Touching Fire (Touch Saga)

by Airicka Phoenix

  Ashton stepped back from the table. He waved a hand over the rawel and the maze distorted and we watched a man rise from the light; tall with wide shoulders and a broad chest. He was made of gold, or maybe that was just the light. He had a head full of curly hair that fell to his shoulders. He was naked from the waist up and, I won’t lie, he was hot. Definitely a ten. I deliberately not noticed the sharp glance Isaiah sent me and continued to watch as the man came fully into view.

  His head was bowed as though in prayer, hands clasped meekly in front of him, long fingers wrapped around a double-edged sword that was as long and dangerous as he was. He wore a tunic around his narrow hips and sandals on his feet. But none of that explained why Ashton was showing him to us.

  “The only way to explain what we are is by explaining where we came from.” He gave a wave of his hand over the rawel and magnificent wings exploded from the man’s back. Each one expanded into forever.

  I gasped. “We’re angels?”

  He shook his head, leaning back in his chair. “He is not us, but he is the reason we exist.” He raised his head and his hazel eyes met mine. “What do you know of the Tree of Life?”

  I shrugged. “Only what I’ve read in mythology books.”

  With a nod, he dropped his gaze back to the man and his sword. Slowly, the light around his feet swirled and rose to create a beautiful tree in full bloom.

  “Arbor Vitae,” he murmured. “The Tree of Life, the source of all life. Did you know this is the very tree that bestowed Eve with the toxic apple?” He didn’t wait for me to comment. “After the fall of man by sin, Michael,” Ashton said, as he gestured to the man with the wings, “was ordered to destroy the tree. But the moment his blade struck the base, seven roots shot through the earth, creating seven of mankind’s worse fears.” His eyes lifted slowly and I found myself caught in them and in his story. “Do you know what those fears are, Fallon?”

  I shook my head slowly. “Demons?” I guessed feebly.

  He waved his hand over the rawel. The seven symbols of the regions appeared, surrounding the tree and its seven roots.

  “Created as a punishing sin, the tree birthed seven original sins and the roots became the nexus, a network of doors leading across time and space, for sin is everywhere.”

  I stiffened. Isaiah did the same beside me. “You’re a sin?”

  He shook his head. “No. I’m not a sin. I am the sin. The original sin.” He paused, rolled his eyes. “One of the original sins.”

  I looked to Isaiah, hoping he was hearing the same thing I was and that I wasn’t crazy, or dreaming. He had heard and looked as wide-eyed and slack-jawed as I felt. I turned back to my father … my father!

  “What does that make me?” I wondered.

  “You are my daughter,” he said simply. “You’re not an original, but you are Rem.”

  “A what?”

  He smiled a little. “It’s what we are. We are Rem Legacy.”

  “Celia told me about this today,” I said, feeling slightly better that I knew something. “But we were talking about her legacy … Bane Legacy. She said only those born from a Sire are considered part of a legacy, right?”

  “Celia always was better at explaining things,” he said.

  “You said you … we, were sins. Which sin?” I thought of my hunger for blood and blanched. “We’re not gluttony, are we?”

  Ashton laughed. “No, that is Toran region.”

  That was a small relief.

  “Okay, what then?”

  “You tell me. How well do you know your sins, Fallon?”

  I glanced at Isaiah, then back at Ashton and shrugged. “Wrath, greed, gluttony, pride…”

  “Sloth,” Isaiah added when I struggled.

  I nodded. “Right, sloth, and, um … envy.”

  “You’re missing one,” Ashton said when I went quiet.

  Frowning, I turned to Isaiah, hoping he knew, but he wasn’t looking at me. He was staring furiously at the fire. A muscle moved along his jaw and his knuckles blazed white against his gold skin where they were fisted on his thighs. I faced Ashton once more.

  “Luxuria,” he said quietly, moving his hand over the rawel and making the light coil. The symbol of our region appeared, glowing almost white.

  It was Isaiah who answered. “Lust.”

  Chapter 14

  “That’s ridiculous!” I leapt to my feet, disturbing the floating streams of light so they floated harmlessly to the glass table. “I’m not lust. I mean, look at me! There’s nothing lusty about me.” I threw my arms open wide. “Do I look like the sort to invoke lustful whatever in people?”

  Delaying in response, Ashton plucked up the rawel and shut off the light display. He compressed it back to its normal size and slipped it into his pocket.

  “You are misunderstanding your place, Fallon.” He moved to his chair and regained it slowly, sitting upon it like a king on his throne. “It is a common mistake. Humans are so bound by words. Greed, they automatically think money. Envy, they think of greed. Lust, they think of sex. Yes, carnal desires play a part, but one can lust for money. They can desire wealth and success. All sins intertwine, but desire is the root of all sins. Without passion one cannot achieve their dreams. Without longing, we would have no dreams. So you see?”

  I didn’t see.

  “Okay … okay, uh…” I exhaled sharply. “So let’s pretend like I’m not freaking out right now, what does this mean?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. What do you want it to mean?”

  “No, no!” I let out a half-crazed laugh. “You need to tell me what I’m supposed to do with … with this…” I gestured to everything in a wide, violent sweep of my arms. “This is a whole lot more than just a little weird. I mean, at this point in the game, I would rather be a vampire and I hate vampires! Ask him.” I swung a hand towards Isaiah, nearly smacking him. “So you need to tell me what does this means, okay? Please?”

  “Fallon.” He rose to his feet and moved around the coffee table to stand before me. His hands rested lightly on my shoulders. “It means you finally know who you are.”

  “But I don’t know—”

  “Yes, you do.” He squeezed my shoulders. “Now just breathe, okay? This doesn’t have to change anything. You’re still the same person you were ten minutes ago.”

  Was I? I didn’t feel like the same person. I felt like I had somehow dropped into someone else’s life. It all felt alien and out of place.

  “I don’t know what this means,” I said again. “Am I going to start going into people’s dreams and sucking their souls?”

  His mouth twitched, but he smothered it quickly. “You’re not a succubus, Fallon,” he said calmly. “You are a sin and I will teach you everything.”

  I was shaking all over like I couldn’t seem to get warm, yet my palms were dripping with sweat. I had to grit my jaw to keep my teeth from chattering. Somehow, this revelation was infinitely worse than the time I learned I was a cocktail of animal DNA. Maybe because I had stupidly assumed that was the worst possible thing to happen to me and then this happened and I was left wondering what the hell was next? How could this moment possibly get worse?

  “Fallon…” Ashton’s arms folded me into his chest.

  For a moment, I stiffened before I just let myself sag into him. I closed my eyes as his hands started stroking my hair. His warmth seeped into my skin, chasing away the chill. He kissed my temple and it was all I could do to keep from bursting into tears.

  “It’s going to be all right,” he promised. “We’re not monsters.”

  “Then what are we?” I whispered into his shoulder. “It’s called sin for a reason. It’s wrong and evil.”

  He drew back, not much, just enough to frame my face between his hands. “I won’t deny it. We are capable of great evil, but because of us, mankind also knows great joy. Nothing is ever all good or all evil. Not even us.”

  I shook my head. “I need to think about this.”

 
; He released me. “Of course. You’ve had an exciting day. You should rest.”

  Exciting wasn’t the word I would have used, but I didn’t say anything as I started towards the library doors. They gave easily beneath my grasp, surprising me. They appeared so heavy. Not dwelling on it, I pushed onward, moving quickly down the corridor.

  “Fallon.” Isaiah stepped into place alongside me. “Talk to me.”

  I threw up my hands. “About what? That my father is a sin and I’m his sin daughter? I don’t even know where to start.”

  “It makes sense you know,” he said softly.

  I looked to him, my disbelief no doubt clear on my face because it rang perfectly in my voice. “How do you figure?”

  He rolled his shoulder in a slight shrug. His blue eyes met mine, hot and intense. “Do you really need me to tell you the affect you have on people?”

  I stopped walking and stared at him. “What?”

  He nudged me onward. “I’ve been watching you your whole life. I have seen the way boys would watch you in school. The way men would follow you with their eyes when you got older. It always amazed me how clueless you were to it.”

  “I wasn’t clueless!” I snapped. “And you’re wrong. It was never like that. They would watch because I was some kind of circus freak to them.”

  “And why would you be something like that, hm?” he challenged. “Do you have a wooden leg I’m not aware of? A glass eye, maybe?”

  “Because I was new,” I replied, annoyed. “So what you’re saying is that I’m super hot and too dense to know it.”

  He paused to mull this over. “That’s exactly what I’m saying.” He doubled over with an oomph when I elbowed him in the gut. “You didn’t let me finish,” he muttered, barely suppressing his grin. “You’re not dense, just very sheltered.”

  We reached my bedroom door and I rounded on him. “Why? Because in the hundreds of schools I’ve been to I’ve never once found a single guy I liked?”

  The glimmer in his eyes were still there, but darker, almost predatory. “Perhaps.”

  “And how is it you have no idea why that is?” I countered, spearing my hips with my hands and taking a step towards him.

  A shadow shifted over his face. “Why?”

  My heart was drumming in my chest, I realized with a start. An explosion of little wings danced in the pit of my stomach and I gulped audibly. But I was determined now.

  “Because I have always belonged to someone, even when I didn’t know what that meant.” I paused to moisten my lips, my nerves threatening to overtake me if I didn’t say it quickly. “I have always been in love with the boy on the bike.”

  The flicker of emotion that closed over his face could only be described as agonizing. It clouded his beautiful eyes and sharpened the edges of his jaw.

  “Don’t say that.”

  That wasn’t what I was expecting as a response. I always assumed he shared my feelings, at least a little. I certainly never imagined he would look on the verge of throwing up.

  Hurt welled up inside me until it was a white-hot wedge crammed into my chest. I wanted to reach up and smooth the ache, but I couldn’t seem to move. I was frozen from the neck down with only my brain functioning enough to beg me to run. I couldn’t believe he was turning me away.

  He straightened a notch, his gaze never left me. A sad little smile touched his lips. “Do you really think I could ever turn you away?”

  I wanted to say um, kinda doing it right now. Except I knew the moment I opened my mouth, I would break into tears.

  He sighed, dropping back against the nearest wall. He shoved a hand back through his hair, sweeping back the thick fringes that always fell over his eyes.

  “Things are different now, Fallon,” he murmured.

  “You don’t want me anymore.” It wasn’t a question.

  Isaiah swore when my voice broke and closed his eyes. “Of course I want you! God, I’m half-crazy with how much I want you! There is nothing I want more. But…” He opened his eyes and pinned them on my face. “You’re home now. You’re free. You don’t need to worry about Garrison or running. You can start a new life with … with people like you.”

  I recoiled. “What?”

  He growled deep in his throat. “I’m not saying this right.”

  “What are you saying?” I demanded, finding myself finally through anger.

  He averted his gaze. “All you’ve ever known was me. You never got the chance to be like other girls. Maybe now … now you can.”

  “Can what?” I shouted, throwing my arms open and letting them drop back down to my sides.

  “I don’t know damn it!” he snapped, frustration warring across his features. “I just … ugh!” He kicked the wall viciously.

  A small part of my brain knew exactly what he was saying. I wasn’t stupid. I was just stunned out of my damn mind that he was saying it. That alone pissed me right off.

  “Let me get this straight.” I folded my arms and pinned him with all the fury of a seriously pissed off woman. “You think now that you’ve brought me here, these feelings I have for you are going to magically just disappear, is that it?” Another thought occurred to me, this one clutching my insides with razor sharp talons. It was nearly impossible to speak around the pain. “That’s what you want, isn’t it? Now that your job is done, you can find someone else.” I shoved away from him and put the width of a corridor between us. “Someone who isn’t so slow and weak. Someone who doesn’t use you like a Meals On Wheels.”

  Why hadn’t I seen it? He wasn’t giving me an option. He was trying to let me down gently. An upgraded version of the whole, it’s not you, it’s me, line.

  “Fallon, stop.” He closed the space between us and took my shoulders in his hands. “You know none of that is true.”

  I shook my head. “If it’s not true then why are you breaking up with me?”

  “I’m not!” He gave me a little shake. “I just want you to know that I’ll understand if you want to find something else.”

  Anger and confusion took over my crippling pain and I shoved him away from me. “You can go ahead and pretend to be all noble about this, Isaiah. Pretend like you’re doing me this huge favor by letting me go, you’re forgetting one important detail.” I speared him violently in the chest with my index finger. “That I don’t want to be with anyone else. But if you do, if that’s what you want…” I bit my lip when it trembled, unable to vomit the nails wedged in my throat.

  I knew I should be the bigger person and accept the fact that there was a possibility that he would want more, but I couldn’t. Instead, I took another step back from him, wrenched open my bedroom door and closed it between us.

  I didn’t sleep that night. Between my conversation with Isaiah and the one with Ashton, I was pretty certain I would never sleep again. When had my life taken such a nosedive into loony town that I couldn’t even find my way out? It made no sense. Two months ago, the weirdest thing to happen to me was watching the guy behind the motel counter pick his nose and pass gas at the same time. Now I was suddenly the daughter of all the world’s sins, birthed by some mystical tree. I wasn’t even going to touch the whole hallow thing. I couldn’t even fathom the level of brain power I would need to process that little piece of information.

  I stared up at the ceiling as I lay in bed. “What have you gotten me into, Mom?”

  I totally got that every family had their secrets and everyone was so sure that theirs was somehow worse, but I was pretty confident I would win. There was nothing like wandering spirits and deadly vices to crush the competition.

  By the time light sliced across the horizon, piercing the clear black with shards of gold and crimson, I was more awake than I had been my whole life. I watched it blossom, soaking up the darkness until nothing but miles of crystal blue stretched across the sky. Giving up on sleep, I threw off the covers and padded to the terrace. The early morning chill crept across my skin, making me shiver. I wore one of Isaiah’s t-shirts,
a black one that went all the way to my knees. It used to smell like him, but that had faded and I wondered briefly if I could sneak into his room and steal another one.

  I touched the hem and thought of my talk with Isaiah about how my new destiny made sense, and maybe in some twisted way, it did. After staying up for most of the night thinking about it, I was beginning to understand a little more of just what I was.

  It was true what I’d said, about never noticing guys looking at me. I never considered myself grotesquely hideous, but I was, in my opinion, fairly average. Between Angelina Jolie and myself, I would lose. Badly. But I never noticed the attention because I never cared. I was so set on just making it through the x-number of weeks/months that starting a relationship with anyone just seemed stupid. I made it my mission to avoid people, to avoid that connection. What was the point when I would be leaving? Yet a part of me had always felt like I wasn’t alone, which had nothing to do with having my mom. It was something else. Something deep and profound. Something that always made me feel safe. At the time I hadn’t known it, but it had always been Isaiah. But it was beginning, slowly, to make sense.

  My connection to Isaiah. The draw between us. The insatiable hunger, the passion and near obsession. Garrison had said there were parts of me he couldn’t remove, parts of me that were unique and he had used those to manipulate my existence. I wasn’t an expert and I would need to talk to Ashton, but what were all those feelings if not lust? Had Garrison somehow tapped into my heritage and woven it with my feelings for Isaiah? That still didn’t explain why I needed blood. The people I’d met at breakfast the day before, they were eating regular food. There was no sacrificial virgin splayed across the table, arteries cut and drained. Was that part of my DNA or was that something Garrison had introduced? No. He had said I had always needed blood. It was one of the things he couldn’t remove.

  I definitely needed to talk with my father.

  Moving away from the breathtaking scenery, I hurried to the bathroom for a shower. I was detangling my wet hair when I felt him approaching. My heart skipped even as I set down the brush and hurried to the door. I wasn’t sure what I would find. I knew it was Isaiah, but would he still be harboring those ridiculous notions of me finding someone else? Had he finally come to his senses? Would he argue with me? Dread tainted my earlier excitement and my footsteps slowed. I was practically grimacing by the time I pried open the door.