by Sue Wilder
“And in return we have to deal with them in every lifetime?”
Lexi couldn’t help the bitterness. Her emotions were in shreds. Raw and aching. She wanted to be anywhere but here because he was here. Marge was watching, and Lexi saw the sympathy in the woman’s eyes.
“Don’t blame this on the Agreement,” Marge said. “You have the choice before every lifetime whether or not to back. The Agreement doesn’t force you, it simply provides the energy signal so he can find you. In return, he agreed to do whatever the Calata asked him to do, whenever they asked, and for as long as they asked.”
Lexi lifted the mug of tea, held it in both hands with her elbows on the table. She watched the steam curling upward and wanted to argue but stopped herself. “Then fine, I chose to come back and I’m stuck in an agreement and he’s found me. I’m alive and well and he can move on and leave me alone.”
The statement sounded both sad and defensive, which it was, and Marge responded gently.
“It’s not that simple. Immortals form bonds that are symbiotic relationships. It’s a physical link, a mental connection and an emotional source of energy that makes both of you whole. He needs that from you, and you need it from him.”
“I don’t need anything from him.”
“Lexi,” Marge said, “you’re dealing with a connection that was created eons ago, by magic lost from the world.”
“Connections can be broken, Marge.”
“Yes, they can. But even in those cases where the relationship has shattered, both the warrior and the lover will feel the loss of the connection, both physical and emotional.”
Lexi breathed in deeply, trying to ease the tightness in her throat. “What else should I know?”
“This is magic considered so dangerous the alchemists said they’d destroyed it. More than likely, they hid it from the world. But in theory, a mate bond can be transformed into the contract called the blood bond. The warrior grows more powerful and the lover becomes immortal like her warrior. No one knows if that will happen.”
“Why not?”
“Because the relationships haven’t always turned out as expected. And even if they had, no one has trusted the Calata enough to do it. The blood bond could kill the human lover as punishment for desiring the immortality that started it all.”
“Then you never really know if you love each other, or if you suffer from an unfulfilled immortal need.”
“Love is always an act of faith.” Marge paused, and then said, “There’s one way the original bond can be irrevocably broken.”
Lexi tried to sip the tea, found it difficult to swallow. The energy inside her head felt primitive. Animalistic. Dangerously wild and twisting.
“Don’t tell me, Marge.
“You said you hated him. He said it was easy to do.”
“No.” Lexi was suddenly afraid. “I don’t want to know.”
“You already do.” Marge set her mug down hard on the table and shoved it aside. “You wanted to know what happened in those rocks today? Christan happened. There’s a one word that can kill him. That is how you irrevocably break the bond, Lexi, by killing him, and he gave that one word to you. What I want to know now is whether you intend to use that knowledge or not.”
Marge waited a beat as if debating the need to test their relationship with a harsh truth. She decided too much was at stake.
“Your life can no longer be a pity party because your deadbeat mother left you alone. You were offered all the love in the world once, and you refused to accept it. Don’t make me choose between you and Christan because I’m not sure which way I will go.”
CHAPTER 9
There were ten steps from the bed to the adjoining bathroom. Lexi knew, because she’d walked back and forth for the past hour.
She needed a shower. Needed to change into the clothes Marge said were waiting in the closet. She needed a lot of things she wasn’t going to get and she was sick with needing things. Marge was right, she liked the pity parties. Now that she realized the truth of it, she didn’t like them so much anymore. And that was the trouble with your holier-than-thou belief system because it always came back to bite you in the end.
She looked around. Her eyes felt dry and tight. The room was comfortable, but empty, as if no one had been present for a very long time. Maybe no one she knew was present now.
Walking toward the bed, Lexi trailed her fingers over the comforter designed in a woodsy print of greens and cream, then traced the red moose embroidered on a throw pillow. An antler lamp sat on the table. The planked wood floor had a warm patina, and a green striped rug had been arranged in front of the chair. It might have felt welcoming except for the phony cabin look. It wasn’t her. Or maybe it was, and she was as phony as the room.
Machiavelli had it right, according to an old book she’d once read, bored, filled with ennui and looking for answers. He’d said that most people only saw you as you appeared to be, that few understood who you really were. Lexi once thought she knew what that meant, back in her old life.
And it was so funny, she thought now, that she could acknowledge an old life. Funny, after months of rejecting the idea of past lives, she’d walked through the door Marge opened and closed it behind her with little question. What did that say about who she really was, instead of who she appeared to be?
Rock Cove had been her secure place, where she controlled who got close. The small coastal town felt like home. The cottage felt like home. Her connection to earth energy felt normal in a place where spirit mountains had become a business opportunity. There’d been no reason to think about passion, desire, or physical need so intense it felt like hate.
And yet, there’d been moments, when she sat alone on her deck and watched the copper sun disappear into the indigo sea. When she would drift in a dream of something lost. She couldn’t explain the effortless knowledge, not even to herself, but there were countless mysteries in her mind, endless memories grinding up to the surface: the sound of a voice, the feel of a tender finger sliding across her hip, the promise of an excruciating connection. Deep places in her soul would begin to unfurl, unbidden, until she no longer felt whole, as if something vital to life had been excised. She would turn her face toward the ocean wind, where the salty air became her tears. Where she tried to breathe and couldn’t. Where memories felt too alien, so completely physical she ached with them, and as the last faint streaks of orange began to fade into rose she would feel the loss so intimately not even the wine would help her sleep.
Unbidden, the image of that half-remembered lover consumed her with eyes dark as obsidian, unbowed and so ancient it hurt. When Christan confronted her in the rocks Lexi had been unprepared. Had never expected that instant of ecstasy when her body remembered his and all she’d wanted was to be part of them.
She remembered only traces of the way they once were, the raw eroticism that flared, uncontrolled. His existence on earth was so breath-taking it passed beyond myth. Lexi thought about the reason she was tied to him, why he would have slammed that power into her mind with such emptiness in his eyes. She thought about it until her throat closed up, until grief struck her, until she was clawing at her clothes, ripping the material from her body. She was sobbing as she tried to shed the outer skin she’d carried her entire life.
When she was naked, she turned on the shower in the small adjoining bath and stood under the frigid water. The pain was unending, a long silence with no end. She didn’t care as she stood there, waiting for the moment when the shivering stopped, when she would slide into hypothermia. She braced for it, welcomed the instant when even breathing stopped. But it didn’t, and when she turned off the water and stepped out onto the white rug she faced the truth about herself, about who she was, who she had been.
Words rose unbidden, an ancient echo in her mind, from a lifetime she couldn’t recall.
Her voice.
His.
“Sei un mostro. Ti odio Christan. Ti odio.”
“E’ cosi facile
da fare…
She dreamed that night.
It started soft, a sweet dream of a young girl who raced like a gazelle across semi-arid hills. A girl who tended her family’s herd of shaggy black and white goats, using a spear and a bow with arrows to drive away the predators.
There was magic in the air and an ancient spring, and the myth told at night by the Grandmother, who spoke of Kyrene, the mortal daughter of a Thessalian King, a water nymph and virgin huntress who lived in the bright, green woods around Mount Pelion. Kyrene had raced, tended sheep and fought off predators until the day when, in the midst of a battle with a lion, she had attracted the attention of a God—a God who possessed such power he carried her off to the North African coast along the Mediterranean Sea.
Their love had been legendary, this God and his water nymph, and the springs where the girl now lived were named for her, for Kyrene. It was why there had been so many crops, as many as three in a single year over the following centuries. It was the reason, too, for the invaders from Rome, from Egypt and Persia, who came and went, building and destroying until now Cyrene was little more than broken monuments and crumbled buildings, and the young girl with her father’s shaggy goats.
But that had been the story the Grandmother told, around the campfire and in the secret caves, while the child had drawn pictures in the sand. It was the story she loved over the years but never quiet believed. Until the day she saw him watching her and the story became real.
Her name was Gaia, of the earth. She explored the ruins where she lived, loved the stone lions that stared directly at her as if they knew what she was thinking. He had also stared, a bold lion on the hill, wild and standing unafraid. She thought he was a statue come to life. His muscles rippled beneath a honey-colored coat, with colossal shoulders and black-tipped paws larger than her hand. In the transparent summer sun, he had shimmered in copper and gold until her heart clenched.
She knew he had been hunting her for weeks, but not in a bad way. He kept her company in the sharp, clear way he had, always watching. He was a mystery older than time. But she’d not been frightened. Had never been frightened of who she knew him to be. He had been her silent companion for weeks until she’d had enough, of his reticence, his demanding power. She’d turned to face him, there on the open plain, in the midst of her father’s goats. Without her weapons, with no other human nearby. And held out her slender hand.
Their passion had been as wild as the ancient story. When he changed into his human form she’d been awed by the beauty in his bladed face, the midnight eyes and dark hair lifting in the breeze. He was a warrior, but she had always known that he was, never questioned his ability to change form or the lethal efficiency when he had to deliver death. He never did it capriciously. There was always a need, but she would watch him when the shadows were dark and only the dancing yellow light drifted from the fire. When he would stare into the flames, lost in grief.
He was not always hard and remote. He carved a toy for her, whimsical. He offered it to her, half embarrassed. It was a little lion, exquisitely detailed. She tied it to a piece of leather and placed it around her neck so the lion lay close to her heart.
Over the weeks there were nights under skies drenched in stars, teasing in the deep pools beneath the towering boulders, long seductions in the caves hidden in the mountains. They learned each other’s needs, felt each other’s hearts. He taught her how to fight against a larger enemy. She taught him how to cook the rabbits she shot with her bow and wicked arrows.
They raced through the woods and sometimes he let her win. She thrilled when he chased her down and their passion would explode. He told her she was innocence, the one bright, pure thing in his dangerous world. She saw in him a majesty he would never accept for himself. They were each other’s mirror. His strength was her weakness, while her innocence brought him to his knees. She was in his heart, he told her, so deep he would never be free.
He would leave, and return, and leave again. But she always knew he’d come back, and when she stared up at the stars that split the midnight sky, she imagined him flying through the dark rift on some errand for the Gods. She would save up the stories for when he returned. Tell them, while grinding the bsisa, chickpeas with fenugreek and coriander. Tell them, while spilling the hot sweet tea during the evening ceremony, when she was baking the flatbread in sand ovens, tasting the olive oil mixed with dates and milk. She would curl against his side and he would tease her.
“So many stories, Gaia.”
“Not as many as the Grandmother.” And she would feel sad, as she thought of the woman who was young, but held the ages in her eyes. “I’ve not talked to her since I was a child. Perhaps she’s gone.”
“She will always be here,” he said, and kissed her forehead, “here,” and he kissed above her heart, “and here.” Kisses that moved until she no longer thought of stories or sadness or anything at all.
And then one day he simply wasn’t there.
She searched everywhere. She called, begged, fell to her knees and bargained. Panic filled her heart and then turned to dread. He would not disappear unless the one thing she feared had come to pass. And then that fear began to fade and was replaced by another. It wasn’t that he couldn’t come back, but that he chose not to come back.
And her heart began to break.
She cried herself to sleep until she could cry no more, until her eyes were so gritty and raw even her mother remarked about her distress. She busied herself with the goats, with the tending of the cook fires and the making of the bread. Her father watched while her mother turned to the other women for help.
But nothing could bring her back, and over the years she withdrew into her private world, where she would lie sleepless under the stars, imagining he was there in the darkness, watching her. And sometimes, as she drifted to sleep with the dawn, she would feel his soft caress against her lips and ache with a loss so deep she would never be free.
Lexi jerked upright. Her heart was pounding with grief, her skin cold with sweat. She bent her head to ease the tightness in her throat. She was used to the night terrors that woke her in the darkest hours, sending her out onto the deck to stare at the restless waves. Used to the dreams that were visceral, bloody, sharp stabs in the dark.
But this dream… this dream hadn’t come from the imagination. It hadn’t come from a suggestion played through a subliminal message on her phone.
This dream had been real, and her skin still quivered from the touch of his tongue, the stroke of possession that pooled with a heaviness that felt perfect and male and so deep inside a soft cry rose in her throat. She could still taste him in her mouth. Every bit as beautiful as she’d imagined. There wasn’t a part of her body that didn’t still ache. So long ago… all of it, lost.
It took too long to slow her racing heart, and when, in the dark, Lexi curled back on the bed she knew she would not sleep.
CHAPTER 10
When the dawn light warmed from gray to pink, Lexi slid out of bed. She picked up a red moose pillow, held it against her chest. The room didn’t scream phony as loudly as it did the night before, but Lexi missed her own bedroom.
She had spent months getting everything just right. There was the weathered grey planked floor—she’d added scattered white rugs to warm the wood in winter. Shelves lined one wall, displaying the driftwood collected the summer she turned nine, each bundle tied with red thread for good fortune. The old cabinet across from the door had been rescued from a thrift store and provided a bright spot of teal. The color complimented the warm gray of the mohair blanket folded at the end of the bed. The upholstered headboard with the tuck-and-roll design was in a muted sand-colored linen, matching the comforter that kept her warm on damp nights.
Lexi had filled each room with happy memories. Bits of sea glass shimmered in the light. Shells spilled from a mason jar. Beside the jar was a polished half-dome agate, picked up during a research trip deep into the Coast Range. She’d been stranded by a freak wint
er storm and needed the search-and-rescue to find her, much to her embarrassment. Lexi could have found the way back, but the group of burly men had taken one look at her, drenched and bug-bitten, and had driven her home.
The agate was a favorite piece out of everything Lexi collected. Not because she’d been stranded and then rescued. The concentric lines in the stone resonated deep in her soul, black blending into amber as they contrasted with wider bands of white, with the little splash of crimson in the center, blood of her heart. Lexi wasn’t sure who the memory was for—she’d thought it was her grandmother. Now she wasn’t sure.
Nor was she sure if she was a guest, or if the fake intervention was continuing. Quickly, Lexi straightened the room before dressing in jeans and a yellow shirt, not her clothes but fitting as if they were. Generating more questions, which she would demand Marge answer before the morning ended.
But there were two things she did know: the dream still haunted her heart, and Gaia had been the first life. Gaia of the earth.
Lexi tied her damp hair into a ponytail and then went looking for the kitchen. The homestead was larger than expected, with bedrooms at either end of the living room. Windows overlooked the rolling, barren landscape. Sunlight punched through the slatted window blinds, spilling to the floor with transparent fingers. Nothing more than dust motes filled the quiet spaces.
Marge was waiting by the stove. “How did you sleep?”
Lexi sank into a chair, accepted a cup of hot coffee and held up her right hand. Two faint memory lines intertwined with a graceful curl. “How do you think I slept?”
“I expected more to emerge. Just being around Christan will do it.”
Lexi looked away. “It itches.”