by Hanna Peach
Siana spotted what she was looking for. The round clear soulglobe sat undisturbed on the side of the bed. Just as she had left it…was it a few days ago? Siana frowned. The last few days were fuzzy in her head. Things didn’t seem to be seamless in the timeline of her memories but…
It didn’t matter. Yael and she would be together again soon. Once he saw what she had placed inside the soulglobe, he wouldn’t be able to deny it anymore.
Her fingers closed around the globe. Hmmm, it was dusty. She had only left it here a few days ago. There was more dust on it than should be for only a few days. It doesn’t matter. She brushed this aside.
Siana slipped the soulglobe into the small cloth bag she had found in one of the cupboards in the kitchen. Then she left.
Chapter 25
One day…
Midnight tonight was the planned attack. Midnight tonight was also Alyx’s final deadline for Balthazar’s deal. If they failed in their attack, Balthazar would expect Alyx to hand over Israel. Alyx knew that she would never do that. She would break their deal if it came to it and forfeit her own life, the price for breaking a blood contract with a demon.
They had identified an empty house only several houses away from Darkwood Mansion where the owners had gone on holiday. The EarthSifters, led by Aaban, had spent the day burrowing a tunnel from the grounds of the house towards the mansion’s cellar. Now the tunnel was complete except for less than three feet of dirt behind the wall of the cellar.
Israel had donated as much blood as was deemed safe over the last few days. With Tobias leading the team of Alchemists, they had produced a set of blades infused with Israel’s blood. There wasn’t enough for everyone to have one, so they had given the blades to the better warriors.
At sunset, the FreeThinker army gathered at the front lawn of their castle in their groups. Castle Speranza. Castle of Hope. After Tobias ran through their plan one last time, Alyx was called forward.
Alyx looked over at all the expectant faces, the faces of those who were fighting for her, and emotion welled up in her chest. “I had all these things planned to say…” she began, “but they sound insincere in my head now as I look out at each of you, each of your faces, your brave, brave faces, you who are prepared to fight alongside us.”
She paused before continuing, “Tonight is a test of what the soul of the FreeThinker community is about. Tonight we work alongside each other. There is no rank, no class, no separation between us. We are one and we fight as one. Together we create something far stronger than the sum of our individual parts. Together,” she found Israel’s face in the crowd, “together we are better than when we are alone.”
He smiled at her and she smiled back. And for a moment they were both back in the Aradale gardens when Israel had first said those words to her. Alyx felt a prickle of tears at the corners of her eyes. She tore her gaze away and looked up again to address the crowd. “Angel speed. And may God be with you.”
“Angel speed.” The crowd chanted back at her.
It was time.
* * *
“Bro, you even listening to me?”
Yael snapped out of his thoughts, his thoughts about the strange seraphelle named Siana. He turned his eyes to Do’hann, who was seated across the table from him in the Heart of Michaelea, peering at him with a frown on his face. “What?”
“I said, want to come training with us after last meal?” Do’hann asked.
“No, sorry. I’m going to turn in early.” He wasn’t. He was going to meet Siana. He hated lying to his friends, but Siana had made him promise that he wouldn’t say anything to anybody. “Yael, you can’t trust anybody. Not yet. Just let me show you the proof, then if you don’t believe me I promise you that you won’t ever see me again.”
Do’hann seemed to accept his excuse but Stantanople…
“Dude, what the hell is up with you?” Stantanople peered at him with suspicion. “You’ve been acting weird since yesterday. Weirder than usual.”
Yael gritted his teeth. “Get off my back, Stan.”
“No, I won’t get off your back because we have each other’s back. What is up with you?”
“What is up is you’re giving me a goddamn headache. I’m not hungry anymore.” Yael dropped his fork to his barely picked-at plate and it made a loud clatter, causing more than one head to turn in the crowded Heart.
Yael flew from his seat and from the building, ignoring the odd looks of his fellow warriors and the calls of Do’hann behind him.
Later that night, Yael was hidden behind the corner of a shadowed building of Saint Joseph, watching the dark, shaded space by the Burning Lovers statue where he said he would meet Siana again. For some reason, his heart was beating just a little faster than usual.
He had flown here in record time after sneaking out of the Michaelea wards. He was early, but he needed to be early to make sure that he wasn’t being led into a trap. He scoured the area as soon as he arrived, but no one else was around. No one was here to attack him.
Saint Paul’s Cathedral chimed in the distance. She should be here soon.
From the shadows, a seraphelle in a long flowing white robe moved through the square and stopped at the fountain. His breath hitched. A coil of nerves tightened in his stomach. It was her. Siana. He checked his surroundings once more before he moved out from the shadows.
“Yael,” she said as he approached her. The smile on her face was radiant, and she was unabashedly happy to see him. He felt his heart lift. “I knew you’d come back.”
“You said you had proof.”
She nodded. She reached into the cloth bag slung over her body.
“Hey.” Yael grabbed her arm before she could pull it out.
She looked up at him, scowling. “Calm down, Yael. I’m not hiding any weapons in here. I’m getting the proof out for you.” She glanced down at his hand still holding her arm and raised an eyebrow. “Which means you have to let go of me.”
Yael felt himself growing amused. Other warriors cowered at his presence. But this little seraphelle wasn’t afraid of him. He looked down at his hand holding her arm. He liked holding her. Really liked holding her. He really, really didn’t want to let go.
“Any time tonight would be great,” she muttered.
This made him smile. Slowly, he peeled his fingers from her skin and watched as she pulled out a round glass object from her bag.
“Take it.”
He frowned at the globe suspiciously. He still wasn’t sure whether or not to trust her. Even though every fiber of his being told him he could. It was strange to feel so strongly that he could trust her when he had nothing logical to back it up.
“What is it?”
“It’s a soulglobe.”
“What’s a soulglobe?”
“It works off MirageWeaver magic. You can take an empty soulglobe and fill it with thoughts or memories and ‘lock’ it so that it can only be viewed by certain people. You and I are the only two who can see what is inside this one.”
Yael gazed at the globe with distrust.
“Please, Yael. It will tell you everything you need to know about me.”
I guess if she did want to kill me, she would have done it already instead of screwing around with all this nonsense.
He searched her face. He didn’t see any trickery written under her hopeful smile. But then again, she could just be an extraordinary actress. Despite all these conflicting thoughts, Yael wanted to know the contents. He needed to know.
He reached out and with his bearish hand took the soulglobe out of her tiny one. It was cool and smooth and sat like a large marble in his palm. At his touch, it began to swirl and go opaque as if it were filling with smoke. His eyes widened but before he could drop it, a series of memories invaded his mind.
There they were.
How they met, how they grew to care for each other, their secret relationship − they all hit him in succession. All these memories of him and Siana as seen through her eyes. What was t
his? What was going on?
A final memory filtered through that seemed brighter than all the rest. He knew it was her favorite.
Siana sighed in Yael’s arms, and he pulled her naked body even tighter against him. “I could lie like this with you,” she said, tracing the bumps of his thick and prominent abdominal muscles, “forever.”
Immediately she felt him tense. “Don’t say that.”
Siana looked up at him in surprise. “Why not? It’s the truth.”
Yael scowled and refused to make eye contact with her. “Whatever.”
“Yael? You’re angry. Why are you angry?”
“Let’s be real, Siana. You’re just slumming it with me. Soon you’ll get tired of me and you’ll go back to your little friends and your real life. You’ll be announced and you’ll live with the seraph you’re really meant to be with.”
Siana gasped. “Slum−” God, she wasn’t even going to say the word. Is that what he thought? She grabbed his chin with her fingers, gripping him tightly and forcing him to look at her. “You listen here, you big idiot,” she hissed. “I fucking love you. I’ve been in love with you since I watched you win your first Winter Games three years ago.”
“You lo−”
“I’m not finished. You’re brave and courageous and loyal. You fight hard for what you believe in. You have the biggest heart. The heart of a lion. And you were built to be just as fierce a killer. And yet you are so gentle with me. So kind. You would never hurt me and I know you would give your life to protect me. All these things and more make you more of a man than all the weak and spineless Castus seraphs in all of Michaelea. Don’t you ever dare say again that I’m slumming it with you.” She inhaled deeply after this tirade. “Now. What the hell do you have to say for yourself?”
“You said the F word.”
She rolled her eyes. “Out of everything I said, that’s the thing you want to fixate on.”
Yael grinned. “You also said you love me.”
She felt her cheeks heating. “Hmpf. You noticed that, did you?”
“You love me.”
Siana made an exasperated noise in her throat. “Okay, fun’s over. Let’s move on then.”
“You. Love. Me.”
“Now you’re making me regret say−”
He pulled her body up along his and crushed her lips to his mouth, cutting her off. He kissed her so fiercely and thoroughly that her mind went blank.
Finally, he released her from his mouth with a growl. She wriggled against him, trying to get to his lips again.
“Siana?”
“Yes?” She gazed at him through hooded eyes.
“You’re so easy to turn on.”
Her face hardened as she glared at him. “Whose fault is that?”
He chuckled. “You’re adorable when you’re angry.”
She started to push herself off him, muttering, “Goddamn insensitive ogre.”
He pulled her back against him. “I may be. But I’m your ogre.”
“You’re not my−”
“Forever.”
She froze. Her eyes widened as they darted to his. “What?”
“You heard me. Whatever I am, I’m yours. Forever.” His lips brushed against her ear and he whispered, “I love you too, Siana.”
Yael jolted back into his head and the soulglobe flew from his hands as he threw it involuntarily. It landed in the fountain with a splash. Neither of them moved to retrieve it.
This memory settled into the empty place in his heart. It was bare and adrift but it felt a truer thing than anything he had been fighting for in years.
He grabbed Siana by her arm and stared down at her. “This is a trick.” But even he could hear that there was no force behind his words.
“Please, remember me,” she whispered up to him, “if not in here,” her fingertips brushed his forehead, “then in here.” Her hand came to rest upon his heart.
He couldn’t remember her but his body, dammit, his body was reacting as if he did. Without thinking he grabbed her around the waist and pulled her against him, as he had done in his memory.
Oh God.
Her body fit against him just like it did in the memory. He lowered his nose to her hair. Oh man. She smelled the same. And…he pressed his fingers gently into her waist like a cat testing its claws. Her soft, plush skin sank a little against his touch just like in her memory. She moaned softly. The same moan as he heard in those memories. While she had been naked and under him. His belly heated.
“But…who would do this to me? Why would they take my memories of you?”
“The Elders. You’re such a valuable warrior, Yael. It would hurt them to lose you and…how would it look if the Elders had to admit that one of their most prized warriors left our society?”
“You’re telling me that the Elders…my Elders…lied to me? Took memories from me so I wouldn’t leave?” He flinched as a stab of pain went through his head. “How do I even begin to believe something like that?”
She brushed her fingers across his temple. “You’re in pain. It’s from the memory removal.”
“It’s nothing.”
She hovered up off the ground so that her face was level with his forehead and she kissed him on his temple. Just the touch of her eased his pain. It made him think about Siana’s memories where her lips had been on other parts of his body. He made a low growl in his throat. She slid down his body a little so that she was now eye level with him. Their eyes met.
Yael swallowed back a lump in his throat. Even though it had been clear from her memories that they had kissed a thousand times already, he felt nervous.
Siana leaned to his mouth but then she stopped. “So, this would kinda be our first kiss for you.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
She hummed. “If we’re doing first kisses over, maybe make this one better than our first ‘first kiss’.”
Yael frowned a little until he remembered how he had seen their first kiss in her soulglobe memories. Oh God. He shook his head. “Did that really happen?”
“Yep.”
“Nope, sorry. I don’t remember it so it didn’t happen that way.”
“I have the memories as proof. Did you want me to replay−”
He moved his mouth over hers, stealing the rest of her sentence. Her lips were soft and unfamiliar. But as he parted her mouth with his tongue and tasted her, something in him burst with recognition. Her tongue sought his. His hand roamed over the soft curves of her body over her dress and he drank in her moans like they were life-giving. They turned their heads to lock their mouths further.
He realized that they were both moving as one, like this kiss had been rehearsed. Any tiny doubt his mind had over the validity of her memories were dashed away. He knew her, maybe not through his memories, but deep down in every core of every cell of his body, he knew her. He knew how to kiss her, he knew how she should fit against him, he knew how to touch her. He knew that he had found the thing he had been searching for that he didn’t even know he had been missing.
When they finally pulled back, they were both gasping for air.
“Wow,” she said, “I think I agree with you. We should make that one our first kiss.”
“No. You need to work on that. That was terrible.”
“What?” Siana’s face twisted into a mask of rage. “You bastard. That was not terrible. I’m not terrible. I’m a great kisser. Amazing.”
Yael struggled to keep a straight face as she wriggled furiously in his arms trying to get away from him. Squirmy girl. He liked it. Really, really liked it. “It was awful. Just awful. So we should keep practicing until we get our first kiss right.” He winked at her and the smile broke out across his face.
She laughed, then threw her mouth on his again for another “first kiss”.
This time it was him that moaned when she pulled back.
“You remember, don’t you?” she said. “Obviously you don’t remember me, but the way you are with me is just like i
t always was…it’s like you never forgot me.”
Yael closed his eyes and just let himself breathe her in. It was all so much. So, so much. His head was spinning but he was surprised to find his headache had gone completely.
“Come with me, Yael. Please. My friend Lukas, he took care of me and he can help you too.”
“What? When?”
“Now. Come with me now.” She tugged on his hand but he didn’t move. Her face fell into a frown. “Yael?”
“I…” Leave Michaelea? Leave everything behind? But…he couldn’t just leave. He caught the look of pain on Siana’s face. He barely knew her. But…he knew her. He was still stuck on the fact that he and this stranger had had an entire relationship that he just didn’t remember. But those kisses, this feeling… What the hell was he supposed to do? “This…is all happening too fast. I can’t just leave…”
Her face paled. “You don’t want to come with me?”
“I do.” Yes, he realized. He did. More than anything he had ever wanted. “I want to come with you,” he said, and he was a little surprised at how sure he sounded. His mind was still arguing back and forth about this, but his heart, his soul, his gut knew already what it wanted. “Just…give me a day to get used to the idea.” To say goodbye.
Siana flung herself at him, her fingers tearing at him like she was desperate to get as close to him as she could. “No. Please, Yael. You have to come with me now. What if they take your memories again? What if you never come back?”
He shushed at her. “I’m coming back. I promise.”
“You promised you would come back last time…”
There was a silence between them. He hadn’t come back last time. The Elders had found out that he was planning to leave. And neither of them knew how they had found out.
“Do you know what it was like to wait for you out here and for you not to show up?” Siana’s voice warbled as she teetered on the verge of tears. “I thought you were dead. I thought they had killed you. I wanted to die myself.”