hear the truth this time. If he was going to stay, she had to know she could trust him. He wanted her to trust him.
“Is Freyja not your preferred goddess of fertility? I know there are others. In the south they pray to Isis, or Aphrodite. Hera?” He couldn’t bring himself to name Sif, though it was much more obvious. He couldn’t let the thought of her poison this moment, this happiness. “I suppose you could pray to Frigg, instead.”
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