The giddy happiness that had filled me vanished. She’d finally admitted she had powers too. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I wanted to.” She stuffed her hands in her pockets. “I know I promised not to keep more secrets from you. But I swore an oath to the Kyrion, just like you did. I should have told you no matter what. I knew that you had to be part-Paldimori since you had activated the card before. But I didn’t know about the different messages until a few days ago.”
The guilty look she gave me confirmed that they knew I was Chosen when I had activated my card. “The cards usually only show an invitation, but ours had that message about being chosen and finding what you seek. You were woken by Gaia, just as I was woken by Chaos. We think the card really is identifying the Chosen, but we still don’t know what the rest of the message means. I had hoped that we were wrong. That you wouldn’t have to go through the pain of being connected to a god like I was.”
Lia was gripping her hands together so tightly they were turning white. “I don’t expect you to forgive me again. You don’t deserve the hell I’ve put you through. Any of it.” Tears slipped silently down her cheeks, her face a grim mask of regret. “You should have been safe here. I never thought they would come after you or I would have tried harder to keep you from coming here. This is all my fault. I’m so sorry, Dia.”
Bennett wrapped his arms around her and pulled her back against his chest. “Asteràki, the fault is no one’s but those who wish to harm the Chosen. Do not take on this guilt. If you must blame someone, then blame me. I am ruler here. Yet, once again, a Potential under my care was attacked.”
“Damnit, Bennett, I let her come here,” Lia growled. “I didn’t tell her about being Paldimori or that we have enemies that would try to kill her just for being what she is. This isn’t on you. You can’t protect us all every second of every day.”
“Ok, then, everyone is guilty. Yay, we’ll throw a party.” I said sarcastically. “In the meantime, can someone explain to me what just happened?” I waved my hands to indicate all of the flowers. “Did you see that? Please tell me random plants aren’t going to be growing out of me. I’m picturing a total Aliens moment.”
“Calm down, sweetie. Nothing is going to grow out of you that you don’t want to.” Lia turned to Bennett. “Uh, right?”
“Yes. Dia, you were claimed by Gaia. The goddess of Earth. I believe your grandmother called her the Great Mother. Others call her Mother Earth.” Bennett nodded toward the flowers. “The plants. Trees. The land. Animals. Water. They all answer your call now. You have powers gifted by Gaia herself. Much like Lia was claimed by Chaos and received her powers from him.”
“Yeah, that wasn’t an experience that I would wish on anyone.” Lia shuddered. “Apparently the gods think that claiming their Chosen has to be served with a side of epic pain. Someone should clue them in to the twenty-first century. Maybe try laser tattooing instead of crawling inside us and burning their brand on our backs like cows.”
“I had a goddess inside me?” I rubbed at my wrists where the roots had dug themselves into my veins. “Guess that’s one way to be one with Mother Nature. What brand?”
“You haven’t seen it yet?” Lia paused and turned in Bennett’s arms. She laid her hands on his bare pecs and roughly rubbed them. “C’mon, wizard, we need a mirror.”
Bennett growled at her, “Woman, I am not a wizard, nor a genie.”
“All-powerful Chaos descendant, I wish for a mirror. Does that help?”
“I prefer you call me ‘my god’ like you did—”
“Uh, thanks,” I interrupted. “I think we all get the kind of rubbing you want her to do. But can we maybe focus on me being possessed for a minute?”
A stand mirror appeared next to me, and I did a double take. Uh huh, not a wizard or a genie? I was with Lia on this one.
Lia walked me over to the mirror. She nudged me until I turned around. and then lifted my shirt up to expose my back. Her fingers traced a pattern across my back, and I glanced over my shoulder. Like the branding iron Lia had talked about, there were lines of pale pink skin in the shape of a tree. The roots sank down below the waist of my pants, and gnarled limbs reached across my shoulder blades.
“It’s just like mine was after that night in the courtyard. Before our bond,” Lia said to Bennett.
My heart was threatening to beat right out of my chest. “What is it? What does it mean?”
“This is the beginning of Gaia’s mark. It means you will be very powerful.” Bennett placed his hand on my shoulder and looked me in the eye. “It also means you are in danger. The Paldimori are hunted. You saw this yourself at Chaméni Elpída.”
“Those GI Joe people that were attacking the villagers want to kill me?” I asked. Then it registered what he said. “Oh god—er, goddess—we’re in so much trouble. Have you seen those guys? Riiiight. Well, it’s been fun. How about you call me a plane? I’ll go back to Normalville and leave you to your games. I’m a lover, not a fighter.”
Lia dropped my shirt into place and nudged Bennett out of the way. “I wish we could. But this is kinda like Hotel California. Your powers have been awakened. You can’t put them back in the box.” She gave me a sad little smile. “Trust me. I left here, and the bad guys found me anyway. You remember the boiler explosion at my parents’ house? That isn’t what really happened. Natalie is Paldimori as well. She used her wind power to knock me into a support column, and I almost died. You were there. You saw it. She—”
“What?” The bottom dropped out of my stomach. Dread sat like a knife aimed at my heart. That image I’d shrugged off of Lia flying through the air as wind whipped around us came back. “If there wasn’t an explosion why do I remember your parents’ house being wrecked? Why do I remember you having burn marks when I visited you in the hospital?”
“Your memories were altered,” she whispered. Her shoulders slumped, and she refused to meet my eyes. Shocked disbelief swept through me like a hurricane. Then pain at her betrayal cut me so deep I thought I was bleeding out. “We hadn’t figured out then that you were Paldimori. They ... We couldn’t risk you knowing about us. That’s how the Paldimori have stayed hidden all this time.”
The knife twisted deeper at her mention of “us”. Like they were her family, not me—not the one person who had stuck by her side no matter what all these years.
“Anyone who learns too much get their memories altered.” Lia finally met my gaze, her eyes pleaded with me to understand. “Even the Potentials who get sent home. I didn’t put the pieces together about you being able to see the invite until Jaxon mentioned that he thought he felt something when you first met and wanted to test it out on you. I’m sorry, Dia. I wanted to tell you everything—”
“Did you? Or was this one more thing you thought stupid, naive Dia couldn’t handle? One more thing that poor little damaged Lia had to face on her own?” I backed away, feeling sick to my stomach. Lia let out an agonized whimper, but I ignored it. What kind of person let others scramble your brain, then helped them continue the lies? Had she ever cared about me? All she had done was take without giving back. My hands shook as the anger feed my power. Dirt erupted in a shower a few feet in front of me. Then again. A stag sprang from the forest. His massive antlers lowered in challenge as he charged toward Lia. He stopped with his horns only inches from her and snorted threateningly.
“Dia, please.” She tried to get around the stag, but he blocked her every move. “Please call off the deer and let me explain.”
“You don’t get to act like the victim here,” I said. My voice sounded unnatural even to my own ears—like all emotion had been stripped away. “I’ve stood by you through everything. I searched for you when you disappeared without a word. I welcomed you back with open arms when you popped back into my life and never pushed you for answers. I’ve smiled every time you ripped me to pieces by pushing me away. This ... You mistrusted me so much you took my memories from me?”
“No, it was
n’t like that.” Lia cried out, reaching for me. “I didn’t—”
“Save it!” I shouted. “I don’t want to hear any more. You aren’t the person I thought you were. I guess she really did die with her parents.”
Lia gasped and clutched her chest like I had stabbed her. For a moment, guilt tried to edge out my pain, and I regretted my cruel words. There was a part of me that wanted to hug her and tell her we could work this out too. But this wasn’t her being distant or trying to protect me. This time she was the one who put me in danger by not telling me the truth. My chest caved in. Dan had stolen what confidence I’d built for myself. Lia did so much more. She smashed my belief in the goodness of people and the conviction that family are the people who will stand with you against the world.
“You can go now,” I said coldly. “I have training to do.”
“D-Dia, please,” Lia pleaded, reaching for me again.
“Go!”
Lia let out a heartbroken sob.
Bennett’s hard eyes assessed me. A muscle worked in his rugged jaw. “I hope you know what you are doing. Traveling a road alone is more difficult than you think.”
“I’ve been alone a long time.”
“You have never been as alone as you will be if you choose this path.” The thinning of his lips and the hard glint in his eyes said he was speaking from experience. “Things are not always what they seem when glimpsed through the eyes of pain. Why not rest and discuss this further tomorrow?”
“I’m not a child! And I’m done being a doormat for everyone.”
“Cutting yourself off from those you love can leave wounds that run too deep to ever be healed. I ask you not to do this.”
“Should I just keep letting everyone take their stab at me until I bleed to death?” The stag pawed the ground, ready to charge at my slightest signal. “It’s time I stood up for myself and stopped being so damn nice.”
“So be it,” Bennett said ominously. “Since you no longer want Lia here, I am taking her away.”
He scooped a sobbing Lia up in his arms and they vanished.
17
The lingering anger I still felt the next day helped me push through all of my exercises in record time. I was finishing up on the weight bench now, a concerned-looking Jaxon hovering by my side. The sound of the other contestants working out filled the otherwise silent gym. Everyone had been giving me space since yesterday, probably afraid I would send my new friend after them if they got on my nerves. The stag had waited patiently while we finished the race, then tried to follow me to my rooms. I’d had no clue how get him to go back to wherever he came from. Luckily, Gaia helped me figure it out.
“Where’s Molly?” I asked.
“She had errands.” Jaxon helped me rack the bar, and I sat up on the weight bench dabbing a towel at my sweaty neck. “You don’t have a problem with me being your trainer today, do you, Tigerlily?”
“Nope.” I hopped off the bench and quickly skirted around him. “Did you send her on these ‘errands’ on purpose?”
“Maybe.” Jaxon followed me to the mats at the back of the gym area. “Is there a reason you’re always running away from me?”
“I’m not running. I’m concentrating.” My feet planted on the mat, I straightened my whole body getting into the Mountain Pose. “Tada … saaana. Tada … saaana.”
“Are you chanting?”
“Yes, it’s a prayer to get rid of pesky playboys.” I stretched my arms up toward the ceiling. It probably wasn’t a good idea to do a forward bend with Jaxon so near, but I couldn’t bring myself to care that he was staring. I wouldn’t tell him this, but his being here was helping me keep it together. For some reason, I found his presence comforting, and it scared me. “Why are you here? I’ve already gone through all of the exercises we’ve been doing.”
“Oh, I’m just here for the view. What else?” he said with a bite to his voice. He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I’m sorry. You’ve had a rough couple of days and don’t need me making it worse. How’re you doing?”
My throat closed on the words that wanted to spill out in a torrent of grief and pain. Why did I want to pour out my soul to this man? Hadn’t I had enough betrayals lately?
“I’m fine.”
Silence stretched out for a few minutes. I looked up to find Jaxon staring at me as if he was torn about what to say. I could tell the moment he made his decision. His eyes darkened to nearly black and his shoulders went rigid. “I don’t think you are.”
“I don’t want to talk about it.” I straightened from my position to glare at him.
“Funny thing, it seems you don’t want to talk to anyone about quite a few things.” Grim determination tightened his face. “I understand your fear about your memories being altered. You wonder what else could have been altered. Then you start to question everything. Eventually, you don’t know who or what you can trust.”
I sucked in a hard breath as he voiced every thought that had kept me pacing the floors most of the night. “How did you—”
“I’m the one who altered your memories,” he blurted out. His face was carefully blank, but his eyes raged with emotions.
“Wh—What?”
“Lia was dying, again. You were a hysterical mess.” His hands fisted, and a grimace crossed his face as if it was a memory that he would’ve changed as well. “I made the decision to alter your memories. I used Voice—it’s like a compulsion—to keep you calm until Erebus could come wipe your mind. I came up with the boiler explosion story to replace what had happened and he weaved them into new memories.”
His eyes were locked with mine when he said, “This was not Lia’s doing.”
Maybe it wasn’t, but she’d still helped them lie. “You ... Why do you care?”
“You deserve to know the whole truth, even if that means you’ll hate me for it.”
I laughed bitterly. The sound was harsh and painful to hear, like fingernails on a chalkboard. He flinched but didn’t look away. “I must be the biggest idiot in the world. Why do I keep trusting people who betray me?”
He looked surprised that I said I had trusted him. I trusted the man I could see beneath the surface. The one that was smart and kind. That was the man that I had started to fall for. Not the playboy mask he showed to the world.
The quietness of the gym finally registered, and I turned to give our audience a “mind your own business” look.
Jaxon lifted his hand and what little sound there had been died away. “I’ve put us in a sort of bubble. No one can hear or see us. You aren’t a show for their entertainment.”
I swallowed thickly, but I wouldn’t let his thoughtfulness derail me.
“You had no right to mess with my head. Did you know that my mother suffered from depression? No, you didn’t, because you don’t know anything about me. You don’t know that seeing the only family I had fight demons I couldn’t see tied me up in knots and caused anxiety attacks. You didn’t know that I have questioned my own mental health every single day of my life, so afraid that I would end up just like her.”
His face went pale. His mouth opened but nothing came out. The colorful scraps of fabric he had been holding fell to the mat.
“I don’t wear black, ever.” I waved my hand at the lime green and peach yoga outfit I was wearing. “Because that is the color of my childhood. The windows were always covered, and the lights kept off when it got really bad. My mother wore the same black dress for days on end, only showering when I forced her to. I became the opposite of everything I hated.”
My hands fisted as an echo of the cruel words from my youth filled my mind. “I know that I’m not normal. That normal people don’t hear all of these different voices in their heads. But as long as I could still laugh, I was ok, and I’ve learned to deal with my quirks.” I sighed, suddenly so very tired. “You’ve made me question everything I thought I knew about myself.”
Jaxon’s hand gripped mine and wouldn’t let go. “I’m so very sorry, Dia
. For what you went through as a child, and what I’ve done to you. You’re right, I didn’t know anything about you. I didn’t even think about what effect my decision would have on you; I was trying to protect my people.”
He had protected his people at my expense, for his greater good. I might have been able to respect that, but I was too raw. I hadn’t been able to stem the bleeding from the wounds already inflicted before being stabbed again.
His other hand came up to cup my cheek, and I flinched. He dropped his hand, his eyes pools of despair that I refused to acknowledge. “You aren’t your mother. You’re like the sunshine—so bright and beautiful that you draw people to you. Yes, you’re complicated, but that isn’t a bad thing. Don’t let my bad decision make you doubt yourself. I know all too well what that’s like. I’ve questioned who I am my whole life.”
My body reacted to his nearness, his touch like the missing piece of a puzzle I didn’t even know was unfinished. But my head was screaming not to be a fool again. I pulled away from him and wrapped my arms around my waist. “Why would you question yourself? You’re a famous model who can have any woman in the world, right? Or are you the hard-nosed lawyer? Wait, maybe you’re the sweet guy who slips out every now and then? When you take off the playboy mask, who are you really, Jaxon?”
“I-I don’t know.” There was a vulnerability about him in this moment that I had never seen before. “My memories were altered too.”
He stared off over my shoulder, his body held so much tension he was like a guitar string pulled too tight. “My family estate was attacked like the village of Chaméni Elpída. I was three and Nat was five. We were the only survivors.” His voice faltered for a moment before he cleared his throat and continued. “Because I was so young, it was decided to remove all of my memories. Sometimes I wonder what my family was like. I wonder if I look like my mother or my father. I’ve spent years trying to fill in those gaps with research and chasing down leads. I’m good at it. That’s why I became a lawyer. I always want the truth, even when it hurts. We’re alike in that regard.”
Paldimori Gods Rising Box Set Page 40