Feelings make you weak, chica! Come on, he’s not that hot! In fact he’s kind of a jerk.
Growling, she struggled to claw at his face. He made the mistake of not holding her arms down this time. Cursing the moment her nail caught the skin of his cheek, he reclaimed his hold then pulled until she felt her shoulder would burst from its socket any second.
“Fight me,” he hissed.
“Stop, you’re hurting me!”
“Good. In your pain, in your emotion, in your soul, you will find the will to fight, Jessamiene. Now use it!”
“I can’t!” She trembled, began to shake against the inferno of her emotions and all the fears she fought. His words invoked sensory images she would rather forget, the touch of her mother’s hand smoothing her fevered brow, her father’s caress at the tip of her nose, strong hands reaching deep within her chest as Emrys sewed her back together from the inside out. She was brought back by the sound of his voice.
“You’re afraid to give in, aren’t you? You’ve lived your whole life afraid of the dark rather than face it! Ye aren’t worthy of Iudicael’s favor, Jessamiene, not worthy of the Emerald Eyes!”
She screamed and the trembling turned to violent shakes. Her skin felt on fire, alive. The silver blood she had seen coursing through her veins pulsed faster, sent sharp shivers of unmaking through the barriers. Amie flung her head back into his, stretched out her limbs with a cry of defiance and watched the world illuminate with bursting sheens of lavender light.
Emrys was thrown off her back and sent crashing into the stone bleachers behind them. Struggling to stand on her feet, she clenched her fists, sought to reclaim the pure energy escaping her pores. Turning on Emrys, she found him already recovered and rushing her. An inky light surrounded him, seeped from a shadow that should not have been there, until it turned murky bronze. His darker light crashed into hers as he lifted a fist and pushed an invisible rippling force against her power.
Throwing her hands up to stop it, Amie gasped when the sickly black tendrils pierced her hands and flushed up her arms, into her heart and beat in time with each rapid breath. She blinked, saw him laughing and shouting incoherently over the dull roar filling their pit.
Son of a nutcracker!
Just to spite him, Amie thrust her hand towards his chest and watched in disbelief as a stream of violet light escaped her, raced through a swirling stream that pierced his chest. Throwing his head back, he smiled and drew his fists to either side of his chest, unaffected. Emrys controlled the chaos somehow, knew how to warp it snugly back inside of him, like sweeping dust under a rug. It made the shadows around him bolder, lurking beneath the power in his steps.
Ripples of their inner nixies met and melded together to create a dome above the amphitheater, bouncing back to reconnect with the earth below. Flowers and plants sprouted up wherever the magical aftershocks touched.
Amie had never felt more drained in her life. Drustan’s ring burned a cold fire on her finger and she fell to her knees, found relief the moment her fingers slipped through the tangle of grass. Shedding silent tears, Amie watched flowers she had only seen in her dreams sprout from her fingertips.
Emrys sat down on the other side of the lavender flora, drew his knees up to rest his long arms on them and tore a blade of grass between his fingertips. “I should say it went better than expected,” he mused and spontaneously stretched out, crossed his arms behind his head and with a satisfied grin watched the last traces of power fizzle to cloudy skies above them.
Bitterly, tucking her wonder and fear aside, she asked, “What did you do to me?” It couldn’t have been her. One thing she knew for certain, whatever Emrys had made her do wasn’t happening ever again.
“I only taught ye how to open the door, Jessamiene. You’ll be able to tap into it whenever you want now.” He chuckled. “And sometimes when you least desire.”
Amie rounded on him. “Just stop! This is insane! None of this makes sense! There is no way on earth I should be able to do any of what I just did!” She wrung her hands furiously the moment she caught the aim of his amused orbs. Freshly sprouted vines broke from their earthy ties and clung to her hands until she shook them free.
Emrys seemed unperturbed with the fact vines were also curling amid her flowers and tearing at his clothes with prickly thorns. Capturing her attention with the potency of a snake charmer’s he said, matter-of-factly, “Unless you belong here,” supplanting what she was too afraid to admit. Emrys laughed while she denied it. “Amie, sooner or later you’re going to have to start accepting you believe more than you’re allowing yourself to see.”
“Right, next thing you’ll be telling me I have a real talent for catching flobbergidits!” She rubbed her hands together to contain the last waves of power pushing through her unconscious defenses.
“Would you be open to suggestion? Periwinkle could make use of as much help in the garden as he can get.”
Amie stared amazed at his unflinching gaze, mouth parting then snapping shut as she flung her fists at him and shouted, “I’m being serious!”
“So am I.” Emrys laughed, teetered back, and the clouds above parted to allow slivers of light to peek and illuminate his dark features into something foreign. His smile was blinding beneath the full weight of the sun. No set of features made Emrys devastating to look at, she then realized. Rather it was the set of his coal-black eyes, the sensitive twist of his mouth and all its hidden hints of expression. Deeper still ran the danger of his person, echoing of an affinity for his dark past. What disturbed her was the sense that the tightly bound danger in him might choose to unleash at any second.
Just like those bad boys Mamma used to warn you about.
“Never mind,” he said, waving aside the thought with a smirk, “you’d hate the business. Flobbergidits and their prickling needle coats and syrupy sweat. Can’t have our little princess looking like a bag of slip kippers, can we?” Easing back onto his arm pillow, he sighed and stared unabashedly at the afternoon sunlight.
Amie tried to rub away the prickling sensation beneath her skin, when her gaze fell to his neck and the scars crisscrossed over it. Gasping, she said, “Where did you get those scars?”
Emrys tensed after a pained pause, twisted onto his stomach and stood with his back to her. Tucking his chin into his shoulder, he offered, “You’re free to go now, Jessamiene. We shall continue this lesson after supper.” He slipped away with little more than a farewell and left her wanting much more.
Chapter 24
Queens & Enchantments
“Where are we going?” she said with her grass-shaded, life-riddled eyes peering up into his.
“’Tis not much farther, Jessamiene,” he assured with false chipper.
Blackguarded twixdithers!
He hated how easily she trusted him. Another day of lessons had passed betwixt them and he still had no inkling what to make of Iudicael’s niece. From the start he had difficulty calling her by her given name. When Slaine had introduced them properly, he nearly lost his head. Her given name was new, of course, but the second could nay be a coincidence. After this moment he fought what his heart and his nixy kept telling him.
In the pit, when their vastly different gifts clashed for the first time, he was nearly convinced she couldn’t be the wench. Her power felt euphoric to him, addictive to the point he found himself shadowing her steps even after their lessons. He had first felt it as he bumped into her at her parents’ funeral and handed her Iudicael’s letter. Thankfully she either did not recognize him, or refused to believe what her eyes were telling her. Their casual brush in the streets in America and again later in the forgotten West Wing when she called him a wight confirmed she was what they had feared.
Yet nothing could have prepared him for the dismal depths of greatness brewing within her. Harnessing her gift and molding it to his will appeased the darkness he was molded from, so he had nearly drained her dry. Still, he couldn’t reconcile with the way he felt every time their
eyes met, a feeling he had never forgotten that resonated with his very being.
Nimue, he thought as he glanced back at the curls bobbing gently in front of her concentrated scowl.
A thousand lifetimes he had spent living and perishing but he didn’t think he could forget her face. He remembered every miniscule detail about Nimue. Once, she had been his only friend. On a whim she could be cruel and unforgiving. It was what drew his attention to Nimue before he knew she was like him, a Tuatha. Loving her was like a plague that latched onto his body and continued to ravage his soul. And he had loved her long before they met, though he didn’t realize it until after her death.
Jessamiene was like her, much to his chagrin.
Too alike, if we’re being honest, Myrddin, lad…
“So, how did you get a name like Emrys?” Jessamiene piped up, throwing him back into half-shadowed memories. Emrys was different from the rest of his people. He had gone by many names and played many roles through his rare gift as a Traveler. Myrddin, they once called him, though his memory of that life was hazy at best. He did not remember causing quite so much of a stir as legend claimed.
He turned to find her watching him carefully and relaxed his face, then said, “I cannot remember that far back.” When she rolled her eyes, he found it harder to retain his objective. He couldn’t lose himself again, not like before.
“Okay, I get it. You’re the teacher and I’m the student, no blurred lines?”
Laughing dryly, he replied, “I suppose my mother gave me this name, as it’s the only one that remains with me each age.” Emrys smirked when she scrunched up her brow, pondering over his words again, no doubt. He had made a point from the moment they met to never to censor his words like the others did. He knew Iudicael’s reasons for keeping them silent and did not agree.
The sooner she knows and understands what’s coming, the better.
Of course, this was only if she hadn’t been tainted by the others.
Rain misted in thin icy sheets, betraying the coming autumn. Emrys did not stop, however, until they had banked left of the stables and headed straight into the forest. Beside him, Amie gaped at the dark trees and then rushed to catch up, wind tossing her skirts madly about. He frowned.
Either she’s a brilliant actress, or she truly doesn’t remember this.
For centuries he had wandered and Traveled from one time plane to the next. Each lifetime the memories from the previous blurred and refocused once more. He was haunted by a nameless face until the hour he remembered her.
“We’ve passed the pit already,” she said with forced confidence. So much of her exterior was made of a false strength, self-built around her like chink armor after her parents’ death. He knew this because he had been there, watching.
Some things he couldn’t recall clearly any longer, but one aspect of his existence had not changed, not after ten millennia. He was a murderer, a killer of the worst kind, because a small part of his nature reveled in every death as much as he mourned them.
War, bloodshed and the occasional outlaw skirmish on this side of the Vale made his fierce heart tire too quickly. Man reached too desperately for evil these latter days, forgot to live sacred. They forgot their Creator. A hundred thousand wars and Emrys could never forget the One he owed everything to, even if he made a fine mess of things along the way.
She had taught him that and her portrait always screamed louder when his mind tried to forget.
Jessamiene snatched his hand in hers, dragged him to a stop with a tug of his hand. “Wait!” Amie glanced nervously at the silent forest. “Do we have to go in there?”
Her skin burned him like a cold fire and, masking his discomfort, he pulled away with a laugh. “Why not?” He scanned her face carefully, watchful for any foul intent. It had taken years for him to learn each of Nimue’s many faces. He had to make certain she hadn’t found some way to come back to him again, to torment him. Their eyes were too similar, the color of fresh spring grass. Even the small freckle below her jawline, at the side of her neck, was the same.
Nothing is a coincidence, Myrddin, he reminded himself.
He ignored the quick pull of desire he felt as he watched her bite her lip and turn to the castle rising at the peak of the hill. “It’s just I’ve never…”
“Forbid ye to go into the forest, did they?” he asked with more force than he’d intended.
Careful, if it’s already too late she’ll know if you are onto her, ye fool!
Without asking, he could sense the turmoil of her thoughts and addressed them. He drew nearer, until her scent was unbearably close, until he could feel the charge of her inner nixy rise up and brush against his. “Some gates are meant to be opened, Jessamiene,” he said, all too aware of her. Fighting the temptation to take her in his arms and prove him right was much harder than it should have been. He knew well it would only take one passionate embrace for him to know if she was who she claimed to be. No matter how many lifetimes he lived, Emrys would never forget the way his arms had felt around the enchantress he had loved.
Jessamiene seemed wholly unaware of her own glamour, and this was what made her so dangerous to one like him. She broke her spell over him with her words. “Okay. Let’s go.”
What if they aren’t the same? It wouldn’t be beyond the Creator to send her back with no memory of ye, a worse punishment than hell.
Emrys reined his nixy in, yet fighting the beast inside of him was harder around her.
The ground was soft, as if the dark soil had been undisturbed. Animal trails presented paths that overlapped in shadow bent directions. Silently they trod these shadows, though clearly she hadn’t caught the knack for stealth yet. Since the ring had awoken her true form, Emrys had watched her shift out of the human shell. As soon as Iudicael returned they would continue to mold her into the shape they desired, he thought with disgust.
Emrys abhorred Silver Hollow for its wealth of pious Sidhe and their lackluster souls. In all his past century of meanderings he had made a point never to set foot in this horrid borderland again. Of course, even if he had wanted to, the council wouldn’t have allowed him to reach the key. They made it his punishment, this banishment from their sacred Vale. Well, the Merlin knew things about their precious haven that could peel the skin off a flobbergidit’s backside. So it was just as well he owed too much to the underlings lurking in the Vale’s darkest corners. The hour he stepped foot inside the crossing every Golem, Darktwig and Humcking would come after his nixy.
Wouldn’t be the first time.
By banishing him to the human realm, the council was doing him a favor, really, giving him millennia of respite. He couldn’t regret interfering in the humans’ troubles either. What fun would eternity be if he didn’t dabble in his own sick brand of fun? The incident with Atlantis wasn’t really his fault, just a slip of his nixy. After all, the primitive fools had asked him to fix their island.
“I swear, these trees hate me or something,” Jessamiene grumbled when he was forced to reach out and steady her again.
Cursing inwardly for touching her beyond necessity, Emrys clenched his teeth and said, “Highly unlikely. I must object, love.” The idea of plants of any kind hating a Wenderdowne put an amused smirk to his face.
“Love you too, Sensei,” she lashed back at him.
Emrys cringed and questioned what he was about to do to her then, and if she could forgive him.
Chapter 25
Little Lass Lost
She couldn’t help it if certain tangling roots jutted up to trip her, or the curving leaves conveniently masked animal holes. In the past, Amie had gotten pretty decent at making a stumble resemble a modern dance move. She never fell flat on her face or into a wall like she had done before her childhood dance classes. Father always said she just hadn’t grown into her limbs. Amie felt stretched a bit but the graceful-looking legs hadn’t found their proper alignment apparently.
Emrys, though he was always a step ahead, his eyes scannin
g the distance harder to see depths of the old wood, caught her every time she stumbled.
So effortless we could have synchronized and written a ballet, Amie thought with a grin. With Emrys there to catch her she was able to focus less on the treacherous path and better the wooden labyrinth around them.
The trees were ancient, gnarled, twisting things, spreading their roots like a jungle vine. Leaves already dusted the earth though Amie knew it should still be summer. Pale green moss coated fallen logs and stray rocks, watched over by proud jumbo mushrooms. The faeries Amie had watched winking in and out the dreamlike night of her arrival were absent, so the forest was dark. Only slivers of morning light poked their head through the impenetrable foliage. Wind did not stir this deep into the wood. The forest groaned and cracked and bent to its own tree lament.
Amie would have been terrified on her own. This forest wasn’t anything like the thick piney woods of East Texas or any other forest she could remember visiting for that matter. It was older, darker, and if her protector were anyone less threatening than Emrys she might have been scared anyway. Amie took to mimicking his movements to avoid touching him more than necessary. For now she could brush aside their issues and her newfound attraction to him and concentrate on surviving.
“Do you actually have a plan besides leading me into the middle of the forest?” she asked. Amie clutched Emrys’ arm as she kicked at a stray clawing root. Stomping her feet in frustration, she turned on the offending tree. “What did I do to you? Huh? Is there a sign on my back that says ‘trip me’ or something?” When she turned her glare to Emrys she silently dared him to laugh out loud.
“Look,” he said, after turning to the wood, “we’re here.”
Amie jerked her head up and stared at a thicket identical to the one they had already passed. Crossing her arms over her chest, she came full circle then looked up at her companion. Emrys stared at the dark glade with twisted rapture, eyes gleaming all the brighter in the darkness. What light managed to break the tops clung to Amie.
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